Good Things...

I was thinking about how little time I've had to sit down at my computer and write over the last few weeks. It seems I've been BUSY. Don't you hate that word? Isn't it the most overused term in our vocabulary? I aggravate myself using it . It's my excuse for everything. One of my dear friends reminded us a couple of days ago at our Bible study of an Oswald Chambers quote about the "good things that keep us from the excellent". It's the idea of the urgent crowding out the important. If you've never read a little booklet called Tyranny of the Urgent, you've missed a gem. I need to read it occasionally to remind myself of how I allow the urgent to take over my life. It's my default mode. How do we slow ourselves down? I was talking with a few younger women about this tonight. One of them was saying that their Bible study leader had encouraged them to just "be still" this week; to take time every day to be quiet and wait before the Lord. It's hard for me to do that even when I am having my time in the Word. My mind is always racing ahead. I remember my husband reading this and sharing it with me years ago from the writings of Philip Yancey and Dr. Paul Brand. As I recall, Dr. Brand said that he and his wife had begun to pray together. When they first began they would both think of many things, unrelated to their prayers. They would write these things down and then continue praying. He said that after some time, those thoughts became less random and would many time prompt them to some action like making a phone call or writing a note. He also said that these were many times divine appointments made at just the needed time. I have to remind myself and go back to this practice. Praying about those random people and things that come to mind and writing them down so that I don't forget and I don't become so preoccupied with them that I don't pray effectively. I also tend to be overwhelmed with the whole of life because I forget that it's all the little parts that make it up! I have to constantly remind myself to break the big things up in smaller chunks that can be accomplished. It's that idea that you don't have to eat the whole elephant at once (I think I just read this on a blog this week; it was what her mom used to tell her). My husband has also recently told me that his new mantra is to walk slowly, think deeply and love passionately. I have great difficulty with the walking slowly...there's so much to do and so little time:) I think I would do well to also remind myself that God is the creator and keeper of time and my job is not to fill up every moment with stuff but to discern what He has for me to do and where He wants me to spend my time. When this happens there will not only be enough time to do those things but there will be time for rest, reading, worship and reflection and even fun! There will be margin. (A very good book by Dr. Richard Swenson.) I like that visual of having a page with margins on either side; I want my life to be like that, not filled edge-to-edge. I want to have time for the important things: my relationship with God, with people and with service that He has for me.