Living a Balanced Christian Life (and other funny jokes) ... a devotion from Dianne J. Wilson

If you're anything like me, you spend most of your time juggling many things, wondering if you should have them all on your plate and trying to figure out how to 'balance' it all. Sound familiar?

Sometimes I feel like I'm limping along on a flat. Who am I kidding - most times.

I've attempted to fix my life pizza-style. You know, rearrange things into equal time sections so that everything at least gets a touch. That's not realistic though, so I whipped it all about into some sort of redeemed Mazlo's Hierachy... God first, family second, then church... oh wait. Is it meant to be church then family? I just can't get it straight. But where do you fit a book deadline into that? Or car repairs? How about elastics that need to be stitched onto a ballet shoe? Does that legitimately belong in family?

I've winged it too... on-the-fly-allocate more time to those things that are apparently more valuable than others. But you know what? All it takes it one cat with a fur-ball who decides it's time to let it all out over the lounge carpet to blow my priorities out the water. Or a kidlet who forgot about a speech that has to be done for tomorrow. Or a dropped bottle of ketchup-slash-tomato sauce... Fill in the blanks.

I've come to realize what I was missing from the whole equation. To run smoothly every wheel needs an axle, a central point that is constant. For us, that's Jesus. Once He is securely central, the origin for each thing that captures our time and energy... then our lives run balanced.

Here's the funny thing - there will be seasons of complete and utter 'unbalanced-ness' for each of us. A deadline, a new baby... whatever hits your life with enough force to shake you wonky. But when Jesus is smack in the middle, somehow the wheel can still run smoothly.

How can it though, when the spokes - AKA all the demands on us - are sometimes so unequal? Ask any cyclist how bumpy a ride with spokes like that would be.

Here is the secret... Jesus is a magnificent spoke equalizer. He doesn't just stand on the sidelines, barking orders and smacking his forehead when we get it wrong. He is right in the middle of our mess, His grace, the elastic that reaches the bits we can't get to. He stretches and holds on our behalf when our internal elastic is so frayed that our mental and emotional pants are falling down.

Right now for me, life is a stretch. I single-parent during the week, miss my hubby between weekends, try my best to mommy my girls, work, do home & pets and chase my deadlines. Some days I feel like something has to give or I'll conk out. But you know what? I just need to stay cuddled up to Jesus. He has all these things that pull at me, these spokes... He has them all. Where I fall short (so so short) He doesn't. And He's got you too.

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Matthew 11:28-30

Dianne J. Wilson writes novels from her hometown in East London, South Africa, where she lives with her husband and three daughters. She is writing the third book in YA series, Spirit Walker, with Pelican / Watershed. Book 1, Affinity is releasing on the 8th of June 2018.

Finding Mia is available from Amazon, Pelican / Harbourlight, Barnes & Noble and other bookstores.

Shackles is available as a free ebook from Amazon & Smashwords.

Find her on Facebook, Twitter and her sporadic blog Doodles.

THE PRODIGAL'S MOM

By Marion Ueckermann

                       

I’ve just completed writing Book 3 of my Seven Suitors for Seven Sisters series—A Hero for Heather. This novella is a prodigal-type story and will be released in September in the Falling for You box set. You can read the blurb on the back cover below. This novella reminded me of my own prodigal story which I thought I’d share with you today.

                                                

Many years ago while I was away on a business trip, I received a call from my eighteen-year-old son, Kyle.

“Hey, Mom...guess what?” Without giving me a chance to hazard a guess, his excited voice continued. “I might be moving to Canada.”

Now to put things into perspective, Canada is a twenty-four hour plus flight, excluding stopovers, away from our home in sunny South Africa, way down at the bottom of the globe.

“Oh really,” came my chilly response. “I don't think so.”

We’re all familiar with the parable of the Lost Son or as we better know it, The Prodigal. We've read the story and heard endless sermons about the father's anguish or the older brother's jealousy. But how many readers of this popular parable have stopped to spare a thought for the prodigal's mother. I hadn't. Until then.

Maybe his mother had already passed on from this life—the scriptures make no mention of her, and how many of us even pay any mind to the fact that this capricious young man would have had a mother. Perhaps she doesn't feature because of the way ancient middle-eastern culture viewed their women. Perhaps it’s just because the father really is the central figure of this story.

Whatever the reasons why Jesus didn’t bring her into this tale, I'm convinced the Prodigal's mother was there all along. If we could read between the lines, we'd probably see her standing in the shadows, cringing at the mistakes she knew her son was about to make, trying to talk him out of his foolish ways, weeping before God to intervene and knock some semblance of common sense into her headstrong child.

I know I did.

And God did exactly that for us, but not in a way that we as Kyle’s parents would ever have thought to pray—nevertheless, in a way the Father knew would work a life-changing miracle.*

Doubtless the Prodigal was nothing more than an ordinary, wilful teenager, determined to act upon an impulse, a momentary desire, regardless of the opinions or advice of those older and wiser―much like the teens of today.

Oh, we tried to caution our eighteen-year-old to look at the bigger picture, cautioning him that life cannot always be looked at through rose-coloured glasses. The result and unfair response: “You don’t support me in my dreams for the future!”

Nothing could have been further from the truth.

Like the Prodigal's parents, I knew I had to let go and let God, but the thought of my youngest setting off for a distant country pained me. I had visions of him squandering his earnings. Images where he, thankfully, does not literally live among the pigs, but has so much to learn about how not to live in the sty. Who would be there for him in this foreign country, urging him to learn to pick up his clothes, pack away his washing, tidy the dishes, clean his own room?

His world was tinted with snowboarding shades and the hue of Raybans™ to match his designer job (the one he didn’t yet have). My mind, on the other hand, swam with concern over what he would eat, and how he would cope when loneliness struck.

My prayers, as I’m sure were the Prodigal's mom, were that this whim would blow over (and it did). At the time, however, it was my deepest desire that if my son did get to Canada, he would prosper and not fail.

I prayed if God did open the door for him, that, hard as it would be, I'd send him off with tears and my blessing. And I prayed that if it wasn’t the Father's will, and he still chose to rush down this road of daredevilry, that when he finally came to his senses, he’d remember that home would always be a sunny spot at the bottom of his world. I prayed he’d never forget that he could always come home to his father―and mother―who’d be waiting for him at the end of his journey. I’d be there, as I know in my heart the Prodigal's mamma was, stoking up the fire and placing the fattened lamb on the spit.

* Soon after the Canada whim, God took Kyle to Cape Town for a year, a two-hour flight away from home. There his spiritual life blossomed, resulting in him dedicating his life to God in missions. Today, eight years later, he does live far away from home (and has for more than half that time)—first in Finland, and now in Hungary, doing full-time mission work.

Do you have a Prodigal son or daughter you’re praying for, waiting for? Entrust them into those beautiful, nail-scarred hands—they’re the only hands that are able to keep them from falling, able to bring them back home again.

MARION UECKERMANN’s passion for writing was sparked when she moved to Ireland with her family. Her love of travel has influenced her contemporary inspirational romances set in novel places. Marion and her husband again live in South Africa, but with two gorgeous grandsons hanging their hats at the house next door, their empty nest’s no longer so empty.

Visit Marion at her website www.marionueckermann.net or her Amazon author page.