Balancing Busyness

Yesterday marked leap day, an occasion viewed differently by each of us: some welcome the extra day, while others see it as just another hectic day of work or school. It seems that the older I get, the busier I get. It has become harder and harder for me to carve out quality time for friends and family, personal projects, and self-care. Full transparency, the busier I get, the harder it is for me to have intentional time with the Lord.

A friend asked me the other day how I establish a routine with God with all the busyness of life. She expressed to me her struggle with finding time to sit down and spend a moment alone in The Word and prayer. When she asked this, I felt a conviction in my own heart as I knew this was something I had struggled with off and on. I felt like the least qualified person to answer this question. At that moment, I remembered a piece of wisdom someone had given me a couple of years back when I was struggling with the same thing. That is: if you're too busy to spend time with God, you're too busy. Plain and simple. Or is it? In some cases, God seems to be the first thing we cut out if we have too much to do. Or perhaps, we think the other things we have to do are mandatory and spending time with God is optional. If the enemy can’t make us sin, he will make us busy. He will specifically and intentionally attack our focus. Today’s culture will persuade us that being overly busy is a good thing. Busyness tries to tell us we are productive, we are important, and we are needed.

The truth is, some of us are entirely too busy. We are busy trying to take care of families, friends, ministries, and businesses, all while failing to take care of our own hearts. We spend more time making sure our businesses are safe than we do making sure our hearts are safe. We spend so much time helping people fix their mess that we ignore our own. This is extremely dangerous. I would argue that our number one duty as Christians is our own heart. Why? The status of our hearts will seep into every other aspect of our lives. Personally, there is a drastic change in the attitude and posture of my heart when I spend time with the Lord versus when I do not.

Jesus knew when it was the right time to work and when it was the right time to rest. Scripture shows us that he made a regular habit of stepping away to be alone with the Lord. Mark 1:35 tells us, “And rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, [Jesus] departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed."  Various times throughout scripture, we see Jesus stepping away from the busyness of life to spend time in prayer and meditation with the Lord. If the Son of God needed to spend time with God, what makes us think we can be okay without it?

God often calls the busy people. The call of a busy man is a test of loyalty. God often calls a busy person to test what is more important in our hearts. Take the story of Martha in Luke 10. While Jesus was in her house, Martha asked Him, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me” (verse 40). Even with Jesus right in front of her eyes, she couldn’t step away from the busyness. I think I’m a little like Martha too. I get so caught up in the busyness and to-do’s that I fail to recognize God’s call and work right in front of my face. Are we more loyal to our busyness or to the Lord? We get so distracted with the good things that steal our attention that we miss the best thing. Our hurried lifestyle will eventually start to kill our relationships, our joy, and our hearts. Our busyness makes us blind to what God is doing in our hearts and how he is speaking. If we have a million different voices yelling at us, do we know God’s enough to differentiate it from the noise? Sin and busyness can have the same effect, and that is they cut off our connection with God and with others.

I once heard a sermon message say that the busy man is in worse condition than one of a deadly disease. Why? Because a diseased man can see his symptoms growing worse and worse. Yet, a busy man grows comfortable in their distraction. The disease of busyness is often easier to excuse. When we are out of communion with God, it’s like willingly sitting in infested water. We are just vulnerable, waiting for the enemy’s attack. The reality is that whatever we focus on, we pay for it with our time. The enemy often sends distractions because he wants to waste your time. Every moment he occupies your time with busyness, he is ultimately stealing your time with God.

Might I even say this: the need to feel busy all the time is a trauma response. It is a fear-based distraction keeping you from what you’d be forced to acknowledge and feel if you slowed down. But perhaps we need to slow down and listen to God. Perhaps, the Lord has been calling you and you’re too busy to hear the call. You can’t just jump head-on to a moving train. You have to run alongside it, sync up with it, and then jump. You can’t expect to hear the call of the Lord because you think it’ll be obvious when He calls. You must be running alongside him to hear the calling. It requires focus and intentional listening.

All that said, I'm not saying we should deny every opportunity that comes along out of fear of being too busy. I am saying that we need to have a balance in our busyness. If you find yourself without any time for the Lord, you must ask yourself what you are willing to sacrifice to bring Him back into your day to day life. If you find yourself making excuses, I want to encourage you in love to reevaluate your priorities.  The relentless demands of life may tempt us to prioritize busyness over the Spirit, but in doing so, we risk neglecting the very foundation upon which our lives are built. After all, God gives us opportunities to live for Him, not to replace Him.

May your roots run deep, and your faith remain strong! As always, Stay Rooted, my friends! <3