What Really Matters

 

  Sometimes I have a horrible time with priorities.  Oh, I know what they are, and probably at some level even know how to divide them up, but there are so many choices, that when I look at my to-do list, for each option there are for five sub-options!  

MULTI-TASKING

The problem is everything seems equally important.  Our culture lives in a way that insists we must get as much done in a given short amount of time, as possible.  If you can’t multitask between half a dozen things at once, you aren’t being productive.  Inevitably in this category, I fail miserably.  My mind is narrow tracked, and I rarely can do two things at once, much less three to five, or more!

My mind even rails against listening to music and concentrating!  Writing is nearly a lost cause if I have music on, unless….  it’s music without any words.  My mind will pick up on any words and completely convolute what I’m trying to think…and the sentence that is typed (or read) isn’t nearly what it should be!

MISSING MOMENTS WITH GOD

I think sometimes we are so intense on tending to the many things we are working on, we totally miss the immediate!  We can’t see the person near us who is speaking, we can barely keep a decent conversation going with sincere dialogue, or even respond to the child who needs just five minutes of our time.  But even more than these, we miss quiet moments with God.  

As we do all our multitasking, what we become frustrated with, and how we handle it comes right out of our mouth!  We’ve opened the door to let satan stick his foot in.  We haven’t even noticed, because we’re frustrated with what we’re doing.  As time inches on, another project sets us in a fit.  We aren’t able to concentrate, and that frustration level, just keeps building ---and satan is giddy with glee. 

SENDING SIGNALS

The Holy Spirit within us, keeps sending us signals to slow down and rethink how we are doing things and how riled we are getting.   But in our aggravation, we again don’t notice.  Meanwhile our blood pressure has climbed, our minds are spinning with alternate ways to accomplish the tasks screaming at us to get done, until we hit the point where we want to just throw everything in front of us!

We arrive home from work and somehow things aren’t any better.  Dinner still needs to be cooked, one of the kids is sick, the car is acting up, another bill has arrived and we just what to have a melt down!

We hit our breaking point and say, ‘God I can’t handle all this! What in the world am I going to do?’  

FOCUSED ON ACCOMPLISHING

We become so focused on accomplishing, that we forget to live. We finally realize over time, we really need to have some kind of way to prioritize the work load, the bills, our social lives, and all that life demands of us…  So where to start?  

WHAT REALLY MATTERS?

That’s when the question hits!  'What really matters!?'  God has been trying to remind us we’ve lost focus on what is important!  Ultimately it’s our spiritual life.  God wants a relationship with us. He created us to talk with Him and he with us! Yet how often do we really s.t.o.p. and just communicate with the Father?  He made us like him for a reason!  He wants relationship, just like your spouse, children and friends!  

The biggest difference is, in a relationship with Christ we can find peace, which no one else can give, and answers to questions no one on the planet can answer like Him.  He’s a miracle worker, a healer and so many things that make living in this world possible.  Even when things are going ‘wonky’ we can know God is right there with us, because He is what really matters.

Photo Credit: Focus On What Matters 

In This Moment

          I sat down to write the other day and just couldn’t do it.  My brain was just mud!  I’d been working for the better part of a week and a half on a curriculum project that took an enormous amount of energy for the intense and tedious content.  My goal, however, was to get it finished.  It wasn’t a deadline a publisher gave me, or anyone else for that matter.  It was me.  I wanted it finished before I did anything else.

PRIORITIES

That said, it made me think about priorities!  After I finished the project, I looked at my list, that for the most part I’d ignored, and thought ‘Oh my goodness, now I have to catch up!  Where in the world am I going to start!?’

CHANGE OF PLANS

The truth is, I closed my computer and basically said, ‘Nope!  It’s not happening. I need some down time.  I’ll begin again tomorrow.’  So I picked up my quilting and just worked on something that calms me and gives me enormous peace!   

Not surprisingly, I was able to come back to the computer with focus and had more ‘fun’ working than I had in days!  It was like I’d been on vacation and felt refreshed when I was back to ‘work’ with my normal schedule.

