I’m learning the importance to pay attention to the still voice in my head during these times on this growing sacred stretch of pavement.
This week my mind has been busy processing and mentally (and physically) writing and crossing things off my never ending to-do list. I have a long list needing to be completed at work, and an even longer one at home.
It’s that time of year of endless holiday planning and preparations. Of excessive gift buying and wrapping. Of Christmas party planning. Of holiday treats and multiple menu details to coordinate, shop for, and make. So many details. So many demands and expectations. So many behind the scenes perfections I feel I need to take care of for my family.
Right now I am spending so much of my time and energy simply trying to coordinate and keep all these millions of tiny details straight, making sure nothing is missed, nothing is forgotten, nothing is overlooked or not completed on time.
In all this excessive mayhem I’ve convinced myself I need to merely buckle down and just survive. I need to diligently keep at the tasks at hand so I can get everything crossed off the lists, completion accomplished.
On this little hamster wheel of holiday chaos, I’ve inserted so many selfish thoughts and attitudes, reminding myself over and over how much I’m doing for for everyone else, with a growing bitterness as I allow myself to wallow in all those little voices telling me none of this energy will be returned to me, because of course I deserve to be lavishly showered upon with gifts and accolades for my greatness.
Satan is busy whispering all these lies convincing me that no one else is thinking about what gifts to buy for me. No one else is offering to help me buy, and wrap, coordinate, and create a joy filled holiday. No one else is looking over at me thinking about how appreciative they are of me and all I do, how hard I work and how dedicated I am to all that I love and all whom I love. Satan has yet again this year encouraged me to hate the holidays and convince myself I am actually worth so much more than I actually am, that all of this is somehow all about me, when it actually isn’t.
Satan is busy filling my heart with his staining darkness, a blackness that seems to seep from inside out, infecting my thoughts, my words, and my attitude and actions towards all those around me. I’m allowing him to fill me with a “justified” bitterness and selfishness, an unnatural state of absolute entitlement.
All of these things I’m doing for others, is actually what I should be doing - and doing with a much more grateful servant heart. We were created to live and love others well, deeply, fully. Doing for others is what is the DNA of our existence and purpose. We were created to give, not to receive.The entrance of sin seems to have corrupted all that and is continually trying to turn our hearts to focus on our selves, our wants, our desires, our entitlement, our selfishness.
We are to live and love fully with a servant heart. We are not to live with a selfish heart.
Servant heart vs selfish heart. Extreme ends of the reality spectrum.
It was really a profound thought, a profound moment as I sat at a corner waiting for my turn to enter onto the highway. I sat stopped and waiting, a moment of absolute stillness before entering the full speed traffic of busy lanes of the highway, hurtling forward again at full speed towards my next destination, my next goal, my next thing on my list.
It’s not about me, it’s not about what I want, and what I do, and what I expect from behalf of my family. I should be filled with great joy and excitement at the opportunities to live and love on those near and dear to me during this busy season. This is an opportunity to show what they mean to me, through my giving and my acts of servanthood.
There is no reason that my heart and thoughts are so constantly filled with such negativity and selfishness.
It is this growing discomfort within, this content tension in the midst of the details. This inner battle of what I know to be true and right, and the lies I seem to allow myself to hear and believe over and over again.
I admit it, I am hardwired for drama and selfish extremes and motives. It’s a trait I have always had and battled. It is a personality trait I am in constant battle with, leaving me at war between that which brings out the best in me and that which brings out the worst in me.
I seem to live most of my life living in the reality and simmering in the lies that bring out the worst in me. I don’t want this selfish and bitter heart, I honestly want a full on giving and joy-filled servant heart.
We have such abundance and so many opportunities to display Godly love and giving right now. And here I am harboring so much bitterness and selfishness. I’m convicted by this sour state of my soul right now. Why do I turn everything inward and allow myself to be filled with the poisons of personal ungratefulness? Why am I wired to so quickly focus on myself rather than on the gifts and opportunities of all those around me?
Heavy sigh. Heavy heart.
I admit… I think ultimately I just want to be seen, loved, appreciated, and thanked by those in my house. I want the holidays to be all about me, even when I know they aren’t. It’s an odd tension that leaves me edgy and exhausted. Why is it so hard to just turn my hands and heart outward and give it all away with a joy-filled attitude? Why is it so hard to joyfully give and celebrate everyone else that I love without having this sharp edge of selfishness always attached to it?And why is it so hard to accept the way that I am in fact already being seen, loved, appreciated and thanked? Why do I have to set these boldly colored expectations so high and so colorful?
Oh Lord, humble me, hold me, harness my utter selfishness in this season of giving and getting. Continue to remind me and whisper to me that this isn’t about me, that it’s about You - about Your gift of salvation and the story and journey You went through over two thousand years ago, so that one day I would be able to receive that hope and grace.
Oh Lord, open my mind, thoughts, and heart to the servant heart I was created to relish and share, and continue to guard my selfish heart from sabotaging and turning this all around and try to make it all about me.
{ Previous Blog Post "My Word For 2018" HERE }
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