A Balanced Schedule

Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Thursday, October 12th. When you look at your daily calendar, do you have a time set aside for God?

Today's podcast helps us understand the importance of a balanced schedule. To become the person God wants you to be and to achieve the things He wants you to achieve in life, one of the things that's very important is the way you utilize your time. Because you see, your time is your life. It's irreversible, you can't go back in time.

It's irreplaceable, there's absolutely no substitute. And either we will invest it wisely or we will waste it foolishly. Very important how we utilize our time. And so I want you to turn, if you will, to Ephesians chapter five. And just a couple of verses or so here, the Apostle Paul is writing to the Ephesians and admonishing them about the way they live their life and the way they invest or spend their time. He says, Therefore be careful how you walk, how you live your life, not as unwise men or women, but as wise men and women, making the most of your time because the days are evil.

So then do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. And it is certainly the will of the Lord that you and I live our lives outright and we make the most of our time. Now when he says here, making the most of your time, what he's saying in essence is this, take advantage of every opportunity. Make the most of the opportunities God has given you.

Don't waste your time. And so when we think about how we reach our potential, how we become the persons God wants us to be, achieve the things He wants us to achieve in life, it's very evident that a balanced schedule is essential to making that happen. And when I think about what Paul was saying in his day, how essential it was, what about today when we are pressured by so many things, we're driven oftentimes by the clock and the second hand as much as oftentimes the minute hand, we live in this kind of a pressurized society. Well, we have to be very careful that we govern our time, that we use it wisely, or we'll never reach the potential God has for us, never achieve those things that He has in mind. In fact, your whole life can be transformed when you begin to recognize, listen, that a balanced schedule is the will of God.

In order for you to become the person, God wants you to be and achieve the things that God wants you to achieve. Now what we have to ask is this, what does a balanced schedule look like? Somebody says, what do you mean a balanced schedule? Well, let's think about what we think in terms of schedule. A schedule is just increments of time that you and I have allotted to an activity or activities and an order in which we want to carry them out.

So if a person has a balanced schedule, they have decided what the activities are and then they have allotted the proper amount of time to each one of those and to keep it balanced. And so when I was thinking about that, I was thinking about Jesus, thinking about a pattern. Did Jesus live a balanced life or was it all just one thing? When you look at the Scriptures, oftentimes you read it pretty fast. You say, well, you know, all I see that Jesus did was preached and healed and taught and fed five thousand and performed all these miracles, but I want you to notice something. Jesus lived a very balanced life, very balanced life. And when you begin to look at it, you and I have to ask ourselves, well, what kind of life do we live? What kind of schedule do we keep?

Are we living a balanced life or are we overextended in this area or that area or the other? And so when somebody says, did Jesus have a good time in life? Yes, He did. Did He have an awesome time, a tribulation trial?

Yes, He did, but you know what? He knew how to walk through it. And He balanced His life among time with the Father, private time, time training those disciples with a small group, time with individuals like Nicodemus, the woman at the well, and others, always doing what He knew the Father would have Him to do. He knew exactly where to be at the right time.

Why? Because He had lined His will up with the will of the Father. And as He began His days, He began His days asking for the Lord's direction and guidance in His life.

So that's the wonderful pattern of Jesus. Now what about your life and mine? Would you say that your life is balanced well?

Well, let's see if it is. So we have to ask ourselves this question. Do you begin the day with the Lord Jesus every morning? We certainly ought to. If you're going to become the person God wants you to be, do the things that God wants you to do in life and achieve those, the most important thing you can do is the time you spend alone with Him. That ought to be our priority in life. A second part of your schedule in mind ought to be time with our family and friends. You say, well, my family's gone or whatever it might be.

I understand that. But so many people do have families. You've got children, you have your wife, your husband. And so when you assume the responsibility of marriage, you assume the responsibility of developing your schedule in such a way that you could use or spend, invest the right amount of time with your wife, your husband. And when children come along, of course with them. And that is a vital part.

That's a responsibility we have. And so God expects us to spend and invest time with our family and our friends. Now, somebody says, well, I just don't have time to have friends.

Yes, you do. The longer you live, the more you're going to understand how very important your friends are. Because your friends are a different kind of relationship.

Friends are a different kind of relationship because you can share sometimes with a friend something you can't share, don't feel like it's proper to share or you want to share with somebody closer to you than that. Friends are very valuable. They encourage us. They enable us to be able to relax. For example, and oftentimes challenge us, giving us new views and helping us see things a little different than we would normally see or maybe that our family would see. Sometimes encouraging us and sometimes reproving us. Friends are very, very important.

Jesus had His, stopping at Mary and Martha and Lazarus' home for having a meal. Very important. And so when you think about how we live, our friendships and our families are very important from God's perspective. Then I think about this whole idea of work. Now, you and I have the responsibility of working. And we have responsibility of knowing and believing that we're doing God's will in the place He has us at this particular time.

