Leisure Time Recreation
Text: (No specific text; topical — principles drawn from general biblical wisdom)
Series: Restoration Sermons
Date:
Speaker: Ed Rangel
Location: Waupaca Church of Christ
Bible Version: NASB 1995
Sermon Type: Topical
Learning Objectives
By the close of this lesson the hearer should be able to:
- Explain why recreation requires pulpit attention — what the "problem" is that makes this sermon necessary.
- Identify the five categories of recreation enumerated in this sermon and give one example of each.
- State the nine rules provided for evaluating recreational choices and apply at least three of them to a specific example.
- Explain what a "budget of time" means and describe how the day should be divided.
- Name the two groups identified as failing at this subject — parents/schools/churches, and youth — and describe the failure of each.
Thesis
Recreation is not the enemy of godliness; it is the restoration of the person for continued godly work. The Christian who does not know how to rest, play, or use leisure time well is not more spiritual — they are less whole, and eventually less effective. The rules that govern recreation are not a fence around pleasure but a framework for keeping recreation in its proper place: servant to the life, not master of it.
Burden
The burden is generational and practical: parents, schools, and churches have failed to teach the subject of recreation — its place, its appropriate forms, and its governing principles. Youth are left either unoccupied (with the consequences that empty time produces) or unguided (taking up recreational forms that the adults around them have never evaluated). The sermon is an attempt to supply what the culture has failed to teach.
Introduction
The subject of leisure time and recreation is seldom addressed from the pulpit, which is itself part of the problem. The silence of the pulpit on a subject that occupies a significant portion of the average person's week communicates, by default, that the subject has no spiritual dimension — that what people do when they are not working or worshiping is their own business, subject to no principle and requiring no guidance.
This is wrong. The principle of stewardship applies to time as fully as it applies to money (Eph. 5:16: "making the most of your time, because the days are evil"). The person who has given their life to God has given all of it — including the hours that are not spent in labor or worship. What is done with leisure time is a spiritual question, and the answer is a spiritual responsibility.
I. The Importance of the Subject
The reason the subject requires pulpit attention is the failure of the institutions that should have addressed it.
Parents not teaching it. The home is the first school. The child who grows up watching parents manage leisure time well — who sees rest taken, play enjoyed, creative pursuits pursued, and all of it kept in proportion — has received an education in recreation from observation. The home that has no model for healthy leisure produces children who have no model. Parents who have never thought about what recreation should be and should not be cannot teach what they do not know.
Schools not teaching it. The educational system teaches academic knowledge and, in some forms, athletic discipline. But it does not teach the student what to do when there is nothing that must be done — how to occupy free time in a way that restores rather than depletes, that develops rather than degrades. The graduate who can parse Latin and solve differential equations but who has no idea how to rest has been equipped for labor and abandoned in leisure.
Churches not teaching it. The church has often treated recreation as the world's territory — something to warn against rather than to instruct in. The result is that the person who comes to faith inherits a clear theology of work and worship but no theology of play. The spiritual person who reaches the age of adulthood without being taught how to rest well will either rest badly or not rest at all, and either outcome damages the work they return to.
II. The Problem
The problem is not that people do not want recreation — it is that they do not know what to do with it or how to manage it.
Youth unoccupied — "idle hands." The young person with unstructured leisure time is not at rest — they are at risk. The absence of occupation is not neutral; the person who has nothing good to do finds something to do, and what they find is rarely better than what they would have done if they had been guided. The failure to fill leisure with good things creates a vacuum that something will fill.
Won't take advice about it. Youth are peculiarly resistant to guidance on this subject — more resistant than on academic or vocational questions. The reason is probably that recreation feels private, self-expressive, and exempt from the authority of parents or teachers. The person who accepts correction on their work habits may resist correction on their play habits because play is where they feel most themselves.
III. Its Solution
The solution is structural: a budget of time, five categories of appropriate recreation, and rules governing all of them.
