From The Crucible (by Pastor Linda Pugsley)

© Bill McCown | www.myghcf.com

“Hold please”. Don’t you hate that when you are trying to get hold of someone to resolve an issue and they press a button that puts you in phone limbo for thirty minutes or so? What do you do? Do you just stop everything and stand there for an hour, 24 hours, 30 days? Do you just wait forever for them to answer the phone—not hardly! Usually, if someone puts you on hold, you hang up and try later.

Are you doing that to God? Does He keep “calling” you, but you put Him on “hold”? “I’ll get to some Bible studying later”, you say. Or, “I’ll focus on You, Lord, right after I finish one more thing”. Have you inadvertently made time your master instead of your servant?

In our country, our awesome, industrious country, we have become slaves to work. Work has mastered us instead of us mastering it. Hard work is good; it has been the bulwark of our success here but it cannot be our God. As crazy as it seems, when you carve out the time with God first, you get more time in return! God’s miraculous power can work through your life, in the rest of the time left in each day in a more powerful, intense manner than you could even imagine. He can get more done than you ever could.

Want more of God? Give Him more of you…and that means your time as well as your tithe and talent. More meetings, more programs, more reports, more being busy doesn’t mean it’s more of God! Steal away with Him; be refreshed in being alone with Him. Don’t bring the crowd or the calendar, just bring your heart. (Song of Solomon 2:10) As you walk with Him in that wonderful place of intimate companionship, just watch how much more than your “busy-ness” that He can produce through you which manifests in His fruit and blessings. Endure the fire…it’s producing pure gold!

---