As I write this article, the time will be changing tonight. Daylight Saving Time begins at 2:00am on Sunday, March 9. Daylight Saving Time, Standard Time, Eastern Time, Central Time – we sure have a lot of “time” categories and time zones! It can be confusing at times. (Sorry, couldn’t resist the pun.)

I live in the Eastern Time Zone; my sister lives in the Central Time Zone; my brother lives in the Mountain Time Zone; and a close friend used to live in Arizona – which doesn’t do the Standard/Daylight Saving flip-flop, so part of the year she lived on Mountain Time and part of the year she lived in sync with Pacific Time. With the wonky way that the time lines are drawn, my sister lives a solid 100 miles further east than I do – but she’s in the Central Zone and I’m in the Eastern Zone. And then I have a colleague who lives in Australia where there is a time zone that is 30 minutes different from the zone beside it. (And I thought it was hard to keep the hour change straight!)

Some time references can be absolute – a doctor appointment at 10:00am Central Standard Time. Some time references can be relative – “I’ll be ready in a minute.”

Time.

As we read the Bible, the Greek original uses two different words to refer to time. The Greek word chronos is what we might describe as absolute time. It measures days and months and years, as well as hours within the day. The Greek word kairos is a special sort of time. It is the opportune time, the fulfilled time – that moment when things come together in the perfect way for some unique action to be completed.

As we live our lives in ordinary chronos time, we will encounter many unique kairos moments. The moment when the baby cried out its first breath – sure it might have been at 3:26pm EDT on June 8, 1984, as chronos time measured it. But for that moment, kairos time stood still. Even for parents who will mark the chronos birthdate with parties for their child, this is a kairos moment. Months of waiting and preparing have come to this moment – this fulfillment – this completion. The moment of a person’s last breath is just such a kairos moment, also. Yes, it can be marked in chronos time – 4:32am CDT on August 26, 2022 – but kairos time stops – pauses – seems to last for eternity.

Looking back through your life, can you mark the chronos time of kairos events? They may be traumatic events or breathtakingly beautiful moments – the Twin Towers fell, the Challenger exploded, the house fire alarm went off, the car accident happened, the child was born, the Eagle landed on the moon, the Northern Lights appeared over Lake Superior, the sun rose on the solstice at Stone Henge. Some moments are deeply personal, some are felt by families, some are experienced by whole communities or across the country or around the globe.

As we consider the power of God’s love, there are some kairos moments that come to mind, too – the call of Abraham and Sarah, the rescue of the Israelites from slavery, the covenant cut at Mt. Sinai, the birth of Jesus, the death of Jesus, the resurrection of Jesus, the flash of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost … and each of the moments in our own lives when God’s love was powerfully present.

As you think about those kairos moments in your life – do you remember who was there with you? Do you remember who shared God’s love with you? As we live our daily lives in chronos time, we may be completely oblivious to the ways in which God is working in and through us creating kairos moments for someone else. God’s love is present wherever we are present, and God can make any chronos moment into a kairos moment with the power of God’s love.

We love because God first loved us. May we live God’s love fully in our ordinary chronos days, so that God’s love creates kairos time in the lives of those around us.

Shalom,
Pastor Kay