QUESTION NO 14: BALANCING YOUR SPIRITUAL MARITAL AND PROFESSIONAL LIFE

BALANCING SPIRITUAL, MARITAL

AND PROFESSIONAL LIFE

 

The questions we want to answer are: How do you, at the same time,

1. Continue to increasingly work hard, provide for your families, and advance in career?
2. Maintain a marriage relationship that could be a model for both believers and unbelievers?
3. Have enough time to play, nurture and teach your children in the way of the Lord?
4. Maintain and keep increasing your spiritual tempo, exercising the various gifts of God in your life?
5. Make extra incomes here and there to meet up with ever-increasing demands!
6. Keep social appointments, and have adequate sleep, rest and exercises to improve your health!!
   Have enough time to pray, read the Word of God, meditate, evangelize, do follow-up, engage in personal and Church vigils, attend mid-week services, and be active in some departments in the Church such that you will surpass all?
7. This is like walking on tight-rope across a long gulf with a baby saddled at your back, a heavy luggage on your head and handbags on your both hands. Yet, you want to get to the other side unscathed!

 

In order to succeed, utmost care must be taken on how you balance yourself otherwise a slip or little off-balance the rope could be fatal.

Life is such a journey! Every step you take must be balanced – the spiritual, the marital and the secular. Just as the body, soul and spirit combine and uniformly make a man function, so must you perfectly combine the spiritual, marital and secular in order to be a balanced Christian!

 

The following are critical in consideration of this topic:

1. Everybody has only one life. There are no three lives. You can’t have separate spiritual life different from marital or secular life. Anyone living more than one life is a hypocrite. Anyone living separate secret life from public life is a deceiver, a clown and a pretender. Eph. 5:22-6:9; Col. 3:18-4:1.

 

2. Each one of us is allotted the same number of hours per day which, as a resource is limited. Just 24 hours! You can’t expand it. Thus, mutually exclusive issues are competing for attention at the same time, Eccl 3:1-10

 

3. Some of us may be so fortunate to have house helps, nannies or caring relations assisting in house cores. A few of us may have understanding spouses or grown up children supervising some domestic works. But many of us have to struggle and contend with career wives, nagging spouses, ever-busy husbands, and living with closely knitted extended family members as well as energy-sapping secular, yet still have to actively engage in Church activities and responsibilities.

 

How to know when you’re Off-Balance:

1. When you’re constantly regretting over yesterday’s mistakes. Yesterday is gone. Nothing can be done to ameliorate its effects except to learn from it. Let go of the past! Repent of it. Restitute your ways to have clear conscience. Accept the forgiveness of God as expressed in the Word of God. Forgive yourself of the errors. Let the past pass, so that you can pass!

 

2. When you are always anxious about tomorrow. This leads to stresses and depression. Anxiety is paying the interests on loans you didn’t borrow. Anxiety changes the mood. It obliterates and heightens the facial appearance. Anxiety breeds fear of the unknown. Fear results into high-blood pressure. Very soon, it aggravates into heart failure or stroke! Contentment is the bedrock of long life. We brought nothing into this world and surely none of us will take anything out of it. Be contented with what you have and where you are. We are exhorted never to be anxious for anything. Our tomorrow shall certainly be alright in Jesus name! Therefore, you’re to leave tomorrow till tomorrow so that you can live beyond tomorrow! Matt 6

 

3. When you’re ungrateful for today’s blessing. You’re constantly complaining, murmuring, grumbling and you’re never satisfied with what you have. You’re always jealous and envious of what your neighbor possesses.

 

4. When you’re physically or emotionally exhausted, you become easily irritated. Because you are tired, bored and worn out, you get annoyed over little things, nagging exasperatedly, and unable to have good night rest. At a point as this, you discover you are not as productive at work and become unsatisfied with your accomplishment.

 

5. When you’re tensed here and there. When you’re losing your temper often; when your level of happiness dissipates and joy disappears. You become insensitive of the plights of others. When you feel “empty” inside of you. Devotional life becomes mechanical. Zeal for evangelism dwindles. When your “first love” for the Lord is waning. Prayers become burdensome. Inspiration from the Word of God ceases. You’re no longer “pricked” in your heart any time you go late to Church services. Fellowship with other brethren becomes infuriating. Colleagues get on your nerves so easily. You easily pick quarrels with friends and acquaintances.

 

6. When you’re over-committed at work. You have little or no time for your family or Church activities. You’re so much absorbed in work schedules such that you have to take work home to continue till late in the night. When you’re getting the money but losing compassion. When you’re getting the promotion but losing His presence. When fans and followers are building up at the expense of your family. When you’re more comfortable amidst colleagues than in company of your nuclear family.

 

7. When you are often fatigued after work or after Church services to the extent that you can’t engage in simple house chores. When your marital spice drains up. When as a result of boredom, there’s lack of active performance not only in the kitchen but also in the “other room.”

