A View from Heaven’s Perspective
Heard this song today and was encouraged to see life through God’s perspective. If you are struggling today, know that He is there for you, and rest in the comfort of His arms. Blessings as you listen!
The Encroaching Vine of Busyness
August 1, 2011 at 2:49 am (Devotion & Dedication)
The Encroaching Vine of Busyness
“Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, I will give you rest.”
Matthew 11:28
“Wow!” I thought. “These trees are really thick on this road. I can’t even see through the branches!” The side of the road was a mass of green leafy trees, so brilliant in the sun, and I was amazed at how many of them seemed so close together. As I kept driving, however, I noticed that I couldn’t see any part of the trunks of the trees. It seemed like leaves were cascading down the
trunk, instead of up to the light of the sun. It was then I realized that the trees were being overtaken by a broad leafy vine. The vines had completely encased the trunks of the trees, all the branches, and the tree was actually in the process of dying. “How sad,” I thought to myself. “All this beautiful, luscious greenery is actually crippling and killing these trees.”
It is the same way with sin in our lives – in particular, the sin of busyness. When we are so busy doing things that seem good, positive, and beneficial, we can lose sight of what those “good” things are doing to our lives. They are slowly encroaching on our personal time alone with God, and our quality time with those we love. We keep adding events, and meetings, and ministry opportunities to our lives that fall into the “good thing to do” category, but we are slowly overtaken by our schedule. The busy lifestyle we have chosen slowly starts to crush our spirit and discourage our soul. We feel like all we are doing is “keeping up,” and we become useless in our service for God as a wife, mother, friend, as well as in our church ministry.
God did not mean for life to be this way. He gave us the principle of rest starting in Genesis 2 when he established a day of rest. All throughout the Bible this theme of rest continues. In Matthew, God entreats us to come to Him and rest. We need to look at our lives, cut out the vine of busyness at its root, so that it doesn’t overtake us and make us useless servants for God. Find ways to cut out the busyness in your life, so that your relationship with God and others can flourish and grow.
