Cultivating a Quiet Heart
We won’t begin the count-down to the last day of school yet, but I want to encourage you to begin thinking about how you will spend your summer days. You may have already scheduled VBS, your family vacation, and other activities. In between those special events, there will be wonderful pockets of time. How will you spend these days and weeks?
First things first; be intentional about planning your own schedule. Is summertime an easier and slower pace for you and your family? I hope so! How about an earlier and more leisurely start to your day before the children awaken as you read your Bible and devote quiet time with the Lord. Could you find a few minutes to journal about what God is speaking to you from His Word? Are you inclined to have daily devotions and Bible reading with your children since your morning schedule gives you some leeway? Consistency, not length of time is the goal.
How about the necessity for you, precious Mom, to have solitude – a time set apart where the rush, noise, and anxiety of the world fall mute on your ears and heart. Even the most classic extroverts need solitude. We read in Scripture where Jesus rose early and went to a desolate place to be with His Father (Mark 1:35). Rising early to sit quietly before the Lord is a discipline that returns spiritual dividends throughout the day. As I am typing this, I am sitting in solitude and silence (minus my fingers typing and the noise of a plane flying overhead).
The hum of a plane in the clouds took me immediately back to my summer days growing up on our farm in Indiana. Why? Because the noise of an airplane against the backdrop of a cloudless, blue sky was the only noise that interrupted my solitude as I roamed the farm. In those moments I sensed the beauty of God’s creation. Now, as I look back on those days, I recall thinking of them as boring, but absolutely delightful as well! Seeing the freshly plowed fields, experiencing the smell of newly baled hay, and noticing the few cars that passed our house created in me memories that at the time were rather dull and insignificant. Even the slamming of our screened-in back door gave rise to an uptick of activity, which I welcomed! But as I grew older, I began to realize those were actually sacred moments; moments of life’s gifts from God: the beauty of creation, a slow-paced life, the sights, the sounds, and smells of a rich and simple life, which created in me a quiet heart.
Is this enticing? Does this seem uncommon or impossible to recreate? Sometimes I think a more structured schedule like you have during the school months, makes it easier to say “no” to the extras that are requested of you. With that being the case, I want to encourage you to be intentional about how you plan your days with your children. I believe it takes discipline to say, “I don’t have capacity to do that.” In one sense, maybe you do, but maybe your priority is a scheduled quiet time for your children- a planned time of ‘quiet nothing.’ Perhaps, just perhaps, you can give them the gift of simplicity and stillness, which can create in them a quiet heart- a heart that is attuned to Jesus, to others, and to the chirping of a bird.
In the upcoming weeks, I will be giving more ideas about summertime with your children, but for now, be thinking about being intentional with prioritizing your own morning routine and how you will cultivate your own quiet heart. That, in itself, is a gift to your children!
