Creative Procrastination: Moving God up on your list by moving other stuff down

Back to that time management program I was talking about last week…

Brian Tracey recommends a technique for getting important stuff done (in the context of work) that I think might help you and me move God up to a higher priority on our to-do lists.

Tracey recommends “creative procrastination” or “setting posteriorities.” In other words, take a look at everything on your to-do list today and decide what you can put off ‘til last. What is least important? What won’t matter if you don’t get to it today? After examing your to-do list, do this exercise again with your daily routine--you know, the stuff that doesn’t even make the to-do list--like folding the laundry, reading emails and watching American Idol. What can be put off until everything that is more important has been done?

I’ve been having fun with this. There are lots of things I would like to put off for a bit. It is kind of nice to say to myself, “I won’t fold that load of laundry now. I’ll take 20 minutes to read about the events of Easter week in my Bible.” Or “I don’t have to respond to that annoying email this second. I can take a few minutes to pray about my priorities for the day.” And you know what, the “oh-so-necessary” things like laundry and business emails still get done. They just take a slightly lower priority--more like where they should have been in the first place.

“...let us throw off everything that hinders...and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.” Hebrews 12:1

P.S. If you are interested in time management techniques, setting priorities and goal accomplishment in the business context, check out Brian Tracey’s blog. I find many of his suggestions helpful toward running my spiritual race as well.

Creating Quiet for God #2

Here is Gordon MacDonald in Ordering Your Private World on getting quiet with God:

Silence and solitude have not come easily to me at all. I once equated them with laziness, inaction, and unproductivity. The minute I was alone, my mind exploded with a list of things I should do: phone calls to make, papers I should be filing, books unread, sermons unprepared, and people I ought to see.

The slightest noise outside my study door was a massive intrusion to concentration. It seemed as if my hearing became supersensitive, and I could overhear conversations at the other end of our house….Because my study is near our laundry room, it never seemed to fail that the moment I got into spiritual activity the washing machine would decide the load inside was unbalanced, and its foghorn-like buzzer would go off, insisting that I…should come and readjust the wash.

But concentrating even when there was silence became desperately difficult. I learned that I had to warm up, to accept the fact that for about 15 minutes my mind would do everything it could to resist the solitude. So among the things I did was to start by reading or writing on the subject of my spiritual pursuits.

MacDonald goes on to explain how journaling has been incredibly helpful to him in many ways, one of which was to get over the “hump” and begin to focus.

So don't be discouraged if you're distracted as you try to get quiet with God. Just keep at it every day. Eventually your mind will become trained and will more easily set aside your extraneous and irrelevant thoughts. And, even more importantly, God will honor your attempts to seek Him out and put Him ahead of all your other pressing thoughts and responsibilities. I've mentioned Elisabeth Elliot’s thoughts on this subject before but they continue to help me so I'll mention them again. Elliot also frets about that “wasted” time when you can’t seem to pray or get your mind to stay focused on God. She says she has come to regard them as an offering to God, no matter how imperfect.

It is a good and necessary thing to set aside time for God in each day. The busier the day, the more indispensable is this quiet period for prayer, Bible reading, and silent listening. It often happens, however, that I find my mind so full of earthly matters that it seems I have gotten up early in vain and have wasted three-fourths of the time so dearly bought (I do love my sleep!). But I have come to believe that the act of will required to arrange time for God may be an offering to Him. As such He accepts it, and what would otherwise be "loss" to me I count as "gain" for Christ.

(From Elisabeth Elliot’s A Lamp for My Feet.)

Creating Quiet for God

I was listening to a Brian Tracy audio program about time management this weekend. Tracy told about a conference he recently attended which included a formal dinner opened in prayer. Upon opening his eyes at the close of the prayer, Tracey was startled to see that four or five people seated at his table seemed strangely moved by the prayer. They remained with heads bowed, hands in their laps, well after the “amen.” In fact, they remained this way even as their food began to be delivered. Then Tracy realized that they had not been praying; they were using the opportunity to check messages on their blackberries.

