How to Not Let Busyness Hold You Back
By Drenda Keesee
“Your Word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path” (Psalm 119:105, ESV).
This Bible verse encourages us to let God’s Word be our light, yet so often we forget how essential it is to read our Bible. We know we couldn’t survive if we didn’t eat, but we allow ourselves to go days, maybe even weeks, without seeking out spiritual food. Why?
Our schedules are constantly packed with running kids to soccer practice, dance recitals, dinners, playdates, errands, and more. These things might keep us busy, but they don’t keep us satisfied. Busyness can actually become a way we distract ourselves! If there are cuts to be made to the family schedule, why is it that…
…our spiritual food is always first on the chopping block?
Don’t let busyness hold you back from your time with God. The enemy would love nothing more than for us to go into survival mode and live in a constant state of frantic busyness.
So many Christians abandon their walk with God once they’ve received His blessings. We can’t let our success be our end game. Seek first the Kingdom of God, because that is what will fill your heart and keep you satisfied.
Take this step—evaluate your relationship with God. There are warning signs when you’re spiritually malnourished. For instance, you might be having issues in your personal relationships. Once you put God back in the driver’s seat, you will see a difference in your life!
Seek His Presence First
When you look at your relationship with God, how often do you spend time talking to Him? One of the most powerful habits you can cultivate is valuing and protecting your time with God. When you get up in the morning, what’s the first thing you do? It’s easy to wake up and fall into our routine, but when we make the decision to seek God’s presence first, it changes the course of our entire day.
Like any relationship, our relationship with God depends on us seeking that special one-on-one time with Him. God delights in those times of silent devotion so that He can speak into our hearts much louder.
Allow God to reveal answers to you. When God speaks to you, it’s up to you to listen and obey His Word. You can change your course by making God your top priority!
Switch from surviving to thriving!
Create Intentional Quiet Time
“And rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, he [Jesus] departed and went out to a desolate place, and there He prayed” (Mark 1:35, ESV).
Jesus spent a lot of time with His disciples, who were His close friends. He traveled with them, ate with them, and constantly talked with them about God’s love. But often, Jesus retreated from the disciples and went alone to meditate on God’s will. One of the most powerful examples of this is when Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane on the night He was arrested: “Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and He said to His disciples, ‘Sit here, while I go over there and pray’” (Matthew 26:36, ESV).
In fact, Jesus left the disciples, who were fast asleep, on three different occasions. Jesus was relentless in praying for God’s help and counsel, and He repeatedly went off on His own to do so!
As you continue on your walk of faith with God, new struggles will arise; however, you don’t need to be afraid. You can receive God’s wisdom in everything you do—all you have to do is talk to Him. As soon as you open your eyes in the morning, try to set aside distractions and spend a few minutes with your Heavenly Father.
Be a lover of God, not of earthly pleasures. Declutter your mind, and spend some quiet time with God. Holding on to God’s Word is our lifeline! God loves you, and He wants to bless you with the desires of your heart. You have purpose and potential.
You have the keys to switch from surviving to thriving… will you use them?
~ Drenda
Listen in Now to Faith Life Church!
Drenda Keesee’s contagious zeal and humorous personal experiences help make her ministry of spiritual, emotional and relational wholeness one that will bless your life and spark a new fire in your spirit.
A wife of over 30 years and a mother of five children, Drenda has ministered at churches, seminars, and conferences, and through the mediums of television and radio, for more than 20 years.
Her books, The New Vintage Family, Better Than You Think, and She Gets It are available wherever books are sold. In these heartfelt books, Drenda shares her personal journey and the life lessons that have brought her to where she is today, as well as practical answers that all people need to live a joyful life.
Drenda and her husband Gary founded Faith Life Now, a ministry designed to spread the message of freedom in the areas of finances, faith, marriage, and family. Tune in for their weekly messages here. Faith Life Now hosts conferences worldwide, and sponsors both Fixing the Money Thing, which Drenda co-hosts with her husband Gary, and Drenda.
Through their own life experiences, the Keesees have found the principles from God’s Word to be powerful and effective. At one point, Drenda was a young, suicidal feminist with no hope of ever being “good enough” for her own standards of perfection. She never wanted the “inconvenience” of a husband or children, and she was on her own path to success. But the stress of trying to achieve perfection and perform for love left her broken and used. She had success, but it was nothing compared to the pain and loneliness it had also brought.
That’s when God got a hold of her heart. It was there—at her lowest point—that she found the One who accepted and loved her, faults and all. Since that transformation, Drenda has had a passion to reach women who find themselves where she once was.
She married Gary after attending college, and there she found herself in a personal boot camp of sorts. She says, “I cried and told God, ‘I can do anything but be a wife and mother.’” She committed to learning how to do it God’s way. Through the many years of raising their children and struggling to make ends meet, Drenda learned from their mistakes. “I didn’t know how to be a wife and mother, but God saved our marriage, taught us how to parent our children for success, showed us how to have financial success, and then irony of all ironies, He called us to ministry.” It’s truly because of these life experiences that Drenda can now share so many insightful principles for people who are now going through the same struggles.
