Making Room ...

This is my dining room table. It's where I sort, fold and stack my laundry. I scrapbook here ... recount my children's lives through pages filled with photos, I'm a 'scrapbook junkie'. I share meals with family and friends at this table. My sister and I have spent countless hours sitting at this table ... drinking coffee and soaking up our friendship. This table was a gift from my parents. It sat in my great aunts house for years. After my aunts passing, Dad stripped it down, refinished it and gave it to me and my husband. This table has been, and is, used for so many purposes, but the most important for me ... this is where I read my bible. I spend my quiet time with God. In the early morning hours, just before sunrise ... this is my place. Our place ... God and me.

Last night, I was working on laundry. Using this table for one of the many purposes. I generally start laundry on Saturdays and finish before nightfall. But, I thought I would get a jump start on it because I knew our Saturday was going to be busy and I didn't want the laundry spilling into my Sunday. But, I didn't finish before going to bed last night. I was tired, so I let it go.

This morning, I headed to the kitchen. The house was dark and quiet. I got my cup of coffee, bible and devotional. Heading for the dining room table ...  and ... there it sat ... unfinished laundry. Stacks of it. Covering the table. My quiet place. There wasn't a free inch of space. Sure, I could move it all. Pile it up and then later 'unstack' it. But, that would mean more work for me. Because once you stack up laundry from three boys ... all different sizes ... fishing through it to make sure each boy has their own clothes. Well, that's a chore. Not one I really wanted to tackle. Plus, all of the boys were still in bed. Putting their laundry away to make room for me at the table would mean waking them up. And, in my house, you do not wake sleeping giants.

I stood there. Cup of coffee in one hand, bible in the other and thought ... my life is like that table. My life's purpose is to serve God in whatever way He has planned. In this world filled with so many distractions, sometimes my life gets out of order. Too busy. It's piled up with all kinds of things and then ... there's no room for God or anything else that I'm called to do or be.

I need to make room for my time with God. I need to carve out time, space and quiet ... to just be with Him. I need to protect that time. Because, in doing so, I let Him know ... He's important to me and my time with Him is important to me. It's worth letting the laundry go undone for a few more days. It's worth letting other distractions stack up in other places but not in a way that it takes over my quiet time ... like the laundry I left undone took over today.

Matthew 6:6 "But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you."