Now you and I might not go quite that far—checking email during time devoted to public prayer—but I wonder how different I really am from these people when I repeatedly find myself thinking through the day’s to-do list when I actually mean to pray. Or how about when I leap up from Bible reading to answer the telephone, take the laundry out of the dryer as soon as the timer buzzes, etc.? I let things of far lower priority interrupt and distract me from the really important task of speaking with God.

Now Brian Tracy was not trying to emphasize the importance of prayer when he told this story. He was simply illustrating how absurdly attached we’ve become to our hi-tech communication devices. He recommends turning them all off for periods of time during the day—no cell phone, telephone, email, PDA, blackberry or anything else that can summon your attention and distract you from the project at hand—in order to achieve maximum efficiency in time management.

But Tracy’s idea is a good one for Christians seeking to achieve more in their daily relationship with God as well. We know we need to set aside some time when no one can reach us but God. We know we need to get quiet so we can hear His voice above all the others. But it seems impossible in this fast-paced crazy world, doesn’t it? One very practical way to make progress in this area is to deliberately turn off all communication devices for some period of the day. Let the calls go to voicemail. Check email later. While you're at it, make sure the radio, iPod and TV are off as well. Get quiet with God.

Waltzing into God's Office #2

On the same day Nancy Perot waltzed into her dad’s office, Perot’s son Ross Jr. also stopped by to say hello to dad. Ross Jr. was older than Nancy and immediately caught a sense of what was going on in his dad’s office that day. He recognized Bull Simons, a retired army colonel famous for an attempted POW prison raid and realized that his father must be planning a rescue mission.

Perot knew his son had caught on and so began to talk with him about what he wanted Ross Jr. to do in the event something happened to his dad. In particular, he asked his son to leave college—although he knew it would be a sacrifice--to come home and raise his sisters properly. Ross Jr. immediately replied with tears in his eyes, “Dad, that’s what I would have done even if you’d never brought it up.” The father and son reached a new level of closeness that day.

There are two things that are interesting to think about in this story.

First, Nancy and Ross Jr., despite their differing levels of maturity and responsibility, had equal access to their father. Both were free to stop in at any time. Both shared equally in their father’s love and attention that day. This is what God’s relationship with His children is like. We all have equal access and we each enjoy all his love and attention. So if you have something on your mind that you want to talk about with God, don’t deprive yourself because you think there are other people He’s going to pay more attention to. Billy Graham is not at the front of the line monopolizing all of God’s attention. God wants to hear from you no matter whether you’re a brand new Christian, a long-time Christian who really hasn’t paid much attention to Him for awhile or a world class evangelist. We all can waltz into the office anytime.

Second, Ross Jr. accepted responsibility from his father because he was ready to do so. It was natural and not some big, awful turning point. Some of us are afraid to get closer to God because we think He may ask us to give up something or do something hard. (I had lunch with a friend awhile back who told me she was afraid to get closer to God because He might bring hard stuff in her life into force her to grow more—and she was afraid NOT to get closer to God because He might bring hard stuff into her life to force her to draw close!) Yet, in my experience, God generally asks us to take on harder stuff only when we become mature enough and aware enough that taking on responsibility seems pretty much the natural thing to do--like Ross Perot Jr.’s reaction to his father. We are ready and willing to accept it even if we’d rather take an easier path. Like Ross Jr., we’re ready to say, “Of course, that’s what I think is best. That’s what I would have done anyway.” And do you think Ross Jr. walked away from the office that day thinking, “Boy, I wish I did not stop by?” I’m sure he was instead thinking, “I hope everything goes OK but, if not, at least I’m glad I had that talk with my father. I’m glad I know what he wants me to do and he has confidence in me.”

So don’t hesitate to waltz into God’s presence and enjoy your parent/child relationship because God might be handing out tough chores today. If you are at the “Nancy” stage you will enjoy a wonderful time snuggling with your dad and you will not be handed responsibilities you can’t handle. If you are at the “Ross Jr.” stage you will also enjoy a wonderful time with your father and you will be at the point that you quite naturally and with little regret accept whatever He has in store for you.