December 2

Day 263: We're All Just Tired

I've been in two conversations this morning. One local (fellow elders) and the other with a friend on the other coast. Common theme? How tired we all are.

Here in town, the wind, the rain, and the many power outages means someone (if not everyone) in the house has not slept well the night before. Aside from the weather (and today's flooded streets, adding a new dynamic) we're all just tired anyway.

If we pause to take stock, we each have ample reasons to feel the fatigue. Doing the same things day after day, in the same order, often with the same results contributes. The ongoing lack of face-to-face socializing contributes. The recently completed election season didn't leave any of us the better for it.

Organizational leaders are bemoaning the loss of inertia and momentum this year. Churches are approaching Christmas this year with less the full enthusiasm. And we're tired of the ever-changing mandates and restrictions Covid has brought upon us.

In some ways we're all just tired of being tired. And it may be we've forgotten what enthusiasm and optimism, even hope feel like, it's been so long.

The hashtag 2020 will be a punchline for perhaps years to come. But that is for then, and we're still living in the now. Today, almost everyone is feeling tired. True at our house too.

We can be tempted to misread and misapply Psalm 127:2, which says, "It is vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for He gives to his beloved sleep."

Most of us are less active than we were a year ago. Lethargy in us is the new enemy. And while our bodies may be fatigued, our minds keep racing. Fear, anxiety, discouragement each takes its toll on our ability to find rest. The temporary threat of falling trees and flooding basements doesn't help.

Sometimes, when everything else fails, we have to ask the Lord for sleep, for rest, for rejuvenation. The older I get, the more frequent this prayer request comes from my mouth.

Any physical lethargy I feel can be a direct correlation to spiritual lethargy. This is the time, therefore, to ask the Lord Jesus for a new, revitalized spirit, souls that look forward with gospel hope.

Everyone in our city, perhaps everyone we talk to today is tired. It may be that the only way out from our present fatigue is to seek rest in God's Word.

The Lord knows we're all just tired. We all need some sleep. Let's trust Him to give us all some sleep. We just read that it's His gift to us, and we can believe it to be so.

-Mike Rydman, Lead Pastor, Radiant Church Juneau