Time's up, now imagine you're at a game show and they ask you a question and you only have one minute to answer this question and your brain starts going into overdrive, your saliva gets dry in your mouth, your heart starts beating really really fast, your muscles stiffen, you're scared you don't know if you can answer this question but a part of you believes that if you just push hard enough that you'll be able to come up with the right answer and then it's 8, 9, 10, time's up! Isn't that life nowadays, you must keep answering right to beat time.
I'm Michael Uzor, I'm writing this from the very beautiful beautiful city of Lagos in Nigeria and I wish I could show you the views I'm in right now but I'm in my homeland, I'm Nigerian, Uzoramaka, so you know I'm Igbo and I'm very excited to be speaking to you all today.
This is Young People Please Calm Down. Today's topic is Time's Up. I wanted to speak about time because I see that especially with young people, people in general, that in life, time seems to be a thing that is very hard to control. We want certain things to happen, certain plans that we seek to happen at this certain time when we're this age then when it doesn't happen there's a tendency to lose faith, there's a tendency to feel discouraged and there's a tendency to want to give up on what we plan to do and do something else. So what can we do or what can I say in this article to encourage you all to not only not give up but to see time in a different way so as usual, young people please calm down, I'm going to use historical, biblical, contemporary and personal examples to properly dissect the topic of time's up.
Historically, Yukio Mishima, one of my favourite writers and actually one of the best writers that came out of Japan in general e was known as someone who wrote beautifully and he also was nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature many times in his lifetime but what really stood out to me was his obsession with time. He would walk by watch window displays and he would be so transfixed by the ticking tocks on the watches. There was even a time where one of his lovers said that when he was staying with him that his watch went missing and he literally flipped the whole room upside down to look for this watch. His publishers say that he was the only writer at the time who never missed a deadline this was somebody who was clearly obsessed with time to the point that at the end of his life, Yukio Mishima, when he was going to commit suicide because his suicide did not happen at the right time, at the appointed time it was supposed to happen, you can imagine how excruciating that thing was to him. Everything had to be in order. He wanted to plan his whole life to almost be a master of time itself. It's easy to judge him, but we'll transition into the next part, contemporary.
Contemporary wise, there's a rush in the west to get somewhere. We're obsessed with advancement, technological advancement, all sorts of advancements and because of this it can cause issues with our relation with time. If you actually grew up in the west, you know that everything is organized time by time. If you miss an appointment by a certain time you have to come another time or you won't be able to even attend at all. Time is a big big thing in the west, in any western country or any country influenced by the west like some countries in the east. Now you would say that if everything is so organized in the west—why then is there an issue in the west with loneliness, anxiety, depression if we all know when things are going to happen? But the problem is that when technological advancements and innovation like to do with time, (because everything that is advancing technology wise is meant to actually make things faster.), for example: faster cars, faster lights, faster food, fast food restaurant, everything is fast fast fast fast fast in order for us to somehow beat time.
But this can create issues because when we spend so much time trying to make everything fast, it destroys the ability for humans to relate and create relationships so whereas there's this innovation, there's this technological advancement in the west, what happens is that human connection is destroyed. We all know that in order to develop human relationships, this takes time and effort which is not really valued in a world where time seems to be an obstacle. So instead of actually dealing with time and actually understanding it, what happens is that we push time to the side altogether. We delve straight into the internet, social media, where time is not obvious where we can be in this AI world where whether it's morning or night no one really knows, we can create virtual relationships which can happen suddenly, and the whole process and beauty of developing relationships is thrown to the side, and the virtual world is put at number one.
Bible deals a lot with time, in Ecclesiastes 9 verse 11, it says "I returned and saw under the sun that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill but time and chance happening to them all." What is it saying? That time and chance is the determining factor if anything is going to be successful not what we have, not our strength, not our ability, but time and chance and this is going to happen to everybody. Andy Warhol says that everyone is going to have their 15 minutes or 15 seconds of fame so time and chance is actually grace the Bible says that, "for by grace are we saved through faith and that are not of ourselves," so grace is something that is not a product of our own strength and this grace actually relieves us from the sting of death.
In 1 Corinthians 15 verse 55 it talks about death, about its sting and about how the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ to those who believe has removed death or the sting of death away from us. The reason why many of us, many humans are afraid of time and are trying to constantly beat it, almost as if there is a gun at our heads pushing us to keep moving forward, is because of our fear of dying. If we did not die, there would be no time. Time wouldn't really mean anything but because that there is death, time somehow now has some substantial meaning. That is why we humans don't like change, whenever we see change it gives us this subconscious feeling that time is moving forward and that we are closer to death, closer to a time that we will not remember anymore. This fear translates in our stressful and anxiety driven purpose in life.
However, according to scripture, Christ brought change to us so that we can have life so whereas the world sees change in time as death, Jesus Christ sees change in time as life and it says in Isaiah 43 verse 19 in prophecy about Christ's death and resurrection it says, "Behold I will do a new thing that it shall spring forth shall ye not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert." So rivers in the desert, desert is a place where there is no life so rivers being there, water representing life, shows that change represents life to God and to Christ to corroborate what I am saying further, in 2nd Corinthians chapter 4 verse 16 it says, "For which cause we faith not, but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." So you can see the outward man which represents the world and its fleshly pleasures is perishing representing death and time whereas the inward man which is renewed through Christ is renewed day by day. He is given life.
Personally, for many years since I was 6 years old and I left Nigeria, I always wanted to come back but through different circumstances, I could not return to my country of birth. It took over 19 years. Over 19 years have passed by! But each year I would always wish. I wish I was here, I wish I could see my family again, I wish I could see everybody again because many people died and many people are alive to the glory of God that I have seen but to just go that many years without seeing them almost removed that side of me that was very important. This also came with my fight against time you know because each year that went by I was always thinking man: is it this year, is it this year, is it this year, is it this year?
But now I am finally here at the best time where there is no stress, where things are moving smoothly because God chose the best time for it to happen so when the topic of this article, Times Up came to mind, I wanted to show that time is never up and in Christ we are renewed day by day and every day is just another step for us to fulfilling God's purposes for our life so now I am enjoying the beautiful beautiful Lagos, Nigeria, and the great sun. The atmosphere you know just being here it just feels good to be in your homeland because there is no place like home and God did it at the best time. To wrap up this article, I am going to say Ecclesiastes chapter 3 verse 1 to 8, it says:
"To everything 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 kill and a time to heal, a time to break down and a time to build up a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance a time to cast away stones and a time to gather stones together a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing a time to get and a time to lose, a time to keep and a time to cast away a time to rend and a time to sow, a time to keep silence and a time to speak a time to love and a time to hate, a time of war and a time of peace."
So what does that mean? It means that your time is never up. Time is in season, however because that time is in season we should not fret, we should not worry, we should not have anxiety because God who is faithful in all his promises will surely bring it to pass at the right time and look at the smile on my face. This is the result of the right time. I'm Michael Uzor, this is Young People Please Calm Down. Let me know what you think of this article, like, comment, share and I'll see you on the next one!
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