Philling Up On Philippians: Paul’s Singular Focus

Since starting the Solitude Challenge, I’ve been spending that time every day with Paul in his letter to the Philippians. It’s been good. I’m taking just a bit of it at a time and slowly working my way through. It’s been good.

Yesterday, I was on Philippians 1:15-18. I’ve read that passage many times over the years. But yesterday something from it struck me in a new way. It’s not just that he doesn’t care that people are proclaiming Christ to somehow make things worse for him. That’s huge but not new to me. What I thought about yesterday was Paul’s singular focus on the one most important thing in all life – proclaiming Christ. To him, even if people’s motives were all wrong, but they were proclaiming Christ, that was okay. The proclamation of Christ was Paul’s chief end in life. If it made things worse for him, so be it. He could rejoice in that. Crazy.

It’s super convicting to me to think about Paul’s focus. Mine is so all over the place. Part of that comes with being a husband and father of three little ones. Part of it comes with the society we live in – all the hustle and bustle that we’ve decided is “normal.” But the biggest part of it – is that I just don’t care enough. I live in my own little world and don’t really care nearly enough about my neighbors, the people I serve, or even my own family. My serial selfishness makes it impossible to focus on the one thing that will change everything for everyone, including myself. It’s a huge problem.

So, what to do about it? I’m open to suggestions. My current thought is to find some way to keep the words “proclaim Christ” in my visual field as much as possible for a while. Not sure how to do that. I’m a visual person though (isn’t everyone?) and it helps me to actually see the words. I’ll figure it out.

In the meantime, what helps you keep your focus on proclaiming Christ in all things?

Off to A Challenging Start

I launched the solitude challenge this morning and almost failed miserably. I set my alarm for 6:30am. That’s usually plenty of time to get up and get some quiet time in before things really get going around the Brown house. However, this morning was a little different. Paul (our 2 year old) rolled in at 6:28am and beat the alarm to the wake up punch. By the time I got him into bed, settled down, and back to sleep, I realized that I had left my Bible and journal in my backpack at work. D’oh!

So, I did a little exercising and then Abbie, our 3 year old, came in wanting a glass of milk and a little TV time with Dad. How could I refuse? So, I ended up putting the solitude time off until getting to work. Not too bad really.

I got to work a little early and was just sitting down with my Bible and my journal when I got a call from a local vendor helping us out with an event we were hosting today. He needed me to let him in the building and get him started on his part of the project. Darn. When are you people going to let me have some solitude?

Finally, around 10:45, I got a chance to sit down with my Bible and my journal and get started. I’m starting out in Philippians. No rush to motor my way through it, but just taking my time – camping out as needed. It was good. It’s been a while since I journaled and that was great. I’m really looking forward to this, but I’ll get started a little earlier tomorrow. Honestly, I’m not sure that what I did today, really counted as solitude. It counted as a quiet time, but that’s not exactly the point of this little exercise. My plan is to get out in the backyard tomorrow before things get rolling at the house and see if I can spend some real time in solitude with Jesus. We’ll see what happens.

The Solitude Challenge

After a couple of days to consider everything, I’ve decided that the next challenge will in fact be the Solitude Challenge. Here’s how this is going to work.

Beginning on Day 1 and proceeding on to Day 99, I will spend at least 20 minutes each day in complete solitude to the best of my abilities. No iPhone, no email, no TV, etc. During this time I will read my Bible, pray, journal, and meditate. That’s it.

I’m looking forward to this. It’ll be good to have some structure around this time.

Now, for the nitty-gritty. When to start? Desi’s going out of town tomorrow night. The weekend should be kind of crazy. So, I’m planning to start on Monday. More to report then.

Re-Thinking Things Just a Bit

Okay.  So last night I got all fired up and went ahead and announced my intentions for the next 99 day challenge.  However, I’m re-thinking things a bit this morning.  

I’m excited about the idea of taking on a complete book of scripture – Philippians or James for example – and memorizing the whole thing.  I think there’s something about memorizing big chunks of scripture like that that will be profitable to me.  However, after thinking about things a bit, I want to lower the bar just a bit.  I know that concept – lowering the bar – is antithetical to our must win, must improve society, but the realist in me is saying, “Why don’t you pick something you might actually have a chance at before you take on a huge task like that?” I don’t always listen to that guy (Randy Realist) but I think I will in this case.  He’s making some sense. 

My current thinking for the next challenge is this: I think I’ll do 99 days of solitude.  That doesn’t mean I’m going to take the next three months off and go live in isolation in a monastery somewhere. No (Still with me, Desi?).  It does mean that I’ll spend time in solitude for the next 99 days.  I need to figure out how I’ll define solitude.  For example, does reading a good Christian book count? I don’t think so.  Sorry
Donald Miller. No, I think it will look more like me sitting and reading a scripture, thinking about it for a while, and then journaling my prayers about that. 

For me, 99 days in a row of that will be a huge task.  I’m more active in my prayer and reading during some seasons and less so in others. Doing it for 99 days regardless of season or circumstance will be good for me.  

I need to figure out the ground rules and the start date, but I’ll have that in the next day or two.  

Looking forward to this next singular social experiment.  Wondering when will be the time to open up the challenge to more than just myself.  

To be continued.