Oliver in the Hat

It is a fascinating chapter of life I have entered into.  I almost wrote “we” but this is a blog about me, so I will assume you know that I fully acknowledge my son’s brain surgery is not about me.  But how I am affected by it is.

I have heard of people in busy jobs, lives that become ill, and are forced, for health reasons, to take a break – to step out of their routines for a time controlled by the process of healing.  I think part of the reason God made us like He did was to force this upon us.  When we are overworked or overstressed, our body tends to break down easier, forcing us to slow the pace.  In this case, it was not my pace of life, or stress, or anything we had done.  It just was.  Thankfully, we have an amazing community of friends and family that have stepped into the situation and made it possible for Cheryl and I to simply “disconnect” (though the rate of Facebook communication has stepped up considerably as we try to keep everyone informed about how Lyndan is doing).  We are so very grateful for the rest of our boys being cared for at home, for my responsibilities as pastor being lifted by my associate Bart and other leaders in Grasslands Church.

This disconnect has opened up so much time.  Time for things that get swept away by the urgent or the routine.  I have been able to finish a book – “Your Secret Name” by Kary Oberbrunner.  I am glad I did – it was a very good book and I will be mulling over what I took away from it for some time (expect a blog post at some point).  I have also had time to write towards my next message – it’s not often that I am afforded 3 weeks’ lead time for the next time I speak.  I have even had time to wrestle with some subjects that I would like to speak on but need further development before moving forward.

And also, it has given me time to blog.  Which I really do like but often feel too busy to do these days – as you can tell by the frequency of my posts here, on our church planting blog, Planting on Faith and even on the Grasslands Church Blog.

On the subject of busyness, my associate, Bart has been encouraging me to read “7 Habits of Highly Effective People” by Stephen Covey, and while it was written more than a couple decades ago, it really is timeless in its ideas and pointing out not only the general idea of how to move towards doing what we want to do well, but also with specific, applicable things we can do to find that zone.  I am not the most organized person in the world but I am certainly convinced that I would like to do more with the time I am given – and the only way that is going to happen is if I implement more structure into my life.  “You lack DISCIPLINE!” I can hear Ahnuld’s voice ringing in my ears when I begin to get that rush of adrenaline from a looming deadline.  There is something about the way German speakers pronounce the word “lack” that adds extra weight to the word.

Lastly, I am finally getting to chop through a book that I have wanted to read since Tim Challies first wrote it – “The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment”.  The topic is almost unwritten on but so critical for Christians to understand in this day and age where too many supposed God-followers are content with their Bible reading limited to their pastor’s powerpoint slides and their thinking on the intersection of Christ and Culture as a couple of streets in Mexico City.  I find much of my job as pastor so far has been doing the interpretation of culture for people, but I am convinced that my calling as pastor is to teach people to interpret culture through Christ themselves.  Hence, I had better get reading.

Without further ado, back to my Kindle app!