Priorities: God first
“If you don’t set priorities, the world will set them for you.”
How many of us are too busy? How many of us have too many things on our plate? We want to do a good job at everything, but there are too many things coming at us to get everything done, and more especially, get it done well.
I certainly identify with all of that.
I suspect most of us are letting the world set at least some of our priorities. Instead of doing what we should be doing, we do what the world tells us to do.
There’s increasingly another side of this, at least for me. I only have a certain level of energy. I can go with most for a period of time, but particularly with hard and intense work, I run out of energy after a while. I usually get up at 5:30 and go until 10:30, but there are nights when I am in bed at 9 p.m.
“Take a look at your checkbook. That will tell you where your priorities are.”
I remember going to a financial advisor almost 30 years ago. We laid out our checkbook. She was horrified by how much money we were spending going out to eat. Right or wrong, and we were spending too much money there, going out to eat was a priority for us at that point in our lives.
I haven’t done a study lately, but I suspect if I did, a lot of our money now would be going to pay for things we bought but didn’t have the money in the bank for: interest on credit cards and the like. I’ve tried to get better at that.
There are things we want to buy for the house, improvements, and trips we would like to take. Part of the problem is waiting until we can afford them. It takes discipline. It’s a lot easier just saying yes when no is the right answer; for me as well as others.
I am a big believer in multi-tasking and working with greater efficiency. It is revolutionizing our society.
Computers have enabled us to do so much more. As I type this column, not that many years ago I would have been typing it on a typewriter, double spaced. After I finished typing, I would have marked corrections, and I might have re-typed it because I didn’t like what I ended up with (I still do that on occasion). It’s a whole lot easier to do on a computer. It usually underlines my misspellings so I don’t miss them.
After I finished my writing, someone else would have punched it in to a typesetter. There would have been changes made. Then there would have been someone to put it together on a page with the rest of the copy and pictures for that page. An editor usually would design the page, and someone else would put it together. The editor would help make it all fit right.
Then it would go to a pre-press department. Someone would make a page negative, and then someone else would make a plate.
Today I write the column, an editor puts it on the page and prints it out. It is proofed, posted on the internet, and then someone outputs it to a plate for printing. So much faster, much less labor intensive, and so much better. It enables a person to do more, and him or her to make more money.
I am amazed at the number of kids whose parents are at their school sports games. Even games during normal working hours, there are lots of parents who somehow get off work.
I remember Mom being at a lot of my games, but she was a stay at home mom. Dad never was, but he was always working.
This may sound a bit “if it was good enough for me, it’s good enough for them”, and I think it’s good that we try to support our kids, but I think sometimes we go overboard.
Do we coddle our kids with attention and a lifestyle that they won’t be able to recapture for many years on their own? Do we give them new cars, take them on (or give them money for) beach trips and vacations without expecting them to work? Do they have to pay for anything while they are living at home? Are we setting them up for a harsh world of reality, trying to make it living on their own, providing for their families, with the expectation of having plenty of money all the time and the things that go with it? Are we teaching them responsibility and preparing them for the world? Are we fulfilling our responsibility as parents?
Is it any wonder many kids don’t want to ever leave home?
Speaking of close to home, how about what we are using with our own time? Are we focused solely on our kids? Are we putting back into our community, our church? Are we taking the time to tell others that we care about them, maybe not so much in words but in actions?
Put another way, are we giving God what is right, or what is left over? Are we making His priorities our priorities? Are we bringing Him the first fruits of our time and our talents and our treasure, or are we giving Him what is left over after we get what we want?
It begins for me with setting and keeping the proper priorities. I can do better. How about you?
How many of us are too busy? How many of us have too many things on our plate? We want to do a good job at everything, but there are too many things coming at us to get everything done, and more especially, get it done well.
I certainly identify with all of that.
I suspect most of us are letting the world set at least some of our priorities. Instead of doing what we should be doing, we do what the world tells us to do.
There’s increasingly another side of this, at least for me. I only have a certain level of energy. I can go with most for a period of time, but particularly with hard and intense work, I run out of energy after a while. I usually get up at 5:30 and go until 10:30, but there are nights when I am in bed at 9 p.m.
“Take a look at your checkbook. That will tell you where your priorities are.”
I remember going to a financial advisor almost 30 years ago. We laid out our checkbook. She was horrified by how much money we were spending going out to eat. Right or wrong, and we were spending too much money there, going out to eat was a priority for us at that point in our lives.
I haven’t done a study lately, but I suspect if I did, a lot of our money now would be going to pay for things we bought but didn’t have the money in the bank for: interest on credit cards and the like. I’ve tried to get better at that.
There are things we want to buy for the house, improvements, and trips we would like to take. Part of the problem is waiting until we can afford them. It takes discipline. It’s a lot easier just saying yes when no is the right answer; for me as well as others.
I am a big believer in multi-tasking and working with greater efficiency. It is revolutionizing our society.
Computers have enabled us to do so much more. As I type this column, not that many years ago I would have been typing it on a typewriter, double spaced. After I finished typing, I would have marked corrections, and I might have re-typed it because I didn’t like what I ended up with (I still do that on occasion). It’s a whole lot easier to do on a computer. It usually underlines my misspellings so I don’t miss them.
After I finished my writing, someone else would have punched it in to a typesetter. There would have been changes made. Then there would have been someone to put it together on a page with the rest of the copy and pictures for that page. An editor usually would design the page, and someone else would put it together. The editor would help make it all fit right.
Then it would go to a pre-press department. Someone would make a page negative, and then someone else would make a plate.
Today I write the column, an editor puts it on the page and prints it out. It is proofed, posted on the internet, and then someone outputs it to a plate for printing. So much faster, much less labor intensive, and so much better. It enables a person to do more, and him or her to make more money.
I am amazed at the number of kids whose parents are at their school sports games. Even games during normal working hours, there are lots of parents who somehow get off work.
I remember Mom being at a lot of my games, but she was a stay at home mom. Dad never was, but he was always working.
This may sound a bit “if it was good enough for me, it’s good enough for them”, and I think it’s good that we try to support our kids, but I think sometimes we go overboard.
Do we coddle our kids with attention and a lifestyle that they won’t be able to recapture for many years on their own? Do we give them new cars, take them on (or give them money for) beach trips and vacations without expecting them to work? Do they have to pay for anything while they are living at home? Are we setting them up for a harsh world of reality, trying to make it living on their own, providing for their families, with the expectation of having plenty of money all the time and the things that go with it? Are we teaching them responsibility and preparing them for the world? Are we fulfilling our responsibility as parents?
Is it any wonder many kids don’t want to ever leave home?
Speaking of close to home, how about what we are using with our own time? Are we focused solely on our kids? Are we putting back into our community, our church? Are we taking the time to tell others that we care about them, maybe not so much in words but in actions?
Put another way, are we giving God what is right, or what is left over? Are we making His priorities our priorities? Are we bringing Him the first fruits of our time and our talents and our treasure, or are we giving Him what is left over after we get what we want?
It begins for me with setting and keeping the proper priorities. I can do better. How about you?
posted by Barry | 9:00 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home