Martha, Martha.................

Luke 10:41-42
"Martha, Martha," the Lord answered, "you are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her."

How precious it is to spend alone time with our Lord and Savior and how even sweeter it is to know that He longs to spend time with us! This hammock hangs in my beautiful backyard and it is a place where I often spend quiet time with God. I find that it is in these times when He will so often speak to me. I've never heard his audible voice but He comes to me in a deep feeling in my spirit and I know that I know it is Him. He comes sometimes in a very authoritative way, letting me know that I MUST be obedient to Him. He comes through His Word when a passage of scripture speaks to my circumstances so loudly and clearly that I know, beyond a doubt that it is no coincidence!

But, this wonderful world of going deeper with God involves action on my part. I've heard it said that it is a miracle in itself that the God of Heaven even speaks to us, individually. Like all the other miracles that Jesus performed in the Bible, they all required some effort on the part of the recipient. He did not just zap them with their miracle. They were almost always commanded by Jesus to take some sort of action, some step toward receiving what He had for them. Like those people, if I did not make the choice to spend one-on-one, quiet time with God, I wonder what I would be missing out on. Actually, I know what I'd be missing out on - sweet fellowship with the one who created the universe and yet knows my name!

The world we live in is absolutely full of distractions. There are things coming at us constantly ranging from jobs to family obligations to hobbies to technology to ministries to our schedules and the "to-do" list goes on. Not that any of these things are bad things, but if we choose to fill every free moment of our lives with the "stuff" of life, we will miss out on the only true meaning of life, the whole reason we are here in the first place. I want to be so intimate with God that every step I take, I ask Him about it first. I want His opinion on absolutely everything. So how can I clearly hear His voice if I, like Martha, busy myself so much with all of this "stuff" that I don't set aside enough time, each day to spend with Jesus? He longs to spend time with me and I believe He is heartbroken when we don't make time for him. If He truly is our "Everything" then why would we not want to give Him our time, our attention, our affection? Remember that teenage boyfriend you could not get enough of? You know, the one your mother, deep down, could not stand because you wanted to spend every waking moment with him and if the two of you weren't together, you were talking on the phone?!?!?

James 4:8 says, "Draw near to God and He will draw near to you." This clearly means that if we want to get close to God, we must choose to draw near to Him. I have found this to be impossible without first getting alone with Him. How often, during play-dates with my "mommy" friends, do we try to have "adult conversation" but find ourselves being constantly interrupted and distracted by the voices of our little happy children. We joke and say we only have "half" conversations because we have one eye on each other and the other eye on our kids. A half conversation really is the most we can hope for during these play dates. We don't go into them expecting any more than that. If our time with God takes place amongst other distractions, how can we really give Him our undivided attention? But God wants both of our eyes focused on Him. He wants us at his feet listening, praising, adoring and worshiping Him. He wants to reveal Himself to us in such a mighty way that we will be shocked at just how real and present He feels to us. Sometimes I sense Him wanting to grab our cheeks and turn our faces toward as he says, "Listen to me, my precious child! I've got something awesome for you but you must tune in, in order to get it! So, drop the TV, drop the yacking on the cell phone, drop the e-mails, drop the fiction book, drop the thing that you are so tightly hanging onto. Let go of it long enough for you to grab onto my hand, I want to take you somewhere incredible!!"

In my personal experience, this has involved making sacrifices to make sure I don't give God the short end of the stick. I am in the season of life of pre-school aged children. I have a particularly early rising 3-year old who is up by 6:00 a.m. - regardless of what time he goes to bed. Therefore, I must rise up much earlier than him if I am to get my time in with God. For me, if I don't spend my quiet time at the very start of my day, I won't get it in. As soon as life starts coming at me it is so much harder to grab onto that uninterrupted quality time with God. I also believe He wants our first fruits, the best of us, before we fail and sin later in the day. We can start with a clean slate every morning and ask Him to create in us a clean heart and pour out His new mercies on us that day. We can ask him to fill our day and stay near to us all day. Of course, it is not easy getting up very early and I'll admit, there are some mornings when it just doesn't happen! I mean, in our human flesh, who wouldn't rather stay asleep, all cozy in a warm bed? But the more I consistently stick to it, the more God speaks to me. I find myself not wanting to miss my time because I am so anxious to hear what He has for me that day. It is certainly true that, not every morning involves a grand, huge revelation from God. There are some days when I can just sit back and thank Him for all the ways He has blessed me. I cannot tell you how much better my day goes when I start off praising God for it! I believe that when we start our day with Him, we are inviting Him to stick around with us the rest of the day!

By all means, we can be in His presence anytime, all day, all the time, not just during the one-on-one time. I am learning more and more how to stay with Him all day - just to talk to Him off and on, all day long. He never leaves us!! I believe both ways of being with Him are essential - the bottom line is He wants us - ALL of us!!

I guess it's just like anything else, you get out of it what you put into it. But, unlike other things in life worth spending time on, the benefits of spending time in the presence of the King of Kings, our Abba Father, our Daddy is something we simply cannot put a price tag on! Nothing compares to it!!