Intimacy or activity

Are our efforts for God keeping us from Him?

If you’ve been following the SundayMonday for any portion of the past five years, you may have noticed that the format has shifted quite a few times. Initially, I designed it to be similar to an online magazine: I invited many of my friends to write for me, and even brought a priest on board to serve as our editor. It was COVID lockdown times, so many of us had a bit more time on our hands.

In 2020-2022 iteration of the SundayMonday, I would solicit articles from my friends, edit them them, and post them. I also had an active Instagram account where I would post reels and stories and carousels, all of which were fun but also quite time intensive. It was important for me to also engage with the Instagram community and so I spent a lot of time on there responding to very personal spiritual DMs that I probably had no business responding to. Six months later, I started a podcast, which was what I was most excited about. This, too, originated as an interview series. I would reach out to guests, schedule interviews, run the interview, then post and promote. Finally, I always sent out a weekly newsletter, which includes links to things I love as well as a reflection.

If you’re keeping track, you may have noticed that I stopped posting on the Instagram in October 2023 (and for almost 2 years prior to that worked with an amazing social media manger who did the bulk of the heavy lifting on the account, thanks Lauren!) I have not posted a new podcast in six months. This was not necessarily intentional, but rather a pretty organic process as I’ve prayed through and lived through different iterations of the SundayMonday.

This week I was listening to an episode of the Restore the Glory podcast with John Eldridge as the guest. He said something that I think perfectly describes this evolution of the SundayMonday: what often happens is that “activity for God becomes an impediment to intimacy with God.”

Mic drop.

I know that trap well! I was publishing Instagram posts and reels and podcasts, and while I heard externally that the fruit of others was positive, the fruit in my own life was becoming anxiety, comparison and stress. I remember one situation on Instagram where another “influencer” sub-tweeted one of my posts, insinuating that I had copied her — even though the reality was that I wasn’t even scrolling on Instagram at that point because I was already overwhelmed by it. I remember feeling so anxious and worried that this girl didn’t like me because she thought I’d copied her, so we had a whole heart-to-heart, where we thankfully resolved the situation but the emotional rollercoaster was no fun at all.

So why am I sharing this? Because I think there is a pressure for us to consume and produce at a rate that might not be natural or even good for us. The amount of content I consume in a day (even without being on Instagram and TikTok) is ridiculous. My work and YouTube and the news and text from friends — I’m taking in so many stimuli during the day that I’m exhausted by the time it gets to 6 PM.

I love John Aldridge’s quote so much because I think all of us can fall into that trap of doing activity for God (or just activity that we think is “good”) instead of pursuing intimacy with Him. You might not be making and sharing content, but what does your schedule look like? Are you constantly running from church meeting to church meeting? Are you spending more time planning young adult events than actually sitting in front of the tabernacle with the Lord?

I’m not condemning you because I struggle, too. And to be honest, if I’m not spending time with the Lord, then everything I share here is for naught. I want to live like a vase, filled with the love of God, overflowing into these newsletters — not standing at a sputtering spigot begging for a few drops so I can send this out (and I’ve been there, many times.)

There have been seasons where I put more time into the SundayMonday than I have spent with God. And — spoiler alert — I think it probably takes 8-10 hours of good prayer to produce a halfway decent newsletter each week. Am I getting 10 hours of per week? No. But I sure as heck need to prioritize it.

So I invite you to consider this now. Is your activity for God (a good thing) overshadowing your intimacy with Him (the One thing)? Are there places where He might be asking you to let go of something for a season so that you can just sit and rest with Him?

I’ll be praying through it with you this week.

In Christ,

Jane

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What I’m loving lately

Obsessed with how my clothes smell

I’ve shared the Laundress brand detergent before, but let me just say that I made a mistake this week and ordered the wrong scent… at first I was going to return it because I didn’t like how it smelled in the bottle, but then I gave it a try in my wash and I’m OBSESSED. I truly cannot stop smelling myself. I can’t even describe the scent (called Isle) but it’s so lovely — allegedly it’s “a dewy, luminous infusion of fresh basil, mint, lime, and watery notes, anchored with the warm aromas of heliotrope, jasmine, and sandalwood.” It’s sold out on the site but you can find on Amazon.

What story are you telling yourself?

This week I’ve received a few words from books I’ve read and podcasts I’ve listened to with the reminder to go to the Artist, go to the Storyteller, when I have questions about myself and my story. It’s so tempting to run to friends or the internet to get quick answers about why I am the way I am or try to figure out why something feels harder or more frustrating than it should — but why am I not going directly to the One who made me who I am? He is always knocking at the door of our heart and ready to answer us.

St. Teresa of Avila is my new best friend

I love this woman so much — I’ve never read an autobiography of a saint that I could really see myself in (little flickers in the early parts of St. Augustine’s Confessions, moments of St. Therese) but wow, St. Teresa gives me hope. I really think we would have been friends. I found this audio book for free on Spotify and I’ve been laughing out loud (her sense of humor from the 1500s is beyond). It’s phenomenal. “You pay God a compliment by asking great things of Him.” St. Teresa pray for us!

Song of the Week:

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Prayer intentions

• For a friend’s son who just got married

• For Grace and Justin

• For the Hunt family

• For a special intention