There’s a logic embedded in this notion of self-stewardship.  It goes like this.

1. God has made me in his image and likeness, with intellect and will, with freedom and responsibility.  Everything I am, have, and am capable of doing is God’s gift.

2. The law of all visible life, including mine, is growth.  Unlike other life-forms, I as a human person can exercise voluntary and deliberate freedom to choose and to act—to determine the direction and pace of my growth.  My growth is by and large not inevitable.  I can envision the growth I wish, I can choose it, and I can act on it.  God’s gift becomes my task.

3. My free, voluntary, and deliberate actions from moment to moment determine the shape of my life–how I invest my capacities of body, mind, and spirit; how I participate in the process of becoming the person God created me to be.  I’m like a fine sculpture in the making.  Each free and responsible act chisels something outside of me, in the world I inhabit and, of equal importance, each intentional act shapes my very self.