As we try to find enough hours in the day to do all we need and want to do, I think of the words of the 46th Psalm... God, through the psalmist, exhorts us all to 'be still and know that I am God'... a very foreign concept in our world (and, I am ashamed to say, in my life) today.
Anytime I ponder the subject, I think of places like Volcan, Panama, where our dear friends the Nelsons now live and minister 6 months each year. I have heard several missionaries discuss how 'close' they feel to God when they are on the mission field... especially when they are in a foreign place with no Blackberry or Cell phone or Internet...
It occurs to me that the reason missionaries find it so easy to feel that close to God is the environment which allows and encourages them to be still...
When I am in the Olancho Province of Honduras ministering to and visiting with the indigenous Pech Indians, there are no cell phones. There are no phones whatsoever! There is no electricity... there are no cars.... there is no Internet.
When we are in the village of Santa Marta, Panama, there is no running water... there is no electric stove... the cars you see are either a taxi or something we drove in...
The same is true for Eton Village on the Island of Efate in Vanuatu....
In these places (and thousands like them across the globe), it seems easier to be still... to gain that closeness we are all created to crave.
So why is it I am so in love with my technologically enhanced life? It seems at once to provide opportunity and hamstring 'near'ness! And, at the end of the day, I wonder (selfishly, for me) if it would not be better to expose myself more regularly to an environment which creates/begs for/develops that closeness to my Creator....
In his book "Tyranny of the Urgent", Charles Hummel explores how we allow the urgent things of life to crowd out the important things... He suggests an exercise in which you list the 5 most important things in your life... (God, Family, Church, Work, Golf, etc)... then, beside that list, write down the top 5 things on which you spent your time today... it is quite eye-opening to honestly record what you did (went to work, ate lunch on the go, worked out at the gym, attended a chamber-of-commerce meeting, etc), then compare it to what you said was important...
Try it. I believe you may reach the same conclusion I have (over and over again): the 'urgency' of life routinely crowds out the truly 'important' things in my life....
let me encourage us all (especially me) to make the attempt to 'sync up' these two lists... and to begin by finding a place and time to 'be still'.... so we can hear His 'still, small voice' as He guides us...
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