KEEPING TIME

Our first sailing charter was in 1992.  We sailed out of Guadeloupe in the eastern Caribbean.  We arrived one evening, picked up the boat the next morning, had a skipper “check us out” to make sure we knew the basics and headed toward the island of Isle de Sainte.  About ten miles away.  Beautiful.

While our arrival that afternoon was a bit shaky (another story for another day), the next morning was announced by… the roosters.  About 4am (or so it seemed), I started hearing the cocks crowing.  First one, then several, then several more, and eventually the dogs were barking all over the hillside.  The time was right to announce the new day – I guess.  I scowled, buried my head under the pillow.  And eventually I squiggled out of our berth to make sure those roosters weren’t trying to tell me something about a sinking boat.  Well, it wasn’t about me after all.  It was about a Kairos moment, the right time to wake up!

The first clock-watches were German made in the early 1500’s.  A Peter Hele is named in a passage written by Johan Cochlaus in 1511: “Peter Hele while still a young man…shapes many-wheeled clocks out of small bits of iron…”   First there were clock-watches worn on clothing (15^th -16^th  centuries) and then there were the pocket watches (17^th century).   Some say the first wrist watch was made by a Swiss clockmaker for the Queen of Naples in 1810.  While relatively short in the span of human history, the invention of the clock has led to one of those great human obsessions: keeping time.  Of course, before then, we kept time by the stars, the sun, the seasons, by …. roosters.  The Mayans were especially adept with their mathematical formulas.

And today, we have watches which not only keep the time, but tell us how to stay “fit” and do so much more to connect us with others.  The Dick Tracy watch of my childhood has become the Apple Watch of today.  It’s all about the ticking of the tock and the march of time.  Fast and furious.  It’s about Chronos. 

The non-racing sailing world makes passing note of the ticking and tocking.  We will make time when we’re out on the water and the clouds appear and we suddenly recognize the need to move quickly to a harbor.  We will pass the time with a sundowner at the end of the day.  But, we’re not so likely to stress about the time.  The rhythms of the day are set by the sun and the night and… the crowing rooster.

Chronos, Kairos.

In the sailing world we are entering, Kairos more than Chronos shapes our days.  And in the world of the faith, Kairos more than Chronos shapes God’s time and God’s activity that’s accomplished in the “fullness of time” through Jesus.   Leonard Cohen, the Canadian folk singer, wrote:

And Jesus was a sailor

When he walked upon the water

And he spent a long time watching

From his lonely wooden tower

And when he knew for certain

Only drowning men could see him

He said "All men will be sailors then

Until the sea shall free them"

But he himself was broken

Long before the sky would open

Forsaken, almost human

He sank beneath your wisdom like a stone

We don’t own an Apple watch (though it would be cool to emulate old Dick Tracy – for a day).  And I suspect we will take our watches and put them on a shelf down below for this next season… and listen to the roosters, and the dogs, and watch for the signs of those Kairos moments to face the challenges and seize the opportunities before us. 

Pretty nice.

Dave