[Note from Tai Sophia: I read this post on Hannah’s blog — HERE — and it resonated in my heart, so I asked her if  I could share it here. I feel like it is a good reminder for us ALL, as it is something I have seen happen over and over again to those — especially young people who have a real encounter with the Lord, and suddenly feel very passionately about seeking Him and serving Him, and everything they live, breathe, sleep, and eat is their passion. But…it doesn’t last. So often. SO, so often, they burn brightly for a while, but then burn out, and end up in a tailspin downward. And it is something I catch myself doing, and something that I’m not safe from yet either! I’m very task oriented, and I can get into “production” mode, or “doing big things for God” mode…….and chase after it for a while until — *WHAM* — I hit a brick wall, and burn out. It is especially hard not to burn out when you see so many gaping needs, and no one around you to help bear the load. BUT…it all comes down to ABIDING in Christ, and looking to HIM to accomplish HIS work. Because we can’t do it all ourselves…..and trying to is not impressing God. BUT, ahem…I’m giving it all away. Here is Hannah’s post, in her OWN words:]

I’ve been running a lot lately.

For the last 10 weeks, actually. It started with a local 10k, which led to another 10k, and a husband inspired to train for a marathon (thanks, Chip Gaines).

So for the last 8 weeks especially, I’ve been intentionally training and putting in the miles.

I don’t know what it is about this week, but I’ve been exhausted. We had a race this past weekend that I put my all into and I’m not sure if I burned out, or if the heat has gotten to me, or if I’m just tired. But my regular runs feel as difficult as they did at the beginning of our training! This might be why today’s run was extra introspective, a feeble attempt to distract my body from it’s pain.

The reality is I’ve been running for a lot longer than 10 weeks, friends. It’s my nature.

Fear? Run away.

Conflict? Run away.

Doubt? Run away, hide.

Loss? Run away — run, run, run.

Anger? You better RUN away.

This has been a hard year in a lot of ways. God is pruning, I am remembering; God is moving and I am finding my emotions out of control. I’m often scared and sad, grieving so many things both good and very bad. I am afraid of the future and afraid to stay in the present. I’ve adopted an attitude of life that I need to just run and get it all over with before it hurts. Yet I so long to leave something meaningful behind. Is that even possible?

You can imagine how this makes me less of a joy to be around.

And yet, God is so faithful.

John 15:1-17

Sometimes on a run I think “go faster, just push it and you’ll be done sooner.” But, if I’m already tired, or I’m running mile 1,283 for the week, my body rebels and I burn out too soon. Other times I think to myself, “this is a good speed, settle into this and enjoy the ride.” (I’ll admit that second message isn’t as prevalent as the first, but it happens on occasion. Thank You, Holy Spirit!)

Today I was reminded of how I so need that latter message in my life. My passion and my calling and my ideals have told me that God wants me to produce, to do big things, to not waste a minute.

I’ll show You, God! I am good at this!

But how often does my striving leave me too depleted to actually finish out a mission well? How often am I so empty from trying that I can’t even think of pouring into a relationship? How many times have I collapsed into my bed, too exhausted to do the things that matter like love my Jesus, or talk to a friend?

When I was around 8 years old, we had a field day at my home-school group. There was a race for my age class. I remember being so excited, itching to go at the starting line. “*POP* GO!” sounded in my ears and I bolted. I can honestly see the whole scene now as if I was a bystander. I took off, a solid distance ahead of my peers. Giving it all I had, showing I was so capable, so good at running, and then suddenly I got about half way and completely ran out of energy. My legs grew weak, my lungs were burning, my heart was racing probably harder than ever in my life.

Then all of my little peers started sneaking past me, inching further and further ahead as I slowed down to a walk.

I burned out because I didn’t pace myself. I didn’t understand what it meant to start out slow, warm up, and keep a steady pace until the end.

Isn’t it funny how we learn the same lessons over and over again?

“Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself, it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in Me.”

Stay with Me, walk with Me in each season: hard or easy. Joy or pain. Let Me carry it, child. Let me carry it all. Don’t run away.

Remain in Me in every area of life. It’s not your accomplishments, it’s not your trying, it’s My love and My Spirit that accomplishes the work. Just love Me as I have loved you.

Slow down. Don’t run from the bad stuff, because it’ll make you miss the good stuff.

