how are you tonight good it's good to be here at a special time like this in talking about time what time is it are you wearing a watch right now what time is it huh I'm sure you've experienced this before you ask someone else the time and their watch is always either ahead or behind yours yes or no you've noticed that it's hard to find people who have the exact same time on on their watch and that's an interesting thing about time I even remember the story about a you remember in the old days people
used to call the telephone operator to check the time remember that yes I think they still have it here don't they 1 2 three to nowadays it's a it's a recording it's a machine right but they used to actually have an operator answer the phone to give the time you would call and say what time You' ask what time is it you'd pay a few cents and and they would give you the time the exact correct time and there was this this town where a man would call every day to check the time he would
every single day call the telephone operator and ask what time is it please and the telephone operator would give him the time and week after week that would happen one day the telephone operator said look if you don't mind me asking why do you call every day to ask the time he said oh I'm the man in charge of the clock tower in town and I have to set the the clock right every day so the bells will ring at the right time and she said oh my God I set my clock by The Clock
Tower so they were they were both relying on false information but I want to talk to you today about time because we are a we are at a time of the year where everybody's thinking of time because we are at the end of a cycle at the end of a year and in the beginning of a new cycle a new year and we all tend at this time of the year to look back and think at least Le a little bit some people think a lot a lot more others don't think too much but everybody
seems to think at least somewhat on how they spent their time how the year that is finishing has been for them what they have achieved Etc you just received the magazine with the main events that happen here at the church all that that's the kind of thing that we tend to do at the at the end of of each year we look back but we also look forward because we are beginning a new year so the subject of Time and Time passing is 2012 and when you were young remember when when you were young you
you got very excited about turning 16 and and then 18 and then 21 and you could buy drinks right and we got excited which e with each birthday but after 30 something with me started with 35 I don't know you but at 35 I stopped being so excited about my birthdays so but this this thought of we are getting old and the kids were really little are now taller than us and this this thought of time is constantly on our minds especially at this time of the year and I want to talk to you about
this because this is so so important not just in the in terms of time itself but because time is something very closely connected to God and you'll understand why in a moment first of all I'd like to meditate with you on this verse that you'll see on on the screen this verse tells us about time the importance of time so the psalmist is praying and asking God teach us to number our days in other words teach us to count our days the meaning of this sentence in the Hebrew is basically in today's terms is Lord
teach me to understand the value of time help me understand the value of time and how short life is that's the meaning of this sentence there teach us to number our days and he adds a consequence to that he adds a a result of that knowledge of that knowledge acquired by that teaching basically he's saying if you teach me to number my days if you teach me to value my time if you teach me to to use time wisely then I will gain a heart of wisdom I will become wise knowing how to use your
time makes you Wise Wise when we learn how to use time we become wise which is the same of say as saying you become smarter than most people and if you are smarter than most people you are ahead of most people you will have more money than most people you will make better decisions than most people your life all around will be better better than the life of the average person if you know if you learn how to use time well your heart will grow wise you will have insights and understanding that other people don't
have that's the one of the connection connections between time and God when you learn that time is something so Divine and you learn to respect it you learn to use it well you learn to understand it it rewards you it pays you back with wisdom you know here's something that you probably never heard before as I was meditating on this verse I was thinking in in fact in reality no one has time you've probably complained yourself many times or heard people complain I don't have time I'm out of time oh I want to do this
but I don't have time I've been so busy I don't have time you've heard people say that you've said that yourself many times I've said that too right we've all been familiar with with this expression I don't have time I don't have time I just I've been too busy we all complain about not having time and this is truer than we appreciate because literally we don't have have time we don't own time no one has time not a minute not a second not an hour no one has time is there a place in your house
where you keep time is there anyone here who has a special cupboard in the kitchen or in the bedroom that says okay I'm going to keep two months here in the C the cupboard for when I need it when I'm out of time I come here and I get some time out does anybody have have a place like that or an account somewhere where you you keep time no no one has time no one owns time No One controls time you can't make time go faster you can't make make it go slower you can't bring
it back once it's spent no one has time no one has the control of time no human being has the control of time in fact quite the contrary time has us time owns you it's because of time that you are getting older is it true or not it's because of time that some of you have given up on your dreams because it was taking too long for them to happen you just gave up time beat you it's because of time that some of you are discouraged because you you hope for things and and they don't
