Life’s a funny thing, isn’t it? When we’re young, we spend our days wishing life would go faster. Nothing comes fast enough, our tenth birthday, being a teenager, getting to drive. But the older I’ve gotten, the more I realise I’m okay right where I’m at.
If we all got what we wanted right when we wanted it, our lives would nearly be over before they even got started. There’s wisdom in contentment with where God has us in the here and now.
“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build, a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance, a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing, a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away, a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.”
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8
As we get older, there does seem to be a trending, a pull, towards busyness and chaos. There’s something to be said about it, that as we grow older, so too should our responsibilities. We should be a people of great resolve, grit, and ambition. We should not be sitting back in idleness as the world goes by, we should absolutely be getting our hands messy with the work of the gospel, the good news of Jesus for every single person on the earth, which, by the way, is not just a calling for those “in ministry.” If you are a believer, you are a messenger of the gospel to those around you. But as we busy ourselves with the work of the gospel, we also come into contention with one of the enemy’s greatest tools–distraction.
It’s almost like the strategy is for the enemy to just fill our lives with so much “stuff” going on that we seem like we’re doing well, and we either begin to become self-reliant, or we begin to try to do great things for God without doing these great things with Him.
There’s got to be another way.
Jesus did a very simple thing when things got crazy. It happened over and over again. And it’s something we overlook nearly every time we read it.
In Luke 5, Jesus heals a man of leprosy, and the word gets out, and people start coming out of the woodwork to find out more about Him. It would seem like a good time to get a newsletter going, maybe start filming some YouTube videos, get a campaign going…. but that’s not His style. The passage says that crowds of people gathered to hear him and be healed of their sickness. However, in verse sixteen, Luke just says this about Him, ‘But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.’
What a seemingly counterintuitive strategy! But it’s not, and Jesus is right on the money, per usual. Why exactly?
So often, when things get busy, the first thing that happens is a growing self-reliance. “I can do it.” No, you can’t. What’s God teaching you lately? “Hm, I’m not sure, that’s a great question though.” Our tendency can so easily be to rely more upon our own strength in times of chaos and busyness than abiding in the Father. Where our focus is, our desire follows.
Jesus is consistently going away to lonely places to pray. Paul talks about praying without ceasing. There is something here that we miss–life is meant to be lived with Jesus, not compartmentalised. Our relationship with God is not a drawer in the dresser of life, it is to be the dresser of our life, the cornerstone that our life is built upon, our firm foundation. And I think that a lot of times what I have done when my life becomes exceptionally complicated is to put Jesus in a box, or assign Him to a day, or a time of day… and I miss out on the kind of relationship He desires to have. It’s an every moment of every day kind of relationship that He desires.
The more complicated my life becomes and the older I get, the more I find myself longing for the simplicity of life the way it was when I was younger. Well, those days aren’t coming back. We’ve already established that responsibilities and busyness only grow as we do. So what’s the solution? The approach. The relationship. The posture.
The answer is in abiding. Simplicity is not necessarily the absence of lots of things going on. When we understand that Jesus wants to be apart of every aspect of our lives, things become simpler. Not because they’re any less of a thing to deal with, but because we’re not dealing with it alone. Jesus is King, and I am not. There is a God, and I’m not Him. And that’s a blessing.
When we start to realise that the weight of the world need not rest heavy on our shoulders because it already rests lightly on His, we see that life is far simpler than it first appeared.
So as life gets busy, as it fills up during the holidays, when work, school, or commitments are going crazy, and things feel out of control, it’s a good time to step back and remember we were never in control in the first place. Delight in the simplicity of knowing life is out of your control, it’s in the hands of someone much more capable than you or I.
His yoke is easy and His burden is light.
‘“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”’
Matthew 11:28-30
The Treehouse 