To ask the Lord to teach us to number our days is to learn to see life with the perspective of limited time.
Sermon Title: MAKE YOUR LIFE COUNT
Sermon Text: EPHESIANS 5:15-17 (NIV)
Sermon Series: EPHESIANS: GOD’S PLAN FOR GOD’S PEOPLE
By: PTR NESTOR SY
Sermon Notes:
EPHESIANS 5:15-17 NIV
15 Be very careful, then, how you live--not as unwise but as wise, 16 making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. 17 Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is.
“Every time I reach a Starbucks, I feel like I’ve accomplished something when actually I’ve accomplished nothing.”
John “Winter” Smith
We need not just a vision for our lives, we need God’s vision for our lives.
“No one who really wants to count for God can afford to play at Christianity.”
Henry Ironside
I. BE WISE (v. 15)
careful | Greek: akribós
“with exactness”
PSALMS 90:12 NIV
12 Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.
To ask the Lord to teach us to number our days is to learn to see life with the perspective of limited time.
When we lose perspective, we also lose track of what’s important.
The problem is really not about losing track of what’s important (for us), but losing sight of what’s important for God!
The most important skill we can learn in our day is deciding what to pay attention to.
II. BE ALERT (vv 15-16)
It’s too late to redeem the time that is past, but not the time that is passing.
“A life once spent is irrevocable. It will remain to be contemplated through eternity … the same may be said of each day. When it is once past, it is gone forever.”
Adoniram Judson
How you invest those hours can determine the difference between a sense of contentment because you know you are doing what you were made for instead of a sense of regret because you squandered your time in doing things that have no positive return.
“Time is what we want the most but what we use the worst.”
William Penn
It is often in the most challenging of times where the greatest opportunities show up.
EPHESIANS 5:15-16 NIV
15 Be very careful, then, how you live--not as unwise but as wise, 16 making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil.
III. BE DISCERNING (v. 17)
It is not enough to possess something, you must also know what to do with it.
PSALMS 40:8 NIV
8 I desire to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart.
Our question:
God, what do you want me to do?
God’s question:
Will you do what I want you to do?
If you want to know the will of God, then do the will of God that you already know.
“To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all.”
Oscar Wilde
“The only thing Christianity cannot be is moderately important.”
C. S. Lewis
There’s enough time every day to do everything God wants you to do and do it well.