happen as quickly as you want them to and time wears you out so no one owns time time owns us the best we can do with time or about time is learn how to play along with it learn how to use it well we never have it we can't control it but we can learn to use it well we can learn to number our days to respect time are you following me this is so important for you to grasp because you you waste so much time in your life doing things that don't bring you any
profit you complain to God and to friends and to yourself in your head that life is not the way you want it to be that money is never enough maybe you hate the job you have you wish you had a different job maybe you complain about your family and so many things that you're unhappy with in your life you complain about it but you are not putting in the time to do anything about that if you did something if you did at least one thing for each time you complain about your life if you did
just one thing instead of complaining in other words you're going to me meet a friend and your friend is going to ask you how's everything and you're going to complain because that's what you do that's what you you you've grown accustomed to do is just gripe about your life you complain about your life ah it's this it's that it's the weather it's the car it's the child it's the husband it's it's it's my back you you're always complaining about something and you complain and you you sigh and you say oh if instead of doing that
it might take you a minute it might take you two minutes or even longer depending on the type of friend you have you're talking to if you took those two minutes three five minutes to sit down instead and say okay I'm unhappy about my job I'm unhappy about where I live you know what I'm going to start doing a b and c to see if I can change my job if I can if I can get a different job if you just sat down it might take you 30 seconds maybe a minute or two about
the same time it took you to complain for you to do something productive about that situation then you wouldn't be where you are right now do you agree yes maybe your son your daughter wouldn't be the way he or she is if you would take the time that you have instead of complaining and shouting and doing everything that's not working and tried something different that works but that's the crazy thing about us we hope for a better life while doing the same thing over and over again we hope for a different outcome without changing our
behaviors and logic and intelligence tells me that if I overeat every day I exceed my quot of food every day I will never lose weight so I can't hope that tomorrow I will fit into that skinny jeans if today I just filled my tummy with turkey and and cake and and all kinds of food that filled my eyes that I I saw in front of me I can't I am not going to lose weight unless I change my eating habits that's obvious every everybody knows that but instead of doing something with their time doing something
productive we like to complain we like to just lament about life and just you know look at all the peep and say oh look how easy it is for them oh it's easy for you to say because you don't have my age or because you don't have this problem that I have or because you had it easy you had people to help you and me and I never had this it's that's what we usually do we take our time the time that we don't have right we we take time time and we use it badly
we waste our days we waste every day and life keeps going by you pay lip service to the importance of God in your life somebody asks you in the street what's the most important thing in your life you say God first my family second my health and yet these are probably the three last things that you're focusing on right now most people will say God family health and yet these three things are the three most neglected things in most people's lives people NE neglect their health they neglect their family and talk about God that's that's
the last of of the list but they deceive themselves they tell themselves this story that sounds nice sounds good but they never really act on it so when you appreciate that time time is something Divine that God is is the one who who has allowed us to spend any time on this Earth he has the control of the clock he's the only one who can make a long time something that would take a long time to happen happen in a short time and some that should happen in a short time take a long time he's
the only one who can do these things because as the Bible says for him a day is for is like a thousand years and a thousand years like one day so God you see is not tied to this this time frame that we are all tied to he's not and if we learn to connect with him really give him the time of our life to give him the place that he deserves in us then he will teach us wisdom he will teach us how to save time you know things that you're now waiting you've been
waiting for I don't know God knows how long weeks months or years for things to happen and they don't happen it seems that the longer the more the more time passes the the farther away from you that go that goal becomes why because you are not giving the time of your life to God you are not honoring the owner of time you're not and when you do that you pay you pay a price you waste time and time wastes you time wastes you your your eight hours a day or whatever number of hours you work
a day they don't seem to prosper you see that there are people who when they go to work it's like they really focus in one 2 three hours they're done they've produced more in two or three hours than most people do in a week it's like time prospers in their hands things happen quickly some people they at 14 or 16 they are ahead of of most teenagers their age they seem to to be ahead of time and they not even necessarily believing God but God has promised that when we connect with him when we put
him where he belongs which is the first place of our life Psalm 25:14 says that he shares he lets us in on secret things God lets us in on secret things he shares his secrets with us which means as I was telling you earlier he gives us Insight intelligence he helps you to to sus something out very quickly what takes people ages to get to understand you grasp in a matter of seconds because God lets you in on certain secrets you have inside information you see God gives you inside information because he speak speaks to
