Recently I went to a conference and heard some renoun creatives speaking on the issue of “Balancing Workload and Life”. This conference was none other than the Dirt Conference put on by New Life Church in North Little Rock, AR. When I heard what was said by the speakers, my first reaction was to want to get up and exclaim “AMEN!” But it wasn’t until afterwards when the validity of what they were saying sunk in to a deeper place.

If there was one thing that I walked away with more than the rest it was what Anne Jackson said in retort to the question “Why do you think as a church culture we wear being work-a-holic as a badge of honor?”

Quickly, she replied as if it was her next breath “It’s because we like to let productivity define our spiritual maturity.”

We feel that if we overwork ourselves, abuse our volunteers, keep track of our hours only to use then as ammo around the water cooler (or at starbucks), that all somehow makes us closer to God, or more spiritual.

We feel like if we go home and don’t work work work until we feel a sort of finalization to what we are working on, that we are somehow derailing the move of the spirit and now someone is not going to be saved. God cares more about your personal walk and the spiritual and physical health of your family, than he does about you being able to mobilize a team to deliver a good weekend of worship. Although that is an amazing ministry, the ministry opportunity that we have been failing in as a “church culture” is in our homes.

Pastor Tim Lundy has said that he doesn’t blame non-believers for not understanding the sanctity of marriage. We hardly have a leg to stand on to defend it. With a divorce rate among Christian families at the same percentage as non-believing families, how can we tell a non-believer that homosexual marriage is bad, or that divorce is not an option,  when we don’t care enough about the “Holy Matrimony” to stick it out, swallow our pride, and never have our marriages part ways?

Have we really missed it? Do we really believe that God is not big enough to take care of process, if we have to take care of family?