Mary, Martha, David Allen, and Edgar Allen Poe

While packing some books the other day I couldn't help but chuckle. I packed the book Having Mary Heart In A Martha World: Finding Intimacy With God In The Busyness of Life. The very next book I packed was David Allen's book, Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity. That is a picture of the tension I constantly struggle to balance, and I'm guessing the same is true of most people living and working these days. Wouldn't it be great if there was a way to be so efficient that we could do everything and still have plenty of extra time to spend with God? Yes, but God doesn't want our extra time; he wants our best time. Sometimes I think I struggle to spend undistracted time with God because I know that my to-do list is always there. It's like The Tell-Tale Heart (Poe); no matter what I'm doing I can hear it making noise and distracting me. But the time we spend with God cannot be shortened, compacted, or made to be of such "quality" that "quantity" no longer matters. There is no substitute for sitting down with God and simply being in his presence for an extended time.