Quietness. Stillness. Uncomfortableness.
For me, these three words seem to go together. Being still and just doing nothing is incredibly uncomfortable. I always seem to be doing so many things at once. Even when Nate and I sit down to watch a movie, I want to have something in my hand to do. I will get out my iPad, crochet, work on answering emails, and so many other things that cause me to not really be in the moment. I seem to be constantly distracting myself with so many things, that even just sitting on the couch with my husband to watch a movie isn’t enough mental stimulation to keep me from getting bored. I feel like I have to be doing so many other things at the same time so I feel entertained.
I also know from talking to many others that this is something that I am not alone in. We bury ourselves in work, TV shows, sports practices, church groups, and anything else that we can seem to pile on to the point that doing one thing at a time isn’t enough. We feel the need to be so busy that we don’t have the chance to think about anything. We never face up to our problems, we just want a distraction.
Satan is using this against us.
In my life, I KNOW that Satan uses busyness to keep me from God. When I allow busyness to take over my life and control it, I am the foolish woman who built my house on sand (Matthew 7:24-27). My foundation is weak because it is built on things that will be completely obliterated when the waves and storms come. When my marriage is struggling, Netflix doesn’t make it better. When I am completely overwhelmed in a time of depression, my calligraphy won’t hold my hand and walk me through it. When I am completely burdened by financial hardship, committing to another weekly activity won’t bring me peace.
When this is the kind of life we live, we look exactly like the world. We are allowing ourselves to run around like chickens with our heads cut off wondering why we don’t feel peace. We are wondering why our marriage is failing. We are wondering why we feel disconnected from our friends and family. We are wondering why we don’t feel like God is there or like God is for us.
Friends, we are looking for comfort in all the wrong things. We build this habit of running everywhere but God in the good times, and then wonder why in the bad times, we feel lost, alone, and confused. We are all sponges. We soak things up and when we get squeezed by the hardships of life, all the stuff we have been sucking up comes out. Take the time to be still and suck up some God so when you get squeezed, God is what comes out.
Be still and know that I am God. Psalm 46:10
Miranda Huyck – Children’s Coordinator
