Part II
We began with setting our life’s priorities. I pointed out that this is different from organizing your day or your activities with planners or to-do lists or calendars. As helpful as those things are, setting your life’s priorities is a much bigger picture, and far more important from God’s point of view.
Unfortunately, many people go through life without giving much thought to their life’s priorities. They may indeed do a very good job of prioritizing their day or organizing their activities, so that they’re very busy, maybe even productive. But all that busyness doesn’t contribute to the over-arching priority for their life because they’ve never really considered what that priority should be. So the days run one into each other, and meaninglessness can set in pretty easily.
God has a plan for your life.
Here is a verse that I find absolutely amazing, the more I meditate on it. Listen carefully:
Ephesians 2:10:For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
This is really a powerful truth: You were created in Christ Jesus to do good works, and God has a list of good works for you to do. Please let that sink in: God has a list of good works he has prepared for you to do, and this list has been prepared since long before you were born. The list of your good works is uniquely yours; if you don’t perform those good works, no one else will. It will simply mean they go undone, and you will have missed God’s best for your life.
If you seek to know the good works which God has prepared for you to do, he will reveal them to you and then you can prioritize your life and your daily activities around those things God has decided you should do. You need to know what that list is and then do it. It’s really that simple—not easy, but uncomplicated.
How do you know what good works God has for you to do?
Ask God to show you his plan.
Maybe you don’t know God’s plan for your life, you’re not sure of the good works he has planned for you to do, because you haven’t really asked him to show you. If you truly want to know his plan, then ask and keep asking. But remember, asking God for his plan assumes that you’re willing to do whatever he leads you to do. So make sure you’re ready to let go and give him complete control.
We do what we really want to do!
Do you want to know what God has prepared for you to do more than anything else? Do you want to do God’s will more than you want your will? Do you want God’s will more than you want to be married? Do you want God’s will more than you want to make a lot of money? Do you want God’s will more than you want to make a name for yourself? Do you want to do those good works God has for you to do more than you want anything else?
When you have a passion, a dream, a desire deeply implanted in your heart and mind, nothing will be able to keep you from working toward that dream. You’ll learn how to organize; you’ll force yourself to be disciplined; you’ll read books, go to seminars, find the money, get the education, spend the time needed—whatever it takes to make sure that you do what you really want to do!
If your life is just floating along, in mediocre territory, it may well be because you just don’t have a priority or passion greater than your lazy streak, or your fear, or your lack of confidence, or your lack of skills—or whatever else you want to name. Those negative influences in your life are stronger than your desire or passion, so they keep winning, because we do what we really want to do.
The biblical priority
Jesus really made it very clear how we set priorities:
Matthew 6:33: But seek first the kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.
To say yes to the important things we should do, to seek first the kingdom and his righteousness, you and I must learn to say no to other activities, even sometimes good activities. Keep in mind that you are always saying “no” to something. If it isn’t to the apparent, urgent things in your life, it is probably to the more fundamental, highly important things. Even when the urgent is good, the good can keep you from God’s best.
Are you tyrannized by the urgent?
In his little booklet, “The Tyranny of the Urgent,” Charles Hummel writes: “We live in constant tension between the urgent and the important. The problem is that many important tasks need not be done today, or even this week. Extra hours of prayer and Bible study, a visit to an elderly friend, reading an important book: these activities can usually wait a while longer. But often urgent, though less important, tasks call for immediate response. . .”
Perhaps one of the major reasons you have not set the right priority for your life is that you’ve become tyrannized by the urgent. What does that mean? It means that you have allowed the urgent things in your life to dictate your activities, without realizing that you are neglecting the truly important things, the good works that God has prepared for you to do.
Remember that often God’s best is replaced with the good. It may not be that you’re living in some known sin, but rather that you’ve simply allowed yourself to be so tyrannized by what you think you should do, or by what others think you should do, or by the culture of our time, that you’re missing the good works of God.
A friend told me recently that she’s beginning to realize how tyrannized she’s been to doing good things. For example, she is driven to clean and keep house the way her mother taught her, which means an inordinate amount of time is spent on needless tasks. Her husband is helping her to understand that what she thought had to be done really doesn’t. And it’s making a big difference in her life, as she is becoming free from the tyranny of the urgent. She has time to do the good works of God. It wasn’t wrong or bad to keep a perfect house, but it became a tyranny in her life and kept her from doing God’s best.
Those urgent things can fool us easily. They scream to us that they are important, and because we stay busy, we deceive ourselves into thinking we’re doing the right thing, when often we are busy being tyrannized by less than important tasks
Ask yourself these questions:
1. “What one thing could you do (that you aren’t doing now) that if you did on a regular basis, would make a tremendous positive difference in your life?”
2. “What one thing are you doing now that if you stopped it or limited it, would make a tremendous positive difference in your life?”
I would urge you to stop right now if you can and actually write down your answer to those two questions.
This could be step one in moving you out of the tyranny of the urgent, and helping you get a handle on where your priorities are off-base. Then, choose one change you need to make and start praying that change into your life on a daily basis. For example, if you watch too much television, start praying about that. If you don’t spend enough time studying the Bible, make it a matter of daily prayer. Then put some feet to your prayers and do what you know you need to do in order to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.
I would remind you of the promise that comes with that command: All these things will be given to you. All the things you need will be supplied by our Lord; you’ll not be in want of time or resources or energy or fulfillment if you truly seek first to do God’s will.
Conclusion
So often our priorities become confused and we find ourselves on that proverbial treadmill, working hard but seemingly getting no place. I want to encourage you to take time to consider whether or not you have your life’s priorities in good condition. Are you living your everyday life with the big picture in mind, aware that God has good things for you to do and making certain that those are the things which take highest priority in your life?
I can assure you that when you live like that, though it won’t be pain-free or void of frustrations or fatigue, it will be unbelievably satisfying and fulfilling to know that you’re doing the good works God wants you to do, and therefore, they will have eternal significance.
Those good works may seem like mundane activities; they may even go unnoticed or unappreciated by others. But God in heaven knows when you are doing his good works, and your balance sheet in heaven will reflect that.