Crunched for Time?

'...To whom does my time belong? Typically, we view time as our own. When Jesus comes into the picture, that often begins to change. He turns us outward and begins to make us mindful of the needs of others. As we heed Jesus' call to love our neighbors as ourselves, we start to shift from thinking of time as our own to seeing time as belonging to the person in our path.

...A saying goes, 'God put me on earth to accomplish certain things. Right now I'm so far behind I think I'll never die.'

Has God given us enough time? No, not if through our busyness we are trying to find significance or fill boredom or cover pain or gain acceptance or safeguard our futures (or those of our children). However, there is all the time in the world for us to do those things to which God calls us. Time to pray. Time to enjoy God. Time to sleep. Time to further the kingdom. Even time to turn around and pick up a man walking home in the rain.

The claim that God gives us enough time to do those things to which He calls us is consistent with Scripture.

For example, Paul said in Acts 20:24, "I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me- the task of testifying to the gospel of God's grace."

That sounds a lot like squeezing the infinite into the finite. But not many years later, with the task still far from finished, Paul was able to write: "The time has come for my departure. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race." (2 Tim. 4:6-7).

The task remained, but Paul was true to his God-given calling within it. He did not need to do it all; he only needed to complete that part of the task that God had given him. How readily we fall into thinking 'I have to do it all, and I have to do it all NOW.' But not everything we think to do is something God is calling us to do."

-Henderson, David. Crunched for Time? How to Restore Breathing Room in Your Life. Discipleship Journal.