Making The Most Of The Time

Well, here we are. We made it to the year 2015. I’ve written the number 2015 several times already and am getting use to it. So we’re in the month of January. The Romans gave it the name

January after their god, Janus, who had two faces, one looking forward and one looking back. And that’s a good exercise for us today as we talk about stresses of time. Look back at 2014. Did you ever have a time this last year when the clock was your enemy, where you were stressed because you had too many things to do and there just wasn’t enough time to get it all done?

Did you ever have a moment like this?

Or a week like this?

Racing to stay on top of the clock.

That’s enough looking back. Let’s put that out of our minds and look forward into 2015. Would you like to do better with time stress? We have more time-saving devices than any other generation in human history, so we should be easily in control of our time. But we’re not. We ought to be able to do better.

I don’t know how to guarantee that you will never face time pressure in 2015. That’s going to come, especially if you are diligent to try to make good use of your time. I know I’ve never figured out how to avoid time pressure, myself. And a pastor’s job always has more things you would like to do than time allows. But I’ve found some things that help to cope with the stress.

And to get us started, listen to the word of God from the Apostle Paul’s le

tter to the Ephesians, chapter 5, verses 10-20.

10 Try to find out what is pleasing to the Lord. 11 Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. 12 For it is shameful even to mention what such people do secretly; 13 but everything exposed by the light becomes visible, 14 for everything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says, "Sleeper, awake! Rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you." 15 Be careful then how you live, not as unwise people but as wise, 16 making the most of the time, because the days are evil. 17 So do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. 18 Do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery; but be filled with the Spirit, 19 as you sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, singing and making melody to the Lord in your hearts, 20 giving thanks to God the Father at all times and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

In verses 15 and 16, Paul reminds us to be careful how we live, making the most of the time. God gives each one of us a certain number of years and days and hours on this earth. That’s our time. It’s a precious gift. He calls us to make the most of it.

When we read the phrase, “making the most of the time,” that’s a fine translation. But the Greek word has a flavor of a little more struggle than that. Have you noticed that sometimes it’s a battle to make good use of your time? Have you noticed that it sometimes costs a lot to make good use of the time? This is the reason that I first started thinking of going to seminary. I wanted to learn Greek so I could go deeper into the words that the New Testament writers chose for us. Paul’s word here is exagoradzo.

Its two words put together. It starts with “ex” like in our word for exit, to go out. The second word is from the Greek word “agora,” the word for the market where you shop. So the literal meaning would be to pay the price to get something from the store. And you can’t read everything literally, but you’ll recognize that we pay a price for making good use of our time. You have to go looking for what you really need, what’s important, grab it, pay a price for it, bag it and carry it out of the hustle and bustle of the marketplace. It can be hard. It takes time management skills and time management work.

And so this morning I want to talk about two time management skills to practice in the coming year. I can’t guarantee that you’ll never be pressed for time if you use them. But they can make a big difference in coping with time stress.

The first management skill is to manage the tasks that you do. You cannot do it all. Let’s say it together. “I can’t do it all.” So we all have to manage which tasks we are going to take on.