The Dawning Of A New Day.

New Year's Day was not always celebrated on January 1st. Here are a few facts to consider:

• The early Roman calendar designated March 1 as the new year. The calendar had just ten months, beginning with March. September through December, our ninth through twelfth months, were originally positioned as the seventh through tenth months (septem is Latin for "seven," octo is "eight," novem is "nine," and decem is "ten."
• The month of January did not even exist until around 700 B.C., when the second king of Rome, Numa Pontilius, added the months of January and February.
• The new year was moved from March to January in Rome in 153 B.C. because that was the beginning of the civil year, the month that the two newly elected Roman consuls—the highest officials in the Roman republic—began their one-year tenure.
• In 46 B.C. Julius Caesar introduced a new, solar-based calendar that was a vast improvement on the ancient Roman calendar. The Julian calendar decreed that the new year would occur with January 1, and within the Roman world, January 1 became the consistently observed start of the new year.
• In medieval Europe, however, the celebrations accompanying the new year were considered pagan and unchristian like, and in 567 the Council of Tours abolished January 1 as the beginning of the year. At various times and in various places throughout medieval Christian Europe, the new year was celebrated on Dec. 25, the birth of Jesus; March 1; March 25, the Feast of the Annunciation; and Easter.
• In 1582, the Gregorian calendar reform restored January 1 as new year's day. Although most Catholic countries adopted the Gregorian calendar almost immediately, it was only gradually adopted among Protestant countries.

So, what did you do on New Year's Eve? How did you celebrate the ending of the old year and the bringing in of the new; the changing of a Decade; the changing of a Year; the changing of a Month; the Dawning of a New Day? While Cindi and I did not doing anything other than watch the ball drop on TV, we will still remember such insignificant actions because of the significance of the time.

 New Years Day is a time that is recognized as a chance to start over, a time of new beginnings. A specific time that bookmarks in our memories insignificant events. Sometimes resolutions are made to make positive changes in order to make the event significant along with the time. A laying aside of past regrets, filled with determination and new hope for a better future, and New Years Day will provide the time frame to mark the occassion. Where were you New Year's Day when we went from 1999 to 2000 on the calendar? On that day I was skydiving at a Drop Zone in Simcoe Ontario.

 But we don't have to wait to turn the page of a year on a calendar to mark a change of direction. We don't need to use a significant time to measure an insignificant occasion, we can use a significant occassion to mark an insignificant time. Where were you when the first man landed on the moon? Where were you when Kennedy got shot? What about when planes flew into the twin towers? That is the most glaring example of an occasion marking a day so much so, that all anyone has to say is the numbers 9, and 11 together, and it makes that date significant by the significant events of that day.

A birth or a marriage; a promotion or an accident all makes the time and date memorable, but the anniversary of those times and dates make what ever events that transpire on those dates memorable. A gift received on your birthday makes both the gift and when it was received memorable.

And how about this for a remembering of times and occassions: One year,Cindi's son got a watch for Christmas, and it had an alarm that could go off every minute. After the clock struck midnight New Years day, and every everyone shouted "Happy New Year!" one minute later his watch alarm went off and he shouted "Happy New Minute." So that is an event remembered by a time remembered by an occassion remembered by a time! Whew.

The bible has lots to say about time, which I don't want to take up too much of your time, reading about all of the times that I could take the time to list.... so, I will just take the time to list a few.
 
 Psalm 39:4 “O Lord, help me understand my mortality and the brevity of life! Let me realize how quickly my life will pass! 5 Look, you make my days short-lived, and my life span is nothing from your perspective. Surely all people, even those who seem secure, are nothing but vapor"

Ecclesiastes 3:1 For everything there is an appointed time, and an appropriate time for every activity on earth: 2 A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to uproot what was planted; 3 A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; 4 A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance. 5 A time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; 6 A time to search, and a time to give something up as lost; a time to keep, and a time to throw away; 7 A time to rip, and a time to sew; a time to keep silent, and a time to speak. 8 A time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace.

Ecclesiastes 3:9 What benefit can a worker gain from his toil? 10 I have observed the burden that God has given to people to keep them occupied. 11 God has made everything fit beautifully in its appropriate time, but he has also placed ignorance in the human heart so that people cannot discover what God has ordained, from the beginning to the end of their lives. 

“Time” is the Greek word kairos. In contrast to chronos which may refer to elapsed time, or to the duration of time, kairos more often looks at fixed or definite time, and especially of the quality or characteristics of a particular time with its accompanied events. Kairos is used 85 times in the New Testament and 30 of these by Paul.

Kairos time is most significant when it marks an event by which God uses to change the course of your life! Many Chronos years may have transpired before a Kairos moment takes place, and you become a believer in Jesus Christ as your savior. As a believer more Chronos time takes place and then God marks another Kairos moment in your life and you have a deeper revelation of Truth that changes your relationship with God to something more significant than ever before!

It is sometimes that Chronos marks the significance of Kairos, and other times Kairos marks the remembrance of Chronos. Chronos can mark the Dawning Of A New Day as far as the passage of time on a clock goes, but what is more significant in our lives is when we can mark those Kairos moments; the significant events that mark a spiritual Dawning Of A New Day!