Be Afraid of Yourself: A Plea to Christian Men

By Shane Morris

Another prominent Christian leader has confessed to inappropriate behavior with two young women on his ministry’s staff, and resigned. It’s the latest stroke in a seemingly endless drumbeat of similar confessions and resignations. The list of Christian men in ministry, whether pastors or apologists or speakers or authors, who have been caught in the net of sexual sin over the last few years is dizzying. It’s nauseating. It’s a punch in the gut.

Whatever the actual statistics, the merciless repetition of pastor after author after apologist toppling for the same avoidable failures of the flesh gives the impression that sexual sin is eating the church alive. Pastors are now less trusted by the public than daycare providers, doctors, military officers, or grade school teachers.

There’s no appropriate reaction to this parade of scandals that does not start with falling on our faces before God and begging for mercy. We’re in bad shape, and we need Divine help. We’re supposed to be a “city on a hill,” but those watching the American church right now probably see a mosquito-infested pond. This is cause for grief and repentance. It may even be time to take those biblical references to sackcloth and ashes literally, again.

The Enemy Is Me

But there’s more to be said, and more work to do than just repentance. It’s time for a revolution in the way Christian men see ourselves. We’ve had our chance to prove our mettle against sexual temptation. And we’ve failed, miserably. Even though many individual leaders of integrity remain, we have collectively proven ourselves incapable of acting in private in accord with the morals we profess in public. Sin is gobbling us up at an unsustainable and unconscionable rate, and swallowing our ministries, churches, and life work along with us. Something has to change.

Here’s my modest proposal: Men, it’s time to stop trusting ourselves. Stop trusting in your integrity and strength. Stop telling yourself that you would never surrender to temptation. Stop telling yourself you are better than the scores of Christian luminaries whose lives and families have disappeared in scandal. There is no moral chasm between them and you. You are not made of finer clay. Each of us is just one bad decision away from becoming the next stroke in the nauseating drumbeat of the church’s public failures.

Let me say this dramatically to get my message across: You should get to the point where you are afraid to be in a room alone with yourself. I’m not kidding. As Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry put it, we have met the enemy and he is us. The devil isn’t chiefly responsible for Christian leaders sacrificing their witness for momentary indulgence. We give him far too much credit, here. He probably has to do very little to get us to topple. As Uncle Screwtape quipped, “It is funny how mortals always picture us as putting things into their minds: in reality our best work is done by keeping things out.”

And what the devil has kept out of our minds for too long is this: We are weak. We are usually no match for sexual temptation. It pummels us, especially when we’re certain we can get away with giving in. If you still think you have the integrity to deal with its onslaught on your own, I can only ask how many more high-profile resignations it will take for you to abandon your delusion and save yourself.

Have the Courage to Run

Christian men, it’s time we stopped trying to be heroes. It’s time we stopped going it alone. It’s time we recognized how muscular the monster of sexual sin really is. It’s time we had the courage to run.

That’s right–run.

Scripture says to flee sexual immorality. As in, turn tail and retreat. I don’t think we’ve spent nearly enough time considering what this might mean. We remind me sometimes of the Eloi in H. G. Wells’ “The Time Machine,”–a smiling, peaceful people whose screams fill the night as the Morlocks come to drag another one of us to their dinner table. And like the Eloi, we seem to have forgotten it all by morning. After each victim is dragged into the darkness, we go on with our lives as if nothing has happened–as if hairy, hungry monsters aren’t returning for us come nightfall.

Sexual sin derives much of its destructive power from this notion that each pastor or evangelist who falls into its clutches is a fluke–that there is no essential connection in the seemingly endless chain of moral failings by Christian leaders. “It could never happen to me,” we seem to be telling ourselves, “so I don’t need to do anything differently.”

This might be true if the enemy were out there. But he’s not. He’s in here. I am my own worst nightmare. The more alone I am with myself, the greater danger I am in. The more convinced my baser instincts become that they can enjoy one, small indulgence, the more certain it becomes that I will dive headlong into iniquity and eventually be discovered, to the ruin of the family, church, or institution I love.

Don’t Try to Argue with Yourself

Oh, I know. You think you will be able to hide it. You tell yourself, “just this once.” You remind yourself that “everybody messes up, and besides, I deserve to cut loose a little.”

