We had realife yesterday and this is the message I shared. Now, be forewarned that the first part of this is Rick Warren's - from his daily email devotional that I receive. I thought it was so good and I needed to share it with the group. But I added the 3rd portion - don't worry, it's obvious. Rick and I, well, we have unique writing styles. Like, his is good and mine is bad. But it's fun and I hope you enjoy it!
Margin or Marginless?by by Rick Warren with closing thoughts by Anna Thoreson
God, listen to me shout, bend an ear to my prayer… You’ve always given me breathing room, a place to get away from it all. Psalm 61:1, 3 (MSG)
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A lot of people are on overload and headed for a crash. Consider these statistics:
· People now sleep 2½ fewer hours each night than people did a hundred years ago.
· The average work week is longer now than it was in the 1960s.
· The average office worker has 36 hours of work piled up on his or her desk. It takes us three hours a week just to sort through it and find what we need.
· We spend eight months of our lives opening junk mail, two years of our lives playing phone tag with people, and five years waiting for people who are late for meetings.
At least in the U.S., we’re a piled-on, stretched-to-the limit society that is chronically rushed, chronically late, and chronically exhausted. Many of us feel like Job did when he said, “I have no peace! I have no quiet! I have no rest! And trouble keeps coming” (Job 3:26 GWT).
Overload comes when we have too much activity in our lives, too much change, too many choices, too much work, too much debt, too much media exposure.
We’re stressed by information overload; we’re stressed by accessibility overload – we’re connected all the time. Simply put, we’re stressed by the pace of life.
Is there a solution? Yes. The solution is to put some margin into your life. Margin is breathing room. It’s keeping a little reserve that you’re not using up. It’s not going from one meeting to the next to the next with no space in between.
Margin is the space between your load and your limit. But most of us are far more overloaded than we can handle, and there is no margin for error in our lives.
Dr. Richard Swenson, MD says this: “The conditions of modern day living devour margin. If you’re homeless we direct you to a shelter. If you’re penniless we offer you food stamps. If you’re breathless we connect you to oxygen. But if you’re marginless we give you one more thing to do. Marginless is being 30 minutes late to the doctor’s office because you were 20 minutes late getting out of the hairdresser because you were 10 minutes late dropping the children off at school because the car ran out of gas two blocks from a gas station and you forgot your purse. That’s marginless.
“Margin, on the other hand, is having breath at the top of the staircase, money at the end of the month, and sanity left over at the end of adolescence. Margin is grandma taking the baby for the afternoon. Margin is having a friend help carry the burden.
“Marginless is not having time to finish the book you’re reading on stress. Margin is having the time to read it twice. Marginless is our culture. Margin is counter-culture, having some space in your life and schedule. Marginless is the disease of our decade and margin is the cure.”
There are Four Benefits of Putting Margin in Your Life
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Matthew 11:28-30 (NIV)
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Here are four immediate benefits you’ll receive by building margin into your life:
1. Peace of mind. When you’re not always hurrying and worrying, you have time to think, time to relax, time to enjoy life. We had a bird come into the building one evening before service. He started singing, and it was just like we’d been given an invitation: “Just relax. Everybody except those sitting directly under the bird, relax.”
2. Better health. Unrelenting stress harms our bodies. We all know that, yet we let it continue day after day after day. Many times we only build margin in our lives after the heart attack almost happens or does happen, or the blood pressure skyrockets. Why do we wait until our health plummets before we make this decision? Why not realize that we need to build some margin into our lives now? The truth is your body needs downtime in order to heal. Race cars make pit stops occasionally in order to get repaired. You can’t fix anything going 200 miles an hour. Yet, we try to repair ourselves while we’re still racing through life. Margin builds in time for better health.
3. Stronger relationships. Lack of margin is one big reason for the collapse of the American family today. When we don’t make relationships a priority and make time for each other, our relationships suffer. Relationships take time; and margin provides the time to sit and talk, to listen and enjoy one another, and to provide the comfort we each need.
