A steward is one who manages and administrates what has been entrusted to her or him by another. For us, we are stewards of what God has given us, which is everything. Therefore, stewardship is the careful and responsible management of all that God has entrusted to our care.
The three traditional legs on the stewardship stool are often listed as TIME, TALENT, AND TREASURE. In regard to “time,” God’s perspective of time is very different than ours. For God all time is but an instant, but we measure and view our time in specific amounts and allotments.
For example, to us, the following outlines what we see as time:
1 DAY = 24 HOURS; 1,440 MINUTES
1 WEEK = 168 HOURS; 10,080 MINUTES
1 MONTH = 730 HOURS; 43,829 MINUTES
1 YEAR = 8,766 HOURS; 525,949 MINUTES
Stewardship calls us to view all time as gift, as it surely is. We understand that each of us receives gifts in differing amounts — at least as far as talents and treasure go. However, we all have the same amount of time, at least in terms of minutes in a day, etc. The key to good stewardship is how each of us uses that time.
In addition to Sunday Mass, do we give other time to the Lord and in service to others? There are many ways to be a good steward of God’s time — prayer, Scripture reading, Eucharistic Adoration, time with our family, helping those in need in our parish and in our community, sharing time with others.
When we come to the realization that it is God’s time, not ours, then we are better able to be good stewards.
