Making Your Life Count

Before Jesus ever asked anyone to follow Him, He asked them to think. To sit down. To count. In one of His most practical teachings, He pointed to a builder starting a tower and a king marching toward war, and He asked a question that still lands squarely on our lives today: have you counted the cost?

For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have sufficient to finish it? Lest haply, after he hath laid the foundation, and is not able to finish it, all that behold it begin to mock him, saying, This man began to build, and was not able to finish.

Luke 14:28-30

Jesus was not discouraging us from building. He was teaching us how to build so that we actually finish. A tower half-raised and abandoned, a war entered without a plan — these are pictures of good intentions that never became anything. And most of us know that ache. We meant to grow. We meant to change. We meant to draw closer to God. But meaning to is not the same as living it out.

The truth is that the degree of fruitfulness you experience in this next season of your life will be closely tied to two things: the direction you point your life, and the intentionality you bring to the decisions you make. You cannot control everything life brings you. But if you have a sense of where God is calling you to go, a plan of action, and the discipline to walk it out, you are far more likely to arrive. That is exactly what Jesus is advocating here. Those who bear fruit are those who sit down, seek God, count the cost, and follow through.

The days are precious, and they do not come back

Here is something worth sitting with. Every single one of us has been given the same gift: time. You have exactly the same twenty-four hours as anyone else in the world. No one has more. No one has less. What happens between now and the end of your life is, in large part, up to you — God has a plan, and it is up to us to cooperate with Him.

See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil.

Ephesians 5:16

Paul is telling us that the days are diminishing. They are racing away from us. Despite what we may feel, we do not actually have all the time in the world. Make the most of today, of this opportunity, because once a day is gone it can never be gotten back. There will never be another one exactly like it. No amount of fasting or praying can return a wasted day to you.

So the only question that really matters at the end of a day is this one: did I make the most of it? Did I take even one step closer to God's purpose for my life? Or did the noise and pull of the day get the better of me? You do not have time to waste. And that is not a threat — it is an invitation to live awake. Let me share five steps we can take to keep from wasting the life God has entrusted to us.

1. Sit down and set your goals

Begin by naming three to five goals — no more, no fewer. Too many and you will burn out trying to reach them all; too few and you will settle for less than what is possible. Think through the areas of your life where you long to see growth.

• Spiritual
• Personal
• Marriage and relationships
• Physical
• Emotional
• Financial
• Professional

Let one or two of them be a stretch goal — something that feels just beyond your reach: run a marathon, read through the whole Bible, get out of debt, start a side business, write a book. They can start out general, but they must become specific and measurable. In other words, if you reach the end of the season without achieving the goal, you should know it. And if you achieve it early, you should know that too. A vague hope cannot be tracked. A clear goal can.

Some goals are simply a step inside a larger, multi-year vision. A business earning a certain income may take years to build. The sub-goal for this season, then, might be to launch it — because it must exist before it can grow. Whatever you choose, let each goal be aimed at somewhere you genuinely want to go, somewhere you believe God wants to take you.

2. Count the cost and write it down

For each goal, write out what you believe it will take — the price to be paid to see it accomplished. What is the general strategy? If your goal is to lose thirty pounds, do not just write down the number. Write down the path: lose thirty pounds by eating less and exercising more. Reduce my debt by spending only with cash and paying it down aggressively. Overcome my tendency toward irritation by learning to see people the way God sees them. Deepen a relationship by doing more things together and giving it more of my time.

Notice what happens when you write it that way. The goal stops being a wish and becomes a plan. That is not a small thing. Scripture itself commands it.

Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables, that he may run that readeth it.

Habakkuk 2:2

Any goal you do not write down, print out, and keep in front of you is just a wish. Make it plain. Give it a form you can return to, so that you — and anyone helping you — can run with it.

3. Break your goals into clear, actionable steps

This is where most of us fail. It takes time and discipline, and the help of the Holy Spirit, to work out the step-by-step actions that will actually carry you to your goal. Jesus did not merely say to sit down and have a goal. He did not even say to sit down and know the cost. He said to sit down and count the cost — to map it out, action by action.

This is where research, study, and honest counsel matter. Read about people who have done what you are trying to do. Seek them out. Ask them questions. In Jesus' parable, the wise king consults before he marches. Why does this matter so much? Because success is a journey, not an event. It is the progressive accomplishment of small actions leading toward your goal. In the end, the daily things you do faithfully matter even more than the outcome, because they are what shape you.

We become what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not a single act but a habit. Sow a thought and it becomes an action; sow an action and it becomes a habit; sow a habit and it becomes character; sow character and it becomes your destiny. So write down your next step. Then the step after that, and the one after that, until you reach the goal.

You may wonder: how can I know all the steps to a goal I have never reached before? That is exactly the point. We often assume we must achieve something first in order to know how to achieve it — but it works the other way around. For many of us, a goal has stayed out of reach simply because we never sat down and worked out the steps. Think of a pilot. Before takeoff, she plots the entire flight plan — sets the destination, charts the path, and only then leaves the ground. In the air there may be a course correction, but you can only correct a course you already have, not one you never made.

4. Make yourself accountable

Nothing significant gets accomplished in a single day. Big things are built by a hundred tiny steps taken throughout the year. A resolution is only a starting point; you must develop a rhythm for revisiting your plan. If you fail to make a plan to follow, you are, in effect, planning to fail. So use a calendar. Use a planner. Put your actions on the schedule where you will actually see them.

Here is the principle to write across all of it: what you do not plan to do, you will not get to do. Want to strengthen your marriage? Put a daily call or a monthly date on the calendar. Want to invest in your children? Schedule the outing before life crowds it out. Want to read a Christian book each month? Choose all twelve now and assign them. Want to grow financially? Set a monthly time to review where you stand. Turn your goals into scheduled, repeatable actions, so that simply by keeping to them, over time, the goal is reached.

Something beautiful happens when you live this way. Every hour, every day, every moment becomes precious to you. You begin to realize there is not enough time to do all that God has placed in your heart.

He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: also he hath set the world in their heart.

Ecclesiastes 3:11

God has planted eternity in your heart — dreams and callings larger than any single day can hold. That is not a burden. It is a reason to stop wasting the days and start letting your life be driven by purpose.

5. Plan for and celebrate your victories

Finally, plan to celebrate — no matter how small the win. Motivate yourself by marking your victories along the way. Promise yourself a reward for reaching a milestone: for landing that job, losing that weight, overcoming a habitual sin. Fear of failure keeps many people from ever making plans at all. So when you do succeed, rejoice. Nothing succeeds like success. Give thanks. Be glad. Throw a party, even, because you have refused to let the day be wasted.

A life that counts

This is not about becoming driven or anxious. It is about stewardship — receiving your one life as a gift and offering it back to God on purpose. The builder who counts the cost is the one who finishes. The king who consults is the one who wins the peace. And the believer who sits down before God, names the vision, counts the cost, plans the steps, and celebrates the grace along the way is the one whose ordinary days quietly add up to something eternal.

Wherever you are starting from, you are not behind. God's mercies are new every morning, and today is enough to begin. Sit down with Him. Ask what He would build through your life. Count the cost, take the next step, and trust Him with the rest. He is not asking you to be impressive. He is inviting you to be faithful with the time He has placed in your hands — and to let your life count.