EPHESIANS 5:15–16 – Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil.”
THEME OF THE DAY: EVALUATING OUR SPIRITUAL CONDITION. There are many ways for Christians to examine themselves to determine their spiritual condition. The Bible gives us many tests to diagnose our spiritual health and especially good health. I am just going to ramble off a few and then get to the main point in today’s nugget; healthy Christians consistently are in their Bibles to know the Lord; healthy Christians love other Christians and will not neglect being with them for spiritual things; healthy Christians pray with other Christians; healthy Christians share the gospel with lost sinners; healthy Christians sacrificially give of their resources to help needy Christians; healthy Christians see holiness, and the list continues. But there is one area I didn’t list which will always and immediately tell us where we are spiritually – healthy and growing or sick and declining. It comes from today’s scripture and the use or investment of our time.
After we fulfill our many responsibilities in our 168 hours a week life, each of us have discretionary time; time we get to choose what we do, and the choices we make tell us exactly what we think of Jesus, the spiritual life, and where are affections are attached – on Christ and heaven or self and the world. The greatest challenge we may face when it comes to our time is the temptation, which we easily fall to, to fill up our lives with worldly busyness which leads to significant spiritual consequences. The little four word sentence “I am too busy” has led many Christians to travel down a painful prodigal trail leading away from God and producing painful consequences. Be careful, believer, too busy cannot characterize our lives. It leads to spiritual disaster. And to keep us from this sin, and busyness is a sin, ponder this little poem from an unknown author. It might help us in making decisions about our use of time:
Too busy to read my Bible, too busy to wait and pray! Too busy to care and struggle, to think of the life to come! Too busy building mansions, to plan for the heavenly home. Too busy to speak out kindly to someone on the way. Too busy to help a brother who faces the winter blast! Too busy to share his burden when self in the balance is cast. Too busy for all that is holy on earth beneath the sky, too busy to serve the Master, but not too busy to die (author unknown).
Life is short. Time too precious to be wasted. Don’t let “too busy” keep us from investing in what is of eternal value – the interest of Christ and others!
PRAYER: “Father, forgive me for the way too many times I am too busy for You and spiritual things but not me and worldly things.”
QUOTE: “How we use and invest our time is one of the most revealing ways to determine the priority of the Lord in our lives”
Because of Him,
Pastor Jim