On Saturday, September 23rd, 2023 at 2:50 am, EST, something interesting happened. The sun crossed an imaginary line above the earth’s equator. And for a single moment, the earth was neither tilted away or toward the sun by 23.5 degrees. It was perpendicular to the sun. While we all probably missed it because we were most likely all asleep; we have just been through the 2023 Autumn Equinox.
This global balancing phenomenon happens twice a year, in the Autumn and the Spring. On our Northern Hemisphere calendars, every September, it signals the end of summertime and the start of fall. At the autumn equinox, the days and nights are of equal length, although for us, the daytime seems to be a bit longer because of refracted light.
This kind of perfect balance doesn’t last very long for our planet, and perfect balance doesn’t last very long in our lives either. It seems that we humans live in a constant struggle. Our work / play life balance never seems equal. There is seemingly always more work to do and less time and money for leisure. We want to spend more time doing the things that we love, but our schedules rarely allow it. And then we feel guilty, knowing that we should spend more time with the people that we love and that we should put in more work on that project for our boss, and we should exercise more and we should get more sleep; but all our schedules never seem to work out that way. Our lives pitch and yaw and we roll on through our months and years, seeking any way to just make it through our daily to-do list while not missing our next appointment.
I don’t know about you, but I find some comfort in the fact that the Earth is seldom in equal balance. God has designed it so that 363 days a year, our planet spins along on in its tilted orbit; the light of its days and the darkness of its nights unequal and in constant flux, either growing darker for longer in the winter or lighter for longer in the summer. The earth does not exist perpetually in a perfectly perpendicular status. The harmonious event of the equinox is fleeting, it is the exception and not the rule.
In the same way, it is ok if our lives are also rarely perfectly in balance. We do the best that we can with the minutes we have been given, and we count on the grace of God to forgive us as we occasionally miss deadlines and when we often fall short of being our best selves. As humans, we cannot balance our own schedules, nor the entirety of the world.
Ecclesiastes chapter 3 reminds us that for everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven. It does not say that our lives will constantly be harmoniously balanced, but that there is an appropriate time for every human matter and deed. May we all have the wisdom to know what to do and when to do it. May we get all of our necessary things done, well enough to get us through all of our seasons. May we all seek to love God every day while loving our neighbor and ourselves. So be it!
Article printed in Rockford Squire Newspaper 9/28/2023.
