:: in.a.mirror.dimly ::

I confessed to my wife last night that I’m a hockey fundamentalist. There’s something so wonderful about the game itself that I don’t see a need to tack on anything extra to “jazz” it up. Here’s an example:

I watched a Columbus Blue Jackets game last night and I saw them score a goal for the first time (yes, it’s been a long 3 weeks). Now, I’m no lover of the loud fog horn they blast at some arenas or that stupid, annoying song that Chicago plays whenever they score a goal, but Columbus merely begins their celebrations by firing a canon. No, that’s not quite gimmicky enough. They tack on a live rock band and cheerleaders.

Cheer leaders in hockey?

Blasphemy.

I longed for the old days of the lame old organ. Yes, I’m a hockey fundamentalist.

I suppose Columbus can keep their rock band, but these gimmicks do say something about the way we add more stuff to things that are already pretty good. More is better and interesting. Take the Amazon Kindle Fire.

It’s not enough to be able to read books on a device. They integrate all kinds of apps that you can use. On the one hand, that is really convenient. On the other hand, the possibilities for distraction are endless. The more we add, the more we jeopardize our attention and discipline.

A Kindle Fire does not lead directly to distraction. It’s not a matter of cause. We’re simply placing ourselves in a position to be distracted. Sometimes the best thing we can do is limit ourselves, place boundaries around our lives, and give out attention wholly to one thing.

There is something wonderfully freeing about being able to focus on one thing, becoming consumed in the observations and lessons of a moment. That alone is my reason for using a journal every day.

My journal goes to church, to bed, and to work with me. I have it at the breakfast table and even tote it along on a car ride if I anticipate some free time. It provides a very simple way to sit and reflect on one thing, following it to wherever it may lead me.

There is no temptation to check e-mail, to tweet a bad pun, or to read the news. My attention is wholly given to the task of jotting down what’s on my mind. This simple discipline is incredibly useful for spiritual growth.

Once God plants a seed in my mind, it has room to grow and flourish in my journal. A simple sentence may spread roots as deep as two pages. Life-changing lessons have developed strong and fruitful in the greenhouse of my journal.

Multi-use devices such as iPads, Kindles, and Nooks have their place for sure. However, as we embrace new technology and tools, we need to be honest about what they lack and what we lose if we switch over to them exclusively.

The pen and notebook are innovations from the past as well. As we gained the ability to write, we stopped developing our memories. It’s not like I’m preserving some kind of golden age in my journal.

My journal provides a way to keep my life simple and focused in a world that thrives on distractions, speed, and endless options. Journaling is a conscious choice to pursue a path that enables me to focus on reflecting or meditating.

After writing in my journal, my mind is sharper and focused, and my ideas and lessons are safely entrusted into a safe place. With my ideas secure, I’m free to power up my computer and watch another hockey game.

I had to confront one of my fears a few weeks ago. It’s a bit too private to share all of the details on a blog, but if I had to list the top three things that freak me out, I’d say this is right up there. It’s the kind of fear that I can’t control, that I know can only be resolved through prayer that I’ve been too afraid to seek.

A few weeks ago, I decided to take action. I wasn’t facing anything life threatening or uncomfortable, but I was in a situation that made it really easy to face that fear. The freak out was pretty awesome: sweaty palms, beating heart, short breaths. I was a ball of fun at close quarters in the elevator that day.

And then something changed. I gained an understanding of the actual source of my fear, and I realized that I’d completely mischaracterized it. It wasn’t quite as bad as I thought, even if it still kind of freaks me out.

By staring into my fear, I discovered a weak point in its defenses, and you’d better believe I’m praying into that weak spot with everything I’ve got.

On Becoming Less Fearful

I had a chat with some classmates at my 10-year college reunion, and one guy asked how we’ve changed over the past 10 years. One friend said that he is now less fearful after working through so many hard times at his first job. He cares far less about what people think of him, and he is far more confident as takes risks and pursues challenges.

In a sense, his first job blasted him with so many sources of stress and anxiety that they soon lost their power. He saw them at their worst, and he realized that God was able to sustain him.

There are real things to fear in this world, but so much of what we fear is insubstantial, lacking teeth. The substantial parts of our fears may knock us around when we face them, but God is able to deliver us because Jesus is Lord over all.

