Redeem the Time

A fellow blogger raised the question: what do you do that makes you forget about the passage of time?
http://blinknholly.blogspot.com/2011/02/time-flies.html

What an interesting idea!  I love those thought-prompts--the ones that seem to give my brain a chance to rummage in a toy box of ideas only to pull out a delight.  And then, I consider it from Your perspective, God (we are made in Your image, after all.)  Can we be such a thing of happy forgetfulness to You?  Is your delighted engagement with us part of the reason why 1000 years are as a day for You?  What a humbling thought!  I'd love to live up to such a calling.
I also stumbled across this "time" quote that Joni Eareckson Tada shared online, from the works of Fredrick Faber:
"In the spiritual life God chooses to try our patience first of all by His slowness. He is slow: we are swift and precipitate. It is because we are but for a time, and He has been for eternity. Thus grace, for the most part, acts slowly. He works little by little. Sweetly and strongly He compasses His ends, but with a slowness which tires our faith because it is so great a mystery. We must fasten upon this attribute of God in our growth in holiness. There is something greatly overawing in the extreme slowness of God. Let it overshadow our souls, but let it not disquiet them. We must wait for God, long, meekly, in the wind and wet, in the thunder and the lightning, in the cold and the dark. Wait, and He will come. He never comes to those who do not wait. He does not go their road. When He comes, go with Him, but go slowly, fall a little behind; when he quickens His pace, be sure of it, before you quicken yours. But when He slackens, slacken at once: and do not be slow only, but silent, very silent, for He is God."

September 30
Another thought of Richard Foster's:  chastity for monks meant they lived in a state of "holy vacancy."  That meant they had room for God despite living in a world crowded with interpersonal relationships.  Given how much we crave those relationships now--often replacing You with them--how do we find that holy vacancy now?

[Given that I mused on this before we even had the time-consuming social media options we have now, the question becomes all the more pertinent to my schedule today.]

Oct. 2
"When we have a spirit of thanksgiving, we can hold all things loosely."  (Challenge of the Disciplined Life, Richard Foster, p.49.) Even hold a bounced check loosely, God?  I'm afraid I bounced a check when I bought those 14 Godspell tickets for the kids' worship team. I should have balanced the checkbook before I wrote that big check, especially since I knew it would be a week before the church would reimburse me.

In fact, money is a big area of prayer for me today.  For the past six months we've had to push at least one bill forward every month.  I know with the recession and all we aren't alone in this sort of thing, but we're nevertheless trying to adjust our lives so there is less of this skating on thin ice.  We're trying to trade the Suburban for a minivan--cheaper car payments, gas $, insurance, etc.  So I'm lugging that ton of steel before You and asking You bless our attempt to drop it from our pile of obligations.  We're getting rid of cable TV today, too.  Show me what else, Lord.  What else can we throw off?  If financial situation stays grave all year like this, I may need to try to teach full time and drop the church job.  [I can't "hear" my voice here.  Way I bitter?  Was I holding that hope for career change into deacon ministry loosely, too?  I don't remember how broad this prayer ran.  Most likely I  was just hedged in by a moment of financial panic and blind to larger implications.] 
Is that your will? Full-time teaching for me.  Go into the deep parts of us, Lord, where our views on lifestyle are formed.  Help us receive simplicity from You and protect us from greed.

I didn't journal about it then, but I remember vividly something that happened the day after I wrote this prayer.  I was working at the church, standing at the photocopy machine praying again because two women in the church had spoken spiteful words against a project I'd been running.  I stood there while the machine flashed and whirred, and I prayed, "God, I know I need to bring these two women before Your throne so You can talk to me about them, but I feel too weak to carry them."  Immediately, I "heard" a voice in my head say, "You didn't have any trouble dragging a 'ton of steel' in here yesterday.  What's the problem with bringing me two little ladies?"  I laughed out loud...and then I prayed for those two women.