Ecclesiastes 31

 There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under heaven: 
 a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,  a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
 a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain,
 a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
 a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
 a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace

Imagine you had a bank that at the stroke of midnight paid £86,400 into your account, to do with as you wish, but at the stroke of midnight that money would be deleted and another £86,400 would be paid in.  No overdraft, no balance carried forward, no borrowing against the next days money. What would you do?  Me, I’d spend every penny of it!!

Well, you do have an account like that, its called time.Every day you get 86,400 seconds to use as you will for the day, but any of them that aren’t used at the end of the day are gone. We can live life to the full, or we can waste our lives and God’s gift of life to us.

Today is Shrove Tuesday, a day when we eat pancakes to mark the older tradition of using up goods in the house to prepare for Lent.  Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday, the start of the 40 days of Lent, and most people give something up for it.  Chocolate, alcohol, sweets are all firm favourites.  We go without them for 40 days and think how good we are, and then stuff ourselves on chocolate on Easter Sunday.

This year I’d like to suggest something different. I’d like you to take something up.  I want you all in Blog land to think of ways of living life to the full, doing the things you would regret if you died tomorrow. Maybe its telling Aunty Mabel you love her, even though you only see her twice a year.  Maybe its spending more time with your family, rather than working yourself to exhaustion.  Maybe its visiting your local church, giving spirituality a chance.  If you live in the Black Country, you may even see me in the church.  God would like us to let him in on our lives, before its too late.

Everything has a time, as the bible verse says, the problem is we don’t know when its our time to die.  Lets make sure we do the things that will make our lives fulfilled so that on the final day, when we stand before God, we don’t think “I wish I’d done that, or said this”