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Patience and time are closely related, since being patient implies being able to remain calm and not be annoyed when waiting for a long time. As children our sense of time develops along with our other understandings of the physical world in which we currently live, but it does not take too long for small children to develop the desire to get what they want immediately and a definite impatience when required to wait. While I cannot recall too much about the time prior to beginning school, I certainly remember what seemed to me to be endless hours in school, when I wished that the day would zoom by. On the other hand, the amount of time on summer vacation—or even holiday weekends—seems, even today, to be gone all too quickly. I suspect that you can recall vacations that, when you planned them, appeared as though they would last for a long time, but then when you were on vacation the time passed very swiftly and, before you knew it, the vacation was over.
I suspect that for most of us time and its passage seems to be related to what we are doing. When we are involved in things that are pleasant to us time seems to pass quickly, but when we do not enjoy what we are doing, time seems to move very slowly. God’s creation has natural markers for time, with days marked by daylight and nighttime, as well as years marked by the seasons. One of the ironies of life is that when we are young we want time to pass quickly, whether to get to Christmas, or even our high school graduation, or to be able to live away from home, but as we get older time can seem to move too quickly for us as years rush by.
The time period between the end of Genesis and the beginning of Exodus spans hundreds of years, and during that time period the relationship between the Israelites and the Egyptians changed from honored guests in Egypt to Egyptian slavery. Exodus 3: 7-10 tells us about God’s plan for the deliverance of his people from this slavery, which he shared with Moses:
Then the LORD said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.“
I think we can be relatively certain that for those who were suffering under slavery in Egypt, they would have desired a quicker deliverance, but God does not see time as we do. Peter tells us in 2 Peter 3:8-9, “But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.”
Does time seem to fly by or inch by when you are together with Christians? Do you wish Bible classes and worship services were shorter? Why is that? Do you really want to spend an eternity with God? Will you enjoy it? If not, what needs to change now?
David M. Lacey
Channelview Church of Christ
Channelview, TX