I remember reading a leadership/management book or article somewhere to keep a precise hourly record of your daily schedule for a week.  I actually never took that challenge to heart but I did a brief exercise on my own this week and recalled my schedule each day of this week to write down everything I did and how long I did it for.  Among a few other surprises, what I was most surprised about was the percentage of time I spent in literal “quiet time” with the Lord – this did not include any pastoral day-to-day job requirements, church events, or Christian book reading.  I defined “quiet time” as set aside time in communication (prayer) with God, nothing in front of me except for a bible, journal and a pen.  Out of a week that consists of 168 hours only 4% of my time (roughly an hour/day) was spent in personal, intimate, alone, quiet time with God.  In comparison, 8% of that week was spent watching tv/movies, and over 10% spent with friends hanging out – over DOUBLE the amount that I spent with the Lord.  I know many of us reading this have heard of statistics and comparisons like this before, but taking personal inventory of where my time was spent was eye opening for me.  If the saying “time is money” is true of how we view the 24 hours of our day, I was only giving the Lord only 4 cents of my dollar… A WEEK. Furthermore, if we apply time spent with the Lord to the traditional 10% of tithing, we should be spending 16.8 hours a week (10% of 168 hours in a week), about 2 hours and 24 minutes per day with the Lord.  But I’m busy… right?  We’re all busy with daily essentials with work, family, and friends, aren’t we?
In Luke 5, Luke’s account of the calling of the first disciples and healing of the man with leprosy, verse 16 subtly mentions that in the midst of all the healing and teaching that Jesus did, “he often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.”  Now scripture isn’t clear on why he withdrew, but one thing is very clear, because of busy-ness, Jesus withdrew to pray often.  His prayer was not the time spent in our cars while driving to work or while cooking a meal or waiting for our children as they finish sports, Kumon, or violin lessons.  Jesus’ prayer times were withdrawn from the craziness of life in “lonely” or “deserted” (void of people!) places.  How are you all doing with that?  How is your time spent with Jesus?  In what ways have you compromised or made excuses to avoid spending time with the Lord?  Martin Luther, responsible for the Reformation, is often quoted saying “I have so much to do that I shall spend the first three hours in prayer.”  He deeply understood the value of close connection and communication with the Lord.  Friends, let’s get our priorities straight.  Let’s commit to withdraw from the day-to-day busyness and give the King, who gave His all for us, the most precious commodity in our lives, our time.

From Pastor Keeyoung’s Heart
August 16, 2015

Our 11 year-old son Julian has been away at a summer camp down in NC for a whole month. He’ll be back at the end of this week. This is the longest he’s ever been away from home. His mother and I miss him but he seems to be having a great time so that’s good. He’s been writing letters a couple times a week. He has my decidedly bad handwriting scrawl and instead of writing “Dear Mom and Dad” he addresses us in the letter as “Parents” but it’s cute to see him describe his experiences. He’s having a blast amen to that.
At first I was worried about him going down there: whether he’d make new friends, whether mean kids would pick on him, whether he’d get homesick, whether he’d be safe, whether he’d make good decisions and not buckle under peer pressure. He’s an only child and perhaps because of this we’ve noticed he’s had difficulty in the past interacting with kids his own age. Kids acting silly like, well, kids sometimes frustrates him into having little meltdowns. But he’s got to be able to grow in those difficult situations. We can’t and shouldn’t interfere by trying to shield or protect him from every little thing that comes along.
We’re not done raising him he’s still just a boy. But this time apart is just a glimpse of when the day comes where our role as parents will naturally diminish and he’ll want to be his own man, left to find his own way in life according to his judgment and decisions he makes. So we try to raise him as best we can to respect himself and others and get along, to love and fear the Lord and make decisions reflecting as much. The rest we leave to God.
What occurred to me is that this journey is similar to our experience as Christians. As Christian parents or in a given ministry leadership role such as Sunday school teachers or oikos leaders, God has placed certain people in our care to shepherd them through their faith journey. To be a small part of someone coming to Faith for the first time is a beautiful thing. But there are many forces of this world that seek to undermine, discourage and distract them from their faith journey. We worry and fret over their well-being and want them to experience nothing but God’s love. But as we are all children of God and the whole world is under the control of the evil one we realize we cannot protect them from every dimension of spiritual battle. We are used by God to do His good work but at the end of the day we accept that their lives are in God’s hands.
There is a second part of the title verse of this column. When Jesus sent out his disciples in Matthew 10 as “sheep among wolves” to preach the good news he also cautioned them to be as “shrewd as snakes and innocent as doves.” I get the innocent part as being pure and Christ-like, but to be shrewd suggests there is a level of wisdom and discernment born over time and experience. His disciples were wise to the world but no longer of it. Perhaps the trials and tribulation one endures seeking Christ are part and parcel of the cross we bear daily. Amen to that.

From Pastor Mark’s Heart
August 9, 2015