From Hurry to Unhurry
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. This is a story of kids who buy Wonka Bars to find the Golden ticket which is an invitation to come and visit the Wonka Factory. In this journey, a poor boy known as Charlie Bucket who lives in a shack comes by some cash he finds on the street and out of all odds finds the fifth and final ticket to visit the chocolate factory. A guy named Slugworth traveled the globe to each of the ticket winners enticing the children with a load of cash to bring him a Wonka invention yet to release known as the everlasting Gobstopper. Charlie and his grandpa Joe visit the factory along with a four other kids, Violet Beaureguarde, Augustus Gloop, Veruca Salt, and Mike Teavee. Wonka takes them to the invention room of the factory and offers all of the kids an Everlasting Gobstopper but they had to promise to keep to themselves. Of course, majority of the kids were planning to sell the Gobstopper off to Slugworth. While in the factory, all of the kids break the rules. Augustus Gloop falls into the chocolate river that was meant to not be touched by human hands. Violet chews an experimental 3 course dinner gum that causes her to swell up like a big ole blueberry, Veruca Salt is enticed with the Golden egg and falls into the trash chute with the other bad eggs, Mike Teavee gets in front of the camera of the WonkaVision and is transported into the TV as a tiny 6 inch version of himself, and Charlie and his grandpa joe drink the fizzy lifting drink that takes them almost to their death until they burp their way down. In the concluding scene, Wonka makes it clear that though Charlie and his grandpa were the only ones to survive the events, they wouldn’t be getting the lifetime supply of chocolate because they still broke the rules. Grandpa Joe blows a gasket on Wonka and tells Charlie that if Slugworth wants the Gobstopper, he’ll get it, and honestly they would walk away with a bag. Charlie has to think about it. Take care of his family financially or keep a promise to Wonka. It ends with him handing over the Gobstopper to Wonka and in the end it was all one big test to see who the successor of his chocolate factory would be. Wonka says these beautiful words to Charlie,
“I had to test you, Charlie. And you passed the test. You won!”
Willy Wonka
It was Charlie’s self-control through the temptation to give away the Gobstopper to “Slugworth” who was actually a loyal worker to Wonka, so they wouldn’t have got anything, or give the Gobstopper to Wonka and live with integrity. He chooses integrity and he gets a blessing because of it. What a story we can relate to. When something looks enticing like sex, pornography, cheating, getting drunk, going with the greed to gain money and status, it often leaves us empty. But, if we we would seek the self-control Jesus gives to us, we have a wall of defense against the darknesses of this world.
Self-control is the believer’s wall of defense against the sinful desires that wage war against the soul. If we want to be like Christ, and be full of self-control, then what that means is adopting the mindset of Christ.
About self-control, my friend Adam said in a series over the 2 Peter 1 text about internalizing God’s virtues in our lives,
Goodness is added to faith because faith without virtue is cold and sterile. Knowledge comes alongside this to bring maturity and growth and understanding, and that can make way for a self control that is God oriented and Spirit led. And through self-control, we can add perseverance knowing that we can live in harmony with God regardless of what life throws at us.
Are you willing to do that? My hope is that the answer would be yes! Whether you follow Jesus or not, you are here for some reason because you are interested in Jesus. Following Him, you will learn what it means to live like Him if you are serious about it. And I’m about to say something that I think will challenge us all.
What you do in secret is what you should be willing to do out in the open. By that, what you do in secret should still model that you are an apprentice of Jesus.
Paul writes:
Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.
Philippians 2:12-13 ESV
With Paul being away from them, the Philippians still sought obedience and faithfulness to Jesus. I am challenged by this. I want what I do when nobody is around to look like when I’m around others. That self-control would run through me to further learn what it looks like to be a Kingdom worker of Jesus.
I am challenged by what Paul writes to the Colossian Church and what it looks like to not be full of self-control.
5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. 6 On account of these the wrath of God is coming. 7 In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. 8 But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. 9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.
Colossians 3:5-10 ESV
I am challenged by these words, but through the power of the Holy Spirit and how He’s helped me transform my heart and being willing to listen and follow His leadings, I’ve been able to work through many of these like sexual immorality, being more aware of things that are idols in my life, seeking Him when something is a selfish ambition or a holy ambition, learning to be slow to anger, and seeking to not always being right, but being willing to be wrong and learn from my mistakes. I don’t say this as putting myself on a pedestal at all, I say it as a testimony of one who has had a lot of work in learning what it means to follow the Holy Spirit, letting Him convict you and challenge you and learning from past mistakes and putting on the new nature that through knowledge of God leads to learn to be more controlled.
