‘A sense of God’s time, and of God’s hand on our lives, whether we are deadline driven, locked into caring, or folding paper, is something we can cultivate this new year,’ says Rosemary Hector.
I decided an origami star would be the very thing for a New Year decoration. The first challenge – to make a pentagon from a piece of stiff paper. Where was the protractor? An angle of 72 degrees is hard to measure, especially on my waxy paper, bought years ago before I became squeamish about waste. The paper had been rolled and wouldn’t lie flat – an added complication.
Four Japanese New Year traditions and what we can reflect on in our Christian faith
As I tussled with folding and instructions, I listened to the radio. A philosopher was discussing the nature of reporting on time. He made a point we all know is true. In the general run of our days, nothing much happens. Listen to the early morning news. Return at mid-day, and the event you heard about earlier will not have changed much.
In the general run of our days, nothing much happens.
The speech made by the Australian Prime Minister has been commented upon by the Prime Minister of Greece. He said, she said, then he said, then she said. Barring a terrible event (and it is always a disaster rather than a huge act of kindness or sacrifice), not much has changed in the intervening hours. Therefore, not much is reported.
Switch the calendar back a few weeks, however, and context emerges. The row between Prime Ministers was a trade negotiation. It’s been resolved. The terrorist has been found and tried. Or has disappeared and is no longer reported on, because the news, if not the victim, has moved on. The stock market has recovered, the floods have drained away. Reporting on the clear-up after events is never as interesting – it’s slow work.
It’s the first day of a new year, are you feeling fearful for the future? Here is how to lean on Jesus every day of 2024
Go back fifty years. What might be reported over that period? What has happened since the early 1970s? Probably things that did not make the daily news then or now. Nuclear war did not happen. Measles declined in the UK population. The reds didn’t crawl out from under the bed and take over our institutions. Investors in our water companies reaped their benefits.
Time essentially folds. Like my origami star, it’s a great mystery.
Time essentially folds. Like my origami star, it’s a great mystery. Events, too small to make it on to a breaking news website, are seen, with hindsight, to have been of great significance. We don’t know when a baby is born if the child will become a great leader or a tyrant. We don’t know when a protest at Downing Street will be forgotten or be a defining moment. Only time will tell. But an accumulation of small events over time will show a wider pattern.
The writer Annie Dillard notes this. She says How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. What we do with this hour, and that one, is what we are doing.
New year, same you?
We need a sense of proportion. My star was an attempt to be creative, for fun – its wonkiness made us smile. A wise person judges when energy spent on a task is ‘worth it’. A sense of God’s calling helps us as we think about how we might use this hour, or this morning. That leads to how we spend this year. Sometimes our circumstances are not negotiable. The baby or elderly parent needs cared for, the child needs fed – for a season we have little choice or spare time.
A sense of God’s time, and of God’s hand on our lives, whether we are deadline driven, locked into caring, or folding paper, is something we can cultivate this new year. If we daily ask for his help in choosing how we use today, every day, then ahead lies a year when we know we tried to live as He wants us to.
No comments yet