Homily, Time as Divine Storytelling
Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 18A, 2023
Good Shepherd Episcopal Church
Tequesta, FL
The Rev. Derek M Larson, TSSF
Today’s Lectionary Readings:
Exodus 12:1-14
Psalm 149
Romans 13:8-14
Matthew 18:15-20
In the name of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.
Have you ever felt pressed for time? Have you ever wished there were more hours in a day? Have you ever taken your to-do list and set it beside your schedule and realized the two simply don’t go together? Raise your hand if you’ve ever felt like that.
Yeah. It’s a common experience isn’t it? And not just common, for many of us, it feel like it’s the driving factor of our daily lives. So many of us are so busy.
And this is the time of year when it really starts to kick-in to full gear isn’t it? The kids are back in school. Sports and other extracurricular activities are starting. The holidays really aren’t that far off anymore. And then… the church starts it’s program year with Sunday school and Bible studies and choir practice and service projects. There simply isn’t enough time for it all, is there?
Well, sadly I can’t solve all of our issues with time, but as I listen to our reading from Exodus this morning, I’m really fascinated by the role time plays in this story. And I think it could teach us something.
In today’s passage, an event so big takes place that it changes the very way the Israelites experienced time. It changed their calendar.
It says, “This month shall [now] mark the beginning of months,” the passage says, “This day shall [now] be a day of remembrance for you. You shall celebrate it as a festival to the Lord; throughout your generations you shall observe it as a perpetual ordinance.”
I love that word, perpetual. In the Hebrew its olam, which can mean eternity, everlasting, long-distance time. And I love how its used here in this passage. Because here we see a month, a day, a moment, become olam—become eternity. In this story time folds over onto itself so that a single moment somehow lasts for many lifetimes. A single moment has eternal significance. Because of its part in telling the story of God. Which in the Hebrew mind is what time is: time is the ongoing story of God and each moment (and especially this moment in Scripture) is shaped by the telling of that story of God and God’s people.
Now this is a hard concept for us to grasp. Because in our modern minds, which have been steeped in the economics of capitalism, that’s not how we see time. For us, we see time as something in a wallet or a bank account. We see time as something we exchange for things that bring us value.
Which you might not ever realize, until you stop and think about the language we use for time. Think about some of the phrases we use:
“I’m going to spend my time with a friend.”
“That event is not worth my time.”
“What are you going to with your free time?”
“Do you have any spare time?”
“Can you lend me some time?”
“My time is valuable.”
“What a waste of time.”
“Perhaps that will buy us some time.”
“Time is money.”
For better or worse, we see time as currency. And just as productivity is the measure of successful business, we are charged with the task of making the most of our time and we feel pressure to make every moment count. Perhaps that’s where some of our anxiety about time management comes from.
But that’s not how the ancient Hebrew mind saw time. Rather than a bank account, time was story-telling. Time was the unfolding of the story of God, and our lives are characters and participants in that story. Every moment is pregnant with Divine narrative.
Now I wonder how we might experience time differently if our moments were little chapters in God’s story rather than currency we spend. I wonder how we might experience time differently if we saw our days as part of the chronicle of God’s love for us, rather than a limited resource to maximize profit. Probably pretty differently, right?
And so today I have three little ways for us to shift our perception of time from bank account to Divine storytelling.
- Listen to God’s story.
Pay attention. Be present. Open your awareness to see how God is working in each moment of your life with Divine love. Too often we live our moments with our attention elsewhere—on the future, on the past, anywhere but the present. But if we can slow down to pay attention to God’s presence in the now, we will begin to sense the movement of God’s story through eternity. But we have to listen for God’s story.
2. Love God’s story.
If we listen to God’s story of love for us, than we will begin to love God’s story. It will become important to us. And we will always organize our time around that which we love, around that which is important to us. If you take a look at your at your schedule, it shows you what you love, or at least what you believe is important. And so if you fall in love with the story of God, then you’ll start to prioritize your time in such a way that it highlights that story.
3. Participate in God’s story.
And by that I really mean: live liturgically. Just as the ancient Israelites organized their calendar around these Divine stories, so we in the church have a liturgical calendar designed for us to live out and participate in the story of God through regular seasons and rhythms. Pay attention to the church season. Celebrate daily Feast Days. Mark your day with times for prayer. There are all kinds of tools for doing that, and I’d love to help you with them, but if you just observe the liturgical seasons of the Church, you will find yourselves participating in these Divine rhythms that carry the story of God.
In our busy lives, time can be such a struggle to manage. But time can also be the media by which we experience the story of God’s love for humanity. And if we simply shift our perspective, than maybe our fleeting moments, for us, will become eternal—will become olam. Amen.
Thoughts on Faith 