When something runs perfectly, operates smoothy, we say it runs like a “Swiss Watch.” These time pieces became known by their precision and carefully engineered parts. A good watch is used to tell time in minutes, hours, days, months, and even years. This year is a Leap year, which is calculated by precision time keeping. For a year is not 365 days, it really takes 365 days 5 hours 48 minutes and 56 seconds for the earth to circle the Sun. Every year is exactly the same, down to the second. That extra time needs to be accounted for, so every four years we add an extra day; February 29th: Leap Year.
If we did not add that extra day, over a couple of centuries it would throw off our calendars, then our seasons, and we could find ourselves celebrating Summer in December. If our orbit around the sun was off a few hours or minutes, each year our life would be in constant chaos.
Thankfully, God’s universe runs like a Swiss watch, one that never needs winding. Our Solar system operates with great precision by a carefully engineered created power. God set up His universe that “while the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease” (Gen. 8:22). Our year’s journey around the sun takes place with such precision that… well, you can set your watch by it!
-Dennis Doughty
