Thanks to those of you who have already responded to my last post, Back to the Basics. This is a response to one of the comments on that blog. Someone asked “How exactly do you intend to shift your focus from your to do list to Jesus? What do you intend to do differently?” Thanks for responding and that is a great question!
I first want to mention that I don’t think to-do lists are bad in and of themselves. I think writing out a list of things that need to get done is a helpful tool and very useful. I don’t think I will ever stop doing that as a way to stay organized and on task. But like any good thing can, my to-do lists often take the place of Jesus in my life.
It sounds funny to think I could make a to-do list an idol in my life, but it happens regularly. Here are some lyrics from the song “Clear the Stage” by a friend of ours, Ross King:
Anything I put before my God is an idol.
Anything I want with all my heart is an idol.
Anything I can’t stop thinking of is an idol.
Anything that I give all my love is an idol.
We must not worship something that’s not even worth it.
Clear the stage and make some space for the one who deserves it.
(Wow do I love that song!) “Anything I can’t stop thinking of is an idol…” Often that is all I am thinking about in a day: what’s next on my to do list. How can I get more done? When is Lively going to sleep so I can get things 2,3, and 5 done on my list. I will choose to be productive rather than sit with God. And I often long to get everything done way more than I long to get to know God more. Unfortunately, all these things point to my list being an idol in my life.
This doesn’t mean I can’t ever make a list ever again. Jimmy has also been an idol in my life, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be married to him. It just means I have to always to make sure that God is still on the throne of my life and my number one priority because everything else is always trying to take His place.
So, how does a list-a-holic keep Jesus the focus of her day? Before I write out some practical ways that I do this, I wanted to mention that first and foremost it is a heart attitude that keeps Jesus central, not a step-by-step program.
The story of Mary and Martha in Luke 10 is the best picture of what it looks like to be focused on Jesus rather than focused on doing. Mary is sitting and listening to Jesus and Martha is busy getting her home ready for Jesus. Martha had great intentions in all her busyness, but the Bible says she was “distracted.” Distracted from what? From Jesus! But Mary had her whole attention on Him and was resting at His feet. The question for list-a-holics like me is always this: “Well then, does that mean I sit around and do nothing all day but pray and read the Bible? Practically I can’t do that. There are actually things that have to get done.”
The book “Grace Walk” by Steve McVey gave me great insight into this. Here is a quote from the book:
Jesus could have said to Martha, “Now calm down. What you are doing is good, but what Mary is doing is important too. Both serving and resting have their proper place. Martha, you need to learn balance.” Yet that isn’t what He said. Instead, He said, “But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.” How many things? One thing is needed–resting in Him. Does this statement minimize the importance of serving Jesus? Not at all. How do you suppose Mary would have responded if Jesus had asked her to bring Him a glass of water? She would have immediately have spring into action. On the other hand, if He had asked Martha for a glass of water, she might not have even heard Him because she was too busy making His bed–and He wasn’t even sleepy! Do you see the point? Resting in Christ is the sole responsibility of the Christian. Everything else flows out of that.
The point is this: when you choose to daily keep your focus on Jesus, He will clearly lead you in everything else. And instead of wasting your time on frivolous things that won’t matter in the end, you will spend all your time on important things that do matter because you are being directed by Jesus. I don’t want to be so distracted with my to-do list that I can’t hear the direction Jesus is giving me. I want to rest in Him and in His peace, knowing that as I do that, He will help me accomplish everything that actually needs to get done. It might not be everything I wanted to get done, but it will be exactly what He wanted for me that day. And after all, Jesus knows way better than me the best way to spend my day.
So in light of that, here are a few things that I do to try and stay seated at Jesus’s feet all day and keep myself from being a frantic Martha:
SET APART TIME WITH GOD AND HIS WORD FIRST
This is by far the most important thing for me. If I just start my day doing, doing, doing, it will be 4pm before I know it and I haven’t thought of God once. But if I dedicate some time for reading my Bible and journaling in the first part of my day, even if only for 15 minutes, that makes a huge difference. This time is a refocusing time. Every morning I wake up with my default set on myself and the things of this world, which is a product of living with indwelling sin and in a world that doesn’t revolve around Jesus. So I have to intentionally change my default setting in my mind by refocusing on more eternal things that I can’t see. “So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” (2 Corin 4:18) It is very unnatural to focus on things that are unseen. It doesn’t happen by accident, it takes effort. That’s why it’s so important for me to have time to refocus my mind on my unseen God. Reading the Bible is key because it is 100% truth (2 Tim 3:16) that I can count it. It is also living and active (Heb 4:12) and gives me ammunition for the day to fight off things that threaten to take my focus off of Jesus. Then spending time communicating with God through writing helps me to not just gain head knowledge but communicate with Him about what is on my heart and mind and ask for help in those situations.