Facing our fears often seems like a terrible at idea in the thick of things. However, we’ll never have a chance to experience God’s power and deliverance unless we own our fears and let him begin working in us.

I have found that deliverance is often a process, a series of stumbling steps forward. As I discovered in the elevator that day with my nervous faith, God can break through and begin to heal us when we face our fears.

When I say that Mary was a spiritual mother to me, I fear that I may call up an incomplete image of who she was to me and to so many others. Mary cared for many of us like a mother, but she was also a spiritual dynamo who played every bit the role of a pastor.

She was the first woman that I knew who led with tremendous spiritual authority. She certainly wasn’t the last. Mary’s leadership, pastoring, whatever you want to call it, began with lunch.

Sitting down for a meal with a group of people creates opportunities for tremendous conversations and even transformations. I think Jesus intended his followers to keep gathering around an actual meal when remembering his death and resurrection—there’s something more life-giving when we face one another and actually interact.

I don’t know when Mary started this, but since she had several sons attending my college, Taylor University, she hosted a huge lunch once a month on Sunday afternoons. She led the college Sunday school class, and we were her flock that she cared for like a mother and like a pastor—which when you think about it, have a lot in common.

She prayed with and for us.

She fed us with pot roasts and vulnerable teachings from scripture.

She sat in the presence of Jesus while alone and then showed us the way to him when we gathered together.

When I try to sit in the presence of the Lord each day, I’m often reminded of Mary. She modeled it for us. We followed. That is the kind of spiritual authority that the audience of Jesus saw in him.

That spiritual authority was also the thing that the Pharisees didn’t understand.

You’d think that everyone in our church could see the love of Mary and her care for us as a good thing. But no, certain men couldn’t see through a couple of Bible verses. They clung to a few scripture verses about the role of women in the church and missed everything else that the Bible says about women who prophesy, who are apostles, who speak as God’s representatives, and who guide entire nations.

They chose to focus on a few words on a page and missed the life-giving power of God at work in Mary that lined up with everything else in the scriptures. They put pressure on her, and sometimes even killed the freedom of the Spirit in our Sunday school class.

These men who claimed they were standing on the Bible showed none of the love that Mary modeled from the Bible. They did not exhibit the fruits of patience and self-control. They didn’t welcome us into their homes. They never offered to pray for us.

Whatever they tried to assert by the authority they claimed, the power of Jesus in the life of Mary trumped them. She became the lowly servant before Jesus, and God exalted her through her weakness.

Mary did so many small things that built up into a kind of tidal wave that swept into my life and left me forever changed.

She prayed each morning.

She read scripture.

She shared from her heart.

She prayed with us.

These were all small things that took discipline and commitment. She didn’t see immediate fruit sometimes, but her faithfulness changed many lives.

Before any of those changes could take place, we needed to know that we were welcome and more importantly, that we were loved. All of the spiritual impact of Mary did not begin in a Sunday school class with us, though it would help.

Mary’s spiritual power began over lunch—serving us and sharing her life with us.

May we find God in the small things today and faithfully remain in him so that we can courageously serve others with his authority and power.

Read more stories about the importance of small acts at Faith Barista today: The Penny Man by Guest Blogger Billy Coffey

At the start of 2011, I knew one thing for sure: I did not want my life in the new year to resemble the frustrating mud pit that was 2010. Things were ho hum spiritually and my professional work had only advanced in short bursts without becoming secure and steady.

I don’t know why I waited so long to do this, but I began asking God, “What’s happening? What needs to change?”

God’s answer came back, “Seek first my Kingdom.”

That seemed sort of like a no-brainer. That’s right in scripture. I know that. Why did God need to remind me?

Well, because I had forgotten it. I was stuck pursuing goals that were leaving me frustrated.

So I had to figure out the next big question: What does it look like for me, Ed Cyzewski, to seek first God’s Kingdom?

That was a tough question to answer. I mean anyone can take the theology test and fill in the blank:

“Seek __________ the Kingdom of God.”

Applying it is another matter.

The Kingdom isn’t a test we pass or a creed we recite. The Kingdom is something we seek by changing our to do lists and our actions. Based on my actions, the Kingdom was something I had sought third, fourth, or fifth in my life.