Budget of time. The day divides roughly into thirds: approximately eight hours for sleep, eight hours for work or study, and eight hours for the remaining activities of life — which includes meals, transportation, personal care, family, worship, and leisure. The "leisure" portion is smaller than the arithmetic suggests, but it exists and it requires management. The person who budgets money but not time is managing the smaller asset carefully while letting the larger one run without discipline.
Five types of recreation:
Athletics — physical exercise, competitive or non-competitive sports, outdoor activity. The body is the instrument of the soul's service; caring for it through physical activity is stewardship. Athletics also teach disciplines (patience, endurance, teamwork, how to win and lose) that serve the character.
Social parties — the gathering of people for conversation, fellowship, and mutual enjoyment. Human beings are social creatures; the need for companionship and the pleasure of society are not weaknesses to be suppressed but goods to be managed. The social gathering that is organized around genuine fellowship — not merely around the consumption of alcohol or the performance of entertainment — is a legitimate and restorative form of recreation.
Amusements — entertainments that provide pleasure without demanding active participation: theater, music, games. These are not inherently wrong; they are evaluated by what they produce and what they prevent. The amusement that relaxes without degrading, that entertains without corrupting, that fills leisure without displacing better things is legitimate.
Aesthetics — the cultivation and enjoyment of beauty: art, music (as active rather than passive engagement), literature, natural beauty. This is the category that is most often absent from lists of Christian recreation but that has the deepest connection to the Christian understanding of God as creator and of beauty as his gift. The person who cannot be stopped by a sunset, moved by a symphony, or held by a great painting has closed a door that God opened.
Conversation — the deliberate, engaged exchange of thought with other people. This is perhaps the most underestimated form of recreation: it requires nothing material, is available in almost any circumstance, and produces benefits — the exchange of ideas, the sharpening of thought, the development of relationship — that no other recreational form produces as efficiently.
IV. Rules for Recreation
Nine rules provide the framework for evaluating any specific recreational choice.
Is it right? The primary question — not "is it fun?" or "will it relax me?" or "is it legal?" but "is it right?" The standard is not comfort or custom but righteousness. If the answer is no, the discussion ends.
Will good people approve of it? Not "will everyone approve?" — unanimous approval is an impossible standard. But the pattern of approval among people of established godly character provides a useful check. The recreation that consistently fails the approval of genuinely good people has a problem.
Will it interfere with my work or study? Recreation that displaces the responsibilities it is supposed to refresh has ceased to serve its purpose. The rest that makes the worker less able to work is not rest but its opposite.
Will it produce bad habits? Some forms of recreation produce patterns of behavior that persist beyond the recreational context. The habit of late hours, of alcohol, of sedentary passivity, of electronic consumption — these are not contained within the recreational time slot; they reshape the person who engages in them. The evaluation of a recreational form must include the habits it forms.
Will it put me in doubtful company? The company in which recreation takes place is not separable from the recreation itself. The person who participates in wholesome activity in unwholesome company is not sheltered from the company by the wholesomeness of the activity.
Will it take me to questionable places? The location of recreation matters for the same reason that company matters: the person who frequently occupies certain places becomes identified with those places — by others and, eventually, by themselves.
Will my example hurt others? The Christian's life is public in a way that the non-Christian's is not. Every choice is a signal to the people who observe it. The Christian who makes choices that weaker members of the congregation will follow to their detriment has exercised a freedom that cost more than the recreation was worth.
Can I afford it financially? Recreation that requires expenditure beyond one's means is not recreation — it is debt in disguise. The stewardship of financial resources includes the recreation budget; the person who has not budgeted their leisure costs has not managed their resources.
Will it affect the rights of others? Recreation that is harmless to the person engaged in it may not be harmless to others. Noise, trespass, pollution, and competition for shared resources are all ways that one person's recreation becomes another person's burden.
Application
The nine rules together form a grid through which any proposed recreational activity can be evaluated. They do not produce a list of forbidden activities — they produce a habit of thought. The Christian who asks these questions before adopting a recreational pattern is not being legalistic; they are being responsible about the one-third of their day that is most easily abandoned to chance or impulse.
The application for congregations: teach this subject. The sermon that addresses work and worship but never addresses leisure has left a gap that the world will fill. The church that equips its members to think Christianly about recreation is addressing a real need that the culture is not meeting.
