Thom Rainer has posted an article written by Mike Glenn titled “Balance is Bunk.” In it he explains that there will never be balance to your life. This is something that I have been asking regularly since I accepted my role as associate pastor in Cheyenne. How do I maintain order in my life when my job is my life? When I leave church I spend time with people from church. When I’m not at church I’m thinking about and praying through issues going on at church. When it’s my day off I’m still spending time with people from church. When I go on vacation, I still hear about what’s going on at the church. It never ends! I’m grateful that during this season of stumbling around figuring out how I can best serve in this role, I have 2 other godly men speaking truth into my life and encouraging me to take the time I need. Right now I can make the church my entire focus, but what about when I get married? What happens when I have kids? Then my priorities would need to shift.

I appreciate what Mike said in his article, “Here’s the hard reality. All of us have multiple priorities. Each of these priorities has multiple and competing demands. Not only that, but most of these demands are mutually exclusive.” We can’t continue to please everyone, and we shouldn’t try to please everyone. There is 1 person we should work to please and as we work to please him, the other priorities will fall in to place.

I just started reading ‘What Did You Expect?” by Paul David Tripp. In it he says the only way to have a great marriage is to line up the vertical relationship first and make that the number 1 priority. If the vertical relationship to God is your primary focus, the horizontal relationship with your spouse will fall into place as the love and grace God has so graciously extended to your pours out into your relationship with your spouse. I think it’s the same thing with the church. If your vertical relationship with God is in the right place, that will flow out into the way you conduct your job in the church and the priorities will fall in to place. This does mean that at times you’re going to let people down but remember who you’re working to please, not man, but God.