Over the TopSample

"How much do you make an hour?"

When you tell someone you've got a new job, this is typically one of the first few questions you get asked. But have you ever thought about what a strange question this is? Why do people care so much about the money math when it comes to having a job? They probably want to know how excited they should be for you (which is nice of them), but when you think about it, time and money are not even close to similar. Time is way more valuable than money. There are thousands of ways to make more money, but there's no way to make more time.

The precious nature of time is why the writer of Psalm 90 wants you to think about the number of days you have. Doing this puts your limited time here on earth into a bigger perspective and opens you up to what it looks like to spend that limited resource wisely.

So while it may not be helpful to measure your time in terms of money, it may be helpful to start thinking about how you spend time in a similar way to how you spend your money. Think about how you did this week. If you did what the poet in the Psalms suggested and numbered your days, was how you spent your time worth that precious resource?

As you start thinking about your time this way, it opens up a better question to help you learn how to be generous: "Is this worth my time?"