Sixteen Hours

Sixteen hours. 960 minutes. 57,600 seconds.

It describes the amount of time that I’ve spent on the road each week for the past couple weeks driving between Hardin and Louisville, KY during Martha’s hospital stay.

I’m a person who tries to do the best that I can with the time that I’m given (Ephesians 5:15-16). As a preacher, every day I juggle time limits and deadlines. Since Sunday comes around at the start of every week (at least until the Lord comes) there are constraints on the amount of time that I have to prepare to teach. I value every minute I have in a regular work week. When the equivalent of two work days is “taken” away, it hurts!

Or at least it could hurt me, if I wasn’t proactive.

I remarked to a preacher friend a few days ago about how much I could get done in sixteen hours if I was able to be in my office instead of driving. But it’s not as though I’ve been wasting that driving time.

When I was growing up I spent great amounts of time on a lawnmower during the summer. While driving around in circles could be maddening for some, I found it to be a great time to contemplate. To this day, mowing the grass results in some of my clearest thinking.

A little food for your thoughts about what to do with your “down time” in the car:

• I’ve been listening to a lot of podcasts. The Equip Network has some great ones! I’ve managed to catch up, and feed my mind with some excellent information and ideas.


• I’ve also listened to a few magnificent Gospel sermons along the way. I recommend the sermon audio feeds from the Bear Valley Church of Christ in Denver, the Mount Juliet Church of Christ in Mount Juliet, TN, and the Spring Meadows Church of Christ in Spring Hill, TN, just to name a few. Each of these are updated regularly, and cover a wide variety of topics. By the way, you can offer suggestions in the comment section of this page if you’d like.


• More listening: I went to the Recharge Me seminar’s website, signed up for their newsletter, and downloaded their seminars. They’re great. I’ve also been going through my collection of Polishing the Pulpit cd’s.


• I haven’t just been listening to audio to “entertain” me. I’ve also spent some time thinking. I have the Evernote app for Android which let’s me save audio notes to myself. I’ve thought of about 6 different sermon series’ on my travels, and even have the skeleton of the lessons for  a couple of them. I’ve also taken the time to try to develop some ideas for projects that I’ve been thinking about for a while.


• At times I will also rehearse my sermons. I’ve been working diligently to free myself entirely from using notes (a personal goal) and I make use of this driving time to test myself on the knowledge I have of the lessons I’m going to deliver the following Sunday.


• When my brain get’s “tired” from those things, sometimes I’ll just take time to meditate (obviously not too deeply since I’m driving) on God’s love for us, and the blessings that have come from the situation that my wife and I are in now.

It’s tempting sometimes to think that driving time is the time for trying to find a way to entertain yourself, or keep the kids entertained. I can remember, though, having many great learning experiences with my parents during trips in the car, whether they were long or short. There are lots of great discussions that can happen as a family when you are all “trapped” in the car on a trip.

Don’t waste that valuable time with an iPod or a mobile DVD/Gaming system. Spending it sharing, learning, and growing. Redeem the time!

~Daniel Howell