THE CLOCK“For when David had served God’s purpose in his own generation, he fell asleep; he was buried with his fathers and his body decayed.” –Acts 13:36
Foyers of classic old homes often had a place for a tall, stately cabinet clock properly called a “longcase clock.” But we have come to know them as “Grandfather’s Clocks” because of a story told of two brothers who operated an English travelers’ inn. The clock in their lobby kept perfect time until one brother died. Then, despite repair efforts by local clock makers, it started losing time until it absolutely quit the day the second brother died.
Poet Henry Clay Work took that story and in 1875 turned it into the well-known poem and song “My Grandfather’s Clock.” Most can remember the tune with its steady tick-tock in the background and lyrics about the clock bought on the day the owner was born. The famed final lines say, “But it stopped short, never to go again, when the old man died.”
Clocks make us think of our own “time.” The chiming of a classic clock gently reminds us that time is passing. If it chimed the hour and half-hour, over a typical human lifetime of 75 to 80 years it would have sounded nearly 1.4 million times. That seems like a lot of time, but to God, it’s a blip on the screen of eternity. Even the remarkable life of King David, Israel’s shepherd-turned-warrior-king, was a “blip” in time. After forty years as king, one day at age 70 he took his last breath. He touched history, and went on. God considered David’s work ended—or as Acts 13:36 says, he lived until he served God’s purpose in his generation.
We, too, live for God’s purpose in our generation. But that’s not the end of the story. Something wonderful happens with “time” when we die. The Grandfather’s Clock song failed to tell it. Even writers of hymns have a hard time expressing our “after-time” life. Think of “Amazing Grace”: “When we’ve been there ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun, we’ve no less days to sing God’s praise, than when we’ve first begun.” Some people quip that’s an awfully long choir rehearsal! But remember: death takes us from earth-time to heaven-time.
Heaven won’t be “endless time” or “timelessness.” Time is a way to measure things happening, and things will truly happen in heaven. People will speak. They’ll fall down in worship, casting their crowns before the throne. Music inherently has beat—another “time” element. The Bible describes a “tree of life” in Heaven that bears twelve crops of fruit, one each month (Rev. 22:2). Does this mean we’ll have “time” as we now define by it by a solar orbit? We don’t know. Perhaps God used an earthly term to let us know this miraculous tree will provide on a regular basis.
People who couldn’t live without their pocket or desk planners, watches, or alarm clocks will be able to relax in “heaven time.” There will be plenty of time for everything that’s important—which is, of course, everything in heaven. I believe that time in heaven will most likely mean activity without physical or mental weariness. It will not tick down, like a timer. It will go on for infinity. We’ll never have to say, “I wish I had more time.”
But until we’re there, we live in earth time until we die. The Bible says, “No man knows when his hour will come”(Eccl. 9:12). This uncertainty bothers many people who fear death or feel unready to die. One respected Bible teacher admitted that when he started preaching across the country and needed to fly to his engagements, he feared the plane would crash and end his life. Then one day a friend counseled him: “Remember this…God’s man, living in the center of God’s will, is immortal until God is through with him” (David Jeremiah, Prayer: The Great Adventure, Multnomah, 1997, p. 216). Jesus modeled that principle for us. In spite of many threats on His life, Jesus didn’t go to the cross until He finished His work on earth.
The psalmist declared his trust in God’s timing: “My times are in your hands” (Psalm 31:15) Charles Spurgeon, a great preacher of the 19th century, called this a “golden sentence.” Because our times are in God’s hands, he said, all is well because God never changes. “Things will happen which you cannot foresee,” he commented, “but your Lord has foreseen all, and provided for all. Nothing can happen without His divine allowance” (Quoted in Ellen Vaughn, Time Peace: Living Here and Now with a Timeless God, Zondervan, 2007, p. 210).
Tick, tick, tick…those sounds remind us of God’s gift of time. Let them also assure you that His timing to come to Heaven is exactly right.
Prayer: God, comfort me and remove my fears about not having enough time. Your timing is perfect. Amen.
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