What I Write About

I write about the infinite number of intersections between every day life and the good news of the God who has come to get us.

Thursday, May 28, 2009

New York in August v. Sticking with the Diet

About a month ago I got an invite to do a pretty sweet speaking/consulting gig. It was a quick trip, overnight, to New York. The only catch was that it was in mid-August. August for a campus minister is like December in retail. You buckle down, work your butt off, and try to enjoy the ride.

But as I looked at the exact dates, the invitation fell right in a pleasant window of what looks right now to be wide open space. Nothing on the calendar. As I talked it over with a couple of friends and my boss, it seemed like it might be do-able. I was pretty geeked out about it.

Then I was listening to a sermon podcast where the pastor was prodding us to ask the question: "in light of my present responsibilities, my past experiences, and my future hopes and dreams, is this a wise use of my time?"

He argued that many things we choose to do aren't sinful, they're just not wise. He was calling us to look past the simple "there's nothing wrong with this decision" to think more deeply about the ramifications of our decisions.

In the course of the sermon he talked about the areas of our lives where small deposits over a long period of time are crucial and non-recoverable.

Exercise is one example. If we exercise just 30 minutes a couple days a week, we're healthier people. But you can't make up for the lost time by trying to make up for eight months of non-exercise in one sitting. I've tried. It hurts.

Going to church, same thing. Dieting, same thing. Personal time in prayer and Scripture study, same thing. Miss one day at church, cheat on the diet one time, skip out on one day in personal prayer, no big consequence. But make it a habit, and you fall away from community, from health, and from God.

The speaker wrapped up by talking about small deposits we have to make with our family. He's a tremendous communicator, head of a large church, and has published several books. He gets invites to speak all over the place. And he's got three kids at 12, 8, & 6.

"Maybe some day," he said, "when my kids are grown and out the door, I'll just travel around and take every speaking gig I can. But for right now, my assistant and I just look at each other and we say, 'just say no!'"

"Because my future hopes and dreams include having healthy adult relationships with my kids. And that means saying no to other things so that I might be available to make these small, incremental, regular deposits of time."

I turned down the gig. I desire to make my default posture towards all the cool stuff that might come my way towards a firm "no" unless I get a clear sense that I should make an exception.

I've got a five, three, and 20-month-old (not to mention a wonderful wife) who need to know that they are more important. I desire to faithfully make small, regular deposits of time, to turn towards them and not towards other stuff, even good stuff, even stuff that feels like it could make an impact for the gospel.

I've got a prior engagement.

4 comments:

Bonnie said...

this is a timely post for me alex. thanks. ~bon

Alex said...

thanks, bon!

i think that moms/women have a more complicated deal here because the mom thing is just so loaded with cultural expectations, Christian sub/counter-cultural expectations, and their own experiences and desires: to work or not to work or to work part-time or do you need to work to pay the bills...all that stuff is more complicated.

the dads, i think, have our own issues but in some ways i think the call is simpler, assuming a traditional situation where the man is working full-time: we need to make decisions to make those small deposits of time as regularly and faithfully as we can. where we have decisions, we need to turn towards home rather than work.

this is not in our nature for most of us (see the curse on adam, which is mostly directed towards work) but i think in some ways it's actually more clear-cut. stay at home moms, on the other hand, are already at home, and they need space and time to breathe, to have hobbies, to get out and have a sense of who they are apart from mommying.

this means that stay-at-home moms have more real-time decisions to make (do i need to get out this week apart from the kids for my sanity?) whereas I think us working dads need to just make the commitment to turn towards home as much as possible and say no to other (work-related, anyway) things that we can.

Carolyn said...

AK, you mind sharing which podcast you were listening to? One of the things I really want to do with this sabbatical is to be well set up to make the right decisions about our commitments next year. We have this blank slate and don't want to muck it up too quickly!
Thanks, CO

Alex said...

sure, mrs. o! it was Andy Stanley's podcast at Northpoint--if you opened up itunes, you can search his name. the sermon is 'the best question ever, part 4: time bandits'

make sure that you get the full-length version (they accidentally posted 2 versions, one is only half of the sermon).

hope it's helpful, looking forward to having you here in town!