Ben Franklin is famously quoted as saying, “early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.” More importantly he rose at 5am every morning, asking himself this one simple, powerful question:
“what good shall I do today?”
By pondering this one question each day your mental aptitude, attitude, motivation, money and limited time will be best used and driven towards accomplishing positive, worthwhile goals. It’s a creative process to first find and then align your life, “to create, we must first identify the problem, then offer the best solution possible.”
“Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.” –Benjamin Franklin
For me it became a question and a prayer. The day I started incorporating this into my prayers, it was immediately answered. Daily people would call, text, email, or show up at my door asking for help.
Sometimes it was in a form of their direct question for help, other times it was a pleading in their voice I had to recognize and respond to. Every time, it required time on my part and a change of schedule. There were days I didn’t know how I would “fit” them into the schedule I had, but I did anyway. We should be inconvenience by the Gospel. Every time, I was blessed by an added measure of God’s Spirit and improvement in business. I have (re)learned,
the greatest gift of God which is charity, cannot be received just for the asking, planning or “fitting” into our schedule. It’s not like taking your car in for an oil change or tune up. This doctrine comes in disguise.
It is received by responding to inconvenient requests from others, by willingly giving up our wants to His will, giving our temporal time to eternal values, our talents during others tempests. This is the attribute of Christ and character development we can never calendar in.
Charity isn’t developed by our moments of need, but responding to others minute needs. By our giving we truly receive. So, begin to ask yourself each morning, “What good can I do?”
You never know how much good you do.
