On Losing An Hour...
The Revd Deacon Polly M. Bowen
March 11 came and went without significant incident for me. I managed to set some of my clocks ahead and get to church on time, giving thanks that the dreaded loss of an hour happened on an ordinary Sunday instead of on Easter Sunday as in some other years. I ignored the “wrong” time on my computer and in my car, and wondered why the time change can’t be on a Saturday instead of a Sunday.
I’ve always thought that changing the time is silly. It’s like trying to fool God. But then I realize that we try to fool God all the time in so many ways – like when we make excuses for our various sins of omission (Did I send a card? Did I visit a shut-in? Did I welcome a stranger? Did I make that special offering?) Or when we scurry through that traffic light that we know is changing, or worse - fail to speak up where we see injustice.
But now we have a metaphysical question: just where did that hour go? We keep it floating around until payback time in October, when we are allowed to reclaim those precious lost moments of sleep – if we can. Obviously, we aren’t fooling God one bit, because God doesn’t keep time the way we do. If we read the Scriptures, we know that God’s time is a matter of “fullness.” (And it came to pass in the fullness of time, etc. . .)
This concept has practical implications for our lives. For centuries Christians appealed to the poor and downtrodden with little hope for improvement in this life, but with the promise of a better life to come – after death. But that is not the message of Jesus. Jesus said, Come to the wedding banquet – NOW. Visit the sick, help the poor – NOW. Be alert and ready for action – NOW. Obviously, he expected us to do something about the problems of this world.
Liberation theologians took that message and acted on it, working to transform the world, and often incurring both political and ecclesiastical wrath for their actions. And half a century after the open acknowledgement of the scriptural preferential option for the poor, the work still goes on – perhaps a little more quietly than in the mid-20th century, but no less effectively. The prophets, pioneers and martyrs of Liberation Theology did their work well. It’s an uphill battle - the creeping (or galloping) forces of evil in this world are mighty. But God’s power is mightier, and if you’ve read the Bible, you know that he’s already won the battle! (Remember that Eternal Now – for God, it’s all one great cosmic moment.)
But meanwhile, we’re mired in human Time, and we have that lost hour floating around somewhere. How to recapture it? What to do with it? Instead of “lost” time, maybe we ought to think of it as “found” time – an hour banked in an imperishable savings account – an hour not dedicated to any of our humdrum pursuits, a gift that we can use for God. Maybe we can even cull out some other “found” hours here and there – get up an hour early for prayer (or, for night-people, go to bed an hour late and spend the time in prayer); skip lunch to visit a shut-in; turn off the TV and write a letter to a lonely person; clean a closet and give some once-treasured possessions to someone who needs them.
Once we get good at finding lost hours and using them profitably, we might even tackle our bank accounts – there are dollars here and there that could be put to better use. For starters, consider Episcopal Community Services – a place where we can be sure our dollars will be well spent.
And then there are the intangibles – we have smiles that we’re not using, loving thoughts that we push aside because (we think) we are too busy, old wounds to bind, old friendships to rekindle, peace and justice issues to acknowledge and support.
The possibilities are endless! Can you just imagine what could happen if we all put our hearts and minds into this project? The shalom of God’s rule might even become a visible reality in the world, or at least in our corner of it. And all because of a silly “lost” hour one morning in March.
