African Time

While walking down the street in an African village, I soon discovered the necessity of taking time to visit with the people I would meet. No matter what each person's destination or the purpose of their travels, the most important thing at this moment for them was to stop, inquire into my welfare (at length), and make me feel both welcome and important. Schedules, appointments, business -- all gave way to the pre-eminence of the person standing before them.

I was deeply impressed with the value their culture places on the person. The person is more important than the task at hand; the person is more important than making money; the person is more important than some schedule. This was true not just for me as a visitor, but also for one another in their world.

Therefore, time became a very fluid commodity. We would joke about African time and say "It is 7 o'clock until it is 8 o'clock," because if someone was scheduled for a meeting at 7, they might not arrive until 8. For those of us from a western culture with the emphasis on punctuality, it took some adjustment, and sometimes a lot of patience. I found this same focus on the importance of the individual to the denigration of time in the Hispanic culture, both in Bolivia and in South Texas.

Yet, as I read the story of Jesus in the Gospels, it seems that he was anything but pressured by deadlines or hemmed in by time constraints. He always had time, took time, made time for the needs of the person in front of him -- the blind, the crippled, the infirmed, the hungry. Definitely people were his priority as he went about doing the will of his Father.

If I look at the way my time is spent, what does it tell me about my priorities? Are people more important than anything else? Do I spend time with the people who are the most significant in my life? Or are work, schedules, deadlines controlling me? Is this the way that I want it to be?