Where do you struggle with self-control?
Self-control means knowing when to say yes and when to say no. So, do you know when to say yes and when to say no? If not, a good place to start is by going to Jesus and seeing what He has to say. In John 14, Jesus tells His apprentices He’s leaving them and that they know the way to where He’s going. Thomas questions how. Jesus says,
“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7 If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”
John 14:6-7 ESV
We focus a lot on the Truth and Life aspect of this verse, but we often miss the Way. The Way is what leads us into living these proven and divine characteristics and that leads us into self-control. When we have faith, we trust God and His good way. When we seek goodness, we begin to live like Him and learn about Him and live with virtue, and from the knowledge of Jesus and knowledge of the story of Jesus’ invitation to join Him in His Kingdom, we learn to live with self-control.
The truth is we have been ingrained with the ability to not chase after what we crave.
What can we do to learn self-control and choose to not go through with what we desire? We need to put to death the earthly nature and come life in our new nature through Jesus. We need to live in the renewing of our minds that Paul talks about in Romans 12. I don’t normally read from The Message translation, but I love how Eugene Peterson puts nuance into this verse, Romans 12:12. We’ll read the ESV first.
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. Romans 12:2 (ESV)
Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.
Romans 12:2 (MSG)
That hits home for me. To live in self-control means to fix our attention on God and allow Him to change us from the inside out. To respond with what he wants for us and not what culture wants. And allow Him to develop well-formed maturity in us. We’ve got to have some mindset shifts, because if we want to live in a life that is devoted to Jesus and full of self-control, then we need to have a shift in our lives that aligns with Christ in how He lived.
The lifestyle shift for becoming full of self-control:
Shift from hurry to unhurry.
The Psychiatrist Carl Jung wrote,
“Hurry is not of the devil; hurry is the devil.”
Carl Jung
John Ortberg was seeking some spiritual direction from Dallas Willard and he writes about this conversation in an article on his website. He told Dallas about the fast pace of his church, the van-driving, soccer-league, piano-lesson, school-orientation-night years. And asked Dallas how to be spiritually healthy. Living spiritually healthy means being in self-control and living like Jesus. Willard’s answer,
“You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life,” Dallas Willard
Then Ortberg asked if there’s anything else. A long pause later,
“There is nothing else. You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life.”
Dallas Willard
If you had to guess when that article was published, what would your year be? 2002.
At a lunch with a friend, Willard was asked what one word he would use to describe Jesus. His word? Relaxed.
Of the four Gospels, Mark was in a way the most hurried in how he wrote his Gospel being choppy with the events of cascading into each other, yet not even he could speed up Jesus.
When it’s time to launch his public ministry Jesus is unhurried and goes to the desert to pray for forty days in fasting, prayer, solitude, and silence (Mark 1:12-13).
When his family tries to manipulate him in front of a crowd he calmly sets a boundary (Mark 3:31-34).
When crowds interrupt his retreat he patiently feeds them (Mark 4:32-44).
When he’s in a small boat at sea and caught in a life-threatening storm he naps (Mark 4:37-38).
When he sees loan sharks and hucksters turning his Father’s house into a marketplace and taking advantage of the poor he takes time to weave a rope to drive them out (Mark 11:11, 12:15-17).
When religious scholars gang up on him with trick questions he speaks the truth in love to them (Mark 12:13-17).
When he’s sweating drops of blood in the Garden he finds comfort in God as Abba (Mark 14:36).
While being tortured to death he lovingly ministers to everyone around him, even his enemies (Luke 23:34, 43).
When He resurrects from the dead, one of the first things He does is to go on a 7-mile walk to Emmaus with a couple of disciples He doesn’t even reveal His identity to until they are back the couple’s house (Luke 24).
Try to hurry up Jesus, and He will go slower. Think about all of the times in your life when an answer was needed, when was it answered? Probably, at the last second. God is not a God of haste. He is a God of patience, unhurry, and wants His people to rely on Him. Reliance on Him means going the slow pace of unhurry and focusing on the Savior who gave His life up for us. It means surrounding our week around Him versus attempting to place God in this five minute window on thursday when we realize we haven’t been in Scripture, prayer, or done much to even think about Him. Our leadership team is going through a process called pathway to help set up a formation to help us live unhurried, and focused on Jesus and it takes planning to get there. But, when our weeks are surrounded by Jesus we build up the wall of self-control against the sinful desires that wage war against the soul. It takes being unhurried to get there well. Not that you can’t take steps closer to Jesus when life is lived in haste, but a pace that is the Jesus pace, will take you closer to Him and full of self-control faster than haste.
