Is Your Faith A Hobby?

by Rev. David O. Jones

I just finished rereading J.I. Packer's "Rediscovering Holiness." If you have never read anything by this very human author, you have a distinct void in your heart and mind.  Of the many points that have touched my heart, I quote here a brief passage which speaks abundantly to our mutual interest in the education of our children and the world in which they have been born into.

Christianity has totally lost its cultural leadership.

Secular relativism controls the world of education;
Consumerist materialist rules in the marketplace;
The idea that we can know what is finally true about life is ridiculed;
Tolerance for departure from yesterday's wisdom is demanded; and
Any appeal to absolute standards of right and wrong is viewed as bigotry.

In practice, Christianity has ceased to be the accepted basis of personal and community life in the West. It has been down-graded to a mere hobby for the minority whom it still interests. (page 143)

In the midst of our activity, in the midst of our commitments to family, in the midst of our service to our church and community have we allowed our faith to become a hobby?

A hobby is something which greatly interests us. It is something which takes commitment.  It is something which involves our time and monetary resources.  It is something we will even evangelize for.  But a hobby is only allowed in the spare parts of our lives.  We make time for the necessities of life before taking time for our hobby.  We spend our energy and money on the demands of the moment before we attend to our hobby.

Do your friends and neighbors recognize that you hold your faith in Christ as an ultimate priority...or as a hobby?  Does your family?  We all need an occasional reminder of the significance of attending to our daily walk with Christ.  If those around us would say that our Christianity is merely a hobby, then we need to inspect our priorities, repent of our unfaithfulness, rearrange our activities, and attend to reestablishing a personal and growing relationship with our Lord Jesus. 

January 2001