What did it look like to seek first God’s Kingdom? I began to ask God for help, and with his guidance, I took action. Here are a few things that I changed in 2011:

Minister in Prison

I don’t write about serving in prison much because I don’t want it to ever sound like I’m bragging about something that I count as a privilege and blessing. However, I want to share just how much serving in prison means to me. At the start of 2011, I’d put off some training and paperwork related to serving in prison, and God prompted me to get moving on it.

Each Wednesday night I’m part of a 2-hour meeting where I share what God is doing in my life, other volunteers share, and the inmates share what God is doing with them. Sometimes we encourage one another, and often we pray for each other. Driving home last night, I sensed that I had just been with members of my family.

I serve in prison because I looked into it, I had the opportunity, and God prompted me to do it. When God burdened me to serve someone else, I needed to obey his lead if I wanted to receive his blessings.

Pray Intentionally

I don’t quite know how to say this, but I felt that I needed to pray differently. For starters, I try to pray on my knees if possible, but otherwise I at least try to stand or sit up straight—communicating respect to God through my posture.

I’m also praying out loud when I’m alone, which both keeps me better focused on my prayer and feels a bit more powerful. There’s nothing like confessing sin by speaking it out loud before God and then claiming his forgiveness and healing power verbally.

Wake Up Early

This changes depending on how much sleep I need, but I generally try to wake up between 5 am and 6 am most days. This provides me with enough time to pray, read the Bible, and wander around the kitchen until I’ve had some coffee.

Waking up early also ensures I have enough time to work on some fiction and my blog posts for the day. My writing is a ministry, and writing for this blog is a big part of that. I want to make a significant investment in this site so that readers will be encouraged and built up.

Early mornings leave plenty of time to hammer out and edit my posts, while also providing enough time throughout the rest of the morning for my business writing.

Manage my Time

As God challenged me to seek first his Kingdom, he also prompted me to write this at the top of my to do list on my computer: “Be faithful with a little.” If I had one article to do during the week, I made sure I wrote the best piece I could as quickly as possible. Soon additional projects began to arrive, and I was grateful to have improved my time management skills. Here’s what I did:

I set up a simple schedule on my Google calendar for my time between 5 am and 5 pm. It’s grouped by hour or half hour-long chunks such as work for a company, magazine projects, search for writing gigs, marketing, networking, etc. I leave the calendar open in my browser so that reminders pop up when it’s time to move on to the next project.

Each morning I assign 30-60 minute tasks to each block of time so that I ensure I’m hitting the right mix of business writing, magazine work, and searching for new gigs. 

Some Results

Praise God, 2011 is nothing like 2010. It’s not that 2010 was a total waste of time. Some great things happened during that year, and I certainly learned some lessons about what not to do.

However, there were some places in my life where I felt stuck, and the biggest game-changer for me was figuring out what it looked like for me to seek first God’s Kingdom each day. That means I serve in a prison, wake up early to pray, and faithfully use my God-given talents for writing.

My hope is that the next time I face a theology test about the Kingdom of God, I’ll be declared exempt from it. I won’t need to be tested on my knowledge because the right answers to the test will be evident in my life.

What is something new God is asking you to step out in?

For more posts on this topic, visit Bonnie Gray’s blog today: 5 Principles of Starting New.

On Wednesday night our Alpha group at the local prison watched the video and met in small groups on the topic of the Holy Spirit. While I believe it’s really important to learn about the Holy Spirit—you have to start somewhere—it can also be really discouraging.

I now have a laundry list of all the awesome things that are NOT happening in my Christian life.

I caught myself sort of begging the Holy Spirit to descend on me during the video—such is my insecurity at times. However, the point of it all is that the Holy Spirit is within us, and we can’t replicate the Holy Spirit’s work among us.

Our job is to seek and wait. Those two words come up over and over again in the Psalms. Stillness and silence often help, which run counter to everything in American culture.

The truth is that the Spirit sometimes just shows up. Sometimes we need to fight off every distraction and get a drop of God, and it feels like the most precious thing in the world. Other times God fills us with himself in ways that almost seem wasteful. I want to bottle some of it up for later.

Christianity is all about God bringing the dead to life—people who spiritually have no life going on and no power on their own to connect with God. They can only seek God and wait for God to bring the Resurrection.

The Christian life is full of Good Fridays where we confess our sins and die to ourselves. We’re waiting for Sunday to come—the day when God comes to us with his presence, joy, and peace. These are the moments we realize that every other source of joy in ours lives, even playoff hockey, cannot compare with the goodness of God.

