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I spend a lot of time in my car. Part of this is because I have a fairly long commute to my job, and part of this is because I am a mom with active kids who love being involved in church, school, and extracurricular activities. Often, when people find out how quickly I put miles on my car, their eyes widen in astonishment. I almost immediately follow up with the comment that I try to redeem the time by using it in productive ways. Because of the number of hours that I drive, I have learned that there are a variety of ways that I can creatively use those minutes, and to increase my impact as a mom, wife, employee, and church member. 

While your commute time may be far shorter than mine (or it may be longer!), it is always helpful to think about how we can use our time better. With that in mind, I am going to share some things I have learned along the way based on each of the roles mentioned above. Over the next four weeks (Lord-willing), I will highlight one specific role and share some things I have learned about how I use my time in the car to extend my Kingdom impact in the spheres of influence God has given me.

However, before I get to the specific roles, I wanted to share some general principles that anyone can use to redeem their time in the car.

Pray

Whether you are driving by yourself or with others, you can use the time in the car to pray. Our family’s practice is to pray when we are on the way somewhere as it helps to give us the right perspective and right attitude for whatever activity we are about to participate in. We also pray when we see someone in need or when we are talking about what has happened during the day. When I am by myself, the car is a great time to have extended conversations with God about a particular issue or concern. Rather than battling runaway thoughts about how things can go wrong, I take those concerns to God and ask Him for wisdom and grace.

Learn

Trips in the car are also great times to learn. With the media options available to us, we can listen to sermons, books, or a variety of other educational materials. We can also use the time to instruct our kids and to talk to them about creation, relationships, or current events. We have tackled spelling words in the car, memorized verses, and played guessing games to learn more about animals. In our fast-paced world, we often don’t even take 20 minutes a day to grow our mind, but even those amongst us who aren’t road warriors probably spend 20 minutes a day in the car. If you used this time to learn something new, over a year you would spend 7,300 hours on that subject. This is just short of the time that research suggests it takes to master something (10,000 hours).

Plan

Although short trips aren’t the best as planning sessions, extended time in the car can be. If my hubby and I are in the car without kids, we use the time to talk about our upcoming weeks and what things we need to add or remove from the calendar. I will often (mentally) plan my lessons in the car, giving me a jump on things when I need to make notes for upcoming teaching sessions. Additionally, my kids have learned that the time in the car is a great time to let us know what things that they would like added to our family schedule – whether that be trips to the zoo or inviting friends over for dinner.

Build Relationships

Whether you are spending 10 minutes in the car or are on a multiple-hour road trip, the time you spend in the automobile is a great time to build relationships with your fellow passengers. You can get a recap of their day or you can talk with them about their hopes and their plans for the future. I find that often my kids are more willing to share their struggles with me when we are talking in the car than if I try to ask them about them when they want to be playing with their toys. Additionally, you can use the time in the car to make (hands-free) phone calls and catch up with people that you may not have chatted with in a while. You could spend the time in the car listening to music or daydreaming, but how much more beneficial is it to use it to build relationships with people who you treasure or are ministering to?

Scripture teaches us that the time we will spend on Earth is limited. In fact, for each of one us, the days are numbered (Ps. 139:16) and there is nothing that we can do to add to that time (Mt. 6:27). Therefore, it is profitable to use the minutes that we have been given to grow in our relationship with God and with one another, and to maximize our effectiveness in ministry by making effective plans and engaging in ongoing learning. We may not think that the trip to the grocery store gives us these opportunities, but it does! And in the coming weeks, I hope to share more about specific ways we can use those car rides, short and long, for God’s glory. In the meantime, may we all be mindful of how we use each minute God has given us in order that our lives may give glory and honor to Him.

Several years ago, there was an app that sought to quantify a person’s influence on social media. “Be Known For What You Love” was their tagline, which was appropriate given their business model. A quick look through a social media feed can often tell you a lot about a person’s priorities, preferences, and proclivities. We are eager to share what we “love” in our social channels.

While social media may give us a quick snapshot of people’s loves, if we stop to think about it, a lot of what defines who we are is based on what we value and treasure. Whether it is a favorite sports team, a beloved author, or an adored hobby, how we spend our time, our money, and our energy are determined by what we hold dear. Whether on a public profile or in our private lives, what we love determines who we are.