Side note: Being a mom now has caused me to have to rethink when I spend my time with God. My days often start out with a crying baby that needs my attention which doesn’t always allow for the very first part of my day to be dedicated to reading the Bible. So I have been setting apart her morning nap time for my time with God. It is still pretty early in the day and allows me some time to myself to really refocus and connect with God. Whatever your situation is, if it is unreasonable for you to spend the first part of your day in the Bible, get creative and find a solution that works for you. Do anything you can that helps to refocus and reset your default to Jesus instead of self in the early part of your day.
STOP AND PRAY
I need little check-points throughout my day to help me keep my focus on Jesus. It could be an alarm on my phone that just reminds me to spend 3-5 minutes reconnected with God or singing a worship song or re-reading a favorite verse from what I read that morning. It’s amazing how 2 or 3 check-points in a day keep my eyes fixed on Him. It is also important for me to pray about things as they are happening. Just having an attitude of prayer about all the menial tasks in my day reminds me that life is ultimately about sitting and listening to Jesus as He directs my day.
USING MY SCHEDULE TO MY ADVANTAGE
Currently, I am still nursing my 8 month old daughter. This means that there are times in my day when I am sitting in silence in her room nursing her. I will often use this time to my advantage to pray for others, sing worship songs to myself, or memorize scripture. It is built in down time in my day that I can use! Maybe for you it is a morning and evening commute you can use to stay focused on Jesus. Listen to worship music or a Christian podcast while you shower and get ready. Again find creative ways to use time that is already built in to your schedule.
PODCASTS: REVIVE OUR HEARTS
This is a personal favorite of mine. While doing a task that is somewhat mindless in my day (laundry, dishes, unpacking boxes, etc), I will listen to my favorite podcast, Revive Our Hearts. These are 28 minute episodes of a radio program run by Nancy Leigh DeMoss. Not only are they fun to listen to, but give me spiritual food for thought in my day. It is another tool for keeping my focus in the right place. There are many great podcasts out there and radio programs that could serve this function, and they are all free!
WRITING MY TO DO LISTS IN MY JOURNAL
I have started doing this in the last few months. Instead of using a separate piece of paper for my lists, I will write them in my prayer journal. This way, I can have an attitude of prayer when trying to decide how to spend my day. I can also write out everything I think needs to get done or that I want to do, and then ask God what He thinks is and isn’t important. I admit, I don’t hear a voice from heaven saying do this and don’t do that. But doing this has definitely given me more sensitivity to God’s Spirit inside me to be more discerning about how I should spend my day. It also helps me to hold my list more loosely knowing that God might have other plans for me that day.
I would love to hear what you do to keep Jesus your focus throughout the day. Feel free to add your comment to this post and let me and everyone else know. Here’s to keeping Jesus our focus today! Nothing else is more important!
Tag Archives: Revive our hearts
Review: “A Place of Quiet Rest”
For some time now I have been meaning to blog about recent books I have read and would recommend. I am always glad to hear of book recommendations from friends, and in the same way, I hope that some of you may find these posts helpful. Maybe you will be inspired and pick up some new books to read.
If you have read my blog regularly, you might recognize the name “Nancy Leigh DeMoss.” I listen to her podcast, Revive Our Hearts, almost daily and believe whole-heartedly in her ministry. Nancy and Revive Our Hearts, in my opinion, are unequaled in their Biblical perspective of womanhood. Today, I just finished her book, A Place of Quiet Rest. In this book, Nancy tackles the topic of having a daily quiet time, or daily devotional time with God. She presents an overarching and in-depth view of this important spiritual discipline. Beginning of the book, she reminds us that time alone with God was a part of Jesus’ daily life, and thus should also be a part of our day to day. From there she moves to a discussion of the multiple purposes of a daily devotional life, which is a refreshing reminder to prevent us from getting stuck in a purposeless routine.
One of my favorite chapters deals solely with the reasons we find it hard to cultivate a consistent time with God. After surveying a couple hundred women, Nancy deals with their most common reasons for not having a quiet time, most of which I identified with myself. It’s always refreshing to see that there are others who share the same struggles you have, and yet be challenged on how to push through and gain victory in that area.
