Redeeming the Time

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Redeeming the Time

For Ourselves, Our Families, & For Others

Has any ever said the following?
I wish I just had more time. I am so busy. I just don’t have time.
Have you ever these type of thoughts?
I need to get of rid of some things to do in my life or I need to be less busy.
I wish I had more time with my family.
I wish I could spend more time reading my Bible and praying.
We live in a culture that has never been so “busy”. Everyone is looking to fulfill their purpose in their lives, but how many actually just stop to think about if their time is being well invested.
Stewardship is an important topic in the Church, but when it is brought up, most will automatically associate stewardship to finances alone.
Stewardship: the conducting, supervising, or managing of something especially : the careful and responsible management of something entrusted to one's care
Stewardship applies to finances but also applies to others things such as our time.
To further explain this, the CDC National Center for Health Statistics estimates that the average life span of an individual from birth is 77.5 years.
Males have average lifespan of 77.8 years and women 80.2.
To put this is perspective, if you are a 40 years old, this means that on average you have 38 birthdays left, 38 New Years left, 38 Summers left, 38 Christmas’ left and the list goes on.
This is a humbling thought. When I first heard this example my mind immediately went to Matthew 25 verse 21.
Matthew 25:21 ESV
His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’
In the grand scheme of time, we have been given a small portion to be responsible over.
When that day comes when we stand before God on the day of judgement, will we be able to look over our life that we were given and be able to say that we used it for His kingdom?

Perceive Time's Preciousness

Ephesians 5:15–16 ESV
Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil.
How many believe that the day we live in are evil?
We all know that our King Jesus is returning soon. The signs are everywhere and time is shortening more and more.
Time is a precious investment that God has given us. We often circle our thoughts around material things and money.
What job can I take to make more money?
What investments can I do to increase the dollars in my bank account?
Where can I earn more money to pay for these bills that keep piling up?
Money comes as easily as it goes. Time is an investment from God into us that once it is gone, we can never get back.
The more projects I work on, such as vehicle maintenance and house projects, the more I am willing to give up more money to buy a tool to save me time.
Time is our most important asset that we have in this life.
In the King James Version of Ephesians 5:5-16
Ephesians 5:15–16 KJV 1900
See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, Redeeming the time, because the days are evil.
We need to redeem our time. But why?
Paul began Ephesians 5 discussing all the different devices of life and how we are to abstain from them because we are followers of Him.
Jesus was asked by the Pharisees in Matthew 22:34-36
Matthew 22:34–36 ESV
But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?”
Matthew 22:37–40 ESV
And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
One day when I came home while we still lived at our apartment in Pulaski, my wife let me know that our carpet cleaner broke down and it was leaking water everywhere.
So, I did what every good husband and privileged American die, I threw it away and bought another one. I am kidding.....
No I am too cheap for that. I took that carpet cleaner and ran it and looked for the source of the leak. Once I found it I began to take it apart, and I took it apart I discovered the inner workings of what made that carpet cleaner function.
Long story short, I was able to get it to work again, because I reversed engineered it.
I say this to show you my frame of mind. When I read this scripture of Jesus answering the lawyer, I reversed engineered His response.
If we don’t love ourselves, then we can never love people.
We will never love ourselves, unless we love God with everything.
If we truly love someone or something, we are willing to give up our most valuable asset, time, without hesitation.
Do you know what the phrase I don’t have time means? It is not a priority.
I know we wish we had more time for a lot of different things, but the reality is, is that we are all given the same 24 hours a day, 168 hours a week.
It is not that we don’t have enough time, it comes down more to what do we prioritize in our lives.
The Jar of Life Visual Aid (5-10 minutes)
Step 1: Assemble the following items:
A large jar,
like a mayo jar
some large rocks or shells or golf balls
Gravel 
Sand
Fill the jar with the rocks first.
Step 3: Ask the group if the jar is full, they’ll likely say yes.
Step 4: Fill the jar with the gravel and sand.
The jar represents your life, and the rocks are your most important things — like your family, health, work, and so on.
The gravel represents things like your house and car, and the sand represents everything else.
Which objects you put in first determines how many of the other items you can include.
It highlights the importance of prioritizing each urgent task and getting those done first; otherwise, we may not have time for the smaller tasks.
We redeem the time by establishing it into what is important to God to invest it into.
There's a story about a professor who filled a jar with rocks, then pebbles, and finally sand. When asked if the jar was full, he replied that it was. But when he added water, it filled even more! This illustrates how we prioritize our time—putting the big things first (the rocks). If we focus on the important tasks that God has given us, we'll find we have time for everything else in life too!
By redeeming or making the most of our time, as Christ did, we live in a manner that glorifies Him, making purposeful choices in our daily activities to serve and honor Him.

