Habits That Echo | Help, I Have Bad Habits (Class 4)

Hello, my name is Charles, and I wanna welcome you to class number four, and it is titled It is About Time, and this is a part of our digital discipleship collection called Help, I Have Bad Habits, because here's the truth. If you wanna change your life, you have to change your habits. We're gonna spend the next couple of moments talking about one of my favorite topics, which is time, time, time, time. Time is interesting. Here's the first thing I wanna start off with is that time is a human thing. Now you know this, but maybe you have a watch, maybe you've checked time on your phone, maybe on the oven, I always remember growing up when, I don't know what this says about my childhood, but the power would go out for random spurts of time, I guess, 'cause we weren't paying the power bill. But it's like all the clocks would get off, or when you jump forward or spring forward or whatever, you know what I'm saying? Like we just be randomly changing the time, but time kind of controls everything. Do I have enough time to get to work, or how much time before we go to bed, or how much time before the movie starts, or how much time, time, time, time? And here's what I wanna talk about,

that if you're gonna talk about the habits of your life, it's really about time. Now the title of our course today is actually inspired by a sermon I preached in our series, God Chose Me, and in that series, there was this phrase that I said that honestly, if you've been around for a certain amount of time, you might have heard, and it is this, it summarizes the biblical and holistic view of time, and it is this statement right here. God was standing outside of time. Then he created time, placed you and me in time so that at the right time, we would be on time for his appointed time. I know there's a lot of times, I'll say it one time. God was standing outside of time. Then he created time, placed you in time, so at the right time, you would be on time for his appointed time. What this is speaking of is that God in his grace and his mercy and his kindness, he created time for you and me because time helps us process, and honestly, time is a gift for hope. Think about it, time, if you have a bad day, what do you think? Oh, man, well, tomorrow will be better. Well, tomorrow is a concept of time. If you're at work and your work day's going bad,

you look at your watch and think, I get off in 30 minutes because when I get off, I'll feel relief, why? But that's a concept of time. If you've been single for some time and you know you got a date, you think, oh, in three days I got that date, but that's a concept of time. Without time, we would have no idea how to perceive our hardship and our pain because it would seemingly last forever. But God in his grace and his mercy, he gives us time. And time is a way that specifically when it comes to having habits or bad habits, time is one of those habits that we have to talk about. And we have to talk about it because how we use it, how we spend it, how we steward it, is so important to the life that we live. I want to talk to you in the next couple of moments of what we can spend our time on. Before I do that, I want to read to you a couple of scriptures. There's scripture in James chapter number four in the 14th verse and it says this, you are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. That's original scripture, the original language. It's kind of like the morning do. Like you know how you wake up in the summer

and there's mist on the top of the grass and then by nine o'clock or 10 o'clock it's gone. What James is saying is that there's a part of time and a part of our life that you gotta realize you're not here forever. Like this is not gonna last forever. We're not gonna be here forever. We're not gonna have all the time in the world. And so it's that awareness that brings a presence and a purpose to our life. I love another scripture in Psalms 90. It says this, teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom. I mean, how powerful is that? What it's saying is, is that we need to understand the limited amount of time we have and in doing that we become wise. What is the inverse saying? It's saying to think you have more time than you do is unwise. It's ignorant. It's not the way you should think. To act like I've got plenty of time to do whatever, to act however, with whoever, it's not wise. But the Bible says the way we gain wisdom is by teaching God teach us to number my days. I wanna talk to you about the habits you keep and specifically, what are your habits with your time? We're all different. And you know, I saw this thing on social media one time

and it said there are two types of people in this world. People who are 20 minutes early and people who are two hours late and usually they marry each other. And it's a hilarious picture of that we all have different relationships to time. Like, I think me and my wife were very different in that way that I'm kind of fluid with time except for if I've prepared and planned to leave at a certain time. Like if I'm person that like, it's sixth grade, I started picking out my clothes the night before. I don't do that always now, but like in my head, I'm processing, like I'm probably gonna wear this or that. So I'm already thinking about how my wife, she, it's like a royal sin to think about the next day. It's like, no, I'm here, I'm present and it's beautiful. But also I'm like, bro, you could have at least for like two seconds. Anyways, we won't talk about it. But me and Abby are deciding to leave. We'll be sitting in bed. We talked in one of our other courses about our morning routines. We said in bed, we're reading our Bible. And I know I can get ready in six minutes and 38 seconds. I can literally get up out of the bed. I don't have to do anything man, I'm gonna put a hat on. We'll put this jacket on, put these jeans on, put these boots on. I'm gonna brush my teeth and walk out the door.

I can do all of that. I can be laying in bed and in my car in eight minutes. Abby, that's not the case. She doesn't take a long time, but it's more than eight minutes. But we all relate to time differently and we all steward our time differently. And when it comes to growing in your habits, one of the best habits you can have is to steward your time well. So I wanna give you three things that are worth your time. There's a lot of things in life that are worth your time. There's a lot of arguments we get in. There's a lot of comparison we spend ourself doing. But there are three things that I believe are worth your time and worth your investment. The first thing we can spend our time doing, right this down, spend your time becoming. Spend your time becoming. There's a lot of things that we spend our time doing. We spend our time doing things. We spend our time cleaning the house and taking the kids to school and working at our job and working on a project. But in all you're doing, my question is, are you spending time becoming? I wanna build a habit in my life of I'm spending my time becoming someone of grace. Becoming someone who's patient. Becoming someone who's loving. Becoming someone, I mean, the scriptures in Galatians 522,

they give us the fruits of the spirit. Do you know the fruits of the spirit? Are things you become? They're not just things you're supposed to do. This is where we can get it wrong. We think, oh, you do love, you do Joey, you do patience. No, I don't do patience. I'm trying to become someone who is patient. And that only happens through time. I've gotta spend time becoming. If you're gonna have a habit with anything, a habit with your time, one of the first things I would say you should spend your time on is are you becoming the person you want to become? Are you becoming the mom you wanna become? Are you becoming the dad, the leader, the coach, the student, the learner? Are you becoming who you want to become? Because here's the thing. You don't become someone on purpose by accident. I'll say it again. You don't become someone on purpose by accident. What do I mean by that? I mean, this version of yourself that's disciplined and clear and confident and knows the word and is all those things, that's not gonna happen by accident. That's gonna happen by you spending intentional time becoming who you wanna become.

