Distinguishing Good and Bad Distractions

Today on Summit Life with J.D.

Greer. The best things in our life don't come because we plan them, but because God interrupts us with them. So thank God for divine interruptions. The bottom line is that a healthy Christian life is one in which you learn to avoid unhealthy distractions so you can be open to divine interruptions.

You know, it's safe to say that our generation deals with more distractions today than at any previous point in history. But today, Pastor J.D. shows us how distracted we are by comparing us to Jesus's example. On the one hand, Jesus seemed much of the time to be so focused that you couldn't interrupt him.

And yet on the other, he was so completely open and interruptible. Discerning the balance seems to be our challenge as we seek to be more like him. And don't forget, you can reach out to us at J.D.

Greer dot com or give us a call at 866-335-5220. We've got resources available to help direct you in your journey with Jesus. So give us a call today. But for now, let's join Pastor J.D.

in Luke Chapter 10. Last week, we talked about being a tired people who needed rest. This week, I want us to talk about being a distracted people who need focus.

We're going to talk about being focused. Ever find yourself wishing that life had one of those little do not disturb buttons like you have on your phone that you could just occasionally turn on? I wish I could put one on my kid's forehead sometimes. I'm just like, nope, not right now.

We cannot watch Frozen again. I wish I could turn on a do not disturb sign on them. Speaking of the phone, this is the single biggest distracting element ever conceived. It almost seems designed just to add distraction into our lives.

It gives everybody, including huge swaths of people that I've never met, and many of whom are only concerned about making money off of me, it gives them instant access to me at any point. It quite often will interrupt the very best parts of my day. I use the Summit app for my quiet time, which means that I have to open it up every day to see what the Bible reading section is for the day.

Inevitably, for a while, I didn't have any of my news banners or whatever turned off. I sit down to open up my quiet time to see what chapter I need to read. I just get assaulted with all these news of things that are happening around the world. I sit down to hear from God. Twenty minutes later, I'm reading about the five most bizarre things Justin Bieber plans to do in his honeymoon.

It interrupts the very best parts of our day. Tony Reiche, in a very important book that I'm going to recommend to you today a few times. You've seen this book. It's called 12 Ways Your Phone is Changing You. It's a great summer reading. If you're looking for something just to make you feel guilty and terrible about your life, you'll want to pick that up. He points out that the average person in our society checks their phone 81,500 times every year, which mounts to once every 4.3 minutes of our waking lives, which means that most of you will check your phone or at least be tempted to check your phone at least eight times by the time I finish this sermon. Distraction does not produce a happy, well-balanced, or productive life.

Almost every study that's been done demonstrates this. In fact, get this. Interesting etymology of the word distraction. There was a form of torture in the Middle Ages where they would tie a man's limbs, you know, his arms and his legs, to four different horses and send the four horses in different directions. The French called that form of torture, they called it distraction. I kid you not.

That is where we get our word from. What a great picture of what is happening to our lives. You ever feel like you're literally being pulled apart, death by distraction? By the way, if you're like, nope, I actually feel great right now, just take a quick peek at that person besides you who is, you know, your significant other or whatever and just have them give you sort of a thumbs up or thumbs down about how dialed in you typically are. This is average, this is good, this is bad.

The majority of you are going to get average to bad, I'm going to get. I know of one Christian counselor who says that distraction destroys more relationships today than anything else that comes into his counseling office. Distraction, he says, the reason is because distraction makes real intimacy impossible because in order for somebody to feel intimate with you, he says, now whether we're talking about a spouse, a child, a good friend, in order for them to feel intimate with you, they have to believe, number one, that you consider them to be a priority in your life, that you have plenty of unrushed time that is available for them and that you are giving them your undivided attention. Busyness and distraction, he says, makes those three things impossible, which is why it kills intimacy, it kills relationships.

Distractability keeps our most important relationships shallow, including and maybe most importantly our relationship with God. Furthermore, studies now show that distraction makes us ineffective. I read a book last year by a guy named Greg McCowan, it's not a Christian book, it's called Essentialism, in which he explains that the new cool word for distraction today is multitasking. Multitasking, he says, is one of the great hoaxes of our generation.

