I have an especially busy week this week. Don and Larisa, my fellow pastors, are at a conference out of town, so I’m holding down the fort, church-wise, for the next few days. I also have some important responsibilities surrounding a funeral and graveside service. I have a UMW circle meeting to prepare for and attend, a wedding, and a police chaplains meeting. And I have my usual responsibilities related to teaching, preaching, and pastoral care. (Moreover, it’s homecoming weekend at Georgia Tech, and I do hope to have time to make it to the game.)
All in a week’s work, and I’m not complaining. But I’m busy—like everyone else, probably. And this is exactly the sort of week in which I’m tempted to push prayer to the back burner. But if I believe in the power of prayer, how can I be too busy to pray? The busier I am, the more I need prayer. So I set my alarm a bit earlier this morning and prayed.
As I was doing so, I found this psalm, Psalm 131. Isn’t it just what I need to hear in the midst of my busy-ness—to have a “stilled and quieted” soul, like a “weaned child with its mother.”
As you start this or any other busy day, maybe meditating on this will help you, too. (This comes from the NIV.)
My heart is not proud, O LORD,
my eyes are not haughty;
I do not concern myself with great matters
or things too wonderful for me.But I have stilled and quieted my soul;
like a weaned child with its mother,
like a weaned child is my soul within me.O Israel, put your hope in the LORD
both now and forevermore.