OVERWHELMED

I wonder, have you ever been so overwhelmed with life you just feel like closing the door on life and walking the other direction?  We have these lists that are 20 items long—or longer —and need to decide what to do next!  Sometimes the list has life altering decisions.  Which bills do we pay this month or/and if I do, can I at least get groceries?  Do I make the Doctor appointment or let it ‘slide’?

TOO MANY DECISIONS

Sometimes, they aren’t life altering, but still important.  There’s another meeting to attend, but someone is sick and you can’t attend, even though you’re the president!  Or volunteers are needed, but the house hasn’t been touched in two weeks.  Or even your soul feels so dry you haven’t felt the Spirit in weeks —or even months, and you can’t see God working in your life. You’re frustrated and just feel empty.

It’s so hard to prioritize everything, so you feel like you need to have a plan! But the plan is pulling you every way at once.  But priorities aren’t necessarily about deciding what’s important. It’s not that each item on the list doesn’t need attention. But not everything can be first.  It’s about deciding what is most important…in this moment!

GOD IS ALWAYS FIRST

As believers we’ve learned to put God first. After that it’s usually family, work, and then everything else—even if it doesn’t always work like that!  Life isn’t always that neat.  

God certainly needs to be first.  This is where we will receive the guidance, strength, and direction we need to follow.

Our families are a huge priority and when one is sick, or in any other way requiring immediate attention, it seems everything else goes on hold.

Our workplace is designed that we also give it priority.  This is the means we have for paying our bills and even seeing to the needs of our families.  But even in this arena, there are days when things go askew.

ADDING REST TO THE EQUATION

And when we add the rest we need, to just function, that too, can be an added element into how we choose our priorities.  I think this is where I was the other day.  I needed rest.  Once I my body and brain caught up, I was again able to look at my priorities and put them in the order in which God is pleased.  

God still remained first.  He is the strength of my day.  God provides for rest in his plan for humanity.  And I’m learning that sometimes trusting Him means putting down the list for a little while, taking a breath, and allowing myself to rest.

Then  with renewed confidence and energy, I can pick it back up—work on that list…one thing at a time—and trust Him with what remains.

Photo Credit: Needing Rest

Making Room

      I’ve heard my sister-in-law say many times over the past years, “I’m downsizing!  I’m not leaving all the stuff behind for my kids to go through the way Mom did!”  

I absolutely adored my mother-in-law.  She was one of the kindest people I knew.  But she did ‘keep things’ …. a lot of things!  As a family, we’ve been years going through all the things she’d kept, and she’s been gone a long time.

HOLDING ON 

My Charles was a lot like his mom in this way….keeping stuff.  “We might need this someday".  Or, "You never know when something like this might come in handy,” he’d say. Charles is gone now and it’s up to me to go through all the ‘stuff’ we’ve collected over 51 years!  It’s a lot!

WHAT TO DO WITH EVERYTHING

It’s hard though.  First when I look at the different rooms, I sigh and think, ‘Where in the world do I even start?' or 'There’s so much history in all this.’

Sometimes looking at a gift from a child or grandchild, or even one given by my mother-in-law all those years ago, completely stunts progress.  Some days it makes me sad, because while it was a nice gift when I received it, I haven’t used it in years.  Still….. it was a gift.

Other times it’s about something we paid good money for!  Or even ‘What if the kids want this later?’ But trying to put ‘that’ object in a box to give to GoodWill, or another place, can cause my heart to break.

I CAN'T KEEP IT ALL

As the days pass, though, I find myself feeling a lot like my sister-in-law.  I can’t possibly keep all this ‘stuff’—- and the truth is, I don’t want to.  Nor do I want to leave it for the kids to have to go through.  I’ve had to do that…and I don’t wish that on someone else!  It’s tedious and just not a good thing to have to do!

But I also find myself saying, ‘I don’t want to spend the rest of my life taking care of all this stuff.’  I’ve learned, ever so slowly, that getting rid of an object doesn’t erase the memory attached to it.  The ‘gift-er’ of the item will always hold a special place in my heart because of the love they gave, not an object.

