T-I-R-E-D!

You know there are those days when you are just tired!
T-I-R-E-D!!!

Tired of running kids.
Tired of talking about things that really don't matter in the grand scheme of life.
Tired of picking up toys.
Tired of doing laundry.
Tired of seeing sticks laying in the yard after the snow melts.

Just T-I-R-E-D!

You know your mind starts wandering...

Tired of feeling.
Tired of helping.
Tired of doing.
Tired of hearing the bad news
                               the sad news
                                    even the glad news.

Just T-I-R-E-D.

Today I got a text from my sister that a friend's father had passed. This came just minutes after getting off the phone with a friend whose relation will bury their 16 year old son this weekend. And only days after talking with a student about the death of her pastor and his wife who leave four children behind.

Three deaths. Three funerals. Three families grieving the loss.

I would be lieing if I didn't say that the news hit me today. The news reignited those feelings of watching my father take his last breath here on earth. Of seeing the sadness in my mother's eyes the past nine months as she attempts to go on in this world without the love of her earthly life. It reignited the tears, the grief, the feeling of utter loss that just doesn't seem to get replaced even as much as I try to fill it.

The news hit me.

It reignited the memories of running in the church parking lot with my dad, of hearing his funny, sarcastic comments like, "Did you get wet?" as we returned from the swimming pool, of the long talks focused on Jesus on the front porch.

It reignited those feelings of calling out to God and saying,

"Why? What is the purpose? What is the goal? What else can we do to follow you?"

And then came the feelings I felt as I sat on a plane, having kissed my dad for the last time just a week prior, holding a little girl from a foreign country in my lap who was scared and crying, and myself crying out to God and saying,

"I am T-I-R-E-D!"
"I am D-O-N-E!"
"I can't do ANY MORE!"
"I QUIT!"

And then... the whisper comes.

I love how gentle God can be with me.
I wonder if I can even come close to his method of loving me.
Here I am, his child...throwing a temper tantrum, crying out to him, saying I am done, wanting to throw in the towel, wanting answers, wanting to know why, and how, and when all in one swift swoop...

         and gently, ever so gently God whispers...

"Jen, I don't want you to do it."
"Jen, I will do it through you."
"Jen, just listen and come close to me."
"Jen, my arms are open."

And this afternoon, as I sit with my beautiful daughters on an early out school day, with a warm cup of coffee in hand, and a devotion propped open, I climb up on my Father's lap and say, "Let me rest Lord. Let me rest."

And He does...

He does!

"Come to me all you who are weary and heavy-laden and I will give you rest!"

Matthew 11:28