We think that it means I'm on top of things and I'm doing a lot and I'm really efficient, he says, but all it really means is that we're distracted and we're not really doing anything well. The word multitasking was first invented in 1965 by IBM to describe how a computer could do multiple things at one time, but the problem is that the human mind isn't wired up exactly like a computer and we have consciousness, whereas a computer doesn't, and consciousness is pretty much designed to be in one place at one time and switching back and forth between places and tasks takes time and energy. For example, when the average person is sitting at their desk, they check their email every five minutes in the midst of whatever else they're doing, writing a report or doing other stuff or whatever.

The problem is that it takes an average of 64 seconds to resume the previous task after you finish, which means that simply because of email alone, we typically waste one out of every six minutes in our working day. So Greg McCowan says, so when I hear people say they are multitasking, all I really hear is my attention is scattered, I feel stressed out, and I don't do anything well. All right, finally, in Jesus' parable of the seeds, Jesus explained that it was distraction, not doubt, not disbelief, but distraction that most kept the Word of God from burrowing down in people's hearts and bearing real fruit. The bottom line, if we are going to live productive spiritual lives, we are going to have to learn to deal with distraction. So I want to explore the only passage in the Bible where the word distraction is actually used. There are multiple places the concept is there, but the only place in the Bible the word distraction is used, and I want to show you what Jesus said about it.

I'm freely going to admit to you, this is not going to be the best sermon that you've ever heard, right, but it might be one of the most relevant ones you've ever heard. Okay, Luke chapter 10, verse 38. While they were traveling, he entered a village, and a woman named Martha welcomed Jesus into her home. She had a sister named Mary who also sat at the Lord's feet and was listening to what he said, but Martha was, here's the word, distracted by her many tasks. Her many tasks were doing the dishes and straightening everything up and getting the snack tray ready, and the Greek, by the way, the word distracted there means what it does in French, it means pulled apart.

He was distracted by her many tasks. Jesus had come there to spend time with her, and she was being pulled away by these other things that she thought needed to be done. So she came up and asked Jesus, Lord, don't you care that my sister has left me to serve alone?

So tell her to give me a hand. The Lord answered her, Martha, Martha, you are worried and upset about many, many things, but one thing, Martha, is necessary. Mary has made the right choice, and it will not be taken away from her. Now to be really clear, just so we're on the same page here, to be really clear, Jesus is specifically here warning Martha about being distracted from him by anything else, because knowing him is the most important thing in life. So that's the context. The context is making sure that Jesus is in the right place, but I think even in that context there are some important principles about distraction that we can learn, that we can apply to other contexts as well.

Does that make sense? The context is prioritizing our relationship with Jesus, but the principles of avoiding distraction we can apply to a bunch of different relationships in our lives. Okay, first let me give you one important clarification before we really dive in.

This will be point one if you're taking notes. Number one, distraction is not the same thing as divine interruption. This is a very important clarification, because it's going to talk about another problem that some of us have, but distraction is not the same thing as divine interruption. Jesus seems to be entirely indestructible on the one hand, but imminently interruptible on the other. For example, indestructible in Matthew 12, Jesus would not even let his family keep him away from what he thought God wanted him to be doing. So when his family comes to him with some kind of need, he's like, hey, right now I'm doing what God wants me to do, and I can't even be distracted by the most important earthly relationships I have. That can't take me away from what God has me doing right now.

That's indestructible. In John chapter four, we see that not even Jesus's own hunger could keep him from pursuing God's will. In John four, Jesus's disciples had gotten hungry and gone off to get something to eat, and Jesus stuck around, ministered to the woman at the well, the Samaritan woman at the well. A few hours later, they come back from the Golden Corral buffet, and they're wiping their mouths, and Jesus is still sitting there talking to that woman. And he's like, Jesus, aren't you hungry?

Aren't you starving? And Jesus's response was, my food is to do the will of him who sent me. In other words, my food, I get more fulfillment. I get more fulfillment from doing the will of God, even then I do from eating when my body is hungry.

Now, that is indestructible. If there is one thing that could distract me from focus and ministry, it would be hunger. I'm not a great person to do counseling, period, but I definitely, you don't want to be across from me counseling when I'm hangry. People are pouring out their problems to me, and I'm like, just get, stop it, okay? Stop doing that, read the Bible, pray, get saved, okay?

