Your Days are Numbered: A Closer Look at How We Spend Our Time & the Eternity Before Us

by John Perritt

For others, our inability to plan and execute consistently sows the seeds of chaos and pushes the eternal to the margins in favor of the temporary, and the urgent is too often prioritized over the important.

So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom. Psalm 90:12

Wasting time might not seem like a big deal to some, except for the fact that our time really isn’t ours, but God’s.

The reality is, there is a clock ticking somewhere, right now, and it is the clock of your life. Seconds that add into minutes, which add into hours, which add into days are ticking off your life.

It is a sobering reality to think that this may be the last book you read. This may be your last day on earth.

Rather, let the reality of death and eternity with a limited amount of time on this earth, spur you on to good works for the glory of God. Use the limited amount of time that Christ purchased to point others to His Kingdom.

I would like to posit this thought. Maybe the way in which we steward the time given us is the major problem with Christians today.

Therefore, living with a sense of urgency is a must if we hope to live wisely. Urgency can cause anxiety in some, but that is not the intent of the psalmist. Rather, we must live with an excitement to make God known. Using our numbered days to spread the good news of Jesus Christ, is time wisely spent.

However, the ways in which the average Christian spends their days seems to imply that they will live forever. There’s little urgency. The focus is very earthly, not eternal.

cultivate this mind-set of seeing each day as a vital opportunity to live for the glory of God.

So, God is eternal and has now made man(kind) after His image and likeness. What does that mean for us? It means we still have eternality hardwired in our DNA.

What is time? Time is a result of the fall. Yes, ‘In the beginning’ refers to a point in time prior to sin.

We are all eternal beings who have entered into time, but our time is running out. Our bodies will expire and we will return to the eternity we were designed to live, if we are in Jesus Christ. If you do not have faith in Jesus Christ, there is another eternity that awaits you, one of weeping and gnashing of teeth (Matt. 25:30).

The point is, time is a result of the fall. Time is unnatural to us. We never feel like we have enough time

Time is against us. We are at war with our time, because time is at war with our eternal natures.

Reflect more on how the fall impacts our time. How does it war against you on most days? At home? At work? In recreation?

Since we were all created with eternity hard-wired in us, how does this affect you on a daily basis? Do you take more on yourself than you’re able to handle because of this truth?

how much of our time is actually free? We’ve established that time is synonymous with life and value, so how can we now say that time is free?

I would say however, that many of us have hobbies that seem to be disconnected from God. Survey your own hobbies, how connected are they to the Eternal One?

they can actually worship God through their hobby. This is why our theology is so important.

the first of the Ten Commandments reads, ‘You shall have no other gods before me’ (Exod. 20:3). This being the first and greatest commandment tells us that we are worshipers. We will worship.

we were designed to be worshipers, but now our sin is confusing our worship.

Ed Welch’s, Addictions: A Banquet in the Grave,

If you remember, what I said previously about time is that it’s not our time. Scripture tells us, ‘You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body’ (1 Cor. 6:19b-20).

our very lives don’t belong to us.

What a cost it was to redeem His rebellious children. It certainly wasn’t free for Him. Should this give us pause in using the phrase ‘free time’?

Christians must be cautious of throwing around this term. Our lives are not our own and neither is our time. The time we have cost our Savior much, so let us keep that in mind.

one thing it teaches us is that sin is fun. I have always said, if sin wasn’t fun we wouldn’t be tempted to indulge it. Sin does bring pleasure, but it’s fleeting.

Therefore, our hobbies may bring about pleasure, but if we aren’t seeing these earthly pleasures through the lens of Scripture, they are fleeting. They possess a pleasure that will not last.

Basically this verse is telling us that the more we live for selfish pursuits, the more empty our lives will be. That is, we could indulge ourselves in money, possessions, the pursuit of happiness, success and yet ultimately you will – guaranteed, one hundred percent – lose your life.

Take a look at your hobbies. Look at the things you do on a regular basis. Are they feeble attempts to save our lives and give us earthly (fleeting) pleasures?

Many a hobby that wears people down, so they’re physically present on Sundays but spiritually absent.

I am not saying quit all of your hobbies, but I am asking you to evaluate them. Are your hobbies in competition with the Lord’s Kingdom? Are they keeping you from serving your church and others? Are they selfish pursuits of your own pleasure? Do they rob your family of significant time? Do they draw you closer to the Lord and make you a more significant servant for His Kingdom?

If you discover that your hobby is in fact in competition with God, maybe it’s time for a new hobby.

‘One of the greatest diseases of our day is trifling. The things with which most people spend most of their time are trivial. And what makes this a disease is that we were meant to live for magnificent causes. None of us is really content with trivial pursuits of the world. Our souls will not be satisfied with trifles. Why is there a whole section of the newspaper devoted to sports and almost nothing devoted to the greatest story in the universe – the growth and spread of the church of Jesus Christ? It is madness that insignificant games should occupy such a central role in our culture compared to the work of God in Christ.’ 1

However, to reference Piper again, he once sent a tweet that provides a helpful perspective, ‘One of the great uses of Twitter and Facebook will be to prove at the Last Day that prayerlessness was not from lack of time.’ Innocently spending time on Twitter and Facebook (and Vine and Instagram and ‘insert your favourite social media here’) can do some harm to our prayer life, which can feed a lifestyle that’s anything but innocent. Innocent things often become deadly in the hands of our Enemy.

From Paul’s second letter to the church in Corinth we read this exhortation, ‘as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal’ (2 Cor. 4:18). If God’s objective is to have our focus on the eternal, I guarantee you Satan’s objective is to keep our sights set on the temporal. And he does that with excellence.

Ask yourself this question. Have I ever given twelve to fifteen hours in the service of the Lord? If I have, how often? Am I reluctant to? Why is my heart continually happy to give this large amount of time to a sports team, but not to the Lover of my soul?

I can almost guarantee you that a major factor that this short-lived concern was extinguished was because of busyness. Christians are too consumed with other things.

Sadly Satan has convinced us to focus on what is seen and he has also gotten us to buy the lie that God is against our joy. He has convinced you that if you really want to serve and please God, you must do a bunch of boring things. To make God really happy, you must be miserable.

God wants you to have an eternal perspective on beauty, sports, food, not to rob you of joy but actually increase a deeper joy.

We must keep video games, social media, blogging and other trivial matters in their proper perspective. Too much time devoted to anything, other than God, is idolatry and trifling.

Let me challenge you to evaluate your life a bit more from an eternal perspective. What aspects of your life could be considered trivial?

So, how do we decide what is trivial and what isn’t? Take a look at any of your daily activities and ask, what eternal impact does this have?

live out the ordinary in light of the extraordinary (eternal).

Life is too short and too great a gift to waste it on trivialities, so we must be careful. We must funnel all of our activities through the mind-set of the eternal. Therefore I am saying you most likely need to drop some activities, and now I’m suggesting that you say ‘no’ to some trivial things.

Start bringing some eternal perspective into the trivialities of life. God commands us to be in the world, but bring His Kingdom to...

Do you open up your home to show hospitality to others? If not, why?

That reality is, we don’t have time for God.

but the real difficulty that requires discernment is saying ‘No’ to good things.