Just like I constantly need to pace myself when I’m putting in the miles, I need to remember that this life, this calling, this gift of existing that I’ve been given is not about how fast I can do it all. It’s not about how well I hold myself together. It’s not about accomplishing all these things that will impress God.

Because I can’t do that. My own strength will fail, my own emotions will betray me, my striving will leave me empty.

I’ve got to slow down and remain in Jesus, letting Him have every moment: good and bad.

I teach it, I preach it, but it’s sometimes so hard to live it. I’ve got to let Him have all of me: the good and the bad.

No more running away.

~Hannah Gies

I have had lots of heartaches and disappointments when it comes to friendships. These things can make me hesitant, at best, when it comes to investing in new relationships. I find myself struggling, wondering if it is worth the time and effort….wondering if (or, more accurately: “when”) this person is going to just move on with their life, making new and better friends, not even remembering I exist. And, it can be hard saying goodbye to someone who has become a new friend – never knowing if I will even ever see them again. And with our not-so-normal lives (always traveling, always at the whim of others as to where we will be, when we will be leaving, how long we will be gone, etc.), I am confronted with these things a lot. There’s just nothing that you can ever count on to be the same from one day to the next. And throughout my life, I have had so many friends who have moved on in life, or moved away, or walked away from the Lord and, consequently, didn’t really want to hang out with me any more.

All that to say….I have a hard time opening my heart to people. It might surprise you to hear me say that, but it is true. I have lost so many friends, that I have a tendency to put up walls in my heart to not let myself get too close, or too attached, so that “WHEN” they leave too, I don’t have to deal with the hurt, and the loneliness.

And so, I have learned to turn off my heart. I cease caring. I don’t want to risk loving. And yet….lately, I have felt so strongly that Jesus has been asking me to let myself love people. And, more, to let HIM love people the way HE wants, through me.

A New Perspective

The other day I was thinking about friendships that had formed, but where God was calling them elsewhere yet again….and, with a bit of grumbling, I asked God, “Why, Lord? Why do we always have to say goodbye? Why does it seem like I can’t ever have friends who stick around? I don’t want to struggle so much to love people, but…aren’t I kind of justified here, in the way I’m feeling? I mean….look — you don’t see any friends here, do you?”

But God just started speaking to me, and gave me a really sweet perspective.  I’ll do my best to try to explain.

He showed me that every moment I invest in a friendship here on earth translates into eternity. Every moment spent loving someone is a moment — a memory — that transfers into Heaven. If I spend just one afternoon loving someone, and making memories with them, and then never see them again on earth during my lifetime, I will STILL recognize them in heaven. And not only will I recognize them, but we will have an instant, meaningful connection that is a deeper connection than with just about anyone else there — because we actually spent time together on earth. As little or much as it may have been, it is still a touchpoint that we will have between us forever. A memory together that goes “way back”.

So God was gently showing me that I don’t have to be afraid of investing in friendships. In fact, each opportunity that I take to pour into someone, and to let myself love them fully will reach into eternity. Loving someone is never pointless or a waste of time, but each time I let myself love them, a bond of friendship that can’t be taken from us is nurtured…and in Heaven, we will meet upon some side street sometime, and immediately have that bond — that connection — from our moments together on earth, that goes even deeper than with all of the multitudes that I never knew on earth (granted, I’ll probably meet them all eventually, and probably become close friends….but there will still be that special connection with those I loved on earth). And we’ll be just as comfortable to run out to a quiet field somewhere to catch up on the past several hundred years, and where God took each of us, and what happened when we were apart.

Heaven-Bound Friendships

And it is just so sweet, because there is no time limit on heaven-bound friendship, like the friendships of this world have. And, being creatures born of this world, we so often feel that same press of time upon us…..that feeling of there being a real end of our lives, and the struggles that come with that — including the struggle of feeling like you’ll never get to see someone again if they move away.

But for those of us who are heaven-bound, we can rejoice that there will always be a “later”. We don’t have to grapple to cling to a friendship on earth, or melt into a puddle of despair when friends leave us (or we leave them), because we have been blessed with an eternity on the other side of the toils of this life, where, when our labors to rescue souls have come to a rest, we will have all the time we could ever want to be able to spend with each and every person there. We can rejoice that, no matter how many years pass on earth without us meeting, there will always be a “later”. We WILL see them again.