We have that responsibility. Not just to work, but to do the best job we can possibly do. To have a sense of direction. A sense of purpose in our life. To know that we're going somewhere, we're headed somewhere. We aren't just filling time with activity.

We are working diligently, giving it our very best. Because you remember, Paul admonishes us to work as unto the Lord. Because you see, He placed us here to fulfill His purpose. And whatever your vocation, whatever your job may be at this point, it doesn't make any difference what it is. You're responsible to God to give it your best.

Responsible to the person who trusted you with the privilege of working to give it your best. You say, I don't like my job. I don't like this. I don't like that. Treat me this way, that way, and the other.

You know what? If you're where God wants you to be, ask yourself the question, God, what are you doing to me, with me, and in me, or to me at this particular point in my life? If you're not where you ought to be, tell God you're willing to move, you're willing to change, whatever. But while you're working where you're working, you owe it to God. You owe it to the people who trusted you with the responsibility to give it your best. And you see, if you don't give it your best in your job, how do you think that God's going to bless you by helping you to reach your potential? Becoming the person God wants you to be because if you don't do your best, you're cheating yourself, living in denial, and you're costing yourself more than you realize. Likewise, in the life of Jesus, there was time for worship.

So you think about this. When somebody says, I don't have time to go to church. I work six days a week and I don't have time to go to church. You don't know what church is.

Maybe you've been to the wrong one. Worship is a very important part. And the Scripture says, forsake not the assembling of yourselves together as some do.

It's the will of God. That's why He put the church together. Somebody says, well, you don't have to go to church to go to heaven.

No, but you know what? If you're saved and you're in love with a living God, you'll be in love with His people. Listen, you'll want to go. You desire to go.

What does He say about loving each other? Losing one another. What you fail to remember is this, and that is, it isn't just for you. It's for somebody else. You walk into fellowship and you shake someone's hand and say, I'm glad to see you, happy to see you. You don't know what one handshake may mean. So it's also for someone else, not for you.

But worshiping together is very important, very vital. Then I think about this whole idea of rest and relaxation. Somebody says, well, you know, I don't have much time to rest with all the things that I do. Let me just give you an idea about rest, two things. Number one, the value of rest is not only that your body needs it, but that's the times you become the most creative when you're rested.

There's something about rest that makes it a time that we can listen carefully, be very creative. The body needs it. And we certainly saw that in the life of Jesus.

And when I think about what happened to Him, I think, well, Lord, if He needed it, we certainly do. Then I think about this whole idea of fitness and health. We're all responsible for the way we treat our bodies.

Now, we think, and you could say, well, that's my body. I can do with it what I choose. Number one, it is not your body belongs to God. You're only the stewards. You happen to inhabit it.

Number two, you do not have the right to do with your body what you choose. It belongs to the living God. And here's what He said, the body was created to be the temple of the Holy Spirit. The living God live on the inside of us to live out in this life the purposes of God. That means it is not your body. He says you're bought with a price. He says you're the purchase of God.

He saved you in order to live in you and to live out His purpose in your life. So we're responsible for how we treat these bodies. What we place in it, what we relate to it, whether we keep it healthy or not, we're responsible.

To have a balanced schedule, we cannot neglect the body. Now what I would like to do is to give you a short list here of things and attitudes that will indeed hinder and prevent you from reaching your potential when it comes to what we're talking about here. So number one is this, a divided mind. If your mind is divided, listen, it's fragmented in your thinking.

You're not focused and you're not going to do your best no matter what you're doing. And so divided mind is a detriment. A second thing is slothfulness. That is just being pure lazy. Listen, it's one thing to be inactive for a season because you're resting and relaxation or whatever. It's something else just to be goofing off, wasting your time. You're not resting and relaxing on purpose, with purpose in mind, but you just don't want to work. Slothfulness and laziness is a sin against Almighty God, because remember, your life is your time. Your time is your life.

And to waste time is to waste life, a God-given precious gift from God, to live out His purposes and when you waste it, you sin against Him. So a divided mind, slothfulness, the influence of other people. Listen, you can't live your life according to the influence of other people. That is unless it's Godly influence where people tell you, you ought to do this and you ought to do that. The issue is this, what's God's will and purpose and plan for your life?

At this season of your life, what is God's plan and purpose? So people always want to give you their idea of what you ought to do. And I can remember the time in my life when I'd get letters from people who'd say, well, you ought to get out of the ministry and you ought to do this and you ought to do that and you ought to do the other. And I'd get on my knees and God says, you keep doing what I called you to do until I tell you to do something else. And I think about what I would have missed, what I would have lost if I had listened to other people tell me how to spend or invest my life.

