Maté Maté Time
15July 12, 2012 by agirlikemee
I’m taking you girls on a trip with me. So, in that crazy imagination of yours pack your sun glasses, your sunscreen, your camera, maybe even a good magazine ( lets face it… we like magazines), and a good pair of shoes, and let’s head south to explore a beautiful place called Argentina. It’s hot in Argentina. Busy in the streets, markets filled with hostile customers, cars honking… the business and chaos goes about the day… just like every day. People needing to be somewhere, running here, driving there, businesses needing to be run…. So you think, “Argentina is not too different from us.” There’s this perfect little store we walked by with amazing dresses and jewelry and we just need to get back there to take a look around. We arrive at the door and there’s a “closed sign” hanging there. What?? It’s 12 o’clock!! Then you begin to look around and you notice all the businesses have closed. Everyone is leaving and going somewhere. But where? You can’t believe what you’re seeing. You’re a good paying customer and these people are missing out on your business. How frustrating. You decide to investigate. As you’re walking around the quiet streets you stop a lady to ask when the stores will reopen. She goes on to tell you that it is maté maté time. The stores will not open again until 5 because of their siesta and their much cherished maté time. In the warmer months all business shuts down around noon. Everyone goes home to their families for lunch. Which is then followed by a two hour siesta time.. than about 4 o’clock its maté maté time. What the heck is maté you ask?? Yerba maté is a beverage made from the leaves and stems of a powerful rainforest tree found in Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina. The people of these countries carry this tea around like we carry coffee. It is special to them and very much desired. So much so that they take out time from their busy schedules to sit around a table together and drink it. It is then that Yerba maté reveals its talent: connecting people and allowing two people to talk, to enjoy a simple moment. It’s a time where you can sit across the table from a friend face to face and discuss anything. Share your hearts, laugh, cry… just commune together. And while that is taking place the yerba maté tea is known to be energizing, relaxing, and clearing all at the same time. Whether at the beach, on the road, on a camping trip, in a motel, at work or at home, when it is maté time in Argentina, everything else can wait. It is a sacred tradition and valued for a joyful life.
I have a very good friend who introduced me to this tradition. She had first mentioned it when I asked her why she had a tea cup always sitting at the same place by her couch. She went on to explain that it’s for her maté maté time with Jesus. This got me thinking. First thinking about how she was so spiritual and really has her life together, and I don’t because I rarely read my Bible and rarely spend time with the Lord. Thinking that God must really love her, probably more than me, because she actually sets aside time with Him. Battling with the thoughts that I’m not a good Christian because I’m not like her and God must really be disappointed in me for not spending quality time with Him. All this guilt, and jealousy, and shame filling me up with lies… but deep down I could feel this little bloom making its way through the nasty lies. This bloom of desire. I wanted mate mate time with Jesus! It sounded so special, so joyful, so fulfilling. I could see that my friend really treasured that time and looked forward to it. I guess I never really looked at it as so beautiful and exciting! I had a choice… wallow in my shame and guilt and allow it to keep me from making a change, or change my thinking and make it more of a thing to look forward to than to dread. But how?
Through reading a lot of your emails my heart was really led to write about this because I have found that we just don’t spend time with God like we should. A lot of what you are feeling right now… the pain, the confusion, the questions, the anger, the hurt, the abandonment, the sadness… all stems from spending no time with Jesus! Now hear me out… You can spend time with the Lord and yet still feel these things… but God can and will heal your heart more than Heather and I can. Or anything else for that matter. Even more than Yerba Maté tea… Jesus is energizing, renewing, clearing, and healing. When we are overwhelmed by this world (as I so often am) why are we not running to His Word and prayer instead of running back to the world–television, friends, shopping, coffee dates, etc?? We have come to look at time with Jesus as something to add to our checklist, a burden, a homework assignment and an interruption in our daily lives. We dread it and frankly would just rather shut our brains off and watch TV. It’s easier, it takes our mind off of the crap going on in our own lives. We don’t have to take the energy to change our hearts, change our thinking, be told what we’re doing wrong… and then wake up the next morning with the same `ol feelings of anxiety and pain. Don’t we want to be changed?? Are we so apathetic that we would rather stay where we are at spiritually because we just don’t feel like reading the Bible and because we just don’t have the time? Sure we do. Sure I do! I felt like this a lot and still do on occasion…. but I asked myself what needed to change in my time with God to make me want to run to Him!?
