We’ve embraced a myth in our culture.  It is a myth that we all wish was true.  In fact, we operate our lives and schedules around this myth in search of its illusive and tempting claim, consequently robbing ourselves of the very thing we are searching for.  This myth is called “Planned Isolated Quality Time.”

Let me explain…

In our culture, we have come to accept that the illusive and mythical reality of planned isolated quality time is possible and so we schedule our lives around creating this mythical time in our various relationships, futilely attempting to compensate for the lack of quantity time we have in our busy schedules.  I believe we accept and embrace this myth specifically because it means we can live without boundaries or margins, perceivably skipping those realities because we have scheduled quality time.

We seek this mythical quality time with our spouses, believing that if we just schedule special times where we will be together alone, it will make up for the hours spent apart through our daily routines of busyness.

We seek the mythical planned isolated quality time with our kids, believing that if we just schedule special events and holidays (planned isolated quality times), they will offset the lack of quantity time spend because of our overfilled schedules.

I want to suggest that planned isolated quality time is a myth!  My experience has always been that quality time always happens spontaneously in the midst of quantity time and is often unplanned and never isolated.  Said again, quality time does exist, it is just very difficult to plan it.  When we attempt to plan quality time, at the expense for quantity time, we end up starving those we love and ourselves from the quality time we all desperately desire and need.

I write this article with full disclosure that I am not an expert in this and am constantly learning what this means in my every day life.  I, too, am at times a believer in the myth of planned isolated quality time and am constantly (re)learning to reject this myth.

Quality time exists spontaneously within the selfless gift of quantity time.  We all desire what can only be accomplished through quantity time with those we love and those who love us.  This takes effort and self-sacrifice but it is worth it – the ones we love are worth it.  Reject the myth and accept the hard truth that time is an expensive gift worth giving and sacrificing for those we love.

A few weeks again I was in the drive-through at Tim Horton’s with my beautiful wife and three great kids. After making the customary order of two large coffees, our kids petitioned that we go home and have a family meeting about our coffee “problem.” I believe the actual word they used was “intervention.” They joked about our addiction to coffee and we laughed about the incident. Although their real issue was about them having to patiently wait in line at Tim Horton’s while we got coffee, they were right about our love of the java bean and it’s aroma filled, caffeine infused, goodness.

As a lover of coffee, I have been intrigued with different blends and coffee roasting practices from around the world. Many people don’t realize that the process of harvesting and processing coffee beans takes time and is not gentle. Coffee beans begin as a harvested cherry that must have its fleshy covering removed. This removal and subsequent appropriate aging and roasting of the coffee bean take time and effort.

What makes coffee so flavoursome is the process the coffee bean goes through. This same principle is true of our lives. Our lives are filled with hardship, pain, struggles and disappointments. Agree? Jesus does! One of the most forgotten promises of Jesus is “In this world you will have trouble…” (John 16:33a). Jesus promised that you would have troubles, hardships and problems! It’s a guarantee.

However, the Bible also teaches that God can use those troubles for our good and for His glory (Romans 8:28). He can take what could be used to harm us and allow it to grow us and shape us. The challenge is: the decision of how trouble will be used is up to us. We can allow these things to create bitterness and resentment or we can allow God to use them for our growth in faith, patience and understanding. The choice is ours.

When Jesus makes the statement that “In this world you will have trouble…” he ends it with the following promise: “…But take heart. I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33b) The reality is, in this world we will have trouble and we have a choice of whether we will face the challenges with hope that Jesus has overcome the world or we can face those challenges with anger, bitterness and resentment.

What challenge are you facing? What trouble are you going through? Take heart! Christ has overcome the world. Choose today to believe in that promise and allow God to use your challenges to form you and mold you into the man or woman He has created you to be. The choice is yours! Take heart, my friend!

We live lives full of distractions.  Our lives are now so crowded with distraction that we need laws to prohibit our overuse and abuse of those distractions (the distracted driving law is a great example of this).  Think for a moment about your day and the myriad of distractions that routinely flood your life: email notifications, phone calls, Facebook/Twitter updates, TV, movies, etc.  Our lives are now bursting with distractions.  Interestingly, Piers Steel has recently written a book that argues the distractions in our lives are costing us vital productivity and efficiency.  Whether or not this is true, it is analogous to our lives when it comes to getting distracted away from areas of even greater concern and of utmost importance.

Life is filled with tough circumstances, questions about meaning and purpose, as well as issues of eternal significance.  These are important questions that have been reflected on since the emergence of humanity.  These are questions that Google or iPhone’s Siri can’t answer (interestingly, if you ask Siri “What is the meaning of life?  She responds with a variety of different and funny answers such as: “I don’t know. But I think there’s an app for that.”)   These questions are important and no mobile device application, search engine, tweet, or status update can fully answer them.  The fact is, most people would rather be distracted than seriously reflect and wrestle with questions of eternal significance.

As we approach Easter, this is the ideal time to deal with our obsession with, and reliance on, distracted living.  In fact, Christian churches everywhere practice the season of Lent (40 days before Easter) in preparation for the Easter season (the season of remembrance of Christ’s death and resurrection).  One common practice for Lent is to give something up for a month, to purposely focus on Christ and our need for Him preparing our hearts for the Easter Season.  This practice, among other things, is about purposely removing distractions from our lives so we can focus on issues of eternal significance.  It is about reflecting on the birth, life, death and resurrection of our Savior and what faith in Christ Jesus means for our salvation.

As we approach Easter, think about your life and how many distractions you have embraced.  Consider for a time/a season, some questions of eternal significance, those question we, too often, ignore.  Think about the purpose for life, your belief in God, your understanding of the afterlife and consider experiencing the Easter story at one of the Christian churches in Vermilion this Easter season.  Experience the life, death and resurrection of Jesus and what it can mean, through faith, to have new life in Christ that is both abundant and eternal.  Come and look deep into life’s big questions, purposely pressing ‘pause’ on life’s distractions.