The Family Room
Dr. Larry Thorson
May 24, 2009
Matthew 16:24-25
24 Then Jesus said to his disciples,
"Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their
cross and follow me. 25 For whoever wants to save their life
will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.
Today’s New
International Version Copyright © 2001, 2005 by International Bible Society
This is the fifth in a series based on Robert
Munger’s My Heart, Christ’s Home. In this series Dr. Munger helps people
understand what Christian discipleship is by picturing the human heart as a
home. Becoming a Christian in this
imagery means inviting Jesus into our hearts to make His home there – as Paul
says in Eph. 3:17: “I pray … that Christ may dwell in your hearts through
faith.” But Jesus not only wants to make His home in
our hearts, but to do His transforming work there. And so Munger describes
Jesus as going room to room in the home of our hearts doing his renovating work
– with each room representing a different part of our lives.
Today we look at what Munger calls “the Rec Room”
or what is also called the “family room.” I’ve noticed in a lot of houses built in the
last ten years that there’s a casual room downstairs attached to the kitchen where
the big screen television is but there might also be a loft room outside the
upstairs bedrooms where families often put a pool table. Whatever you call it, the rec room or the
family room or the loft, this room represents the part of our life where we
have fun.
In My Heart
Christ’s Home, Dr. Munger imagines getting ready to go out on the town with
one of his friends, when Jesus stops him and says, “I would like to go with
you.” But Munger responds to Jesus awkwardly by saying, “Oh, I don’t think you
would really enjoy where we are going. Let’s go out together tomorrow night.
Tomorrow night we can go to a Bible class or a social at the church, but tonight
I have another engagement.”
What Munger imagines himself doing there is what
we do all the time. We try to compartmentalize our faith and in so
doing trialize our faith. To
compartmentalize your faith is to put your
religious life into a little compartment that you take out for church.
I’m a great one for compartmentalizing my
life. There’s an old saying that helps
me stay organized and I follow it fairly strictly which says “everything has a
place and everything in its place.” I
have literal compartments for everything.
When we lived in a little thousand square foot
house in
Compartmentalizing is good for keeping order but it’s
terrible for relationships. Like the
evangelism elder I had in another church who had a compartment for his
religious life and that was the time he spent in church. He had a compartment for his family. When he was on the road for business he had a
compartment for hiring female companions.
Everything was neatly compartmentalized until his wife found a receipt
from one of the female companions and then nothing in his life was
compartmentalized.
Sometimes we compartmentalize our free time because
we know we’re doing something Jesus wouldn’t approve of, and consciously choose
to have a separate double life. But often, this double life develops not
because we are choosing it, but because we don’t choose not to. The world
relegates faith to a small part of our lives, and we follow that pattern. Jesus really has little influence outside our
coming to church on Sunday morning.
For example a lot of Christian unmarried couples
don’t give a second thought to living together or being sexually active – not
because they don’t believe in Christian morals, but because they’ve been able
to separate their religious lives and their personal lives. There are Christian
students who think nothing of cheating on their homework or a test because they
see the need for good grades and getting into a good college as out of the
realm of the influence of Christian faith.
Instead of compartmentalizing our faith, we are
called to integrate our faith. Our faith needs to shape every area of our
lives. The apostle Paul in Colossians
3:17 put it this way: “And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it
all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through
him.”
The Scriptures don’t see our relationship with
Jesus to be the most important priority among many. It’s not Jesus, then
family, then work, then my recreational time. Instead, our relationship with
Jesus is to be the priority that defines all the others.
It is not Jesus, then family – but “What does
Jesus want for my family?” It is not Jesus, then work, but “How is Jesus
calling me to do my work?” It is not Jesus, then personal time, but “How does
Jesus want me to spend my personal time.” It means allowing our relationship
with Jesus to be at the very center of everything we do in life.
The way we can live this integrated life is by first
believing that Jesus desires our best all
the time not just some of the time. Jesus’
best will bring us joy. Believing Jesus desires our best and that his
best will bring us joy allows us to make Jesus to be the lord of all our life.
How do we do this? This is where it gets upside down and
backwards. Jesus said in Matthew 16:24; "Whoever
wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow
me. 25 For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but
whoever loses their life for me will find it…”
You’ve heard the saying “Get a Life” and usually
that means have some fun. Jesus said the
way to get a life or get happiness (and that’s what we want out of our rec
room) is to deny ourselves. That’s the
opposite of what we usually think is right.
But it works like this: when I wake up in the
morning at 6:00 do I want to get out of bed and take my dog on a 45 minute run? Usually not.
What I want to do is go back to sleep but if not sleep then get up, go
downstairs, pour a bowl of cereal and read the news. That would really, really bring happiness to
me. Right? Yes it would.
If I followed that pattern day after day after
awhile I’d feel lousy, then anxious, then fat, then depressed, and finally
lethargic. Eventually without exercise
I’d be looking at high blood pressure, and long term painful visits to the
doctor. If I do 45 minutes of pain first thing in the morning I can avoid 15
hours of not feeling my best later on.
That’s what exercise can do for us.
But you can’t exercise without denying yourself something.
The Chancel Choir could have dreamt all they
wanted about singing anthems but if they hadn’t denied themselves television
time on Wednesday nights and come to practice they wouldn’t be singing anthems today.
You can’t have Jesus at the center of your life
without denying something in your life.
It won’t work. I can tell you
cute story after cute story but if all you want to do is sit on your sofa in
your family room and watch television those stories won’t help.
Jesus
can’t be a compartment in your life.
Now if we don’t live like this, according to
Jesus, we will miss life – “whoever wants to save his life will lose it.” But
if we “lose our lives” – that is, if we quit trying to be in charge of our own
lives, submit to Jesus and seek to allow Him to direct our lives – we “will find
it.”
That is what Munger discovers when He relinquishes
control of the Rec Room to Jesus. He found that Jesus transformed it. He writes:
“He brought new friendships, new
excitement, new joys. Laughter and music
have been ringing in the house ever since.
With a twinkle in his eye, he smiled. “You thought that with me around
you wouldn’t have much fun didn’t you? Remember, I
have come ‘that my joy may
be in you, and that your joy may be
full.”
Let’s make a commitment today – to allow
Jesus to
decompartmentalize
our lives. Let’s not try and stuff Jesus into a
certain
compartment – limit Him to being in only one place.
Instead,
let’s seek to allow Him to be the Lord of every part of our lives because we
know He wants our best and that His best will bring real joy.
Where today do you need to allow Jesus to work? In
your work life? In your family life? In your recreational life? In your
relationships?
Let’s talk to Him about it right now. Let’s pray.