Hitting Pause

But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. Luke 2:19

Life moves fast. We say this all the time and simply accept it as a fact. Busyness consumes us, especially this time of year. But it doesn't have to be that way. We need to practice the habit of hitting pause. We need to stop and take in the moments. We need to learn to let our memories become more than the busyness of our lives.

Which is exactly what I'll be doing over the next few weeks.

This idea of pausing to breathe and see those around me has been on my heart for weeks, and God keeps bringing it to mind. Who knows? Maybe it's my Word for 2016. What I do know is that verse above has impacted me more than anything else this Christmas season.

Life is busy. We could all make a list of all the reasons why our households are crazy...and they'd all be good things. Legitimate things. But we can get lost in the "doing" of those things and forget to enjoy them. To pause and savor them. We push on to make it through and then move to the next thing like our lives are one giant "to do" list we simply need to check off, and in the "doing" we forget to treasure the good. We forget to capture the moments.

We don't get this time back. We are only in this season for a season. So I'm pausing for the next few weeks. I won't be back until the new year, and in these next few weeks while I have a very real "to-do" list (moving over Christmas will create one) I'm going to make sure to stop, breathe, look around, and treasure each moment. Will you do the same?

Merry Christmas, friends!