Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
John Perritt
Read between
September 1 - October 16, 2017
A friend of mine once said, ‘Good is the enemy of great.’ There are many good things that we have committed time, money, and energy to, but are they the greatest use of our time? Are they the best way we can be using the time God has given us?
Are you too busy to include God in your day? How can you fill the time you have freed up by saying ‘no’ with time for God?
Our days are made up of numerous mundane moments which end up establishing patterns of great significance. God uses these mundane occurrences to conform us more into the image of His Son. A traffic jam, being left on hold, the paper jam in the copier, or the difficult person in the office, are used by God to make us more like Jesus. Ordinary, insignificant moments which make us more like the Second Person of the Trinity! That’s anything, but ordinary.
Numbering our days assists us to see that every conversation, every moment of laughter, every moment of frustration is a gracious gift from God.
While we may never make it in the world’s eyes, every second of our day is highly significant. The last breath you just drew was a gracious gift from our Sovereign Lord. Any moment of difficulty is a blessing to experience. The fact that you have eyes to read this sentence, a mind to comprehend it, and fingers to turn the pages are all testimony to a loving God who gives us thousands of ‘mundane’ blessings every day. It’s probably a good idea to stop and give Him thanks now …
We blow our money here and there and spend it on non-eternal things, but actually it’s not our money to blow. As stewards, we are ‘blowing’ God’s money.
In actuality, being a steward of our time is a far greater responsibility than stewarding our money.
Therefore, to actually sit back and think about the reality of sitting in front of an infinite, holy God and giving an account for the ways in which we spent our time is quite sobering.
We are going to have to answer to the hours we slept, played games on our smartphones, talked on the phone, texted, watched TV or movies, surfed the web, blogged, gossiped, lied, and the list goes on and on. Broadly speaking, we are going to have to own up to the seconds, and hours, and days, and weeks, and months, and years we spent serving ourselves and our interests, above and beyond the interests of our Savior and others. Thank God He took on flesh and stewarded time perfectly to redeem our abuse of it.
Our actions should demonstrate to the world that we have been redeemed. Therefore, we must be active in ordering our lives in a way that brings God glory. This requires planning, scheduling, sitting down with a calendar, removing items from your plate and maintaining good stewardship.
What steps are you taking to keep from wasting your time? If you need help with this, it’s probably a good idea to implement the ‘30-minute’ experiment I mentioned at the beginning of the book. Keeping track in 30-minute increments for two weeks will reveal a lot to you. Why not try it out?
I need to do this
the blessing of the Sabbath has become an unopened gift for many a Christian.
wonder
wander?
Start remembering the Sabbath the day before and make similar preparations for God’s worship as you do for worldly pursuits. Let this be the constant day on your calendar that you plan around. Let everything else in the upcoming week revolve around this day.
did you spend any time preparing your heart for worship? 2
How in the world should we expect to show up and hear from God’s Word without praying? As I said, we are sinners who are inclined away from God and His Word. We are also in love with the things of this world. Therefore, if we aren’t properly remembering the Sabbath by praying for our hearts, you can guarantee that church is going to be boring or that we won’t get much out of the service. Don’t you think God loves to answer prayers from His saints that ask, ‘Please help me worship you today’? You better believe He does!
maybe i can pray this for my boys
My practical application for this is simply prepare your lunch the day before so you can rest from slaving in the kitchen on Sunday.
Don’t see this as a rigid law, see this as a gift.
Sometimes we even use paper plates on Sunday, not because doing the dishes is a sin on the Sabbath but because it makes cleaning up that much easier and restful.
That’s another thing we practice, simply referring to it as the Lord’s Day. In my systematic theology class, Dr Derek Thomas said something to the effect of, ‘It’s amazing how differently you will treat the Sabbath day, if you call it the Lord’s Day.’
I would strongly urge you to leave the TV off before church, this includes the internet as well. If you insist on watching, simply ask, how does it enhance your worship?
