There are some clues that can tell you when you are due for a spiritual realignment. Of course, it’s better if you set aside regular, recurring times to recapture the Sabbath rhythm, but there are also several things you can look for that tell you a spiritual recalibration is overdue.
When your pace of life is too fast for too long, it’s time to pull back and recalibrate. We are just not wired to go full-bore, day after day. Eventually, something is going to go boink, and we are in for a system crash.
A few years ago, a social anthropologist made the observation that, based on the archaeological evidence, our hunter-gatherer forebears spent about twenty hours per week in focused efforts to secure the food supply. The rest of the time, they made things with their hands, told stories, sang, danced, created art, and ate meals together.
Today, many of us spend sixty to eighty hours per week to securing the “food supply,” and we’re so exhausted the rest of the time that all we do is vegetate in front of the television or sleep. “And,” the anthropologist remarked, “we call this progress.”
It makes me sad to realize that some of the people who are busiest burning the candle at both ends are my counterparts in ministry. Because of our deep commitment to advancing the kingdom of God, we too often forget that, in order to nurture others, we must have time to nurture ourselves and to be nurtured. And you need to be nurtured, too. When the treadmill is spinning too fast, learn to step off.
Another telltale sign of the need for recalibration is when you find yourself utilizing certain behaviors as escape mechanisms from the stresses of your life. If you find yourself drinking or using other substances to avoid thinking about what’s going on at work or at home, you’re trying to avoid your life rather than live it. If you feel the need to spend money in order to feel better about yourself or to compensate for some other part of your life, you are probably getting out of alignment. Often the classic workaholic personality is really trying to escape from something. Any behavior – even some that others might view as praiseworthy – that you adopt as a way of not facing up to some aspect of your life that needs to be dealt with is an indication that you are in need of spiritual recalibration.
A general lack of contentment is often a sign that your life is misaligned from God’s purposes for you. As Ecclesiastes says, “A person can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in their own toil. This too, I see, is from the hand of God” (Ecclesiastes 2:24). God intends for us to find meaning in our work and to enjoy the simple things of life. If you are finding this difficult, you probably need to reclaim the Sabbath in your heart.
And here’s another benefit: you’ll also find that as contentment increases, hurry decreases. It’s interesting that when we discuss the idea of life moving too fast and being too full, we generally go straight to our calendar to see if we can make some changes. This is usually just a temporary fix, and often life will go back to being out of control within weeks. Why? Because hurry is not a calendar issue – it’s a heart issue. Slowing down starts with your heart, not your planner. If you don’t learn to be content in your heart, you’ll always return to a hurried life.
But there is good news, as Paul reminds us in Philippians 4:11: “I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.” I think the key word there is “learned.” You are not by nature a contented person – and neither am I. It is in our nature to want things to be different, to want them to be better, to want them to be something other than they are.
If you find yourself more easily angered than usual or if your reactions to events are starting to seem out of proportion to the actual situation – to yourself or to other people who are significant in your life – it is likely that you need to set aside some time for recalibration.
Really, the common denominator all of these indicators is that each of them, in some way, is an attempt to put ourselves at the center, in control, calling the shots. This goes back to something we discussed [earlier in the book]: your life is calibrated with God only when you recognize that God – not you – is the center of everything. Only by committing yourself, over and over, to placing your supreme trust in God and in him only will you remain in sync with the way God means for you to live your life.
It is a simple but profound fact: if you are living in a way that is out of tune with God, you will not have the confidence you need to live out his dreams for your life. Embrace the holy rhythms of the spirit and the times of Sabbath. God has built a need for these into every human soul. It’s the way you were meant to live.
Hear more from Pete Wilson this Thursday on LIFE TODAY. This is an excerpt from What Keeps You Up At Night? by Pete Wilson. Copyright ©2015 Pete Wilson. Published by W. Publishing Group, an imprint of Thomas Nelson. Used by permission.
