MCCH Biblical Rest Retreat

February 2-3, 2024

Priory Spirituality Center

Lacey, Washington

Ruthlessly Eliminating Hurry!!�

 Agendas�

• To become Biblical Rest Practitioners” (J. To)

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•  “My agenda is: to pass on some of the best things I’ve learned from sitting at the feet of Jesus.”

(John Mark Comer)

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Reviewing Biblical Rest Principles �

• MCCH Biblical Rest presentations focus on Character Transformation not on Information Exchanges. 
• Biblical rest is most often found in being with Jesus. 
• A core problem with Busyness is a lack of intimacy with God. 

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Changes are needed to be with Christ. Nothing is more important than knowing Christ intimately. �

• What are Intimacy’s best definitions?
• When Adam & Eve disobeyed God, they lost their Intimacy & Paradise with God.

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Learn from our earliest intimacy models starting with our parents. �

• Charles Swindoll focuses on 4 Decisions & 4 Disciplines to regain Intimacy with God. 
• “The single greatest need of Christ’s church is the restoration of ministers.”

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• Hurry involves excessive haste or urgency. 
• Hurry Synonyms: uproar, hurl, hurdle, hurricane.
• Hurry uses frantic efforts to control “fears, guilt, inadequacies.

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• The most simple cause of Hurry is: Too Much To Do,
• Not hurrying brings pleasure & the ability to do calmly & effectively with strength & joy- that which really matters.

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•  We should make it our target 🎯 to live our lives entirely without hurry.
• We must learn to live one day at a time with clear goals that please God.
• “Without clear goals, we get mush.”
• Jesus said: “ my meat is to do & finish My Heavenly Father’s will. “

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•  Psalm 23 does not say: “The Lord is my shepherd, therefore I gotta run faster!”
• “All my worst memories . . . are when I am in a hurry!”
• “ Love, joy, & peace are incompatible with Hurry.”
• “Freedom perhaps never comes without great cost.”

• But the average iPhone user touches his or her phone 2617 times daily.”
• “What would my mind be like if God touches my mind as frequently as I touch my phone.”

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• “Make the best use of the time, because the days are evil.” (Eph. 5:16)
• “We have become so used to spiritually mediocre days- days of irritation, fears, & self-preoccupation & frenzy-that we can throw our lives away in a hurry,” 

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God’s Great Invitations�

• Take a deep breath
• Put your cell phone away
• Let your 💗slow down
• Let God take care of the World.

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Measurements�

• I want to reset the metrics of the church,
• When the church measures for success, what metrics do they use?
• When your church measures you, what metrics do they use.
• When you measure your church, what metrics do you use.

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Key Questions�

• Who am I becoming?
• What if I changed my life?
• “As go the leaders, so goes the church.”

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PAUSE & DISCUSS with another person�

All three Biblical Rest Authors- Pastors Mark Comer, Chuck Swindoll, & Tony Horsfall- research & warn us of dangers of living Overly-Busy lives leading to Hurry Sickness

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�PAUSE & DISCUSS with another person

Discuss with a partner these two  question. Be specific with examples.�

1. “What is all this distraction, addiction, and frenzy pace of life doing to our souls.?”�
2. What changes can I make to change cause to more Christlike living?

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Observations & warnings�

In Byung-Chul Han’s book The Burnout Society, he observes: “That most people in the Western world  are too alive to die, and too dead to live.”

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Could author Dallas Willard be right. “That an over-busy, digitally distracted life of speed is the greatest threat to spiritual life that we face in the modern world?”

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Observations & warnings�

The Problem—HURRY is the great Enemy of spiritual life.

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A brief history of Speed: Roman Sun Dial, Thomas Edison, 1960’s SCI-FI, 7-Eleven, 2007 Steve Jobs releases iPhone

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1370: 1st public clock in Germany created artificial time

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Many people stopped listening to natural rhythms in their bodies.

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Sleep Patterns �

• Before Edison invented the light bulb, the “average” person slept 11 hours.
• Now in America, we are sleeping an average of 7 hours.
• Any wonder why so many people are so exhausted?

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Where did “Saved time” go?�

• Answer: we spend it on other things!
• “Average” American works 4 more weeks per year since 1979.
• Leisure used to symbolize wealthiest; now Busyness is wealthiest.

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Negative outcomes of Busyness�

• Decline & Death of Sabbath 
• 7-11 chain store became 1st to remain open 7 days weekly until 11 pm
• Sundays began evolving from a day of Rest & Worship to To Do Lists.

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From human Being to human Doing�

• If we lose Sabbath Rest, we lose a day for our souls to open up to God.
• If we lose Sabbath Rest & Worship, we can change from a Human BEing to a human DOing. 
• Careful not to transform into part Machine part human.

Internet’s Squeezing humans�

• Decreasing our IQs & our capacities to Pay Attention
• Internet is chipping away our Concentration & Contemplation capacities
• Human minds now expect to receive information in “swiftly moving streams of particles”

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Scuba Diver vs Jet Rider�

“ Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words;  now I zip along on the surface like a jet rider.”

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iPhone: Pros & Cons�

• iPhone instantly available to user’s hands
• “Average user touches iPhone for 2.5 hours over 67 sessions
• iPhone users “have no clues how much time they LOST to phone.”
• Reduces working memory & problem solving skills-increases dumbness.

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PART 1: The Problem�

• Like slot machines the iPhone is addictive.
• Small actions (texts, emails, etc.) on iPhone adds up to large amounts of time gone
• Some software designers “intentionally design to distract & addict users
• Some Facebook designers asks how they can consume as much of your time & attention as possible to exploit vulnerabilities in humans.

