“Work willingly at whatever you do, as though you were working for the Lord rather than for people. Remember that the Lord will give you an inheritance as your reward, and that the Master you are serving is Christ.â Colossians 3:23-24
I remember watching as long shadows were cast against the gravel driveway on the school playground as we worked to balance our tiny elementary-sized selves on the see-saw. Sitting across from my sister we scooted forward and back, watching each other shift until we struck a balance, a rhythm, a stride. Once we hit it we could both hover in the air, above ground, defying gravity. It felt wondrous in the moment, but in order to get there we had to keep our eyes on each other, and our focus on the task at hand. After all the hard work, it was such a delight, even if only for a fleeting moment, to feel like we belonged in the sky.
Life feels a bit like a balancing act lately. Everyone going in multiple directions, work feeling like a hit or miss, stressing over things that donât need stress and forgetting things that should not be forgotten. Itâs easy in all the whiz-bang of life to feel like as much as you want to strike a happy medium, something somewhere gets shifted and falls, flailing to the ground. (I can still feel the plummet back to earth in my stomach when someone jumped off the teeter-totter, remember that? It was the worst!)Â
What if we were never meant to balance it all?
We can spend our days trying to achieve everything and still not get the outcome we want. I think that’s excruciatingly telling. Truth is, we can’t balance it all. Some things are more important than others, and those things deserve the priority of our attention. Other things need to be let go of, if in the end they only serve to distract us. What we do for God isn’t about balancing things for him, but instead learning to prioritize him. At the end of our lives, our relationship with God, and what we do for him and with himâŠ.is really all that matters, because itâs all that lasts. Everything else, needs to get behind Him.
The above passage from Colossians admonishes us, what we do with our lives, we are actually doing unto God. Everything else, even if it is urgent (interuption urgent, not emergency urgent) holds potential for distraction. And thatâs where the hold up, gets held up. Weâre too focused on people pleasing, or getting stuff done when in reality we need to be focused on pleasing God. God is the one thing that we need to be concerned with honoring, loving, blessing, working and living for. Not the balancing act, and not the noise of the crowd.
When we live in intimacy with God, our every act of life becomes an act of surrender, of worship and of being led towards him. We want what God wants, the way he wants it and surrender with trust wholeheartedly to his timing. When it comes down to it, we learn to honor him because we love him, and want to give him priority.
As a final note, I just want to say we are under grace as we (all of us, myself included) work this out. I know that we can’t spend our days laying on the floor listening to worship music and hoping the dishes watch themselves and deposit after deposit miraculously gets added to our bank account. Life needs to happen. But I am suggesting that prioritizing God bleeds into every aspect of our lives…..he’s with us when we work, when we play, and yes even when we do dishes. Ultimately, placing him at the center is the only way everything else is going to get balanced. We hold onto him, and he holds it all together.
Much love,
Joy
PS…..if you need to take a moment to further process what prioritizing your relationship with God looks like, give yourself the grace to do exactly that. If something needs to get shifted or changed, then do the work to follow through. If you need to set aside time to journal or talk to a trusted friend, then do it. And, if God is putting his finger on something that needs attention, be quick to follow through. Your walk with God is worth it friend, so much love to you!