Priorities - Family First

"Enjoy what you have rather than desiring what you don't have. Just dreaming about nice things is meaningless--like chasing the winds." Ecclesiastes 6:9

My dad is a perpetual motion machine and has the heart of 10 servants. He lives to work and bless others, can be a workaholic at times, but has an insane work ethic. He finds it hard to just sit down, unless there is an OU game on. He works from sun up to sun down and I don't really think he knows what the term "free day" means. He has always been this way and I've learned a great deal about work and service from my Daddy, but there are some drawbacks to being hard wired like this. He is at times so work oriented that if there is something that needs done, he is the first one to volunteer, at times to the expense of his own family. It has changed in recent years, but I remember growing up that Dad was gone a lot.

My dad worked an awful lot when I was younger. He put in long hours, was gone when I woke up and at times didn't make it home by the time I was in bed, or just shortly before. He served at church and helped others when they needed help. All this built up to him not being around a great deal. In the 90's I remember hearing a song come on the radio that really became my prayer as a child. It was by Michael James, a Christian artist, and it's called slow down. The chorus goes like this:

Slow down, Daddy, don’t work so hard
We’re proud of our car
We’ve got a big enough yard
Slow down, Daddy, we want you around
Daddy, please slow down

I remember thinking this chorus over and over in my mind, praying it in my heart, silently begging my dad just to stop working and be with me. It wasn't that he did so out of a drive to get more and have the best stuff, it was a need to provide for his family, serve others, and work with everything in him. He is a servant and that is a rare gift to find in our world, but at times, to me, that got in the way of being my dad. Sure, he was there at my football games, band concerts, etc., but I just wanted times with my daddy throwing a football, playing catch, riding bikes, etc. As I got older, he was around a lot more and I have very found memories playing basketball with my dad on summer nights in the driveway, but as a child growing up I remember wanting Dad just to slow down and be with us.

It is a sad state in today's world that Consumerism has crept into our family mindset. We are always striving for more and better things, bigger houses, bigger cars, better insurance, nice food, nice clothes, cell phones, computers, etc. We run ourselves ragged trying to provide all these "necessities" and can begin neglecting the real necessities of life. We get wound up DOING so much for our family that we forget to BE with our family.

In Luke 10 Jesus was at Mary and Martha's house. Martha is running around working like a dog, trying to do everything and provide everything for their guest, while Mary is just sitting at Jesus' feet. Martha complains to Jesus, "Lord, tell that lazy bum to get up and help me! I'm working like crazy here trying to provide a meal for you." Jesus just looks at Martha and says, in essence, "Martha, you are so worried about so much, trying to so hard to make everything right, while she has chosen the better part, being with me, and I'm not gonna take that from her."

The major lesson here is that BEING is better than DOING. It's easy to get caught in the trap of "providing" the needs of our family, when in reality what we have is perfectly fine. We want nice stuff and things, but is it really a necessity? Is it worth working our brains out trying to give the best, nicest stuff when really what we have is fine? To slightly modify what Jesus said, "What does a man gain if he serves the whole world but loses his family?" It doesn't do our family any service if we work our tails off to do all that we can for our family but end up missing all the good things with our family.

When I get done in the office, I just wanna go home and rest, my brain fried from the day. I'm tired, I want to veg, but I came to a realization the other day that my time with Kai as a toddler is limited, my time with my wife is short, and I can either veg my time away, waiting for a free day or a weekend to spend time with them, or I can take every moment and make the most of the time I have with them. I had to define my priorities for life, would it be work or family first? This is even harder in ministry, when my work is full time service of the Lord, but the reality of Scripture is that my ministry is first to my family, because God has blessed me with a wife and family. I could choose to throw myself into the "sacred" work of the ministry, I could choose to kill myself with multiple jobs in an endless attempt to try and raise the financial level of our family, pay off debt, etc. Or, I could choose to enjoy the time I have with my wife and child, investing my energies and efforts into my relationships instead of tiring myself with an endless list of to do's and jobs, spending my resources on things that really don't matter in the long run.

Let me challenge you today to not get so busy with the rat race of life, to not work so hard "keeping up with the joneses", and invest everything in your family, because when it's all said and done, that's all you have. If that means rearranging your budget (or making one period!), down-sizing, etc. do so. God, spouse, children--that should be our priority list. Invest yourself in something lasting, in BEING and not so much in DOING.