4. Usefulness in ministry. When you’re overloaded by activity, you can only think of yourself. You’re in survival mode, just trying to make it through another day. But being available to God for his use makes all the difference in this world.
When you have no margin in your life and God taps you on the shoulder, saying, “I’d like you to do this for me,” your first response isn’t joy. Your first response is, “Oh, no! Another thing to do! Sorry, God – I’d like to do that, but I’m just too busy.”
We end up resenting the great opportunities God brings into our lives. But when you have margin, you’re available for God to use.
You don’t have to live on overload. You don’t have to live in survival mode. Begin today to build a buffer around your schedule. Then enjoy the benefits of margin and see what God does next!
So what then? How do we find margin in our already overloaded life?
Ok, so I need to admit that first of off, this is where Rick Warren’s lesson ends and mine begins. I was so excited to receive these emails, they spoke to my life in such a real way. I was left after this second one, waiting for a third. I checked my email box daily for a week hoping to find it waiting for me – the answer to all my problems – HOW do you build margin into a marginless life?? And yet, no answer came. So now, I have to find the answers myself. Seriously, this is the blind leading the blind here. It’s like asking a 3 pack a day chain smoker how to quit smoking!
So I’ve had these emails in my box for a few weeks now, and they’ve been eating away at me. In 2009 I’m building margin into my life. In fact, it’s my word for the year, if you believe in such a thing. Here are some steps I personally am taking.
Getting more rest. The world looks a whole lot brighter with an extra hour or two of sleep. If Rob and I get a day off, we lay out baggies of cereal for the kiddos and let them self serve breakfast in the morning – sneaking in as much as 45 more minutes of sleep. Going to bed earlier helps too, you don’t really need to take in those late night programs. There pretty trashy anyway, right?
Learn to say ‘no’. It’s a hard word, especially in this society. Or is it? You tell telemarketers ‘no’ all the time. You shoo off those pesky people in the common area of the mall with free samples or nail kits, don’t you? You block pop ups and ignore emails all the time. In fact, look around the room and see all the people who aren’t here today – they in essence, said ‘no’ to realife today. You can say no. You just need to exercise the ability a bit more often. It’s ok to say no to protect your family time, or to get a little extra sleep, or to make sure you get your quiet time in that day.
Speaking of quiet time…
Quiet time is essential for margin. You need time to spend with the Lord, to bask in His Presence and remember why we are running around this crazy planet. You need to remember that you are His precious child and He has tasks for you each day. If you are living without margin, you are probably so busy you are cutting Him out and you probably can’t even hear His voice over the din!! Sound familiar?
The cool thing about quiet time is that once you start building it into your life, you will change gears and build your life around it. You’ll crave that down time with God, where you can pour out your heart before Him. It’s revolutionary, but it can’t happen if you don’t make time for it.
And last, but not least,
make a list. You may not cross off every task, but it at least organizes the chaos and gives you chance to prioritize. You may be a little less likely to waste an hour on the internet or sit down for that cheesy (and probably inappropriate) reality show with a list of what really needs to be done in your hand.
Keep in mind, your to-do list doesn’t need to be all unpleasant tasks like scrubbing the kitchen floor or mowing the lawn. I like to put the fun things on my list too, such as taking a long bubble bath or listening to that new book on cd I borrowed from the library. Prioritize down time for yourself so you don’t burn out on everyone else.
Above all, remember it may not all get done in one day. Sometimes we get really overwhelmed. Take it one day at a time. You can plan for that day and then wake up tomorrow and plan for the next day. Ask God to intervene when you are overwhelmed, but don’t be surprised if He intervenes in an unexpected way, such as a Snow Day or case of strep throat. Remember that He is in control and we need to be serving Him first.
So, in the spirit of Margins – I’m going to give you a little extra margin today. We are skipping past worship this afternoon to give you an extra 20 minutes in your day. I encourage you to use it wisely!!
*** Afterwards everyone sat around for another twenty minutes and just hung out talking. It was really cool. :)
