Learning Along The Way

House of Bread and Busy-ness

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I love words.  I love seeing connections and sharing what I see.

Today I have been pondering how to push back against the busy-ness this Season often brings. Well more like how to push back and not feel bad about saying No or choosing Not to do something.

I’ve been pondering the simplicity of the night when Joseph and Mary came to Bethlehem.  You may know the story well.  Two young newlyweds traveling to his home town to register for the Roman census. They lived in a time when distractions were few but the effort to simply live was huge.  Every aspect of life was more work than we are used to in this present day American culture.  Food, transportation, and lodging all took a lot of time and physical effort.  Simply living truly meant staying alive.

Bethlehem—House of Bread.  Bread of Life.  Basic, foundational needs.  Met simply that we might simply live.

To slow down and take time to reflect is almost an oxymoron in the midst of the busy-ness this Season of the year usually holds.  The end of the year brings its own demands: change in weather, planning for taxes, end of term in school, work parties, school plays, musical performances, shopping for presents, planning for guests coming; I could go on but I’m getting weary reviewing all this!

Today, we are far from simply living as in the journey to the House of Bread for Joseph & Mary and turning the phrase to living simply takes on a different meaning.  It means less stuff, less distractions, and more opportunity to have margin.  We have more freedom to choose today than those young newlyweds had.  But do we use it or do we allow externals to control our internals?

Living simply allows your choices to be choices rather than obligation driven.

How do you get to living simply?  Away from busy-ness and toward the simplicity of Bethlehem?

Examine your motives for saying Yes to things this Season.  If you are feeling driven by externals, by the busy-ness, you may be doing things for the wrong reasons.  It’s okay to say No once in awhile.  Give yourself permission to live simply.  You just might have space to ponder the peace and joy that entered the world at the end of Joseph & Mary’s journey.

If you’re not sure how to start, or want to talk it out, click over to the Contact Me page on my website and we’ll start a conversation to simplify your life!

The Life of Joseph and The Rhythm of Life

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Here’s a word association: The Life of Joseph, the Rhythm of Life, and Bingo.

What do all these things have in common?  At first blush, common threads aren’t obvious but there are a few actually.

When I was a child there was a game show on TV (black & white back then before God invented color, according to my sons!), whose name I don’t remember (age issues showing up again) and there was a clear drum turning with ping pong balls bouncing around.  Each ball had a letter and number on it, somewhat like a Bingo game.  Every once in awhile one ball would roll out of the drum and down a ramp to where it could be picked up and identified.  In recent years in California, a similar system was used for one of the many lottery games.  The anticipation of waiting to see what the ball said was exciting.

My mind has been a lot like that drum lately.  The ideas in my head have been a lot like the ping pong balls bouncing around waiting to roll down the ramp into the foreground of my thoughts to be identified.  The anticipation of what the thoughts mean is almost as exciting as the game show was.

So here’s where The Life of Joseph comes in.  Our pastors have been teaching about the Life of Joseph all through the Fall.  I love how much depth and application these men show us each week.  You will definitely learn a lot if you click the link and listen.  But there has been this random ping pong ball idea bouncing around in my head that has formulated itself into a question.

Here it is: If Joseph could trust God so thoroughly, why can’t we?

He didn’t have the Bible in print or on his computer, smart phone or tablet.  He didn’t have Bible studies or small groups or the fellowship of other believers.  He didn’t have commentaries to study or a plethora of books to read about Who God Is and How to Know God.

He simply trusted.

Perhaps God was more obvious to Joseph because he had less-distractions?  He was in a pit and in prison for quite awhile.

How can we have less-distractions in this day and age? This is where the idea ball named Rhythm of Life comes down the ramp in my mind.

If we make time alone with God a priority and we plan for this time in each day as an appointment on our calendar, then we are actively choosing to make God a priority and push back against the tide of distractions that threaten to overwhelm us daily.

My google calendar says Coffee with Jesus from 6 am to 7 am daily.  It is a starting point.  Pick a time that you like.  Make it a date.  Write it on your calendar.  Show up.

