Only 150 hours....

...until the Hobbit. 7 days. One week. Etc etc CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?!!

I've faithfully scratched off each day on my countdown calendar, adding numbers in the corners. The bottom right is for how many days. The bottom left is how many weeks (used to be months, but we're into less-than-month-counting now) the top left is how many hours, and the top right is how many days until the DW Christmas special. (18)

There. Are. Only. 7. Days. Until. I. See. It.

7 days, you understand. 150 hours, currently. (in about 15 minutes it will be 149 hours) I've been waiting longer than a year, and it's only 150 hours away. Less than 150 hours, actually.

I am ecstatic. I am excited and I keep bouncing like that hopping hen in Between the Lions and I can't keep from humming and it's only a week away!

And...
Well...
See, I got to wondering (read: Dad made me think of) how much time and energy I'm spending on this movie. Not to mention money. And thoughts. And desktop backgrounds. Anyway, it's a lot of time.

But I got to wondering about how ridiculously jumpy and excited I'd be if I didn't know when it would come out. I know that I'll see An Unexpected Journey at midnight, Pacific Time, December 14th, 2012, in a certain city. But what if I didn't? What if they had never released the release date? I've known the day it was coming out for longer than a year! If, when I had first heard about it, they just said, "Yeah, it's going to be coming out soon," and that was all they ever said, what would I be doing then?

*dons black sunglasses and a walkie talkie and agent voice* Canvass all area theaters, run hacking programs on Mr. Jackson's computer, track cast and crew, stake out the theater most likely to show it first. May need to turn to those who can drive and ask for their assistance.

Or would I? would I just shrug and say, "Well, I'll keep tabs on the movie theater, I suppose." Would I be even more indifferent? "It's probably going to take them 5 years to come out with the movie, I've got other things I can be doing."

and that got me to wondering how the apostle Paul stood it. He "eagerly awaited" his Lord's coming, and he didn't know when He was coming. He did not have a countdown calendar, he was not counting the hours, but he was still as excited and ready at the end of his life for Jesus to come as when he had first learned of it.

And us? We tend to shrug it off. "Eh, He's been gone for thousands of years. He's not coming back any time soon. I'll--*swallows*--focus on this fictional movie and give it all of my time and energy." If we did know the exact hour Jesus was coming, what would we do? How would we prepare, if at all? (If I know when The Hobbit is coming out, how am I going to act?) If we don't know when He is coming, then what do we do? (and this is where the illustration goes a bit wobbly. Truth be told, if I didn't know when it was coming out, I'd probably forget about it.) Perhaps a better question is what should we do?

As the oft-repeated saying goes, "If you knew you were going to die tomorrow, what would you do today?" Perhaps a better saying is, "For all you know, you will die in the next second. How are you going to spend the rest of what little time you have?"

I'm still excited about the Hobbit, don't get me wrong--EEk! 149 hours!--but I'm going to try and spend at least an equal time thinking about my Creator. How about you? (and if you aren't spending it thinking about God, what are you spending it on? Family? Friends? Angry Birds? What really matters?)