Kevin De Young's Crazy Busy ~ Reviewed

Crazy Busy

By Kevin De Young

Published by Crossway

ISBN#978-14335-3389

128 Pages

Back Cover: “I’M TOO BUSY!” We’ve all heard it. We’ve all said it. All too often, busyness gets the best of us.

Just one look at our jam-packed schedules tells us how hard it can be to strike a well-reasoned balance between doing nothing and doing it all.

That’s why award-winning author and pastor Kevin DeYoung addresses the busyness problem head on in his newest book, Crazy Busy — and not with the typical arsenal of time management tips, but rather with the biblical tools we need to get to the source of the issue and pull the problem out by the roots.

Highly practical and super short, Crazy Busy will help you put an end to “busyness as usual.”

Review: 

“Crazy busy” is a term I feel explains what many people are in the middle of including me. I was so thankful for the review copy of a book that had me stop and think about how I went from busy to crazy busy.

Kevin De Young is the senior pastor of University reformed church in Michigan. He blogs at Gospel Coalition and has 5 kids. He knows something about crazy busy! I appreciated his approach to this subject. It helped to re-evaluate priorities, see them in a different light. It also showed me how fast things can get “crazy” busy. All things are possible when we realize “to live a life with more craziness than we want will give us less Jesus than we need.”

This small book is easy to read, brings hope to the reader and drives home the point that keeping the main things the main thing is important not matter what life throws our way.

He has 10 short chapters that cover the following

1. Hello, my name is busy
2. Here, there and Gone. 3 Dangers to Avoid
3. The Killer P’s
4. The Terror of Total obligation
5. Mission Creep
6. A Cruel Kindergarly
7. Deep calls to deep
8. Rhythem and blues
9. Embracing the burdens of busyness
10. The one thing you must do

Kevin De Young helps the reader look at life and how it’s changed. With change boundaries have gotten blurred and life is spinning out of control. “Crazy Busy helps you reclaim your sanity, and a lot of encouragement for your soul; it strikes the desperately needed balance between doing nothing and doing it all. We weren’t made to do it all.”

He asks these questions, “How did I get myself into this mess? When will I ever get my life under control? How long can I keep this up? Why can’t I manage my time? Why did I say yes to this? How did I get so busy?”

I’ve you’ve asked yourself any these questions this is the book for you.

The author says, “I’ve missed too many great times and been too impatient with my kids. I’ve taken my wife for granted and fed important relationships with left over’s. I’ve been too busy to pursue God with my whole heart, soul, mind and strength. In other words, I’ve likely been just like you.”

“Care is not the same as do.” Huge one for me, Kevin goes on to say, “He didn’t’ want to say we should do something about all suffering, because we can’t do something about everything. But we can care. We have different gifts and different challenges…we have to be ok with other Christians doing certain good things better and more often than we do…I can always pray right now. Prayer can feel like the biggest burden of all. We can’t possibly pray for every need in the world. Even if we are extremely organized and disciplined, we won’t be able to consistently pray for more than a handful of people and problems.”

I could breathe a little easier after reading this small but powerful story. This book will set you free of a few misconceptions about life and its expectations. I highly recommend it for everyone to read and re-read! Thanks Kevin for your honest and transparent approach to an issue that affects us all.

Reviewed by: Nora St.Laurent

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