Monday, January 5, 2015

When You Want To Go Deeper


Come sit by me and let’s talk.

Have you been thinking about it too?

This contemplating of moving forward into the noisy, first full week of the brand New Year. And it's already biting at your heels with it's cold wind and crushing demands, but you want to be more intentional than you were last year?


And do you quietly wonder if you will spend the next 360 days caught in the exhausting, monotonous pattern of doing things that don’t spark life in your soul and merely reacting to the daily-ness of your existence with all of its normal pressures?

Yeah, me too.

Just last week I fell in bed, fired up about setting healthy boundaries and not just being the answer to someone else’s current crisis. The next morning the sweetest lady in the whole world called me and asked if her little Chihuahua could come stay with me for a few days.  Just as the words, “I’m sorry, no….,” were leaving my lips she added, “My husband passed away.”

I’ll admit that stuff I wanted to do the night before, just went running out the front door.

So that is the hard thing isn't it? Yes, we all definitely need to say no to some more things that seem like very good commitments. But how do we discern what are God-interruptions from plain old energy consuming distractions?

As you can imagine I don’t have a corner on this, but I do believe that the only way to have wisdom and discernment on any day is to spend time with Jesus.

Long before 2014 had finished, I felt the not-so-subtle moving in my life to release things that were all good, but not the best. Things I have done year after year. Things that quite honestly, are a step of faith to walk away from.

The fact is and will always, always be: every commitment, takes away from something else.

I need wisdom so that at the end of the day, or week, or year, or my whole life….. that I don’t waste it all doing good things, even great things, but miss the very things that God really has for me.

Well, that is my heart anyway. 

I’m feeling the urgency of the hour. And a calling to come into some new territory.

What I have been doing is narrowing the focus of things and going deeper in those things.

It might sound unpleasant, but if I were to go home to heaven this year, there are so many things that really do. not. matter. and that no one, ever, will be impacted by, which I have given great energy, time, and resources to.

No one has time for that.

But what if. 

What if this year were the year that you and I made some small shifts in how we do a few things?

What if we sifted through the rubble of what did not work last year? 

What if we held up to the Light, our thoughts, and motives behind things that drove us a little crazy? 

What if we identified one or two things that stole our energy and our resources?

What if we repented to God about the things that are pouring out of our earnest hearts and start the year, not by ‘hit-the-ground-running,’ mentality that we often think of, but that we would make it a priority to stop, bow down before the Holy God and get quiet.

What if?

What if we started this year, not with resolutions or even One Word, which can be helpful, but they have no power in and of themselves?

The One who has the power is Jesus and He would love for you and me to bring our time and hearts-humbled to Him. There we can lay out our hopes, dreams, and concerns. And when we pray we are talking to the One who can do something about all those details.

The most amazing thing?

God knows what the future holds.

So as we step into the freshness of a new calendar, filled with the hope of brand-new beginnings and glistening with a promise of better things, do you want to join me in writing out a Prayer for 2015?

Prayer is the most intentional, proactive thing we can do and the very best investment in time and eternity we can make.

And if we write out a prayer, we can look back and see how God moves on our behalf.

Before you go, I should tell you. 

In December, I was praying, asking the Lord to give me my One Word for 2015. 

It was early in the month and I thought maybe the word would come to me sometime over the next few weeks. Not even a minute had passed when this word came quietly into my thoughts.

Deeper.



I was instantly telling the Lord that I really didn't like that word.

There were a few things that came immediately to mind. 

None of them were good. 

For example, there was the time I swallowed more chlorinated water than is good for anyone body while taking Lifeguard Training. 

Yeah, I could not drag the #25-pound weight off the drain at the deep end.

Deeper make me think of drowning.

But that morning, as I prepared for the day, it was as if the Lord unpacked why He was giving me that word. 

To sum it up as best I can, it was as if He was telling me to do a few things well instead of doing many things marginally.

So I’m shaking a bit. 

Stepping off the safe shoreline of life and going wherever He takes me in the days ahead, but friends, I am praying up front.

Will you join me?

Please share your One Word for 2015?

If you need some help and inspiration here is a link. 


0 comments:

Post a Comment

I love hearing from you! Thank you for stopping by.

 
© Rhonda Quaney