Spend It All

The importance of time

by Brian Radcliffe

Suitable for Whole School (Sec)

Aims

To encourage us to consider how we use every moment of time, day by day.

Preparation and materials

• None required.

Assembly

1. I want to make you an offer. I’m offering you £86,400 a day, every day - and there are only two conditions attached. First, you must spend every penny of the £86,400 each day. You can’t save any until the next day or the next week; it must all be used. Second, the offer can finish at any time. You can’t depend on receiving £86,400 tomorrow; it may not be there.
   
   
2. Ask the students, ‘How do you feel about this offer?’
   
   It sounds pretty generous to me. But what are you going to do about the two conditions? How can you ensure that you spend the whole amount by the end of each day? It will require a deliberate plan of action. You might need to spend some on yourself and give away the rest for the benefit of others. And how do you tackle the possibility that there might be no money coming tomorrow? Whatever the outcome, it’s a remarkable offer!
   
   
3. Sadly, I must come clean with you, in case you haven’t already worked out what I’m talking about. The offer that I mentioned has nothing to do with money. The amount that I specified - 86,400 - is the number of seconds in a day. When we multiply 24 hours by 60 minutes by 60 seconds, it comes to 86,400 seconds.
   
   Every day, we are gifted 86,400 seconds - no more, no less. We must use every second on the day when it occurs; we can’t save an hour or two for tomorrow. The only thing that’s certain is that, one day, time will run out for us. The offer will end.
   
   
4. So, how might we spend this huge amount of time, day by day? It requires a deliberate plan of action.
   
   To start with, we’re advised to spend 28,800 seconds - or eight hours - asleep, doing nothing. However, although we’re doing nothing, this time is important because it enables our mind and body to recharge. Spending less time asleep is likely to affect how we function in our waking time.
   
   We can use our waking time in many ways: for leisure, socializing, exercising, learning, eating and drinking. All of these are important because they stimulate us, provide variety and can be satisfying. However, it might be good to devote some seconds (or thousands of seconds) to others too. We could provide company for the lonely, help people who can’t manage certain tasks themselves or build our communities through environmental work. Each day, it would be time well spent.

Time for reflection

It can be helpful to think of time in this way. We appreciate that £86,400 is a lot of money; it is very valuable. Yet we don’t tend to think of time as a valuable commodity, so we can end up letting it slip away, like money through our fingers. We waste time, we rush time, we don’t plan how to invest each second, minute or hour. We take time for granted, especially when we’re young. Our attitude is: there’s always tomorrow. However, as we get older, we begin to realize that tomorrow’s time may not arrive.

Jesus gave some sound advice about how to handle time. He suggested that we should take one day at a time. He said, ‘Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.’ (Matthew 6.34)

So, how can we follow Jesus’ advice? I suggest that we start with a plan. The school timetable helps with that during the week in term-time, but it’s also good to have a plan for the weekend and holidays, which I’m sure we’re looking forward to.

Let’s ask ourselves some questions.

- What do we want to enjoy and learn, to exercise our minds and bodies?
- Can we slot in some time to assist others?
- Can we plan ahead rather than letting time slip through our fingers?
- Are there decisions to take, issues to face or problems to solve? If so, we should tackle them straightaway and invest some valuable time in them.

The payback will come at the end of the day when we look back at how we’ve spent our 86,400 seconds - and we should feel a great sense of satisfaction.

Song/music

‘Time’ by Pink Floyd, available at: https://youtu.be/JwYX52BP2Sk (6.48 minutes long)

Extension activities

Encourage students to draw up an account for each of the next three days.

On the left side, they can pay in 86,400 seconds. On the right side, they can note the amount of time that they spend sleeping, on personal activities and on community activities.

Plan a feedback session later in the week.