The Lord of Time

Christmas represents the time of our Lord while the New Year underscores the Lord of all time. In nearly total sync, calendars for 2009 are discarded, computers and electronic devices automatically reset, and a multitude of people recast their thinking to the New Year’s designation of 2010. All at once, every year, the global New Year focuses on Jesus Christ, the Lord of all time.

Because of His unique divine Lordship, "…at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth. And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." (Philippians 2:10 & 11) Most Bible interpreters assign this to a future time when all mankind, dead or alive, will acknowledge His literal and visible Kingdom rule. But everyone should bow now, and in this New Year’s calendar miracle, they involuntarily do so by instantly changing the year designation.

Every "Happy New Year!" carries a subtle worship of Christ. On New Year’s Eve, much of the world will watch the huge crystal ball in Times Square slide down the enormous pole to be electrically set ablaze with "2010." At that moment, believer and atheist, Christian and pagan, young and old, rich and poor, all universally bow at the Bethlehem manger. Indeed, as someone once said, "The door of history swings on the hinge of the Bethlehem stable."

Secular people, even atheists, will bow on unwilling bended knee each time 2010 is written into a business contract, inscribed on a check or printed on a school paper. Almost no one realizes it nor do secular analysts understand why, but the world’s business is done according to the Christian calendar, counted from the birth of Christ in a lowly cow stall in a tiny obscure village in southern Judea.

There are countless alternate ethnic and historic calendars that could have become the global timekeepers, but somehow the world has been irresistibly drawn to using the Christian calendar, which honors the great bisection of time accomplished by the birth of Christ. No parliament voted it, no monarch imposed it, no army marched to enforce it, and no global body decreed it. Yet, every knee is subtly bowing to the Lord of time, celebrating His birthday every day of every year.

This global designation crystallized only about 200 years ago, meaning that some 1,800 years after His birth, a global influence was growing. Our Jewish friends reject the Messiahship of Christ but tangentially honor Him by using he terms BCE and CE to designate "Before the Common Era," and "Common Era." Both precisely correspond to BC and AD, which meaning "Before Christ" and "the year of our Lord."

2010 AD means "two thousand and ten, the year of our Lord," and "Lord" is not Mohammed, Confucius, Bhudda or even Abraham, but Christ. The founders of the United States of America dated their Articles of Confederation and U.S. Constitution with "In the year of our Lord," and American presidents have concluded their many proclamations with that same stunning line. (In case you are wondering about the Declaration of Independence, it is dated "July 4th, 1776," and refers to God four times.)

Revelation 1:8 & 11; 21:6 and 22:13 all refer to Christ as "Alpha and Omega," which are the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet. In other words, Jesus is "the beginning and end."

As 2010 dawns, every knee may not be bowing as it should, but every knee is bending as it must. Welcome to the New Year of 2010 AD, another year of our Lord, who is clearly Lord of all time. And the New Year is always happiest when He is not only a historical Lord but our personal Savior.

Dave Virkler