Practical lesson – How are you? "to spend" Your time?

This is a practical lesson you can use to teach children the importance of spending time with God every day. To complete the lesson, you will need $168.00 in play money. (Many dollar stores have play money.) The suggested Bible verse to use is Psalm 90:12, but there are plenty of others if you want to do some searching.

This is a suggested dialog. Feel free to adjust it according to the children you minister to.

I have here $168.00 in play money. As it happens, there are 168 hours in each week, so each dollar will represent one hour. How do you spend your time? (Count the bills as you go through the following options.)

Let’s say you sleep around 8 hours each night. Multiply 8 hours by 7 days and you get 56 hours. Let’s set aside $56 from our stack.

Then comes school. Let’s say that averages 7 hours per day. That will equate to another 35 hours taken out of your week. We’ll set aside $35 for that.

Everyone needs to eat, so we have to make time for that. Let’s say you eat 3 meals a day and an average of 20 minutes per meal. That works out to one hour a day or 7 hours a week. I’ll put aside $7 more.

Homework? Most nights you probably have homework to do. Let’s say you average 5 hours per week; there’s another $5.

Watch television. Many people do more, but let’s say they watch 2 hours of TV every weekday and extra hours on weekends. That will add another 20 hours, so we’ll set aside another $20.

Play, including video games. Once you start playing, especially a video game, it’s hard to stop. Let’s say you spend an average of 2 hours a day playing video games. That works out to another 14 hours, so I’ll put another $14 aside. That only leaves us with $31 dollars; not much for a week.

Wasting time is also very easy to do. Let’s say you waste 1 hour a day, which will add another 7 hours, so I’ll put another $7 aside. Now we go down to $24.

Computer time including Facebook, internet, email, etc. Even if it’s just 30 minutes a day, that works out to another three and a half hours. Let’s round that to 4 and set aside another $4.

How about sports activities? If you’re on a sports team or in a band or choir, you have to practice. Let’s say you add another hour each weekday plus a few hours on the weekend. That adds another $8. Now we have $12 left for the week.

The question is, of all that time you’ve “spent,” how much do you spend with God or even thinking about God? God can be part of the things above, but you have to recognize and recognize that he is there while you do those things. But let’s see this from another perspective.

What are some things you can do to “spend” time with God? (Let the children give some suggestions. Figure out how many “dollars” they can represent each week and count the bills.)

– Read the Bible (15 minutes a day = $1.00)

– Pray (15 minutes a day = $1.00)

– Go to Church and Sunday School ($2.00 – $4.00 depending on number of services attended).

– Memorize Bible verses (15 minutes a day = $1.00)

– Add others as the children think of them.

Think about how you spend your time. Are you using your time wisely? God says in Psalm 90:12 that it is important to number your days. That means you have to use your time wisely and take the time to approach him. As you do, he promises to get closer to you.

If you find yourself doing something that is a waste of time, consider quitting and spending that time with God. For example, is spending time with God more important than watching TV? If you give up a thirty minute TV show and spend that time with God, it will give you a little over two hours ($2) each week and it will be time well spent.

Will you make a decision this week to spend time with God every day?