Dear friends, let's just be honest for a moment. Quarantine has taken its toll. For the women - the moms, let's just be real: we haven't worn jeans in months, our nails are all grown out and we can't remember the last time we were alone. Some private time would feel pretty good right about now wouldn't it? Thank the Lord we are entering some normality now.
During this time however, a lot of added pressure and tension can fill our souls and thus our homes. What does the atmosphere of your home feel like? What words are you speaking into your world? The Word of God says something very important: "...for it is out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaks.” (Luke 6:45)
What we speak matters. It is very exhausting to filter out every single thing we say before we say it. It's easier to just have a peaceful heart and not have to worry about what will come out. If my heart is full of peace, then peace is what will be spoken. I know, this is easier said than done. How do we get there? How do we enter into a steady stream of rest and not lose our peace?
Sure, there are some days when I don't feel God's presence or feel peaceful. But no matter what I feel, I can't unknow what I know. My faith is not based on feelings. It is based on the immovable, absolute truth of Christ's life, death, and resurrection.
Peaceful emotions, closeness, and mountaintop experiences are important to our relationship with God, but they are more like the decor inside a house. Decor helps make the house a home, and we should enjoy our home in Christ! But it's the foundation that enables a home to stand firm. Yet how often do you hear someone who takes great pleasure in the foundation? That's not the purpose of a foundation — its job is to create the stability by which we can enjoy all the other things that come with having a home. The only time people notice the foundation is when there is something wrong with it. In our culture we have massive foundational issues, and cracks can be seen everywhere. We know that we are to build on the foundation of Christ (Matthew 7), but I have noticed a growing trend of people confusing their feelings ABOUT Jesus for Jesus Himself. When speaking about waring for peace in our homes, it's a fundamental difference between teaching our kids (and ourselves) to base their spiritual foundation on the experience of Jesus versus basing it on Jesus. You see, experiences change, Jesus does not!
Another way I like to look at it is like this: I got inspired by a scene that caught my attention during the first week of quarantine. My husband has been going to work this entire time, which is great because a sense of normalcy and routine has remained in our family. But the first week he worked from home, which as many can testify, isn't an easy task. I noticed one afternoon that my husband was sitting at his laptop with head phones in. I asked what he was listening to and he said it was relaxing, instrumental music. He said it helped drown out the background noise of the house and enabled him to focus on the work that was right in front of him. I realised then how important the background noise is that we have playing in our homes.
I don't know what background noise you have playing in your homes, but I'm here to tell you that you have a noise in the background of your life and it is important that you find out what it is. Often there is a soundtrack playing in the background of our lives that we are not even aware we selected. Perhaps it was selected by someone else or something else. It's kind of like when you get into an elevator or go into a store; someone else, without your permission has selected the soundtrack that is playing. Usually we aren't even aware of it because we are just looking for the food we need to buy, so we just push our cart along. But have you noticed, so often after you have left that environment and get into your car, you are now humming a song you weren't even aware was playing? It was a song playing in the background, but it has now come into your brain and you are repeating what you heard. Every life and every home has its own unique soundtrack. Please stick with me, because I want to explain to you why this is so important. I grew up in a home that loves listening to music. We always had music playing and it just set the atmosphere and created the vibe of the home. We would strategically choose the right playlist depending on what we were doing. But unfortunately I don't think that we strategically chose the background track of our lives, because the foreground noise is so loud that it grabs our active attention. But I'm here to tell you that this shouldn't get ignored because background noise is a powerful thing. It sets the tone for every conversation that happens in the home. Imagine having guests at your home and in the background there would be loud rock music playing. The guests would be listening to you, but they would also be distracted by the noise in the background. And actually, the background music would change the way you speak to your guests because you would have to raise your voice or even shout to be heard. I really hope you are starting to see where I am going with this analogy. It is the same in the spirit. I can be having a conversation that sounds like faith, but if the background noise that is playing in my life and in my home is fear, then those two things will be competing to be heard. What does your house sound like? What does the atmosphere sound like? Did you know that atmosphere has a sound? I'm sure everyone reading this has made the experience of being invited over to someone’s home and when you entered, everything looked right and everything was presented beautifully, and the conversation sounded good, and yet you notice that something in that room is off. There is tension, maybe someone had had an argument before you arrived; that atmosphere of tension is powerful. Are you starting to see now why this matters?
Romans 12 in the Message Version says the following: "So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you."
So, do you need to decide to change your playlist? Have you become too well-adjusted to the culture around you? Is it dragging you down every single day? Your playlist is important! Is your playlist full of praise? Is your playlist full of gratitude? Are you listening to fear or faith? What would your children say about you?
An encouraging story comes to mind about Paul and Silas. They were thrown into prison. They were literally on 'lock down'. But they carefully chose their soundtrack. I'm sure the soundtrack of the prison was not full of faith.
Still, Paul and Silas made a choice, that no matter what sort of lock down they were in, their faith would not shift. See some of us, when put into difficult situations, allow the playlist to change in our lives. In this season you cannot empower your feelings to select the playlist of your home. Paul and Silas knew that the sound of that prison was fear and negativity, but they chose to plug into their playlist right at midnight when probably all of the other prisoners had gone to sleep. They plugged into their playlist of praise and worship in spite of their circumstances, and we read in Acts 16 that all of the sudden an earthquake hit the prison, shook it violently and all the prisoners’ shackles fell off. Their soundtrack freed everyone in that prison. Hallelujah! And right now, there are people leaning in to your life and finding strength in adopting your soundtrack for themselves. The jailor was frightened when he saw that all of the prisoners were free. But Paul and Silas said: ”It's all good. We are still here. We haven't run away.'' (emphasis mine). And we read that the jailer falls at their feet and says these powerful words: "What must I do to be saved?"
Wow! What if during this time, others would lean into your faith and say: "How can I have what you have?" Help us Lord Jesus to select a good playlist for our lives and our homes. Do you have a peace song on your playlist? Maybe it's time to switch up your playlist and add a new song. Do you have some background noise of trust playing in your home? How about some patience? Ask the Holy Spirit to download some new sounds to the iPod of your soul and turn up the volume of peace and let it fill your home in Jesus’ Name. Be blessed and enjoy the sound ...
Laurie Prentice
Jesus Worshipper, Wife, Mother