86,400 Moments

Every morning. Tick. Tick. Tick.  A little rhythm I hear as I rise each day by the seemingly small clock next to my bathroom sink.  Tick. Tick.  It's a subconscious reminder that a new day has begun.  Minute by minute. Second by second.

I have 86,400 seconds every single day to either use or waste, depending on the day and the perspective.
Tick. Time is so fleeting.  

However, as I woke this morning, there was just silence.  The seemingly insignificant little clock next to my sink was silent.  No sound. No rhythmical reminder that a new day is upon me.

As I woke from my sleepy fog and it began to register that something was quiet, too quiet, it took me aback to realize that something so seemingly small took me by such big surprise. The silence. It was almost uncomfortable.  I had this overwhelming desire to have to quickly make my way to the laundry room for a new, refreshed AA battery to replace the cavity holding the worn out, dead one.  There.  There it was again. Tick. Tick. Tick.  Steady.  Familiar.  Safe.

As I started to walk away from this small keeper-of-time, I began to realize how deeply I am desiring reminders of being alive at this point in my life!  Maybe it is my age.  I embraced 40 last year and as time keeps flying by I am reminded more and more of the words of James, Jesus' half-brother:

What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. (James 4:14)

And the words of Job as he cried out in his afflictions:

Remember, O God, that my life is but a breath. (Job 7:7a)

Yes, the older I get, the more I realize these truths, and the more I crave to find ways to make time stand still.  This is probably why I am loving my newest interest and hobby of photography.  I can capture a moment and truly time can stand still.  For one second.  It is completely captured. One second, out of 86,400 in a day.  Or even better, one second out of 31,556,926 in a year.  Wow. Overwhelming. Overwhelming in good ways, and challenging ones.

Don't get me wrong, I am truly loving the age I am and the place God has me.  I am old enough to know better, and learned from the years where I didn't.  I love more freely because I am learning to embrace not caring as much what people think and working hard to value first the opinion of my Creator. I have lived long enough to know that I have to appreciate each moment.  Because they are gone, in a moment.  Each laugh. Each triumph.  Each challenge.  Each tear.  To appreciate each moment.  It is learned.

So, as time marches on, to the rhythm of a tick, tick, tick, I will rejoice in the moments.  I will choose to capture and freeze as many I can. I will choose to look forward to the next one.  I will choose to embrace the rhythm of the clock.  I will choose to rest in the very next verse in James (4:15):

Instead, you ought to say, "If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that."


Let's see what the Lord has for our next 86,400 moments...tick, tick, tick. Lord willing...