How we spend our time is so important and pausing to look at our activities and evaluating how what those activities are and how they help us to fruitful, balanced and available to serve God and others is a worthy endeavor.
I did this recently and realized that I could gain almost 5 morning hours per week if I combined my two exercise groups at an earlier hour. I often feel time-crunched in the mornings, not having enough prayer time, and I had to be willing to give up own training time and exercise along with my students to gain this time. So far it has been wonderful to have more time to pray and be more available to serve my family and ministries. It has also been fun and humbling to train alongside my students.
Evaluating how we spend our time and asking the Holy Spirit to guide us in how we use our time can be important in our walk with Jesus. Having a more ‘eternal perspective’ on time can help us see it as a treasure and to seek to be good stewards of our time to better serve God and the people he places in our lives.
Sometimes looking at our time this way leads us to adjust our schedules to permit ourselves to have more unscheduled time to spend with God and our family and friends. Other times, and in different seasons of our lives, we may feel called to spend more time in more formal ways, such as joining a weekly bible study group, going on a week- or month-long retreat or volunteering to lead or assist a ministry.
I often hear people say they don’t have time in their week to both exercise and pray — especially if they are working full-time and/or raising a young family. Sometimes adjusting our expectations can help us to fit both in to strengthen us both physically and spiritually. We might consider walking and praying or stretching and praying a few minutes in the morning. Maybe we are praying in the car on the way to work and again at night. Maybe it’s spending more time in prayer and exercising on the days we have more time and less on those days we are busy serving others (serving is prayer!)
I would say that my prayer life and physical life are constantly changing due to the ebbs and flows of the various activities, family and work commitments. Praying and asking the Holy Spirit to guide me can often yield surprisingly results — I have found that I can sometimes fit in way more than I ever thought possible on the days when i truly turn my schedule over to God. Even when I’m busier than I like to be, I try to look at it as “my cup is full ” and consider it a blessing — with the hope and prayer of returning to more balance in the future.
Every now and then, God calls us to do big and hard things in our lives that may move our time into an uncomfortable zone, such as when we care for a sick family member, prepare to move, change jobs, train for a marathon, go back to school, write a book, manage our own illness or infirmity, and so on. These can be beautiful and holy times in our lives, filled with extraordinary grace and spiritual growth when we approach these activities with an eternal perspective.
There is much wisdom in scripture about using our time well. From Ephesians 5:15-17, “So, then, be careful how you live. Do not be unwise but wise, making the best use of your time because the times are evil. Therefore, do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is.”
We reach in Colossians 4:5, “Behave wisely toward outsiders, making the best use of your time.”
Ecclesiastes 3:11 challenges us to have an eternal perspective on time, “Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end.”
In praying about this and reflecting on how to have a more eternal perspective about time, the word that came into my heart was ‘fruitfulness’ and many questions to consider … Is how I am spending my time helping me to be a better daughter of God, wife, mother, family member, friend and evangelist? How can I refresh and renew my body and soul to be my best for others? Am I honoring the Sabbath and keeping it a time of simplicity, rest and refreshment with family and friends? Are the activities that I pursue helping me to learn, grow and play in holy and healthy ways? Is there good fruit being produced from the varied activities in my life?
The saints also give us an eternal perspective on time.
St. Gerard Magellan said, “Consider the shortness of time, the length of eternity and reflect how everything here below comes to an end and passes by. Of what use is it to lean upon that which cannot give support?”
Blessed Charles de Foucault said, “The best used hour in our lives is that in which we love Jesus the most.”
Let us give thanks for the gift of time to develop into the person God created us to be.