Re-working Time

In the midst of my individualistic, compulsive world, how do I mark time? Perhaps by the hoards of events on my calendar, perhaps by the clock, perhaps by "living for the weekends" or TGIF. Perhaps by phrases such as "my time is important" or "time is money".

Perhaps time is my most precious commodity and perhaps I've been taught that it's all mine. It is the one thing I can (I falsely believe) "control". I can share it as I desire; I can give it entirely or I can shrewdly dole it out small increments, like a slow, dripping faucet. I can withhold it and I can decide what to do with it (because it's my time).

But what if I'm entirely wrong and the generation around me are entirely wrong too?

What if time belongs to God? (not a novel concept for a Christian) But what if I practiced time as though it belonged to God? What if I stopped at certain intervals during the day so that "the Watchmaker and I could have a conversation about the clock and my place as a nano-second in it"? (Phyllis Tickle)

What if, in a larger sense, I began to rework my life according to the "Christian Calendar" and let its narritive shape my days and weeks rather than being powerfully and unwittingly shaped by the calendar of the non-Christian or psuedo-Christian world? What if I marked time in seasons of advent, Christmas, epiphany, lent, Easter, Pentecost, and ordinary (proper) time more than father's day, fourth of July, labor day, memorial day etc? (not that any of those are evil!) We seem to celebrate days rather than seasons focused on (usually) some sort of consumerism rather than a larger story of History. How would my children be different as they are immersed in a way to count time that is larger than days and weeks and hours?

"Teach me, dear Lord, to number my days
that I may apply my heart unto wisdom.
Oh, satisfy me early with Your mercy,
that I may rejoice and be glad all of my days."
(And give me grace and great patience as I learn to re-work time with You at the center. Give me perseverance as I exchange the "norm" for something I know very little of and have very little experience in.)