From Screens to Simplicity: Reclaiming Beauty in the Evening Hours
/Put more thought into your leisure time … when it comes to your relaxation, don’t default to whatever catches your attention at the moment, but instead dedicate some advance thinking to the question of how you want to spend your “day within a day.” 1— Cal Newport
I was recently convicted that I had been spending too much of my limited downtime watching TV. Although my schedule is full—many evenings are taken up with school functions—I had slipped into the habit of defaulting to television when I finally had a moment to rest. My justification was simple: “I deserve this time.”
Rest and relaxation are gifts from God. Jesus Himself said, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27). The Hebrew word Shabbat means “to cease,” “to end,” or “to rest.” Rest is good and necessary. But like all good gifts, it can be misused. Taken to excess, it becomes harmful. This is why moderation matters. As Proverbs 25:16 warns, “If you have found honey, eat only enough for you, lest you have your fill of it and vomit it.” Even good things, when overindulged, can do more harm than good.
That doesn’t mean every moment should be filled with work. Although Scripture exhorts us to “Walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil” (Ephesians 5:15–16, MKJV), it does not require nonstop labor. Rest is good. Leisure is necessary. The question is not whether we rest, but how. Are we using our leisure time wisely?
That question led me to take a hard look at how I was spending mine—and to a growing conviction: my wife and I weren’t stewarding our leisure well. We both felt it. We weren’t using the gift of rest in ways that nourished our souls or honored the time God has entrusted to us.
So we made a change.
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