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The busyness of life

I have the pleasure of spending a couple hours at a new coffee shop in downtown Lufkin this morning. I've needed this. The peace and quite of it is comforting. The serenity of my mind when I just take a few hours and relax is an incredible feeling.

I've been in America 3 days short of a month and I am overwhelmed with the busyness of life here. It's crazy. It's like people are running a race every single day. Here is a picture of one typical day: we wake up thinking about everything we have to do today, take a shower or get ready for work, grab a cup of coffee and head to work, work all day, then run errands like visiting the bank or buying groceries. We try to fit in a work out, then head home where we pick up around the house, cook dinner, clean the kitchen, put the kids to bed, prepare what's necessary for work the next day, spend some time with your spouse, take a shower, and go to bed with all the thoughts of what you have to do tomorrow. Geez, I'm exhausted just thinking about it.

Now obviously it's different for each unique person, but you get the idea. Maybe you don't have a spouse or kids, but like me, you have friends that you spend time with that fill up that time in the day. The point is that life in America is generally BUSY. There is always something that needs to get done. I've set in this coffee shop for about an hour and a half and probably 50 people have come and gone. Some have come to get a to-go cup of coffee and some have come to visit with friends but it's all the same, these people are in and out so quick because they are on an agenda. There is something else to do.

I'm reading this book called, "The Battlefield of the Mind," by Joyce Meyer. It talks about how the condition of our mind effects the actions we take each day. For example, I woke up today and thought about the things I needed to do. Workout, eat lunch with Meme and my niece Kyla, go to Nacogdoches with Mom, do some stuff for work, write some Christmas cards, spend some time in the word, figure our dinner plans, etc. I started my day and realized one of the last things on my agenda today was spending time in the Word. So, I took a right into downtown Lufkin instead of going straight and stopped at the new coffee shop. I restructured my day because of the thoughts in my head. Luckily, the Spirit urged me to the conclusion of spending time in the Word first. Most days, I wake up and start thinking and my time in the Word is left to the end of the day where I get so BUSY I can't find time for it.

What are YOU thinking about each day? As I've said, our actions reflect busyness, but our actions stem from the thoughts in our mind. If my actions are busy, what does that say about my mind? If you're like me, you can think about hundreds of different things in one single minute.I can think 100 times faster than I can move, so I asked myself this morning, WHAT IS HAPPENING IN MY MIND?

I read this quote in the book and it convicted me to the core. "The Holy Spirit desires to bring us this enlightenment, but the mind often misses what the spirit is attempting to reveal because it is too busy. A mind that is too busy is abnormal. The mind is normal when it is at rest--not blank, but at rest." By saying "normal" she doesn't mean "common", she means the correct condition of the mind.

I was struck in two ways:
  1. My mind is ridiculously busy, therefore, I'm not in the right condition of mind.
  2. I pray and pray and pray to hear the Lord's voice, and get frustrated when I don't. I realize now that it's not that He's not speaking to me, it's that my mind is so incredibly busy that I can't hear Him.
Then I started thinking, when do I hear the voice of God more? When am I led by the Spirit more? And it's always when my mind is at peace. I'm always either in nature, sitting in a coffee shop with my headphones in, or driving down the road listening only to the sound of the pavement. It's when I can block out all the distractions of life and focus on calming my mind.

I'm convicted this morning because I know that I think about the world far more often than I should. This causes me to move about in this world in a crazy fast-paced motion missing out on the simplicity and divine enlightenment I should be receiving. Satan has victory because he has filled my mind with the irrelevant stuff and I miss God's still small voice.

Often times, I find myself living in this world as if it's my true home. It's not. I am taking a stand today to fight the busyness of my mind with the stillness of the Spirit. I encourage you to do so as well.

Comments

  1. Good post. Jesus often withdrew to solitary, or lonely places. And He prayed.

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