I’m giving myself permission to slow down for the summer.

There’s only so much of any of us to go around, and that means we have to make choices. I’m there right now. I love ministry and yet I know I need to slow it down. I need to refuel. I need to be with my family right now as we battle together. I’ll still be here every Thursday. I plan to do a video series and I’m excited about that. We’ll grab our coffee cups and Bibles and have an amazing and honest conversation each week.

Maybe you wonder why I have to give myself permission to do this. Well, it looks like this.

Less activity = less ministry or less success or less of [fill in the blank].

Or at least that’s what we tell ourselves. We think that if we aren’t hustling, promoting, speaking, connecting, tweeting, uploading, or hosting an event that somehow a ministry will fade away.

Oh, Father, help us. 

You see, ministry isn’t founded on how much I do, but the call on my life and being true to that. It’s God’s plan, not mine.

I love the story of the apostles standing in front of their accusers. They wanted to jail the men, but one person steps up and says something profound.

So my advice is, leave these men alone. Let them go. If they are planning and doing these things merely on their own, it will soon be overthrown. But if it is from God, you will not be able to overthrow them. You may even find yourselves fighting against God!” Acts 5:38-39 (NLT)

If God is in this ministry, it’s not going to fall apart. If it does fall apart because I slow down, then I needed to put it down. That’s true for you too, my friend. If God is asking you to release something, loose your grip, or slow down, then listen.

Right now, He’s saying that I have to slow it down. To wrap my arms around family as we face cancer together. To give myself permission to fill back up after writing 400,000+ words in the last two years. If I don’t, I’ll get burned out, bummed out, turned around. I don’t want to be that women pretending that I can tell you how to live free if I’m in bondage myself.  So my answer to the Lord is joyful surrender.

This is how our summer will look like together.

Each #livefreeThursday I’ll post a video sharing what I’m learning in this “Summer of Permission.” It will be raw, honest, and hopefully there’ll be a takeaway that will help us all live a little more free.

We’ll take a deep breath together each Thursday. We’ll laugh. We’ll dig deep into the Word. We’ll connect. If you aren’t a part of the Living Free Together Facebook community, I hope you’ll “like” that page. It’s just one more way to connect.

I’ll be back in full force in mid-to-late August. We’ll launch a new 21-Day Adventure. We’ll check out my new devotional that will release. We’ll have some fun parties to celebrate the Come With Me Devotional.

For today, I’m inviting you to watch a broadcast with two friends.

Holley Gerth, Jennifer Watson, and I are genuine friends. We have been hanging out for about four years. Six months ago we decided to put some of those hangout times on video and just hold conversations, inviting you in. In this conversation, we talk about what a Summer of Permission might look like for each of us.

The broadcast glitched out in the first few seconds so the intro is a little choppy, but hang in there with us. We get to the good stuff after our “awkward moment” stories.

 

[bctt tweet=”If a ministry will fall apart because I slow down, then I needed to put it down. #livingfreetogether https://wp.me/p4jbdw-49I” username=”suzanneeller”]

Now it’s your turn

I want to hear your answer. Listen to God for the answer. Don’t be afraid to say yes.

I give myself permission to ________________ this summer.

Suzie

Related resources

Looking for a summer read?

Deepen your walk with Jesus and rediscover him all over again as you read Come With Me: Discovering the Beauty of Following Where He Leads.

[inlinkz_linkup id=720063 mode=1]