You ever list them? What comes first, second...third in your life? I honestly haven't thought about it much for a while. Don't get me wrong, I have priorities - just haven't written them down to often. That also means I haven't evaluated how I'm doing living out my "ideal" priorities. I'll give my first five:
1) God - my relationship with God, my devotion and obedience to Him.
2) Wife - Yep, gonna list that one separate from the kids...so often I think we lump our families together so that games, activities, sports and everything we do as a "family" counts towards our spouses. Not true. I need to make my wife a priority!
3) Kids -Each individual kid too...I've got 3, so that means balancing time and what I do with each one. They vary in age, personalities, likes and dislikes...honestly this might be one of the toughest jobs for me as a parent.
4) Myself - Not selfish fun time, but the way I take care (or don't take care) of myself matters. Am I sleeping enough, eating right, exercising? Am I accountable to others? If this isn't happening, if I don't care of myself, it effects all the other aspects of my life. I actually toyed with the idea that this should be second priority. Because who I am or how I am, is what my wife and kids recieve.
5) Ministry (Work for Me) - It certainly helps to LOVE what I get to do!! I love working for the church, being a pastor, working with others, watching people come to know Jesus and have their lives changed by him! It's amazing...but again, this doesn't happen unless I set the example with the previous priorities.
So, here's the thing, I attend to all these things. It's not that I work myself down the list and can't get to one of the priorities until I've dealt with another. The point is to work, integrate and balance all these things in my life. The Holy Spirit is a huge help in working this out. I look at the above list and ask honest questions of myself. This is my blog, not my journal! But, I'd encourage you to write down the priorities in your life and evaluate your time and energy towards those things. Set goals to live them out! Ask God to direct your life and give you wisdom!
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