I recently confessed to a group of women how extreme my ego-centricity was growing up. As a senior in high school we had to perform 200 hours of community service during the school year to graduate. I worked a total of 25 hours and forged signatures for the remaining hours. I was consumed with the idea that my time was too valuable for anything outside myself, not realizing the opportunities I would gain and the knowledge I could obtain from trying new things and meeting new people while providing service.

Our time is not our own. We are responsible for managing it well and that is all we control. We can’t save time like vacation hours at work. One of the Greek words for time is kairos, “a passing instant when an opening appears which must be driven through with force if success is to be achieved. We have to be intentional on how we spend our time. Kairos also means the appointed time in the purpose of God. It is up to us to live the life God intended so the time we have is well spent. If we see time in this regard think of how much better our work, our relationships and our community could be. Let us live a life of exceeding abundance, beyond what is expected, imagined or hoped for.

Christ came so that we could live an above-the-ordinary life…an abundant life. In today’s language it means more than enough, ample. We assume this idea of having more than enough means we need to strive for this “abundant” life by getting more, more, more. More cars, bigger meal portions (who doesn’t go to a buffet and “eat their money’s worth”?) We often try to obtain the most praise at work, giving into the competitiveness rather than the compassionateness of relationships.

Look at the word abundant in its Greek origin, perissos. It means superior or beyond measure. The word in this context it isn’t so much as more, more, more but better. Once we accept Jesus Christ as our savior our lives can be superior. Not in comparison to those around us, but to our life before.

“I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” John 10:10. Why would we spit in the face of Jesus by refusing this abundant life?