Wednesday, December 4, 2013

What is Your Plan?

Luke 10:38-42  38 Now it happened as they went that He entered a certain village; and a certain woman named Martha welcomed Him into her house. 39 And she had a sister called Mary, who also sat at Jesus’[a] feet and heard His word. 40 But Martha was distracted with much serving, and she approached Him and said, “Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Therefore tell her to help me.”
41 And Jesus[b] answered and said to her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and troubled about many things.42 But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.”

This week has only started to get busy. The end of year is filled with commitments and things that need to be done. Children in school and church productions (though I shouldn't complain one of them was my idea). Prize Giving ceremonies and Parent/Teacher Interviews and loads of baking. Everyone has something on to celebrate and wrap up the end of a long year. So much attention to detail and making sure things run smoothly
Planning, lists and checking them twice and most of the kids are naughty not nice because they too are tired of the hectic schedule.

All these things are really wonderful and I love spending time celebrating with friends and family and seeing how my children have grown and watching them take the stage. A lot of our time can be invested in these areas this time of year that we tend to neglect our time with God.

We become too busy to read our Bible's or pray and if we do pray it is a quick 'Dear Lord please can I get out of this chaos in one piece, thank you Amen' But this can be said for most of the year. Life gets busy and we allow our busyness to shelve the greatest gift we could ever receive... a relationship with Jesus.

I love making or buying gifts, wrapping them and giving them to people and watching them open them. It is my favorite part of Christmas and all the other events that involve giving. I like to remember too the greatest Gift we will ever receive is Jesus and the wonder of His saving power in our lives.

It blows my mind every year to ponder the Saviour's birth and that God came to us in the form of a baby and lay in a manger. What greater gift can we receive than this. That the Father sent His only Son to die for our sins, for our wrongdoing and selfishness that we might be saved and called His sons and daughters.

I know this time is busy. It is inevitable no matter how well you plan. But it is in our busyness that we need to we focused on God. We need to be drawing on His strength and making time for Him first and then all the busyness will not be too crazy.

I know many times when I have looked at what I have to do and gotten so overwhelmed that I did not feel like doing anything. I just wanted to quit before it all started but when I have gone to God first and asked Him for help with getting through the day and reading His word and being refreshed I feel I can do things and it will all be ok. God is with me and is strengthening me so that I can do this work of wife, mother, leader and all the other hats I wear. Our plan for the day must firstly involve spending time in the Word and in Prayer. We need to order our private world within ourselves before we can be effective in out outer public world. While we are being like Martha to everyone we must not neglect being like Mary and sitting at the feet of Jesus.

My heart goes out to all those around me who feel the loss of a loved one this time of the year. Christmas is just not the same without them. A lot of people are depressed and lonely and in need of some hope, friendship and family. This is something we can pray about and ask the Holy Spirit how best we can bless our friends. We can give out Christmas cards and gifts but we need to bring them a message to encourage them and comfort them. Who best knows how to comfort than the great Comforter we have in the Holy Spirit.

My blog posts on a Wednesday may be published a bit later in the day during the holidays because I would have to wait until kids are in bed but I still plan on writing every Wednesday. After schools are closed for the year we plan to take day trips to our favourite places and watch a movie (The Hobbit) and spend time with family and friends. Mainly just veg and enjoy not having to race to school. Ah I love Summer.

 Tell me what your plans are for the Holidays?

 If you need prayer please either email me or comment below.

Until next week :)
xx Tamryn

2 comments:

  1. Thanks for your writing, I look forward to reading it :-) We are looking forward to doing Christmas with our family this year ... us and the kids - will be quiet, but going to look for ways to make is special.

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    1. Thank you for reading. Your Christmas sounds lovely. Have a very Merry Christmas. :-)

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