Is There Enough Time In Your Bottle?

When I was in Sunday school as a little kid I remember my teacher bringing in a big bottle, a bunch of sand and some mongo rocks.  She poured all the sand into the jar and then began trying to fit the rocks in.  They didn't fit! Us five and six year old's then started brain storming how we could fit all the rocks in the jar.

Eventually (and not without help from the teacher) we realized we needed to fit the big stuff in first.  The rocks could all fit in the jar, and then the sand would fall into place around the rocks.


Sometimes our days seem like they would overflow if we tried to add one more thing.  When the to-do list is longer than life, work is getting hectic, it's finals week at school, and then you're car breaks down it's easy to get frustrated.  The lesson we learned in Sunday school can apply to this.  If we put the important things in first, all the rest will fall into place.  What's important is to have the faith to know what the important things are.  When we have faith we know that when the prophet Jacob said,

• 18 But before ye seek for riches, seek ye for the kingdom of God.
• 19 And after ye have obtained a hope in Christ ye shall obtain riches, if ye seek them; and ye will seek them for the intent to do good—to clothe the naked, and to feed the hungry, and to liberate the captive, and administer relief to the sick and the afflicted.

he was talking about priorities.  Let's use Facebook as an example.  Think of the time you spend on Facebook... Now think of the time you spend in the scriptures.  In most cases Facebook will win because it's sooo easy to get rapped up in.  But let's face it, reading the word of God is more helpful than reading that bobby got forty thousand points on the Ultimate Unicorn game.

It's easy to think that taking time out of our already crouded day for prayer, scripture study, and church would be a bad idea, but when we have faith in the promises Heavenly Father has made to us He can bless us according to that faith!  And after the massive mess I'm sure we obliviously made when I was five, we learned the lesson that when we put the gospel of Jesus Christ first, everything else will fall into place.