Building Margin Into Your Life

Written by Ed Allen
Saturday, 28 September 2002 19:00

Building A Balanced Life

Psalm 30: 1-5:
I will exalt you, o Lord, for You lifted me out of the depths and did not let my enemies gloat over me. O Lord, my God, I called to You for help and You healed me. O Lord, You brought me up from the grave, You spared me from going down into the pit. Sing to the Lord, you saints of His, praise His Holy Name. For His anger lasts only a moment, but His favor lasts a lifetime; weeping may remain for the night, but joy comes with the morning.

Isn't it good news that no matter what we are going through at this moment, rejoicing comes with the morning? In a little while we are going to be talking about building margin into our lives, a critical topic for folks that live in our area. We are in the middle of a series of sermons on building a balanced life. Today we are going to continue with our Balance talks by talking about margin.

Anybody feel stressed out? At your limit? Too much to do- too little time? Consider these statistics:

1. People now sleep 2 ½ hours less each night than people did 100 years ago.
2. The average work week is longer than it was in 1960, and the average commute is longer by 25 minutes than it was in 1960.
3. The average office worker has 36 hours of work piled up on his or her desk.
4. We spend 8 months of our lives opening junk mail.
5. We spend 2 years of our lives playing phone tag with other people who are also to busy to answer their phone.
6. We spend 5 years waiting on people who are late, trying to do too much.

We are a piled on, stretched to the limit society. We are chronically rushed, chronically late, chronically exhausted. You may feel as Job did when he said:

I have no peace, no quietness, no rest; only turmoil (Job 3:26).

Can anybody identify with that verse? Evidently we don't just feel overloaded; we ARE overloaded. Merry -go-rounds on playgrounds are no longer allowed. They were a safety hazard; invariably kids would pile on, going faster and faster, and some kid would try to throw himself on and break his arm or something. Our schedules are like that: one more thing, going faster and faster, until somebody gets thrown out of our lives and damaged. Or maybe they get thrown under and run over by the merry-go-round of activity around you and I. Last week we mentioned typewriter margins. Some of you may not remember what a typewriter is, but if you're old enough you will remember setting the typewriter's margins. If you didn't set the margins it would just type out to the rubber and stay there, pounding the rubber, and I can remember having the typing teacher in high school tell us what the exercise was and say, "go!" I would type as fast as I could and look up and see one sentence- and the typewriter pounding the rubber in a big black mark- because I had forgotten to set the margins. You and I do that in our lives- ultimately we end up not being very productive. Here are some of the areas we experience overload in our lives:

1. Too much activity. Some of our kids are scheduled for four or more different activities.
2. Too much change.
3. Too many choices. I've read stories of how when immigrants come to the US from third world countries and walk into a grocery store, they are overwhelmed by the selection of potato chips we have.
4. Too much work where we spend too much time.
5. Too much debt.
6. Too much media exposure.
7. Accessibility overload: telephone, internet, cell phone.

What's the solution? Margin. Margin is the space between my load and my limits.

When I read the biographies of Jesus, it amazes me to discover how free Jesus was to respond to the needs around Him. We're going to take an overall, birds-eye view of Jesus this morning. Normally it is our habit to break open one passage of scripture and lock down and see what God is saying to us. Today will be a survey. We will take a practical look at how to build margin into our lives. A terrific model for us is Jesus. I want you to think about Him for a minute: isn't it amazing that Jesus' job description was 'saving the world'- but he never seemed to be rushed? He never seemed to be late- and he seemed to always be able to respond to teachable moments. Dial back through your own recollections of the life of Jesus- how often He was able to seize teachable moments for those who followed Him. There was always room and time to minister to people if people needed it. Now I don't be seem to be able to live this way. Hopefully, your load is not heavier than your limits. Most of us are far more overloaded than we can handle- and there is no margin for error in our lives.

Excerpt from "Margin" by Richard Swenson:
The conditions of modern day living devour margin. If you're homeless, we offer shelter, if you're penniless we have food stamps, if you're breathless, we connect you to oxygen. If you're marginless, we give you yet one more thing to do. Marginless is being 30 minutes late to the doctor's office because you were 20 minutes late getting to the hairdressers because you were 10 minutes late dropping the children off at school because your car ran out of gas 2 blocks from the gas station and you forgot your purse.

Margin, on the other hand is having breath left at the top of the staircase, money left at the end of the month, and sanity left at the end of adolescence. Marginless is the baby crying and the phone ringing at the same time. Margin is Grandma taking the baby for the afternoon. Marginless is being asked to carry a load 5 pounds heavier than you can lift; margin is a friend carrying half the burden. Marginless is not having time to finish the book you are reading on stress; margin is having the time to read it twice. Marginless is fatigue; margin is energy. Marginless is red ink; margin is black ink; marginless is hurry, margin is calm. Marginless is anxiety; margin is security; marginless is culture; margin is counterculture. Marginless is reality; margin is remedy. Marginless is the disease of our time and margin is its cure. Some of the benefits of having margin in our lives:

• Peace of mind
• Better health
• Stronger relationships
• Being more available for God to use
• Living in the moment and experiencing contentment
• Margin enables us to live with the expectation of God working in our lives.

