Kairos vs. Chronos

The leaves sway and crackle in the wind, a dog barks, a truck goes by, a lawn mower sucks and crunches leaves and I sit and listen. This is peaceful. Not because there is no noise, but because there is no hurry. This is Sabbath, a rest. Peaceful to me is carving out precious time from the routine and hub bub. Chronos time is the minute to minute time that passes on the clock. The time we use to set the alarm clock, to schedule appointments, dinner, work. Peaceful to me is ignoring chronos time and intentionally experiencing kairos (God's time) the day planner is not opened, the calendar is not consulted, there is no agenda other than what God brings to my mind this is peaceful. It doesn't mean I sit under a tree and do nothing. I may read that book a friend gave me months ago, or watch a movie I have passed by a hundred times, or take a little cat nap. This is when I take time to listen. I listen to my heart beat, listen to my breath, listen to the trees sway and the squirrels scurry. In these moments, this time I have carved out I remember what it feels like to be fully alive, fully present in the moment.

It is not easy to carve out this time, sometimes it is forced, by sickness, the flu, sometimes by shear exhaustion, but that is not the best way. There is a finite amount of time in a day. If we were to divide our time into a pie chart, much of our 24 hours is given to others, to work, to children, this is not bad, unless it is in excess. Jesus said, the greatest commandment, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart with all your soul and with all your mind and Love your neighbor as yourself" (Matt 22:37-38) In The Message it is paraphrased as, "Love others as well as you love yourself" Jesus wants us to love ourselves, to love who we are, to love being alive and to love our Creator. But most people I know, including myself, don't love themselves enough. In our culture it is not popular to love yourself, you are labelled as conceited, vain, or worse, selfish. To me, selfishness is loving yourself to excess. Jesus tells us to love ourselves because when we love who we are we can find our purpose and thereby better love God and our neighbor.

So take a kairos holiday, it doesn't have to be a whole day; take a little time to listen to yourself breathe and thank God for that breath, or listen to the leaves and thank God for Autumn, or sit on your couch and be grateful you have a place to live. All of these little moments, these stolen minutes, help you love yourself. These are the moments when you step out of the routine of life and into kairos (God's time). When you learn to carve out kairos time for yourself, you will also be better able to love God with all your heart, soul, and mind and guess what? When all you soul is taken care of you can better take care of the rest of that pie, your children, your spouse, your work. So, have you had a kairos moment today? What did you do or not do?