You have already lost your life at this moment. Your concupiscent morlocks already have their claws in you. Before you even commit the act, or open your browser, or steal that sweet kiss, you are doomed. The act is just the terms of surrender. You are walking yourself into the death camp and choosing your guillotine.

Even your victories can turn to defeat. The battle may be going well. You may have defeated sexual temptation on your own, a few times. You may be reaping the blessings of obedience. You have the trust and admiration of those you love. They place you on a pedestal. They strive to imitate your integrity. You are a model Christian. Then you start pacing the parapets at night. A woman on her rooftop catches your eye. The next morning, it’s all over.

Defeating this inner monster and stopping or at least slowing the nauseating drumbeat means doing more than living with our shields at the ready. It means more than cultivating inner virtue and habits of the heart, though these are important. It means being able to see the beginnings of temptation, to catch its shadow coming around the corner, and run. It means recognizing that you cannot beat it. You cannot stand against it on your own. Look how many better men than you have fallen! It means fleeing to where you know there are reinforcements, where the hosts of Heaven are strongest. It means dialing up a trusted confidant in Christ the moment desire is born, before it even matures to lingering thoughts, much less into full temptation!

Don’t try to reason yourself out of your attraction to that coworker. Flee to a brother who will tell you that what you’re feeling can never be allowed to flower. Find someone who will tell you that you must not even suffer such feelings to survive–someone who will help you stomp them out without mercy. “A man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him—a threefold cord is not quickly broken.”

A New Attitude

What I am proposing is something a little more radical than accountability partners. It is a fundamentally different attitude toward ourselves, one of everlasting mistrust and suspicion. Do not trust yourself. Do not believe in yourself. Do not even turn your back on yourself. Do not dare keep a secret.

This goes against everything our culture tells us, I know. And it goes against something still stronger than our culture: our pride, as men. We want to be seen as self-sufficient and strong. We want to be immovable rocks for God. But I am convinced that any man who thinks this way will become lunch-meat for the first sexual temptation that strikes him. You cannot stand on your own. You will not. None of us can, consistently, and reliably. That’s why God gave us the Church. That’s why He gave us each other.

Run, men. You are no match for yourselves

All Hail The Power of Jesus's Name:

After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high . . . (Hebrews 1:3)

Imagine that moment when Jesus first sat down on heaven’s throne.

Having taken on our full flesh and blood, lived among us, died sacrificially for us, and risen in triumph, defeating sin and death, he ascended to heaven, pioneering our way, as human, into the very presence of God his Father. Then Jesus stepped forward toward the throne, all heaven captive with history’s great coronation, a ceremony so glorious that even the most extravagant of earthly coronations can barely reflect it.

Most of us today don’t even have the categories for the kind of pomp and circumstance that accompanied coronations in the ancient world. We’ve never witnessed an entire kingdom harness all its collective wealth and skill to put on a once-in-a-generation tribute to the glory of its leader. The extravagance communicates the importance of the person and his position. Royal weddings, no doubt, have their splendor, but the ascending of a new King to the throne, and that solemn moment of placing on his head the crown that signaled his power, is without equal.

And yet all the majesty of history’s most grandiose coronations now have been dwarfed by the heavenly finale to which the greatest of earthly ceremonies were but the faintest of shadows.

Crown Him Lord of All

The first chapter of Hebrews gives us a glimpse into this coronation of Christ, this moment when the God-man is formally crowned Lord of all. First, the scene is set: “After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high” (Hebrews 1:3).

Then Hebrews quotes from Psalm 2, which was a psalm of coronation for the ancient people of God: “You are my Son,” God says to the new king of Israel, “today I have begotten you” (Hebrews 1:5). It was on the day of his ascension to the throne that the new ruler of God’s people formally became his “son” in serving as his official representative to his people. The coronation was the day, so to speak, that God begat the human king as lord over his people.

To Him All Majesty Ascribe

Next, verse 6 mentions “when [God] brings the firstborn into the world.” What world? This is not a reference to the incarnation, but to Jesus’s return to heaven, following his ascension. Hebrews 2:5 clarifies by referencing “the world to come, of which we are speaking.” In other words, “the world” in view in Hebrews 1 is not our earthly, temporal age into which Jesus came through Bethlehem. Rather, the world into which God brings his firstborn here is the heavenly realm, what is to us “the world to come,” heaven itself into which Jesus ascended following his earthly mission.

