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How to Fight Busyness During the Holidays

How to Fight Busyness During the Holidays

Life can be busy and stressful, especially during the holidays. School is stressful for your children, which stresses you out. Sickness levels the house, which is followed by unexpected bills. You’re stressed out that you’re stressed out and not enjoying time with your family. Christmas parties start to pile up, along with all the white elephant gifts you need to buy. You need to work out before you eat too much over the holidays, but you can’t seem to find time for going to the gym. Travel plans need to be made for seeing family, which means the oil has to be changed on the car (and the windshield wiper fluid along with two new tires). All the while, Christmas shopping weighs on the back of your mind. But that brings you back to finances, which has you stressed out again.

This struggle is particularly felt during the holidays between late November and early January. For the Christian, this should be a season marked by gratitude, reflection and rest. This, of course, clashes with the culture of consumerism in which we live. One invites us to go, do and get. The other invites us to stop, rest and remember. The sad reality of the holiday season for many Christians is we are so busy we end up missing the wonder of Immanuel—God with us.

I recently returned to a book Kevin DeYoung wrote a few years ago—Crazy Busy: A (Mercifully) Short Book About a (Really) Big Problem. I would highly recommend it to you. His conclusion especially speaks to our busyness during the holiday season. It’s simple—it almost sounds too simple. DeYoung suggests, “Making consistent time for the Word of God and prayer is the place to start because being with Jesus is the only thing strong enough to pull us away from busyness.” Like Mary, we need to choose “the good portion” and sit at the Lord’s feet and listen to his teaching (Luke 10:38-42). We need to hear Jesus’ words to Martha, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary” (Luke 10:41-42). Even more poignantly, DeYoung challenges us with these words: “It’s not wrong to be tired. It’s not wrong to feel overwhelmed. It’s not wrong to go through seasons of complete chaos. What is wrong—and heartbreakingly foolish and wonderfully avoidable—is to live a life with more craziness than we want because we have less Jesus than we need.”

Let that sink in…we do not have to live a life with more craziness than we want because we have less Jesus than we need. That’s the key to fighting our busyness—more Jesus. We get more Jesus by being in God’s Word and with God’s people. Let me suggest three avenues you can pursue this during the holidays:

1. Individually: Make time to be in God’s Word and prayer. The daily rhythm of spending time with the Lord is the surest way to prepare ourselves to navigate our busy lives. God does not command us to have daily devotions, He calls us to dwell on His truth day and night. God does not demand a quiet time; He calls us to entrust all of our time into His hands. Devotions and quiet times will never last if we guilt ourselves into doing them. It is God’s grace and empowering Spirit that sustains our daily time in God’s Word and prayer. We cannot afford to neglect it. But if we have, return to Him tomorrow with confidence that His mercies are new every morning.