Month: December 2022

Categories
The End of Many Books

Essentialism

by Greg McKeown

I’ve read a lot of books in this genre, so many, in fact, that I committed to not ready any new (to me) books about GTD/productivity in 2022. Instead I chose my top twelve to review, one for each month, which I did, more or less.

The one exception was Essentialism which I started on December 29 of 2021; I made allowance to finish it. Which I did in January, and which I decided would be my book to review in December. Here’s my actual review.

McKeown gives good reminders. Though by a different guy, it relates to this tweet:

It also really relates to The ONE Thing, which I had just finished reading before McKeown’s book. It is sort of KonMari for your calendar not just your closet.

What is required is courage for decisions about what is important. “[T]he deeper I have looked at the subject of Essentialism the more clearly I have seen courage as key to the process of elimination” (Loc. 1659, emphasis mine). And I didn’t know this, but I’ve been thinking about it a lot. “The Latin root of the word decision—cis or cid—literally means ‘to cut’ or ‘to kill.’…You can seen this in words like scissors, homicide, or fratricide” (Loc. 2036). So when we decide, we are deciding what to cut. There must be cuts. Something(s) will be cut. Will we cut what is not essential?

We need to eliminate multiple meaningless activities and replace them with one very meaningful activity. (Loc. 2058)

You probably don’t need to read the whole book, but we all need to decide what to do with our four thousand weeks. It turns out that I chose as my theme for 2023: BUDGET, applied not only to money but also to minutes (and meals and Mo), and it’s impossible to avoid decisions. So GET WISDOM (Proverbs 4:5, 7). And GET CUTTING.

3/5 stars

Categories
Every Thumb's Width

Recapping the Sun

I haven’t written about the Marysville Sun here for a while, but today the final issue of the year went out.

Thirteen months ago I made my first public comments about the idea of starting a local newspaper. I’d been thinking about it enough that it seemed better to make something rather than just keep thinking about it, and on the thirteenth of May the first issue came out.

Today’s Sun has some year-end numbers about current subscribers and a recap of some first-year highlights. I still think it’s a good project for loving Marysville and making it a destination.

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

Born to Reign

Early in the morning on the day of His death Pilate questioned Jesus, “Are you the king of the Jews?” Jesus was disrupting things already, but not in the typical way. He said, “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36).

His kingdom is not of this world, it’s not worldly, but that doesn’t mean that His kingdom is not in the world or for the world. If His kingdom had nothing to do with the world, then why did He come into it? What was He doing here in the world?

Pilate replied, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world—to bear witness to the truth” (John 18:37). The particular truth He’s talking about with Pilate, the truth for which He was born, is that He is King.

This was the question of the wise men. “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews?” This is why Herod the king was troubled so much that it boiled over onto all Jerusalem (Matthew 2:2-3).

Mild he lays his glory by
Born that man no more may die
Born to raise the sons of earth
Born to give them second birth
Hark, the herald angels sing
Glory to the newborn king

Jesus has grown up. He’s fought and won His greatest battle, defeating sin and death and the dragon. Now He invites us to eat and this outpost table of His kingdom until He returns to reign on earth.

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

Waiting for Perfection

I’m sure you’ve been waiting to find out this fourth and final part of Defeated Devil December. Actually, you didn’t have a choice to wait (I didn’t even give any hints), though you did have a choice how to wait. In fact, the fourth virtue of Defeated Devil December is waiting patiently. Not panicked, not agitated, not hotfooting it toward the path to immediate gratification. Be patient, the devil hates to see it.

The Seed of the woman has already come once and settled His battle with the ancient dragon (see Colossians 2:15). Because the serpent fights on in his bruised position, there are ways for us to demonstrate the glory of The Offspring’s win. We are to be content, to love truth, and to be generous without a show. We also know how to wait when the Lord says, “No,” or at least “Not yet.”

Eve and Adam swallowed what the devil said was the shortcut to God-like glory. Satan tempted Jesus the same way, showing Jesus how all the kingdoms of the world could be His just by submitting (Matthew 4:8-9). But the nations were already promised to Jesus, He was the Anointed (Psalm 2:8). His inheritance would come after obedience, glory after sacrifice.

