Investing Your Time
As I read Matthew 6:19-24 (The Message translation) this morning as a part of my devotional, I experienced an aha moment. The verse reads “Don’t hoard treasure down here where it gets eaten by moths and corroded by rust or-worse!- stolen by burglars. Stockpile treasure in heaven where it’s safe from moth and rust and burglars. It’s obvious, isn’t it? The place where your treasure is is the place you will most want to be, and end up being”…”If you live squinty-eyed in greed and distrust your body is a dank cellar. If you pull the blinds on your windows, what a dark life you will have!”
Ouch.
At least that was my reaction. You see I’m someone who likes to invest my time wisely. I like to complete tasks with efficiency and sometimes this means I allow myself to be blinded by my own agenda and forget to ask God where He would have me invest the time He’s given me. For example, G asked me if I wanted to volunteer at this event on Sunday. As he proposed the idea I thought to myself, “I’m already giving up an evening to work on ministry things, I have a ministry meeting in the morning and am volunteering at the Food and Clothing Drive my church has every third Saturday.” So I wanted Sunday to be “for me.” I’d planned to kick back, hang out with my old roommate Sam and scope out some shoes for some photos G and I are taking. I wasn’t really trying to rearrange those plans. Until God checked me this morning.
He forced me to ask myself, “If I only invest my time doing the things I like to do or those things that fit into the time slot of everything else I’m already doing, am I truly serving?” In my mind the answer was no. It’s like the last part of the verse from above says “If you live squinty-eyed in greed…your body is a dank cellar.” I can’t just put on the blinders to all the other areas of my life where God wants to use me and I can’t cite my current ministry involvement as an acceptable “Do Not Disturb” sign on the door of my life. I could be missing out on a huge opportunity.
Time is one of our biggest commodities and where we spend our time is a huge indication of where our priorities lie. When this world is over, I don’t want my time to reflect that I only did things that benefitted me. I want it to be a mirror image of the way Christ spent his time, healing and helping the sick, feeding the hungry and preaching and teaching the gospel.
This does not mean, from this moment forth I’m going to run myself into the ground each day trying to do everything. I’m still human and will need rest to function properly. But, I am going to work on not wearing myself out on things that only benefit me. Instead, I am going to work on spending more time asking God how He wants to use me and leaving room in my schedule for Him to move things around as He deems necessary.
“Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be added unto you.” – Matthew 6:33 (KJV).