Living for more

I'd like to say that I wake every morning, glowing at the possibilities the day holds. But if I'm honest, I usually roll over, glare at my alarm clock and count the days til Friday. Especially in February. (I firmly believe it is the longest short month of the year...)

It makes me a little sad that I'm so often rushing through my life, discounting all that lies in the mid-week (albeit imperfect) -- opportunities to be with my students, laugh with my colleagues, read books and say bedtime prayers with my boys, and to enjoy the quiet with my husband at the end of a long day.

I'm also realizing that my hurry -- my focus on those precious weekend hours -- may be a sign of a greater yearning in my heart. My failure to be present in my current moment may reveal that I'm a little too focused on the things of this world. I know, I know -- it seems illogical and backwards -- but I'm wondering how focusing on things beyond this world might give me some much-needed perspective for life here on earth. It seems that in order to really embrace where I am now, I need to be more focused on God's big picture and what really matters.

On Sunday I heard a very convicting sermon on idols that emphasized that our idols are actually good things in our life that we cling to too tightly -- sometimes even our kids, our jobs, our homes, our possessions. Our pastor, Larry, called all these "incomplete joys." But, rather than eliminating our lives of these idols, we just need to understand their place in our life. He put it like this: "Battle idolatry not by trying to remove our idols -- because our idols are rooted in good things...but replace them by loving God above our idols." As author Tim Keller says, "It is not that we love other things too much, it's that we love God too little; a deep love of God will put all other things in their proper place."

And that's what I'm trying to get at -- if I can learn to focus more on the love of God, more on living God's way, seeing things through an eternal lens -- maybe I can get a bit closer to making my joy complete, even in the midst of an imperfect weekday schedule.