For the Christian, this recognition should be both a cause of celebration and a cautionary reality. If we are in Christ, and we love Him, this should be reflected in the words that we say, the things that we do, and the way that we live. This means that faithful obedience to Christ, in and of itself, can become a way through which we point other people to Him. However, we should be careful too because this means that how we live can also distract from our witness if what we appear to love does not reflect our love of Christ. We should take care, then, to evaluate whether our lives demonstrate that we love the same things that He does.  And if not, we should commit to making some corrections.

Here are three areas where we should ask whether what we love is reflective of what Christ holds dear:

1. What We Take Joy In

If I were to ask everyone reading this, “what do you take joy in?” each person would probably have an answer. However, it is unlikely that any one person’s answer would include all the same things as anyone else’s. The readers among us may talk about their favorite author or genre of books; the movie buff may rattle on about their favorite actor or style of cinematography; the sports fan would extol win-loss records or team histories, and the athlete may talk about their latest goal or achievement. Whatever it may be for each individual everyone has things that cause them to smile and things that cause them to laugh, and these are things that we turned to when we need a break from the grind, or we seek a moment of bliss.

The challenge is that outside of distinctly Christian answers (things like reading the Bible, praying, and fellowshipping with believers – all of which are good things and may genuinely bring us joy), where we find our joy may look suspiciously like where those who don’t follow Christ find theirs. If what we laugh at, rejoice over, and celebrate all are the same as our non-Christian friends, we should ask if what we love, is truly reflecting the love of Christ.  The way to diagnose this is by evaluating whether our definition of what is “good” and God’s definition are aligned. I may say that a TV show is good because it captures my attention, showcases talented actors, and has a compelling story line. But that is not how God would define whether a TV show is good. His evaluation of a TV show’s worthiness would depend on how well the story line focuses on the things in which He delights. He wants us to focus on what is pure, lovely, and of a good repute (Phil. 4:8). If we can’t honestly say that the things that give us joy reflect these characteristics, then we need to reconsider where we are investing our focus and attention.

2. How We Treat Others

What we celebrate and extol is one indication of what we love, but another indication is found in how we treat others.  First, Christ made it clear that how we love His children reflects our love for Him (John 13:35). Christians are to do good to everyone, but especially to those who are brothers and sisters in Christ (Gal. 6:10). Are we showing the type of love to our Church body that readily demonstrates that we love Christ? Are we willing to set aside our own preferences and conveniences in order to minister to another believer? This is how much Christ loved us – He gave up the riches of Heaven to come to this Earth and pay the penalty that we deserve (Phil. 2:5-8). We should make sure that our relationship with other believers reflects a commitment to love them as Christ did, and to willingly serve them and sacrifice for them, just as He did.

While it is important that we show that we love God by how we treat His children, it is also important that we demonstrate our love for Christ by how we treat everyone else too. If we value making a point over making a disciple of Christ, then something is askew with our priorities. The Bible says that our interactions with non-believers should be seasoned with grace (Col 4:6), and that besides loving God, loving others is the greatest thing we can do (Mt. 22:37-40). If we are known for what we love, we should be known for loving others well, because in doing so, we bring glory and honor to Christ.

3. Where We Spend Our Time

There is an old saying in business that what gets measured, gets done. The idea behind this truism is that individuals are likely to spend their time on what they know gets evaluated, and that spending time on something is one indication of its relative important. Spending time, like spending money, involves choices; you can’t do everything that you desire, and you must choose how you will allocate this limited resource. The way you use your time, then, should be reflective of what you truly treasure.

For many of us, we may not have previously thought of time in this way. As days go by, it may seem like we are simply getting through them, trying to make sure that our to-do list doesn’t get too far behind. But people pay attention to where you invest your minutes and hours. Are we spending them serving someone else or are we expending them in pursuit of an activity that has little redemptive value? Do we consider how we can maximize our hours to have the greatest eternal impact or are we just focused on when we can have time that you can spend as you wish? We allocate your minutes to pursue what we love most – even if we don’t realize that we are doing so. We should be careful to make sure that when people take note of how we invest our days the fact that Christ is our priority is readily evident.

Our First Love

In Revelation, the church of Ephesus was admonished for having lost its first love (Rev. 2:1-7). “First,” in this case, wasn’t referring to time, but priority. Christ was to be their greatest treasure – the primary recipient of their affection. They were warned that unless they turned back and put Christ firmly at the center of their lives, there would be significant consequences. The same is true for any Christian. When Christ ceases to be our first love, when we let our affections be centered on lesser things, it will impact our walk with Christ and our witness to others. We are known by what we love – and we should make sure that all that we love stems from our love for Christ.