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I finished Ephesians last week and I'm now studying Proverbs 31 using Amy Bayliss' new ebook Pursuit of Proverbs 31. I had the privilege of reviewing Pursuit of Proverbs 31 before it released. It's wonderful and packed full of information, thoughts, and guidance for studying Proverbs 31.
Want your own copy? Pursuit of Proverbs 31 is available in PDF, Kindle and Nook.
I read and studied using the first three chapters of Pursuit of Proverbs 31 this week. There's way too much to share everything with you so I'm only going to share one thing that stood out to me: priorities.
Priority means: status established in order of importance or urgency.
How do you order your life according to priorities? Most of us have seen the order of God, spouse, children, home, etc, etc. But is this the best order? Not really. It is actually better to look at our lives and priorities as a wheel. God is at the center and all other things come off of that central focus. Keeping God at the center of our lives then shows us what other things have importance and/or urgency on a particular day and time.
Here's what priorities look like in our home:
- God is at the center of everything we do.
- Family
- Paying off debt.
We make decisions by asking three questions:
- Does this fit into spending time with and building up our family?
- Does this fit into paying off debt?
- Is God asking us to do this even though it doesn't fit into our first two priorities?
Paying off debt might seem like an odd priority, but this is a big deal for us. By focusing on reducing expenses and paying off debt, we're freeing ourselves up for bigger opportunities in the future. We've gotten “gazelle intense” to use a Dave Ramsey-ism and we've already seen God honor the steps we've made towards this goal. I recently shared how we were able to pay off the rest of Josh's student loan in 3.5 months.
Let's look at an example of following the wrong priorities: I've seen a lot of negative and potentially condescending blog posts recently about how some bloggers feel that moms are spending too much time online and blogging to the detriment of their families. There are plenty of activities that we can each wrongly engage in that will keep us from our God-given priorities. While blogging and other online endeavors could be this time-zapping activity for some, the focus needs to be on determining what your priorities should be and framing everything within those priorities.
I put a great deal of time into my blog because it fits into our priorities. My blog is first for me and my family. It's a record for my family of our lives and our homeschooling. Second, it's a place for me personally to write and process things that are going on in our lives in a way that can encourage others. Third it's the platform I use to network with people. This is essential to our paying off debt priority because my contribution and income comes out of this networking, whether through direct income from the blog or through virtual assistance clients whom I've met because of my blog.
My point? Priorities look different for each mom and each family. Find the rhythm that works for your family. Once God is at the center, listen and obey. Follow where he leads. Are there perhaps some main priorities that God is asking you to use to frame all other decisions? Are you missing out on opportunities because you're following another family's priorities instead of the priorities God has for you?
Have you read Pursuit of Proverbs 31? Have any thoughts on the topic of priorities? Share your thoughts in the comments.