you he reveals you things he gives you groundbreaking ideas ideas that other people look at and think wow how on Earth did you come up with that how did you come up with that idea I wish I had thought of that yes but you didn't because you're probably watching the 10:00 news or something worse you were wasting your time while that other person was using it well so God lets you in on on certain secrets so you need to learn how to use your time and one of the most important things that I have ever
realized about time is that it's always now I asked you a moment go to look at your watch and tell me what time it was and I heard different answers one thing I know for sure right now the time right now is always now it's never yesterday it's never tomorrow it's never an hour ago or an hour ahead it's always now which means that I need to learn how to use the now to my advantage and I'll give you an example of that right now what's happening what's happening here right now huh you are in
church you are listening to a message inspired by the scriptures right this is happening here right now this is what's happening but in this crowd here today and the more crowded the place the easier it is for this to happen in this crowded place today how many of you are with your mind somewhere else thinking I got to get to that New Year's Eve party until when he's going to talk when is he going to stop talking in other words you are here but you're not here you are not in the now you are not
into what's happening here right now you are not here you are not in the now which means you are wasting your time the one you don't have you are wasting time because you're not focusing on what is happening right now in front of you you're not focusing some people are sleeping others are paying attention to the funny hat of the other person next to them which tells me that if you're doing that you are a very poor manager of time cuz you don't recognize the now right now you don't realize that the past and the
present are never here I mean the future the past and the future are never here it's always now do you hear what I said yesterday and tomorrow never here it's always today it's always right now this is one of the biggest lessons I've learned about time that I have to learn how to make the most of my opportunity here right now I can't I can't be so arrogant so proud so conceited to think that I can control time and I will be here tomorrow I can leave for tomorrow the things that are in front of
me today to be done such as my salvation there's a scripture that says here is the day of salvation today is the day of salvation turn to God while you can while you can find him today is the day of salvation but a lot of people come to church and they keep telling them the devil tells them this story and they believe it and they tell themselves no I'm still very young you know I I know I should get closer to God but when I turn 18 when I turn 25 when I turn 30 you
know when I'm older I will get right with God but not now I I'm kind of busy I I don't have time to devote to church to go to church right now so I'll do this but not now that's so arrogant that's so stupid who are you to know if you're going to have the time to do this later don't you have a brain to realize that this may be your last chance you're here today you're hearing about God God is calling you once more but perhaps in your mind you're not even listening you're not
even paying attention because you're so proud so full of yourself and so wrong so wrong there are a lot of people in hell just like you regretting right now that they didn't take the opportunity to make right with God when they could while they could there are a lot of people in hell just like you right now I'll stop sinning but I'll sin a little bit more because I like it but I'll stop later I'll drink some more I'll sleep around some more I haven't slept with enough girls yet I haven't slept with enough guys
yet I I still have to enjoy the world a little bit more but I will I will stop you're so deceived the devil has wrapped you around his finger so nicely you need to learn how to respect time how to number your days how to count your days need to learn the value of now when I turned to God I was 14 and one of the things I heard the most from my friends at school and young men and you know guys girls we just used to be together and do stuff that teen just do
and I was starting to come to church starting to take things seriously so I began to be different to act different from the way I used to act and be different from them and when they noticed that I was starting to distance myself from them I used to hear a lot man you're too young for this church thing you're so young enjoy yourself a little bit by all means go to church but on Sundays you know if you must go to church go Sunday morning to the church by all means but hey the rest of
the week let's have fun you're too young for this church thing and I heard that so many times so many times and not least from my parents I heard that from my parents because when I started thinking about going to Ministry because I I really had this encounter with God I I discovered something I had never known before I found my salvation and when you find your salvation there's something really interesting that happens and this is a sign that you can use to tell if you're saved or not when you received your salvation when you
really received your salvation you know you've received your salvation when immediately after you want to tell everybody about it you want to tell everyone about Jesus you even become a kind of a pain on people's side because you can't let go you can't stop talking about this Jesus that you found and and this thing that you read in the Bible and this new thing that you discovered you begin to really want to give God to people because you received him you found him it's like when you had a an incurable disease and you struggle with
it for years and then suddenly you find a doctor who has a medicine and a cure for your disease you want to tell everybody who has that disease to go to that doctor it would be czy crazy not to do that it would be abnormal if you kept it to yourself so it happened to me I want to tell everybody and I wanted to not just tell everybody when I had a chance during a coffee break in school or something I I wanted to devote my life to doing that because I realized my God our
