Article April 6, 1987 Issue

Are we wishing our time away?

Daydreaming about what we hope the future will bring seems harmless enough. But is it keeping us from proving that God's goodness is present now?

Lloyd Childs Little

Sometimes it seems as though good is always just ahead of us, and we have to let much time pass before it will be ours. When I was in elementary school, I wished I were old enough to be in junior high because then I would be allowed to do so many more things. At the age of thirteen I drove the farm truck in the fields and woods, but I longed for the day I would have my license and could drive out on the highway. Then later, of course, there was that wish for a car of my own.

This kind of wishing can lead to coasting, waiting, and wasting a valuable part of our lives. Actually, each step in our experience can be progressive, happy, and satisfying if we have this spiritual perspective: that God is our starting point and expressing Him is our constant goal.

To me this is graphically illustrated in Christ Jesus' healing of the impotent man at the pool called Bethesda. See John 5:2-9 . He had been ill for thirty-eight years, and for a long time this man apparently believed that he was separated from God and that God's goodness would be realized in his life only after a certain set of circumstances were synchronized. Jesus proved this concept of God to be false. He told the man to rise and walk. Immediately the man got up and walked, showing the ever-presence of God's goodness.

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Tender, loving care
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