Kairos

Greek has two words for time. Chronos is measured time — hours, days, the ticking clock. Kairos is different: it is the right time, the opportune or appointed moment, the season charged with significance. When Jesus began his ministry announcing the time is fulfilled, the word is kairos — the decisive hour had come.

Kairos teaches us that God works by appointment, not merely by calendar. In the fulness of the time God sent forth his Son; there is a kairos to be born and to die, to plant and to reap. For the believer, this is deeply steadying: our times are in his hands, and he is never early and never late. It also carries a summons — to redeem the time, seizing the God-given moment while it is here.