Making Time

"Never again clutter your days or nights with so many menial and unimportant things that you have no time to accept a real challenge when it comes along. This applies to play as well as work. A day merely survived is no cause for celebration. You are not here to fritter away your precious hours when you have the ability to accomplish so much by making a slight change in your routine. No more busy work. No more hiding from success. Leave time, leave space, to grow. Now. Now! Not tomorrow!" - Og Mandino

I let it happen too often. Everything on my schedule gets pushed end to end. There are no gaps, no time to breath. The day is all set then here comes that thing I really should be doing. However, because I am so over committed, it goes by without notice? Responsibilities are important but if there is no time to talk to my child or give a neighbor a hand or spend a few moments in prayer when a friend asks, perhaps there is something on my responsibly list that shouldn't be there.

What are you praying for?

Okay, got hit with this a couple of weeks ago during a sermon at church. Still trying to digest it so thought it would help to write through it.

Imagine two canvases. On the left is a painting of a bright sunshine lit day. Across the top of the canvas, there is a crisp blue sky with only a few white clouds. In the foreground is a perfectly still lake with smooth as glass blue water. Rising in the distance is a majestic Colorado type mountain perhaps snow still visible on the peaks. All around there are beautiful trees with unmoving leaves depicting the calm peaceful tranquility of the morning scene.

Now on the right is another painting. Same location but this time the bright sunshine is gone and a storm is in full fury. The lake is churning with large white capped waves crashing against each other. The mountain is no longer visible through the massive dark storm clouds. The trees are bent over as they are being whipped by the gale force winds. Yet, on the lake there is a small boat being tossed at the mercy of the waves and wind. You can see inside the boat and there is a man asleep completely relaxed inside all of the turmoil.

So here is the question. What are you praying for? Do your prayers focus on God bringing you the perfect day or beg God to build your trust in Him so that the circumstances mean less? Do you want to dictate the how the picture should look or do you work on how you should look in the picture? Is your desire for God to deliver something you can be peaceful with or to trust him to bring peace to you no matter how it is delivered?

I have pondered these questions for weeks. I hope it strikes something with you as it did with me.

A Prayer Request

Whether this prayer comes from Billy Graham which was aired by Paul Harvey or Minister Joe Wright during the opening of a new session of the Kansas Senate, I am not sure. I find references to both. However, I do know the words are our true need…

'Heavenly Father, we come before you today to ask your forgiveness and to seek your direction and guidance. We know Your Word says, 'Woe to those who call evil good,' but that is exactly what we have done. We have lost our spiritual equilibrium and reversed our values. We have exploited the poor and called it the lottery. We have rewarded laziness and called it welfare. We have killed our unborn and called it choice. We have shot abortionists and called it justifiable. We have neglected to discipline our children and called it building self esteem. We have abused power and called it politics. We have coveted our neighbor's possessions and called it ambition. We have polluted the air with profanity and pornography and called it freedom of expression. We have ridiculed the time-honored values of our forefathers and called it enlightenment. Search us, Oh God, and know our hearts today; cleanse us from every sin and Set us free. Amen!'

The Sea

“If you want to build a ship, don't drum up people together to collect wood and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea” - Antoine De Saint Exupery

How often do we as Christians wrap ourselves in the details of building the ship instead of casting the vision of the endless immensity of the sea? If God's endless immense love is not communicated then the acts of discipleship in ones life will never find their target. I blush at how often I have beat the drum of reading the Bible or finding your quite time or getting involved in service but spent too little time kendeling a desire to be like Christ.

What is it like for even a small moment in time when my heart is touched by God? Why does the creator of an entire universe allow me to draw near? Where does this amazing peace come from when everything seems to fall apart around me? What happens when my eyes open to see what God is really doing around me? What does it really feel like when God connects my heart with another heart to share their load?

That is what I need to find out how to say. Then reading the Bible, quite time, service, solitude, worship and prayer will be joyous simple tasks that build the ship to float along on God's endless sea.

More Valuable Less Visable

Been wrestling with these words since late last year. More Valuable - Less Visible. I have always struggled with what motivates me to service within the church. I love filling different areas of need and have grown in those responsibilities over the past few years. I realize it was service in the parking lot that first developed my habit of attending church each week. I knew I had a responsibility (a specific spot to cover) that would cause others to scramble if I was not in my place. God used this four years ago to drag me out of bed every Sunday because I needed to grow. Yet there was always that nagging feeling that I enjoyed the recognition of standing in front of the church and the kind comments and waves as people arrived or left each service.

Later I felt called to other tasks around the church. My schedule begins to fill up with very worthwhile endeavors, each growing me in my relationship with God. Leading small discipleship groups required a number of hours of preparation where God taught me many things as I drew closer to Him. Teaching kid's Sunday School required my trust in God to reach out and touch lives in ways I never thought possible. Prayer team required me to really understand what prayer is and learn to communicate and share in the needs of others.

Yet each of these and my other duties around the church are each visible. It grinds at me of what is my motivation. I do these as an act of obedience to what I perceive to be God's direction for me but I find such joy in these rolls that I cannot feel I am giving but receiving.

Then these words started in me last year. Where do I look to be more valuable and less visible? God has already provided a couple of new rolls that are behind the scenes and my commitment is to learn the discipline of silence from these rolls. I pray that God teaches me to seek and accept those tasks that are hidden from view of others.