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There is something more important than knowing what time it is—it’s knowing how you are spending or investing your time. The critical issue is the "how." There is no more critical arena in our lives than our time. You can run out of money, gas, ideas, and relationships and still have time left. Time, not money, is now the most precious commodity in America. Time is life.

Over the past 20 years, the average American has added the equivalent of one month to their work year. The combined weekly work average for couples with kids under 18 is 91 hours. A USA Today poll asked what mothers needed most: 32 percent said more time; 27 percent said patience. In the attempt to save time, many will speed through a red light—costing insurance companies $7 billion annually in repairs and medical costs. Life isn’t so easy going, is it?

The best question is not 1) what is right, legal, moral, cool, and acceptable; or how far can I bend the rules and not get caught; but 2) what is the wise thing for me to do?

When the best question ever is applied to the priceless commodity of time, the question becomes—In light of my past, present and future, what is the wisest use of my time? Now, in order to understand this question, there are a number of time-impacting principles on which we must get a handle. Andy Stanley in his book, The Best Question Ever, addresses several of these.

1. There is a cumulative value in investing small amounts of time in certain activities over a long period. If you exercise regularly over a long period of time, you’ll get in better shape. If you invest in weekly music lessons and regularly practice over an extended length of time, you’ll improve. If you invest a few minutes a day with God over a long period of time, your relationship with Him will grow. You see there’s great value when investing small amounts of time over a long period.

But the opposite is also true. Neglect has a cumulative effect as well. Ignore your marriage, kids, or health for a year and you’ll definitely have something to show for it, but it won’t be something you’ll want.

2. There are rarely any immediate consequences for neglecting single installments of time in any arena of life. Skip church one Sunday, miss a workout or two, blow the diet with a death by chocolate dessert, or skip an assignment, and in the big scheme of things it probably won’t have any long term lasting consequences on you. Unfortunately, this self-deceptive perspective is what we use to rationalize our way out of doing something that has lasting value.

3. There is no cumulative value to the urgent things that you allow to interfere with the important things. When we add up all the random stuff we do instead of getting to the important stuff, the net result is little, nothing or zero. Let’s say we’ve all decided to do something important by spending less and saving more in 2006. You write out a spending plan—a budget—you eradicate some expensive habits, and set in motion an aggressive plan to retire your credit card debt. And for accountability, you tell your friends that you’re on the way to financial freedom.

But within the week, you’re asked to spend an expensive weekend in Chicago, you’re tempted by some "can’t say no to" bargains and you eat out every meal. Before you know it, all the urgent stuff and the random pursuits have interrupted your important budgeting routines, and you have spent yourself into a deeper deficit. What is the cumulative value to all the random, urgent stuff you spent money on instead of doing the things you knew were important? Little, nothing, zero.

Stanley says, "When random urgent activities constantly interfere with strategic deposits of time, it is like throwing away our most precious commodity. It is worse than wasting time. We waste our life…when you add up all the what-I-did-instead-ofs, they always equal zero."

4. In the critical arenas of life, you cannot make up for lost time. Critical arenas of your life require small deposits of effort over the long haul. You may be able to pull an all-nighter to finish an assignment or pass a test, but you can’t pull an all-nighter to rebuild a relationship with a child, spouse or estranged family member.

You can’t miss a month of working out and expect to catch up in one night with a four-hour workout. You can’t neglect a marriage for a year and expect a weekend away with lots of flowers and romance to make up for lost time. Sure, you need to start somewhere to build for the future, but you can’t make up for the cumulative value that you have lost. It’s gone forever.

Now, when you add the God factor into these time-impacting principles, the bar gets raised to a higher level. For instance, listen how the Old Testament character, Job, describes God’s time limits for us. Job 14:5 says, "[God] You have decided the length of our lives. You know how many months we will live, and we are not given a minute longer."

We can outspend our budget and calorie count. We can overwork and overplay, but we can’t "overlive" our lives. Our time is in God’s hands.

Moses writes in Psalm 90:12, "Teach us to make the most of our time, so that we may grow in wisdom. God has numbered our days for impact." God has given us a certain number of days for maximum impact. Unfortunately, we don’t know how many days we have. Tim McGraw said it well in the title of his hit song, "Live Like You Were Dying." Knowing our time on earth is limited should cause us to evaluate and invest our time more wisely. Doing the urgent, random stuff will not maximize our time or impact in all our arenas of life.

Last week we looked at three key verses from Ephesians 5 that revealed the best question ever. I’d like for us to return there because Paul, who wrote these verses, takes the best question ever and applies it the arena of time. He could have picked any arena of life—our spiritual lives, kids, relationships, work, or health, but he chose time instead. Here’s what he says:

Ephesians 5:15–17, "So be careful how you live, not as fools but as those who are wise. Make the most of every opportunity for doing good in these evil days. Don't act thoughtlessly, but try to understand what the Lord wants you to do."

Proverbs 28:26 says, "He who trusts in himself is a fool, but he who walks in wisdom is kept safe."

Stanley writes, "Just the sheer recognition that our time on earth is limited should compel us to evaluate all of life differently. Unfortunately, we spend more of our lives asking for the time than evaluating how well we’re investing it."

Your time is your life. So in light of your past experiences, your current circumstances and your future hopes and dreams, what is the wisest use of your time? Redeem the time: spend and invest your time wisely. It’s not about what time it is. It’s about what you’re doing with your time. What will you do with the time that is left?