So here’s what my maté maté time looks like. I am a mother of two little kids, a wife to a band member who is on the road often, a friend who wants to keep in touch with her friends, a daughter, a sister…. there is just not enough time in the day to do all the things that I would like to do. It just doesn’t happen. For me my maté time with Jesus has to happen at 6am. It is the only time that I can be still and sit face to face with Jesus and not be interrupted by a screaming child. I don’t want to wake up at 6… but i try. I walk downstairs and put on the kettle. I make myself a cup of good coffee. (passionate coffee drinker right here). I light some candles, sometimes put on some Bethel worship music- sometimes Patty Griffin. I have just created an atmosphere that is quiet and filled with things I love. We are human after all… God created us to love beauty and our atmosphere can affect our mood. This year I decided to read through the Bible. So I open my Bible to where I left off and I read asking God along the way to speak to my heart. Sometimes He does and other times I don’t feel anything but I am open to learning, open to conviction and open to His presence. I journal what I read and write my thoughts and my struggles. I pray and I am filled with a fulfillment that nothing else can do. It’s special, its maté maté time… It’s my time to sit face to face with the maker of the universe and spill my heart, read His heart and just allow myself to feel at all. This doesn’t make me a better Christian and this no longer becomes something that I have to do in order to be a good girl. It’s something that I want and something that I absolutely need. And I fail. I don’t do it every morning like I would wish, I can get distracted at times, I am tired at times and let the pillow get the best of me… but I know that the time exists for my taking. And I can come to the Father as a failure. I can just sit and listen. I can sit and just scribble in my journal. I can sit and just pray. I can sit and just cry. (it’s been done) But this has helped me to look forward to my time with Jesus. It’s sacred and is not meant to get in the way of our lives… but to give us life. So let me ask you in the midst of your chaotic lives… how much time do you spend with God? And if its just a thing you may get to if you’re lucky or you just don’t have any desire for it… than how can you make your time with Jesus unique from everyone else? How can you make it a time where you enjoy the words that are living and have power? Do you realize that its sitting face to face with someone who desperately loves you and wants to speak to your heart? It’s relational, its beautiful and romantic. It doesn’t have to be the same time every day… but I encourage you to set that time before the day begins… make it a priority… make it sacred and desired…. and discipline yourself. No more excuses. I’m talking to myself here too. I have been slacking a lot lately and I want to press in more. Hosea 10:12- ” Sow for yourselves righteousness; reap steadfast love; break up your unplowed ground, for it is the time to seek the Lord, that He may come and rain righteousness upon you.”
In the midst of busy lives, downward spirals, and messed up thoughts… remember this- The Lord is kind. He wants to speak tenderly to you and wants to share with you words of life that will comfort, unscramble thoughts, heal, restore, fill with joy, give peace and pick you up off the muddy ground when you fall over and over again. He is here to forgive you, pick you up, and walk with you as you take one step at a time. You can either choose to step without Him or step with Him today. And I assure you that when we step with Him there is a much fuller life. I need to get my butt in gear and have more maté maté time with Him who loves me most. Like Yerba Maté..The Word of God can reveal one of its talents… A super natural talent… connecting people, and allowing two people to talk (you and Jesus), to enjoy a simple moment.
Reblogged this on St. Mark's Quiet Time.
Wow. Instead of having quiet time first, I just came here….and yeahhhhhh, I’ll be going to have that quiet time now. Thank you, Kelly! I hope you enjoyed the presence of the Lord this morning in your mate mate time, however that looked.
