Time to slow down.

I love baseball season. It reminds me of when I was younger and would run around the outfield chasing down fly balls. I enjoy watching my boys play and helping coach Cooper's team. One downside to the months of April, May and the first week of June is that we spend so many nights during the week running from field to field that I don't have a chance to watch the Red Sox or Braves on TV. It's such a travesty! But probably the more pressing downside is that the hectic schedule makes it difficult to accomplish the things that are more important than playing children's games, like baseball. Parents find it difficult to help their kids stay up on their homework when the schedule is so busy. Nightly devotions are pushed to the side and will wait for another night when the ball game ends after bedtime. Time around the dinner table is sacrificed for fast food in the car so showers can be taken as soon as the family arrives home. And Wednesday nights are often seen as the "only night" we have free and our personal attendance suffers at midweek church services. I get it. I understand it. I've been there and seem to live there regularly. Sports, dance and other extracurricular activities in the spring, summer, fall and winter make life a crazy, frantic pace we can hardly keep up with. So what do we do about it? We intentionally take time to slow down.

One verse in the Bible that I think speaks to this issue is Psalm 46:10. It says "Be still, and know that I am God." I remember my mom giving me a card when I felt God calling me into ministry and this verse was the focus of the card. She wrote in it for me to be still and listen to God. I think she had a real idea of the frantic pace of ministry and that I needed to start off slow and listen for God's voice. That is what we need to do when we find ourselves in a frantic pace that threatens to leave us drained physically and spiritually. We need to slow the pace and listen more intently for God's voice. He is constantly speaking we just have to set aside the distractions. But what we find in our frantic pace is that listening for God to speak is like trying to listen to someone while riding a roller coaster. It won't work. 

Each family and each life is different. What works for one family or person to slow their pace may not work for another. Find what works for you and your family. If it means taking a walk, sitting on the porch, or some other way of slowing your pace so you can listen for God, then do it. You won't regret listening more to God's voice than you do to the drone of a fast paced life.

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