i wanted to dive deeper into my commitments for 2010 & i wanted to bring you along for the ride. please feel free to share any thoughts, suggestions, comments, encouragements or questions as we go along.
3. use my time well:
the life, death & resurrection of christ has drastically changed my life: my life now & for eternity. shouldn't the way i use my time reflect that?
i've been putting off this post because i don't know how to articulate my thoughts on the subject. its not that i don't have anything to say...it's that i have so much to say. in my head i have a big mess of thoughts & questions that i'm just not quite sure how to eloquently, accurately, effectively spill it all out to you.
using my time "well" is such a challenge for me. i don't miss deadlines or forget major events but in the day-to-day i often feel overwhelmed & disorganized. it isn't as if i don't have a planner & a list mapping every last second out {because i do} but i live in this crazy & strange paradox. i have 1,000,000 things to do & read & plan & prepare & clean & buy & make. meetings to go to, people to see, places to be.
the majority of what i spend my time doing are things that i love, things i feel called to, & things that are "good." i often keep myself so busy "doing" that i don't leave time for things that are of the utmost importance to me - like spending time in the presence of the Lord, spending time in the Word, spending time in prayer. what makes it all the more complex is that i long and covet these times of freedom where i don't have things planned where i could literally do anything i want & yet when those moments present themselves, i don't want to do anything. i don't want to get things done off my list, i don't want to learn or serve or cook or tidy or read or any of the ga-gillion of things that i SAY i would love to do...if only i had the time. i end up wasting the tiny precious seconds that i left open by watching trash tv or sleeping.
i know that the Lord is clear and concise in what is most important to Him - that we love Him with all our heart & that we love people. somehow it gets all twisted up when i actually try and live it out. i have not figured out the balance. i have not concocted a plan. i am committed to working on it though. i am committed to using my time well, not wasting precious moments made for me to sit in the presence of the Lord and not running myself ragged just to be a "do-er". i often tell myself Jesus was pleased while mary sat at His feet remember? not by martha's completion of many tasks.
what do you do when you desire to be the woman:
who sits for hours at the feet of the Lord,
who wears down the floor because she kneels before Christ so often
who is a disciple
who lives out ministry daily & gives her life away to those she's been entrusted with
who is a missionary
who has super close girlfriends of her own that she spends bundles of time with
who has a happy, healthy, christ-centered marriage where we spend genuine & authentic time together
who can do things that she enjoys like learn to cook, bake, create, decorate & sew
who runs
who gives
who reads & learns
who works {out of necessity}
who leads & teaches
who dances & plays & rejoices
who cares for peoples
who spends time with her family
who goes on trips & sees the world with her friends, fam &/or husband
who celebrates with those who celebrate & mourns with those who mourn
how can you be all of that & do all of that & keep your sanity....or sleep....ever? are there really enough hours in the day or even days in the week!? i don't want to look back & see a wasted life. but i don't want to lose my mind either.
i know that everyone is different. what one person can handle would drive another crazy, one person needs certain boundaries and another family needs none at all. i know that i can sometimes feel burnt out & i am regularly very tired. i know that i am far less social than i was a year ago {i don't do less social things, but i get less excited about doing them}. i feel like i still have the same heart, just a different kind of life. working all week leaves me drained in the evenings but every evening is filled just the same. i fill them myself. if they weren't filled i would most likely waste them as i mentioned above.
i know i am rambling...i told you i didn't know how to talk about this #3. so the moral of the story is that i'm a little lost. i just know that i want to use my time well. i want to figure out what it means to live a life worthy of the calling i have recieved {eph 4:1}, i
if you've read this far, bless your heart & your weary little eyes! please feel free to shed some light, insight or even just some fellowship into this dilemma.
{links to things you may have missed}
Amen! Darling, you are not alone. That has been the dilema of the working woman since we started thinking we needed careers and could balance work, home, children and family. Think of how difficult the lives of others are who aren't so grounded in their faith. They are just as busy but they aren't striving for that special relationship with Christ. Busy doing junk or busy with responsibilites and running after the Lord! I'll take the latter any day of the week!
ReplyDeletedearest jen, i just love these posts. all of them have been so relevant to me and exactly how i feel. i wish there was an easy answer or a plan that someone could come up with that would allow us to have more time to do these things or to prioritize our time better but i think it just takes lots of practice and patience and trial-and-error (unfortunately). but we're still young and we're still learning and i hope by the time i'm a pretty, wrinkled old grandma that i'll have done all of these things and more and learned how to be a woman whose sole purpose is to spend time with and glorify the Lord through all of it!
ReplyDeleteSweet Jen, I love this post, and to be honest it nailed me right between the eyes. I have been trying to sort through the exact same dilemma to a T, and I find myself completely exhausted. I try to think back on the times when I have tried doing it on my own and how that never really gets me very far as a reminder of how much I need Christ to lean on and speak to my heart in every area of my life. I take on way too much way too often, and I was so encouraged and blessed to read what you wrote here. :) Thanks for inspiration today!
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