What Will You Do With the Time You’ve Been Given?

I have always loved watches.

That fascination began when my grandfather passed away, and I inherited his pocket watch. At first, I treasured it simply because it had belonged to him. It was a connection to someone I loved and admired. But over the years, that watch has come to represent something much greater.

Watches are remarkable works of art. Hundreds of tiny, precisely crafted components work together in perfect harmony to measure something we cannot see, touch, or hold.

Time.

Every glance at that old pocket watch reminds me of one simple truth:

All we really have in this life is time.

Our lives are nothing more than the sum of our moments. Every minute becomes an hour. Every hour becomes a day. Every day becomes a year. Eventually, those years become our lives.

The question isn’t whether time is passing.

It always is.

The question is how we choose to spend it.

We spend so much of our lives trying to accumulate things—money, success, possessions, recognition. Yet every one of those can be lost, replaced, or left behind. Time is different. Once a moment has passed, it belongs to history forever.

Perhaps that is why the scriptures so often speak of redeeming our time and living with purpose.

Time is one of God’s greatest gifts, but it is also one of His greatest stewardships.

King Benjamin taught this principle beautifully in Mosiah chapter 2. Speaking of our relationship with God, he said:

“I say unto you that if ye should serve him who has created you from the beginning, and is preserving you from day to day…with your whole souls yet ye would be unprofitable servants.” (Mosiah 2:21)

He continues by reminding us that God gave us life itself. He sustains us from one moment to the next, and whenever we choose to obey Him, He immediately blesses us. We could spend an entire lifetime trying to repay Him and still remain forever in His debt.

Everything we have comes from Him.

Every breath.

Every opportunity.

Every blessing.

Even every second.

When we begin to see time as a gift from God instead of something we own, our perspective changes. We stop asking, “How can I fit God into my schedule?” and begin asking, “How can I use the time He has entrusted to me to glorify Him?”

That doesn’t mean every moment must be filled with extraordinary accomplishments.

Most of life isn’t lived on mountaintops.

It’s lived in ordinary moments.

Changing diapers.

Going to work.

Studying for an exam.

Preparing dinner.

Serving a neighbor.

Listening to a hurting friend.

Reading the scriptures before the house wakes up.

Offering a quiet prayer at the end of a difficult day.

These ordinary moments, offered to God, become extraordinary acts of discipleship.

I’ve learned that some of the greatest growth in life doesn’t happen when everything is going well. It happens during seasons of struggle.

There have been periods in my own life when I felt overwhelmed. Times when I questioned whether I was strong enough for the road ahead. Times when I prayed until there were no words left, asking God simply to help me endure another day.

Those seasons eventually passed.

They always do.

Looking back, I can see that God often answered those prayers not by changing my circumstances immediately, but by changing me. The difficult moments became the very moments He used to shape my character, deepen my faith, and teach me to trust Him more completely.

I have seen this same pattern in the lives of missionaries, parents, spouses, friends, and faithful disciples everywhere. Growth rarely comes through comfort. It is forged through faithful perseverance.

God has given each of us a different calling.

Some are called to raise children.

Some to serve missions.

Some to build businesses.

Some to care for aging parents.

Some to quietly minister to neighbors without anyone ever noticing.

The calling is different.

The stewardship is the same.

How will we use the time God has entrusted to us?

Every tick of a watch reminds us that life is moving forward. We cannot stop the hands from turning, but we can decide what kind of people we become while they do.

J.R.R. Tolkien captured this truth perfectly through the words of Gandalf:

“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”

May we spend our time loving God.

May we spend it serving others.

May we spend it becoming more like Jesus Christ.

Because in the end, our lives will not be measured by how much time we were given, but by how faithfully we used it.