Margin

This morning I was contemplating reserves.  Emotional, physical, financial, and time demands all seem overloaded at the moment.  That puts us in a position of surviving, rather than thriving.  Once again I am at that place where I realize that I must restructure my life to provide margin.

You know about margin.  The spaces around the edges of a page, and between columns, so that all the printing doesn't bleed off the edge of the pages and allows for easy reading.  Human lives need margin too.

Richard A. Swenson, M.D. wrote a wonderful book entitled Margin.  As far as I am concerned, it is the best work on this subject I've read.  You should read it.  I'm going back to the book because I need to restructure things so that I can restore emotional, physical, financial, and time reserves.

Reserve is the key word.  Right now I don't have any physical reserves.  Somehow I've grown so busy in life I don't seem to have any time reserves either.  Let's not go to the emotional scene right now.  Our financial situation isn't critical, but it isn't in good health either.  How did I get here?

"That's the rub!"  As they say.  Getting here was easy.  Fortunately, getting out isn't as difficult as it sometimes seems.  Go back to basics.  Structure your life in the Biblical model.

I know one thing for certain.  Life, change, even history is unfolding exponentially.  Historian Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. put it this way:  "Nothing defines our age more than the furious and relentless increase in the rate of change."  Schlesinger was "court historian" and a special adviser to President John F. Kennedy.  That was back in 1961.  Imagine what he might say today!

"But there's so much that needs to be done!"  WRONG!  The only thing I need to do today is simple.  Today I need to love the Lord Jesus so very much that my love for everything else looks like hatred in comparison!  Today I need to put His words in my heart, store them away, so that I can talk about them when I rise up, when I sit down, when I am on the way somewhere, when I am there, and when I lie down.  That is it!  That is my task today.

Oh sure!  But what about your responsibilities as a husband, father, friend, church member, and at Grace Resource Center?

No problem!  If my mind is fixed on Jesus, today I'll get everything done that needs to be done, because I work for Him.  He's my boss.  He decides what I need to do.  And when I allow Him that kind of access to my life, things get a whole lot easier.

What did Solomon say?  "Trust in the Lord with your whole heart.  Don't trust your own understanding and wisdom.  Acknowledge Him in everything (the clogged drain, the busy schedule, the sore feet, are just tests to see if my heart is truly thankful, after all) and He will keep me on the straight path where I won't get lost in the mire and deadly darkness of activity overload, change overload, choice overload, commitment overload, competition overload, debt overload, decision overload, education overload, expectation overload, fatigue overload, hurry overload, information overload, media overload, ministry overload, noise overload, people overload, pollution overload, possession overload, problem overload, technology overload, traffic overload, waste overload and work overload."

Solomon goes on.  "Don't think you know anything in and of yourself, that you can figure things out!  Be in awe of God's amazing knowledge and understanding and make a u-turn every time you are headed for evil!  It will be healing to your body and refreshment to your bones.  Give to God first, everything he puts on your heart to give, and He will provide everything you need."

The psalmist said it this way:  "Cease striving, stop, be still, and understand that I am God."  The Bill Bennet paraphrase of that is fun!  "Dude!  You're running around like a chicken with its head cut off!  Chill!  I'm in charge, nothing catches Me by surprise, and I don't miss any details along the way!  Hey! Focus!  Here!  Look at Me!  Okay, now we can accomplish something!"

I get so caught up in doing things, in "doing" ministry, that I forget about the Author of my ministry.  It's easy.  If people are pleased with what I'm doing I feel like I'm doing okay. What's amazing is that I can be on the downward spiral of absolute destruction and feel like everything is okay because I'm pleasing myself!  Yeesh!  What an idiot I can be some times.

So today is about restoration of that relationship with Jesus.  Once I get that where it needs to be, everything else will fall into line with His plans.  His plans are the only perfect plans.