Simplicity
Week 01: Simplicity of Time
We all want to be happy. We long to live lives of joy. We long for the special moments of life that leave us breathless — that leave us with unforgettable memories and joy. We long for contentment, but we have settled for “more”. And as a result, we often find ourselves more busy than happy. We don’t have time for the things that make life worth living, let alone time for the things we’re made for. We have too much work to do, TV to watch, and social media to scroll through. And at the end of the day, it feels like life is slipping away from us and we’re not living life to the full. It’s as if time is slipping between our fingers.
Is this really living? Deep down we know we were made for more, but we’ve all settled for this lifestyle. We rarely question it. We do this day in and day out… Never really thinking about it. But what if we are wasting away our lives? What if we were meant to live life with wide-eyed wonder?
Many people never become who they know they were created to be because they’ve never prioritized their lives around it. It’s not that they didn’t want to become the person they were made to be. It’s that they’ve prioritized other things. As apprentices of Jesus, our goal is to prioritize our lives around following Jesus and becoming like him. And to follow him we’ve got to live with simplicity of time. There are things worthy of our time and other things that aren’t.
Practice for this week Declutter your life so you can live a life of purpose — a life to the full.
01 – Step one. Take a Time Inventory of your week. Take each day and write down what you do hour by hour. Total the numbers and write down how much time you spend doing each activity. How much time do you spend with your family, working, watching TV, scrolling social media, with friends, etc? How much time do you spend on your health, relationship with Jesus, investing in others, etc.?
02 – Step two. Write down the person you want to become. Set 2-4 priorities for who you want to be in 3 years. Do you want to be physically healthy, closer to your family, more relational, on fire for Jesus, able to hear God’s voice better, or amazing at baking? What are the 2-4 things you want to become in the next season of life? Write them down.
03 – Step three. Make your schedule reflect the person you are becoming. This will mean cutting out things that aren’t as important to you that need to go (i.e. social media, binge-watching TV, eating junk food). This will also mean prioritizing your goals in your schedule. Add in your priorities to your weekly schedule in place of the things you’ve cut out.
Recommended Resource: The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry by John Mark Comer