Conclusion
Recreation is the servant of the life, not the master of it. The person who rests well works better; the person who plays well prays better; the person who uses leisure wisely is the person who returns from leisure ready for whatever comes next. The rules that govern recreation are not restrictions on the enjoyment of life — they are the framework that keeps recreation from destroying the life it is supposed to restore.
"Making the most of your time, because the days are evil" (Eph. 5:16). Time is the resource of which every person has the same amount per day; what distinguishes people is not how much time they have but how well they use all of it — including the leisure.
Invitation
The stewardship of time that this lesson describes begins with the most important allocation: the time given to God. The person who has not obeyed the gospel has not yet given their life to the one who gives time its ultimate meaning. The first act of time management is to bring the whole of one's life — including leisure — under the lordship of Christ.
Believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of God. Repent. Confess his name. Be baptized for the remission of your sins (Acts 2:38). And receive back your time — not as your own possession but as a stewardship entrusted to you by the one who made the day.
Word Study
| English Term | Greek Term | Basic Meaning | Usage in This Sermon | Sermon Significance | Key Texts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Making the most of your time | exagorazomenoi ton kairon | Literally "buying up the kairos" — seizing the decisive, opportune moment. | Used in Eph. 5:16 as the governing principle for the stewardship of time, including leisure. | Paul's instruction is not to manage chronological time efficiently but to seize opportunities as they present themselves. The leisure that is wasted is a kairos not seized. The principle of stewardship applies to the third of the day that is not labor or worship. | Eph. 5:16 |
| Recreation | recreatio (Latin) | From Latin recreatio — the action of restoring, refreshing, or renewing. | Used as the governing concept throughout: recreation as the renewal of the person for continued service. | The word itself defines the purpose: recreation that does not re-create — that leaves the person more depleted — has failed at its own stated goal. The framework keeps recreation as servant to the life, not master of it. | (Conceptual) |
| Stewardship | oikonomia | Management of a household or estate on behalf of an owner — the steward is accountable, not the owner. | Used to frame time as something entrusted to the Christian rather than owned by them. | The Christian's time — including leisure — is managed on behalf of the one who gave it. This is why recreation is a spiritual question, not merely a personal preference question, and why these nine rules are not optional for the person who has given their whole life to God. | Eph. 5:16; I Cor. 6:19-20 |
| Idle | argos | Not working, inactive, producing nothing. | Used in the discussion of unoccupied youth whose vacant leisure produces harmful choices. | The concern is not about rest but about vacancy that produces carelessness or actively bad choices. Recreation fills leisure with something good, preventing idleness from filling it with something harmful. | Matt. 12:36; Titus 1:12 |
Scripture Interlock Table
| Theme | Boles' Outline | Supporting Scripture |
|---|---|---|
| "Making the most of your time" — stewardship of leisure | Intro./Concl. | Eph. 5:16 |
| Body as temple — physical care as stewardship | III (Athletics) | I Cor. 6:19-20 |
| "Not forsaking our assembling" — leisure does not displace worship | Rules (3) | Heb. 10:25 |
| "Whatever is true, honorable, right, pure" — standard for amusements | Rules (1) | Phil. 4:8 |
| "Each one of us will give an account of himself to God" — example rule | Rules (7) | Rom. 14:12 |
| "Owe no man anything" — financial rule | Rules (8) | Rom. 13:8 |
| Baptism for remission — the first and foundational allocation of time | Invit. | Acts 2:38 |
---
Converted from H. Leo Boles, Outline 134. Primary text: none stated; topical. OCR corrections: "lll." → "III."; "lV." → "IV." Doctrinal audit: recreation treated as a stewardship subject, not as worldly territory to be condemned; the nine rules developed as a practical grid for Christian evaluation without adding to Scripture or imposing traditions of men; the five categories of recreation developed with the specific inclusion of aesthetics and conversation, which Boles includes but which are often omitted from Christian discussions of recreation; no forbidding of what Scripture does not forbid; invitation retains full obedient response (Acts 2:38).