The setting is indeed the great enthronement of the King of kings. And as Jesus, the victorious God-man, enters heaven itself, and processes to its ruling seat, God announces, “Let all God’s angels worship him” (Hebrews 1:6). Him: God and man in one spectacular person.

Originally God had made man “a little lower than the heavenly beings” (Psalm 8:5). But now the angelic hosts of heaven worship him, “the man Christ Jesus” (1 Timothy 2:5). So great is this man, as a genuine member of our race, that he not only eclipses and bypasses the race of angels, but in doing so, he brings his people with him. No redeemer has arisen for fallen angels. “Surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham” (Hebrews 2:16). In Christ, angels no longer look down on humanity but up. We now experience firsthand “things into which angels long to look” (1 Peter 1:12).

This new King of the universe is indeed fully man, and fully God, and addressed as such (quoting Psalm 45): “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever” (Hebrews 1:8). Verse 12 (echoing Psalm 102) restates the glory — “Your years will have no end” — which is the climactic expression of (and even outstrips) saying, “Long live the king!” (1 Samuel 10:24; 2 Samuel 16:16; 1 Kings 1:25, 34; 2 Kings 11:12; 2 Chronicles 23:11).

Bring Forth the Royal Diadem

Finally, the grand finale sounds the great oracle of Psalm 110, which has lingered in the background since the mention of Jesus sitting down in verse 3. Again the Father speaks: “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet” (Hebrews 1:13). For generations and centuries, the people of God had waited for the day in which great David’s greater son, his Lord, would ascend to the throne and hear these sacred words from God himself. Then, at long last, captured for us in the vision of Hebrews 1, the great enigmatic dream of Psalm 110 was finally fulfilled.

Having finished the work his Father gave him to accomplish, God’s own Son (not merely David’s) has ascended to the throne — not a throne on earth but the throne of heaven. The Father himself has crowned him King of all the universe. He has called forth the royal diadem and crowned him King of every kindred, every tribe, every nation.

We who call him King and Lord will not only gather one day with “yonder sacred throng” to fall at his feet, but even now, he gives us the dignity of participating in heaven’s ongoing coronation ceremony. We crown him with our praises, both in daily lives of continual praise (Hebrews 13:15) and together in the midst of the congregation, as we gather weekly with our new kindred and tribe in worship (Hebrews 2:12).

The glorious enthronement of Christ has not ended, but continues. We see it now and experience it by faith, and participate with our praises. And one day soon, with all his redeemed, we at last will join in the everlasting song that does not end, and grows only richer and sweeter for all eternity.

10 Commandments For College Students:

Here are the 10 commandments for college students; applied from the commandments the Lord gave Moses.

John Piper, who clearly articulates we are not under the Ten Commandments, stated, “Love God and do as you please is not bad advice if you are bent on holiness. If you are bent on love, the Ten Commandments are really important. You should hang them on your wall and live your life by them, but in a very different way than when you were under them, because they have been kept for you.”

Because Christ kept them for us, we obey out of love and gratitude. Since Christ has perfectly fulfilled the Law on our behalf and given us His perfect record, we are not under the Law. The Law no longer speaks against us because Christ has spoken for us. But as believers we delight in His truth and His commands, and we can look to the “ten sayings” — through the lens of the gospel — for clarity and direction on how we should now live as the rescued people of God. When the Lord gave the commandments to Israel, He gave them to the people He had liberated from slavery, the people He miraculously rescued.

1. Seek Christ first (Do not have other gods besides Him).
There is so much you can seek after in college, as a whole new world of choices is available to you. In the midst of everything you can join and all the activities that are available to you, seek Him first. Only Christ has rescued you and only He can satisfy you.

2. Beware of idols, even the good ones. (Do not make an idol for yourself)
Because, as John Calvin once commented, “our hearts are idol factories,” we have the temptation to take good things – such as grades, friends, career options, even Christian campus ministries – and bow before them. Don’t give your ultimate affections to those things.

3. Study in His name (Do not misuse the name of the Lord).
You carry His name if you are His. You represent Him to your professors and fellow students. “Do everything in the name of the Lord” (Colossians 3:17). Offer your studies to Him, as if He is your professor.

4. Rest and reflect on Him (Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy).
As His son or daughter, you are always at rest from your works to earn His favor and love. But take time each week to slow down, to rest, to reflect on His goodness to you.