Hurry sickness is a real a thing. According to Masterclass, this is their definition:
Hurry sickness is the feeling of constantly being behind and rushed, which causes stress and anxiety. If you are experiencing hurry sickness, you may feel like you’re always racing to accomplish tasks on your to-do list, leading to frustration if anything holds you up. While multitasking under time pressure can boost your productivity in the short term, it can damage your long-term health and relationships.
Masterclass
What are the effects of this hurry sickness? Burnout, constant worry, damage to physical health, fatigue, fixation on saving time, irritability, and relationship strain. Maybe you relate to one of those are all 7 of them. In this article, the ways to combat hurry sickness are recognize the signs, learn proper prioritization, take breaks, practice mindfulness which is learning to slow down, practice self-care, and seek additional help. Pretty good advice, and I agree with it, but as followers of Jesus, we have the pathway to combat hurry and gain a relaxed lifestyle of following Jesus which is what I want, and living in that relaxed state, helps to grow in self-control because you lean into Jesus, you learn to take a break and step back from the hurried world, and you eventually come back rejuvenated and whole.
If you’ve been around Jesus for awhile these verses are common but good.
28 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
Matthew 11:28-30 NIV
Jesus doesn’t call us to more as His followers, He actually calls us to less. How many of us would desire to have less on our plates right now. Following Jesus is hard because the tension of worldly and godly, but when we choose an unhurried lifestyle, not to be confused with laziness, because to live unhurried actually takes more planning than a lifestyle of hurry, then we draw near to the source of the water of life. We receive the humble and gentle lifestyle of Jesus and live from a place of passion and rest. It’s easier to live in self-control when busy isn’t taking over our lives and many say it is the great temptation of the Enemy.
When we live from a place of slowing down our lifestyle and doing things that draw us near to the heart of Christ like Bible study, prayer, solitude, silence, and more, we become in tune with Christ. I struggled for so long to figure out how to get the heart of this message to come together and I think what we need to know is that we have to slow down our lifestyle so that we can be with Jesus, to become like Jesus, and to do what Jesus would do if He were us. A quote I love,
“Solitude is the furnace in which transformation takes place…Solitude is the place where Christ remodels us in His own image and frees us from the victimizing compulsions of the world.”
Henry Nouwen, The Way of the Heart
Summarized, being remodeled in Christ, helps to grow in self-control. Solitude helps us to find a quiet place to allow that to deeply happen. With the noise of this world, to get away with Jesus for like 30 minutes twice a week and rest with Him, it will be transforming. What it means as well is being in silence.
Numerous studies have linked noise pollution to increased anxiety, depression, high blood pressure, heart disease, and stroke.
brainfacts.org
When we silence the world and phones, and spend deep time with our Savior, we learn to take up His easy yoke and live from a place of rest and unhurry. We desire less. With temptations like materialism and sexual immorality, we can do practices like fasting to draw near to Christ to choke out the temptations of sin that try and take hold of us and commune with Jesus as our sustainer. What’s the after effects? Instead of getting upset when someone disrupts your day, you find joy that you ran into that person. Instead of seeking out pornography from a place of boredom and desire, you seek instead to watch a sermon, read Scripture, or quote verses you have memorized. Instead of going to a party and seeking to consume a copious amount of alcohol, you instead desire to be with your other brothers and sisters in Christ. And from a place of rest from the Sabbath, you find yourself becoming more compassionate for people around you, and around the world. Why all these reactions? Because it’s becoming more like Jesus. I think Jesus would call us to shift our lifestyle from hurry to unhurried. And from that unhurried mindset can we truly take up these Proven ways and become more like Jesus and do what He did.
There’s a verse that I kept hearing whispered to me, “to the right and to the left.” So, I looked it up and I feel this is a perfect way to end our teaching time with this prophecy from Isaiah given to the people to turn from their rebellious ways and seek divine wisdom.
And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left.
Isaiah 30:21 ESV
Holy Spirit, hear our prayer. Show us the way and may we walk in it.
