Busy is the new fine. But maybe with a hint of added importance, value, and productivity – often veiled as complaint. It still means nothing – or at least reveals nothing – in answer to questions such as, “How are you?” “How are things going?” “How is life/work/ministry?” Busy. Fine. It is all the same.
We can even make a competition out of it. Afterall, some of us are super busy. Others are beyond busy. Maybe even too busy to stop and pay attention and chat.
When my daughter was a toddler, she had a favorite book about bees. Oftentimes, when she was doing “important” things like putting 10 dolls to bed, or teaching stuffed animals to count, or having a tea party with the dog, we would ask, “what are you doing?” And she would say, “I’m like a bee.” Her way of saying, “I’m busy.” My husband and I would just smile at her entertaining, well-meaning, earnest, but ultimately futile efforts.
As a heavenly parent, I wonder how God views our busyness…
I think God’s invitation to abundant life is to more than fine. To something far bigger and better than busy. Why would anyone feel compelled to follow Jesus if that’s all it is, if that is what we convey, if that is what we live. A fine life. A busy life. Like a bee. The same as everyone else.
To be clear, busyness isn’t necessarily bad. It can be a mark of purpose, vision, focus. It can be finally finding your groove in something important and wanting to give yourself to it and enjoy it all. It can mean days, seasons, a life, full of recognized blessings. Being busy with good things – the right things – is a gift.
But too often we are busy with the wrong things. Or we waste our precious time and have nothing left for the right things. This is the busyness that leaves us stressed, frantic, unhealthy. Suddenly, we’re in a spiral we cannot navigate and living a chaotic and undiscerning life.
A dear friend and mentor of mine, the late Steve Hayner, loved busyness but loathed hurriedness. It took me years to understand what that meant. Steve was always busy, but rarely hurried. He tried to embrace the many and varied responsibilities of his work, including what he described as, “the things that come in sideways”, but he was rarely hurried. He sought to “be where his feet were” – a different kind of ministry of presence – attentive and engaged wherever he found himself. And not because there was nothing more to do. There was, there is, always more to do.
The plans of the diligent lead surely to abundance,
but everyone who is hasty comes only to want.
Proverbs 21:5
Jesus had a full and busy ministry. But He didn’t seem to tell (or boast to, or complain to…) everyone about how busy He was. And He certainly wasn’t hurried. I love the story of Jesus en route to heal Jarius’ daughter – on the heels of teaching parables, calming a storm, and restoring a demoniac – when he gets interrupted by a woman who had been bleeding for 12 years. He stops, questions the crowd, and then the woman “came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth.” (Mark 5:33b) And she was healed. This was neither a quick stop nor a brief interaction. And Jarius’ daughter needed Jesus. Quickly. Yet Jesus was aware, attentive, present, engaged. Busy with purpose and clarity. Unhurried.
Busy is the new fine. It may also be the new stressed. Or the new hurried. None of these are anything to boast about or hide behind. We’re all busy.
The question is, what are we busy with?
And hopefully – surely – as followers of Christ, we can come up with a better descriptor of our lives. Or else a better way of living.
- When you say you are busy, what do you mean? What are you trying to convey? And why?
- Where in your life or ministry might you be busy but hurried, and what would it look like to practice being more attentive, present, and unhurried in those spaces, following the example of Jesus?
- Looking at your rhythms and responsibilities, what are you busy with that leads to abundance, and what might be quietly pulling you away from the “right things” God is calling you toward in this season?
- Let me be the one to genuinely ask,
“How are you?”
“How are things going?”
“How is life/work/ministry?
Try not to answer, “busy.” Or “fine.”
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