5. Honor those who helped you get here (Honor your father and mother).
Many college students can point to a parent or both parents for their love, encouragement, and example in paving the way for college. Some look to a caregiver or mentor. Whoever helped you get here, honor them by giving your best while you are at college.

6. Love people (Do not murder).
Jesus said that if we hate someone we have already committed murder in our hearts. You will make a massive impact in this season in your life if you love people in Christ’s name. Love justice and offer mercy. Show hospitality to those who are lonely.

7. Be wise and self-controlled (Do not commit adultery).
Jesus said if we lust after someone we have already committed adultery in our hearts. You have grown up in an extremely challenging time, a time with unprecedented digital access to sexual images. Your freedom is going to be expanded even more. To overcome temptation will take more than willpower; it will take wisdom and Holy Spirit empowered self-control.

8. Be thankful for all the Lord has given you. (Do not steal).
The Lord has graciously given you all that you currently steward. Be thankful for what He has given you and you won’t desire to steal from others.

9. Care about your character (Do not give false testimony).
There will be lots of temptations for “small” integrity lapses – for “small cheating.” Small lapses in integrity now often turn into larger lapses in integrity later. Tell the truth. Care about your character. Guard your integrity in the small things.

10. Don’t compare. (Do not covet)
If you compare yourself to others the result will always be hubris or envy. If you don’t compare, you won’t covet. Joyfully live the life the Lord has given you.

Just as the Lord gave the commandments to a community of people, throw yourself into a community of Christ-followers. The faith is meant to be lived out in community and you need community to encourage you to live out your faith. Find a church your first semester. Throw yourself fully into that church. Attend, serve, and love that church.

Gray Hair and a Righteous Life:

It has always been one of my favorite proverbs: “Gray hair is a crown of glory; it is gained in a righteous life.” It’s one that clashes hard with Western culture and its glorification of youth. But it’s one that is fully consistent with a biblical worldview and its emphasis on wisdom.

The book of Proverbs is meant to demonstrate two very different ways to live. It contrasts the way of wisdom with the way of folly. In this generalized view of life, the foolish make bad decisions, suffer the consequences, and die young. The wise make good decisions, enjoy the consequences, and live to a ripe old age. The Old Testament views older people not as “elderly” or “senior citizens,” but as “gray-heads.” But because gray hair is associated with long life, which is in turn associated with wisdom, this is an honor, not an insult.

Proverbs 20:29 says, “The glory of young men is their strength, but the splendor of old men is their gray hair.” If you’re helping someone move furniture, you may point to your son and say, “I brought him along to be the muscle.” You are defining him by just one part of his body, but you mean it as a compliment. After all, “the glory of young men is their strength.” But as the years go by and strength fades, that great attribute is replaced by another one. Strength is replaced by wisdom, so that the glory or splendor of old men is their wisdom, which is pictured in gray hair. Young men are great in strength but small in wisdom; old men are small in strength but great in wisdom. God has a place or a role for both.

Of course proverbs are general rules for life, not universal truths. Not everyone who has gray hair is wise, just like not every young man has a glorious set of biceps. There are some weak young men and there are some foolish old men. But the point is clear. While everyone ages and while most will eventually see their hair go gray, only those who are wise—those who have lived a righteous life—are able to consider that gray hair “a crown of glory.”

We need to know that this crown is not a symbol of office but a recognition of achievement. It is not merely bestowed, but has to be earned. This isn’t the kind of crown that’s placed upon the head of a king at his coronation, but the kind of crown that’s placed upon a winner at his victory celebration. And while any crown carries authority, this kind of crown carries authority related to achievement—authority that comes when someone has proven his mastery of something.

If you want to learn chess, no one has more authority to teach it to you than a person who has been crowned a grandmaster. If you want to learn a sport, no one has more authority to teach it to you than a person who has been crowned an MVP. In this proverb, the crown has been given to a person who has mastered the art of living. He has received a crown that recognizes and publicly displays his success at living life. That’s a pretty good crown!

And the Bible calls upon each one of us to earn that crown. In one sense that crown is just given to you whether you like it or not, but in another and more meaningful sense it has to be earned. Everyone ages, but not everyone grows wise. Everyone wears gray hair, but not everyone wears the crown. That crown needs to be earned through a righteous life. And so each of us needs to ask: Am I living the kind of life that will allow that gray hair—that proof that I’ve grown old—to also stand as a symbol that I’ve grown wise, that I’ve lived a righteous life?

