There’s a Right Time for Everything

Today's scripture passage is from Ecclesiastes 3:1-11. The title of this passage of scripture in the NIV version is "A Time for Everything" which was what I remembered from reading it many times it the past. But in the NRSVCE version which I read today it is called "Everything Has Its Time" which I think is a bit better. Of course in the original language there is no title so the title created in a translation is meant to summarize what this entire passage says. I think the Message (MSG) translation gives an even better summary of the passage: "There’s a Right Time for Everything". It begins in verse 1: "There’s an opportune time to do things, a right time for everything on the earth" and this is where I begin my reflection today.

I have now been retired for more than 2 years. Right before I decided to send in my letter of retirement, I went through a bit of existential crisis. Yes I turned 65 in 2016 but the university did not have a mandatory retirement age. I loved my work and the people I worked with. I enjoyed my clinical practice and had a very good relationship with the majority of my patients. But it was an opportune time. A resident I trained share a very similar practice style and my patients generally liked him. He is a Christian also. He worked hard after graduation until he was offered a faculty position. I can't think of a better person available at that time to take over my academic practice. So I did not feel I was abandoning my patients (I had to do that twice in the past!).
"A right time to hold on and another to let go,"

Moreover, I was finding I needed more time to nurture my spiritual life. I took a 20% income cut back in January of 2013 to reduce my work hours to 4 days a week in order to do more serious scripture studying and to start writing this blog (it's hard to believe I have been doing this for more than 5 years and have already published 264 blogs!). I found the extra time very helpful to discipline myself in reading and writing on spiritual thing (although with academic work I didn't always get my Friday off!). So in 2016 when my request for a further 20% reduction in work was denied I knew it was time to retire.
"A right time to plant and another to reap,"

But I still felt the need to do something to use the gifts God has given me (and to feel needed!!). I applied for two positions (both half time work) but got turned down. My wife told me later she was happy I didn't get any of the two jobs because she didn't think they suited me. Well what should I do then?
"A right time to search and another to count your losses,"

I started to look for work that I knew nobody wanted to do. Well, there are plenty - the Transition Bed Programs, the Convalescent Bed Programs etc. I knew these work were not profitable enough to attract family physicians so my intention was to build them up to the point that it would be both meaningful and financially sustainable. I also increased my work at the Nursing Home. So along with my bi-weekly volunteer work at the Refugee clinic and BBQ for the poor on Fridays I was busy enough.
"A right time to cry and another to laugh,
A right time to lament and another to cheer,
A right time to make love and another to abstain,
A right time to embrace and another to part,"

Well more than two years have gone by since my retirement. Was it the right decision? Absolutely YES!! I am finding that my work which focuses on the care of the elderly is meaningful and fulfilling. My faith has grown and (my wife told me) I am more content and generally more pleasant! And along the way I have reverted back to my original Catholic faith! I attend daily mass as often as 4 or 5 times a week and I paddle my bike to my 4 or 5 work places to stay fit. I have signed up for more volunteer work (I am the chairman of two not-for-profit boards, one Christian and another non-Christian). I have already transitioned one Transition Bed Program to a young physician and I look forward to transitioning more of my work to a young Christian graduate in January. My involvement in eHealth is increasing and I hope to finish what I started in my OSCAR project (worldoscar.org).

Praise God! There’s a Right Time for Everything.

But in the end, does it really make a difference what anyone does? I’ve had a good look at what God has given us to do—busywork, mostly. True, God made everything beautiful in itself and in its time—but he’s left us in the dark, so we can never know what God is up to, whether he’s coming or going. I’ve decided that there’s nothing better to do than go ahead and have a good time and get the most we can out of life. That’s it—eat, drink, and make the most of your job. It’s God’s gift.

"For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord"
(Romans 8:38-39)

"That is why I am suffering as I am. Yet this is no cause for shame, because I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him until that day."
(2 Timothy 1:12)