TIME
Time is the wisest of all counselors.
Know the value of time; snatch, seize, and enjoy every minute of it.
—Philip Chesterfield
Time flies; but remember, you are the navigator.
You will never find time for anything. If you want time you must make it.
—Charles Burton
Everything comes to those who hustle while they wait.
—Thomas A. Edison
Most Americans spend six months of their lives sitting at traffic lights, contends a time management expert. Michael Fortino, president of Priority Management Pittsburgh, Inc., bases that and other estimates on his firm’s year-long research.
The study indicates that the average person in the United States spends one year searching for misplaced objects (eyeglasses, keys, etc.), six years eating, and eight months opening junk mail. We spend five years waiting in line—at banks, stores, theaters, sports events, the post office, etc.
—Have a Good Day!
If you have a time and place for everything and do everything in its time and place, you will not only accomplish more but have more leisure than those who are always hurrying as if vainly attempting to overtake what has been lost.
—Tyron Edwards
If we live seventy-five years, this is how we would normally spend it:
Activity
Percentage of Your Time
23 years sleeping
31
19 years working
25
9 years watching TV or other amusements
12
7.5 years in dressing and personal care
10
6 years eating
8
6 years traveling
8
.5 year worshiping and praying
0.7
—Mark Porter
Time is God’s gift to mortal man.
It is that fleeting little span
Between our birth and heaven’s door,
Where we begin God’s ever more
When time is o’er.
How then, should we our time employ?
In service or in passing joy?
Can we afford to throw away
And squander time in passing play—
O men of clay?
—Neighbor
Time is what we want the most but what we use the worst.
—William Penn
Counting time is not nearly so important as making time count.
I have only just a minute
Just sixty seconds in it;
Forced upon me—can’t refuse it,
Didn’t seek it, didn’t choose it
I must suffer if I lose it,
Give account if I abuse it;
Just a tiny little minute
But eternity is in it.
What we love to do we find time to do.
—John Spaulding
Time flies even when you aren’t having fun.
A small town operator received a call each day for the correct time. One day she asked the caller why he phoned each day for the time.
“I have to know the exact time,” he explained, “so I can blow the town whistle right at noon.”
“My goodness,” the operator gasped. “I always set my clock by your whistle.”
—Lowell Nusbaum
I defeated the Austrians because they never learned the value of five minutes.
—Napoleon
When as a child I laughed and wept,
Time crept.
When as a youth I dreamed and talked,
Time walked.
When I became a full-grown man,
Time ran.
And later as I older grew,
Time flew.
Soon I shall find while traveling on,
Time gone.
Oh, how precious is time; and how guilty it makes me feel when I think I have trifled away and misimproved it or neglected to fill up each part of it with duty to the utmost of my ability and capacity.
—David Brainerd, who died at age 29
I wasted time; now time doth waste me.
—William Shakespeare
The less one has to do, the less time one finds to do it in.
Somebody once thought it would be a wonderful thing if every day of our lives each of us had $1,440 in the bank that we had to spend before the end of the day—none of it could be carried over to the following day.
Each of us does have 1,440 minutes every day. Could they be spent in a better way?
—Bits & Pieces
Take time to work—it is the price of success.
Take time to think—it is the source of power.
Take time to play—it is the secret of youth.
Take time to read—it is the foundation of knowledge.
Take time to worship—it is the highway of reverence.
Take time to help and enjoy friends—it is the source of happiness.
Take time to love—it is the one sacrament of life.
Take time to dream—it hitches the soul to the stars.
Take time to laugh—it is the music of the soul.
Take time to pray—it helps bring Christ near.
No time for God,
What fools we are to clutter up
And leave without heart’s gate
The Lord of life, and life itself—
Our God.
No time for God?
As soon to say, no time
To eat or sleep or love or die.
Take time for God
Or you will dwarf your soul.
And when the angel death
Comes knocking at your door,
A poor misshapen thing you’ll be
To step into eternity.
No time for God?
Some day you’ll lay aside
This mortal self and make your way
To worlds unknown
And when you meet Him face to face
Will He—should He—
Have time for you?
—Trott
An emissary from a learned society came to invite Jean Agassiz, Harvard professor of zoology, to address its members. Agassiz refused on the grounds that lectures of this sort took up too much time that should be devoted to research and writing. The man persisted, saying that they were prepared to pay handsomely for the talk. “That’s no inducement to me,” Agassiz replied. “I can’t afford to waste my time making money.”
—The Little, Brown Anecdote Book
John Erskine, the well-known author, professor, and lecturer, once wrote that he learned the most valuable lesson of his life when he was fourteen. His piano teacher asked him how much he practiced and how long at a stretch. The boy replied that he practiced for an hour or more at a time.
“Don’t do that,” warned the teacher. “When you grow up, time won’t come in long stretches. Practice in minutes, whenever you can find them—five or ten minutes before school, after lunch, between chores. Spread the practice throughout the day, and music will become part of your life.”
Erskine stated that the observance of this advice enabled him to live a comparatively complete life as a creative writer, outside his regular duties as an instructor. He wrote most of Helen of Troy, his most famous work, on streetcars while commuting between his home and the university.
