So its been quite an interesting past few months and I haven’t written anything.  I have had so many ideas, inspirations, Biblical applications, etc. and yet I just find myself purely exhausted. I want to write yet I don’t. I want to share my thoughts then I don’t. Simply, I’m just tired. And I’m sick of being tired. Four months ago I had pneumonia and since I have not fully recovered. I have not been able to catch my breath at times. That goes for physically but also metaphorically. My workouts have been, well, crap. Despite my efforts to run multiple 5k races, train for my second Tough Mudder, and maybe even start training for a marathon, my body is fighting me.  In fact, I have even gained an unpleasant amount of weight since my Tough Mudder… aka when I got pneumonia and stopped working out for 3 months [and eating like crazy].  On top of my health issues, I have had some busyness elsewhere with the church, friends and family visiting, special events, and more. I moved into an apartment, my first completely alone. Even with these others events and people being in town, I still could have been pushing myself more, ya know because we always need to be busy doing something.

But I find myself now, five months since my Tough Mudder and the initial pneumonia, and I have had a ton of time to reflect. I mean really reflect, pray, and think about things. Let’s just call it a sabbatical of a sort. During this time of less busyness than usual, moving into my first solo apartment, and being sick where often I’m in bed earlier than normal… God has done so much. He has proved to be faithful. He has proved to be intentional, timely in his way [not necessarily mine], and faithful.  I realized today such a simple yet profound lesson. Spring definitely has arrived. As I sat outside of  my church today in a t-shirt and shorts with a blanket, my Bible, a journal, worship music and the warm sun beaming down… He is a good God and I don’t just rest in Him enough.  I have been forced to relax more with my sickness but even in that I haven’t been entirely resting in Him.

Rest.
Breathe.
Relax.

Sometimes we need to just sit in His presence. We don’t need to be doing anything profound. We don’t need to be busy. We don’t need to be figuring out how to save the world or preach the best sermon. We need to learn to just love Him and let that overflow into our lives. No wonder we get so physically, emotionally, spiritually and mentally drained… we don’t have enough of Him in our lives! We get so caught up and distracted with ministry  family, school, friends, church, arguing about the Church, ranting about politics, ranting about the government, worrying about money, worrying about relationships that we completely forget to invite God to be in our lives at all or even a little. We can’t fit Him in our schedules. Whatever excuses we can come up with are never good enough.

He just wants to spend time with you alone. He wants you to rest in Him. If we believe, that the sun can brighten our day because it is now springtime, why can’t we let Him brighten our spirits? He can give us strength. He can give us courage to face the difficulty and the ability to overcome. He can provide for you, but sometimes we don’t have faith in Him. A lot of the problems we, as the collective Church, have aren’t necessarily going to cease but we can at least go through them, overcome them, have joy in them, and strength in them if we just let him have more of us. Intimacy. Faithfulness. Love. We all love receiving good things from Him, but often we fail to give him even a portion of our day, portion of our heart, soul, mind or strength. And in that we find ourselves weak, frail, weary Christians struggling to make it through the day. Stop being so busy. Stop trying to work hard enough to please yourself or Him. Stop trying to do things your way. For a moment, just rest. Relax in Him. Maybe pick up the Bible. Listen to worship music. Take a walk and talk to Him out loud. Just find a place for you and God to be together.