We really need to have a proper view of our sin and our Savior before we go to worship, therefore prayer and His Word are the means God has ordained to assist with this. We are at war against the world, our flesh and the devil; these are mighty weapons against this three-fold attack.
play music before church.
Not too long ago I read a tweet that said something to the effect of, Because we’re so busy, have so much activity, and are constantly on the go, this is proof that Satan knows how powerful silence is. I wish I knew who said this in order to give them credit, but they are dead on. Satan knows the power of silence and reflection and has overly succeeded in making everyone so busy, that they have little to no time for reflection. Maybe you can’t even remember the last time you had a moment of solitude?
So much of our scurrying can be evidence that we don’t believe in a Sovereign God. We feel that our work, our effort, our incessant schedules are going to accomplish what we need to get done.
Take time to find solitude. Find time to be still before the Lord. I know this goes against the grain of this culture, but moments of solitude are a must.
When we are still and quiet we begin to reflect on matters of great significance. We are reminded of who God is, who we are before Him and that our days are passing us by. We must be seeking and guarding days of quiet reflection, because they remind us of the fact that our days are numbered.
Excellent book I am slowly working through.
We think of necessities being food and shelter. Christ saw solitude as a necessity – do you?
Do you do anything to prepare for the Lord’s Day? If not, why? Looking at the practical suggestions given to prepare for the Lord’s Day, which do you think you might implement?
A blessing we receive from such a mind-set is that our priorities should change. Since we know we are a mist and our lives are brief, it should change our focus.
Having a numbered-day approach assists us in keeping focused.
If we are Christians and an eternity with God is before us, shouldn’t we be developing that relationship now?
Men must be taking the lead in making the marriage an exciting relationship.
Plan weekly dates. This is something my wife and I try to do, even though at times we don’t guard this like we should. Personally, we don’t have money to spend on babysitting and fancy restaurants, so we do date nights ‘in’ many times. We will feed the kids first, get them ready for bed, and then have a nice quiet meal or dessert by ourselves.
Couples aren’t taking the time to get to know and love their spouses more. If your spouse is to remain your standard of beauty, you must continue to get to know them. The more you know about them, the more you care about them and the more beautiful they become.
Parents, you have such a brief time to influence your child for the Kingdom of God. As William P. Farley says, ‘[Parenting] is to transfer the baton of faith in Christ to the next generation.’ 3
His primary means of working is through the household.4 Therefore, we must be spending time with our children. Praying with them, reading with them, evangelizing them, playing games with them, laughing with them, and discipling them because they will soon be gone.
One danger is distraction.
My main point is to simply be a bit more discerning about investing too much time in relationships that are relegated to an ‘online wall’ like Facebook. There are many close friends I have on Facebook, but I must be cautious of investing too much in a relationship when others are physically present in my current life.
The truth is, we sacrifice our children much more than we are willing to see.5
Living under the thought of this ‘numbered-day’ mentality, it should cause us to ask, Am I using my gifts in my job? God has given every human being unique gifts, therefore, He wants us to use them to point to Him. Are you doing that in your current job? Is your job simply a pay check? A way to take care of the bills?
If our recreational pursuits become our only place of peace and comfort, instead of making us long for the new creation, they can quickly become idolatry.
Ultimately, if you spend your days pursuing life for you, you will waste it.
Maybe we should forfeit a vacation from time to time in order to minister to those in need. While we need vacation and recreation honors God, we should also serve those in need (Phil. 2:4).
if you are truly resting on the Sabbath, you will need much less vacation. Think about that.
If you truly use the Sabbath for rest, you would get over seven weeks of vacation,
Do some chores around the house, do something with the family, but do everything at a slower pace.
he won’t stop to give his spouse the time of day.
Say no to the world, and yes to the church.
The reality is, at this moment, we have a certain number of days left that are ever-decreasing. We can’t live in fear of this, rather trust in a Sovereign God who is ruling these remaining days. And, in light of this Sovereign God’s control, live with a certain urgency by prioritizing those days.
