I was speaking to one of our members recently about the challenges of parenthood in Connecticut. She was telling me about all the good things her children are involved in, from sports to school to church. We both agreed that this is a great community for kids, but then she said a telling thing, “Still, you can have too much of a good thing.”

I can relate. Families are running themselves ragged, doing everything we think we should. Keeping our children busy with enriching activities is good. Developing over-functioning youngsters who are so busy that they have no time for the spontaneous and find it impossible to be alone or be quiet is not. That goes for adults, too.

One of the glories of living in our free-market society is the number of choices and possibilities it affords. Yet, we have created a society where little is sacred anymore. Decades ago, Blue Laws declared Sunday off-limits to selling, so nearly everyone (except preachers) got the day off. This was clearly unfair to people of other faiths, so as we became more pluralistic, Blue Laws got bounced.

Yet, something was lost with the passing of those restrictions. Now Sundays and holidays are prime shopping days, which means that many of us have to go to work so that the rest of us can buy all the stuff we think we need. It has become an inalienable American right to buy whatever we want whenever we want it.

We pay a price for this, as Jean Bethke Elshtain writes:

The more we want, the more we have to work...We have less time for children, less time for spouses, less time for friends, less time for sociability in all its many varieties.


When nothing is sacred, no time is sacred. We have to fight just to hold on to some sense of family and community. As one father said of his son’s soccer team: “It is a great program and they have a wonderful approach to teamwork and sportsmanship, but they start so early on Saturdays and Sundays that they’ve wiped out the time our family used to enjoy around the breakfast table. We have to take our lives back.”

Taking our lives back. As we approach Christian Family Sunday (Mother’s Day), it’s something for all of our modern, on-the-go families to consider. Is our lifestyle of many good things leaving room for the best thing of all, time with each other, time with ourselves, and time with God?

Maybe it’s time for us to get off the doing-everything treadmill and get a grip on what will make for truly happy, well-adjusted humans. Being comfortable and peace inside our own skin is the place where contentment begins. Spending more time with God and family and less on other activities, whether we are big or little people, may add up to getting a whole lot more out of life. 

Let’s take our lives back!

Pastor Roy

P.S. Click the picture or link below to read the full May 2023 edition of The Beacon. 

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