A City Life For Me

I have always had a list posted in my kitchen of my daily, weekly, and monthly household "chores."  It helped to keep me on track so I didn't forget things, and the goal was also that it would keep me from overdoing it all in one day.  When I was a mom of just little people (I had four under three years old when the twins were born), it was a sanity saver.  I work better and relax better in a clean and organized environment.  But sometimes my desire for cleanliness makes me a little "OCD" as my mom says.  Trying to do all of the jobs in one afternoon usually leads to a crying breakdown right about the time dinner needs to be cooking... Some days with little people feel as if the cycle will never end.  The kids make a mess.  You clean the mess.  Or you don't clean the mess and it eventually drives you nuts.  But recently I have entered a "sweet spot" where my kids are able to help with the chores.  Now, many times it still feels easier if I just

Something that I have been learning about recently is the practice of Sabbath.  I always equated the practice of sabbath  with the Lord's Day.  My husband preached from Luke 14 a few weeks ago, and in that passage we examined the sabbath principle.  Because Sunday is one of our biggest "work" days as the church staff, it's hard to think of Sunday as a day of rest like it was when I was growing up.  But I have also been realizing that I cannot maintain the speed and pressure of everything on my list at this season of life, so looking for a rest day has been in the forefront of my mind. The word for sabbath  just means seventh, so a true  sabbath would be on Saturday.  Again, this is not practical for our family as a lot of ministry and ministry preparation for Sunday takes place on Saturday.  This has led me to evaulate what and when we could do to create a culture of rest in our home on a different day. We had been taking a half day off on Mondays.  Ben o