November is going to be a busy month for me. In addition to all the usual things that I have to do, I will also be taking a week's holiday during which time I will be going to preach at a Crusade Meeting at Tabernacle Chapel in Terrace Road, Swansea. I preached there in September last year and the evening was videoed for a DVD, a clip from which you can find by following this link. I shall be leaving on the 15th and be there for two days, and I would greatly appreciate your prayers for a truly Spirit-filled evening. At the end of the month I'm travelling to Essex for the Christian Broadcasting Council Awards, again a two-night stay away. Two of my books are entered for an award, so please pray for a blessing for me!Of course, November is a very busy month for me in terms of getting ready for the Advent Services to be held in my church. Now none of this means that I shall be any busier than many other people, but then my concern has to be how busy I shall be. Of course, this applies to much of the year, not only Advent. The problem is that, with all of this thinking and planning for tomorrow, we can often miss out on living each day to the full.
Many years ago, when I first started work as a 16-year old teenager, I worked in a clothing shop and there always seemed to be new posters to display that ate the year up! It would be posters urging people to order their suits in time for the holidays, or Easter, or Christmas, or for some special event. In January we advertised the SALE; in February & March it was the Easter Event. In June we posted about the forthcoming JULY SALE, and in July we urged people to think about the holidays. About mid-August our posters screamed out about BACK TO SCHOOL! and then in September the spoke of the need to be READY FOR AUTUMN. Then it was time to start reminding people that they should be getting their orders in for CHRISTMAS DELIVERY. Once all that was out of the way, then it would all begin again.
The trouble is that it's all too easy to miss out on the present with all this looking ahead. It sometimes makes me wonder if we are so busy looking ahead for our Lord's return that we miss out on serving Him in the present. Scripture tells us that no-one knows either the day or the hour that Jesus will return, so yes, let us look forward to it, but let us make quite certain that we don't allow our looking forward to hide today's work from our sight
So true. We were speaking just the other day that in our zest and zeal to serve Christ that often we are planning ahead, and failing to merely abide in Him. I think of Mary and Martha. I am very much a Martha, trying to do all I can to serve my Lord. I think often He would like to see me more often just sitting at His feet.
ReplyDeleteWe often don't think we have enough time for both. Our pastor reminded me that we have just as much time as God intended us to have. We chose what all needed to be accomplished in that time.