ACTS 4:32-35<\/strong><\/p>\n

^{32\u00a0<\/sup>All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had. 33\u00a0<\/sup>With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And God\u2019s grace was so powerfully at work in them all 34\u00a0<\/sup>that there were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned land or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales 35\u00a0<\/sup>and put it at the apostles\u2019 feet, and it was distributed to anyone who had need.<\/em><\/p>\n}

 <\/p>\n

My thoughts on money<\/a> a few weeks ago sent me directly to these verses in Acts post-haste. If I could learn to live like this, sharing and caring and LETTING GO then life would feel a little lighter, a little sunnier. But communes went by the wayside in the 70s and communism is not my political flavor of choice. So\u2026how do you live with hands wide open with your whole life?<\/p>\n

Tithing is good. Tithing is necessary for our minds to open up to what is a gift to<\/em> us and for<\/em> us to give. Donating to Goodwill, to charities, all good things. These I can do. But you know the hardest thing for me to give? Time. Oh, I want it to be mine all mine to parcel out as I see fit. In Screwtape Letters<\/em>, C.S. Lewis (the most famous introvert I know), writes: “Nothing throws [the Christian] into a passion so easily as to find a tract of time which he reckoned on having at his own disposal unexpectedly taken from him.”<\/em><\/p>\n

True story: when I was in high school a couple friends came knocking at my back door. You see, I had a door to my room that opened onto a deck that led to freedom. My parents trusted me much more than I plan to trust my own children. I did not use that door enough. That\u2019s a clear metaphor for my teenage years…closed doors. So these friends came knocking and invited me to play night baseball with a group from school. My answer: I had to study\u2026Latin. I valued my time and my choices more than theirs. I won\u2019t get that night back or my youth or those friends who live thousands of miles away. And Latin is a dead language.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s where you\u2019re waiting for me to say that I\u2019ve learned my lesson. I suppose I have in some ways. I love and need my friends and my husband and my children. My life is more circus that solo act these days. Which is why those two precious days when all three kids are in school are golden<\/em>. I catch myself wishing into Wednesday on Wednesday eve when the bedtime ritual is tortuously drawn out and littered with tears and the hysterical laughter of the exhausted child. In the morning after drop off, I\u2019m the weird speed walker racing to her car. I barely slow for the other moms, even if they are friends, especially if their mouths are opening with what looks like the beginning of more than \u201chello.\u201d These are my days to write and do laundry and SIT DOWN. I hunker in my bunker like a rabbit in its den. These hours are the hours I snatch to \u201ccome back to myself.“<\/em><\/p>\n

And yet, God wants me to find myself in him and with the other humans he puts in my path. They are not objects to be avoided, video-game ninja style. They are to be aimed for<\/em> not away from<\/em>. Honestly, the tighter I hold those two days, the less enjoyable they are. They start to feel like payment in a job I\u2019m only doing for the money. Not worth the effort. And the ironic part\u2026I miss my kids. I crave my quiet time and then I miss them. They are little sorcerers. They\u2019ve cast their spell.<\/p>\n

Now we all need our time to re-set. We, especially us introverts, need those precious moments to meet our minds and settle into our thoughts without any effort to speak them. We are bread rising and we need a warm still place to rest. But I\u2019m going to try to live a bit more as the disciples who \u201cshared everything they had,\u201d including time. I\u2019m going to slow down and talk to those mothers. I\u2019m going to make lunch dates and coffee dates. I\u2019m going to let the laundry pile up. I\u2019m going to at least try to open that back door.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ACTS 4:32-35 32\u00a0All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had. 33\u00a0With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And God\u2019s grace was so powerfully at work in them all 34\u00a0that there were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned land or houses sold them, …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1290,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[22],"tags":[55,54,17,15,59,125],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/mom-gene.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/watch-698498_1920.jpg?fit=1920%2C1280&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8ca5p-kM","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mom-gene.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1288"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mom-gene.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mom-gene.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mom-gene.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mom-gene.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1288"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/mom-gene.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1288\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1460,"href":"https:\/\/mom-gene.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1288\/revisions\/1460"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mom-gene.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mom-gene.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1288"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mom-gene.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1288"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mom-gene.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1288"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}