The Measured Life

There’s a truism in business that what gets measured gets managed. In other words, if you want to make sure that something is getting done, that a goal is being worked on, make sure you quantify your expectations for it. If you do so, and you regularly check whether progress is being made towards that goal, people are more likely to focus their attention on its completion. It’s an approach that we utilize in our own life as well. We assess our life based on the numbers on the scale, the dollar figures in our bank account or the worth of our house. We quantify our expectations so we know how close (or how far away) we are to fulfilling them.

Sometimes we are apt to try to take a similar approach with our spiritual life. We look at how many times we have read our Bible or how long our prayer time was and we extrapolate these figures to measure our walk with God. Unfortunately, while these things can certainly be utilized as benchmarks for a deepening relationship with our Savior, they are too easily “faked” much like we may choose the scale that gives us the lowest figure. Time invested does not necessarily equal quality of investment and if we simply just watch the clock we may miss the point of our spending time with God altogether.

The other challenge with this approach is that we are not in a position to fully assess the impact of our obedience to God. When God calls us to do something, it may seem like a “small” deal to us and therefore unworthy (from a purely statistical viewpoint) of our time and attention. However, God is often in the business of multiplication. He is not beyond using small acts of obedience to have long-lasting results. Abraham’s son and heirs were all blessed because of his obedience (Gen. 26:4-5). Jesus saw the faith of the paralytic’s friends and not only healed their friend, but forgave him his sins as well (Mt. 9:2-6). Both of these stories, and countless others, have been retold for generations and have taught others what a life of faith looks like. There is no way that the primary actors in these instances could have accurately predicted these results. If they had attempted to do so, their measurements, and perhaps their obedience, may have fallen short.

Jesus told His disciples to let their light shine before others so that “they may see good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Mt. 5:16). How far and wide God chooses to cast our light is up to Him. Our job is to faithfully live our lives in keeping with what He has called us to do. We will likely be unaware of the full measurement of that faithfulness this side of Heaven, but we can trust that God will use in for His Kingdom’s purposes.

Continue Reading

Tracked Time

©iStockphoto.com/Devonyu
©iStockphoto.com/Devonyu

As a fan of organization it would come as no surprise to those who know me that I like systems. However, when you become a parent having a system to manage all of the ins and outs becomes a necessity, not a preference. Your child’s doctor, babysitter, grandmother, or concerned friend will all want to do what is “normal” for your kid. Because so much changes so quickly, “normal” is a shifting definition. The only logical solution is to note and record what happens during the day.

Because of the need to keep such records, I have become astute at tracking how much time I spend doing various activities with my kid. On any given day I can give you a fairly precise review of what happened the day or week before. I can report how much time my child spent eating, how long she slept, and at what times these events occurred. I have a detailed understanding of how the day has been invested, and based on my recorded schedule, I can give you a pretty good indication of whether the day was a “good” one or not.

Recently, I wondered what would happen if I did something similar with the time I invested in my relationship with God. What would the record look like if I noted when I prayed, at what frequency, and at what length? Would my daily schedule reflect a commitment to ingest and digest the Word of God? Would the resulting report show that I spend as much or more time pursuing Him as I do going after many lesser things?  If I stood before the Great Physician and reviewed the daily details of my life, would the diagnosis of any soul troubles be readily apparent?

I’m concerned that if I were to do such a thing, I would quickly be aghast at how I spend my time. When I realized how many hours in any given day my child spends intaking nutrition I was astonished, yet I wonder if my investment in my spiritual growth can be even slightly compared to the investment in her physical maturing. The moments and the minutes of the day can pass by so quickly and it is easy for our focus to wander from the things that are primary and be distracted by that which eternity will find futile. If we kept track of what we spent our time doing, perhaps our tendency towards diversion would dissipate.

The danger, of course, is that we would measure the value of our relationship merely by the time that we spent investing in godly activities. Or perhaps that we would spend a perfunctory amount of time seemingly investing in our relationship with our Father only to cross the to-do off our list. Just like my child doesn’t keep a timecard to assess my feelings towards her, neither should a simple count of minutes be the sole determinant in our evaluation of our love for our Father. However, the way we invest our time is at least one indication of what we value and treasure. It would be good to consider whether our moments, as well as our days, are spent pursuing things of eternity.

Continue Reading
1 2 3 104