Living in the D.C. metro area, it is all too common for me
to talk with people who are constantly busy, always on the move, forever having
a full calendar that doesn’t include a lunch break or any kind of break for that matter. And I myself am VERY guilty of
this. Living a life constantly on the go, without margin, means that I am
living a life where I am not giving God any space in my life to move. If I have
an overloaded calendar without any time to rest and recharge, how am I ever
going to have time to truly speak
with God and lay out all of my cares and concerns. How am I going to praise Him
for all of the amazing things He HAS done in my life?
My friend Naomi sends me daily devotionals to my e-mail and
yesterday she sent me one about building margin in your life. This hit me hard!
So much so that I felt a need to share it with all of you:
A lot of people are on overload and headed for a crash. We sleep
less and work more than ever before. We're a piled-on, stretched-to-the limit
society - chronically rushed, chronically late, chronically exhausted. Many of
us feel like Job did when he said, "I have no peace! I have no quiet! I
have no rest! And trouble keeps coming." (Job 3:26 GWT)
Overload comes when we have too
much activity in our lives, too much change, too many choices, too much work,
too much debt and too much media exposure.
Author and medical doctor
Richard Swenson says, "The conditions of modern day living devour margin.
If you're homeless, we direct you to a shelter. If you're penniless, we offer
you food stamps. If you're breathless, we connect you to oxygen."
"But if you're marginless,
we give you one more thing to do. Marginless is being thirty minutes late to
the doctor's office because you were twenty minutes late getting out of the
hairdresser because you were ten minutes late dropping the children off at
school because the car ran out of gas two blocks from a gas station, and you
forgot your purse. That's marginless."
You need margin in your life.
When you're not hurrying and worrying all the time, you have time to think.
Time to relax. Time to enjoy life. Time to be still and know that God is God.
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| Living a life without margin means that I would miss too many sights just as beautiful as this. |
Can you examine your life and find a place to create margin?
If you do, I know that God will use that time to do amazing things in your
life. He just needs space to do it. I am committed to creating margin in my
life, to finding time daily to rest and talk with God. To clear my mind of the
harmful thoughts that are of this world, I would rather focus on Him who is not
of this world. Through Him all things are possible (Matthew 19:26).
Linking up for Totally Posted Tuesday.
Linking up for Totally Posted Tuesday.
Love this, and it's so true! The sermon in church on Sunday talked about how we live in a society where we have to have one more thing, do one more thing, accomplish one more thing, etc. We struggle to be in a place where just being with God is enough.
ReplyDeleteThis is beautiful! Thanks for linking up honey :)
ReplyDeleteI cannot live life without some time to just think and relax. i don't care whats going on I will create that time for myself!
ReplyDeleteAwesome encouragement... thanks for such a sweet reflection... I love reading your inspirational posts. :)
ReplyDeletexo, Abby @ Always, Abby
Not only is this a great lesson... but OMG I live in the DC metro area too!!!
ReplyDeleteI very much agree with this, and I was feeling really overloaded and overwhelmed last week and the week before. I had to take a step back and re-assess things so that I could find that margin and find peace and relaxation. This is a wonderful post, thanks for sharing Lindsay!
ReplyDelete