Redeeming the Time: Living Out the Dash
The Watch That Woke Me Up
I've never been a watch person. In my entire life, I've owned two that I can remember: a G-Shock while I was in the Army, and an Apple Watch for a short stint. I've always just relied on my phone when I needed to know the time. But recently, I got my first real watch — the kind that, ten years from now, will still be ticking.
For those interested, it's the Hudson Diver from Dasher Watch Co. It's an automatic watch, which means it doesn't use a battery. Instead, it powers itself through the natural movement of your wrist or through manual winding. It's a beautifully crafted timepiece, and it carries a nice weight when worn (that makes you think of the weightiness of time). Now, all of that may sound like useless trivia — but it got me thinking deeply about something far more important: the value of time.
Throughout the day, as I would glance down to check the time and watch the seconds hand sweep steadily forward, or when I took a moment to wind it up, I began to realize this watch was more than a timepiece. It was a mirror. What I mean is: a watch doesn't give you more time, it reminds you that you have less of it than you think. Whether I'm conscious of it or not, life is ticking.
That truth rocked me about two months ago. I was sitting in my car after a long meeting, looked down at my wrist to check the time, and saw the word "Dasher" on the watch face. Something shifted. All of a sudden, that watch felt less like an accessory and more like a tombstone, because on a tombstone, there are two dates with a dash between them. And that dash is your entire life. Every thought, every choice, every conversation, every wasted moment, and every faithful one.
So, sitting there in the car, I asked myself: "Am I living intentionally inside my dash?"
That question was deeply convicting, because the honest answer was: not as intentionally as I should be. There is so much time wasted. So much time unredeemed. Over the following weeks, I brought this up with other men and realized I wasn't alone, far from it. Lots of men are not living intentionally inside their dash. Time is slipping through their fingers like sand. Life is passing them by. And this leads to a life marked by feeling overwhelmed, anxious, and unproductive.
As a follower of Christ, I knew I needed to sit down and look at what the Bible has to say about living inside the dash. That search led me to Ephesians 5:15–16, where the Apostle Paul delivers a sobering word to men who are sleepwalking through the sacred time God has given them.
What Is Paul Actually Saying?
"Therefore, look carefully how you walk…"
Time is the one resource you cannot make more of. Once it's gone, it's gone. So Paul commands us to examine how we're living — carefully. The word carries the idea of exactness and diligence. It's the same word used in Luke 1:3 to describe the thoroughness with which Luke investigated the life and ministry of Jesus. This is not a casual glance in the mirror. It is an intentional, honest examination.
Paul then uses the word "walk," which throughout Scripture describes the pattern and direction of a person's entire life — not just the fleeting moments of a single day.
Put it together, and the charge is clear: live with deliberate intentionality. With focus, resolve, direction, and purpose. The sobering reality is that most men are drifting. Moving through life without a clear mission, like a piece of dead wood be carried upstream. That is not how God created us to live. That is not how the redeemed man should live. But Paul has more to say.
"Not as unwise, but as wise…"
The contrast here isn't about intellect, it’s not between smart and stupid. It's the difference between ignoring eternity and living in light of it. It's a call to live with the conscious recognition that every moment of your life has been given to you by God — to know Him, love Him, obey Him, and glorify Him.
Which means that time is theological.
Far too often we view time as something entirely disconnected from spiritual realities. But the wise man understands that no matter what you accomplish with the time you've been given, if you've been spiritually foolish with it, it was time wasted.
"…redeeming the time…"
The word redeem means to buy back. In Scripture, it's most often used in the context of the salvation purchased through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ (1 Pet. 1:18–19). Applied here, it means that time is something we must steward with great care. To redeem the time is to constantly ask yourself: "Am I spending this time, or am I wasting it?"
"…because the days are evil."
This is where Paul presses the urgency. We live in a world overflowing with endless distractions, temptations around every corner, and spiritual opposition knocking at the door. If we as men are not resolved to redeem the time, these evil days will devour it — and we will arrive at the end of our dash having wasted the life God entrusted to us.
The Problem
I never thought wearing a watch would lead me to the realization that men are losing their dash without even knowing it.
So many of us keep telling ourselves the lie that we have more time. We live as though our time is unlimited. It isn't. By the time you finish reading this post, you will be closer to death than when you started. Life is a vapor (Jas. 4:13–14). And the dash doesn't pause. It doesn't slow down. It doesn't wait. Tick tock, tick tock.
What this has forced me to confront is that busyness is not the same as fruitfulness. I know life is demanding and men carry a mountain of responsibilities. But I want to plead with you to stop and honestly examine your life, because you may be exhausted not because you're doing too much, but because you're pouring yourself into things that carry little to no eternal weight.
Activity without intentionality is just noise.
The watch on my wrist isn't there to watch time pass. It's there to remind me to use it.
The Call
So, as I bring this to a close, let me put one question before you:
What do you want your dash to represent?
A man without Christ-centered, eternal priorities will always sacrifice what matters most on the altar of what feels urgent. We must make sure that our faith, our family, discipleship, the local church, and our God-given calling are the non-negotiables — the things we protect at all costs.
And let me be clear: redeeming the time doesn't mean hustling harder. It means being Spirit-led. The goal for the man who is redeeming his time is to be unhurried but never idle.
The dash on your tombstone — and mine — is being written right now, by the choices we make with the time we've been given. Men of God don't just manage time. They redeem it. They fight to take back what sin and the enemy are trying to steal. They understand that how time is spent is meant to be an act of worship.
So live like time matters — because it does.
We will give an account for how we've used the time we've been given (Heb. 9:27). We don't know how long our dash is, but we know the One who holds it, and how He calls us to fill it.
Reflection Questions
Where is time currently slipping through your hands unnoticed?
When it's all said and done, what will the dash on your tombstone say about your priorities?
