I’m not busy

Written By Susanne Willdig

Reaching out to help

Many years ago, I once contacted a well-known megachurch in America because my local church wanted to run aspects of their children’s programme. I looked at their website, found the correct person, and emailed her directly. Her response stunned me: it was long, deep, and she ended it with: “Do let me know if I can help with any more information. Email me, I mean it - I’m not too busy.”

This happened about 20 years ago, and it stuck with me, that one line. This lady ran a busy megachurch children’s ministry, and to say she was ’not too busy’ didn’t mean she was idly waiting for emails from random English strangers. It meant that she knew what her purpose was, and she wasn’t distracted by the peripherals. Enabling children’s ministry in other churches: that was within her purpose, so she was not too busy to spend her time on it.

In the twenty years since that email, I have often fallen into the busy-ness trap that this lady was able to avoid: there’s a million things I’m ABLE to do, and that others NEED me to do, and I may even have TIME to do. But if I accept, these will fill my time and crowd out the opportunities that may come my way that are within my calling and purpose, but often aren’t planned or foreseeable. As I grow older, I get somewhat better at filtering these, but this lady’s email continues to inspire me.

As I leave you to consider this for your own life: in your week, what activities are keeping you to busy to hold space for your true purpose?

Susanne Willdig

Susanne is a member of the Open Ears’ Team. She is a busy mum of two children now, but used to work for Prospects for People with Learning Disabilities as marketing manager. When Prospects, together with other Christian disability charities, put on a conference in London about the theology of disability, she noticed a lady typing live subtitles at all the talks – all day long. By mid-afternoon Susanne could see the lady was exhausted and offered to help, and when Don Mason, then Chairman of Open Ears, saw her doing this he cornered her immediately afterwards to ask her to help at Open Ears; and the rest, so to speak, is history.

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