My pastor said something in one of his sermons a few weeks ago that I haven’t been able to get out of my head. It was something along the lines of how we live in such an information age and it’s so easy to hear and read biblical advice anywhere. He specifically used an example of sermons- we are able to listen to basically any sermon we want to online and jump from sermon to sermon without dwelling on anything we learned. His fear was that we spend all this time listening to sermons or hearing biblical advice but we never take the time to make a change to our own lives concerning the advice that we just learned.
This got me thinking- do I do this? I am constantly on the look out for more- more blogs to read, more books to read, more pastors to listen to online. I have a mile long list of books I want to read and sometimes I catch myself speeding through the book I’m reading so that I can get to the next one. And for what? Why am I doing this? I’m not even taking the time to enjoy what I’m reading. I even do this when reading my bible sometimes- I want to read the through the whole bible in a certain amount of time and I hate to admit it but sometimes I am reading it just to check it off my to do list for the day. I’ve recently decided to make reading my bible a daily habit because I know how important it is to transforming our minds. But I guess I’d have to it just because I feel admit that reading like I “have” to kind of defeats the purpose of reading it at all doesn’t it? If I’m not really letting this information transform me or using it to spend time with God then what’s the point?
I need to really dwell on the information I’m taking in when it comes to biblical advice if I really want it to transform me. If I’m reading just to get it done and on to the next I’m missing so much. I’m still in the process of figuring out what it means to really simplify my life and really enjoy the things I’m doing. My fear is that I’m always looking for what’s next and never really present in the moment itself.
I think some of these issues are rooted in me being such a performance driven, type A person and I tend to value myself based off of what I’ve done for the day even if that means just finishing a book. I don’t want to be this way though- I want to rest in what Jesus has done for me and really value myself based off of that because that’s the only thing that really matters.
Does anyone else struggle with this? I don’t want to miss the important things in life because I’m always focused on what’s next. Does anyone have any helpful tips? I’m going to really spend time in prayer and try to set some rules to help me make sure to keep me from an information overload- maybe only allowing myself to read 2 books a month or something along those lines to insure that I really am enjoying the moment, I’ll report back sometime next week with what I’ve found and some tips for anyone else who might struggle with this as well 🙂
