A time to walk and a time to wait

There are some places along the promenade where the waves almost always break over the railing at high tide, even if it isn't stormy. As I walk there often, I have learnt to gauge when it is safe to walk past so that I don't get sprayed with wet, salty sea spray. Those who are careless, get wet. One needs to watch how far away the next wave is, how fast it is travelling, and how big it is. Not all the waves break onto the promenade.

The Spirit can teach us how to make righteous judgements about people or situations to gauge their safety, whether physical or spiritual. Careless people don't learn how to judge, don't listen to the Spirit, rely on their own judgements, and get "sprayed with wet, salty sea water". As they make mistakes, they suffer in some way for making inaccurate judgements.

There is a time to walk and a time to wait so as not to be sprayed by the waves. There is a time to do all things, each in its appropriate time. A time to serve a mission, a time to marry, a time to have children, and so on. Doing things at the wrong time or in the wrong order can lead to heartache. I have learnt to walk just before the wave reaches the promenade, just as surfers learn the exact moment when to catch a wave, or it will be missed. There are opportunities we should take when presented, or we will lose out, eg the call to serve a mission.

"There is a tide in the affairs of men
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries."

(Julius Caesar Act 4 Scene 3 Lines 218 - 221 by Shakespeare)

"To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; ... a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; ... a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; ... a time to keep silence, and a time to speak... " (Ecclesiastes 3: 1-9)