4.22.2009

un-simple

i crave a simple life.

or at least i like to think that i do.

when life gets crazy, when and i'm overrun by demands that i brought on myself; when the clutter of things that i have collected seems to revolt and take control; when the meaningful conversations are drowned in the sea of "'hi, how are you doing?' 'good, how are you?' 'fine. bye.' 'bye.'" ones; when i no longer feel like i am actually living my life, but instead i am its puppet.

Oswald Chambers wrote this in yesterday's entry in My Utmost For His Highest:
Our Lord must be repeatedly astounded at us-astounded at how "un-simple" we are. It is our own opinions that make us dense and slow to understand, but when we are simple we are never dense; we have discernment all the time.
once again, i am faced with the reality that i need to simplify. the challenge becomes greater as there are more areas of life which are so easily becoming un-simple. only a few years ago, who would have guessed that we would have such complex on-line lives? email, twitter, facebook, MSN... as much as i am an advocate for *most* of these things, and, admittedly, it would be much more difficult to do my job without them, they do cast yet another un-simple shadow over my life.

let me ask you...

what are the unsimple areas of your life?

how do you simplify?

4 comments:

Lynn said...

Oh, how true is this. You are quite right about FB and the likes. I know I spend way too much time on them when I should be doing other things... Like simplifying my life... my home... my relationships. Thanks for the reminder. Maybe it's time for me to pick up Oswald Chambers devo again.

LN

Anonymous said...

It's funny you mention Ozzie today, I read him yesterday, too and was convicted by his words. He really gets right down to it, and makes things simple. No pun intended.

What struck me most was the idea that we and in my case, I, most definitely overthink things and doing so miss God in my life right
now, at this moment. He said, "The mystery of God is not in what is going to be, it is now; we look for it in some cataclysmic event." Ozzie goes on to say that in the questions we ask of God about our lives, we hurt Jesus, because we are not living in the now. "Realize that the Lord is here now, and the emancipation is immediate." I'm grieved over how I must hurt the Lord, when I look right past Him trying to get an understanding of what lies ahead. I need to simply look at Him today and simplify.
-Angie

susanne said...

@lynn: i think it's always time for MUFHH...one just needs to be able to handle the inevitable pain of change!

@ang: i agree. i don't often think about having the power to hurt God, but OC does have a way of making you see your life in a different light!

Anonymous said...

Dear Suzi,

I've simplified my life by cancelling newspaper, not doing facebook, twitter and MSN. There are still issues that need dealing with but praying that God helps me with those. Clutter is one of those issues not easy to deal with. We collect for many years so therefore difficult to part with stuff in a short period of time. But I must be vigilant....

Miss yu!
Love,
Esther:-)

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