All Moments Are Precious

You can’t copyright precious moments.
In fact, our faith tells us that our life is better when we are able to see and to recognize that all our moments are precious.

You don’t have to look very deep to realize that one of the persistent themes of our Bible is that all moments are precious.


The Psalmist thought that all moments are precious.

And we could do nothing less than recognize that our God is present –
our God is with us – in all our moments of time – regardless of the circumstance.
And that makes all moments precious.

I remember when I first started thinking about this topic, I searched for precious moments on the internet.

What I found out was astounding to me.
There is actually a copyright on precious moments.

(I suppose if you should actually experience a precious moment, you would have to pay somebody for the privilege of having one.
I want a dollar for every precious moment you experience.
At the very least, it would get in the way of any of us ever acknowledging that we recognized a precious moment when it happened.)

Actually, for some 40 years or so, Precious Moments has been copyrighted to refer to super-cute drawings of children with big tear-drop eyes in various poses to evoke a feeling of cute togetherness, you know?
(The kind of drawing that is reproduced on the front of our bulletin today.)
Throughout the years these drawings have been produced in a line of dolls that illustrate the theme.
And they even became the theme for a theme park in the Midwest.

But, for me, this is another way important expressions of faith are highjacked of any original intrinsic meaning.

You don’t have to look very deep to realize that one of the persistent themes of our Bible is that all moments are precious.

If I were to ask, I do believe that everyone in this room could come up with a list of a least ten moments in time that you remember and recall as “precious moments”.

Many will identify a birth of a child as a recognized “precious” moment.
And there a lot of experiences that are common to many people that are thought of as “precious” moments.
But, each of us have a few memories of unique moments that made an impact on us – and we just knew them to be precious moments.

I remember last summer, Suzanne’s nephew and his young family came to see us.
They were on their way back home to Montreal after a three week family vacation that included a visit to Florida.
He recounted that after driving all night on the way down there, they arrived in Daytona Beach early in the morning – before sunrise.
He and his wife carried their two sleeping children into the room and placed them on beds,
and as he was unloading some needed baggage from the car he became aware that it was getting lighter fairly rapidly.
And as circumstance would have it, the room to which they were assigned faced the east and sun began to pop up way over the horizon of the sea.
He described it as a sign that said slow down,
this is a precious moment,
this time of your life is sacred time.

A number of stories were shared at Nason Clark’s service, but one that was not told is one that he to me about the time he and a friend went for a bike ride.
I guess this would have been around 1930 or a little thereafter, so there was not too much development – or roads, for that matter – around here.
Well, he told me that he and his friend ended up in a field somewhere over where Lawrence Park now is.
And when he and his friend came upon this field of spectacular wildflowers, they became aware of swarms of butterflies – butterflies by the millions fluttering over the field.
Describing it still takes his breath away – as it did on that day so long ago.
Truly a precious moment.

No, you can’t copyright precious moments.
In fact, our faith tells us that our life is better when we are able to see and to recognize that all our moments are precious.

The call of God is to be present at each moment as it arrives.

Psalm 90 informs us that God is uniquely able to experience a "telescoping" of time –
that for God a thousand years are like a day,
but even more intriguing, that a day is as rich and meaningful as a thousand years.

Quite literally every moment matters eternally – which means that this present moment counts forever.

One of the great human obsessions of the modern age is to make time jump through more hoops –
to force time to be more productive.
That's why so many of us are suckers for the next generation of computers, date books, blackberries, and smart phones.
ESPN has endeavored to fit more than one hour of sports highlights into a one-hour show.

That's why NFL kickoffs that are returned for a touchdown (without doubt one of the most dramatic moments in football) are now being replayed as if the fast-forward button is stuck.
Instead of presenting the play at normal speed, which consumes all of twelve or fourteen seconds, the action is frequently speeded up –
now consuming just six or seven seconds –
so viewers can quickly move on to see another highlight,
and then another, and then another.

First-time visitors to London frequently conclude that they may have only one chance to explore such an historic city.
Therefore they sign on for one of those everything-included-hurry-up-and-keep-moving tours.
"Now here's The Tower of London, there's Big Ben, and just over your right shoulder is Buckingham Palace."
You know the drill.
Hurry. Hurry. Hurry.
Stand over there and let me get your picture in front of the lions at Trafalgar Square.
Wow, there sure are a lot of pigeons.
Hey, look at the time. We gotta go.

That is all too often an out-of-towner's only exposure to the city of London.

Experienced Londoners know that years are required simply to begin to comprehend what this place has meant to human history.
A tourist cannot possibly appreciate that perspective in a four-hour sweep across town.

With all of our hearts, we must resist the temptation to become tourists in our own lives.

"I'd like to take the four-hour highlight tour of parenting, please."

"Come on, kids, it's time to do third grade.
Stand right there and let me get your picture.
Okay, on to the next stage in your life."

We must refuse to buy tickets for the quick walk-through of the Museum of Religious Experiences.
God calls us not to rush through the time that has been given to us,
but to be fully alive to God and to each other –
actually to become residents within these moments we've been provided.
Why?
Because, every one of these moments counts forever.