God reveals that endurance, long-suffering, patience is the final piece of perfection that He’s planned for His people.

the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. (James 1:3, KJV)

So count it all joy when you have to wait, whether to open presents, or to get relief from pain, or for the Son of God to advent again.

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

Second Advent Caring

In the Son’s first advent, He was hardly recognized as a King, more recognized Him as a servant, and He self-proclaimed Himself to be a shepherd. “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep” (John 10:11). His office is identified by His sacrifice. Then He says the same thing a couple sentences later, with a different emphasis.

He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. (John 10:12–15 ESV)

He sacrificed because, unlike the hireling who runs because he cares nothing, Jesus came because cares entirely for the sheep. Unlike a stranger, Jesus as shepherd knows His sheep and the sheep know and follow His voice. “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me” (John 10:27, also John 10:4).

He is making “one flock” and He is the “one shepherd” (John 10:16). And, church, will this care of the Shepherd, this affection between Shepherd and us His sheep, not also continue after His second advent when He is recognized as King “to the ends of the earth” (Micah 5:4)? Is this not why He says, “I give them eternal life” (John 10:27), abundant life (John 10:11)? This is why He came, it is why He is coming again.

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

The Lex Talionis Gift List

It’s not found explicitly in the Gospels, but when Paul spoke to the Ephesians (in Acts 20:35) he mentioned that the Lord Jesus “Himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.” That provides another virtue for Defeated Devil December.

We’ve considered that the ancient serpent would rather have us discontent and dishonest. Jesus called Satan the father of lies, so he lies about God’s goodness to man and gets men to lie about their goodness to others. Satan also gets men to lie about their generosity.

Ananias sold some property and claimed that he was Mr. Altruism when he laid the money at the apostles feet. He did everything he could to make it look like he’d given it all; of course he hadn’t. Peter said, “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit…?” (Acts 5:3). A man convinces himself that it is more blessed to look like he’s given.

There is another angle to this devil-ish conceit. It’s giving, but with brown-paper bitterness tied up with strings. It’s giving, what you see is what you get unlike with Ananias, but what you don’t see is the internal spreadsheet keeping score in columns. Maybe it’s the Lex Talionis Gift List, expecting a gift of equal (or better) in return. Maybe, even more prevalent, is the Honor System Gift List, where the second column is for thank-you cards received (and not received)[1]. Such accounting acts as if it’s more blessed to be recognized for giving.

Be generous. Don’t give anything you can’t afford in your soul not to get credit for. Count it all joy to be generous, not counting appreciation. Don’t join Satan as an accuser of the brethren.

[1] YES. Writing thank you notes is great, appropriate, fitting, right, and something that parents should model and teach their children. The point of this exhortation, though, is about one of the ways we mess up on the giving side, while obviously it’s also possible to mess up on the receiving side.

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

Anticipation Proper

Maybe the word advent is a little new to you. You’re familiar with Christmas, and even the building anticipation toward the 25th, but “advent” almost sounds like a separate holiday (compare to Acts 17:18 and those who thought “Jesus” and “the resurrection” were separate “divinities”). It’s possible that a few others of you are very familiar with Advent, capital A, from a religious/church context with all the formal tradition and stuff.

Advent proper is the four Sundays prior to Christmas, usually represented by four purple and pink candles, each one referring to a different element (Hope, Love, Joy, Peace) with a different reference (Prophecy Candle, Bethlehem Candle, Shepherd’s Candle, Angel’s Candle), and as Christmas gets closer the combined light gets brighter. A fifth, white candle usually gets lit for the day itself (Christ’s Candle).

We don’t have candles for our liturgy, though some have them at home, whatever colors and whatever you call them. Our community doesn’t talk about Advent like a narrow, let alone biblical, necessity. All are yours, and so parts of it are strategic without defining your righteousness by it.

The feast that we’ve been given and required to celebrate is the Lord’s Supper. And we remember Christ our Savior, not only in facts, but with the bread and wine.

