Wednesday, May 1, 2013
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Chimney Mountain! I wanted our family to conquer it together. So, my wife and I, and our then three little Hutchcrafts started hiking up the trail. And my wife was a lovely tour guide as we went up that mountain trail. She pointed out for example, "Oh, look at the chipmunks over there! Hey, there goes a squirrel! Oh, look at those roots, they're huge! Notice how they tangled around the tree. Wait, wait, stop, listen; can you hear the wind whispering to us in the pines?" We were having a great time together.
We were about half-way up the mountain and my wife said, "Oh, this has really been nice. Well, let's go back." I said, "What? Let's go back? What is the purpose for getting on a mountain trail in the first place? The reason you climb a mountain is to get to the top of the mountain. We've got to conquer it! We have to achieve!" But my wife was saying, "Well, we've had a nice experience together. Isn't that what was important?" Sounds kind of like a guy and a woman perspective, doesn't it? Get to the top or get with each other? You have to decide what's important on your mountain too.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Get To the Top Or Get With Each Other."
Our word for today from the Word of God comes from Ecclesiastes chapter 4. Solomon says this in verse 4, "And I saw that all labor and all achievements spring from man's envy for his neighbor." He called it kind of a great chase! "This, too, (he said) is meaningless..." That's his verdict on a lifetime of work. Listen to this: "...a chasing after the wind." Then he says, "Better one handful with tranquility than two hands full with toil and chasing after the wind."
Now, this sounds like an indictment really of a lifestyle that's considered normal by most of us. Work harder and harder to get more and more. The tendency is to live as if my worth is my work. I am what I do. Then one day people retire and they don't know who they are because they don't have their job any more.
One day after I spoke at a church, a well-dressed woman came up to me, probably in her 30s, she started to cry and she shook her head and she said, "I can't believe I fell for it."
I said, "What do you mean?" She said, "All these years we've watched the price that our husbands paid to chase success: stress, heart attacks, pressure, broken relationships." And she said, "I decided I would go after that too." And she said, "Do you know what I have to show for it? Pressure at work and failure at home."
Men have fallen for the lie that your worth is your work for a long time - getting up that mountain. And you know what? Now women are falling for it too. Now they're getting the ulcers; they're getting the heart attacks, and both are leaving a trail of neglected relationships as they push up the trail. There was a song some years ago that said, "Daddy, don't you walk so fast. Won't you slow down some, because you're making me run? Daddy, don't you walk so fast."
People around us may be crying, "Slow down! I need time with you!" But we're ruled by our work. God says, "People are more important than work or achievement." Only you can be Mom or Dad to your kids. You're the only husband or wife, brother or sister that they have. Are you busy chugging up Mount Work, Mount Accomplishment, Mount Goal? Are you so busy that the people you love are only getting your leftovers?
Being is more important than doing. Who you're on the mountain with is more important than getting to the top.