A Prayer About Time, Again

Recently I noticed that the clock in my car was forty minutes behind. That happens occasionally, I guess; some short in the clock fuse or something. So I corrected it with a mild grumble and drove myself home from the office. I got home and noticed that my atomic clock--you know, the clock that is regularly updated by satellites, the clock by which all other clocks are judged--was an hour and a half ahead. So I corrected it with a much more pronounced grumble and went on with my life. But it reminded me how significant time as a concept has been to me in my life--it's the subject of countless posts both here and at my other blog, Strangely Dim--and I was reminded of what follows: my first ever post to Loud Time, a prayer that theologian/sociologist Robert Banks recorded in his book The Tyranny of Time. This first part acknowledges God as Creator of time, which has implications for how we look at our own experience of time. I reproduce it here for your edification.

God our Father

you are the Maker of everything that exists,

the Author of the world of nature

and of all living things,

the Creator of both space

and time.

Without you there would be no past,

present or

future;

no summer or winter,

spring or autumn,

seedtime or harvest;

no morning or evening,

months or years.

Because you give us the gift of time we have the opportunity

to think and to act,

to plan and to pray,

to give and to receive,

to create and to relate,

to work and to rest,

to strive and to play,

to love and to worship.

The apostle Paul sums up this prayer nicely for us: "In him we live and move and have our being." Hope you enjoy it. Parts two and three to come.