for when we're afraid to stop
Slowing down seems inefficient. What if I don't have time to get it done?
Sitting down can be dangerous. What if I don't get back up?
Stopping feels like quitting. What if I don't remember how to get started again.
Even when I'm at the gym chipping away at the scheduled workout my goal is rarely to finish faster than the person next to me. My goal is sometimes to finish faster than I finished last time (if I happen to have done the work out before). My goal is almost always to just not stop, just keep going until it's done. Tortoise or hare doesn't matter, just don't sit down and down stop.
These thoughts had been ingrained in my mind for so long that the thought of taking a break was akin to sin. You must not be idle, you must make use of your hands, yes work for the glory of God, but you best be working.
Yes, I know, God rested. On the 7th day He rested. But it is easy to convince yourself that you must bust your...umm, let's just say hiney...for the first 6 so that on the 7th day you can.
I would hazard to say that it was not a specific person who filled my head with such incorrect goals, but the immaturity of my spiritual mind and the self-righteous tendencies of my heart. Earn it, Sarah. Show them your worth something. Some of us may have problems with the stepping out in faith to get going while others of us struggle with having faith to stop.
This may sound as if it's leaning towards the admonishment of having a busy schedule, of jam packing every moment so that there's no white space left for God to speak into. That may be a stereotypical problem in the world in which we live, but no, that's not it, at least not today. It is not the busyness behind your schedule, but the obedience behind your yeses that matters most.
There will be seasons where God designs less tasks for you so that you can be fully present on one. Then, there are seasons where He asks more of you than you think is possible SO THAT you can see the way He is stretching you and that HE is capable of bringing you through. But, there will also be times that God asks you to stop, asks you to take those things you thought you were supposed to be doing, that you KNEW you were supposed to be doing, and put them down. Those times may feel like the hardest, the trickiest to understand.
I have been thinking, as of late, on that age old dilemma of pushing the boulder up the hill. Are you familiar with the task? I sit often in contemplation wondering when something gets unbearably hard do you continue to push through knowing some day you'll reach the top and you'll need to have with you whatever it is you're having to push up there OR do you let said boulder roll back down because it is just weighing you down, keeping you from reaching the summit. It's only been recently that a third option appeared in my mind, resting on the side of the mountain until God asks you to get started again.
but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint. Isaiah 40:31
This verse from Isaiah has been a favorite of mine for as long as I can remember. I even wrote it on a wall near ground zero the year after 9/11. And yet, the first part of it I always seemed to scoot quickly past to get to the end. Mounting up on the wings of the eagle, running and not being weary, walking and not fainting. YES! That's what I want, that's what I need! While I knew those parts were only possible with the Lord, I did not understand clearly what the verse was saying would happen before the end could come. Waiting. Because it is during that waiting where your strength is renewed!
Our life, our individual stories, are small, especially when compared to the eternity that God has designed, but they are anything but insignificant, and they work within and around the significant lives of all the others God has created. Because of that intertwining, you are not just waiting for your own life and purposes to be revealed, but you are also for those of who God is putting on the path with you. Those whose own lives and purposes will align somewhere with yours.
We can be so task oriented, so goal driven, that we forget we are in community, we forget we are not on our own. Your yeses to God, your understandings of what you are being asked to do cannot follow your timeline. They are not necessarily homework to be completed and turned in the next morning. Sometimes they resemble boulders being pushed up hills for lengthy amounts of time and maybe if you are getting tired of pushing it up you should just stop, take a break, wait on the Lord to renew your strength because coming up behind you may be who He has placed on the hill to help you push it the rest of the way up. That break may be the exact thing that you need to get you started again.
If slowing down seems inefficient, slow down and look at the view around you. If sitting down seems dangerous, plop your self in a chair and thank God for the ability to both stand and sit. If stopping feels like quitting, put on your breaks immediately. I cannot tell you if you should keep pushing up the hill, let the boulder roll down, or sit and wait for renewed strength, but I can say that if fear comes to your heart and mind at just the mention of waiting than the answer is probably to do so because the spirit of fear is not from God.
I am praying for you friend. I am praying for your yeses to be ones of obedience, I am praying for your time with God to be plentiful so that you are in tune with His will for your life, and I am praying for your Faith, whether it is the faith needed to take that first step or for the faith that is needed to stop knowing that it does not mean quitting, but waiting on Him to renew the needed strength for accomplishing. Pray for me.