actively carefully wise

“Pay careful attention, then, to how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil.”
~ Ephesians 5:15-16

In this careful walking, Paul said that we should make the most of the time we are given. Literally, we are to redeem the time; we are to “buy it back.” That’s what redemption is. In the case of our common, human interaction, our time has been stolen by our supposed busyness. It’s been stolen by our inflated sense of self-importance. It’s been inflated by our use and misuse of people for our own ends. This is what needs to be bought back.

When you redeem something, you trade it in for something better. And because of what Jesus has done on the cross, these everyday interactions that come our way as we walk through life can be redeemed.

The carefulness with which we walk, then, is not born out of fear that we might be inadvertently involved in some kind of sin, but anticipation. We walk through life with our heads on a swivel, armed by the knowledge of what Jesus has done for us in the gospel and the confidence in the presence and work of God. We are constantly looking this way and that, believing that every interaction is significant. And we are committed to make the most of each one.

~ Michael Kelley, Boring: Finding and Extraordinary God in an Ordinary Life

Read the full article at the source:
http://michaelkelley.co/2014/08/walk-carefully-christian-but-not-in-the-way-you-might-think/

See also: What does it mean that the days are evil?
https://biblehub.com/commentaries/ephesians/5-16.htm