Bowing Down to Busyness (pt. 1 of Idol Week)
I think many of us would say that as we look around culture we easily recognize a society that is obsessed with all sorts of idols. The idol of money and material possessions. The idol of relationships. The idol of power and control. The idol of food, alcohol, and drugs. The idol of narcissism – wanting to do life according to your desires on your clock. I think you get the point.
Idol worship is not just an Old Testament problem. It is very much a problem of today, but I think those of us that work in full time ministry or volunteer at the church we try to escape with a free pass on this one, but I (Jeanne) believe that Idol worship is running rampant throughout our lives and throughout the church and over the next few days I am going to talk about some of the most popular idols in the church today.
The first idol is BUSYNESS – and yes I will begin by saying I am guilty of bowing down to this idol far too often.
- Have you ever had weeks where it seems like every moment is a moment of hurry? Off to the next meeting, always 5 minutes behind, trying to juggle a bunch of tasks that you know you should have said no too, disappointing people that are important to you, and consistently injecting your self with caffeine just so you have enough energy to make it through the day.
- Have you ever had those moments when you leave your cell phone or calendar at home and you feel as though you don’t know how to function.
- Do people regularly start their conversations with you by saying, “I know that you’re so busy…”
Could it be that you have made busyness more important than the actual ministry you have been called to do?
Maybe BUSYNESS has become your idol.
What if today you denied the power that BUSYNESS has taken in your life? What would it look like for you to slow down and choose to Worship the One True God that is never too BUSY for you?
Jason
Good thoughts Jarret. It would not be a stretch to say that my wife and I are in the busiest season of our marriage together right now. It's all really good stuff and God has opened some amazing doors for us, but we are racing like never before.
You mentioned situations like at times when a friend or family member will start a convo by saying, "I know that you've been really busy…". But what I've realized is that I will, at times, simply use busyness as a cop-out to not maintaining healthy conversations or relationships. Even though, I've been super busy, when anyone asks me how I've been or how I'm doing, my first resort is to immediately go to the "Oh man, I've just been SO busy…"
I need to watch myself with that. Sometimes I get the feeling that the people that I say that to are wondering if I really want to talk to them at all. Not my intentions.
Sometimes it just feels like there aren't enough hours in the day…
Nov 02, 2009 @ 11:24 pm
brewster
um…thanks for the punch in the gut.
Nov 03, 2009 @ 5:08 am