CLUTTER IN MY HEART

As I ponder these things, I think about the parallel with what I do with the clutter I sometimes have in my heart.  As I pull out the broom and begin sweeping, I can see dust particles of fear, regrets, guilt, old expectations and even things God has asked me to release.  It causes me to ask myself, ‘why am I holding onto these ‘things’ when they’re keeping my heart from healing and growing?'

GIVING AND TAKING BACK

There are times when I’ve given something to God and then find myself reaching out to take it back.  I get all wrapped up in the guilt of something that happened in my youth, with my children, or friends that probably upsets me a lot more than it ever did them, but still ‘stuff’ I remember, —those memories that haunt, even if not intentional!

CAN'T GO BACK

You can’t go back in time and change what’s happened.  I consider my parenthood.  All parents make mistakes…or at least wish they’d handled a situation differently, which might have produced a better outcome.  But there is no going back.  All we can do now is move forward.  

And the best way to move forward is to accept what happened and grow from it, accept forgiveness, even if it’s forgiving ourselves!  

KEEP THE BROOM MOVING

The broom needs to keep sweeping.  ’Clutter’ happens. Fear creeps in, regret settles over, guilt gathers in the corners, all collecting dust!  We don’t even realize it, until we’re tripping over it, just like clutter in our homes.  It’s subtle  Then we notice --and feel like hitting the panic button!

Maybe that’s what I’m learning as I work through my 51 years of ‘stuff’.  Some things need to stay.  Other things need to go!    Our hearts are much the same.  There are things I need to remember, other things I need to learn from, maybe I need to forgive….and some things I need to just release to Jesus!

So I’ll keep sweeping and accept the God’s grace.  He’s a God who forgives …and doesn’t remind me of my failures!  And He’s right there with me as I work through the clutter —-both in my heart and my home.

Photo Credit: Broom 

Trusting God With 'This'

  I know a family who has been struggling with the issue of moving.  Should they move, or should they not?  There are days when both the husband and wife may feel one way, and the next they have changed their minds.  

PROS AND CONS

They have made lists of pros and cons and honestly the lists are fairly balanced.  What one place doesn’t provide in one area, it supplies in another area the first does not.  When the grown children are asked for their opinions, they share their thoughts, and feelings are swayed yet again.  

The struggle became a source of confusion, frustration and on some days even depression!  Yet God is not a God of confusion, he is a God of peace.  Satan is frustrating the matter and causing strife where strife need not be.

NEEDING SOME CLUES!

In exasperation the wife shared she finally prayed that if they were not to move, God would create such difficulties it wouldn’t seem worth the effort, and particularly that her husband would be the one who would see the situation clearly.   

Before this situation was settled, the wife felt an incredible sense of peace.  She no longer felt compelled to tears, with her share of frustration regarding the indecision!  She took God at his word in Scripture. She was believing that God had heard her prayer and that the decision, if she trusted her heart “ears” to God, would recognize His will in the decision she and her husband would eventually make.

GOD KNOWS BEST

I wonder if we sometimes doubt that God is listening when we pray.  Additionally, I wonder if we consider God’s will in matters that are important to us.  Are we so wrapped up in the decision making process, we forget that God knows best?   

We focus on the problem, make the lists of pros and cons like my friends, and then find our minds wavering back and forth so much we are unable to make the decision we are sure is ours to make.  This sounds just like my friends’ issues with their move.  

They found themselves asking other people for advice, wrestling with their own feelings and forgetting that ultimately it’s in the hands of God.  He has a plan that will work perfectly if they allow him.  

ARE YOU WILLING TO SURRENDER?

Ultimately God asked the question “Are you willing to sacrifice ‘this’ for me?  When the wife shared this specific question from God, with very little discussion, the decision was made.  God gave peace that the answer had come.  It was the first night she said, she’d slept the whole night through in ‘she couldn’t remember when’!  

