Simmer Down Saints - Jim Croft

Simmer Down Saints

A plea for believers to enjoy the rich full lives that God intended 

Jim Croft

I deeply respect Billy Graham. Once, after he entered his senior years, I read a statement that he made about his life and ministry. It was something akin to: If I had it to do all over again, I would spend more time enjoying my family.

My objective in this article is to serve the saints in a manner where at life’s end they can look back and have full confidence of lives well spent. I am not at all sure that lives of incessant, front-burner preoccupation with religion 24/7 can accomplish this. I am not suggesting abandonment of first love fervency for Jesus and for matters of the Kingdom.

I am rather suggesting that hyper, non-stop busyness in any aspect of life cannot produce the quality of a rich and satisfying life that Jesus promised. (Jn 10:10 NLT) In this I have an observation. Christians who have the wisdom to balance their lives between intense spiritual activity and relaxed enjoyment of life’s many God ordained pleasures reap optimum credibility with the converted and the unconverted. (1Pet 2:12)

The Bible

The Word of God might be described as God’s ongoing conversation with humanity. No matter how much we read it and how well we think we know it, the Lord always manages to show us new principles with each reading about living life his way. It is best to discern what the Scriptures imply about the entirety of life, rather than just the explicit spiritual activities spoken of in the Bible.

Godly men were inspired to write the Scriptures. The cumulative revelation of the Bible is greater than the revelation of any single one of its book’s authors. Unbeknownst to them, the words they penned contained much beyond the revelations that they wanted to emphasize in a particular writing session. Their by- the-way remarks carry as much revelation about how we should live as anything they intended to convey about religious practice.

Most sermons and testimonies focus on the spiritual aspects of life in the Spirit. We are constantly challenged to increase our concentration on more prayer, praise, witnessing, spiritual-warfare, greater exploits in spiritual gifts, and the exercise of faith confessions, and so forth. That’s all needed. However, in some regards overdose on that diet can become problematic.

It tends to produce a mindset that leads believers to think that they are failing Christian responsibility if every moment of existence does not have some sort of purposed spiritual activity insertion. Too many saints fear disapproval about taking time to smell the roses of life and to rejoice in their God-given capacities for creativity. Some are hesitant about sharing that they have zeal for pursuit of hobbies and other secular interests. This should not be so.

The Bible speaks of the Wisdom of Solomon. At various points in Ecclesiastes he advocated these sentiments - Enjoy the fruits of your labor. Your portion, along with that of your family, is to delight in God’s blessed provision of clothing, food and drink all of the days of your life. (Eccl 9:7-9)

The New Testament has similar admonitions interwoven into it that are too often ignored. Apart from church involvement, it’s godly to live a quiet productive life minding your own affairs and business. (1Th 4:11; 1Tim 2:2; Eph 4:28)

Unfortunately, there are believers who have been persuaded that if they let up for a moment from heavy spiritual-warfare that something terrible might happen. This is a deception. None of the Bible heroes were exempt  from occasional bad eventualities regardless of their focus on intense spirituality and neither are we.

Solomon said that bad things happen to the righteous as well as the unrighteous. (Eccl 9:2) I have dedicated my life to an environment of zealous Christians. I have not seen evidence or experienced that super spirituality builds impenetrable hedges to tragedies in relationships, health and prosperity.

Does spiritual fervency block much and are there often full recoveries? Yes! But, those who preach guarantees of protection by this method and that are setting- up significant numbers of their audience for disappointment and disillusionment.

A Shepherd’s Contentment

I believe that the early life of the Bible’s David supports leading a quiet life of contentment at minding one’s own affairs. He was a shepherd who led his flock to green pastures and to still waters. However, he wasn’t living in Colorado. He lived in the arid climate of the Middle East.

I’ve seen shepherds there grazing their flocks in areas that had no evidence of lush vegetation. But, those shepherds know that their sheep can grow fat eating the stubble they find in locales that have appearance of barrenness. Herding sheep in David’s day was not a labor intensive occupation.

There were intermittent glances to check on the welfare of foraging livestock. At times, sheep had to be liberated from brambles. Other than that, there was a whole lot of time spent finding a comfortable place to sit to escape the sun’s heat in inhospitable terrain. Any shepherd who did not find a hobby to creatively fill his time was sentenced to vocational boredom.

A hobby of David’s was practicing with his sling to hit imaginary herd assailants. I suspect that a lion, bear, or wolf trying to pick-off a sheep could have almost been a welcome intrusion for him.

Forgive me, but I also suspect that David’s acquired proficiency in playing the harp and at composing poetic songs might have initially qualified as a hobby to offset routine boredom. Later, it was his sling, harp and songs that gave him access to fame and fortune. And, for sure his words of contentment have benefitted godly people throughout the centuries.

Religion or Life

Like David and the members of the Early Church, Christ has made a rich satisfying life available to you. It is not a sign of Laodicean lukewarmness to simmer down from excessive preoccupation with religion.

My churches have always been noted for believers who are of high spiritual fervency and proficiency in various fields of Christian service. I have not ever scolded anyone for taking time off to enjoy family and secular enjoyments.

The fact is that at one time I was concerned that our people were too busied with flocking to church every time the doors were opened. Solution – Stop Sunday services for over a year. We relied on midweek home meetings for fellowship, mutual ministry to one another, and for generating the income for a fulltime staff of 8. All needs were met in every respect.

I have practiced the simmer down approach for many years. When we sense that God is about to move in spectacular ways, we are prepared to respond accordingly by laying aside other interests. When that is not obvious, we don’t try to manufacture it by continuous meeting marathons to call down heaven. Though we regularly pray for and believe for great outpourings of the Spirit, we leave the initiative to God.

Does the simmer down approach work? That it does. The fellowships that I have pastored have had a history of experiencing influential revivals and at producing an uncommon number of laymen who have meaningful ministries of their own.

Not long ago, I was discussing these things with my wife, Prudence.  I made a comment that brought a smile to my lips. It was that I am truly happy with the life with which God has blessed us. An alternate translation for blessed is happier.

That dear friend is what I covet for you. I want you happier than those solely confined to hopes of fulfillment at the next meeting. For me, your betterment in every good aspect of life is worth any criticism that might come my way for denting conventional spiritual perceptions in this article.

Editor's Note: artwork below added by me. Steve Martin