A thought by
Larry Osborne,
(2009-04-10) from his book, Spirituality for the Rest of Us: A Down-to-Earth Guide to Knowing God (p. 154). The
Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. (Click on the title to go to
Amazon.com to buy the book.)
But so many
people want it to be. They never want
changes. They want to balance their
life. But Larry says, “Life is not
static. It goes through seasons, some
predictable and some catching us by surprise. Each has its own responsibilities
and assignments.” That is reality.
He says, “During
harvest the farmer had better reap. Family, friends, rest, and spiritual
reflection might all be important, but if the crops aren't brought in on time,
they'll rot in the field. Harvest isn't a time for balanced living. It's a time
for something that looks a lot like workaholism.”
My son is in
Law School right now. He is doing a good
job at spending time with his family but his life is out of balance. It has to be in order to get his law degree. And he can’t feel guilty about it.
Larry goes
on, “Each season of life has its own responsibilities and assignments. The
mother of two or three preschoolers has a vastly different God-given assignment
while the kids are young than she'll have when her nest is empty. Trying to
balance good care of the kids with consistent Bible reading, prayer, physical
exercise, proper diet, time for friends, and sizzling intimacy with her husband
is a recipe for fatigue and failure. It's not going to happen. For this mom, balance is probably out of
reach. Survival is the order of the day.”
Some of you
really need to see this today.
I am retired
right now but my wife, Margaret is an AVP of the Quality Department of a Health
Insurance Company. I drop her off at
work at 7:00 am and pick her up at 6:00 pm.
There is no way that she should feel guilty at the time she spends away
from me. I take her to work so we can
spend time together but in no way am I going to give her grief because of the
other hours she spends away from me. We are in different seasons of our lives. And we do have quality times at night and on our weekends.
Please understand,
you can’t do everything. And you don’t
have to. As Larry says, “The search for
a well-balanced life tends to overlook the fact that we each have a unique
calling and role to play. Playing our role well sometimes demands being out of
balance somewhere else.”
So what
season are you in?
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