It makes me think of Noah, who had never seen rain or Abraham when he left his homeland for a place he had never been.  God hadn't even told him the destination, but would tell him when he got there!  These men didn’t apply pros and cons for the decision.  God called them to it, and they trusted that call through obedience, giving them the peace and faith to move forward.

GOD’S PEACE IS DIFFERENT

God’s peace changes everything despite what’s going on around us.  When we know we are in His will, perspective (and productiveness) changes.

Abraham and Noah's stories proves God answers prayers.  It wasn’t only about the decision, They (my friends nor the Biblical examples) didn’t suddenly have every detail worked out and didn’t know how or when everything would unfold. But they had peace and trust in the One who held the answer.

Sometimes God’s answer to our prayer isn’t an immediate solution.  Sometimes it’s peace while we wait for the solution.

Photo Credit: Trusting In God 

The Things I Don't Think To Pray About

I woke with a plan!  I was headed for the quilt store and the local farmer’s market.  Energized, I did my morning ‘thing’ and was off.  I didn’t give it much thought because I was counting on going.  It was an outing I’d wanted to take since early in the week.

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Most days I don’t have a set plan, short of my to-do list which is domestic duties and writing.  But I was thinking about how much of what I do, I talk to God about first?

PLANNING THE ‘BIG STUFF’

Certainly the ‘big stuff’ I do discuss with the Lord!  My plan to visit Alaska next year….I’ve discussed that, many times with the Lord.  It’s something that intimidates me and there are so many pieces to the puzzle in planning.  I want direction!  The where, when, exactly how, and funding!  All big pieces.  

CONSIDER THE LITTLE THINGS

But do I ever consider discussing the little things with God?  Those things over which I don’t even process before doing—- I do them out of habit, like my morning routine and breakfast, or how I’ll spend my afternoon, or even what I’ll buy at the grocery store!

There are other things which aren’t so ordinary, but often I don’t give it a huge amount of consideration!  For example, how I spend my time, what I’m going to ‘feed my mind’ today, or how I should spend my funds on my outing —even at the quilt store!  

PRAYING ABOUT THE IMPORTANT THINGS

Sometimes I do ask (and often fret) about am I going where God is leading— or am I staying where it’s comfortable?  Do I obey when I don’t understand? Do I even trust Him over something I have no control?  Is He asking me to surrender something I’m clinging to?

Many of the ‘bigger’ things, which I totally pray about, I then struggle with, because I’m not sure exactly what He’s saying —-and I find myself asking ‘What does this really mean?’ What happens if I do it wrong?’ 

I totally trust Him with my eternity…why in the world is it so hard to trust Him with my every day?

SURRENDERING EVERYTHING TO CHRIST

I’ve learned that to trust Him with my ‘moments’ means giving Him control of my life.  That’s not always easy.  I’m human and I tend to cling to what I know.  And while I know the world (and satan) are going to do everything they can to cause me to make the wrong choice, I have to choose to S.T.O.P. and give a thought to God.  

If I aim to let Him lead, then I have to give Him the reins and say, ‘Lord, lead this team of horses’  — or wheel, if the car works better for you! Either way, they are way out of my control and that’s never a good thing!

TRUSTING HIM WITH ALL DECISIONS

I have to choose to trust Him to take me to a place I’m afraid to go, to face a person who I believe hurt me so we can have an uncomfortable but honest-- conversation, to the checkbook if funds need to be addressed, in front of the TV if what I’m watching is not healthy for me, at the dinner table if food has become my idol and all those other ‘things’ that have a way of ruling what happens in any given day!

CHOICES INSTEAD OF HABITS

Sometimes surrender isn’t dramatic at all.  It’s making choices rather than letting habits and desires control us.  It’s relying on God’s steady hand when things get hard —and trusting Him with our hearts when we don’t understand.  It’s allowing Him to mold us into the people we are meant to be so our relationship with Him deepens into a very real time of worship, as we just sit and soak in His presence.

Photo Credit: I Have A Plan