"A mother of preschoolers asked an older mom at her church for advice dealing with her messy house. The older mom said, “Why don’t you think of ways to childproof your home.” The next Sunday when the older mom asked if she had applied her advice, the younger mom replied, “Well, I tried it, but they kept getting in anyway.”
Childproofing your home can be a good strategy for keeping order. You can waste lots of time cleaning up after little people if you don’t restrict access to certain things. But, on the other hand, you may want to consider putting more things in their reach.
We have 11 children in the Grubbs family. With a crowd like that, everyone has to help out at mealtime, including the very young. We’ve discovered that children as young as 3 years old can get silverware out of the dishwasher and sort it and four year olds can put away cups and bowls as long as they are stored low enough to reach.
Making your home childproof and child friendly will redeem the time.
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"US President Woodrow Wilson once said, ""I had rather fail in a cause which I knew would one day succeed, than to succeed in a cause which I knew would fail."" That's an excellent perspective to have. Many people spend practically all their time becoming very successful in a cause that will ultimately fail while devoting little or no time to causes that will eventually succeed.
The greatest example I can think of would be the multitudes who lay up treasures for this life, not realizing they are laboring for a cause that will ultimately fail. At the point of death, they loose it all. Contrast that with the humble Christian who lives a simple lifestyle so he can spend his time helping others get ready for Heaven.
The Christian may experience numerous ""failures"" along the way. And in the short term may appear to be the loser. But his cause will ultimately succeed. That's why choosing the right cause, and sticking with it through failures, is a much better strategy for redeeming the time.
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"If you took the same excuses people use for not going to church and apply them to other areas of life you'd realize how flimsy they are. For example: Someone formulated the following “Reasons Not To Wash”
1. I was forced to as a child.
2. People who make soap are only after your money.
3. I wash on special occasions like Christmas and Easter.
4. People who wash are hypocrites-they think they are cleaner than everyone else.
5. There are so many different kinds of soap, I can't decide which one is best.
6. I used to wash, but it got boring so I stopped.
7. None of my friends wash.
8. The bathroom is never warm enough in the winter or cool enough in the summer.
9. I'll start washing when I get older and dirtier.
10. I can't spare the time
The truth is, we all find time for the things we really want to do. So, put away your excuses and get to church. It’s the best place to redeem the time.
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"Every day, New York City sanitation workers process over 12 tons of garbage. They gather so much garbage because they have so many garbage collection points. Lots of collection points are good if you are gathering garbage in a big city. But if you are an individual battling information overload, too many collection points may also bring you a lot of garbage.
Collection points are the places where you and others place communications and commitments. They typically include your voice mail, email inbox, calendar, to-do list, paper in basket, lots of little floating papers and the sticky notes on your refrigerator. The problem with so many collection points is they quickly become unmanageable.
By limiting the number of approved collection points, you can begin to reign in some of that information so you can more effectively prioritize and process it according to which ones you really feel God wants you to accomplish.
Remember, narrowing the number of approved collection points helps you focus on what matters most, which will redeem the time.
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