So, we need to embrace God’s perspective on time.
And, we need to embrace God's shape to time.
You see, there is a God-ordained shape to human life.
This shape is what gives our lives a meaningful rhythm.
Mornings and evenings, mornings and evenings – it's like a tide.
When we rebel against that rhythm, there are consequences.

What time is it any more?
The nightly news on television reports of an event that happened in Asia this morning.

But, that wasn’t actually this morning – or yesterday morning – but they are reporting on something that happened tomorrow morning!

The boundaries and shape of daily life are rapidly becoming blurred.
One can now shop on-line any hour of the day.
Maybe you’ve seen that television commercial where a group of stunned consumers are standing in the middle of the night outside a conventional store at a mall.
No lights are on.
The customers are puzzled:
"It's closed. Man, that is so weird."

We are taught to expect that everything should be available every hour of every day.
What season is it any more?
We no longer have to wait for summer to get strawberries and watermelons.
We can find ripe peaches year-round.
Contemporary culture clearly wants to remove the boundaries customarily imposed by the more classic shapes and rhythms of time.

In an act that is flagrantly counter-cultural, the guides of certain spiritual retreats demand that weekend participants give up their watches.
Giving up one's watch is tantamount to giving up control, isn’t it? –
which is precisely the act of faith God asks of us moment by moment when it comes to time.

we walk by faith, not by sight

Our call is to trust God and to pay attention to three important rhythms connected to our experience of time.

The God-given shape of time, first, invites us to stop every day for rest.
A key component of the management of time requires us to get the sleep our bodies need.
For some of us (who seemingly have taxi meters for brains and are always counting the cost of every squandered minute) the very idea that we sleep away one third of our lives seems like an incalculable waste.
But we are told that it is during those sleeping hours that our bodies carry out something like eighty percent of the biological processes required to maintain basic health.
At many junctures, God's Word challenges us to commit a portion of each day to the experience of simply being in the presence of God.
The goal of that quiet time is not to be productive. We are simply called to be.

The shape of time that God has provided, second, also invites us to the notion of the Sabbath.
You know the drill: God worked for six days at the beginning of creation – then God rested.
For us to devote one day out of seven to do no work is to be like God.
God doesn't suggest a Sabbath.
It is mandated as one of the original Ten Commandments.
Our Sabbath doesn't have to be on Sunday nor even on a weekend.
But one-seventh of our time during each week should be reserved to pray and to play.

God's design for time also invites us, third, to take a complete break – more often than most of us do.
In Old Testament times there were prescribed festivals for God's people.
Whole families were compelled to walk all the way to Jerusalem three times each year.
These became annual opportunities to enjoy life and to enjoy each other.
Essentially these festivals amounted to divinely ordained vacations.
To believe that we should not take a break each year –
to assert, or to act, as if whatever it is that we do
is far too important to slow down –
is to take ourselves far too seriously
and to violate the rhythm and shape of time as God has provided it.
As the fractured proverb puts it,
Better to have loafed and lost than never to have loafed at all.

Now, here’s the thing:
This moment may seem like an ordinary moment, but it is the gift of an extraordinary God.
This moment counts – forever.
If we were asked the question,
"Do you want to do something today that will be eternally significant?"
our tendency is to sigh, "You know, my day is so full. I really don't have time."
To that Paul thunders in 2 Corinthians:
"See, now is the acceptable time;
see, now is the day of salvation!"

Perhaps we are waiting for the crush of time to pass.
Then we will turn our attention fully to spiritual questions –
you know, when we're not so busy.

Perhaps we are waiting for the right circumstances to arrive,
or for a hardship to vanish.

We're waiting for more money or more education
or more insight or more data.

First let's have the baby,
or wait for the children to get into school,
or wait until summer vacation,
or wait until the nest is empty.
Then we'll have time.

Paul couldn't agree less.
In his second letter to the Corinthians there isn't the faintest evidence that a hardship-free life is just over the horizon.
It will never be the "right time" to act.

Therefore God calls us to act now.

The wise heart is the one that grasps that this moment has become a world-changing moment when we let it fully belong to God.
"As we work together with him, we urge you also not to accept the grace of God in vain."

Will we capture the richness of this moment through an act of spiritual submission –
or do we miss this opportunity altogether?

This day you and I don't need to flip coins or draw straws to know what is on God's heart.
God calls us to receive grace –
to embrace God's perspective and shape of time. We aren't called to wait for the next moment.
This day is filled with precious moments.
This very moment is precious.
This moment belongs to God.
That's why it counts forever.

To God’s eyes,
and through faith’s eyes,
every moment is precious.
May you see and know this day as being filled with precious moments –
as tomorrow will be,
and the day after that,
and the day after that.

When we see them,
when we recognize them,
our lives are richer,
and we are closer to living as though the kingdom of God is near.
Amen.

The congregation of Christ Presbyterian Church in Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania, USA, heard these words during a worship service August 7, 2011.