Sermon, Epiphany +3 (Year B)

 When we think about time, we usually think about what the clock or watch would tell us, or what appointments are blocked off in our calendars.

Sometimes, we focus instead on our bodies or the world around us. The sun is coming up - It's time for coffee. It's dark? It must be time for bed.
So even though we can mark time quantifiably, this is merely chronology. It allows us a pattern, it gives us structure for our days. It's helpful! It's what our human nature leans us toward.
But when our scriptures talk about time, they often take us into a different conception of time: KAIROS.
To be fair: Chronos and Kairos are not an either/or, they are not opposite ends of a spectrum; they simply have different meanings and applications for us.
Chronos - earthly time - is measurable. It's quantifiable. There are times when we seem to experience it differently: time flies when you're having fun, but time also crawls - a cold January lasts a thousand days – but time is broken down into clearly delineated markers – seconds, minutes, hours.
Kairos is holy time - it's not something we can plug into our agendas. It's non-linear, and not subjective. It's qualitative, it's when the divine is breaking into the chronology. It's the right or opportune moment.
And that difference is significant. Especially when we are considering timeless realities, timeless lessons, timeless scriptures.

Jonah: today he's been spending some earthly time learning how to dwell in the midst of grace. It was an important lesson: God gave him a bit of a time-out from earthly encounters - and has some fish-belly time, to do some thinking and praying, and he asks for God's help and declares his trust in God as the source of all salvation.
This is where today's passage starts: Jonah has experienced a KAIROS moment, and is reminded of the power of God's time coming into the world. So Jonah uses his kairotic revelation to help the people God wants him to help: and he enters Nineveh, and proclaims the word of God - with such enthusiasm (and hyperbole) and grace prevails.

For Paul, we hear that the appointed time has grown short: he is blunt in asking the Corinthians to re-evaluate their priorities and practices. He wants them to use their chronos time to do good; to strive toward healthy relationships. He warns them not to be distracted by earthly things, but to prepare their hearts and minds for the time when God will break through: for Paul, the second coming was imminent. And he wanted the best for the people in Corinth, that their (and our) values should reflect divine priorities, not earthly preferences.

Mark's Gospel nicely juxtaposes the chronos and the kairos right from the start - After John was arrested sets the chronology, and lets us know that Jesus has begun his public ministry.

And he begins with a kairos moment, a change of holy presence in the world.
The kairos time is fulfilled, Jesus says, because a new era of Godly experience has begun.
The kingdom of God has come near, this is that opportune moment to repent and believe in the Good News.

And Jesus models for us the best way to do that: as he makes disciples - companions - helpers. He calls others to join with him, in the moment, to share Good News, to bring release to the oppressed, salvation to the lost, comfort to the suffering.
To leave all that would trap and restrict, and instead to extend an invitation to follow, to join, to walk alongside. A God moment indeed, as we watch these accomplished people leave their homes, their businesses, their earthly security - to follow him.

In all of these situations, we see that God does not remove people from the earth in order to fulfill prophecy or scripture or any divine purpose.
Rather, God comes into the world - the chronological time that we humans understand, in a way that is life-changing, ministry-inspiring, a divinely pivotal moment - a kairos experience.

And as a result of this kairos, the chronos changes.
Time influences time, a shift of the cosmos to engage us humans into the will and work of God, to bring about the Good News of God's love, grace and salvation.
In ways that can never be put in a day planner or a wall calendar, or even in a specific way in the annals of history. It's kairos - God's time: bigger and better than we can ask or imagine.

So. while I suspect that if I asked you what time it was, you'd check your watch or device and give me a number. And you'd be correct.

And I also suspect that deep down, part of you would tell me what season it is, what holiness is happening, what important shift there is, and be able to articulate an important God moment. You would share the Kairos moment in your life, as God is revealing good things to and through you.

So what time is it? How is it time for us to repent and believe the good news?

Maybe it’s time to mend relationships, or to reach out to those experiencing need.
It may be time to pray; or to rest and listen to God?
Is it time to extend grace - to others, and to yourself?
Maybe it’s time to offer care, or to acknowledge the beauty of receiving care.
Perhaps we’re hearing the call to re-organise our priorities, as we discern new ways to follow Jesus?
It is time to consider new ways to proclaim the Gospel, and to trust in the nudges to ministry that God is encouraging us towards?

However God's Kairos is breaking into your chronological time, I pray that you will recognise it and celebrate it for what it is: for there's no time like the present to praise our God.