Congratulations graduates on your hard work and new beginnings! Old things end. New things begin. And where you go from here won’t be decided from where you start but how you go forward from here. And key to this is the importance to apply investment thinking in life.
But not in the ways you may immediately think.
Where you go from here won’t be decided from where you start but how you go forward from here.
As you know, there are bits of wisdom you can only learn along the way by experience. Today’s topic is one of those “I wish I had known” conversations.
What’d He Say?
In discussing this topic, the first application most think of is money. To budget well. To pay off school or other debts. To invest in your retirement.
I remembering watching a financial webinar that started with this discussion of investing money. It was a group that gives financial investing advice. As they entered into this topic of investing more deeply, something new came up.
Someone asked a question that had the speaker respond with a surprising note. In the midst of a lot of financial thinking and planning discussions came a surprise.
“What’d he say?”
He said how investing is way bigger than money.
All of your life is investing.
Know the Higher Call for You
One of the primary pictures of God’s calling and invitations to us is in the ways he has made us stewards in this life. There is nothing that we own but we all hold it temporarily. The gifts we have are not our greatness but good gifts from God. And God, who loves us and is good toward us, has a picture of what will bring life.
There is nothing that we own. We hold it all temporarily.
This theme shows up in various places.
- Genesis describes our responsibility and call to stewarding the whole earth.
- Ephesians speaks of rescuing our time and our focus of how we live.
- In observing Paul’s missionary life, he would return to places he had invested. There was a returning to people, not just going on to make new ones.
All of these capture the picture that:
- Time and energy are limited in this life.
- There is an intentional effort in having a life-giving rhythm.
When I am literally in the dark outside, having a flashlight can be a comfort. But you have to know where to point it. So where should our prayers, observations, and reflections be to more effectively discern what to do?
5 Areas to Apply Investment Thinking in Life
Practicing our thinking is part of following Jesus, whether about our investing, seeing hope, or dealing with negativity. Below are a couple of areas that I have found helpful as I address life. And I’ve seen these show up in various trainings or reading over the years.
Watch for one that stands out. Here are some themes:
- Spiritually: What are we giving our best energy and focus in our lives? Is our spiritual life getting the leftovers? While the spiritual and physical are separate, our spiritual life is an incarnational one so our bodies impact our ability to focus at times due to how we eat, sleep, etc.
- Time: Earlier we saw how we are called to redeem, or rescue, our time. There are subtle ways that it slides away. In fact this area may be one that spreads over some of these others and is a helpful measure.
- Emotionally: What people, situations, or challenges wear you out? Which are lifegiving and renewing to you? It takes some work but it is good to know what this looks like for us. Managing this “bank” well impacts the people, work, and even rest in our lives.
- Relationally: How are your relationships? Is work getting more than your family? Are there key people that you aren’t getting to but God may be calling you? Is there a balance in your relationships where you give and others where you receive? (If one is missing, that is something to consider.)
- Money/Possessions: Money and possessions are not evil themselves. But are there things that have become so core to you that your focus is on getting them? How much time do you spend in maintaining the possessions you have? Take a measure of the impact on these.
If there is one broad idea to appreciate it is that many of these areas can be brought back.
But one thing you can’t do is get time back. Invest it well.
Yes, investing looks like a lot of unexpected things. May you invest widely!
