Time?

Does the time change bother you? Try explaining it to dogs and cats. Or cows on a diary farm. I do understand the concept of fuel savings, but really – is it effective?

The National Institute of Standards and Technology has a page showing just how unstandard the question of Daylight Saving Time changes are: http://www.nist.gov/pml/div688/localtime.cfm#who

Out of the nine time zones for the United States and its territories (see, you only thought about four!) six follow DST – with the exception of most of Arizona. Several summers ago we made a driving trip headed west from Oklahoma, two couples, five kids. The children were pretty good about being on time, except our first night in Arizona. After almost an hour had past since they were supposed to be back at our campsite, we went to the game room to chastise them a bit for non-compliance. Ooops – local time was an hour earlier.

The NIST site refers us to the California Energy Commission http://www.energy.ca.gov/daylightsaving.html which has several links to discussions of the effectiveness of DST.

Americans usually blame Benjamin Franklin who wrote about saving light in Paris, April of 1784 http://www.webexhibits.org/daylightsaving/franklin.html but it was an Englishman in 1907 who wrote “The Waste of Daylight.” William Willett suggested moving the clock ahead by 80 minutes by a series of four moves, twenty minutes each. We can be grateful his suggestion was adjusted!!

It did, however, make England aware of energy savings and in 1916 British Summer Time was instituted, helping to save energy during WWI.

Our atomic clock updated this morning, as did my cell phone. The remainder of Beloved Husband’s clock collection will be changed as needed. The two chiming clocks here in the den (yes, we get used to them and the chiming doesn’t wake us during the night) will be changed this morning. Stuck at home for these few days, we really aren’t as concerned about time as we are about hours between medication.

So, where’s the verse? Where’s the application? Two come to mind.

And Jesus answering said unto them, Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's. And they marvelled at him. (Mark 12:17 KJV)

Our government has set specific time zones and time changes. There is no harm to us by doing so, just a bit of inconvenience. Change the clocks.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 tells us every thing has a season – not an hour, but a season. And, one other scripture that mentions time seems timely:

And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: (Hebrews 9:27 KJV)

We appear to be more concerned about an hour’s change twice a year than this one lifetime event.