Wednesday Reflection – July 03, 2019 – Managing Our Time

Teach us to count our days that we may gain a wise heart. Psalm 90:12  

Arthur Jackson writes, “Psalm 90 is a worshipful conversation Moses has with God. The superscription reads, ‘A prayer of Moses, the man of God.’ But even if we weren’t alerted that this psalm is a prayer, the language and tone clearly indicate the psalmist was talking to God. This prayer was spoken during a rough period in Israel’s history. It appears the people of God had experienced discipline (vv. 7–11, 15), which prompted Moses to talk to God about the brevity and fragility of human life in view of God’s eternal nature (vv. 1–6).” The psalmist makes several references to time, such as generations, years, days, morning and evening. For Jackson, “…tough times can compel us to talk to the Lord about our brief time on earth and appeal to Him for His help. They can also cause us to ask who may need the gift of our time.”

There is an African proverb that says, “Westerners have watches. Africans have time.” How many times have we said, ‘I don’t have time’ or ‘I can’t find the time’? It seems as if our very busy schedules and many deadlines to meet is dominating our lives. We seem to not even have time for ourselves. In the midst of all this, Moses prays in today’s Watchword, ‘Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.’ Paul writes, ‘Be very careful, then, how you live . . . making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil’ (Ephesians 5:15–16).

Bill Crowder shares that he suspects that Paul and Moses would agree that our wise use of time isn’t just a matter of clock-watching. For Crowder, ‘The situation may call for us to keep a tight schedule—or it may compel us to give someone an extended gift of our time. We have but a brief moment to make a difference for Christ in our world, and we need to maximize that opportunity. That may mean ignoring our watches and planners for a while as we show Christ’s patient love to those He brings into our lives. As we live in the strength and grace of the timeless Christ, we impact our time for eternity.’

We are urged to be mindful that our time is limited so we have to make use of every time we have. Yet, we are challenged to recognize that what some people desire most from us is not our money or other physical possessions, but our time. Our time to give them a listening ear, our time to empathize with them, our time to extend a word of encouragement. This may be our greatest gift to others. God has given us all the time we need to fulfill all that he has given us to do.

Till next week, let’s remember that time management is not about clock-watching, it’s about making the most of the time we have.

Jermaine Gibson