By Trey Brunson
“No such thing as spare time, no such thing as free time, no such thing as down time. All you got is life time. Go.” Henry Rollins
We’ve spent the month of March on Monday is for Habits considering our time. From considering the price of being late to the reality of being too busy to the confrontation of wasting time, we’ve pressed that you have to think about your time. Time can be so elusive. It never stops. Our lives get busy, overwhelming, or the exact opposite and yet time steadily keeps moving. If you’ve ever been in that place of anticipation, you can stare at a clock and pray for time to speed by or slow down, but it’s constant in its movement. As Chaucer said, “Time and tide wait for no man.”
The reality is that time has to be valued and valuing time is a discipline. That’s why we’ve looked at each of these abuses of time. Today I want to press that there is no greater threat to our time than the loss of it. It’s not that we are late, busy, or wasting time but we just look up, and it’s gone. Every one of us gets the same 23 hours 56 minutes and 4 seconds every day. Sometimes we have honestly wasted it or abused but other times we’ve been busy, and we just find that we look up and the clock has steadily paced on and we lost minutes that we will never get back. Maybe it’s not time that’s lost but normal time like a 9-5 job that we spend days, weeks, months, and years at only to realize that there is no do-over for any of those minutes. Every second is one less than we will ever have again in our lives. None of us knows how long we will live, but as the clock paces forward relentlessly, we have less and less of however much time God gives us. Owning the clock starts with realizing that we are on a down clock from the day we are born. Here’s the point, living is losing time, so to not be defined by loss of time we have to live. We have to wisely and intentionally use every second that we are given in this life.
We don’t know the exact origins of the phrase or idea but the earliest use of “Carpe Diem,” the Latin phrase, was in the ancient story of Gilgamesh where he was encouraged not to mourn but to embrace life and live. The heart of the phrase is that we shouldn’t wait for tomorrow and we shouldn’t waste today. To many of us are living like tomorrow is promised and today isn’t significant. That’s not wasting time like Adam wrote about, it’s losing time. We are giving up minutes of life that we will never get back. We are working at things, involved in activities, and sadly staring at screens for hours each day giving up moments that can never be redeemed. No amount of money or influence can buy your time back. So, we have to seize the day!
How do you begin to seize the day? Start valuing every moment. Sleep is important, but sloth is wasting time. Get up on time. Own your day as we talked about in the first blog of the month. Do something that matters. Don’t work a job to make a paycheck, work a job to impact lives and change the world. That doesn’t mean you need to quit your job today, but it means you need to work not just to punch a clock but to impact the people around you, customers, or anyone. I go to a Panda Express occasionally near my office, and every time the guy in the drive through ends the transaction by telling me to have a blessed day. It’s not just a phrase, he leans in, looks me in the eyes, and says it with joy. Every time, EVERY TIME I go through that drive through there I leave inspired and knowing he is doing all he can to impact lives. What about you? Do people know that your moments are important? We weren’t made to just punch a clock, to Netflix and chill, to passively trudge through the days but to live and enjoy life. Seizing the day means looking for opportunities to do great things. You can impact the world. You can do something great. Don’t let the weight of today or your past confuse you. You were made for great things. You can pour into other’s lives, create something to impact people, give money to an organization that you believe in, and go into the world through trips or work and seek to make things better.
I think the world of Tim Tebow. He’s been a great friend, but more importantly, he inspires me regularly. When we were younger, he shared one time a vision he had for his future when he was still in college. Ironically it wasn’t about the NFL. It was a dream for an organization he wanted to start where he would seek to give people a “brighter day.” In the middle of the most painful moments of someone’s life, Tim thought it would be powerful to show them hope and give them a brighter day. What’s even better is that it wasn’t just a dream, he did it. It started small with little things like going and visiting kids in the hospital. Taking trips to the Philippines and loving on orphans. That small dream grew into global ministry where today Tim leads multiple organizations like his W15H Foundation that grants wishes to children with life-threatening illnesses. He has a hospital that He has funded and founded in the Philippines and is working on another in Haiti. He launched “Night to Shine” an annual prom event for people with special needs around the world. You’d be hard pressed to find someone who has determined to do more for those who are hurting around the world than Tim. It wasn’t his football skills or money that started this; it was his heart and determination. What would happen if more of us seized the day like Timmy has?
Your time is the most valuable thing you have. It’s priceless. Don’t lose it. Don’t give it away. See it for the beautiful gift it is and every day wake up with hope and focus because you can live and live in such a way that you never regret the loss of a single moment. You can start today by determining that you are going to make every moment count. Businessman Harvey Mackay says, “Time is free, but it’s priceless. You can’t own it, but you can use it. You can’t keep it, but you can spend it. Once you’ve lost it, you can never get it back.” Don’t lose time, live!
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