Daniel and choosing the important over the urgent

"...Three times a day he [Daniel] got down on his knees and prayed to His God, just as he had done before." Daniel 6:10b

Early this morning, I read about faithful Daniel in Dan. 9:3 where, after studying God's Word, he "turned to the Lord God and pleaded with Him in prayer and petition, in fasting, and in sackcloth and ashes." Here is Daniel, an exile in the midst of a pagan and corrupt nation. He is without family, without the consolation of home and hearth, without synagogue or any group of kindred believers to encourage and strengthen. Yet here he is, faithfully seeking His Lord in prayer and petition "just as he had done before," day after day, month after month, year after year. What an example of perseverance and dogged faithfulness in the midst of the most difficult of circumstances! If Daniel could daily, consistently worship and seek after His Lord, what excuse do I have? None! I don't want to miss any of the ways God wants to teach me and lead me and conform me to His likeness. What treasures might He have in store for each of us in His Word if we will but come to Him daily with open hearts and listening ears?

Reading the Word and prayer--so basic and elementary and yet how often we fail, as Nike puts it, to "just do it." I know we often have the very best of intentions, but frequently those intentions are waylaid by last minute school projects or extra carpooling or meetings or just unexpected daily tasks. I shudder to think how often I allow the "tyranny of the urgent" to take priority over the important. I can see that laundry piled up or all those dirty dishes, but neglect of a relationship with my Creator is invisible to the eye. I can seemingly ignore it with no immediately apparent repercussions until slowly, inexorably I find myself isolated from my Savior and am empty, frustrated, frazzled, irritable, and powerless.

So the key is to daily make the choice to spend time with Him, no matter what. It's so trite but so true--choose the important over the urgent. Choose, as Jesus urged Martha, "the better thing": to sit at His feet rather than scurrying around getting the meal ready and all the tasks performed. Boy, this can be so hard when there seems to be an infinite amount of work to be done, and it can be so satisfying to see the tangible results of completing those tasks. But that's because my focus is on the temporal and not the eternal, on the visible and not the invisible, on the worldy and not heavenly. So we just have to daily, hourly, choose our focus. If I choose to spend time gazing at Christ in His Word then I will focus on Him and that focus will bring everything else in my life back into proper perspective. Life will always be crazy. Adversity and busyness and struggles and challenges will always be there--just ask Daniel! But no matter what is going on around us, we can choose to turn to God in His Word and in prayer daily, consistently and watch what He will do. If Daniel could do it, so can we. Daniel was no different from any of us. He did remarkable things because He daily depended upon a remarkable God. And so can we. And by the grace of God, so shall we. To God be the glory.