Psalm 46:10 “Cease striving and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations; I will be exalted in the earth.”

Do you like to do housework? I can tolerate the dusting or washing the counters but I really dislike cleaning my floors. Especially, because our cat and dog constantly shed their fluffy white fur onto my lovely dark beige tiled floor. I tried all kinds of brooms and vacuums to clear it. The broom is harder work than the vacuum but it does a better job. Still, as I walk across my living room floor, little puffs of fur scurry about begging me to pick them up. No matter how much or how often I sweep, I still find little fur balls hiding around every corner. Sometime I just want to give up ever cleaning my floors but then I think it might overrun us. I can see the headline now, “Woman missing in home for three days under pile of pet hair.” Therefore, I sweep.

In other countries, I see the women sweeping their homes too. Many stand outside and sweep the dirt around their front door. This seems more pointless than sweeping up my pet fur. I enlightened the women by telling them all about our electric vacuums and the fact we only clean inside. I expected them to be envious and want such luxuries for themselves. However, to my surprise they did not react that way. One woman took my hand, looked deep into my eyes and explained, “Cleaning is not a chore in Kenya.” I think I looked bewildered because she continued, “Cleaning is a social event for us.” After more discussion, I began to understand what she meant. A Kenya woman sweeps her front stoop in hopes of seeing her friends walk by so she can invite them in for tea. The friends would then help her as they talked. A vacuum would be too noisy to encourage discussion and too fast to enjoy the time together. These women liked their lives simple so that they could stop any task or chore to make time to visit with a friend. Life was about relationships, what a wonderful way to live.

We skip past so much of life with all of our busyness. We miss developing deeper friendship with those around us as we rush off to conquer the next chore. We become too busy checking off our To-Do list to notice and enjoy the blessings the Lord provides us. We overlook God’s plans for our day. We miss those special God moments like the perfect sunset settling over the end of a perfect day. We neglect time with a dear friend in need because we worry about the next task to complete. God never wants or plans for us to be so busy we fail to enjoy a full life. In another translation of Psalm 46:10, God tells us “To be still.” Take some time this week to put God and those around you before your chores. Let God interrupt your life, I bet you will be glad you did.

Kenyan Sunset