 

How to Maintain Balance in Spiritual, Marital and Secular Life:

1. Change your perspective: As a man “thinketh” in his heart, so he is.” As noted earlier, tension, pressure and stress stem from many conflicting, competing and mutually exclusive activities clogging one’s limited time. But then, not all stress is bad. A good measure of stress is necessary for stretching and expanding yourself so that you can come up at your best. The truth is that life is full of stress and only the dead are stress-less. Getting involved in many activities at the same time exposes your latent talents, capabilities and abilities. So, instead of seeing the various marital chores, demanding career works and multiple spiritual activities as big problems, begin to see them as challenges that are good for your vitality. It may be discomforting at first, but and as you keep doing them, your muscles, intellect, and capacity to withstand all-weather are exercised which can lead to a healthier lifestyles.
2. Change Competing Tasks to Complementing Tasks: Similar assignments from the marital, career and spiritual angles can always be combined. In spending quality time with his children, Daddy G.O. often takes them along during Let’s-Go-A-Fishing Programmes. With this, he has used one stone to kill at least two birds at the same time. And among other things he is teaching them the virtues of evangelism. If for any reason, you have to take some light office work home, you can engage you spouse or grown up children in assisting to complete the works. If you are to play a role in your Church which conflicts with the time of your office assignment, you can easily substitute yourself with any suitable member of your family instead of rejecting the role or disappointing the Church at the eleventh hour.

 

3. Don’t be overtly heavenly conscious and earthly irrelevant. Focusing on heaven is good but it should not be at the detriment of your earthly responsibilities. You are to dominate your world. This can only be possible not only when you are spiritual but also when you are socially and politically relevant. James 2:15-16, Rom. 8:6-8; 1Tim. 5:8.

 

4. Run away from Idolatry: Don’t idolize spiritual things by abandoning marital and conjugal obligations. Spirituality does not mean you should be sexually inactive. Sex within marriage is not a sin. Also, don’t idolize your secular work to the detriment of your spiritual development. In the same vein, don’t idolize your spouse or your children. Whatever you love more than God or anything that takes the place of God in your heart is an idol. Gal. 5:16; Eph. 5:18; Rom. 8:6; 1Cor. 15:46; Matt. 22:39

 

5. Beware of love of money: Money is good. It is not a sin to be wealthy. It is only the love of money that is the root of all evils. There’s no sin in being ambitious to succeed. But beware of your cravings. Whatever you cherish so much that you can’t do without can easily usurp the place of God in your life.

 

6. Delegate your Duties: No one can do it alone. Other people are good resources to assist you in almost all your activities – secular, spiritual and marital. So, get them involved through delegation. And by this, you teach, train and develop them for greater challenges. Whatever position you occupy in your Church, you can always request for an assistant who would be available and easily step in when you are indisposed. More importantly, if your assignment in the Church involves spending much time and you still want to have a sense of fulfillment in that line, you can easily employ some hands and pay for their services.

 

7. Have a Mentor, Sometimes it can take a long time before someone knows he’s out of balance. It is wisdom to be open and accountable to at least somebody. Such people could be colleagues, spouse, family members or superiors. They will help out through observation and ring the alarm before things get too much out of hands.

 

8. Stick to Priorities: There could be times when different tasks from the family, profession and the Church are begging for the same time which are impossible to delegate. At such times, emphasis should go to the highest priority. If for instance you have an official deadline for the submission of a task and along the way, a member of the Church fell into a critical condition between life and death, and you are the only person who can bring respite, common sense dictates that the member takes priority of your time irrespective of the official deadline.

 

9. Have a Timetable: It is expedient to have schedule of major activities clearly written out to help you maintain balance in the home, Church and office. No one activity must be short-changed for the other except for emergencies. You may decide to do this timetable won weekly basis. And by the end of the week you assess how far you have succeeded in keeping to your written schedule. Our Church is so program-driven such that if care is not taken, it is possible to easily be so engrossed in Church activities to the extent of forgetting or not having enough time for family altar, family retreat, personal quiet time, personal Bible study, and time of being alone with God.

 

10. Avoid Perfectionist Tendencies: The maxim “whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing well” can become a clog in balancing your life. If you have to spend all the time to perfectly do each of your daily chores in respect of home, office and Church, then you may not be able to finish one item. This is because nothing is done that cannot be improved upon. It is far better to just do your best on each item within the time allotted to such item. You don’t have to worry of imperfections on any item on your schedules. Don’t use perfectionism as an excuse to avoid responsibilities.

 

11. Make your family serve God together: Life can be far balanced if the family to attend the same Church and Parish together. With this, programmes can be planed, schedules can be predetermined and time wastage can be cut to the barest minimum.

 

12. Avoid Impulsive Decisions: Most times, many of us make on-the-spot decisions. These are actions stemming from emotions. Emotions can be deceptive. Emotional actions except for emergencies don’t correspond to sound judgment. Such emotions as joy, happiness, sorrow, anger, can blur sound judgment.

