“Time is on our side, or at least on this side of eternity. Eternity is not time continuing on forever, but the end of time or a state in which time no longer has effect – an eternal now. We are given whatever time we have on earth to enter into God’s salvation. Wisdom says God will always accept our repentance, but God doesn’t promise us a tomorrow in which to repent.” (Fr. Ted Bobosh)
“…God has given us time in which to repent. And, he reminds us repentance does not require a huge amount of time. It can be done in a moment (as with the Wise Thief) and it can be done right now. This is why we all have hope and need not despair. As long as we have a moment, we have time enough to repent and accept God’s embrace and mercy. Christ will accept our repentance at any time, He just doesn’t promise us a tomorrow in which to repent. Now is the time for salvation.” (St. John Chrysostom, Fr. Ted Bobosh)
“The Parousia [second coming] carries with it, therefore, the final judgment, that is, the end of all judgment, by its being the judgment: those who have opted for the demonic will realize that they have opted for the impossible, that Satan was in fact a “liar” and has “deceived” them by allowing for non-existence to appear as an ultimate possibility…History, therefore, the time of choice and decision, becomes crucial for eternity precisely because ultimately there is no history (“there will be no time any more”) and hence no choice. This will mean that personhood as demonic will be eternally “tortured” by the very ontological fact that the choice of annihilation, that is, of the rejection of the given world, will be unrealizable. This is the meaning of “eternal condemnation” put in existential terms.” (Metropolitan John Zizioulas)
“To commit to the Christian Faith means an investment of time—to pray, to worship, to learn and to serve. We gain nothing in return if we do not invest much into our “commitment.” Another important thing to note is that when one invests money into business, the return isn’t necessarily immediate. There may even be loss at the beginning or at some point. However, good investments eventually pay off and pay off big. The same is true with Christianity. One can invest some time and effort and not see a return immediately or on a given Sunday. Sometimes experiences with churches might even be negative on a given Sunday. The smart investor, however, does not evaluate based on a day but perhaps on a season or a year. The smart Christian also does not evaluate his or her Christianity based on one day, or one sermon, or even one priest. The smart investor expects losses at time. And like the smart investor, the smart Christian knows that good investments pay off eventually and pay off big, and this is especially true for an investment in Christ” (Fr. Stavros N. Akrotirianakis)
“So often we engage in various ways to resist time and age. This often comes in the form of being stuck in a state of perpetually looking back; having a gaze or focus that is fixed on the past. This can manifest itself in something as innocent as dyeing our hair to something more severe such as an all out mid-life crisis which can lead to rash decisions. Perhaps a certain amount of time spent in this state is normal, however we must come to the point where we say to ourselves, “I can’t stay here. I have to move forward”. In essence, we begin to cooperate with time and God’s plan for us and let go of what we have held onto for so long. We cooperate with time by finding and embracing who God wants us to be and what our continued purpose is in the present. The letting go of a life-stage and embracing the next one, is like a death and resurrection. As Fr. Thomas Hopko once said, “Our life is a practice in dying, in letting go our life”. Navigating life’s stages gives us plenty of opportunities for this practice.” (Fr. Joshua Makoul)
“How much time do we spend on social media, watching movies, attending concerts, and hanging out with our friends? If we can spend four hours attending or watching a football game, why is it so difficult to spend an hour or two attending worship? If we can spend two hours listening to a music concert, why do we complain that the sermons we hear are too long? And if the social media steal an average of two hours, or even up to six or nine hours for tweens and teenagers, why does a sermon lose our attention if it goes past fifteen or twenty minutes?” (Fr. Basil)
“Many of us struggle with living an active spiritual life. It is not uncommon to come home and relax on the couch watching TV instead of reading about the saint of the day. It is easy to spend hours on social media and the Internet but for some reason it is difficult to spend five to ten minutes in prayer twice a day the work of Christians—participating in Liturgy, saying our daily prayers, etc.—is hard work! That statement, though simple, should be encouraging to all…Christians who find keeping up with their daily spiritual life difficult. The world we live in sets impossible standards of wealth, fame, fortune and glory, and it is easy to get swept up, forgetting what we are really on this earth for. But this fact should not be discouraging. It should be inspiring. What a mission! We are called for a different purpose, to be in the world but not of it.” (Fr. Thomas Hopko, Maria Diveris McMullen)
“…we might ask ourselves how much and how often we bring our fear to God in prayer. Rededicating to Christ means regularly beginning anew in our efforts to pray more fervently. We cannot become less self-absorbed by our own efforts. Fundamentally this is the work of God,. What we can do, however, is decide to set aside a certain amount of time every day, whether it be five minutes or fifty five minutes or something in between, for personal prayer with Christ. Our quiet time can be a time to bring our concerns and our strivings to the Lord with the request of taking on the ‘mind of Christ’.” (Albert Rossi, Gay Rossi and Stewart Armour)
“…no matter how much we must do or what has to get done, we clear 20-30 minutes in the morning to pray. This builds the foundation of our day. It gives us our footing and tilts our disposition forward, so we are in a position to lean into the world and the day’s events rather than start the day on our heels. Starting the day with prayer means we are like the ship that starts its voyage with the sails up.” (Fr. Joshua Makoul)
“…people who pray for twenty minutes or more a day express a much higher level of satisfaction with their prayer life than those who pray less than that.” (Rev. Christopher H. Martin)
“If you commit to doing contemplative breathing for ten minutes every day, you may find these ten minutes becoming the most important minutes of your life.” (Robin Phillips)
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