• Cutting costs: God doesn’t want us to waste our lives

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On my other blog is a post titled Site Plug: Living Off the Smell of an Oily Rag (Or, How To Avoid Wasting Your Life), where I describe how wasting money is wasting your life because spending money is spending time. E.g., a person earning $20/hour who ignores the house-brand cheese and spends an extra $2 on big-name cheese has wasted the eleven minutes of their life that it took to earn those two after-tax dollars¹.

It is important to avoid legalism – buying big-name cheese/giving eleven minutes of your life to the cheese company is not a moral issue – but God does tell us to use our time wisely²:

Therefore be careful how you walk, not as unwise men but as wise, making the most of your time, because the days are evil. (Eph 5:15-16 NASB)

Also, we can use our time/money for things that have eternal value or things that have temporary (earthly) value. When we use our time/money to do things that have eternal value, i.e. they glorify God and further his kingdom, we will be rewarded:

For no man can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

Now if any man builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each man’s work will become evident; for the day will show it because it is to be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each man’s work.

If any man’s work which he has built on it remains, he will receive a reward. If any man’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire. (1 Cor 3:11-15 NASB)

Would you rather have the big-name cheese or use the money to glorify God and have a reward in heaven? This is a matter of wisdom, not morals, so the choice is yours.

What do you think about the points that I have raised here?

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1. I’ve used this as an example because the two types of cheese taste the same and almost certainly are the same thing in different wrappers. Then there’s sugar, rice, and so on.

2. In the Bible “wisdom” doesn’t mean “brain power”, it means “good moral character/godly character” and is the opposite of foolishness.

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