Doing productivity God’s way means viewing your entire life as a stewardship. Your time, talents, and treasure are all resources left to your care. And the sensible Christian will take care to do all that he or she can to make a good return on these things for the Master.
Most believers understand this call to stewardship in areas like finances or even with the use of our time. But are you treating your mind like a stewardship?
God has gifted many believers with incredibly sharp minds. However, there is always the temptation to boast about our intellect or to use it merely to serve ourselves. But how do we steward our minds? The Bible calls us to both guard and grow our minds.
Guard Your Mind
One way we steward our minds is by guarding them. The Scriptures encourage us to guard our hearts and minds (Phil. 4:6–7), to take thoughts captive to obey Christ (2 Cor. 10:5), and to be watchful when it comes to our minds (1 Pet. 1:13; 4:7). Guarding your mind means being careful about what you put into it. If you fill your head with entertainment that glorifies sin, or promotes worldviews that are contrary to Scripture, you’re simply inviting temptation into your life.
Positively, guarding your mind means filling it with truth. We must fill our heads with the Word of God and hear it echoed to us in our local church and by other faithful believers. We need constant reminders that cut through the world’s noise with the clarity of God’s truths.
Grow Your Mind
We also steward our minds not just by guarding them but also by growing them. Be diligent about having your mind not conformed to the world’s ways of thinking but renewed by exposure to God’s truth (Rom. 12:2). Growing your mind also means training your mind not just in spiritual things, but for use in all of life. Just as Paul disciplined his body (1 Cor. 9:27), we must discipline our minds. Read good books, solve difficult problems, push yourself to grow in your thinking and reasoning so your mind will be a sharp weapon in God’s arsenal.
And most importantly, as we guard and grow our minds, we need to invest them in worthy pursuits. Give the best of your mental abilities to serve your local church, your neighbors, and your family. God has entrusted you with your mind. Your role as a steward is to make a good return on that trust.
Give Your Mind
One thing we must avoid when it comes to our natural talents, however, is the danger of trusting in or boasting in our abilities. “Some boast in chariots and some in horses, but we will boast in the name of the Lord our God” (Ps. 20:7). We must remember that these are not things we have created but are gifts of God (1 Cor. 4:7). We give those gifts back to God when we use them to serve Him.
An arrogant steward is an abomination. “God is opposed the proud but gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6). So as you use your natural talents, make sure you always do so with an attitude of humility. The whole point of stewardship is to use these gifts to make God look good, not yourself.
Portions of this essay were adapted from Well Done: A Strategy for Life Stewardship (CLC Publications, 2022)
