Motivation Monday – Why You Need to Stop Preparing for the Wrong Things
“Let’s make our lives rather than making our lists.”
We are all wondering what going forward will look like. Will it be more of what we knew before a pandemic changed our world? Will it be more of what we know now? Or will new ways of living with hope and following Christ be revealed that will cause us to change yet again the ways we have gotten used to?
To be honest, I have a bit of fear about things opening up and going back to ‘normal’. I realize how much time I spent before the stay at home season, preparing things.
Preparing my home for guests.
Preparing lists of things I needed to buy.
Preparing my calendar to capture social, ministry and church engagements.
Preparing myself to look presentable when leaving the house.
Preparing the schedule to allow for driving, errands, grocery shopping and coffee runs.
Preparing for less sleep than I need in order to fit everything in on any given day.
Preparing first thing in the morning for the day ahead.
Preparing last thing at night for the next morning.
And in every act of preparation comes the knowledge that it will never all be done. I am always preparing for something. That something comes, goes and then I am on to the next preparation.
It’s my nature to want to ramp up the pace of things again. At the same time, my heart stops at the amount of preparations I will be making just to be back to normal.
I am wondering if I have enough faith to leave the preparations to Jesus when He says:
“And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.” John 14:3
I wonder if all of my preparations, past, present and future have had such a short term focus that I’ve missed the long term purpose.
What Jesus has prepared is the place where your purpose and His pleasure collide: to experience and enjoy God’s presence forever. Welcoming YOU is the focus of His preparation. He is preparing a place for YOU.
What would change if you lived your life in preparation to be ready
to inhabit that stunning unimaginable glorious destination?
What things would you willingly forfeit that were keeping you busy
but didn’t have the long game in view?
Perhaps instead of so many preparations focused on just getting through another day, I would be spending more time preparing my heart to make more room for Jesus.
Dallas Willard calls this the renovation of the heart. While I am busy list-making and putting duct tape in all the places that need to be held together as a temporary measure, Jesus is wanting to knock down walls and blow the wind of the Spirit through my human frame.
I want to prepare in order to be prepared. And to prepare for that place that is being prepared for me may mean not trying to check so many boxes, and instead check in to the state of my soul to see if I am receiving Him in the way He desires to be with me.
Let’s be different in the days ahead. Let’s not go back to old habits of thinking if we do more, we must be more valuable. Rather can we commit to prepare to meet Jesus and if it means doing less externally in order to renovating our interior, won’t it bring more peace and joy than a list of tasks?
Let’s make our lives rather than making our lists.
One moves us forward into our eternal purpose and the other keeps us stuck in endless preparations for things that come and go and are forgotten.
This will not feel natural. But moving from a list-making to life-making is what you were created for.
I believe in you!
Cathie