Driven to distraction

This week, okay, past few weeks, I have found myself once again struggling for time to sit down and have one of those deep, drink it all in, kind of Bible study times with the Lord. 

I’ve been running in about a million different directions, it feels, and honestly, it is really hard to slow down and take the time to “tarry” with the Lord.  Of course, I don’t cut down on my leisure time activities like watching t.v., or taking it easy, so it’s not like I can’t make the time.   I just seem to be in a season of being easily distracted lately when it comes to my time in His Word.

What I have tried to do, though, is switch things up a little bit to adjust to my momentary change in status, so to speak.  When times like this hit, I don’t want to be an “all or nothing” Bible study person, or beat myself up because I’m not sticking to the perfect Bible reading plan. 

What has helped this week is to go back to what I talked about in an earlier post about a book on worship that breaks down the Psalms into phrases that talk about God’s character. 

For example, the other morning I was reading one of the Psalms they were talking about in the book and the phrase “Lord Almighty” really stood out to me.  I thought this was interesting, because, honestly, it’s one of those phrases you see pretty regularly in the Bible and almost grow immune to its meaning after a while because it is such a common phrase  that is used in the text.

It really hit me, though.  “Lord Almighty”…

Almighty as in mighty over all…

all as in all…

all…as in anything that is thrown at Him, He is mighty over it. 

And, because I am His, anything that is thrown at me, He is mighty over it. 

My only job is to get out of the way and give it to Him to be mighty over it in my behalf.  He isn’t going to barge in and knock me over to get to my issues if I haven’t invited Him to help me.  He is waiting for me to give Him my issues so He can reign mighty over them.

So even though I didn’t have an hour-long Bible study session that morning, the Lord gave me something to think about all day long. 

I love that He meets me right where I am.  He still gives me something to focus on from His Word, even when I am not able to sit still long enough to really dig into it.  He knows I’m not perfect and will have times that seem slow when it comes to His Word, and yet He  still chooses to bless even the tiniest effort I can put forth when the going gets tough with my Bible study time.

How about you?  What do you do when the distraction quotient is high, and you find yourself not in His Word as much as you would like to be?