To leap from day to day like a mad hunter scouring the fields, is an omen of being delivered over to destruction.

But the solemn pause, the deliberate consideration — these are means of grace and signs of an indwelling life.

The tide of ocean stays a while at ebb before it resolves to flood again.  The moon sometimes lingers at the full.

There are distinct hedges in nature set between the acres of time — even the stroke of the bell is a little mound of warning; men should not remove landmarks, but beat  the bounds frequently and keep with due interval and solemnity the remembrance of the passing away of days, and months, and years.

— C. H. Spurgeon – Preface to Evening By Evening

Think about people who find themselves in religious ruts. They discover a number of things about themselves. They will find that they are getting older but not getting any holier. Time is their enemy, not their friend. The time they trusted and looked to is betraying them, for they often said to themselves, “The passing of time will help me. I know some good old saints, so as I get older I’ll get holier and better. Time will help me, purify me and revive me.” They said that the year before last, but they were not helped any last year. Time betrayed them. They were not any better last year than they had been the year before.

— A. W. Tozer – Rut, Rot, or Revival

How solemn is the reflection, that with a new cycle of time for each traveler to Zion, commences a new and untrodden path!  New events in his history will transpire, new scenes in the panorama of life will unfold, new phases of character will develop, new temptations will attack, new duties will be assigned, new trials will be experienced, new sorrows will be felt, new friendships will be formed, new mercies will be bestowed.  As the pilgrim journeying thru the wilderness to his eternal home stands upon the threshold of this untried period of his existence, how truly may it be said, when pondering the unknown and uncertain future, “Ye have not passed this way before.”

— Octavius Winslow – Morning Thoughts