LEADERSHIP CAPSULE
...committed to raising, mentoring and equipping leaders to ultimately fulfill the great commission.
Sunday, December 18, 2016

TITLE : THE  EFFICIENT STEWARDSHIP OF TIME

Ephesians 5:15-17 " Pay careful attention, then, to how you walk - not as unwise people but as wise - making the most of the time, because the days are evil. So don't be foolish, but understand what the will of God is"

Leaders are stewards. They manage, direct and coordinate multiple resources because they direct others in using their own resources.

In the last episode I shared eleven vital resources we should effectively manage as leaders. One of these precious resources is time. If we buy into the very first sentence of the Bible, we must acknowledge that whatever we have is not our own. All that we have is a gift or resource from God. This include our time. This is tge foundational principle of biblical stewardship. Our time is a divine resource entrusted to us by God. This means we will be held accountable for how we used each "day the Lord has made" and given to us (see also Ps. 118:24 and 74:16).

Consider for a moment that everyone on earth has the same amount of time in every day. This is the only resource we have in equal measure. This make it so unique. We may have different abilities, talents, ministry, gifts in different measures but nobody has more or less time than you. The President or paper boy, housewife or executive, farmer or financier – they all have exactly 24 hours in each day, 168 hours in each week, 525,600 minutes in each year. Some people take that time and build relationships, dream dreams and make plans, cultivate their walk with God, develop new skills and live lives of adventure. Some people watch a lot of TV.

All of us have been given a little chunk out of eternity called time, and all of us will someday give an account to God for how we have used it.
Our anchor scripture says we are to make the best use of time God gives us, especially in light of the fact that there are so many opportunities to abuse it. Time is very precious. Very few other things are so valuable. God hands out time only sparingly, and all of us know that when items become scarce, they become valuable. Time is a scarce commodity. Each of us is given just one moment at a time, and each new moment comes only when the previous moment is taken back into eternity. Time is not to be wasted. Time is life that's why its called lifetime. When you have life you have time. The factor that distinguish the aged from the youth is time.

What differentiates people isn’t the amount of time available to them, but the manner in which they exercise their gifts and talents within the available time. We can waste time; we can spend time; or we can invest our time wisely. That’s what stewardship is about: faithfully developing and using our gifts, talents and resources within the amount of time God has allotted to us.

Think about time in these four simple terms.

1. It is a trust– It is something God has entrusted to our care, something which belongs to Him but which He has given us to invest on His behalf. The idea here is that He will get a good return on His investment. If He trusts us with a little, and we use it wisely, He will trust us with more. That's why He says, "He who is faithful in a very little thing is faithful also in much…" time is something God has entrusted to us. It is a trust.

2. It is a tool – He expects that we will use it to further His kingdom here on Earth, using it as best we can to reveal His glory and to relate His gospel to those around us.  So it is with money. It has value, but only to the degree that it is used properly, only to the degree that it is used to further the kingdom of God.

3. It is a test – God often gives us something of lesser value to see if He can trust us with something of greater value. If He cannot trust us with something as fleeting as time. why should He trust us with spiritual things of eternal value? If He cannot trust us to make good decisions with the amount of money that we have, it stands to reason that we cannot be trusted with the large amount of money that we may want.

4. It is a thermometer– How we use or manage our time reveals the truth about our spiritual lives. Now let's just take the gloves off for a moment. If you do not at the very least tithe, if you are not investing at least a portion of the time God has entrusted to you into eternal causes, you are not a growing Christian and you probably need to take a long hard look at your life through the lens of scripture to see if you are even a Christian at all. That may sound like a harsh statement, but it's the truth.