Mark 6:30-34

Many of you have heard me quote my favorite poem in one setting or another. The author is anonymous, but the message that is communicated is both insightful and energizing. The poem is entitled, Just A Minute. This is what it says:

I have only just a minute,

Only 60 seconds in it,

Forced upon me, didn’t choose,

Didn’t seek it, can’t refuse it.

So it’s up to me to use it,

Have to suffer if I lose,

Pay a price if I abuse it,

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Just a tiny little minute,

But eternity is in it!

Time is the most precious commodity that you and I will ever possess. We may possess and then lose a large amount of money, but it is possible to reacquire money later in life. We may have what we think is the ideal job, and then suddenly that job that can be taken away by layoffs or downsizing or being fired. However, with a little determination and patience another job can be found. We may be facing a serious illness of some sort, but with expert medical care and the healing touch of a loving God our bodies can be restored to health. Almost anything that you can lose in this life can either be restored, replaced or we discover that we can keep on living without it.

Not so with time. We do not know how much or how little time God has assigned to each of us to live. We do not know just when our time on this earth will run out. But there is one thing that is absolutely certain; when our time runs out we will not be given anymore. You cannot buy time. You cannot borrow time. You cannot go back and relive time. All that you and I can do with our time is make the most of it for as long as it lasts.

On this day when we honor those of you who have graduated from high school, college and graduate programs, and who are now advancing from one stage of life to the next, what I am telling you today is as important a lesson as anything you ever learned in school. Make the most of your time. Realize that time is precious, and do not waste it by concentrating your attention on things that are of little of no lasting value. Take time for those things in life that are most important; your head, your health, your home and your holiness. If you prioritize your time around the protection, the preservation and the perfecting of these four things you will live a life of which you can be proud and about which God will say “well done.”

That is the lesson Jesus is modeling for us in our text in Mark 6. The disciples had been sent out on their first preaching mission, and now they had returned to Jesus and they were anxious to tell him everything that had happened while they were out in the field. But the Bible says Jesus told them to “come apart and rest for a while." The crowds had returned and people wanted to be healed or to hear the message of salvation. No sooner had they finished one assignment than it was time to begin another. They had no time to rest or to recover. And Jesus wanted to teach them a lesson about how to sustain yourself in your career and in your life over the long haul. “Come apart and get some rest.”