Next person. Jesus was so locked into God's will that not even hunger could affect his disposition or his motivation there in ministry. Jesus was indestructible, but on the other hand, while he was indestructible, he seems imminently interruptible. For example, in John 5, Jesus freely allows his Sabbath to be interrupted by a man who needs healing. When Jesus got up that morning, healing this man was definitely not on his to-do list for the day, but Jesus perceived in this moment on the Sabbath that God was doing something, and God was asking him to do something. The Sabbath was the one day a week the Jews felt like they shouldn't be distracted by anything work-related, but Jesus explains his openness to this interruption by saying, verse 17, my Father is always at work around me to this very day, and that means I too am to be working. In other words, I recognize that God is doing all kinds of things around me, and sometimes he invites me into that work, and usually that doesn't show up on my morning to-do list. It's just the way the Holy Spirit works where he invites you into what he is doing. That's how Jesus lived his whole life.

He'd be doing things, one thing, and all of a sudden, some divine opportunity that he hadn't been considering would come out of nowhere, and he'd stop what he was doing and engage in that, and he taught us if we were going to follow the Holy Spirit to live the same way. There are good distractions and bad distractions. Are you beginning to think about that in your life? You're listening to Summit Life with J.D. Greer, and we'll be right back with more teaching in just a moment, but first let me remind you as we're learning this week, those most mature in Jesus are not those working the hardest for him, but it's those that are resting most in him. It's not about being more busy.

It's about being more connected. We want to help you learn how to rest more fully in him with our 15-day devotional called Devotions for the Distracted Family. It comes with your generous gift to the ministry right now, so give us a call at 866-335-5220, or check it out at jdgreer.com. Now let's get right back to today's teaching. Here's Pastor J.D. You see, being distractible on the one hand is one fault. The opposite fault is not being open to interruptions that God puts into your life from the Holy Spirit.

You start to be closed off to what God is doing and what he's inviting you into. This story does not mean that we are to be perpetually doing our quiet time. That's not the Mary Martha story. It's like, oh, always be doing your quiet time and never get distracted by serving. We're not supposed to go down to the kids' ministry and say, Summit kids' workers, what are y'all doing? Put up the goldfish. You need to be feasting on the bread of life.

That's not his point in this story. It just means that there is a time for service, and there's a time for communion with Jesus, and we need to know what time it is and be all in in that moment. Because quite often, the best moments in our lives come in the form of unexpected interruptions, right? I mean, I just think about this as a parent. The best parenting moments that I've had rarely happen on my schedule.

In fact, all the ones I do put on my schedule turn out to be pretty lame. I'm like, I'm going to create this moment for my kids. It's going to be awesome. They're going to cry, and they're going to talk about it forever, and it never happens. It's just lame.

They're like, Dad, this is dumb. But on the other hand, the Holy Spirit will create one that I just wasn't ready for, and it would be a significant moment. He just invites me into the best witnessing encounters that I have never happened on schedule.

When I set aside time on my schedule to share Christ with people, it never happens. It always happens when I sit down somewhere, and I'm like, finally, I've got a few minutes just to read and to unplug from the world. Then all of a sudden, I look up, and there's somebody, and they start talking, and they start pouring out a need.

I'm like, all right, this is what you want to do right now, and this is where I'll go with you. People that I love and truly need something from me rarely have their moments of crisis on my schedule. Let's see, sweetheart, your schedule for a meltdown at 2.30, and well, it's 2.30, so go ahead and have your meltdown.

The meltdowns never happen according to my schedule. My conversion didn't happen on schedule, right? None of us thought, I'm going to be converted in the next season of my life. God interrupted our life with something we weren't expecting, and that's a pattern that continues. The best things in our life don't come because we planned them, but because God interrupts us with them, so thank God for divine interruptions.

Amen? The bottom line is that a healthy Christian life is one in which you learn to avoid unhealthy distractions so you can be open to divine interruptions. In fact, here's how I would summarize a successful Christian life if you're taking notes. Learning to live free of devilish distractions so we can give full attention to divine interruptions.

