Have you got a minute?

I recently asked a friend of mine to take a look at my blog and give me his thoughts. He and I are good enough friends that he can tell me exactly what he thinks and I will not be offended because I know his character. He is going to shoot straight with me and that is not only what I want but it is what I need. Here is what he said:

Good thoughts.  One thing I would say is that keeping things short is better than having a long BLOG entry. That is why I went to video.  I feel I can say more in less time.

I appreciated his insight so I experimented with what he said. I actually timed myself as I read the blog entry and it took me 2 minutes and 33 seconds. Wow thats a long time! Over 2 minutes to read a devotional blog. Over two minutes of exposure to scripture and a few thoughts and possibly an application or two that would challenge me over the next few days. I hope you read my sarcasm in this.

What I am not saying is that my blog is so wonderful I cannot understand why anyone would not want to spend all day reading and pondering my thoughts. However, what I am saying is that I think we have become so busy that we really don't have much time for God. If you take a look at Amazon.com you will find over 50 titles for one minute devotions. There are over ten titles for two minute devotions and over 30 titles for five minute devotions. In other words we are going to spend 23 hours and 55 minutes or more on us and we will give God five minutes or less. Or think about it this way, there are 1440 minutes in a day. If we give God 5 minutes we have given him .3% of our time, not 3%, there is a decimal in front of the 3. Less than one-half of one percent of our time will be given to the Lord! Boy, I hope he appreciates that! 

If I look at scripture I see a different view of God's word. 

Joshua 1: 8 -  Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.

Psalm 1: 3 -  But his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night.

Psalm 119: 97 - Oh, how I love your law! I meditate on it all day long.

The writers of these verses understood the importance of reading, studying and thinking about the word of God for more than just a few minutes. It was more than just a check-off on their list of things to do today. There is an overused phrase that says Christianity is not a religion it is a relationship. Even though that may sound a little cheesy there is truth in the concept. As a husband I want to grow in my relationship with my wife. The only way to really do this is to spend time with her. Spend time talking to her, listening to her and serving her. I am not sure our relationship would last if all I gave her was two minutes a day. I think the same concept applies to our relationship with Christ. 

I am trying to keep this blog entry short - it took me less than three minutes to read it. I did it with the purpose of challenging you to time yourself and see how long it took you to read it. Now apply no more than that much time to your favorite TV show tonight - turn it off after 2 minutes and 33 seconds, your time at the dinner table - get up from the table after 3 minutes and 5 seconds, your time in the backyard with the kids - stop throwing the baseball after 1 minute and 45 seconds for you speed readers. See how well this goes over with the family! For some strange reason we would never think of doing that to our family but it seems ok to do it to God. Please don't get me wrong, I am not saying that quantity is better than quality, it is not just a matter of the number of minutes you spend with God. However, I do think many of us have subconsciously pushed God to the back-burner of our lives.

I hope you will take time today (more than just a couple of minutes) to get in God's word, take time to talk to him, take time to listen to him. He has written an amazing story about who he is, what he has done for all mankind and combined it with an amazing user's guide for life.