A Dad Hack You Need

It was Saturday afternoon, all I needed was 20 minutes. Putting the creative polish on a project for work, I wanted to send it to the team before 4PM (as if anyone was reading emails at 4PM Labor Day weekend).

I was buried in the couch [and my work], face slightly illuminated by the glow of my laptop. 20 minutes.

All three of my boys were with me. College football was on the television, Nerf footballs were flying across the room—inevitably my couch became an end-zone.

All they wanted was for me to play football. All I wanted was 20 minutes.

I could not focus. Between the bouncing from cushion to cushion and the incessant "Dad, watch this" and "Dad, did you see that?" or "Dad! Catch this!" I lost it. Flying off the handle, I abruptly ended the makeshift game, raising my voice as I emphatically explained, "I just need 20 minutes!"

Sucking the fun [and life] out of the room, my kids sat quietly as I worked. On a Saturday. In my living room. One of my boys apologized for being a distraction.

I just needed 20 minutes.

Robbing my kids of play, joy, and time with their father, the words of Henri Nouwen came rushing over me, "You know, my whole life, I have been complaining that my work was constantly interrupted until I discovered that my interruptions were my work."

Distractions and Divine Interruptions

Jesus was never distracted. But He was extremely interruptable.

Scripture teaches us that Jesus was on mission—nothing kept Him from doing God's will. His face was set on Jerusalem (Luke 9:51-53), like flint (Isa. 50:7), he would not, could not be moved. Even human things, things like hunger, that so easily set us off, could not distract Jesus (John 4:34).

Yet Jesus was very interruptible. In John 5, Jesus allows his Sabbath to be interrupted by a man who needs healing. Jesus explains his interruptable spirit by saying in, "My Father is still working, and I am working also" (v17). In other words, Jesus recognizes that the Father is always at work around Him, and often the Father will invite [Jesus] into something He is doing—Jesus must be ready to respond.

As Marcia Lebhar writes, this is how Jesus lived his whole life, how He used His time:

"If you had slept in the same house or field with Jesus, awakened with Him, eaten with Him and helped Him, what would you have observed? One thing we always think of is that Jesus gave Himself almost entirely to what we would consider interruptions. Most of the teaching, healing and wonders we see in his life were responsive...seemingly unplanned. He trusted that what the Father allowed to cross his path was exactly that...from the Father. Jesus always seemed willing for things to get messy."

If you think about it, most of the miracles in the ministry of Jesus were interruptions—the most compelling encounters with Christ were unplanned.

• The paralytic lowered through the roof... interruption.

• Jairus' daughter's healing... interruption.

• A woman's issue of blood... this was an interruption interrupting an interruption.

• The children brought to Jesus... interruption.

• The Syrophoenician woman's request... interruption

• Zacchaeus in the tree... interruption.

• The lepers being healed... interruption.

• The sinful woman washing Jesus' feet... interruption.

If I had been in charge of Jesus' ministry, many of the things I love about Jesus would never have happened. Jesus would never have blessed the children. Jesus would never have met the woman at the well. Jesus would never have gone to the cross. Handling Jesus' itinerary, I would have pushed these events to another day...

Jesus never saw interruptions as distractions because He knew His priorities.

I was distracted because I thought finishing the project was my priority. My son thought he was a distraction because work was the priority. That's where I failed; I led him to believe he was the distraction.

When priorities are out of line, interruptions become distractions.

As fathers, we need the focus and indistractibility of John 4, combined with the flexibility and interruptibility of John 5. As my friend Jon Tyson writes,

"The best parenting moments rarely happen on our schedules. The best witnessing encounters never happen on schedule—God just puts us next to somebody who needs a word from him, and it's up to us to respond. People we love and who truly need something from us rarely have their moments of crisis on our schedules (has your child ever had a meltdown at an opportune time?). Even our conversions don't happen on schedule. A healthy Christian life is one in which you learn to live free of devilish distractions so you can be open to divine interruptions and obedient to the Holy Spirit."

Confession: My life moves at a violent pace. I am scheduled to the hilt, full inbox, empty soul. Even my prayers sound like cries for more productivity. As a result, I am constantly looking for ways to maximize my work and achieve balance. I have an assistant, calendar(s), reminders, multiple laptops and phones; I Sabbath and prioritize myself to death. But despite all of that effort, I still need balance, I can't find congruency. Again, Tyson;

Our sense of self-importance can get inflated, and we unconsciously think of ourselves and our time as more valuable than others. We rate people on a value hierarchy and then grant them access accordingly. How different from the ministry of Jesus. Jesus had more responsibility than you or I ever will. He was the literal savior of the world. Yet, Jesus was an interruptible man. The great tragedy of our time is not that we aren't godly enough to be Jesus' disciples; we are just too busy."

I don't want to be so scheduled, planned, and productive that I don't have room for interruptions, that I miss living room football. I don't want to live in such a way that my family thinks they're the distraction. 

How do we fight distraction and embrace interruption?

1) Enough with the self-care. The Biblical narrative is not one of self-care, it is one of self-denial. As a father, husband, provider, and protector, your focus has to be on others. And I get it, you can't pass on what you don't possess; you must be mentally, spiritually, and emotionally healthy. That's fine, but find time to get healthy that does not take away from your family. If you need to get up at 4AM, if you need to stay up til' 1AM—do what you need to do to get yours so that you have time in the day to give to others.

2) Your family needs you most. Your wife and kids are not a distraction but a gift from God that He has called you to steward well. Do not neglect His gift. You have 18 summers with your kids. Nearly 95% of all the time you spend [in-person] with your children will happen before they turn 18. The last 5% of in-person time will be stretched over 50'ish years. No one will ever remember the extra hours you logged at the office (or care after you're gone), but your family will remember you not being there.At best, after 40 years of grinding at work, you'll get a gold watch to help remind you of all the time you missed.

3) Real life is the best life. C.S. Lewis reminds us, "The great thing, if one can, is to stop regarding all the unpleasant things as interruptions of one's 'own,' or 'real' life. The truth is, of course, that what one calls the interruptions are precisely one's real life—the life God is sending one day by day."

Brothers, interruptions are God’s way of reminding you what is really important. I’m convinced God’s balance sheet is full of interruptions—less profit and loss and more living room Nerf football.

Here’s to becoming an interruptible man,

- Harp

This blog originally appeared on Good Trouble, Chris Harper's blog.