Living in 'Cruise Control'

It’s amazing how many things are around these days to make life easier. You can now play tennis, with a tennis racket in the comfort of your home in front of the TV (Wii), don’t have to worry about the weather, getting burnt, or the rain etc. We have recliners that you just have to sit in to have a full body massage. You can have your whole house connected to a computer that can run almost everything that you can control through your mobile phone. I was just driving to drop Jay off at kindy this morning and just had to press a couple of buttons and not worry about the speed limit anymore, just had to steer the wheel. How good is cruise control? Apart from when you come up to a tractor that’s going 70kms below the speed limit, which is also what happened to me this morning on the way!!! Usually I would get angry and frustrated, especially because I was running late, but I was surprisingly pretty calm. The only reason I was calm is that I was talking with God and was in His presence. He’s actually the one who told me to slow down (because I was speeding!) when I first left and to put the car on cruise control, that way I don’t have to worry. God’s presence is like cruise control. When we’re in His presence, there are no worries. Problems just don’t seem as bad or are non-existent any more. There’s just an overwhelming sense of His love and perfect peace, with absolutely no stress, anger, frustration and we can actually be in a place where we can hear God’s voice. I have found it so hard to hear God when I’m stressed and in a rush, angry or frustrated. When I DO tune in and listen to Him, He’s always telling me to slow down and not to worry about anything. We have all these things in this natural world to give us peace, and ‘less stress’, but everyone is going so fast, most people you talk to ARE stressed and just ‘too busy’. No wonder we can’t hear God’s voice and receive God’s peace and presence. When we’re in His presence (on cruise control), we’re also going the perfect pace because God has taken over. We might come across things or problems that slow us down (like that stupid tractor!!! Only joking – God bless that man! It really didn’t bother me at the time!), but life is so much easier when we’re in His presence and listening to His voice. If we try and race or speed here and there and do life in our own strength, we get ourselves all hyped up, stressed out, in trouble and a speeding fine!