I would never tell you that. You have to do what God wants you to do. One of the things that'll prevent you from reaching your potential is neglecting that private time between you and God. Because listen, that's when you get a sense of direction. That's when you set the rudder for the day. That's when God can give you warnings about what you're going to face, encourage you for the day, cheer your heart if you've had a bad day the day before. In other words, that's a very important time.

Did you know one of the greatest detriments to not living it out and having a balanced schedule in your life is a lack of commitment? Now listen carefully to what I'm going to ask you. I want you to answer the rest of this sentence. You listening? Say, amen. Today, at this time in my life, I am committed to what? Is it somebody?

Is it something? In other words, have you ever decided in your life what you are genuinely committed to above everything else in life? You say, well, I'm committed to lots of things.

What's the priority? What is it you're really committed to? I would never set myself up as an example, but I can tell you what I'm committed to. Because it governs everything I do. I'm committed to being obedient to God no matter what. Now you say, well, that's too simplistic. No, it's not.

Here's what that does. That covers everything. If you're committed to being obedient to God, you live under the canopy, listen, of God's guidance and direction in your life. He's living on the inside of you. If you're committed above everything else to being obedient to God, you know what?

Everything else is going to fall in place. So I ask you the question, what are you committed to? Because what you're committed to is the way you're spending and investing your time. If you have a wrong sense of values, God never gets you where you want to be. Because the most valuable thing you have is your relationship to Jesus Christ. The value you place on your family, the value you place on your friends, the value you place on your own human body, your mind. You don't want to grow old in your brain.

You want to keep it active all of your life. Thinking godly thoughts, thinking the way God wants you to think, thinking about the possibilities because you remember we said in the very beginning, our potential refers to our possibilities, the things we're capable of achieving in life. And then I think about one of the things that will absolutely keep you from being and achieving is misplaced priorities. What are they? It has to do with your values and all the rest.

Let me just spend a moment or two here. One of those things that will keep you from becoming what you ought to be and doing what you ought to do is unbridled ambition. Unbridled ambition. There's nothing wrong to have ambition. But if that ambition throws you out of sync and out of balance, there's something wrong. You say, what is unbridled ambition? What is ambition in a way? When we look around us today, unbridled ambition is that inner need to work yourself to death in order to reach the world's standards.

That will not get you where you want to be because that is not a balanced schedule. Now you say, okay, I got you. I understand all the things that need to be involved and so I make a commitment and my commitment is to be obedient to God and to find out how I can live a balanced life to achieve and to become what God has in mind.

How do I maintain that? Number one, are you listening? Accountability. If you're not willing to be accountable to somebody, it's not going to work.

Accountability says I trust you enough that I want to make myself accountable to you to help me when I need it, encourage me when I need it, reprove me when I need it in order to have a balanced schedule and to be the person God wants me to be. You see, if you can't trust your life with a God-given, trustworthy, confidential friend, and the only thing, in other words, you're going to do it your way, you're going to control your life, you'll decide what you'll do and what you won't do. Well, you know what, none of us are perfect and all of us need encouragement and all of us need somebody on the outside of us looking on the inside of us. Listen, not to be critical, but to be helpful. You know what, someone who will love you because they want to see you become the best you can be and reach your God-given potential.

And I would say to you, if you want to reach your potential in life, one of the greatest assets you'll have is a confidential, unconditional loving friend who is Godly in character, has your best interest at heart, and who will only, listen, only challenge you to do those things that are Godly, that fit the purpose and plan of God for your life. It's one of the most valuable assets you have. A second thing is an ongoing review. For example, at night before you go to bed, make a list of things, I may say these things a thousand times, if you don't do it, you're the loser. Before you go to bed, make a list on a three-by-five card of the things you intend to do the next day.

You know what you've done? Is you ask the Lord, and Lord, give me direction about this and show me this, or, no, I shouldn't put that down, or I ought to. What you've done is, listen, you've already got your mind thinking, and all night long, your subconscious mind is doing what? Gearing you up for what's going to happen the next day. You've got to have priorities, stick with them. And one thing I would say is this, discipline. You have to make yourself do things you don't necessarily want to do. But to get where God wants you to be, to do what He wants you to do, you have to make yourself do some things that sometimes are difficult, very hard. One of those things for some of you is just getting out of the bed, right?

It's just, it's just tough. It just happens to be where you are physically or whatever it might be, or some other things and somebody says, you know what, I just don't have time to just sit down and read the Bible. Yes, you do. It is a matter of balancing your time. And you know what happens?

You balance out the schedule and you tell God that you're on, listen, you're lining up with His will and His purpose for your life. You know what happens? Your life will change. There'll be more joy, more peace, more happiness, more fun. God will bless you in ways you've never been blessed before.

You know why? Because you're in sync with the will of God and on God's timetable. And it's yours for the asking. Thank you for listening to A Balanced Schedule. If you'd like to know more about Charles Stanley or In Touch Ministries, stop by InTouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of In Touch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.