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Ever have one of those great days you never wanted to end? A day spent with your best friends doing something you absolutely loved. Or a day where the weather was just right. Or one of those last few days of summer. Don't you just wish some days could go on forever?

But then, there are those days that can't end fast enough. A day where everything goes wrong. A day that just seems to drag on forever … and ever … and ever.

On days like these I wish I had a Universal Remote Control for Time, like in the movie Click, where I could skip through the bad and boring parts and play the best parts over and over again.

Well, strangely enough, something like that kind of happened not once, but twice in the Old Testament. On two different occasions, the God who created time manipulated it and used it to serve his purpose and to bring him glory.

The first incident occurred in chapter 10 of the book of Joshua. Joshua was on a mission to defeat five wicked kings who had tormented Israel for way too long. By the hand of God and through several super sneaky surprise attacks, Joshua had been victorious so far. So in a moment of deep faith, he prayed out loud, in front of everyone, an outrageous prayer asking God to hit the pause button on the sun and the moon so he could defeat his enemies. Look at what happened:

"The day God gave the Amorites up to Israel, Joshua spoke to God, with all Israel listening: 'Stop, Sun, over Gibeon; Halt, Moon, over Aijalon Valley.' And sun stopped, moon stood stock still until he defeated his enemies … the sun stopped in its tracks in mid sky; just sat there all day. There's never been a day like that before or since" (Joshua 10:12-14, The Message).

The lesson found in this exercise of holy time–control? The God, who created time itself, was still the Lord over it and could use his control over creation to bring his people victory and bring himself glory.

The second time we see God mess with time is in Isaiah 38. King Hezekiah was at death's door. His prognosis had moved from "barely alive" to "mostly dead" when he began to weep and beg God not to let him die. God heard his prayer, was moved, and decided to let Hezekiah live for 15 more years. God gave Isaiah this message for King Hezekiah:

"'Watch for this: As the sun goes down and the shadow lengthens on the sundial of Ahaz, I'm going to reverse the shadow 10 notches on the dial.' And that's what happened: The declining sun's shadow reversed ten notches on the dial" (Isaiah 38:8, The Message).

Here we see God causing the shadow on a sundial to literally move backward, "adding" more hours to the day and more years to the life of King Hezekiah. It's like the original Daylight Savings. God literally made the hours on a sundial move backward. In doing so, he proved he was still in control of everything, including that crazy little thing called time.

So what does this have to do with our everyday lives? A ton. Now I don't think God will be stopping the sun anytime soon so that you can have more time to study for your history test. But I do know that there is not a second that passes that God doesn't allow to pass. God didn't put the sun, moon, days, hours and minutes into motion, set the timer and then go on a 50,000–year vacation. His power over time in these two stories reveals that he is actively engaged and in charge of every second. And he still cares about every second he creates.

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