SCRIPTURE: EPHESIANS 5: 15 & 16a

STEWARDS OF WHAT?

1. Body – Temple2. Talent3. Treasure4. Time“Our time belongs to God, every

moment is His and we are under the most solemn obligation to improve it to His glory. Of no talent He has given will He require a more strict account than our time” Christ Object Lessons (p.342)

GOD

TIME

TALENT

TEMPLE

“Time is the measurement unit of life”

“Time renders relevance”

Planning – what? how? Motivation – personal rewards Directing - implementation Monitoring – record keeping? Controlling – eliminating unfavourable

variances, reinforcing favourable variances Communication/ Coordination

“More men fail through lack of purpose than lack of talent”

“The bad news is time flies. The good news is you are the pilot!”

1. IMPORTANT AND URGENT

Your relationship with God – Matthew 6:33

Family (Spouse and Children)- They will support or derail your relationship with God

Ministry of God - Your talent?

Health –Meals, Rest, Exercise, Pleasure

Career, education & financial

• IMPORTANT BUT NOT URGENT Other relationships – friends etc

• NOT IMPORTANT BUT URGENT Latest gossip Fashion

- appearance- Movies

• NOT IMPORTANT AND NOT URGENT Idleness (Proverbs 20:4-5) Loitering

• On any task, draw an action plan

“The journey from objectives to success”

– S PECIFIC– MEASURABLE– ATTAINABLE– RESOURCE ORIENTED– TIME BOUNDED!

• Identify time available – “Teach me to number my days….”Psalm 90:12

• Insert “normal wastage”, contingency time for unpredictable interruptions

• Identify time wasting activities AND weed them out!• Know when you’re most productive (morning,

afternoon, evening)

ILLUSTRATIONS

• THE BIG ROCKS– If you don’t put the big rocks in first, you’ll never get

them in at all. True?– To be living as “wise-men” we need to schedule

tasks and put “important & urgent first”

Jesus' example• His priorities were:

1. Time with God• Dawn meetings with God

2. Time with disciples• Walking, eating, talking, eating, going to weddings, going to

the synagogue to worship3. Time for ministry – preaching, teaching, healing (meeting the

needs of “dying souls).

– Time for everything (planned!) – Remember Lazarus? It wasn’t time to go!

• Ecclesiastes 8:6 – There is an appointed time and procedure for everything!

• God first in the day“I have so much to do today, I couldn’t possibly do it all without three hours of prayer” – Martin Luther.

Psalm 90:17 The Lord…Favour…Rest Upon…Establish…Work of our hands

• Think of the ministry of Christ?

• plan on the conduct of your God given duties• Romans 8:28

• Punctuality – sign of honour & relevance– Numbers 9 (Especially verse 3) on timeliness

“The surest way to be late is to have plenty of time”

• Time lost can never be regained

• Time is lost in smaller quantities

• Make good use of time in between major activities

• Procrastination is a thief of time

“A Wiseman does at once, what a fool does at last”

“A year from now, you will wish you had started”

• “THE BEST TIME IS NOW”

• Don’t waste other’s time because time is wealth (Exodus 21:18 -20) – opportunity cost!

“Wait till you’ve missed your flight by 5 minutes”

• We will account for the use of every moment of time (Ecclesiastes 12: 13-14)