However, stuck between Friday and Sunday is Saturday. Before I start singing in an auto-tuned voice, “Gotta get down on Friday” (which can have a sort of spiritual double-meaning if you take it out context), I wanted to say something about Saturdays.

We have to persevere through our Saturdays. There’s no way around it. God does the resurrecting. God raises us on Sunday on his schedule.

On my way to visit some family this weekend while Julie wrapped up some some pressing school work, I put some worship music on in the car. All of sudden, KABOOM! God’s presence invaded, and I experienced three hours of spiritual insanity—joy, hope, peace, love, etc.

Driving through the abandoned wasteland outside of Hartford with empty lots and heaps of rubble and trash, I had a sense of God’s love for the broken people and broken places of this world. The places that no one gives a damn about are his treasured possession—the places where he is Lord. This was his domain.

I sensed his love and delight for me, his child. I felt his acceptance erasing the insecurity I manifested on Wednesday. In a few minutes he erased all doubt and fear.

When I tell people about Christianity, I don’t need to talk about too much theology, even though I’m passionate about theology. It’s moments like these when you meet with God and he turns your insecure Saturdays into the assurance and peace of a Sunday.

I follow Jesus because he rose one Sunday 2,000 years ago, and he continues to raise people every day.

I crave spiritual breakthroughs. Sometimes they arrive unannounced and pounce on me like a rabbit on a carrot. Other times I wait and beg God for them like a rabbit standing up on its hind legs in the kitchen while I make a fruit salad.

Either way, rabbits like their treats, and I crave spiritual food.

Thankfully God gives us what we desire, even if it’s sometimes in a form we don’t expect or at a time that doesn’t fit our schedules.

While the taste of God’s goodness is still in my mouth, the attack comes.

I prefer to think of Satan as more of a pest, a bug that annoys me with temptation and negative thoughts. However, his ambitions go far beyond that of a bug—he wants to destroy us.

This means that every time I have a spiritual breakthrough and experience the joy of God, the freedom of God, or the knowledge of God, I can expect serious temptation, discouragement, and even disruptions to my life. Exhaustion, conflict, and stress can press in, taking away the joy of God’s provision.

Seeking first God’s Kingdom is a life and death struggle. Thankfully God wants us to succeed. I have found him accessible and caring for me when discouragement hits after a breakthrough. After all, God wants us to grow into maturity.

Even if I fell into sin immediately after a breakthrough, I have found God more than willing to accept my repentance and to pick up where we left off. Unlike a person who may want to justify himself by judging us or proving us wrong, God’s love compels us to keep moving forward after we’ve stumbled, when we’re discouraged, or when we’re attacked.

He has overcome the world, and he’ll continue to overcome it today.

For more posts on faith: The Art of Attraction: The Joy of Asking

I have three younger step-sisters. I attended Jr. High and High School during their early years and suffered through their fixations on Barney, Thomas, and the Land Before Time, praying that my friends would never stop by while their shows were playing.

One children’s tape introduced me, much against my will, to military metaphors in Christianity. “I’m in the Lord’s army!” the kids chanted as they marched behind a bee-bopping creature with a large orange head. It was enough to give Liberal activists nightmares and to make pacifists weep. You can add mortified teenagers to that list.

I have since run into a lot of military references in Christianity. We fight, we battle, we take our orders from God, etc. There are Christian organizations that rely heavily upon military metaphors and chains of command.

Just the other day I rewrote something in order to remove a military metaphor, and that got me thinking…

Should Christians use military metaphors?

Now, I know that some of you will say, “But Paul talked about being a good soldier and obeying his commanding officer. Jesus respected the faith of the Centurion who thought in military terms. Of course we should use them!”

That’s correct to a certain degree. There is a precedent. However, are there times when we should not use them? And are we in a context in which we should even use them less often? 

Are We Misunderstood?

I have attended book events by journalists and religion scholars who believe in and fear the rise of religious fundamentalists in America who want to literally make America a Christian nation (they’re also known as Dominionists). They especially fear the armed segments of this group.

These right wing religious extremists exist, even if they are a minority that in no way represents the mainstream of Christianity, and so we need to make sure we aren’t misrepresenting ourselves. At least, I hope that most Christians aren’t interested in taking over America as a Christian nation.

