Losing Balance

Monday morning and it’s time to hit it and get it. Work, kids ball games this week, a round of golf with your buddies, yard work to make the neighbors and your spouse happy, dinner out with friends, maybe a date night with the wife, car needs to go the shop, small group from church wants you to be a part, the boss and customers need you to give a little more…and this is all before Thursday morning. How do you balance work, home life and personal time?

The answer is simple. You don’t. Balance is a concept that connotates your heart, mind and time can be neatly divided like quarts in a gallon of milk. Balancing all the demands in your life is more like dividing those quarts in a gallon of ice cream after it’s been sitting on the countertop all night. It’s not going to happen so throw it out.

The chief culprit adding to anxiety, frustration, luke warm marriages and kids being raised by TV, daycare or the internet is the lie of juggling competing demands. The solution is simple and as old as time itself, but it begs a question not many want to ask. Do you want what God has promised and gives generously or can you have MORE? It’s the same seed Satan planted with Eve in the Garden. Is God holding out on you by telling you not to eat from that one tree? Can’t you have it all, don’t you deserve it all? By the look of your schedule this week the answer is, “I’m trying!!”

Everyone is in this battle regardless of your season in life. Everyone feels it, too. The demands on your time and attention are because ‘our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against..authorities..powers..and spiritual forces of evil..’ It’s similar to the gallon of ice cream. You didn’t see it melt but you know what happened. You don’t see all the forces at work but you know there is more than meets the eye, you can feel it. EVERYONE knows it but they’re too busy to do anything about it.

Like every question you have, the answer is found in the Bible. Too many parents have trained their children more in the ways of the world than the ways of God. Therefore, Occam’s razor and the KISS principle come to mind quicker than Matthew 6:33. ‘But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.’ There it is…the way to balance is to pursue Him BEFORE anything else.

The world tells us to keep things simple and balance the demands of life. God tells us to seek Him first and HE will balance what you need. This is where the rubber meets the road and life starts skidding all over the place. The Premier League match, Formula 1 or a Gran Prix race is on TV Sunday morning so you skip church. Can’t start the day in prayer because there’s an early meeting at the office. The travel team AND the rec league have games on Sunday so no small group in the afternoon much less a service in the morning.

The traditional ways we learn about what’s happening in the world have been sacrificed in the name of propaganda so we find alternative sources to get the news. The traditional ways prior generations sought to learn about God have been crowded out so we must also adapt. Biblical wisdom is simple and makes promises where the world can only suggest. If you want to know how to balance this next week, ask God. ‘If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives GENEROUSLY to ALL without finding fault, and IT WILL BE GIVEN TO YOU.’ James 1: 5.

You want to keep it simple? You want the truth about balancing life? I’m not sure you can handle the truth about balancing life. So now, we’re back to the rub of balancing what YOU think versus what God promises. You want to know how to balance it all, ASK Him. ‘But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. THAT PERSON should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do.’ James 1: 6-8. Sound like anyone you know or see in the mirror?

What about MY plans, MY needs, MY desires….me, me, me. I get it. Nobody wants to submit their free will to God. Yes, I’ll submit my will of being vaccinated to government mandates or peer pressure, but God? The crux sounds ugly, blasphemous but practical. Do you see a need for God? When’s the last time you needed help with something a friend, co-worker, parent or your bank account couldn’t do for you? Think about that and what you’ll come up with are health issues, emergencies, financial catastrophies…real calamities. Maybe you can balance things until that happens and then you’ll seek God. Maybe not.

There’s plenty of scripture I could site in landing this plane but I’ll skip referencing verses that sound familiar. If you haven’t shown your wife OR husband any love in a while, tell me how that works out. If you haven’t talked to your dad in months or years tell me his tone and words when you finally call. I’ll keep it in a vernacular we all understand. Whether you’re talking about athletics, knowledge of a subject, using a foreign language or whatever….if you don’t use it, you’ll lose it.

Bottom line is you can’t balance God. God demands to be first. If you have a relationship with a God who CAN be balanced, you serve a weak and small god…not the one true God.

REAL balance in life is a relationship with God that comes before everything else….don’t lose it.