I suspect you're all saying, "Yeah, I'd like to have more margin- how do I do that?" Let's talk about some practical steps for getting margin into our lives, and I want to set it in a slightly larger context: we are talking about building a balanced life. If you are building a balanced life --slow down. Remember we even used "SLOW" as an acronym:

Surrendering the desire for more and more
Learning to wait on God;
Obeying the fourth commandment
Welcoming God into each day.

After that, we talked about the need to change our orientation from success to significance. Last week we talked about the significance, in God's view, of our work.

Steps to build margin into our lives:

1. Expect to have problems. Some of you know this from having planned a budget. You plan your budget, and your budget has absolutely no margin for error, and the car breaks down. And there goes your budget. Or your third grader has 2 extra field trips you hadn't counted on, and there goes 200 more dollars unaccounted for, because there was no expectation in the budget of problems.

Paul Howdershell had a recent catastrophe in his home (Paul reports on his dishwasher problem that leaked into the subflooring).

Jesus told his followers in John 16:33: In the world you will have trouble. Don't be surprised.

This is not just true physically, but also emotionally. Our marriages are troubled because our expectations are not met. We expected everything to be perfect: to go smoothly all the time. This expectation is also necessary spiritually: you also must expect to have trouble spiritually, so don't be surprised when it happens. This doesn't mean we should live as eternal pessimists, it simply means we should be prepared. Everything will not go perfectly; our plans will run into roadblocks; we'll run short, unexpected problems will happen: we must live with this expectation.

2. A second expectation is to accept my human limitations:

Job 14:5: Man's days are determined; you have decreed the number of his months and have set limits he cannot exceed.

These limitations are not suggested limitations, like the speed limit (which I usually take as a suggestion). The limits on our human lives are absolute: I cannot exceed my human limitations: absolutely; not at all. There is only so much we can accomplish. There are only so many hours in a day, days in a week, weeks in a year. We have physical limitations. I will never be able to play in the NBA. We only have so much talent. Some of us will never be able to be rocket scientists, or brain surgeons- some of you may have that capacity. We only have so many years available to us. I was reminded twice this week of this reality.

Our physical limitations are more obvious, but our emotional limitations are harder to acknowledge. There is only so much weight we can handle emotionally, only so many people we can care for. And for some of you, as a family or couple you have stage of life issues. There are emotional limitations. There are mental limitations for you and I - we can only take in so much. I am in danger of beating a dead horse, but you and I need to be reminded to accept our limitations. Some of you may wish you had an early warning light that would tell us we are passing our limits. The light on our dashboard comes on- "Check engine"( which I also choose to ignore for weeks at a time) but we wish we had a early warning system in our physical, mental and emotional life. I suggest to you that we do- it is called "stress." Pain. Discouragement.

Paul lays out in scripture what a Christ-follower should look like if the Holy Spirit is filling every pore of their life:

Galatians 5:22: But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

Some of you have been leaking your lack of patience, or gentleness. Some of you have been leaking a lack of self-control. You know what that is?

"Warning- something's off." There's not enough margin- eventually the warning gets louder and louder forcing us to accept our limitations.

It's important for us to recognize in the middle of this that God has no limits. That's a wonderful reassurance for you and I who live in a world of limits, as limited beings: God has no limits. This allows us to hope in hopeless situations, because God has no limits. There's someone on our side who isn't suffering from the limitations that we have; there's someone who is not bumping up against the ceiling; there's someone on our side who isn't limited by their lack of vision for where this marriage can go. There's someone on our side who is not physically limited so they can't see tomorrow or where we're going in our career. There is someone on our side who is rooting for us and who knows, physically, where we're headed. This also allows us to let some things go- because God is in control, and He's unlimited. We're not in control- God is.

We need to be reminded that God perfectly understands our limitations. Jesus, the limitless Son of God, squeezed Himself into human limitations. The writer of Hebrews tells us that He understands us because He has been tried in tested in every way, just like we are. And yet now He lives without limit.

3. We must honestly acknowledge our real priorities before God.

Psalm 139: Search me, O God, and know my heart, test me and know my anxious thoughts; see if there is any offensive way in me. And lead me in the way everlasting.

That's probably a Hebrew way of saying. "See if there is any way in which I am living by priorities that are completely askew, see if I've rested my life in a way that is completely off kilter, let me know where the balance is off- what is offensive."

Matt.6:33 (somewhat paraphrased):
Seek the Kingdom of God, and His righteousness, seek that first, as your first priority." Seek that first when you wake up tomorrow morning- seek God's kingdom and righteousness, not your to-do list. And everything else will be ordered around that- all else will be added.

He then said:

So why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell that not even Solomon (Bill Gates) in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field? will He not much more clothe you, or you of little faith?