Religion and Violence

Whether our audience is conservative or liberal, American or foreign, religion and violence is ever before us in the news headlines. In casting ourselves as “soldiers” for God, are we misrepresenting what Christianity is all about when our culture is already on the alert for the mixing of religion and the military?

Are We Fighting the Right Enemy?

When we do use military metaphors for Christianity, we may cast ourselves as God’s insiders, his special force that is fighting against the darkness. However, who is the enemy exactly? Sadly, we sometimes cast those outside the Christian faith as our enemies. And even when we speak of spiritual powers, we may alienate non-Christians by claiming they’re under the sway of these dark forces.

Yes, we are in a spiritual battle against evil in this world. However, we are sinners in need or a Savior much like everyone else. Those separated from Jesus need our help, not our animosity. It’s not us vs. them. It’s all of us against the evil in this world that wants to destroy every single one of us. When we leave behind the us vs. them mindset, we can say, “Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”

Who Gets to Use the Weapons?

Where there are military metaphors, the Sword of the Spirit is sure to follow. While we may speak of wielding the Bible like a weapon, we forget that it is the sword of the Spirit—as in, it belongs to the Spirit. The Bible is a sword and we can use it to hack one another to bits. However, when we let the Holy Spirit use it, it will demolish spiritual strongholds in our own lives and in the lives of others.

Are There Other Metaphors?

While there still are times when we can use military metaphors, such as describing spiritual warfare, there may be some better options to use in describing the Christian life and our relationship with God. Keep in mind that Jesus spoke of himself as the Good Shepherd, as our friend. God is our Father. Military metaphors can obscure these deeper pictures that most accurately describe God’s relationship to us.

When we follow Jesus and obey him, we do so out of a desire to return the love he has poured out on us. We are loved. Yes, God will lead us and expect us to follow, but we are not worthless scum bags

While on vacation with our family last week I gave frequent updates on the past year, and I realized something.

The past year wasn’t the worst. That kind of surprised me. In fact, a lot of great things happened. And then again, I certainly hit my fair share of set backs that cast a shadow over things—hence my surprise.

During this time last year, where did I expect to be in a year’s time? The answer: Well, not quite where I am right now. And now, where do I expect to be next year at this time?

I can live with my lack of progress because life is more than a long to-do list. I need to look at something bigger than my goals.

This isn’t a matter of painting a bulls-eye wherever my arrows land. Rather, I’m talking about the delicate balance of having goals and remembering the larger relational picture of life. Over the past year my daily quality of life has improved and my wife and I have found time to be together in midst of some pretty crazy schedules.

All in all, we’re doing fine, and that is something to be thankful for.

On the Christian end of things, I think I can get caught up in meeting all kinds of goals as well, craving certain spiritual milestones. You know, stuff like being free from a nagging sin, hearing God more clearly, or reading a certain amount of scripture. Christians usually think they don’t pray enough, and we’re usually moving somewhere between the extremes of despairing over our sin or excusing it.

I like the idea of aiming for Christian maturity, and I’ll speak about that more this week, but as far as goals go, I think it’s important to begin any discussion of them from the standpoint of what’s most important.

When I consider my goals as a Christian, I find myself balancing the desire to be more holy or spiritual, but not listing the goal over the relationship with God that will ultimately lead me to that level of holiness or spirituality. In other words, working toward the goals can overshadow the means by which we attain them—namely through intimacy with Christ.

It can be frustrating to struggle with sin or to find that you’re not quite as far along in your Christian walk as you’d like, but we don’t move forward by setting a goal and then working on it without the relationship with Christ in place. I’m learning that the best way forward is not always what seems to be the most direct…

The last significant aspect of our vocabulary of the Holy Spirit concerns the ways in which the Holy Spirit speaks to and through us.

Many evangelicals such as myself have a hard time with this one since we’ve historically been rather fixated on the Bible as our source of revelation. Tossing the Holy Spirit into the mix complicates things.

However, even if we just try to read the Bible without acknowledging the role of the Spirit, we’ll keep bumping into verses that give the Spirit a prominent place in our lives.

Teaching Us

Throughout the Gospel of John, Jesus frequently speaks of the Holy Spirit as a guide for his followers, leading them into the truth (John 14:17, 26; 15:26: 16:13, 15). The scripture itself came about originally through the work of the Holy Spirit.

