By Ryan Shaw
We’ve all been given general life resources: time, affections, money, talents and more. With these resources there is an expectation that we will maximize them for the glory of God. Our response to these life resources reveal our capacity to effectively walk in obedience to God or not.
One of the most critical resources we have been given is time. How we use our time demonstrates much about us as believers. We want to be careful not to squander time but use it in activities that cultivate our purpose in God.
We all have 168 hours weekly at our disposal. The same 24 hours of every day exist for all. We don’t want to say before the judgment seat of Christ, “I wish I’d spent my time differently in order to better serve God.”
If we don’t seize our God-given time, someone or something else will. More times than not our time is not directed time. We don’t want to be about whatever comes our way, but be people of a “Focused Life” according to God’s uniquely scripted call on our lives.
We want to take back control of time in order to purposely serve the calling God has placed upon us. One way to do this is to develop an action plan for managing our time.
A purpose of such a “time management plan” is to set aside allotments of time to develop skills, aspects of our spiritual lives, prayer life, secret life, excellence in relationships, excellence in ministry and or whatever other area important for you to come into the fullness of your destiny in God.
Most often we “intend” to do these things but time gets away from us. Instead of merely having good intentions we need to be sure we are being deliberate about making time for the key development areas of our lives.
One of the pitfalls of managing our time effectively is the “tyranny of the urgent.” This refers to items that come along to distract our use of time from the most important things. It is those “urgent” issues that steal our time from doing what we are supposed to be doing to fulfill our destiny in God.
Before we get into our “time management plan” we want to ask ourselves some crucial questions. Our plan (and the allotments of time) needs to serve the overall sense of divine purpose God has for us. Thus, we need to be somewhat clear of the direction God is leading us.
Questions might include:
(1) What do you want to be said of you when you stand before the judgment seat of Christ?
(2) What do you believe God has put within you to accomplish through your life for His purposes?
(3) What are the areas you are most passionate about when it comes to serving Him?
(4) What have others told you about your strengths, abilities and gifts that confirm the Lord leading you toward a certain destiny in Him?
To develop an effective “time management plan” you want it to be focused and precise, covering the entire 168 hours weekly, and working toward serving your sense of divine purpose in life.
You want to be able to say what you are doing on specific days and times for the next 3 months, 6 months, etc in order to maintain focus toward your overall life vision. It is most helpful to break your weekly schedule down in 15 minutes, 30 minutes, or hour long increments to remain focused.
Some categories of deliberate time allotment to maximize your life energies and serve your overall life vision might include:
(1) Family
(2) Relationships
(3) Ministry
(4) Money (giving & saving)
(5) Bible Study
(6) Prayer
(7) Fasting
(8) Leisure
(9) Rest
(10) Exercise
(11) Serving
