Am I Stewarding My Time and Talents as Wisely as My Money?

You've worked hard to budget well, you give faithfully. But your calendar, well, that's just pure chaos. Your talents, they're just gathering dust.But what if stewardship isn't just about what's in your wallet, but about what's in your schedule and your skill set? Well, I encourage you to stick with me today because we're going to explore the bigger picture of living wisely and more importantly, living fully.

This is Financially Confident Christian, your daily dose of gospel, grounded insight and faith driven tips to help you break the cycle of financial shame with confidence.

Welcome back to your Financially Confident Christian. I'm Ralph and I'm grateful to be with you again today. This is the show where we help you answer that simple but life changing question.And that's how can I become a financially confident Christian? Now we're in week four of our series beyond the Budget. We're finding financial freedom through intentional living.And if you missed yesterday's show, we discovered how generosity. That's right, generosity multiplies freedom. If you missed it, I'm going to encourage you to go check it out.And today we're going to expand that conversation and we're going to answer this question. Are you stewarding your time and your talent as wisely as your money? It's a great question, isn't it? Well, let me ask you this.Do you ever feel exhausted? I mean truly just exhausted, beat tired, whatever those terms are that you use. But when you think about it, you also feel strangely unproductive.You feel busy, you're very busy, but you're not fulfilled. Yeah, you've got skills. Maybe you love to write, or maybe you love to cook, or maybe you love to fix things, or maybe you're just a born leader.But those gifts just be getting buried under daily demands. They're just getting forgot about. And let's be honest with ourselves for a minute. Sometimes financial stress isn't a money problem.Wow, that's a news flash. But it's true. Sometimes financial stress isn't a money problem. It's a time problem. Or even bigger than that. Ready for this one?Or it's a calling problem. When our God given resources like time and talents go unused or mismanaged. A lot of people do that. It creates friction in every area of life.Here's the thing, and you're probably not going to hear this anywhere else. Stewardship is not just about money. If it was about money, hey, this would be an easy thing to learn. Hey, I've mastered this, Ralph.I'm good at managing My money. I'm a good steward of money. It's so much bigger than that. It's about your time. It's about your energy, and ready for this one.It's about the gifts God has placed inside of you. Well, let's look to the Word for some guidance. Let's open up the book of Ephesians, chapter 5, verses 15 and 16. It says this.Be very careful then how you live. Not as unwise, but as wise. Making the most of every opportunity because the days are evil.I use that on the show repeatedly because one of the things you have to come to grips with, you don't get time back as much as you'd like to try. Hey, when I talk to older people, I'm getting to that age myself. But when I talk to older people, the main thing they tell me, they don't.They don't tell me about, oh, Rapha, I wish I had made more money. I wish I had worked more hours. I wish I had done this. I wish I had done that. No, the very main thing they say, I wish I had better manage my time.And if you can't get time back, how you use it matters. Let's look again at the scripture. Let's look at first Peter, chapter 4, verse 10. It says this.Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards. Hey, there's that steward word again. Of God's grace in its various forms. It's crystal clear. The gifts that God has given you.Hey, and we all have gifts. Maybe you're listening right now. You're like, ralph, I don't have any gifts. I disagree with you. There are gifts.Maybe you haven't taken the time because you're so busy with the, quote, busyness of life, that you haven't really prayed about them, that you haven't really thought about what those gifts are. But those gifts are meant to be used. They're not meant to be put under a bushel basket. They're not meant to be stored off for some future date.The thing you need to understand is God has given you gifts and he wants you to use them. He wants you to multiply them. And that applies to money, but it also applies to your minutes and your ministries. So now you're like, great, Ralph.Okay, you say I have gifts. You say I have talents. What do we do? Well, the first thing you've got to do, you got to slow down and take an inventory.Like I said a few minutes ago, maybe you're this person, Ralph. I don't even know what my talents are. But one of the things I'm going to encourage you to do today is prayerfully assess how we're spending our time.Like I said, you're never going to get that time back. And once you look at that, look at how you're using or hey, a lot of people guilty of this myself are just ignoring your talents.And then just realign one area this week with intentionality and impact. So let's talk about your action step for today. I want you to do what I call a time mini audit. I just want you to track your time in 30 minute chunks.I just want you to take the day. Listen, I do it in my accounting practice all the time. Take the day and just track where you're spending your time.No guilt, no shame, just awareness. Hey, I spent a half an hour at the gym, I spent a half an hour the Death scroll on YouTube or on TikTok or something like that.But just track your time because you want to see where your time is going. And then I just want you to really do some brainstorming and think about what you're good at.What are the things you're really good at that you're not using? I'm gonna give you a couple examples. Maybe you're good at writing, maybe you're good at hospitality.Hey, maybe you're one of those people that can organize. We talked about how to declutter our