A week before Christmas I passed along one last minute gift idea to my mama - a new study bible. I'm kind of a bible junkie, a bible-nerd if you will. I have my pretty, leather bound church bible that I go to most often (it's the NLT in case you are curious). I have an older NIV Bible that I pull out while studying at times. I have The Messgae Bible that I like when I need to hear the text differently. I have an ESV that is my "clean" bible, meaning I don't write in it for ministering purposes. But I've really been wanting the New American Standard Version for additional study material. And low and behold, like a tiny Christmas miracle, through the powers of social media I come across this little gem...
And that sweet mama of mine surprised me with it for Christmas!
Me being the bible/book nerd that I am, I get almost as much enjoyment from the introduction as I do from the material itself. Not really, but I just can't skip over an introduction. It's there begging to be read and if I don't, I'm so completely distracted by "what it might have said" that I can't even focus my way through chapter 1. So after days of pouring over the how-to-use pages, I finally started the actual study process this morning. I'd already pretty much decided that I would start in the book of Ecclesiastes. I'd love to say I prayed over this decision but it was one more or less made based on the length of the book and what little I already knew - little being the keyword.
I'm one chapter in and after a good amount if time in the Word this morning, I spent the majority of my afternoon and evening completely ignoring all I had read. I walked around upset, frustrated, and just overall exhausted by all that I needed to do. I was overwhelmed by the feeling of being overwhelmed. This continued late into the night and as I got ready for bed I found myself mentally listing (for the millionth time) all the things I needed to do...all the "if I can just get this done and get this organized everything will be great" items on my list. And just like that it hit me. He hit me (metaphorically of course) with Ecclesiastes 1:14, "I [Solomon] have seen all the works which have been done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and striving after wind." Gah, I just love when He uses something I just read to knock me off my feet.
I spend so much time trying to get my life in order, to get it all organized, to get "my ducks in a row". But for what? If this life is not but a "vapor" and if all my trying to get things to look right is nothing but chasing wind, why do I constantly stress over getting it done? Because organization and order is my fix. It's my false sense of peace. It's what I fall back on, what I count on when everything around me is crazy - the lie of "if I can just get this area in order everything will be better". And the more and more I've tried to restore order here recently, the more and more of a mess everything seems to become. And friend, I don't need a biblical scholar to explain this one to me. No, there is only one reason things keep getting messier and messier, only one reason I keep trying to surface but instead find myself drowning even deeper in the waves of chaos. Because it is only when I'm at the point of desperation, the point of gasping for air from my own life that I finally realize my "fix" won't bring me any peace. Checking that box on my to-do list won't bring rest to my soul. No, that peace comes from one place and that place has nothing to do with a clean house, organized room or weekly meal plan. It comes from a Father who wants me to need Him more than I need order. A Father that wants to be the first on my list. A Father that wants my undivided attention. A Father that wants me to rest in His Presence alone. And it's in His Presence that this life, this "here today, gone tomorrow" breath of existence is made meaningful. It's in His Presence that peace was created in the first place.
So very true my Stephanie. I needed that myself.
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