Is It Ever the Right Time?

[HKHaugan]

Is It Ever the Right Time?

 

A husband and a wife are having a confrontation. She wants to bring up a touchy relational issue. She is coming out of deep concern about a child’s behavior. The husband has just come home from a tough business meeting. “We’ve got to talk and it’s now,” she says. He replies, “Can’t we talk about it later? I’m done in. It’s just a bad time.” “No, this can’t wait,” she says. Her anxiety takes over, “It’s never the right time, is it? You always put off the sticky things. You don’t want to talk it out.” The man leaves the room, slams the door and the wife is left to figure it out for herself. “There he goes again. Why does he keep putting it off?” Sound familiar? 

Notice the real issue here. It’s not the problem of the child’s behavior. The real issue is timing. It’s never the ‘right time’ for unpleasant subjects.   In fact, it can be almost any subject at all. The ultimate question for any of us is timing. When is it ever ‘the right time’ for anything? Is there a ‘bad time?’ Who has perfect timing? Aren’t we glad when we or someone else arrives on time? How about recognizing an anniversary or birthday or some other celebratory event? Don’t we ask people who are close to us when they arrive at where they’re headed to give us a call for reassurance that they made it OK? You may hear from relatives at a graduation or a family member getting a special job, “They finally made it.” 

If we digest the circumstances, we’ll find it has a lot to do with pride (the basic drive in a man) and relational need (the basic drive in a woman). These are spiritual issues and the basic spiritual issue in the above case is spiritual timing. For the man no time is right to deal with ‘womanly’ issues or should we say ‘relational’ ones. For the woman it’s always ‘now,’ the present. Realizing the over-generalization here, it has to be said that spiritual timing is really the core subject.  

 If we say we have a spiritual relationship with the Lord, that is the beginning of the solution to timing and we’ll get to that in a bit. Just follow along here. If we don’t have that relationship, we will either give in to the problem and answer with resentment in some form, bury our discontent and move on feeling more relationally separated. This is when the old observation comes into play as they are ‘living lives of quiet desperation.’

 So, if what we are saying is that spiritual timing is the issue, what do we do? The answer comes in three things: pray, search the Word and let it speak to us where we are. Rather than a whole excursus on prayer, the basic need is first to pray for help. Help to understand, help to trust the Lord with what is going on and the help to bridge the relational gaps we face everyday.. Secondly, searching the Word to see what it says about timing. Third, to realize that our first response is usually self-centered so, relying on the counsel of the Holy Spirit, act on what we find in the Word.

 What does the Word say about timing? There is an interesting insight the Gospel of John offers when it records Jesus dealing with His brothers who when they prod Him to use worldly strategies to push His agenda replies, “The right time for me has not yet come; for you any time is right. The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify that what it does is evil. You go to the Feast. I am not yet going up to the Feast, because for me, the right time has not yet come (John 7:6-8).”

 If you have ever played with Legos or had an Erector Set you know that you have a picture in mind leading you to how you put their pieces together. If you see the John passage about timing Jesus has in mind something He is going to accomplish, a picture He knows lies ahead for Him, ---the Cross. His picture is the Cross. Leading to finishing that picture included making a series of choices and decisions that involved perfectly fulfilling His Father’s will. That will led Him to the Cross, His hour, His special time, that once for all destiny that He would declare as a living lifestyle for His followers (Lk.9:23). Every choice and decision He made up to that point was really a ‘Cross’ decision. That’s what He wants us to see and live out.

 Before we go further let’s look at the word time. There are two Greek words for time in the Bible, chronos (clock and calendar time) and kairos (spiritual time, God’s time). The first is seconds, minutes, hours, days, months and years. The second includes spiritual moments, hours and days. Jesus uses the word time, hour and day as the way we measure spiritual reality. Grace, truth and love, spiritual gifts and spiritual fruit make up the timely atmosphere in which choices and decisions are made. In fact, when faced with choice and decision, they are the spiritual moments we choose God’s timing as opposed to man’s timing. Chronos is the structure in which kairos takes place. So, for Jesus to not appear at the Feast of Tabernacles (chronos) when His brothers chided Him for all the wrong reasons to do so, it follows that His time had not yet come. For Him the right time (Kairos) to attend was halfway through the Feast (Jn.7:14). If you follow the context of the rest of the chapter, it becomes apparent that the Feast itself points to Him as the ultimate spiritual ‘Tabernacle,’ ‘Booth,’ ‘Shelter,’ and that He actually did go ‘at the right time.’

 See also Peter’s desire to build a shelter for Moses, Elijah and Jesus at Jesus’ Transfiguration (Mt.17:1-8). How Moses and Elijah disappear and only Jesus is left. What God intended through Moses and Elijah, Jesus fulfilled. It’s no longer a matter of legal obedience, tradition, bloodline, ethnicity and waiting for the Messiah to save and secure them socially and politically. Jesus was and is the Messiah, but one that exceeded the misunderstood expectation of the past. His Word and His Spirit would bring worldwide spiritual, personal and relational salvation and eternal security through a one-on-one relationship with Him. He was and is the spiritual, personal and relational Messiah who would come to change the world one heart at a time. The Gospel of John especially carries this emphasis and brings to the surface the deeply spiritual and relational work of the Holy Spirit in the rest of Scripture.

 All this brings us to the moment-by-moment life we live every day. It is a field of choices, decisions and actions that depend entirely on the relationship we have with God in Jesus. For some it will be a minefield based on fear. For others it will be a life aimed at living by the attitudes and opinions of others. Still others will set a goal and strive to accomplish it no matter what it takes. Apart from God it will be the spirit of fear and pride that will rule each day. Their end is aloneness, disillusionment and despair. However, placing one’s heart in Jesus guarantees s spiritual and personal eternity with God and those who believe in Him. This is exactly why we concentrate on Jesus’ teachings. They are full of life; spiritual life, personal life and relational life. The gift of the Holy Spirit is the heart assurance that every choice and decision leads to a spiritually formed action that not only honors God but fulfills the meaning and purpose of why we are here on this planet at this time and in this moment.