It’s now official . We are doing life in overdrive twenty-four hours a day. I woke up at two in the morning last night with a low-grade fever and began thinking how I wouldn’t be able to make the early morning meeting I had. So I took my Blackberry and sent a text to our associate pastor to ask him to cover for me. I’m laying back down praying my fever will break, when I hear my phone chirp. He’s returning my text! I started to text him back and tell him to turn off his phone and get some sleep, but there was this issue of a fully body sweat that was starting to distract me.
My point is to not talk about sweat, but to talk about the need that many of us have for a little planned neglect. There are an endless number of outlets to stay “in the loop” when it comes to our jobs and our relationships. And I’m beginning to think that many of us are falling into the trap of feeling like we have to respond to every issue, every question, every email, text, or tweet immediately. I know that I have. This is a real danger, because there is only one connection that must be continuously maintained and that’s the one that comes from being filled with the Holy Spirit.
Being filled with the Spirit is the Christ-conscious life. It’s the neglect of everything unnecessary in order to relentlessly pursue that one thing which is absolutely necessary. It’s planning time in your life to neglect the things that are window dressing and fluff so that you can do the hard work of extensively reading and concentrating on God’s Word , listening to His voice, journaling your insights, and living out your discoveries. Stop right now and consider the last time that you really did this. Or more importantly, have you ever really done it at all?
I’m praying that as you read this you are thinking about what you need to neglect today in order to get alone in God’s presence and soak in His greatness. And when you do, turn off your cell phone.
There is a time for everything so Solomon says in the book of Ecclesiastes. Granted our time as human beings on earth is short, but then God also never fails to accomplish His will on earth either. I struggle living out God's will here on earth...because even if I connect with God in prayer continuously or I search the scriptures for examples by which I can learn the apparent answers to what I should be doing aren't always as clear as black and white to me.
ReplyDeletePerhaps I sometimes I need someone to help me because I am too close to the daily problems that I have such as Moses's father-in-law Jethro telling Moses that Moses should divide his work load among men who can be trusted with some of the work load or perhaps I have just come through a great moment of victory or witnessed God's consuming glory like Elijah did and evil goes right on being evil so that I become overwhelmed and depressed that I need a long time away from it all to wait upon God's plan to unfold slowly but surely.
I struggle with this issue constantly in our day and time of the "Information Age". My wife and I constantly turn down requests to do this and that because we believe that we are already stretched too thinly with just taking care of our three girls. In fact, we have been home more in the last 6 months due to illness going through our home among the girls and my wife. We wonder if people think we are "anti-social", but then I after I spend time with the Lord I realize that God knows the intention of our hearts and the spiritual and physical health of my family comes first regardless of what others may think. If my family is not spiritually and physically healthy then we are negatively affecting our church and our community.
Mark
Pastor Keith, thanks for sharing.
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