But by far, my favorite section of the book is one that focuses on the Word of God. From simply delighting in the great joy the Word of God is, to describing step-by-step how to study it, I greatly enjoyed this multi-faceted assessment of the Bible and the great importance that it has in our lives as follower of Christ. I believe that learning and studying the Bible is key to our growth, and so to see such focus on it in this book is so encouraging!
The purpose of the book is not to be a step-by-step how-to guide to a quiet time, but rather a “gentle nudge on every page, a pointing-in-the-right-direction in every chapter,” as Joni Eareckson Tada wrote in the forward. It is a discussion on cultivating intimacy with God and an encouragement to make this a priority. Yet, at the same time, Nancy gives many great practical suggestions and guidelines that you can grab onto and implement immediately.
Most of all, I am grateful that this book left me without any excuse not to meet with God every day, even with a 1 month old. It was a refreshing reminder of the incredible privilege I have to fellowship with my Creator and the truth that everything else really can wait. If getting alone with God on a regular basis is a challenge for you, I hope you will pick up a copy of this book!
Next book on the horizon for me… ” The Feminist Mistake” by Mary Kassian.
Dignity and Sanctity of the Home
First things first.
This is the attitude I have had for the last few weeks that has lead to an absence of blog posts. It all started with the True Woman conference in Ft. Worth a couple weekends ago. This incredible women’s conference put on by Revive Our Hearts, a ministry run by Nancy Leigh DeMoss, challenged, encouraged, and inspired me in so many ways. While I walked away with many things, the biggest was a strong conviction about the importance of cultivating our home.
Unfortunately, I had not realized the way that our home and family had slowly become second place to other ministry goals and priorities outside our home. I guess I had justified this because we don’t have kids yet and it’s just Jimmy and me. Maybe it was also because Jimmy travels so much it seems I am the only one at home a good portion of the time. Whatever my reasoning, God has called me to be a cultivator of our home, I had been abstaining from my role in this area.
Although my first reaction was to come home and blog about the conference, I knew that I first needed to get my priorities straight through a few practical things. The first order of business was to clean our home. Unfortunately, it had been several months since I had intentionally cleaned our house. I had created a habit of simply cleaning an area when it got out of hand. Secondly, I began de-clutter and decorate our house in some small ways I had been putting off. Thirdly, I set our kitchen table and begin looking for recipes to cook that week. Again, justifying my actions because it is just Jimmy and me and I have a full time job, I had not been cooking meals at all. Cereal, hot dogs, and frozen pizzas had become our regular dinner meals.
These things may seem like small, menial changes, but I think they make a huge difference in the atmosphere of our home. When I think about my house growing up, I see how these little things made my house a place of life and peace. My mom always kept the house relatively clean and cooked on a regular basis and overall cultivated the atmosphere of our home. Although I might not have noticed those things every day, it created an overall environment of welcoming warmth that was attractive and wonderful to come home to. It made our house a sanctuary I looked forward to walking in to after a long day filled with peer pressure and hard classes. I truly believe that her small efforts in the care of our home made a big difference in my well-being as I was growing up.
Just because we don’t have kids yet, doesn’t mean that my husband is not important enough to also deserve this kind of home to come back to. He has never complained once about the lack of meals or general uncleanliness, but he is noticeably more excited about coming home when those things are in place. God has designated women as the primary influencers in our homes, and that is a role that I had slowly begun to abdicate.
Thanksfully, I am now beginning to understand and take seriously the dignity and the sanctity of the home. Devi Titus explains the dignity and sanctity of the home well in her book, “The Home Experience” (a great book I purchased at the conference):
“The dignity of the home is seeing and experiencing its worth by those who are touched by it. Webster says dignity means “worthy of recognition due to a change in character and appearance.” Combining worth with character and appearance defines dignity. A home that has dignity sets standards in order and creativity with the godly characteristics of love, honesty, and loyalty. The sanctity of the home is its purity in heart and purpose – its wholeness and holiness in tone and mood. home is a duet of devotion and worth – devotion to God while valuing one another. Home is the sanctuary for the human soul to be recharged, renewed, refreshed, and restored. Home should be our most treasured asset. however, more and more women are devoting much of their energy to pursuits outside the home. Unfortunately, the ambitions of “earning a higher education” and “pursuing a career” have undermined home values, priorities, and interests.”
Though I would have liked to have blogged more in these past two weeks, I am glad to have put first things first: namely our home. What good is it to be an excellent and frequent blogger, or an excellent minister to the high schoolers I work with, if I have forsaken investing in the very thing that is the basis for human development and the home base for our family? Gratefully, my priorities are back in line, as they should be: God first, family second, everything else following.