Thank you so much for this Kelly… I often find myself in a position to have that quiet moment, but I always seem to let thoughts about the day take any blessing from that moment. This was something I hadn’t really thought about until this morning after reading your blog. I’ve been forcing God into the background even in “Our” quiet time. But I am so thankful that when I confronted this problem withing myself, He was right there waiting for me to see how silly I had been, just waiting to have that moment, for the two of Us again.
It brought this song to mind:
Shut in with God in a secret place;
There in the Spirit beholding His face;
Gaining more Power to run in the race,
I love to be shut in with God.
…thank you again for taking the time to do this blog, for letting God use you to speak to us
Wow! Yet another God-thing, taking me by total surprise. He’s been doing that a lot for me lately, but everything you said really cleared it up… I just haven’t been getting what God’s been trying to say, I haven’t been letting it sink in. For me, last night it kind of all crumbled. I’m 15 years old, been homeschooled all my life, have a lot of friends, have a Bible Study group of my own going, have a summer totally crammed full of stuff – then I broke my right arm just over a week ago. As I’m right-handed, it’s been tough, but its slowly getting better. It’s just been seeming like, How can all deal with all this, and support my friends the way I need to, be a devoted Child of God, be a blessing to my family, and do all the other things in my life that need done?
I do devotionals every night before bed, read a chapter in the Bible, and fall asleep thinking about it. I know that it’s not really enough to satisfy me spiritually, but with all the other stuff, how do I find the time? Reading your revelation for your personal life really helped me see that, no matter HOW I do it, I NEED to do it.
Thanks soo much! AGLM has been such a blessing to me, and to a some friends to whom I’ve forwarded stuff. Keep working for Jesus, and keep doing His bidding, and you will keep touching people in the process.
~Mikayla S.
Hello!
My name is Mayra and I\’m from Monterrey, Mexico.
I thank God for this blog. muchism really blesses me to read every publication. I shared some of their publications in my blog in Spanish with friends, has blessed us so much! thanks for sharing your experiences and let God speak through you.
I send a big hug from the city of the mountains.
Blessings.
With love, your friend Mayra.
I really wish I could get more motivated to do this! I am awful at prayer! I do tend to talk to God all day long, and there’s always a Jesus song in my head…but I forget to actually pray a lot. I forget a lot of things these days though…lol I try to pray at meals & bedtime, but sometimes I even forget that. I don’t know if it’s just that I am constantly conversing with God in my head, if I’m just forgetful..or just plain lazy. I am a stay-at-home Mom of 3 so like you if I want some time between just me & God it has to be early morning, but I hate getting up early! I do find that when I am up that early I usually enjoy myself. It’s nice to sit with a cup of coffee & watch the sun rise…and enjoy the quiet time before the tornadoes wake up! LOL So I will try to make this a priority & see where it goes…..I think us Moms will benefit the most from it! Of course this will have to wait until after this week because I have 6 kids at my house all week for VBS & I need my sleep! LOL I may get my time in after I put them all to bed though….IF I remember! Lord help me be a more consistent prayer warrior!
I’m a single mom of two beautiful kids that I feel very blessed to have. At times I feel like I don’t have the time to spend with my father. After I read your post it remind of the times that I would seek him before I went to bed I had the worship music going the candles around the room and I would get on my knees at times I would pray and times where I would just let him speak to my heart and would thank him for all the wonderful things that he has done for me and my children. I realize now how important that time was for me to spend with my Father. Nothing can compare to that time with him. That has been something that has also been speaking to me lately. “Maria don’t forget how much of a great time we had together how much love I pured out to you, peace, comfort, strength, ect…… I gave to you during are time together”. Thank you for the encouragement. I will seek him tonight wholeheartedly.
P.S. Not a morning person. LOL!!!!!!!!
Thank you! I needed this encouragement
loves
Wow. This is beautiful and true. I was sincerely challenged by this entry. Thank you for sharing!
Wow!! It’s so true.
I was just about to start my day feeling too busy for a chai time(tea time in Swahili) with my best friend. I have just realized that I also find myself running up and down too busy sometimes even for my friends…and most importantly for Jesus.
