If you follow my blog regularly, you might have wondered if I’d fallen off the face of the earth. After all, the last time I put up a post was over two weeks ago.

You really don’t want to hear the whole story, but suffice it to say that I had three massive projects that all ended up with deadlines in those two weeks. And in the middle of that, I hosted my lovely friend and fellow podcaster, Bonny Burns of OysterBed7, and we attended the Authentic Intimacy Conference in San Antonio (with Dr. Juli Slattery).

One of those projects caught me by surprise, and a second one ended up being far more work than I’d anticipated, so I hadn’t planned well for this disruptions to my schedule. Sounds like life, eh?

But whether you’re in the midst of an overwhelming workload or a season of struggle or others needing your ever-so-precious time, you have to make choices. How do you set the right priorities?

When I ended up with a few minutes to spare, I didn’t blog here. I could have, but instead I offered to snuggle up with my husband on the couch and watch a show or go out to eat dinner with the family. I called back the friend who’d been unable to get a hold of me and asked how things were going with her. I chatted with my sister and my son on the phone. I went to church, worshiped with fellow believers, and attended Bible class. I headed to the grocery store, did laundry, made a cup of tea for myself and my hubby.

Each and every day, we’re faced with choices on how to use our time, our resources, our effort. People talk a lot about proper priorities, but how many of us are really living according to the ones we think we should have?

Each and every day, we're faced with choices on how to use our time, our resources, our effort.
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Most of the time, this blog is a high priority for me. I am passionate about passion, I care about your marriages, and I believe God has tasked me to do this ministry.

But these past two weeks, what I seemed to be hearing from Him instead was to not worry so much about the blog and attend to my marriage and my daily life. It’s not that Hot, Holy & Humorous doesn’t matter — I certainly believe it does! — but J. Parker herself isn’t necessary for anyone’s salvation or marital health. That’s God’s job, and I’m just here trying to do my part.

Where I am necessary is as a wife to my husband, a mother to my sons, a member of my church, and a friend to those with whom I’m close.

What about you? Have you really thought about how someone else could teach that Bible class or take a meal to another family? How if you didn’t redecorate the living room, life would be okay? How you could skip out on a social event or even a business meeting, and people would cope?

But if you skip out on your marriage, won’t there be real consequences? If you don’t prioritize your relationship with God, how will you suffer? If you aren’t there for your family, what will be missing in their lives (and yours)?

Likewise, I come here all the time saying that you can’t skip out on the sexual intimacy in your marriage and expect to have a good marriage. Sex isn’t the icing on the cake; it’s an important ingredient in the cake. But have you made it a priority?

You might suspect that within those two weeks, despite all the busyness, my husband and I did not deprive each other (see 1 Corinthians 7:3-5). Because I believe in the importance of sex to our marriage, and I’ve seen that this special intimacy brings us closer in other ways.

I will return on Thursday, hopefully right back on schedule from here on out. But while I missed you all, I don’t regret choosing the priorities I chose. Because honestly, what kind of marriage blogger would I be anyway if I neglected my own marriage and family to write another post that you can live two weeks without?

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