Our greatest danger

Our nation is reeling from the COVID-19 virus and the rioting and looting that is occurring across this nation. People's lives are void of true peace and quiet moments and that is one of our greatest dangers.

Mr. Charles E. Hummel wrote an article titled "The Tyranny of the Urgent" for Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship in 1967. In this article he related a conversation he had with a cotton mill manager who told him, "Your greatest danger is letting the urgent things crowd out the important."

I read this article in 1988 and it had a profound impact on my life. When I feel the stress and frustration building up in my busy life, I pull out that article and read it again and pray about how I respond to the urgent demands and leave the most important things undone.

But you might say, aren't the urgent things the things we are to respond to? Not necessarily. I need to remind myself and those that read this article of the following thought: "Are we more in love with what we do for the Lord than we are in love with the Lord?"

I have to admit that those words are often true of me as well. I get so involved in my workday activities and tasks that I love doing, that many times I relegate Jesus Christ-who I say is the most important person in my life-to an afterthought.

T. S. Eliot wrote, "The last temptation is the greatest treason, to do the right thing for the wrong reason."

P.T. Forsyth once said, "The worst sin is prayerlessness." With our prayerlessness, we are saying we are self-sufficient and independent from God.

Maybe that insight has something to do with the tiredness we all experience after "ministering" so hard. What we need to learn is this: The depth of the intimacy I enjoy with Jesus Christ directly affects the passion I have in serving Him.

As we go through the tough weeks ahead in our lives and nation, we must give attention to deepening our love relationship with Christ in our prayer life. It takes work to keep that relationship with Christ fresh, vibrant and full of passion.

I need Christ every minute of every day and, so do you? Let us join our hearts together to make our relationships with Jesus Christ the highest priority in our lives, then our families the second priority, then all the rest of the activities that we get caught up in.

When we do this God promises that He will deliver us from our greatest danger and provide us the power to serve Him in the tasks of His choice. He will free us to do the important, which is the will of God. That brings us greater joy, peace and understanding.

Let us pray for a true revival to breakout across our nation and world as we deal with this pandemic and the riots across our nation.