Teaching The Gospel In A Way That Connects:

World news, national news, local news, and personal news. There is a lot of news in the world that is important to students! All of these types of news have different levels of influence on a student’ life. Still, the most important type of news is the information that has the power to save their souls. The Gospel, or Good News, is more important for the lives of students than learning about current events in Social Studies class. Only the Gospel has the power to forgive students of their sin, make their relationship with God possible, and change their eternal destination.

First, teaching the Gospel in a way that connects begins with understanding the need of the Gospel. The Gospel may not seem important to students, if they don’t realize that they need it. Students need to understand the doctrine of sin and the effect sin has on their lives or they won’t realize that they need to be forgiven. This is similar to a person with a sickness that will eventually kill them. If they aren’t diagnosed, then they will likely not search for a cure. Teaching students both the gravity of sin and joy of forgiveness is important in teaching the Gospel in a way that connects. An example of a verse in the New Testament that does this is Romans 6:23 that says, “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Second, teaching the Gospel in a way that connects continues with understanding the power of the Gospel. The power of the Gospel is God himself. The Apostle Paul wrote in Romans 1:16 that “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes.” Paul new this power personally. He was changed by the power of God while he was an enemy of God. Students need to be taught the power of God and what can happen when we share this good news with others. God uses this message of good news to transform lives both now and for eternity.

Third, teaching the Gospel in a way that connects progresses with the understanding of the urgency of the Gospel. One of the hard realities that is often ignored in youth ministry is the Bible’s teaching of Heaven and Hell. Many people like to celebrate Heaven while skipping over the reality of Hell. One theologian, Carl F. H. Henry, once explained “The Gospel is only good news if it gets there in time.” This reminds youth workers the urgency of teaching the Gospel to students and equipping them to take the Gospel message to their friends. The act of sharing the Gospel is urgent.

If the Gospel really is good news, then it makes sense that we teach it in a way that connects with students. Students can share this good news with their friends as they grow in their understanding of the Gospel. May God raise up a generation of youth workers and students who understand and share the Gospel.

If the Bible Is Wrong, I'm So, So Wrong:

When it comes to the Bible, we’ve all got a choice to make. We can take the Bible on our terms, or on its terms. We can choose to follow it some of the way, or we can choose to follow it all the way. We can dabble in it, or we can dive deep into it. At some point we have to choose.

Many people choose to relate to the Bible like a map that offers a route, but not the route to their destination. They’ll follow it some of the way, but for at least part of the journey take what looks like an easier path. Many people choose to relate to the Bible like one item at a buffet. They’ll put a bit of Bible on their plate, then also a bit of this and a bit of that. But as time goes by and I continue to live out my little life in this world, I become more and more convinced that there’s nothing better than to go all-in with the Bible. I’ve come to realize I’m so all-in that if the Bible is wrong, I’m wrong. In fact, if the Bible is wrong, I’m so wrong, completely wrong, shamefully wrong, devastatingly wrong, and wrong about all that really matters in life and death.

If the Bible is wrong, I’m wrong about the origins of this world. The Bible tells me that it was created by God over the course of six days and not nearly as long ago as the millions of billions of years other people claim. This world, this universe, was made by God and for God, an incredible ex nihilo act of creative superiority.

If the Bible is wrong, I’m wrong about the origins of humanity. The Bible tells me that the first two human beings were created by God and placed on this earth as complete, grown human beings, not that they evolved slowly from lesser organisms. They were created in the image of God as the crown of God’s creation.

If the Bible is wrong, I’m wrong about the purpose of humanity. The Bible tells me that mankind was put on this earth to bring glory to God. We exist to do good for others which in turn shines a spotlight on our ultimately good God. This stands in the face of a mission of personal empowerment or human achievement.

If the Bible is wrong, I’m wrong about the purpose of family. The Bible tells me that marriage exists to serve as a miniature of the relationship of God to his people through the complementarity of husband and wife. It tells me that marriage exists as the context in which we have the responsibility to create more people who bear the image of God. Marriage is the founding of a new family and family is the building block of society.

If the Bible is wrong, I’m wrong about the great problem and the great need of human beings. The Bible tells me our great problem is that we’ve sinned against a holy God, become rebels against him, and desperately need reconciliation. We are not good people who make the occasional poor choice, not innocent people who sometimes act ignorantly, but evil people who hate God and our fellow man. Our great need is not self-esteem or tolerance or new forms of politics or economics, but the forgiveness that comes by grace through faith in Christ Jesus.

