Peter Willox, Vicar of St. John’s, Ben Rhydding

THIS morning I went for a walk with our dog up on Ilkley Moor… and it was icy. This was a bit of a shock considering the warm weather we have been having.

I love to see the passing of the seasons, but much prefer the smooth more drawn out type of transition than the jolt of moving from 4th gear to 1st . Mind you, whilst I was up on the moor looking at the icy stones, I was reminded that these very rocks were formed over millennia, and sculpted most dramatically by a thousand metres of ice during the last ice age which ended about 13,000 years ago. That season took a long time to change, possibly about 7000 years from beginning to end; from one extreme… as they say.

My moor top meanderings come not in isolation but are part of a season of musing I am having at the moment as I spend some time away from my Church work on a sabbatical break. As part of this, a couple of weeks ago, I spent a few days further up the valley on a retreat at Scargill House, near Kettlewell, which was led by two wonderful ladies from the creative arts retreat movement (CARM – look them up if you are interested). The theme that we took was about time, specifically “time with God”, and was based around the famous passage from Ecclesiastes chapter 3 which begins, “There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven”. The theme really resonated with some thoughts I had already been having on my break, particularly the need to simplify my life and not be rushing around filling up every minute of every day with ‘doing’. However, I was also struck by the suggestion that every moment of my life, whatever I was doing, had a purpose in God’s view of things.

So, now I put these two experiences together: one on the top of the moor, thinking about large spans of time and the slow work of nature shaping our geography and geology; and the other, in a retreat house thinking about the minutiae of my comings and goings and how, in and through time, God has been shaping the geography and geology of my own life. I am thus reminded how true those words of Solomon are, on both the macro and the micro level. “There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under heaven.” There is a time for the shaping and changing of landscapes, and there is a time for the shaping and changing of lives, and each seems to be equally important to God.

Solomon goes on to say, “He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.” I am determined, post sabbatical, to continue to spend some time as the seasons pass contemplating the truth of that paradox. Perhaps you might join me…?