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 Declining Attention Spans �

• Before 2000s & Digital Revolution, human attention spans measured 12 seconds.
• Today’s human’s Attention spans have dropped to 8 seconds.
• A goldfish has a 9 second Attention span.  
• Goldfish are beating “average” human attention spans.

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Humans increasing appetites for“Distractions”�

• Whenever we go on line or use phones,we drop into an “ecosystem of interruption technologies.”
• People have “increasing appetite for Distractions” 
• Some software designers know their companies can get your money if they can get your attention & distract you into their products.

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Digital Addictions�

• Many now have a digital addiction; their will power does not stand a chance against the LIKE BUTTON.”
• “Many Americans have an overwhelming “compulsion” to check texts, emails, to click on . . . “
• But most people will not admit they have a problem of Digital Addiction

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Addiction Defined�

• “The relentless pull to a substance or an activity that becomes so compulsive it ultimately interferes with daily life.”
• If you think you are the exception to Digital Addiction,  prove it by turning off your phone for 24 hours by naming it a Digital Sabbath.
• We talk about the  pros of the modern digital age, but rarely the cons.

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Cultivate a  Healthy suspicion of Technology�

• Every technology carries its program, agenda, & philosophy that requires scrutiny, criticism, & control.
• What looks like progression is often regression with an agenda that helps others get rich, while you get distracted & addicted.

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Amish Communities Evaluate New Technologies �

• Amish communities ask: “Does this new technology make us healthier or sick? 
• Amish ask “Is the new technology positive or negative? 
• Will the new technology destroy our tight-knit community?
• Will it give life to consumerism that will eat away at love, joy, peace?

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Is Our Pace of Life Healthy?�

There is more to life than increasing its speed.” (Gandhi)

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What is all this distraction, addiction, and frenzied pace of life doing to our souls"

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What is deeply wrong?�

• True story of African safari porters protesting with work stoppage
• “We are waiting for our souls to catch up with our bodies!”
• How effectively can I restore my life balance when my soul is weary?
• Biblical Rest Retreat #5 will document the need to insert Margins into our lives. 

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 Hurry Sickness�

• Hurry Sickness is a world-wide disease & epidemic.
• It is a “behavior pattern characterized by continual rushing & anxiousness.
• In Hurry Sickness a person feels chronically short of time, and so tend to perform every task faster and gets flustered when encountering any kind of delay.”

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Type A People�

• Chronically angry & hurried and become more prone to heart attacks.
• “Continuously struggle in an unrelenting attempts to accomplish or achieve more & more in less & less time.

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Symptoms of Hurry Sickness�

• Examples include moving from line to line looking for shorter and faster lanes.
• While driving a car, counting cars in front of you & moving to lanes with the fastest & least volume of cars.
• Multi-tasking & forgetting one or more of the tasks.

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More symptoms of Hurry Sickness�

• Irritability; Hypersensitivity; Restlessness; Workaholism;
• Non-stop activities: Emotional numbness; Out-of- order priorities
• Lack of care for your body; Escapist behaviors; Slippage of spiritual disciplines; Isolation

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Chronic Hurry is violence on the soul�

• “An over-busy, hurried life of speed is the New Normal”
• Grandma said:”Just because everybody’s doing it, doesn’t make it smart.”
• Hurry kills relationships.
• Love takes time; hurry does not have time.

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Hurry Kills�

• Hurry kills joy, gratitude, appreciation, the goodness of the moment.
• Hurry murders wisdom, & all that we hold dear including our spirituality, health, marriage, etc.
• Hurry is “a sociopathic predator” loose in our society.

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Attention is a Scarce Resource�

• “Attention is the beginning of devotion.”
• “Our modern world is a virtual conspiracy against the interior life.”
• Regardless of our income levels, attention is our scariest resource.
• Jesus wisely said “our hearts will follow our treasures- especially time & money”

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Attention Can Move into Awareness�

• Our awareness of God is a major problem for many people.
• When we feel absent from God, who moved away.
• We sit around sucked into our phones, TV, To Do lists, not aware to value God wanting to be with and in me.

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Hurry is a Disordered heart�

• ”Hurry is not just a disordered schedule. Hurry is a disordered heart.”
• Hurry often signals deeper trouble; maybe I am running away from …
• Am I running away from Father-Mother wounds, childhood traumas?
• Running from Self-worth issues? Fear of failure? Boredom? Dull routines?

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Hurry Sickness is Shaping Me�

• “What I give myself to is the person I become.”
• “My mind is the portal to my soul; what I fill my mind with shapes my  character.”
• “If I cannot pay attention to God, what will I become?”

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Dangers of Living Poorly�

• Is there a danger on our deathbed, we will then see how much of our life we wasted?
• During our life, instead of pursuing genuine & valuable things, were we too often distracted by “lesser things” like shiny & worthless things?
• Were Baubles- pretty infantile toys- too attractive to say No to?
• Was God’s Kingdom most on my mind?

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Lost Soul, Gained World�

Jesus asked: “What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?” (Mark 8:36)

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APPLICATION: Putting Biblical Truths into Daily Living

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 “Inner Cohesion”�

Second Chronicles 25:2 tells us: “Amaziah did what was right in the Lord’s sight but not wholeheartedly.

Amaziah’s mind gave itself to doing right in the sight of the Lord but his heart did not support his actions�

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“Inner Cohesion”�

1. “He was outwardly correct but inwardly uncoordinated.”
2. “His inner disunity showed itself in outer disloyalty.
3. This disunity resulted in Amaziah’s failure & death.

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