Kairos Moments
Chronos Time:
The sequential passing of time, chronological time.
It’s about dates and clock time.
Kairos Time:
Kairos Time:
An event, moment, or crisis when time can seem to “stand still.”
A period of “time” when chronos is of no importance.
It could mark a significant shift in your life (Breen 29)
This past Sunday we had a good conversation about Kairos moments from the year 2009. Each of us took some time discussing the various things that God used in our lives to teach us and grow us. If you are unfamiliar with the model we use to analyze Kairos moments let me explain a bit.
One of the tools we utilize at the distillery to help us put these things into perspective is Lifeshape’s ™ Circle diagram (see below).
As these significant events occur in our lives it is for us to take some time and step out of ourselves for just a moment to try and see if maybe God is using these moments to teach us something valuable about ourselves. Thus, when the Kingdom of God is at hand, or intervenes in our lives, it is our task to “repent” (or have a change of heart and mind) and “believe” (do something about it).
That means that we must first observe the things going on in our lives. We then reflect on their impact and the implications those things have on on us. We take it to the group and talk about it (discuss). After deciding that God is trying to teach us something new we turn towards God in obedience and begin to make changes in our lives for the better.
We begin the process of “believing” by planning what we will do next. Then we ask our friends to keep us to our plan (account), and ultimately we carry the plan out (act). By following this simple model we can then effectively respond to the good news that God is intervening in our lives by bringing the Kingdom near to us.
Sunday we talked about the different things we have learned and made a commitment to keep our eyes open this year for more. It was a good time had by all.
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Notes:
Breen, Michael. The Circle: Choosing to Learn From Life. Colorado Springs: Nexgen. 2006. Print
3 Comments to “Kairos Moments”
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By Averyl, January 5, 2010 @ 7:36 pm
Thanks for sharing this. It is really relevant to what is going on in my life right now. I’m making a big change — moving — and trying to weed out of my life things that I don’t need. Since I tend to hang onto stuff forever, this is really tough for me. Hopefully, I can repent of hanging onto things past their time of usefulness and believe by planning what to get rid of and following through. Thanks again!
By John, January 5, 2010 @ 10:11 pm
Glad it helps Averyl. We too have done a huge amount of scaling down and simplifying. Of course it seems like we keep gravitating towards more stuff and we have to keep scaling back.
Sometimes things like this can have a spiritual reality attached to them as well. For instance you may also be dispensing with things spiritually that have not been “useful” over the years, ey?
By Averyl, January 6, 2010 @ 8:51 am
Jaimes told me about your purging.
I hope that I am dispensing with things spiritually that have not been useful. I tend to be a packrat in that area, too. Some lessons to be learned here…