Coffee Spoons and the Creation Mandate

There’s a line about time that has stuck in my memory from senior school English lessons:

“I have measured out my life with coffee spoons.”

It’s from T.S. Eliot’s famous poem, The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock, though I confess that I had to Google the phrase to discover that. And that in my memory it was sugar spoons. But the point remains – it is a memorable image.

The passing of time is such an intangible thing in so many ways – and the idea of measuring it in a concrete unit of daily action brings solidity to an otherwise elusive concept.

‘Lockdown’ – that now distant memory – brought this home to me.

Many people have commented on the strange effects that lockdown had on our perception of time. For those isolated at home, or for whom all their normal routines changed, our grip on time loosened. Without your daily commute, how do you know a working day has passed? With no classes to attend, how is Monday different from Saturday?

I worked from home before lockdown, more often than not, and many – though not all – of my regular weekly tasks were able to continue, albeit in a different way. But many of the routines changed incalculably. For me this was most noticeable on a Sunday, which went from one of my busiest days to a much more family-centred, leisurely affair.

Some of the change was good. I made more time to read. I slowed down. I was reminded that God works at a different speed, and in a completely different way, from me. And as so much of the ‘busyness’ with which I had previously filled my week reduced, I was reminded that the real work is done by God, and my part is prayer and prayerful preparation.

I also noticed that, quite unselfconsciously, I started adding new routines to mark the passing of time. So, for example, I started taking daily – often multiple times a day – leisurely walks around the garden. I carefully observed the different plants and the ways they were changing and growing.

Although I often did this while my tea was brewing, I wasn’t measuring my time in teabags; rather, I was marking the slow and steady growth that my Heavenly Father is bringing about, whether I wake or sleep.

There’s something wonderfully tangible about the horticultural change which can be seen. It’s such a stark contrast to so much of pastoral ministry where change is often (though not always) even more imperceptibly slow than the growth of new plants. Perhaps there’s an echo of Christian mindfulness here, in deliberately taking time to be in the moment and to observe the world around me.

It’s also perhaps no accident that it was in the garden that I noticed these things.

I’ve been convinced for some years that there is something wonderfully Genesis-1-and-2-esque about ‘tending the earth’ which, at some deep level, fulfils a creation mandate and so brings satisfaction as we cut with the God-given grain of the universe. (Although, of course, that could simply be the onset of middle age!)

Either way, it increased my thankfulness in the midst of a very strange time. Each day is a grace-gift from God, to be enjoyed as such in the light of his goodness and grace. As the garden grows – largely outside my control – I am reminded of my Heavenly Father who loves me and who is actively at work even in those times when I am at a loss to know what He is doing.

He has measured out my life and knows the number of my days. And, unlike Eliot’s narrator, he doesn’t do it with coffee spoons.

This article originally appeared in a slightly different form on thevirtualword.org