Today’s scripture: Galatians 4:4-7 (NRSV) (The Message) (KJV) What might God be saying to me?
My thoughts (Jeff Miner):
Do you believe that things happen “in the right time”? In today’s Scripture passage, Paul coins a famous phrase. He says that Jesus was born when “the fullness of time had come.”
What might that mean? Philosopher and theologian William Lane Craig puts it this way:
Human beings existed for…years on this planet before Christ’s coming. But what’s really crucial here is not the time involved; rather, it’s the population of the world. The Population Reference Bureau estimates that the number of people who have ever lived on this planet is about 105 billion people. Only two percent of them were born prior to the advent of Christ. Erik Kreps of the Survey Research Center of the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research says, “God’s timing couldn’t have been more perfect. Christ showed up just before the exponential explosion in the world’s population.”
Roman peace dominated the Mediterranean world; it was an age of literacy and learning. The stage was set for the advent of God’s Son into the world. In God’s providential plan for human history, we see the wisdom of God in orchestrating the development of human life and then in bringing Christ into the world in the fullness of time.
I like the idea that Jesus was born at just the right time. It makes sense to me that, with something that important, God had it planned out. But what about our lives?
While on vacation recently in the Smoky Mountains, one day I walked my dog on a route that took us through through an old church cemetery. A headstone caught my attention (see photo below).
The headstone reads:
Loveday
Arthur Marie
June 24, 1920 Aug. 30, 1919
Dec. 15, 2005 Feb. 23, 1990
Married Sept. 24, 1940
As I walked past the headstone, I noticed that she died just a few months before their 50th wedding anniversary. I’ll bet she really wanted to reach that milestone. He lived for another 15 years without her. I wonder what those years were like for him. I wonder if it was all random or planned out that way.
I’d like to think it was planned. Though God has given us substantial free will, I’d like to think that the really big things in our life happen in accordance with some mystical divine design — “in the fullness of time” — just like the birth and death of Jesus.
Thought For The Day: In this Christmas season, rest in the knowledge that, ” To every [thing there is] a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up [that which is] planted…;a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance.” Ecclesiastes 3:1-4.
We encourage you to include a time of prayer with this reading. If you need a place to get started, consider the suggestions on the How to Pray page.