The process of interpreting the scriptures and living with wisdom is just as connected to the Holy Spirit in the book of Acts (1:2, 6:10). Paul frequently alludes to the guidance of the Spirit in discerning a particular belief or application.

Therefore, as we study scripture we can also speak of the Spirit as a guide who teaches us. This isn’t a stretch of scripture, though we can certainly take this notion too far by creating individual bastions of interpretation and defying all who disagree with us. Though, we don’t need the Holy Spirit to do such a thing, we can abuse the leading of the Holy Spirit in heavy-handed ways.

Prophetic Words

We could choose several different ways to speak of prophetic words from the Holy Spirit, but I think it’s quite biblical to speak of the spiritual gift of prophecy as another way the Spirit guides and teaches us. According to 1 Corinthians 14 a prophetic word is a revelation from the Spirit that edifies the church.

Acts, Romans, and 1 Corinthians all speak of prophetic gifts being given to God’s people, and Paul even said that he wished all of the Corinthians would prophesy. Having said that, he also took a great deal of care to explain how to use their gifts in orderly, beneficial ways. Prophecy is intended, above all else, to help other Christians to grow.

We could debate whether Acts 2 makes prophecy a gift for all Christians or whether Paul’s spiritual gift lists make it one gift among many that we may not have. I’m not certain about this, but I do believe we should remain open to the possibility of God giving ourselves or someone else a specific word for our edification.

I mean, God spoke through Balaam’s mule (or ass if you want a laugh), so there’s no reason why his Spirit couldn’t speak through me, right?

Desiring the Lord, Not Just the Gifts of the Lord

The work of the Holy Spirit is an incredible blessing that I sometimes wish I experienced on a more regular basis, but the trouble with such gifts as prophetic words is we can end up craving the gifts rather than the Lord we are called to love above all else.

And so while we should desire these important gifts that will empower us for ministry and help us contribute to the health of the church, our chief desire should be the Lord himself. As we draw near to him and remain open to the work of his Spirit, he is able to direct and empower us as he sees fit.

The following post is part of the series organized by Christine Sine on spiritual practices.

It’s been two weeks since we made the move to Connecticut. Today I cut apart the last of the boxes in our living room, leaving only 3 in our bedroom out of those which still need to be unpacked.

Our futon frame arrived today and we’ll be shopping for a mattress this weekend.

We’ve been kayaking in the Long Island Sound twice, the UConn Dairy Bar once, and Diana’s Pool at least four times. I’ve been to Home Depot and Aldi twice. On our way back from Diana’s Pool there’s a nice guy with a huge garden and a tiny farm stand where we buy corn, cucumbers, and peppers. Just down the road from him is a lady with pick-your-own blueberries.

In short, we’re settling in.

There’s no semblance of a routine yet. And that is where I can run into trouble. For me, my spiritual life thrives on routines. Whether taking a walk in the evening, reading the Bible at breakfast, or praying before bed, the nature of a move into a new place, new lifestyle, and new routine can throw spiritual practices into a dead halt.

I used to hang out in the garden at our last house digging out weeds, cultivating tomatoes, and harvesting batches of lettuce. There were lessons to learn about patience and attentiveness, while mucking around in the dirt freed my mind to roam wherever God may lead. I often took walks in the evening either before or after my time in the garden.

After being uprooted, I’m now working on carving out a walk in the morning, some semblance of a Bible study around breakfast time, and hope to figure out some more time for prayer and reading. I never realized how dramatically my routines are tied to my spiritual condition. It’s as if I didn’t know where to set down my spiritual roots.

I’m working on taking some steps forward now. The sooner I establish some healthy spiritual routines, the better. They serve as anchors for my day, rest stops and recharging times that reorient me to God’s values and desires.

It’s no mistake that many prayer practices are rooted in seeking God at particular times of the day. These carved out blocks of time provide the regular spiritual recharging that one would expect from three meals a day.

On the other end of a move where my routines and regular practices are disrupted, such lessons scream out. While it has been essential to unpack boxes, find farm stands, and seek out local stores, it is just as important for my spiritual life to take root again in a new soil. In the midst of a move there is too much to do, to figure out, and to set up.

A key part of moving is setting up a solid spiritual routine where practices such as prayer, scripture reading, and meditation can find a peaceful place to flourish, even if the to-do list is growing and boxes loom in the next room.