A fighter jet pilot flying upside down at tremendous speed became disoriented.  Confused as to which way was up and which was down, he pulled the flight stick in the wrong direction. A few moments later, flaming wreckage was all that remained.

Commenting on the tragedy, writer Del Fehsenfeld points out that most of us are in danger of making the same mistake—traveling so fast in life that we are at risk of becoming mixed-up about what is of utmost importance. Fehsenfeld observes, “Disorientation at a high rate of speed is a deadly combination for all of us. Capacity for discernment is diminished. Margin for error is dramatically decreased. The result is a high risk of careening in wrong directions.”

Yet for many of us living at full throttle is not the exception but our normal way of life. What we need, recommends Fehsenfeld, is a pause in our activity that makes room for God. “Room to listen and linger. Room to receive and reorient. Room to ‘be still and know’ that there is a God—and we aren’t Him!”[1]

We live as if we, not God, are the ones who make things happen in life—as if everything depends on us. We think we must work as fast as we can as hard as we can as long as we can in order to accomplish God’s will. Consequently, most of us, as Fehsenfeld puts it, are running on physical, emotional and spiritual fumes.

How do we get our lives back in balance again? “Come unto me,” said Jesus (Matthew 11:28). The reality is that when most of us come to the Lord, we want to do all the talking rather than to just listen to Him.

If your life has become a racetrack of hectic activity, stop. Find a quiet corner somewhere and tell God “Lord, I give up. I’m coming to you to realign my priorities and refill my fuel tank.’ Then listen as He reorients your life.

 

[1] Editorial in “Spirit of Revival, Volume 39, Number One, by Senior Editor Del Fehsenfeld III, Buchanan, MI: (Life Action Ministries, 2008), 4.