family suffered so much because we didn't know God and there are many families like mine suffering many people suffering because they don't know what I know right now so I have to do something to tell them so I want to spend more time doing that and I went tell my mom and my dad and I said look I want to be a pastor I want to I don't want to work for you anymore I I used to work for my dad I don't want to work in in the business in the family business anymore I
want to be in church I want to work and train and become a pastor I I want to work for God and that's when they started going but you're so young you're so young you have your life ahead of you and there was a time when I heard that so many times from friends and from my parents that I came to God and I said God you know what everyone keeps telling me that I should live my life enjoy my life and when I'm older give myself to you you know what I want to give
you my youth I don't want to wait until I'm old I want to give you my youth I want to serve you with the time that I have right now and do it for as long as you allow me to I made that prayer and I never forget that prayer that day I had no clue what God had in store for me I had no clue that I would travel to many places and talk about Jesus I had no clue I was 16 turning 17 years old I had no clue but I knew that I
wanted to spend my time with God serving God and I made that decision I didn't want to wait and I'm not saying this that you have to do the same like become a pastor going to Ministry although some of you here perhaps have been told that same lie some of you there are some young people here who have a lot of potential you have a lot of dreams you you feel the same way I do but be perhaps because of your parents because of society because of a lot of expectations that have been put on
you you keep telling yourself no I'm going to wait first I'm going to do this first I'm going to do that there will always be time to do the ministry later you've bought into that lie you don't know if you will have the time is now so urgent is the time that a young man came to Jesus and said let me bury my father first and I will come and follow you Jesus said no sorry I'm not going to wait for you you want to go bear your father be my guest but I'm going on
if you want to be my disciple Let the dead bury their own dead you come and follow me I don't have time what we are doing is too urgent so what I'm saying is you have to take the opportunity that is in front of you right now if you are living in the wrong if you are living opposite to what God expects you to live now is the time for you to repent now is the time for you to turn back from that and not to say I will do it it's my New Year's resolution
I will do it I'm sure I'm going to sit down this week and I I'm going to talk about it to my wife and and to my my pastor and I'm going to do this no not this week not tomorrow you don't know if you're going to have that time if you're going to do something you've got to do it now your life only changes by by the things that you do now not by the things that you say I'm going to do it later no it's only by the things you do now even if
you don't have the ability to do something right now you have to make the decision right now that you will do it at such and such time tomorrow or this week but the decision has to be now you can't just tell your mind I I'll think about it later I I'll remember later no now if you want to make things happen happen in your life if you want your life to change if you want 2013 to be better for you you have to start now doing the things that you know you have to do learn
this grasp this this is the only thing that matters this whole thing about midnight and and champagne and and all this stuff that people do at midnight on New Year's Eve hoping to get good luck all of that is a bunch of balone all of that never works how many things have you done on your year eve even and including being in church on New Year's Eve and nothing happened do you know why because you were hoping that by being Church your life would be great the following year and it's okay to be here it's
wise to be here but it's not all it doesn't end by being here you have to make the decision decisions that God is calling you to make are you with me yes or no so I want to call you today to grab hold of of this concept of this idea of this truth is in fact let me not use this word concept because it sounds like it's it's something that came out of somebody's head it's not out of somebody's head is from the word of God I want you to grab hold of of this truth
about time and say from now on I want to learn how to use time well I want to learn how to respect time never be so arrogant as to think that I will have time later to do something if I if something is so urgent and important I want to do it right now even if the decision is right now I have to do it so so respect time learn to use time well and with your understanding of this your wisdom about this you will connect with God you will learn to grab hold of this
opportunity of salvation of serving God today and always making sure that you are well with him in the now not later amen there is a scripture that says if a man lives righteously all his life and in the last day of his life he sins his entire life of righteousness will be disregarded because of the last day that he sinned talk about the value of time the importance of now but the opposite is also true if a man lives his whole life sinning but on his last day he turns to God he will be saved
I just don't recommend you to live like that because you don't own time a lot of people who died did not see it coming but when the Bible says you God is is merciful enough to forgive someone who's lived his lifetime in the wrong but turn to him in the end he's talking about his Mercy he's talking about his him being a god of a new beginning of Second Chances a merciful god a God who lives in the now that's what it means God cares about the now what are you going to do right now
that's the question I'm asking you right now what are you going to do about your life about the most important things in your life including your family your job your Health your spiritual life your relationship with God what are you going to do right now beginning right now that's the question for you amen and that's the most important thing that matters here today