 

Twenty-One Infallible Laws of Maintaining Balance – Spiritual, Marital and Profession

1. Set limits. Set boundaries. Have time tables but don’t be too rigid on your time tables. Most pencils always have erasers. If you can’t easily keep to your time table, erase and re-draw it instead of dying in order to keep it. You are the owner. It doesn’t own you!

 

2. Set priorities. Maintain the rule of “do it now”. Don’t procrastinate. Hard work (work becoming hard) is the accumulation of works that have not been done at the time they were to be done.

 

3. Work hard but don’t be a workaholic. Nobody can finish all the work. Do your best and leave the rest. Don’t overreach yourself at the detriment of your health. Long after you’ve done your very best and you’re gone, there will always be “much land to be possessed”.

 

4. Don’t join the rat race for the accumulation of money, properties, and wealth. Whatever you can use up now is enough for you. Any excess of what you can use up now is more than enough. Be contented with what you have and can use up now.

 

5. Don’t strive to impress or please people. Nobody can please everyone. In an attempt to please all, many have turned hypocrites, changing colour to whichever side suits like chameleon.

 

6. Don’t blame yourself if you’re not yet perfect in all. Perfection is only in heaven. Perfectionists are never satisfied with results no matter how good.

 

7. Learn to delegate. Don’t overdrive the horse to death otherwise you won’t be able to deliver the message.

 

8. You can’t evangelize the whole world in your lifetime. Concentrate on your circle of influence. Jesus concentrated on Jerusalem. He only succeeded in handing over to the twelve amongst whom there was a Judas.

 

9. Don’t try to be like anyone. Be yourself. It’s good to be like daddy G.O. But you can’t be daddy G.O. Daddy G.O. can’t be you either. You’re not to be the Jesus but to be like Jesus.

 

10. Take every day at a time. Plan. But don’t be too rigid at your plan. Be flexible. Be conservative, always preparing for eventualities. In other words, get your mind ready at all times for the negatives. Don’t be too hard on yourself, if you don’t meet deadlines now, you’ll meet them someday.

 

11. Don’t be afraid of receiving queries. They are questions that need answers. In fact be expecting some at all times because you can’t please your bosses hundred percent all the time.

 

12. Don’t be afraid of failure. Give yourself chances to fail. Expect that you can fail. You’re still human. No failure is final. Failure in life, if seen from the right perspective and worked upon, can always be the ladder to success in life.

 

13. Know your limits. Don’t try God. That Jesus Christ walked on water doesn’t make you to dare it. Don’t be lured into the den of lions because Daniel spent the whole night in the den of lions. What you know you can’t do, admit your limitations and leave it for someone else who can do it.

 

14. Don’t compare yourself, ability or achievement with anyone. Everybody has his own specialty. The best axiom for life is: you shine your shine, I shine my shine!

 

15. Love own wife. Submit to your own husband. When the ships are down, it’s your immediate family that bears the brunt. Care for your parents. Give good education to your children. That’s their inheritance. If you’re using your money to build houses instead of training your children, it’s these children that will sell such houses.
16. Make friends. But don’t attempt to make friends of all. Don’t create enemies for yourself either. There are people who cannot be your friends no matter how friendly you are to them.
17. Don’t take life too serious. Life is too short to be taken too seriously. Have time for fun. Don’t be pent up. Be relaxed. If nobody takes you out for a treat, take yourself out for many treats. Read humorous articles. Listen to what will make you laugh. Laughter, most times can be medicinal.

 

18. You can’t have it all. Life is full of give and take, win and lose! Sometimes it is night, at other times it is day! As the earth orbits the sun, you’ve got to take whichever side it turns as it is: you don’t even have an option! But the good news is if it turns night on you now, just wait a little while, it will soon turn day on your side.

 

19. Life is full of challenges, from cradle to the grave. Therefore, take it easy on yourself. Whenever you’re passing through any challenge, remember, it’s just a phase of time that will soon phase out. It’s like an eclipse of the sun that doesn’t last for too long. It is not permitted for darkness to show up in the day time but if it shows up at all, as an eclipse, it cannot persist for too long!

 

20. Take life as football matches where there are few players but many are spectators, cheering or booing the players. Everybody in life is both a player and a spectator at the same time. As a player on the field of life, some will cheer you on and others will boo you down. Prepare and expect this because you too as a spectator do cheer up some people and boo down others.

 

21. Take life as a market place. You buy and you sell. Individuals come in and go out at different times. You have your time, I have my time but your time is definitely not my time. If you haven’t made it today, you will definitely make it tomorrow. Don’t kill yourself because you want to be like Mr. XYZ who is making it in life. In the market of life, you either gain or lose, yet, you have to go back home. But a life consecrated and dedicated to Jesus Christ never loses in life!

    Conclusion:
    What do I do if I’m off-balance? The first step to balancing yourself is to recognize and admit that you’re off-balance, itemize those things that have made you off-balance. Then, go ahead and do the exact opposite and you’ll be balanced spiritually, martially and career-wise.

    I pray that henceforth, you will increasingly succeed career-wise, be an outstanding sprit-filled Christian and an excellent spouse at home in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.