Ponder Life's Limits

Psalm 90:12 (ESV)
So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.
In Moses’ prayer to God, we find that when we number our days, we gain a heart of wisdom.
Finding the Ace of Spades Visual (5 minutes)
Shuffle one pack of cards so they’re random, and organize the other in ascending order.
Give each player a pack of cards.
Players must try to find the Ace of Spades in the deck as quickly as possible.
The player with the organized deck will find the challenge much easier than the player with the mixed deck.
This activity highlights the importance of:
Spending a little time organizing a schedule for the day.
Improving productivity by tackling priority tasks first.
It is seems pretty simple to find extra time when we have things organized.
Time Diary Visual Aid (10 minutes)
Hand each student a week calendar that is provides time slots incremented for 30 minutes.
Have students fill out every slot available with their weekly schedule.
This activity reveals that we have time for important items in our life if we so choose to.
I want everyone here to know, that I do practice this for my everyday life, but that doesn’t mean that I arrive to every meeting on time.
It doesn’t mean that wake up at exactly the same time everyday bright eyed and bushy tailed ready to start the day.
I am a fellow struggle just trying to redeem his time for God’s glory and purpose, but we cannot let that be an excuse in our lives on why we can redeem our time.
“I don’t have the same shift everyday.” Then plan a daily calendar for each different shift you may have.
“I don’t wake up at the same time everyday.” Maybe then we need to become more disciple to our alarm clock. Maybe move it so far away from your bed that you have to get up to turn it off.
Whatever excuse we come up with, will not be good enough when the day of judgement comes.
When God asks us if we reached others are we going to say “Well God, I really wanted to, but I was so tired from working all day that I straight home everyday. I wanted to wake up to prayer and read my Bible early in the morning, but my bed was just so comfortable.”
There is not one, no not one reason nor excuse that we are going to be able to give to God on why we couldn’t take His investment of time into us and utilize it for serving His kingdom and reaching people.
This is a call to recognize the transient nature of life and motivate us to consider the significance of each day.
By valuing every moment, just as Jesus did in His ministry, we can develop habits that maximize our effectiveness for God’s kingdom.

Pursue God's Timing

Ecclesiastes 3:1–8 (ESV)
For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace.
Do you think time is important to God?
Every opportunity and activity that becomes available to us does not mean that it is the will of God for us to participate in them.
I once ask the question in my study time, “How did the apostles know where to go and who to heal in world full of lost and hurting people?”
There was so much need in their time , so much sickness physically and yet they were able to effectively reach their entire known world.
You know what I discovered? This is going to be really deep. (Sarcastic)
They were Spirit-led.
We need to make sure that we are not so busy in the work of God that we miss the hand of God in our lives.
For example, is feeding the homeless a work of God? Sure it is!
Using my life, however, is that the call of God in my life? No. God has called me to the Brown County Sheriff’s Office and Jail at this time in my life.
Does that mean I can’t feed the homeless? No, I can still do that, but I priority to invest my time into is ministry to the officers and inmates.
We need to make sure not to not beat our drums to the rhythm of this world and its needs. We need to beat our drums to the rhythm of God’s purpose for our lives.
God wants us to reach others, but we must do it according to His will and purpose for our lives.
He has created each of us uniquely and gifted us with intentional purposes which means that (pick someone in the room), you are going to be able to reach people that I will never be able to reach.
Proverbs 16:9 ESV
The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps.
I once set a goal to wake up early and exercise before work.
The first day, my alarm rang, and I thought I’d hit snooze for just five more minutes.
Five minutes turned into an hour, and I was late! I chuckled thinking, 'I’m not off to a good start!'
But as I thought about it, it reminded me of the parable of the ten virgins in Matthew 25.
All ten virgins took their lamps and left to meet the bridegroom. Some of the virgins were wise and took oil with them not knowing how long they would have to wait for the bridegroom to arrive.
The other virgins were foolish and didn’t take oil with them. While waiting on the delayed bridegroom, all of the virgins became drowsy and slept.
At midnight, the was a cry “Here is the bridegroom!” The wise virgins trimmed their lamps and the foolish virgins told the wise virgins to give them some of their oil for their lamps were going out.
The wise virgins informed the foolish virgins that there wasn’t enough oil to share and that they needed to go and purchase more.
When the foolish virgins returned, however, it was too late.
Matthew 25:11–13 ESV
Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, ‘Lord, lord, open to us.’ But he answered, ‘Truly, I say to you, I do not know you.’ Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.
Just as they needed to be prepared for the bridegroom, we too must be ready. Time is a gift that needs stewardship, not procrastination!
When we have a balanced calendar and schedule, the little things that life throws at us won’t have as much as an effect on us when we didn’t have disciple to steward our time.
Our mental state, our emotions, and our families will remain constant and stable, inline with God’s will, if we steward our time wisely.
The stewardship of time is not only for our personal benefit, but it will ultimately determine our effectiveness and reach to influences other’s eternal fates.
We end tonight with:
Colossians 4:5 ESV
Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time.

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