“Truth isn’t relative, but time is.”

A thought by Mark Batterson from his book, Whisper: How to Hear the Voice of God (p. 152). The Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.)

I know, I know.  We want things to happen right now.  I don’t like to go to the Doctor’s office because you have to wait in that waiting room.  But to the kid playing over there with the toys, waiting is fun.  Time is relative.

Mark says, “Parents of toddlers, you know this. To two-year-olds, next week might as well be next year, and next year might as well be never. Why? Because one year represents 50 percent of their lives. If you’re fifty, a year represents 2 percent. To children, one day can feel twenty-five times longer than it does to their parents, and it might be even more pronounced for the children of God.  With God, ‘a thousand years are like a day’! (2 Peter 3:8) With us, a day can feel like a thousand years!”

Mark goes on, “Those of us who were born after Neil Armstrong took ‘one small step for man’ operate on a different timeline than our parents. We microwave our food, Google our questions, real-time our news, and Facebook our friends.

“Everything happens at the speed of light. But in God’s kingdom, things happen at the speed of a seed planted in the ground that has to take root before it can bear fruit. I love millennials, and that’s primarily who I pastor. I love their passion for justice, their desire to make a difference, and their pragmatic idealism. I’m also concerned about what I perceive to be a lack of patience. I’m guilty of it too. We want what our parents have in half the time with half the effort. But I can almost guarantee that our hopes and dreams will take longer than our original estimates.”

He then says, “Here’s the point: we give up too easily, too quickly. We often get ahead of God instead of keeping in step with the Spirit, or we fall behind out of frustration. It’s not easy discerning His timing, and it’s even harder trusting it, especially when it feels as though God is a day late and a dollar short. But if you’re questioning His timing, perhaps it’s your watch that needs to be adjusted. You get in time with Him by getting in tune with His whisper.”

And that is where trust comes in.  God sees the whole picture and he knows what time it really is. 

So, do you need to adjust your watch to his time?