I definitely don’t have it all figured out by any means, and I’m still working on the process, but some thoughts that were shared with me a while back really keep striking home. Take a look at 1 Timothy 3:12-13:
A deacon must be the husband of but one wife and must manage his children and his household well. Those who have served well gain an excellent standing and great assurance in their faith in Christ Jesus.”
Whenever I’ve looked at and pondered those verses in the past all I saw was the qualification of a deacon to manage his children well, but the verse says children and household. Household encompasses a great deal! Managing your household includes, but is not limited to:
- Having the means to provide and sustain your family. (Getting out of debt if your in it and staying debt free, not living paycheck to paycheck, making wise financial decisions, etc.)
- Having the discernment to not let that provision and sustenance become your idol and god. It is very easy to fall in love with your job, especially if it pays well and you like it. Family comes before working 70-80 hour weeks.
- Deciding where to spend your time. (Do you spend it watching hours of TV, trying to find an excuse to go play a round of golf - or do you spend your time wisely, knowing when to stop working, when to enjoy leisure, and when to get things done that need to get done.)
The last factor of managing a household is key. Instead of trying to balance the time that you have, begin to manage it. If you’re like me, and are a pretty spontaneous person who also tends to procrastinate, conisder setting up a schedule. Of course you’ll need to schedule in some spontaneous time that you can just enjoy, but a schedule might be extremely helpful.
I’m just starting to really think about these things and haven’t officially applied them yet, but after thinking about Paul’s words to Timothy to charge deacons to “manage (a) household well” I’m beginning to be convicted that I’m not really doing that - and something needs to change. Join me and the journey - and maybe you have some ways that you’ve learned how to manage your time and household.
Throughout the last few weeks I’ve been involved in lots of things - looking for a new job, trying to develop ways for me to freelance, working my current job, figuring out how to stay on top of volunteer worship ministry, spending time with my wife and daughter and trying to spend time in God’s Word and prayer. That’s a whole life in itself, but I still love taking pictures, reading, watching a few select TV shows and doing enjoyable things. Then there’s housework, yard work and more. Yikes.
I’ve been thinking a lot about how our time management is part of how we worship God. I want to spend some time thinking about our time, using my own life as an example and talking about some ideas of how time can be managed.
Teaser for tomorrow: There’s a huge difference between managing your time and balancing your time.
See you tomorrow. In the meantime, our pastor wrote one of the best blog posts I’ve seen dealing with our nation’s financial issues and the political race. You should check it out.
As my friend put it recently - “You coming up for air? You’ve been pretty silent lately.”
Yep.
Over the past few months my wife and I began conversation about the potential of me looking for another job. She’s been working full time and providing for our family, which has been amazing and for which I haven’t been grateful enough - but it’s time for that to change. With the addition of our daughter, her mommy desires have definitely kicked in and she would love to spend more time with our little one - which I think is awesome.
So, I’ve been on a job search for the past month or so. I have been working part time for some time, and finally looking for full time work. I would love to be a full time worship and music director someday, but the truth is, many churches find it hard to swing that as a fulltime job. So I will be joining Billy Chia as a bivocational worship leader.
So, in the midst of my job search, this blog went pretty silent as I had begun building a portfolio site to display my graphic design work in order to get a job.
I have one offer and I’m waiting on another offer right now that I think would be a better fit for me. I still want to continue to be involved in worship leading and in writing this blog and participating in The Worship Community - but life is crazy and I’m still trying to figure out some schedule issues.
In the meantime - I would appreciate prayer, you can check out my portfolio site and I’m hoping to get back to blogging on worship and music regularly very soon.
Thanks for the listen - enjoy the rest of the week!
Yesterday was a bittersweet day at Living Word. We had a packed service and people we’re singing out, which was great, but the service was mixed with some very hard news.
Our Pastor and his wife our going through an incredibly difficult situation right now and I would love so much for you to lift them up in prayer.
Our service looked like this:
We were blessed with a sermon from our sister church’s intern pastor - reminding us as we continue through the book of Romans to look at our own sin before juding others.
This will be a busy week here - and I will be back in full force (finally!). Here’s the schedule for the week:
- Tomorrow: Some general news and announcements. Lots of things happening in my life.
- Wednesday: Blog Action Day 2008 - we’ll be discussing poverty from a Christian perspective.
- Thursday: Updates on our process of building worship teams at Living Word.
- Friday: Not sure yet - leave a comment if you’d like to hear about or discuss anything specific.
I miss blogging and being involved in the worship community - so, here we go again!
Just wanted to give some simple updates:
- Thanks so much to those of you who commented/tweeted about missing me blogging - much appreciated!
- I will be blogging regularly again soon.
- Life is in a bit of a transition right now and I’m trying to figure out how to manage some things wisely.
- Ministry at Living Word is happening big time, and I’m excited to see where some recent conversations and plans will bring us.
More to come…next week…
