Time Well Spent, Or Not?

This is a sobering quote from Shaun Groves:

On your first day on the other side of the grave, do you think you’ll look back on this life and be flooded with gratitude for hours spent watching episodes of American Idol and Lost? Do you think you’ll look back fondly on the effort and money spent remodeling the kitchen? Do you think you’ll be glad you were up-to-date on the juicy details of celebrity lives? Will you be thankful for the hours, days, weeks, years you lived feeling victimized and sorry for yourself? Will you regret not spending more time at the office? Will you wish you had been more of a people pleaser? Will you miss your caffeine, porn or Facebook?

Me neither

I think that most of us should be convicted by this statement. If you’re not, then I either need to share the gospel with you or be discipled by you. Also, I found it interesting that he put Facebook and caffeine in the same category as porn. 

Tim Challies also has a good post that deals with our television consumption, primarily regarding retirees. 

Joseph Gleason has also recently posted about "ditching your television." Here is a brief excerpt:

Television works in much the same way [as breathing Carbon Monoxide]. It doesn't necessarily hurt you directly. You can watch nothing but "Little House on the Prairie" and "Leave it to Beaver" and go months without seeing sex or violence. So how could TV be bad?

The real question is, "What else could I do with my time if I wasn't sitting in front of the TV?" We only have 24 hours in a day. And two hours spent watching TV equals two hours spent not reading, not hiking, not having a conversation with neighbors, not romping with the children, not baking a cake, not playing a musical instrument and not making love to your spouse.

If you're like me, then this is the point at which you begin making excuses for yourself. Go ahead. 

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Sanctification Through Podcasts

I don't know a lot about God's means of sanctification. I do know that he uses whomever and whatever he chooses to accomplish his purposes in all of creation, and this includes my personal sanctification. A couple of guaranteed means of sanctification are wives and children. My wife and children challenge, encourage, and inspire me on a daily basis. They are also the best method of accountability, because they see the places in your life that are less than perfect (or less than average). Anyway, moving on to the point of this post.

I can't be sure of exactly of how or when my sanctification will be furthered. What I do know is that prayer and reading Scripture are two activities that the Bible indicates as being part of the Christian life. These also seem to be to definite methods of doing your part to attempt to become more Christlike. However, if you are like me, then these two activities are easier described than accomplished. I truly have a desire to pray and study the Bible daily, but sometimes life gets in the way. Most of the time, my life is far more hectic than I would prefer, and this makes is easy for my flesh to make excuses for my lake of diligence.

One method I have found for giving myself time in prayer and the Scriptures is to take advantage of my commute each morning and evening. It takes me about 35-40 minutes each way, so this is a great time to spend praying. However, I find it distracting to read the Bible while driving (I hope you do to). Nonetheless, I did find a way to feed myself a steady diet of Scripture while driving. I started downloading sermons and podcasts. This is a great way to fill your mind with Scripture and exegesis of that Scripture. This is also a great way to redeem your commute, which most of us do not enjoy.

Here is a list of the podcasts (some are sermoncasts) that I subscribe to

John Piper's Weekly Sermon (Bethlehem Baptist)

Mark Driscoll's Weekly Sermon (Mars Hill)


Matt Chandler's Weekly Sermon (Village Church)

The White Horse Inn (Michael Horton and friends)

Christ the Center (some PCA guys from Westminster)

Ask Pastor John (bitesize Piper)

Renewing Your Mind - R C Sproul


Let My People Think - Ravi Zacharias

The Albert Mohler Program

The first four are my favorites, but the rest are definitely worth your time. If you have any other podcasts to recommend, then please leave a comment. I am always on the lookout for something new.

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