(Of everything around you that you see here, there is only one set of things in this whole landscape that is permanent- everything else is passing. You are permanent- so don't you think He will care more for what's permanent than what's passing? Don't you think I'll take care of you? I'm on your side. So don't worry- for the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows you need them. So seek first His kingdom and His righteousness- and all of these things will be added as well.)

Sometimes there is a big difference between the priorities we live by and those we want to live by. There's a gap. (Margin worksheet on screen: lists activities that you need/want to do for each one to prioritize). I calculated how many hours I spend on each activity and how many hours I have available in a week and had lots of time left. But then I factored in other little things, and by the end I had more hours used up in my week than I had available. That adds up to no margin. I suggest we now ask ourselves some questions:

What does your time expenditure reveal about your priority? Acknowledge this before God. If 80 hours a week is spent at work and thinking about work- guess what! Ask God to help you adjust your lifestyle so your real priorities match your ideal ones. Honestly acknowledge what your real priorities are before God, and allow God to make the changes in you, because we can't do it. That kind of transformation is His business. It's not something we can do on our own steam. Get real and acknowledge what your real priorities are. It may be helpful to acknowledge that to someone else. How are you doing? --- "Not good, I can't remember the last time I prayed, and it felt like the last time I prayed meant nothing- can't remember feeling God's Presence. Work's okay- family? I don't know. Not in touch at home." Of course, the person you tell that to might say, "Thank you, see ya!" But, just maybe, they will say, "Let's pray- me too."

4. Do less- trust God more. Jesus knew that our relationship to God is energized by faith. He knew we can only access God's power by faith; that's why he directed so much of his teaching towards strengthening the disciples' faith. He knew faith was the way we access God's power to transform our lives. Why should I do less and trust God more? Because God can do more in 20 minutes than I can do in 20 years.

5. I talked a couple of weeks ago to a church consultant who planted and pastored a church for about 20 years. During that time, he saw thousands of people change their lives and come to know Christ as the governing principle of their lives, and learn to build balance into their lives- he saw thousands of lives completely changed.

I was reminded as I was working on this during the week how amazing that testimony is, but reminded also that God did that in about 20 minutes at Pentecost. God can do anything He wants to- He doesn't have our limits. How many of you think your life would be worse if you spend the next year devoting an hour a day to focused fellowship with God? Praying, Reading, talking with others about God, seeking Him out- or 2 hours a day? How many of you think you'd be worse off? Maybe you think you would- the missed contacts, missed business opportunities, missed phonecalls, the rearranging of your schedule? I think we need to do less and trust God more. Because God can do in 20 minutes more than we can do in 20 years.

Some of you have goals and dreams that you have been hustling and hurrying after year after year- and haven't achieved it yet. Let it go and see what God can do. God can so rearrange our hearts, minds and priorities that those hopes and dreams get transformed, maybe into something more to His glory. Jesus said:

"If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, move from here to there- and it will move."

Jesus looks out over the landscape and finds the most obvious, immovable object available. There were probably a few gigantic rocks out there that all of the disciples together could have moved. He goes way beyond that and chooses a mountain. The smallest seed they knew- a mustard seed- was used to demonstrate the amount of faith needed. He didn't say, "if you have a great plan, you can move a mountain. If you have the right tools- know the right people- if you work hard enough-if you're busy enough- you can move mountains. Being overloaded is not the way to move a mountain. Being stressed out and having no margin in your life is not the way to move a mountain.

What's the mountain in your life? Building right relationships? Finding a mate? Building an effective marriage- raising and disciplining the kids? Growing in your career? Raising kids to be what God would want them to be? Your health? Your depression? Your discouragement? Cancer? Lack of finances? Your anger? Your hurt? Your past? Divorce? Worry? What's your mountain? It's out there, just to the left or right- for some of you, right in front.

Do less, and trust God more. That mountain will not be moved by frenetic activity, worry, spending more, eating more, by what you look at on the internet, by withdrawing from everyone around you, by filling your life up with activities, by watching movies or TV. When you come back from your distraction, its still there.

Do less and trust God more. We will end here. But let me set it up. God has been doing powerful things at Gateway lately. We're in danger as a church of grieving the Holy Spirit. We can grieve the Holy Spirit when we just don't listen. I'm in danger of this. Sometimes people leave here and say to me, "You talk good." I think I know what God's response to that would be. I think He'd say, "You need to LIVE good."

So why don't we draw a line in the sand? We know this stuff. This is practical, pretty light stuff- most of us know this. If you're new to a walk with Christ- welcome, you've come to the right place; even if you don't agree, you're still in the right place; but most of you know these things. Yet we don't live it out daily, weekly, monthly. We're just not doing it. We're not taking care of first things first. We're not seeking first the kingdom of God. We're not honestly acknowledging our own limitations and how our real priorities are skewed from our ideal ones. We're not expecting problems- if we were, we'd be praying constantly and our lives would be ordered to be prepared when we hear hard news. When we are prepared to hear trouble, when we are prepared for what's coming, then we'll be ready. So how do we stop it, and how do we really build margin into our lives?

We do less and we trust God more.