One day, when (if)
I settle down and own my own home, I'm going to start collecting
clocks. I don't know what precisely it is that I love so much about
them, but I always want to buy every one in sight. I restrain myself
because I don't have anywhere to hang them, but one day…
There is a clock on the wall of our
pastor's house, one of the only clocks I've seen on the Race so far.
It is one of my favorites, not because of how it looks, but because
of how it's broken. The minute and hour hands on this clock are
perpetually stuck at 4:01. The batteries are out,
you think, that happens.
But the second hand hasn't seemed to notice that its fellows have
stopped and so, inexplicably, it continues on and on.
Contemplating the clock makes me think
that time on the World Race feels like this a lot.
Ministry tends to pass by in a flash,
almost as if we packed the whole hour or two into one solitary
minute. We live so much in the present moment, not planning too far
ahead or worrying about little details – partly because we don't
have the most concrete schedule and partly because we are all so
excited about this adventure we're living out. (Also, this month we have been too busy to think about where the time has gone!)
On the other hand, the days and months are steadily moving forward. Somehow, July has turned into October, and soon I will be marveling that it's January. It's not that I feel like this time has gone so fast it's been wasted – quite the contrary. It has just gone fast. (As they say, time flies when you're having fun!)
Those two things are happening at the same time, just like on the clock.
The other day, Pastor put new batteries in the clock, so now it tends to show the correct time. It did give us a scare Sunday morning; it was exactly an hour behind, leaving us to wonder if Daylight Savings exists in Africa and we had gotten ready an hour early. But it's Africa, so we were just late to church!
Time has restarted, and is telling us it's time to move on: first to debrief near Victoria Falls, then to Asia!
