Balance. It’s a buzzword that we all seem to want as a reality in our lives because we see its value. We are physical beings. We are relational beings. We are intellectual beings. We are emotional beings. We are spiritual beings. And each part requires focused attention seeing that it contributes to the whole of who we are. We’re encouraged to walk the balance beam of life and learn how to correctly proportion our weight.
I’ve found myself really loving this concept. I throw out phrases like “creating margin” and “carving out time.” I strive to prioritize work while also finding space for fun and rest. I try to strike the right balance between time alone and time with others. I attempt to routinely exercise my body and my brain. I intentionally keep my interests varied in hopes of being “well-rounded.”
But lately I’ve noticed that my own craving for balance has a tendency to turn idolatrous. Honorable pursuits become the sneakiest false gods because we can so easily defend them. All the while, staying poised on the beam has become the ruling agent of my heart instead of my Savior. And it’s been these last couple weeks, which have seemed anything but balanced, that have brought it to light.
Here’s what I’m finding: balance might be our idol when one of two things occur. One, an unbalanced season propels our hearts into deep despair. Or two, balance regularly causes us to miss chances to love our neighbor.
An Unbalanced Season Propels Our Hearts Into Deep Despair.
We’ve all had them. Days or weeks or even months that totally throw us for a loop. It’s like the demands of life conspire to all arrive at once. Sometimes it feels as though one wrong step on the beam can lunge us into swirling tizzy from which we just can’t seem to recover.
When we oversleep and we miss our morning time in God’s Word. When hectic days have dwindled our five-day exercise goal down to one short workout this week. When date night has to be canceled at the last minute. When laundry piles grow to heights we swore they would never reach. When we haven’t had a single minute to return to that hobby we said we would develop further. And on and on the list of examples could go.
Maybe you can relate when I say that I’ve recently stepped into a season of business that I haven’t experienced in a while. And it’s really been messing with me. My peace of mind was so dependent on the balance that I had crafted that I hardly knew what to do when I was obligated to forfeit it. What I had forgotten is that my peace was never meant to be found in circumstances, but rather in a person. Jesus Himself is our peace because He alone has overcome the world (John 16:33). He is the sovereign King over the circumstances that are out of our control. So when these unbalanced seasons propel our hearts from mild frustration into obsessive despair, then we see that the source of our peace has been misplaced.
Balance Regularly Causes Us To Miss Chances To Love Our Neighbor.
Jesus regularly called out the Pharisees for not adhering to what He would call the “weightier matters of the law” (Matthew 23:23). In Mark 7:8 Jesus tells them that they “leave the commandment of God and hold fast to the tradition of men.” In other words, they exalted their own man-made virtues while neglecting the very heart of YHWH’s law. And according to Jesus, the heart of the law is surprisingly simple: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself'” (Matthew 22:37-39).
For me, balance has become one of those man-made virtues. My excessive zeal for this good quality has all too often robbed my attention from what Paul, like Jesus, calls the “greatest” quality (1 Corinthians 13:13).
Let’s not let the word “balance” actually be nothing more than a mask for promoting our own selfish agendas. When was the last time that our to-do list and our calendar took a back seat to an opportunity to encourage or serve someone? Are we too protective of the beautiful schedule that we’ve created for ourselves and our families to let love disrupt it?
Putting Balance In Its Place
Yes, I’m still a big proponent of balance. I think it’s helpful and wise and good. But balance is a cruel master. When we let it rule our lives, perhaps then the beam has stopped being our friend and has turned more into a path that leads to our own destruction.
And so we’re left to ask the obvious question. How do we combat the luring lie that balance is what we need to make our lives complete? The answer is simple, but oh-so difficult. We tell ourselves the truth. We make intentional effort to remind ourselves daily that Christ is our everything.
“You cannot add to that which is already complete.” It’s a line that our pastor kept repeating several weeks ago as we looked at the incomparable nature of Christ in his sermon on Colossians 1. These words have struck a certain chord in my heart that is still resounding loud and clear. What we really need is Jesus, not balance. He is enough in and of Himself. Anything else we try to tack on as necessary is not true gospel.
My inability to gracefully master the beam has been on full display these past few weeks. There are devotional pages that I haven’t read, workout videos that I haven’t played, and laundry baskets that I haven’t emptied. But my hope cannot be in regaining my footing. On my balanced days and my unbalanced days, I have Christ. And you cannot add to that which is already complete.
Cultivate. 