Shelves of my Heart

Where does your time go every day? Do you clean? Do you play with your kid(s)? Do you shop? Do you sleep? Do you do all of the above?

I’ve said it before…my time is precious. I don’t have nearly enough of it and what little bit I do have, I want to spend on myself. Taking a bubble bath, blogging, watching Lifetime, or just sitting in the total silence and doing, well, nothing. That’s where my spare time foes. And I am starting to really feel guilty about it. I read a post today about how little time we give to God and that really struck a nerve with me.
I have started to realize that I don’t give God nearly the time that he deserves…or the amount of time with him that I need.

My days are typically either totally chaotic when there is a lot going on or overwhelmingly slow-paced…both of which leave me exhausted at the end of the day and ready to collapse into bed. The days when there is tons and tons going on, I find myself rushing back and forth all over the place, just hoping that I get 50% of the things crossed off of my check-list. The slow paced days are just as bad, because then I am suddenly overwhelmed with the amount of free time that I have. I rush around thinking that since I have all of this time, then I SHOULD be able to cross everything off of my list. Do you see the pattern?

You see, I tend to give God whatever is left of my time. I get up in the mornings whenever Noah wakes up, rather than disciplining myself to wake up before he gets up. During the day, I go about doing my chores when I can and when I get a free moment, I give to something else. At the end of the day, when I am tired/drained/stresses/exhausted I yawn, crawl into bed beside my husband and try to go to sleep. It’s during these moments that my conscience kicks in and realize, “Oh man…I’ve gone all day without acknowledging God!”

So then, I say a quick prayer, asking God to forgive me for putting him dead last. I ask him to give me yet another chance to do it right. I promise him that I will do better tomorrow…that I will try harder tomorrow…that I won’t forget. Tomorrow. Then tomorrow rolls around, and where am I at the end of the day? In the same place I was the night before. And the night before. And the night before. Seeking God’s unwavering forgiveness for something that I know needs changing.

I am known for categorizing my life…placing things in these nice, cute, colorful little bins in my head [and my heart] and organizing them into order of importance, most needing to get done, activities to accomplish…and sticking them on a shelf. Cleaning, Blogging, Cooking, Me time, Play time with my son, attempts at romancing and communicating with my husband…all of these things go into categories, sorted into bins, and shelved in my mind.

Then, there is Jesus. And Quiet Time. And Prayer. And Bible Study. All of those things are in a bright red bin together. They are at the top of my shelf. The top meaning, those things are of the most important. But with placing items on the top shelf, they generally get shoved to the back and forgotten about. So they collect dust until the day that I remember that they are there and they need to be removed and dusted.

It’s time to make a change. It’s time to recategorize and reorganize my life. Re-prioritize things. Start putting the most important things first. Like Jesus and prayer and Quiet time. Quality time communicating with my husband. And play time with my son. These are the things that mean the most. Not the dishes. Not whether or not the bathroom is cleaned up completely. Or the floor gets vaccumed. It’s time that we start putting Christ back in the front of our lives. Put him first and allow everything else to fall into place around him.

If we do that, if we start putting him first, the way we should…everything will fall into place. Everything will work out and we can experience a peace and sense of wisdom that we have never known. I challenge all of you to examine your “shelves” and what your priorities are.

“…In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will direct your paths.” {Proverbs 3:6}