How do you do this? Well, it's fairly easy. You can set up different habits in your life that are this habit is about me becoming someone who is something I wanna become. So if you wanna become somebody who is kind, well, you set up a habit of, I send three encouraging text messages every single week. Because in doing that, I'm trying to become someone who is kind. You can set up habits all throughout your life, but I wanna encourage you. Do an audit of your habits and think, which one of these habits is helping me become who I wanna become? Because if you're going to spend your time, I think the first thing you should do is spend your time becoming. We're gonna spend our time becoming the second thing when it comes to our habits, and it comes to the habit of our time, is we're gonna spend our time building. That's my question for you. What are you building? And here's the deeper question, are you building something that's gonna last? Are you building something that matters? Are you building something that will go beyond you and yourself? I heard a leader say one time that,

what a shame it would be to climb the ladder of success only to get to the top and realize it's laying against the wrong building. What does that mean? It means we can spend our time building things that honestly, It's easy to spend your life building at a job, but if that job doesn't have an eternal connection or you miss the people at the job, what are you building? If you spend your life building a house and you get a bigger house and a bigger house and a bigger house and a bigger house, but you don't see the people in the house, what are you building? My question is, are you spending time becoming but are you spending time building? And man, if there's anything worth building, it's building what God has placed in your hands. It's relationships that He's given you. It's the kids that He's given you. It's the church He's placed you in to serve and to be a part of the community. It's the ideas and the gifts that He's placed on the inside of you. You want to talk about spending your time? Some of us spend so much time focusing on other people that we don't build the gifts He placed us. We think one day it's going to be a magic thing where somebody's going to say, "Hey, I heard you could sing.

I want you to be the next Beyonce and I'm going to give you a billion dollars." No, no, no. You've got to spend some time becoming somebody and building something. You've got to spend your time becoming, spend your time building. And if you can spend your time doing anything, I think this last one is so important. Spend your time being a blessing. Spend your time being a blessing. I'll tell you a real life example. I had a little bit of a break in between some meetings yesterday and we, I had to go get gas and so I ran up and got gas and there's a car wash right at the street from the church. And so I was like, "I'm going to drive my car through the car wash. I need to do this." And so I ran in, I pulled up to the little drive through thing and I rode down my window and the guy, it was the younger guy who was sitting there at the, that's how I know I'm getting old. That was a younger guy. It's like, "What does that mean, Jesus?" But anyways, I get up there and I rode down my window and I have my money ready to pay. I'm like, "Hey, I'll do the," you know, "I really went crazy."

I was like, "I'll take the super lava." You know, they have the craziest, what's up with car wash names? Let's talk about that. The super, so cool lava wheel shine. Oh my gosh, what is it? They're just spraying chemicals. Anyways, so I went for the super lava, you know, $25 wash. I was going to really go for it. And I go to pay and the guy just says, "Don't worry about a guy I got, I got you, bro. God bless you, have a great day." And I was like, "What?" And he's like, "Yeah, man, don't worry about this one's on us." And when I tell you, that really did bless me. It was a random thing. I was going to spend 25 bucks just to get a car wash away. But I drove through the car wash feeling like, I got a free car wash, look at this. This is incredible. And I said, I felt like I ain't never washed a car wash, but I was looking at the colors and it was shooting over my car. But I'm saying that it was a small thing. This guy was working his job, spending his time doing what he was doing. But he decided, I'm not just going to spend my time working. I'm going to spend my time being a blessing. I want to ask you, how much time have you spent

blessing other people? The Bible says that it is more blessed to give than it is to receive. I'm telling you, man, it's easy to spend your time working on your own projects, working on your own ideas, working on your own thing. But when you want to find purpose, if you want to talk about habits that change your life, spending your time blessing other people, it has potential to change your perspective, to change how you see yourself and the world. I'm telling you, if you are going to spend your time doing anything, spend your time becoming, spend your time building and spend your time being a blessing. Here's what I want you to do, action step. For the next week, I want you to take an audit your time. Just start there. Where am I spending my time? What do I spend my time doing? Just look at your time for one full week. What do I spend my time on? And then ask yourself are three questions. Is what I'm spending my time on helping me become who I want to become? Is what I'm spending my time on building what I want to build? And then what I'm spending my time on is it helping me be a blessing in being the person of how I want to be and who I want to bless. As you look at your time, I promise you, I believe that the Holy Spirit is going to guide you

and help you see, oh man, there's some areas where it's really about time for me. It's about time for me to become who I've been called to become. It's about time for me to build this business and it's about time for me to be a blessing. And as you take control of the habit of how you spend your time, I know it'll change your life. Let's take a moment right now and I want to pray for you. Even that scripture in Psalms 90, that God would teach us to number our days so we could gain a heart of wisdom. Would you take a moment right wherever you are and would you pray with me? Lord God, right now I'm asking that as the scripture says in Psalm 90, would you teach us to number our days that we would not just spend our time doing anything and saying anything, but would we become the people you have created us to become? So the name of Jesus, we pray, amen. Hey, in closing, I wanna say this, don't just spend your time, make your life count. I love you so much, and like we always say, go out and live a transformed life. (whooshing) (air whooshing)