The rule is that it shouldn’t be done alone, in isolation. It’s an activity for the body, for all the parts together. The rule is that it shouldn’t be done in the abstract, in the intellect only. It’s an activity for the body, chewing and sipping and swallowing. The rule is that it shouldn’t be done in MISERY, but in rejoicing and hope for His return.

In that sense our worship of the Lord in communion does exercise our feasting muscles, and prepares us for Anticipation proper.

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

Advent Honesty

We’re back for the second exhortation of Defeated Devil December. Jesus Christ is the Seed of Eve, the fulfillment of God’s promise to bruise the head of the ancient dragon (Genesis 3:15). When Christ rose again from the grave He made a triumph over the serpent and the serpent’s offspring (Colossians 2:15). Though the devil still prowls around like a lion seeking prey to devour (1 Peter 5:8), greater is the one in us than he who is in the world (1 John 4:4).

How can we advent like death is dead, love has won, Christ has conquered the serpent? Last week we considered contentment as an arrow in our Christmas celebration quiver. Satan would rather us be annoyed at all the things, be ungrateful for what we’ve been given, and be suspicious that we’re not really getting the best we could.

A second virtue of Defeated Devil December would be honesty. The devil is the father of lies (John 8:44), a liar since the beginning. Eve listened to the devil’s crafty deceit; he sold her a falsehood.

We should tell the truth. This doesn’t mean to delight in sharing our irritated opinion; “hey, I’m just telling the truth.” It more means telling the truth, “hey, I was irritated with you, even if at first I tried to say I wasn’t. Will you please forgive me?”

Satan doesn’t want you confessing your sin, or at least not all of it. He prefers your pretense of religiousness (like the religious ones that Jesus called sons of the devil in John 8:41, 44), anything other than the genuine affections and actions of sanctification. The offspring of the serpent bear false witness, but, Christian, he is not your father. Be honest.

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

He Didn’t Wait

How does the incarnation encourage us? There are many ways, and one of them is that, in Christ, God came. God took on flesh and it was His idea. He initiated and He travelled. He did not wait for us to draw near to Him but He clothed Himself with frail humanity.

Our salvation is not the result of any long pilgrimage on our part to some holy place, it is the result of the Son’s sojourning among unholy people. We do not globe-trot or cross galaxies to get to God. He covered the distance. We could not reach Him, but we can also not get too far away from Him that He cannot reach us.

Eternal life draped Himself with a body so that mortal flesh could put on immortality (1 Corinthians 15:53). Heaven came down and glory fills our futures. “‘Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel’ (which means, God with us” (Matthew 1:23). We give thanks for salvation and the fellowship we enjoy with God because He came. We share the bread and the wine because He came.

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

Defeated Devil December

Four years ago (2018) I shared a strategy for our family called No Discontent December. It wasn’t only about not being fussy about what you did or didn’t get for advent/Christmas gifts, but about attitude in all the extra pulls and pushes on our days and schedule and budgets.

I thought about running a second No Discontent December, and while that would be fine, in light of the passage that starts our advent series of sermons (Genesis 3:15), I’ve got a related, but similar idea.

Defeated Devil December – 3D

In no way do I mean to take Satan lightly. Jude said that the archangel Michael, when contending with the devil, didn’t presume to smack talk but called for the Lord’s rebuke (Jude 9). So the goal here is to take God’s promise of a seed that would crush the serpent’s head seriously (again Genesis 3:15). We know that seed was Jesus, and He has defeated and will finally defeat that ancient serpent (Colossians 2:15, 1 John 3:8; Hebrews 2:14).

So what attitude and behavior would demonstrate this December that Christ has conquered?

Interestingly enough, I think contentment really throws a wrench into the devil’s works. He is insatiable for more than he was given, and unraveled Eve’s confidence that the Lord had given her fulness of blessing. Discontentment double-dates with doubt, fussiness comes from a lack of faith in God’s Word and God’s goodness. The serpent wanted Eve to want more, to covet beyond her privileges and gifts.

This Advent/Christmas season, don’t listen to the father of lies. Resist him. Be grateful, content, and in so doing let the devil be frustrated, not you.