My cup runs over. Not in a good way. It is filled with fear, anxiety, and worry. Everyday feels like sprints, though knowing life is a marathon. Work from home has multiplied my responsibilities.I wake up tired. I sleep anxious. I fall sick.

This entire week, my partner, mentor, and staff were quick to point out my stress and how it affected team morale and culture. Truth is, I was afraid of failing. It drove me to work really long hours. The over-time consequence? I am unable to rest and undividedly spend time with the Lord. Always distracted. Always hurried.

It makes me skim through my spiritual walk with God. How can I tune in to God on Sundays when the rest of the week I tuned out from God?

It might be because …

• I had forgotten who I am in Christ apart from my work

• I lost sight that it is about what God has done more than what I do for Him

• I cared of what the world says more than of what Jesus cares about

Here are questions to help uncover our fears and live an unhurried life:

1. Whose business is it?

   In College, I committed I’d be okay if I become a nobody for Jesus. Now that I’m in the midst of a culture-changing venture— the projects bigger and the risk higher—I started to think that God let go off His leash and it’s up to me to run and keep the show going. The truth never changes. Jesus is the same yesterday , today, and forever (Heb 13:8). God’s promise to your faith fathers like Abraham and David that He will never leave you nor forsake you stands true even today, where you are!

2. What is the culture of my heart? Does it mirror the culture of the world? 

The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!

- Matt 6: 22-23

How can I redeem culture if my own heart is not showing the redemptive aspect that I can live unhurried life? How do I help others “heal” when I myself am unwell? We’ve forgotten the freedom Jesus brings “life and life to the fullest" (John 10:10)'. Nowadays, every step becomes about achieving and accomplishing, revealing the ‘never satisfied’ heart. Rest is what freed people do. Have a culture so different than what the world offers; Your first and foremost duty is: To love God and be more like Him daily. You cannot save culture by the way. There is only one Savior.

3. Do you march to the beat of a different drummer?

"You’re not fast enough. You’re not doing enough. You’re not profitable enough,” dictates culture. Even if you’re probably doing everything right, there’s constant pressure to how you’re supposed to run the race. Whose to dictate ? If God is the one who owns the business, at the end of day, isn’t Him to whom you should report to?

God’s pace is different.

“Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint” (Isa 40:30-31).

On the words of Kristi Walker:

We wait on the Lord to act – to deliver, to answer our prayers, to renew our strength, to do what only God can do. We wait on Him because He is God and we are not. As we wait on the Lord, he changes us and strengthens us. He rewards those who wait, and His timing is perfect.

We can take our time. Be unhurried. Tune off a couple of hours. Stop working 1 day of the week. Enjoy fellowship and stop responding to email.

May we have the courage to sing again the psalm (27:13-14) in the midst of our storm, “I remain confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.”

That we may work out of rest,

Tam