Kingdom Chat Week #23: Don’t Feel Guilty About Enjoying Life
” … but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment” (1Timothy 6:17b)
Christians are naturally believed to be caring, self-sacrificing, people who consider others first before themselves and do not care about the things of this world. These are irreplaceable virtues and result(fruit) of our faith, however, it may also lead some believers to abuse or neglect themselves, their family or useful hobbies thinking that this endears them to God. They assume that self-denial means self- neglect. This can be no further from the truth. God created everything in this world for man to enjoy under God’s authority, and it gives Him pleasure and glory seeing us actually use the things He made for our benefit. The opening scripture says that God has freely given us all things to ENJOY.
In the story of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32), the elder brother was angry at the father’s spending on the welcome party for the brother but the father chided him saying, that all those things already belonged to him. If he wanted to eat the fatted calf, he would have just gone ahead to take it all along and not complain. Some believers act in this manner, which is why they also feel others have no right to relax and enjoy God’s blessings. They’d rather every Christian wore a long face, dressed in faded cloths, looked dejected, stressed out and spoke with a low tone so as not to offend anybody. This was the way of the Pharisees in public but when Jesus came, He demonstrated that the Kingdom of God was about making people free to enjoy their everyday life as God intended, which is why they accused him of being a winebibber and glutton (Matthew 11:19). They were not used to such graceful extravagance mixed with undeniable proofs of power of God. Even Judas, once tried to stop Jesus from allowing the oil to be poured on his feet using the religious excuse of caring for the poor but Jesus did not fall for such guilt-tripping. He responded, “the poor you will always have with you…” (Matthew 26:11).
This is not to encourage selfishness because there are also some believers who are selfish and only think of their own needs at the expense of everyone else’. This is also another extreme. We need to strike a balance about it. You can only truly love others to the minimum standard with which you love yourself. If you burn out emotionally, psychologically, physically then you shortchange the world of the best God has placed in you and those you lead. There will always be souls to be saved, a good work that needs to be done, someone to help, etc. Take out the time this Summer to go on that tour, visit that nice scenery, observe nature, go out with that loved one or family, play that game, watch that movie or that show. Loosen up, relax and play, get refreshed, revived and refueled to do even better for the Kingdom. It is not a luxury to enjoy life, but a necessity, so refuse to feel guilty about it. Glorify God by taking care of yourself and replace the guilt by being grateful to God for the gift of a good life.
Discussion:
1) When last did you take out time to relax?
2) What are some of the ways a believer can enjoy life in a way that brings glory to God?
I look forward to your warm comments. Cheers!
- 4 Replies
Pastor Mike, I love it 😂
Oh when I started walking with the Lord, I could not afford to be relaxing because I was always thinking I should be at this program, doing this and that… Life was kind of “boring” because there was nothing new talking about my daily routine till one day a friend of mine invited me to a nice place, juste to eat and relax… It was so coool and nice. At first, I felt guilty because I was not doing something spiritual 😅… But yeah, then I remember your words at the Kingdom Life Summit Owerri concerning living a well balanced life. I remarked that I was putting tooo much stress on myself and I never took time to relax and see what life really looks out there… Even for my family, I was not there. Like I was ready always be outside but never at home 😅
1 – Most of the time I play games, I go out with friends to talk, discuss ideas, etc.. ( will be good to includ sports)
2 – I think there is a lot we can do as believers, As Pastor Phil would always say, it is to use what we love and what we have as passion to serve God.. Now I don’t feel bad whenever I am playing video games or doing something else than praying or reading the Bible
Thank you Jefferson for your insightful response. Like you, I am always passionate about the work of God. I believe every believer should be that way. I realized that the more I spend time with God, the clearer and more relaxed I feel and I experience nature much deeper. Also, when we learn to play and take time out to share our lives in practical ways with the people or environment around us in a self controlled way, it is easier for us to find better opportunities to share the love of God with them.
The last time I remember relaxing was Tuesday. I grabbed some popcorn and finished watching a series called “The Time Travelers Wife.” It was really good. The whole time I was wondering why she stayed with him when it became scary and stressful. However, the wife loved him so much regardless of his condition and what they went through. In my life when giving glory to God even when I’m relaxing,I look at the lessons from what I’m watching or what is God telling me to share with my family and the world. We get to enjoy the things of this world to open our mind to see what is what and to see what is God trying to teach us in this moment. Also realizing as a Christian, life is not perfect and problems do happen and we are only human.
Thanks for sharing Rose. I quite agree that when we open our minds under God’s guidance, we learn a lot even from our daily activities.
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