# Time Day 6 > Come to Stillness: Take a few minutes to allow your mind and heart to be still before God. > ### Opening Prayer: *Lord, Help me walk slowly and deeply with you through the hours and minutes of this day—that I might find all of you that is to be found within it. Allow me not to miss you because of hurry or busyness, but let me sense the fullness of your presence in each moment. Slow down both my feet and my heart that I might be more present to you as I go about my normal activities. In the Name of Jesus I pray. Amen. (JLB)* #### Psalm for the Week: Psalm 90 #### Book Four #### From Everlasting to Everlasting #### A Prayer of Moses, the man of God. #### 90 Lord, you have been our dwelling place[a] in all generations. *2 Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God.3 You return man to dust and say, “Return, O children of man!”[b] 4 For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night. 5 You sweep them away as with a flood; they are like a dream, like grass that is renewed in the morning: 6 in the morning it flourishes and is renewed; in the evening it fades and withers. 7 For we are brought to an end by your anger; by your wrath we are dismayed. 8 You have set our iniquities before you, our secret sins in the light of your presence.* *9 For all our days pass away under your wrath; we bring our years to an end like a sigh. 10 The years of our life are seventy, or even by reason of strength eighty;* *yet their span[c] is but toil and trouble; they are soon gone, and we fly away.**11 Who considers the power of your anger, and your wrath according to the fear of you?12 So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.* *13 Return, O Lord! How long? Have pity on your servants!**14 Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.* *15 Make us glad for as many days as you have afflicted us, and for as many years as we have seen evil. 16 Let your work be shown to your servants,and your glorious power to their children.17 Let the favor[d] of the Lord our God be upon us, and establish the work of our hands upon us; yes, establish the work of our hands!* #### Scripture for the Day: Luke 12:35-48 #### You Must Be Ready *35 “Stay dressed for action[a] and keep your lamps burning, 36 and be like men who are waiting for their master to come home from the wedding feast, so that they may open the door to him at once when he comes and knocks. 37 Blessed are those servants[b] whom the master finds awake when he comes. Truly, I say to you, he will dress himself for service and have them recline at table, and he will come and serve them. 38 If he comes in the second watch, or in the third, and finds them awake, blessed are those servants! 39 But know this, that if the master of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he[c] would not have left his house to be broken into. 40 You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”* *41 Peter said, “Lord, are you telling this parable for us or for all?” 42 And the Lord said, “Who then is the faithful and wise manager, whom his master will set over his household, to give them their portion of food at the proper time? 43 Blessed is that servant[d] whom his master will find so doing when he comes. 44 Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions. 45 But if that servant says to himself, ‘My master is delayed in coming,’ and begins to beat the male and female servants, and to eat and drink and get drunk, 46 the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know, and will cut him in pieces and put him with the unfaithful. 47 And that servant who knew his master's will but did not get ready or act according to his will, will receive a severe beating. 48 But the one who did not know, and did what deserved a beating, will receive a light beating. Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required, and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more.* #### Reading for Reflection: *Not long after moving to Chicago, I called a wise friend to ask for some spiritual direction. I described the pace at which things tend to move in my current setting. I told him about the rhythms of our family life and about the present condition of my heart, as best I could discern it. What did I need to do, I asked him, to be spiritually healthy?* *Long pause.* *“You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life,” he said at last.* *Another long pause.* *“Okay, I’ve written that one down,” I told him, a little impatiently. “That’s a good one. Now what else is there?” I had many things to do, and this was a long-distance conversation, so I was anxious to cram as many units of spiritual wisdom into the least amount of time possible.* *Another long pause.* *“There is nothing else,” he said.* *He was the wisest spiritual mentor I have known. And while he doesn’t know every detail about every grain of sin in my life, he knows quite a bit. And from an immense quiver of spiritual sagacity, he drew only one arrow. “There is nothing else,” he said, “You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life.”* *Imagine for a moment that someone gave you this prescription, with the warning that your life depends on it. Consider the possibility that perhaps your life does depend on it. Hurry is the great enemy of spiritual life in our day. Hurry can destroy our souls. Hurry can keep us from living well. As Carl Jung wrote, “Hurry is not of the devil; hurry is the devil.”* *Again and again, as we pursue spiritual life, we must do battle with hurry. For many of us the great danger is not that we will renounce our faith. It is that we will become so distracted and rushed and preoccupied that we will settle for a mediocre version of it. We will just skim our lives instead of actually living them. (The Life You’ve Always Wanted by John Ortberg)* #### Reflection and Listening: silent and written #### Prayer: for the church, for others, for myself #### Song for the Week: Come, Now is the Time to Worship *Come, now is the time to worship* *Come, now is the time to give your heart* *Come, just as you are to worship* *Come, just as you are before your God* *Come* *One day every tongue will confess you are God* *One day every knee will bow* *Still the greatest treasure remains for those* *Who gladly choose you now* ### Closing Prayer: *O Christ, when I look at you I see that you were never in a hurry, never ran, but always had time for the pressing necessities of the day. Give me that disciplined, poised life with time always for the thing that matters. For then I would be a disciplined person. Amen. (The Way by E. Stanley Jones)*