Guaranteed He will too.

Thankful for Meltdowns?

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Today’s blog post is being written in the back seat of a rental car hurtling through California eastward toward Utah. Gotta love technology!

Spent the morning working down my to do list. Getting things prepped for our trip and simultaneously battling the temptation to allow the ticking clock to ruin my focus on being thankful.

The battle really isn’t obvious (for the most part), but is internal; fought on the battlefield of the mind. That’s the place where I, where we, can make choices. Do we believe time controls us or do we believe the One who controls time? God invites us to be at peace in His abiding Presence at the same moment as the ticking clock tries to distract us.

I don’t always make the restful choice; for about 15 minutes today I had a meltdown. The issue was a missing wallet and a time obligation colliding. True confession: I have too many purses. Good thing for me I keep them all hanging on parallel racks on the back of the closet door so it’s easy to switch from one to another. Except when I don’t use a purse at all just to confuse things and keep me on my organizational toes. That was my recent mistake. So I didn’t know where I had put said wallet. Clock ticking. friend waiting. Peace slipping away.

I stood in my closet and cried. Out loud I apologized to the Lord; telling Him I was wrong to launch in to this hunt without asking Him first where that errant wallet was hiding. Sniffing, I went back downstairs, looking through my office where I had already hunted and come up empty. I knelt down to look through a basket, again, and saw the illusive wallet peaking out of the pocket of my briefcase.

Was it the position of bowing low and slowing down or the tearful acknowledgment of my control issues that helped me see? Either or both. Whatever it took for the Lord to get my attention was good. I smiled, thanked Him for directing my steps and moved ahead.

When you are thankful during this Thanksgiving week, who are you thankful to?

Rhythm of Life

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When I asked my husband, who is a trained percussionist, this question: How important is rhythm to being a percussionist? He looked at me with this quizzical expression, but he humored me and responded seriously, “Rhythm is essential.  You can’t be a successful percussionist without a good sense of rhythm.”  I pressed a little further: Can rhythm be learned or is it innate?  He said, “No one gets all the variations of rhythm without practice.  Rhythm takes practice.”

Rhythm provides the structure to music that all else in the piece is built upon.  Interestingly, what is true of music is true of our lives.

Our pastor uses the phrase, “Rhythm of life”.  I’ve pondered the meaning and implications of that phrase for awhile now.

Rhythms can vary.  Just like seasons.  But even in the repeating of the seasons there is rhythm and it is comforting to our souls.

Rhythm to your day, the regular habits of thought and action that turn your mind and heart toward God are what the phrase is about I think.

It’s a pattern but not a rigid pattern; not a legalistic way of going about your day. Although there are those individuals who are very disciplined and their structure does not vary even to the minute.  That’s not what I am talking about here.

Rhythm of life is more about the big ideas, elements, that fill your days.

Ironically we often move through our day driven by the clock, the external keeper of  rhythm rather than by an internal intention or rhythm.  Time and again I hear people say things like: ‘I just don’t know where the time goes’ or ‘I don’t have time for …’

We are all given 24 hours to steward.  What we do with the time is up to us.  Of course there are fixed and variable elements in our lives that must be attended to: people, work, sleep, food; but it is often the intangible elements that give us pause when they’re missing: time with God, creativity in some form, mental rest.

If you are feeling out of sorts or driven by the clock without a break, I encourage you to make an assessment of your days.  Write down how you spent your time at the end of the day.  Do that for three days.  Look at what fills your time.  Now comes the hard part.

Change.

If there are things in your day that don’t have to be there: tv watching, internet surfing, excessive texting or tweeting, excessive time on the phone; make some changes.  To make rhythm adjustments change has to happen.  To make room for the intangibles some tangibles have to go.

In Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus he tells them about change.  “These former ways of living, don’t work for you any longer.  Put those off.  Instead, put these on.” (the Message)

What are “these” that Paul was referring to?  What are the things on your list that don’t work for you any longer?

 

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