At an annual Trooping of the Colors ceremony in England, Queen Elizabeth rode horseback from Buckingham Palace down the Mall to take the salute of the second battalion of Scots Guards. She reached the parade ground just as the Horse Guards’ clock boomed out the hour of 11 A.M. However, a BBC commentator informed millions of people that the Queen was two minutes and ten seconds late. The truth was—the clock had been prevented from striking the hour at the correct time in order to perpetuate the myth that the Queen was always on time. Reporters traced down the clock expert who had climbed into the clock tower and held back a three-foot-wide governing wheel till the exact moment when the queen’s horse stepped onto the parade ground. He confessed he had done the same thing at every Trooping of the Colors during her reign. Most years she was just a few seconds late, but one year he had courageously made time stand still for four minutes.
Time management consultant Antonio Herrera asked the participants in a seminar, “If we had to buy time, would there be any difference in how we would spend it? Would the days of our lives be used more wisely?” He asked, “What if you had to pay in advance one hundred dollars an hour for the time allotted to you? Would you waste it?” The answer should be obvious.
TIREDNESS
Our fatigue is often caused not by work, but by worry, frustration, and resentment.
—Dale Carnegie
“How far down do you want to sit?” asked the usher.
“All the way,” answered the little old lady. “I’m very tired.”
The population of this country is 220 million, 84 million over sixty years of age, which leaves 136 million to do the work. People under twenty years of age total 95 million, which leave 41 million to do the work.
There are 22 million who are employed by the government, which leaves 19 million to do the work. Four million are in the Armed Forces, which leaves 15 million to do the work. Deduct 14,800,000, the number in state and city offices, leaving 200,000 to do the work. There are 188,000 in hospitals, insane asylums, etc., so that leaves 12,000 to do the work.
Now it may interest you to know that there are 11,998 people in jail, so that leaves just 2 people to carry the load. That’s you and me—and brother I’m getting tired of doing everything myself.
TITANIC
When Mrs. Albert Calwell came aboard at Southampton, she had asked a deck hand, “Is this ship really nonsinkable?”
“Lady,” he answered, “God Himself could not sink this ship.”
On the evening of April 15, 1912, during its first trip from England to New York City, what was called an unsinkable seagoing vessel struck an iceberg and began to go down. That ship was the Titanic. The tragedy happened about 1,600 miles northeast of New York City in the heart of the Atlantic Ocean. The iceberg tore a 300-foot gash in the ship’s hull. Unfortunately, there were lifeboats for less than half of the 2,200 passengers. Two-and-one-half hours after the impact, nearly 1,500 people went to a watery grave. Most of the survivors were women and children.
That horrible night there were men who scrambled and sought to save themselves, caring nothing of others. But there were also those who willingly stepped aside to let others be saved, knowing they would die. Fathers kissed their wives and children good-bye. Friends embraced for the last time and separated, knowing they would not see each other again on this earth. Many willingly paid the ultimate sacrifice for their friends—death.
An insurance company pictured the Titanic sailing straight for the iceberg which many years ago sank that great luxury liner. The advertisement read, “They called her the ‘Millionaire’s Special.’ Four city blocks long, eleven stories high, powered by triple propellers, protected by the latest, most ingenious devices, luxurious and beautiful beyond words, she caught the fancy of the world.
“On April 10, 1912, she slipped out of Southampton on her maiden voyage to New York. Less than five days later, she went down in 12,000 feet of icy water, 300 feet of her hull ripped open by a massive iceberg. Actually the Titanic was more than a ship. She was a symbol of man’s power. Majestic! Colossal! Unsinkable! But when the ‘unsinkable’ sank, something went down with it. No one would ever again feel the same confidence in man’s strength.”
What a perfect illustration this is of all of human society. Proud, modern civilization—heedless of the claims of Christ—is rushing headlong toward destruction.
TITHING
A man came to visit his pastor and said, “Pastor, my tithe is becoming a problem to me. When I was only a fifty-dollar-a-week ribbon clerk, it wasn’t much trouble to drop five dollars in the offering plate; but now that I’ve gotten a large income I can’t spare the large amount of tithe that would be my portion now. I wonder if you could help me with this problem?”
The pastor replied, “Bill, I appreciate your candidness in coming to me. Let’s pray about it.” And he prayed along this line, “Lord, Bill’s tithe is a problem to him because he is making so much money. Lord, give him business reverses, reduce his income so his tithe won’t be a problem.”
The man interrupted and said, “Hold on, Pastor, I don’t think my tithe will be a problem anymore!”
—Morris Chalfant
TODDLER’S CREED
If I want it, it’s mine.
If I give it to you and change my mind later, it’s mine.
If I can take it away from you, it’s mine.
If I had it a little while ago, it’s mine.
If it’s mine, it will never belong to anyone else, no matter what.
If we are building something together, all the pieces are mine.
If it looks just like mine, it is mine.
—Creators Syndicate
TOLERANCE
Tolerance is the virtue of people who don’t believe in anything anymore.
—G. K. Chesterton