lives the other day. Maybe you're a teacher, maybe you're an encourager.Hey, maybe you're a builder, you're good with your hands. Or maybe like a lot of people, you're good at creating. So I just want you to write it down.Write down your talents, write down the things that are passion for you. And then I just want you to plan one alignment. See if it's a time issue.If you did that mini audit and you're like, Ralph, I didn't realize how much time I spend endlessly scrolling or how much time I spend watching tv. But I'm not using my talents. Well then obviously cut back on those time wasters. Maybe you're just beat, tired, you don't have time to function.Well, maybe you need to reinvest that time in rest or maybe service or hey, maybe you need to grow your talents. And then if it's not a time issue, maybe, hey, Ralph, I've got these talents, I just don't use them. Well, offer it to your church.The church is looking for people who have talents, who can bring talents to help out with other people in the community, maybe use your talents to bless a friend, if you like to write, help them, maybe write them a note. That's one of the things we don't see a lot of anymore, just people writing notes. And then because this is a finance show, answer this question.Maybe you use that talent to generate income.So understand where your time is going, brainstorm on what your talents are and then decide, hey, am I not using my talents because I don't have enough time? Will look for ways to find more time, eliminate stuff that's not getting you to your talents, to your core purpose in life.And then I'm just going to encourage you to use those talents and because all of this is going to increase self awareness until you do that audit. And I did it just recently and I was amazed how many time wasters I have.And that will bring new joy and fulfillment to your life because you're going to realize, hey, wait a minute, I'm wasting so much time on this screen, just scrolling and scrolling and scrolling. And when you really do this and you start to brainstorm your talents, it's going to bring fresh energy. Hey, and even maybe more income.Hey, that could help the bottom line. But bigger than all those things, larger than all that, it really does honor God with every resource that he's given you. Let's pray together.Father God, we just thank you for the incredible gifts of time and the unique talents you've placed in each one of us, Lord. And we confess that sometimes we truly do waste time or we neglect the gifts you've placed inside of us.So Lord, we would just ask you to help us see clearly how you want us to serve, Lord. Teach us to manage our time with wisdom and to use our talents boldly. In love, Lord.May our daily choices reflect your purposes for our lives and may our work and rest bring you glory. And we ask this with confidence in Jesus name. Amen, friend. And I want you to hear this today. Someone listening right now. Maybe it's you.You're listening right now. You're like, ralph, I need some encouragement today. Been battling with your finances and it feels like it's just an uphill battle.I want you to know you're more than your budget. God entrusted you with time, with talents and with influence.So today I just want to encourage you, track your time, rediscover one gift and ask, how can I steward this better starting today? Because here's the truth. You're moving towards holistic freedom. Freedom. That's spiritual freedom. That's financial and more importantly, freedom.That is purposeful. And while we're talking about purposeful, I would love it if you would share this show with somebody else.Just grab your phone, grab your email and just send a quick message to somebody and say, hey, I listen to this daily show. It's called Financially Confident Christian. And it really helps me, you know, break that cycle of financial shame.And I'm learning new things every day and I'm really enjoying the empowerment and and I really think you would love this too. Just send them to financiallyconfidentchristian.com and I also want to encourage you to go grab a copy of my book.Hey, I'm only going to offer this for a few more days. It's called Mastering Your Finances. It's a quick book, but it is super impactful to improving your financial situation.The best way to get that is to go to financiallyconfidentchristian.com/master now. Tomorrow we're going to be wrapping up the week with a powerful episode on Investing for Purpose.I'm going to get a little controversial tomorrow, so be ready to join me because I'm going to be talking about investing for purpose, not just return. See, the world will tell you, hey, go get those high returns. Go get those, those huge returns.I'm going to kind of flip the script a little bit tomorrow so you don't want to miss that. And until then, I just want to encourage you today. Stay focused, stay faithful. Let's all go out there and be those financially confident Christians.You can do this. I have confidence in you. Have confidence in yourself. Stay financially savvy. God bless you and you have a great day today.

Thank you for joining us today on the Financially Confident Christian show, where we're breaking the cycle of financial shame with confidence and faith. If you found value in this episode, a simple click to subscribe means you'll be invited right back for our next conversation.And remember, financial challenges don't have to be overwhelming. Just Ask Ralph. This show is a production of Ask Ralph Media and is supported by Saggio Accounting Plus.The information shared in this episode is based on data available as of the date of release. Saggio Accounting plus and Ask Ralph Media, Inc. are under no obligation to update this content if circumstances change.Please note that applying this information to your personal situation requires careful consideration. This episode is not intended intended to serve as financial, tax or legal advice.Always consult your trusted tax advisor or attorney before taking action based on anything we've discussed.