I have a lot going on and I’m a busy guy.
At church I teach adult ed. and participate in a study group. At work I serve at many college campuses.
With so many commitments and projects to attend to, just staying on top of email seems a full-time job.
I have to wonder, however, if I’m on the right pace. Not the right path, the right pace. A few months ago one of my students challenged me with this:
Rick, you’re always telling us to “do a few things well” in our ministry, yet you seem to have too much happening yourself . . .
I did not disagree. What the student didn’t know, however, was that I’d already been considering ways to slow down, to live a more unhurried life.
Unhurried
In his fine book An Unhurried Life, Alan Fadling says, “How can I talk about the Christian life as walking with God when I so often live it at a sprint?”
In contrast with this lifestyle, Fadling goes on to speak of the pace of Jesus’ life, which is captured in a single word: relaxed.
Jesus was in no hurry to accomplish his mission. He did no more and no less than what God gave him to do.
What if I settled for just that?
“Less is more,” as is often said.
But Fadling presses the same point from the other side. He insists that when we work on things to which we’re not called, more is actually less.
I need to think about that one.