We shall all give account!

One of my frequent pastimes is price comparison. I am what you'd call a price maven. I'm always interested in finding out the cheapest price of the most appropriate quality of any item that comes to my attention. And so over the years I have developed a comprehensive database (mostly in my brain) of where to find almost anything at the best price.

Because of this skill, I tend to get tasked with purchasing duties for my wife's catering business during her various projects all over the country.

On one of such projects I had come to realize that my budgets for purchases were inaccurate. As such I was running out of cash. Knowing I inevitably would need to make an account to my wife of all monies spent, I began to mentally sketch out each purchase one after the other. I also decided I needed a little pocket book to jot down all expenses, not just for the benefit of accounting to my wife, but for my personal use and to get a grip on my finances.

This led me on a wider realm of thinking. As I planned to account for my spending, shouldn't I also account for my time? After all it is said that "time is money!" As I thought further I realized that every living thing on earth is blessed with exactly the SAME QUANTITY of time everyday of its life as all other living things! This means that the world's richest men/women are blessed with exactly the same 24hrs of the day that the poorest in the society are. A rich man cannot buy an extra second of time for himself with all the money in the world. So if each second of each minute of each hour of each day were worth a specific amount, then every human being is invested with exactly the same value of that amount daily.

How do we spend our time everyday? What does it yield? When we think of our financial and economic conditions, are we tempted to think of ourselves as disadvantaged? Jesus spoke about this issue in a parable of the talents (Matthew 25:14-26). After congratulating both servants who had yielded a 100% profit based on their initial investment capital of 5 &  2 talents respectively, he faced the last servant who unfortunately had viewed himself as disadvantaged and had decided to keep his capital unused. He was condemned by the master for being wicked and was stripped of his capital.

In that story, Jesus was telling us that inevitably we will all be called to give account for all we have been endowed with. Especially our time. Time is one resource we all have in equal amounts. Other attributes may vary, but time is the measure that will be used to assess how well we manage our resources.

How long do we sleep daily? Do we sleep in order to rest or just to pass the time? The book of Proverbs mentions it twice that sleep leads to poverty. How else are we using our time unproductively? I have resolved to create for myself a personal time sheet to record my daily use of time. What ways can you ensure that not a second of your time is wasted?

Do share your thoughts and comments. Pls share this message widely as you never know whose life it can change!