Are You a Good Manager? - Hovsepian

A couple of weeks ago I got a copy of Canada’s SOHO Business magazine and found that many of the articles went well with the June theme of my church's newsletter that I edit: stewardship.

The free magazine provides small business owners tips on improving productivity, managing your workload, networking, developing good habits, and easing stress. One article that caught me by surprise is titled “The Humility Advantage” and it highlights the importance of not letting your expertise and knowledge make you arrogant or insensitive.

If people in the business world are expected to be good managers — no matter what their rank or position is — how much more should we as Christians be good stewards of the things God has made us responsible for?

People usually think of stewardship as managing one’s finances well or, more specifically, tithing. That is certainly an important area of our lives that God wants us to honour Him with. However, there are many other aspects of our lives that we need to manage well and I think we often either forget that we are accountable to God for those things… or we consciously neglect those areas.

At a recent women’s meeting I spoke at, we discussed how we need to be good stewards, not only of our money, but also of our time, our talents and skills, our spiritual gifts, our relationships, our health, our minds, the environment, and so much more.

A lot of these things fall into place nicely if we first determine what our priorities are. When we are certain that we’ve put God first in our lives, it’s easier to then determine what to schedule into our calendars, where to spend our money, where to go, how to use our talents, and what to do with all our “stuff”.

I think many of us experience stress because our to-do lists are too long, our finances are squeezed tight, we don’t get enough sleep or exercise, our relationships are strained, and we know deep in our hearts we’re not spending enough time in God’s Word, in prayer, in service and even in church.

So where do we start? How do we become better managers or stewards? It may seem obvious, but I believe the first thing we must do is courageously take a chunk of time out of our busy schedules and spend it in prayer, asking God for guidance and a sincere change of heart.

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