My Hour

"When I was daily with you in the temple, ye stretched forth no hands against me:  but this is your hour, and the power of darkness..." Luke 22:53

Good morning, dear friends,

Time is a funny thing, isn't it?

I measure my life in time: seconds, minutes, hours, days, months, years, and decades.  My days are ordered by "times": time to get up, time to read the Bible and pray, time to get the kids off to school, time to clean house, make lunch, do homework, and time to go to bed.

Time continues on.  As much as I would like sometimes to have a fast forward, rewind, or pause button, it doesn't happen.  Hours either speed up during moments of intense joy and pleasure, only to drag on for a seeming eternity when waiting for a special event. Christmas. My birthday.  Graduation.  The last (what seems like the 11th) month of pregnancy.

It is amazing to me to think that God, who is eternal and therefore outside the realm of time, submitted Himself to human time during His life here on earth.  He measured his minutes, hours, days, months and years in the same way that I do today.

Jesus also referred to His "hour," or "the hour" to mean a culminating point of time, the climax of history distilled into one very concentrated focus of His life and earthly ministry.  The days and hours leading up to His death are the most anticipated and dreaded of His life.

After His arrival at Jerusalem, Jesus reminded His disciples of what was going to happen: "The hour is come, that the Son of man should be glorified." (John 12:23)

He spoke of the agonies He would soon face:  "Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour.  Father, glorify thy name." (John 12:27-28a)

He led His disciples to the garden to pray.  The disciples fell asleep, while Jesus prayed during one of the most difficult hours of His life.  He chided them: "What, could ye not watch with me one hour?" (Matthew 25:40)

In His prayer to the Father, Jesus spoke these words: "Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee." (John 17:1)

During this time in His life, darkness would triumph, if only for a season, over the light of the world.  Jesus told the soldiers who came to arrest Him: ""When I was daily with you in the temple, ye stretched forth no hands against me:  but this is your hour, and the power of darkness..." (Luke 22:53)

Time, however, does not stand still.  Even this hour passed...

As I approach the Easter season and meditate on Jesus's greatest love and sacrifice for me, I am moved again by His determination to finish the task that the Father set before Him.  The hour was dark, indeed, but lasted only for a moment's time.

His gift, however, is an eternal one.

Will I let His gift impact my hours today?  Will I remember the greatest sacrifice of love, and share this gift with others today?  Will I, when my life's final hour shall arrive, be able to affirm, like Paul, that I have "fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith?" (II Timothy 4:7)

May my time today be invested in God's calendar, and not my own, today.