That's the whole point of today. You've got to learn to live free of devilish distraction so that you can give full attention to divine interruptions. All right, so with that, let's get back to our story of Mary and Martha here, and we'll see what I mean. Number two, distraction. In this story, we see as often the good keeping you from the essential.

Let's be clear. What Martha was doing was not bad. She was serving and taking care of people. She was using her spiritual gifts. Jesus's gentle admonition of her was that she had simply let the many good things keep her from the one essential thing.

That's almost always what distraction is. In Martha's case, what she did was a really foolish trade. I mean, imagine if you would have asked Martha a year from that point, hey, you spent a day with Jesus. How was that day? What would Martha have told you?

Well, I don't remember much about it because I was in the back, was doing the dishes, and I was making sure everything was straightened up, and I was getting the snack trays ready, and she wouldn't remember any of that stuff. But if you asked the same question to Mary, what would Mary say? Oh, you know, we had this conversation, and he explained this to me, and then he told me this, and then I felt this, and then I had this question, and then he directed me in this way, and I saw this about myself, and it was amazing.

It was life-changing. So Jesus says to Martha, he says, Mary took advantage of something she only had access to one time, something that now can never be taken away from her. You gave your attention to a bunch of good stuff that wasn't really going to make that big of a difference anyway, and now it's gone forever. That's always how distraction works.

Listen, you trade something that you only get one shot at for a bunch of things that, in the scheme of life, aren't that important. Life is short. I'm going to go ahead and tell you, tweets and Instagram and social media are always there blathering on. And honestly, if you find out about something going on in the world 20 minutes after everybody else, who cares?

In fact, it's actually a strategy of mine. There's so much blathering nonsense out there, I'm like, I'm going to let everybody else figure out what's going on in the news, and then just tell me, and then I can go research whatever I'm finding interesting, because 90% of the stuff that's coming across that is just like, that's just a waste of time. I don't care if a woman out in Wyoming has an alpaca that can do calculus. I don't really care about that, so I'm not going to get diverted into that.

So I'm going to let them wade through all the blathering, and then they can tell me what I need to go read about. That stuff is always happening, but that moment, y'all, right in front of you, that moment, that person right in front of you, you only get one shot at that moment, and you only get one shot at them. I love how the leadership guru, Christian leadership guru John Maxwell says it, it is hard to overestimate the unimportance of practically everything.

It's just really hard for me to think about your last day. It's hard to overestimate the relative unimportance in life of practically everything. And the tragedy is when you let the unimportant things keep you from the things that really are important, and there's moments you can never get back. So the point is, whatever situation God puts you in, be all there, and don't let any of it pass by. The way the writer of Ecclesiastes says it, Ecclesiastes 9, 10, whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might. I love how the missionary Jim Elliott that I quote a lot, I love how he summarized that verse, wherever you are, be all there. Live to the hilt.

Every moment that you believe is given to you by God. That means, for example, Colossians 3, 23, Paul says, work as unto the Lord and not unto men. In other words, when you're working, be all there. Make every moment of the day an offering to God.

Don't try to distract away the day with just different social media and other distractions. Be there giving your best to God and make it an offering, and you'll find a fulfillment there that distraction can't give you. In 1 Corinthians 14, Paul says, when you gather with the people of God, everybody should come expecting to hear from God and ready to share something from God. In other words, when you come to the people of God, be all there. Don't come attached to something that's going to take your mind elsewhere.

This is a time to be with God's people and hear from God, so you'll do it if you'll be all there and not be distracted. When you're with a group of friends, be all there. I mean, I used to take pictures to try to show to my daughters, and now I just have so many of them, they're sick of it anyway. I've just groups of teenagers sitting around where there's like nine of them, and every single one of them is looking at their phone. You're like, your friends are right there.

This group right here, why are everybody looking elsewhere on this? Just be there with that group of people. When you're with a group of people in a meeting, be there. Don't sit there with your email open or your phone on. Tony Reinke in this 12 Ways Your Phone Is Changing Your Book, he says, you know what? When I walk into an appointment and I sit down and I put my phone there on the table, even if it's face down, what I'm telling everybody is I'm engaged for the moment, but I got this here just in case something more interesting comes along. So I'm ready to disengage, and I just want you to know, be on your game, because if not, I'm going to be on this right here.

