Wasting Time

" He who lives by killing time dies with it." I remember reading this quote in a book by Chuck Colson years ago. Time is an invaluable resource and yet so many have no plan for how they invest time.

My wife- Amy- always makes fun of me because I started keeping a daily time sheet in 2003. She says I waste a great deal of time tracking my time. She has a point.

I got the idea from reading books about John Wesley and Jonathan Edwards. Both men had rigorous plans for their time and surprise, surprise both men accomplished a great deal of good for the kingdom of God with their lives.

Henry David Thoreau said in Walden, "most men live lives of quiet desperation but I have chosen to live deliberately." We need to heed this wise advice and have a plan for how we invest time on a daily basis.

Most are not addicted to structure like I am and would find tracking time to be a onerous exercise. But I have one strong suggestion. Track the amount of time that you are investing in two areas: watching television and playing video games.

The statistics are numbing. The television is on 7 hours and 40 minutes per day in the American home. The average viewing per person is over 4 hours per day. The full array of stats can be view at http://tvturnoff.org. I was under that average when I started tracking my time in 2003. But I was wasting many hours watching television. The first step in decreasing my television time was to start measuring how much television I was watching.

My goal was to decrease my television time to less than 2 hours per week. In a year, I accomplished that goal. What you measure will improve. So now that the NBA playoffs are over, I can preach again- without hypocrisy- of the importance of limiting your television time. And instead investing that time in more God-honoring activities- prayer, relationship building, study of the Word, reading, exercise, family time, etc...

Here are three tips for decreasing television time:

1. Go to bed early and wake up early. Most people watch TV when they are tired at the end of the day. Our family has moved from the family room where the TV is to the bedroom after 7pm. In the bedroom, we read to our son, talk and play. In the family room, we typically revert to the idiot box.
2. Get rid of the television in all bedrooms. The bedroom is a place for rest and sex with your spouse if you are married. TV in the bedroom is a terrible idea.
3. Set goals for your time in the evening. Keep a list of books to read to children or for your own development. Study the Bible- set a goal to read 4 chapters of the Bible daily and you will read through the Bible in a year.

The best suggestion of all is to get rid of the TV. But I realize less than 1% of Americans are without a TV. I did it for a year when I was single and still look back nostalgically on all the great things I was able to do with time as a result.

"Make the best use of time..." Ephesians 5:16

For His Glory,

Ashley Hodge