Slow Down Time!

Time seems to be going so fast these days. Mainly it's because I've had so much to think about lately. Sadly, all these thoughts have really distracted me from the dual task I have here, learning language and developing relationships with nationals. It's really made me very tired spiritually and emotionally. I really need a pick me up.

So I turned to Philemon and read it. It's such a nice little letter. Paul begging Philemon to accept Onesimus as a brother, not just as a slave. There's no one verse that really jumps out to me. I didn't find some great spiritual truth that I had overlooked for years. It was just a refreshing little read. It's written with such a gentle tone. Paul says that he is "pleading" with Philemon in the letter and you can feel it when you read what he had to say. Paul cared for this guy and for all the people he worked with. I need that same love for the people I work with here.

Another thought, while I'm at it, is about time. It's a C.S. Lewis quote from a book called A Severe Mercy.

"And now, another point on wishes. A wish may lead to false beliefs, granted. But what does the existence of the wish suggest? At one time I was much impressed by Arnold's line 'Nor does the being hungry prove that we have bread.' But surely, tho' it doesn't prove that one particular man will get food, it does prove that there is such a thing as food! i.e. if we were a species that didn't normally eat, weren't designed to eat, would we feel hungry? You say the materialist universe is 'ugly.' I wonder how you discovered that! If you are really a product of a materialistic universe, how is it you don't feel at home there? Do fish complain of the sea for being wet? Or if they did, would that fact itself not strongly suggest that they had not always bee, or would not always be, purely aquatic creatures? Notice how we are perpetually surprised at Time. ('How time flies! Fancy John being grown-up and married! I can hardly believe it!') In heaven's name why? Unless, indeed, there is something in us which is not temporal."

Put that in your pipe and smoke it! (Assuming your company allows such things.) I know I belong somewhere else. I know this is not my home. And as a friend of mine once said, "I can't wait to get to heaven and just kick it with Jesus." Amen.