The Weight of A Day

 

I am kinda on summer break. 

 I have my schedule perfected for summer--work one week, off the next. It's a beautiful thing to wake up in the morning without an alarm to a blank calendar.  I help my two guys get their stuff together so THEY can get out the door on time, but after that, I am free as a bird.  But I don't really use my freedom for flying like a bird does; I use mine for inside stuff.  Sitting, reading, laundry, scrolling, drinking coffee, talking on the phone, paying bills.  When I'm not cleaning houses for my clients, I'm usually piddling around in my own house, organizing something or working on little projects. I rarely turn the TV on when I'm home alone, although I'm almost always listening to an audiobook or podcast.  I "drew up" a graphic depicting a regular day with me at home:

Bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, couch, laundry, bathroom, kitchen, couch, front porch, couch....on repeat over 20 days a month.  It may not sound like a dream day, but after years of running an in-home day care, having the house to myself is a treat!  (Side note--I am now a babysitting Grammie during the school year, so there is also sadness in my quiet house.) 

It's easy, though, to lose yourself in the mundane.  The laundry only needs to be done a few times a week.  I can only sit on the couch so long.  I have one person--myself-- to feed throughout the day.  The neighborhood is too quiet to keep my attention from the front porch.  Before I realize it, it's 3:34 on a Thursday afternoon and I'm still in my pajamas with nothing much accomplished.  Some days I meet my 10,000 step goal; some nights all my smart watch has to report is that I managed to stand 10 times and I breathed the whole day.  😑

 The days I thought I longed for when raising kids and running a busy household are sometimes boring and unfulfilling.   But I have found treasure and failure in both days--busy and restful.

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The Israelites had worked for over 400 years as slaves in Egypt.  By the time God sends Moses to them, each Israelite had spent his/her LIFETIME as a slave.  They've known nothing but work. Moses tells the slaves that God intends to rescue them and take them to the land He'd long promised, one flowing with milk and honey.  The exodus story is famous--signs, plagues, death, stubbornness, arrogance, parted sea, deliverance.  Getting the Israelites out of Egypt seemed easy compared to getting Egypt out of them, because they mourned and longed for a return to the life they lived before, a life of slavery.  They worshiped false gods just like their captors, and what should have been an 11-day journey turned into a 38-year wandering. 

If I compared this map (the condensed written version of which you can find in Numbers 33 ) to the map of my daily dally, it wouldn't look that much different.  We have both been piddlers, gripers, wanderers.  We both have been unfocused and ungrateful.  No matter what obstacle comes our way--real or imagined--when we do the math, WE are the common denominator to our failures.  But yet, we both find ourselves under the guidance and protection of the LORD, the One who loves us more than we can think or imagine.  

 How is all this reconciled? There's nothing wrong with a lazy, loungy day.  There's nothing wrong with a day filled with work.  God, in a cloud by day and a fire by night, led His people through the wilderness.  They stopped when He stopped.  They packed up and followed when He moved.  The stopping days might have felt lazy and unfocused.  The moving days might have felt exhausting and pointless.  Moses, while in the middle of the wilderness, wrote it best:

"Teach us to number our days carefully so that we may develop wisdom in our hearts." Psalm 90:12

There is weight and value in a restful day, if that time of  "lounging" is spent in God's presence.  There is weight and value in a busy day, if the work you're doing is done with integrity--working for the Lord. Mary and Martha are cited as examples of this all. the. time. We make it a point of contention and comparison, when the Bible says both are good, there is just a proper time for each.

Summer is flying by, like it does every year.  Moses felt it too.  Psalm 90 is full of wistful language--"all our days ebb away"; "a thousand years are like yesterday that passes by, like a few hours of the night"; "even the best years are struggle and sorrow; they pass quickly and we fly away".  Teach us, LORD, to feel the weight of a day.  Teach us to make our days count--carefully, intentionally--in the lazy and the busy.  Teach us so that we may present to You a heart of wisdom.  

"Let the favor of the Lord our God be on us; establish for us the work of our hands--establish the work of our hands!" Psalm 90:17