It’s time to reassess my timetable and priorities.
Thanks, will be looking forward to more of your blog posts…they are really good
Afrikana ( from Kenya)
Kelly! I just wanted to share with you my revelation this morning while attempting my time with God. I didn’t get up as early as I wanted too, but I was still the first up. I put on a pot of coffee & started the bacon, then turned on Joyce Meyer. I was wondering to myself if that would be considered time with God, but as soon as I started wondering it she started preaching on how we should not consider listening to a preacher on tv (or anywhere else, for that matter) as spending time with God. Whoa! She said as much as she loves us watching her tv programs we need to turn the tv off and spend 1-on-1 time with God. It just blew my mind because today was my first day actually trying this! Just thought I would share that with all of you
This is exactly what I needed to hear today. I’ve had a rough year this year, and I’ve tried very hard to hold onto God. I love Him with all of my heart, but for a long time I’ve felt like I’ve failed in seeking Him out and pursuing Him. On Sunday I, along with many of my close friends, made a covenant before our church to pursue God, to proclaim the Gospel in our lives, to take a stand in our faith, and to walk with the Lord daily. This has revealed a way to so. Thank you so much!
Hello there. I know this comment is probably a bit late on this post, but I only read it yesterday. I just wanted to say thanks for writing this and letting God use you. You see, I’ve been having my quiet time regularly for a long time now and I guess it’s become something of a habit, which is a good thing, but it has also lately become only a habit, which is a very bad thing. My quiet time just lacked umph and well, intimacy with God and true meaning I think. But I was challenged by this post to see it as more than just a habit. So this morning I got up and made myself a cup of tea and went to sit in our sunroom, even though the sun wasn’t up properly yet (it’s the middle of winter here in South Africa, and jolly cold too!). So I sat there on the couch with my blanket and I honestly prayed, I was truly seeking God’s face for the first time in a long while. Then I read my Bible and listened to His voice in it.
I guess what I’m really trying to say here is that this time was really special to me suddenly and through your post God has shown me that to be able to speak to the Living Father God and listen to Him through His Word is a privilege, something that is precious and not to be ‘lightly esteemed’. I think that I will now look forward to this special time in my day
So thanks for letting God use you so mightily
Love in Christ
So I read this post back when it first came out, and I didn’t know what God would do with it at the time. But, just last week, I was at a camp that I had never been to before, and I was a counsellor to over 20 teens, whom I had never met before. At this camp, they have two activities times each day and during these activities, the leaders get to choose whatever they want to make the campers do for an hour. So I was pondering this idea when I remembered this post that I had read back in July abou Mate Mate time with Jesus. So guess what my activity was! Mate Mate time with Jesus. (Except we called it Mellah Mellah because the lady who made the poster forgot the name I told her
). But anyways, essentially what we did was make our own tea out of pine needles (yeah, I’m from Canada..) And then boiled water over a fire and made our very own tea! Then, everyone grabbed either their bibles or a few guitars and their blankets and we gathered in a circle and we all sipped on our tea and had a time of fellowship in Jesus’ name. The teens realllly enjoyed this activity, and in leading this activity, I really got to enjoy their company and get to know their hearts and views on just the most random topics. It was a really great time, and I believe that God used your blog post to inspire me to inspire 10 other teens to spend time with Jesus in whatever comfortable way they can. So, I hope this story I shared with you serves as encouragment to keep going, and thank you for giving me such a useful and awesome idea! God bless this ministry!
So great to read this. So beautifully written. It stirs me so much, Kel, as life is in full swing this week and mate’ time has been slipping from it’s cherished place. I am so thankful for the way He loves us so, and is always waiting and eager for our heart’s full connection to His. Eye to eye, face to face, just like Moses and the Lord, face to face as one speaks to a friend (Ex. 33:11). He’s drawing me away from the demands and the busyness, into that secret place where He speaks to the hungry places in my heart, the dry and tired places, and breathes His love and laughter and peace and joy into me! Hallelu