Right? Now, that is not a great way to promote intimacy or open dialogue. He says, if I, in the meeting, and the phone is in my hand, and I'm responding to texts and scrolling through social media, I am projecting open dismissiveness to the people I'm with, because dividing attention is a typical expression of disdain. So it's like, if you're going to be there in this meeting, be there in times of rest and solitude.

Be all there as well. You know, God has a purpose in solitude and silence. There are times, I explained last week, that you're supposed to unplug and rest, and you trust God to guard the city and to, you know, build the house when you're not doing it.

That was Psalm 127. Right? So in those times, you've got to unplug and not be distracted. Tony Reinke points out, the irony of the phone is that it keeps us isolated from people when we're with them, and then distracted by people when we should be isolated from them. So whatever moment you're in, be all there. Whatever your hand finds you do, do it with all your might. If you believe the moment's been given to you by God, live it to the hilt, and don't fritter it away with distractions. Distraction is often the good keeping you from the essential.

Now, before I move on here to number three, let me say something here to those of you who are not yet believers, or maybe you're a young believer and you're beginning to grow spiritually. Distraction with the good, listen, is one of our enemy's primary tools in keeping you from considering the eternal. I mentioned this at the beginning of the message, but in Jesus' parable of the seeds, it was good things that the enemy used to take away the seed that the sower had just put in the heart. It doesn't mean that when I'm up here preaching, all of a sudden you get distracted by images of porn and thoughts of violence.

It means that all of a sudden you'll start getting a to-do list in your mind, or somebody you need to talk to, or where you're going to go to lunch, or some report that you got to do. It's a good thing that just snatches away the word from your heart. Well, when you think about what's happened now, we've kind of designed a tool that gives Satan, gives our enemy, just unlimited access to take out the word of God anytime he wants to.

Because now I've got a lot of water people saying about me, and how do they feel about this? How many likes am I getting on this right here? I'm not saying this thing is evil in and of itself. I'm just saying that it can be used for great evil when it comes to distraction, because distraction sends more people to hell than doubt and disobedience ever had. That's the best tool for distraction that our enemy has ever had in all the years that there have been humans. I'll give you one other thing here.

C.S. Lewis pointed out that it's not usually bad or unbelieving thoughts that keep you from considering what's important. It's not usually bad thoughts, it's usually good thoughts. And so, be on alert to distraction. One last thing for many of us, distraction is how we keep ourselves from thinking sometimes about deep things.

Blaise Laskal, 300 years ago, pointed out the irony. He said, we complain about the complexity of our lives, but we actually want our lives to be complex. Because if they are not complex, then we got to end up paying attention to this gaping hole that is in our hearts. And that's why we hate solitude, because solitude just reveals how unhappy we are.

So we try to avoid it at all costs. So we love complexity. We love distraction, because it keeps us from thinking about eternal things.

How often good things have distracted me from the essential things. You're listening to Summit Life. If you missed any part of this message, you can listen online at jdgreer.com. You know, it's not enough to simply go through the motions of Christianity. Most people in church know how to act the part, but there's no real life in their faith. Our newest resource is focused on helping you and your closest community dialogue about your faith.

For whatever reason, talking about our faith with our family or closest friends can be awkward at times. So in addition to the book of 15 devotionals, we'll also include a set of conversation cards. These are simple cards to keep at the dinner table or around the kitchen island that have a question or a prompt on them to kickstart dialogue around important topics. We'll send you both resources as our way of saying thanks for your financial gift of $35 or more to support this ministry. Join this mission today when you give by calling 866-335-5220.

The number again is 866-335-5220. Or go online to give and request your copies of the pair of resources at jdgreer.com. While you're on the website, don't forget to sign up for our weekly newsletter. Get ministry updates, information about new resources, and Pastor JD's latest blog post delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up when you go to jdgreer.com. I'm Molly Vidovitch. Come back tomorrow for the conclusion of our short teaching series on rest and distraction here on Summit Life with JD Greer. Today's program was produced and sponsored by JD Greer Ministries.