If the Bible is wrong, I’m wrong about the future. The Bible tells me that history will culminate in the return of Jesus Christ who will come to judge the living and the dead. The world will not end with ecological catastrophe or nuclear holocaust, but with the re-appearance of the glorious Christ. He will come as victorious King, as righteous Judge, to bring some to eternal glory and condemn others to eternal condemnation.

If the Bible is wrong, I’m wrong about today’s most pressing cultural issues: homosexuality, gay marriage, transgenderism, abortion, climate change. If the Bible is wrong, I’m wrong about today’s most pressing theological issues: the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the nature of same-sex attraction, the authority and sufficiency of scripture. If the Bible is wrong, I’m wrong in how I relate to money, how I honor my body, how I use my time. I’m wrong over and over, again and again, through and through. I’m poor, pathetic, pitiable, and blind.

But I’ve made my choice. I’ve examined the evidence and have chosen to believe it’s not wrong, but right. I’ve chosen to believe it’s good and pure and true, infallible and inerrant and sufficient. I’ve chosen to take it on its own terms, to believe it all the way, to live by its every word. I’ve chosen to be in—all-in

Distracted by Serving Jesus:

In the story of Mary and Martha in Luke 10, we see a woman who loved Jesus, but thought she didn’t have enough time to sit, listen, and enjoy Him. Luke 10:39 says Martha was “distracted with much serving.” Martha wasn’t avoiding Jesus because she was snapchatting her boyfriend that her dad didn't approve of. She wasn’t dodging Jesus because she was the kingpin of a drug empire and wanted to shirk God’s commands. She was just too busy.

If we’re honest, for most of us, it isn’t the Hollywood sins that choke out our faith; it’s all the worries of life. The daily grind and endless distractions make it too noisy for us to hear God clearly each day. It’s the urgency of every moment, the entertainment options that occupy our attention, the 24-hour news cycles we cling to. All the distractions and noise around us simply box the Spirit of God right out of our day.

What if we unplugged, changed our schedule, and decided to sit and listen to Jesus? What if we decided that enjoying time with Jesus was better than watching the ballgame or checking the news or responding to the email?

Martha was fuming when she stepped up to Jesus and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone?” Read her rhetorical question again. Martha asked Jesus if He cared about her circumstances! She was so focused on serving Jesus that she lost sight of Jesus.

Often, we are like Martha. We lose sight of Jesus even when we’re in the midst of serving Him. What we need to do is redirect our attention back onto Jesus. In order to reorient our attention, we have to do 3 things:

• Create margin. 
• Choose rest in Christ over busyness.
• Unplug from technology.

First, we have to create margin so that we can be reminded often who we are and whose we are. Martha was so busy that she became “anxious and troubled about many things” (Luke 10:41). Her busyness allowed her to forget that Jesus cares about her circumstances and troubles. Similarly, we overschedule, say "yes" to too many things, and then technology or media eats up any other margin that we might have. We each have to create space and margin in our daily lives so that we can sit and enjoy time with God by reading His Word and praying.

Second, we have to choose rest in Christ over busyness. Busyness makes us feel accomplished. Busyness makes us feel needed or important. The fact is, however, busyness distracts us from the “good portion” (Luke 10:42) that Jesus offers to us. We must choose to prioritize our time with God, because, in Jesus, we find true rest for our souls (Matthew 11:29).

Lastly, we have to regularly unplug from technology. If you think you don’t have time to be idle and seek the Lord in some stillness, evaluate the media you have consumed in the past fourteen days. Between Netflix, social media, and cat videos on YouTube, not to mention texts, emails, and notifications, how much time have you invested in technology and media in the past two weeks?

That text message is not essential. That email is not essential. That notification is not essential. Time with the Father is essential! Enough with the excuses; we do have time. We must decide to unplug from the phone, tablet, and television and choose to “be still and know that He is God” (Psalm 46:10).

Let’s not give Martha a bad rap here. Martha isn’t this sinister, selfish character in the Bible. Martha loved Jesus. This isn’t a love issue. It wasn’t that Martha didn’t want to sit and listen to Jesus, she just thought she didn’t have time. She wasn’t doing anything bad, she was just being pulled away from what is better.