And for now, we can rest in our mission to rescue lost souls…..and not just to rescue them, but to LOVE them…..and thus, to be able to greet them in heaven as well, as dear friends — with a shout of joy and a big, big hug!

What has ever happened in your life that was actually good?

There are days when I can think back over my life and see so clearly what Jesus has done at my best and worst moments to give me every good thing that I have.  A light shines on every moment to show me the blessings of His care, and the joy that even the trials have brought to me.  Those are the days when it is hard to keep a smile from becoming a laugh, just to think of how the King of all things delights in brightening my day.

Then there are times that the light seems to turn off like a switch.  The days when the above question seems painfully real as I grope in the darkness for the things that I know have been blessings to me, but that I just cannot seem to find.  Whispers creep into my head and argue with me at every point, telling me that all of the things that I know on the warm days, full of light, are just my imagination.  Was it ever really so nice?

Boy, the devil has a lot of gall.

Thank God that we are given strength in Jesus to be unshakable more than just some of the time!  Here are a few things you can do to keep your footing on the days when the light seems dim and the whispers seem overwhelming.

Don’t Panic!

The first thing we often feel at these moments is that all is lost.  It must be that something didn’t quite click when we first trusted Jesus, and that this is what life is going to be like from now on.  It was so happy, following Jesus.  If we don’t feel that way, it must be something we did, right?  Our actions do affect our relationship with Jesus.  If we are sinning, or have not surrendered something to Him, we will struggle.  However, that is not always the cause of our distress.  Read the Psalms.  They are full of distress, and the reminder that the Lord is faithful in the midst of our adversities, even if He seems completely absent through them.  Reading Psalms twenty-two through twenty-four is an especially good reminder.  The first verse is what Jesus spoke on the cross: “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”  If the Son of God can feel that way, then all is not lost for us when we struggle under the burden of a fallen world.  Those three psalms are actually believed to be all one before the chapter divisions came along.  I find reading them all at once deeply comforting.  Try not to dwell on feeling in the dark, but do remember that it’s okay to feel that way.  Overcoming that tendency to panic is usually half of the battle.

Know the Shepherd’s Voice

“Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter by the door into the fold of the sheep, but climbs up some other way, he is a thief and a robber. But he who enters by the door is a shepherd of the sheep. To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.  When he puts forth all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice.  A stranger they simply will not follow, but will flee from him, because they do not know the voice of strangers.”
~John 10:1-5

The devil works overtime to deceive us.  In our moments of distress, he will do everything he can to convince us that it is God who is accusing us.  Our Father does discipline us, and so the devil finds ways to imitate the Shepherd’s voice while telling us a lie.  The best way to keep from being hoodwinked is to spend so much time with Jesus that we see the counterfeit instantly.  The devil will still whisper in countless and seemingly new ways, but if we are walking hand in hand with our beloved Christ, learning the depth and newness of all of His ways, it will be rare that we are taken in and led to greater distress.

Cite Your Sources

The best way to conquer distress is to take the offensive.  Don’t wait for the confusion to set in to decide to hide God’s Word in your heart.  Sometimes the distress is too much to take, and I can’t find any words of my own for how I am feeling and what I need in order to see the light again.  At those times, there is such a deep comfort in being able to quote Scripture.  I have a few of the Psalms committed to memory, and sometimes just the fact that I can speak them and have a solid piece of God’s Word available is enough to block out most of the pressure from the enemy.  Keep the references in your heart too.  Sometimes the exact words or the context can get lost, so don’t be afraid to pull out your Bible or your concordance, or do a quick web search when you can only remember a few snatches.  It’s a great reminder that the promises of God, and the concrete truth of His presence are defined by more than our own ability to hold onto Him.  It is such an encouragement to me that Paul, in 2 Timothy 1:12, wrote,

“for I know whom I have believed and I am convinced that He is able to guard what I have entrusted to Him until that day.”

Sometimes, that is all I need to hear.  This is a very productive habit to start in the New Year.  If you are at a time when it seems like more should be happening, use the time you have to hide God’s Word in your heart so that you will be ready when things get more active.

Bring a Friend

Isolation is a great way to overcome someone.  When we are alone, it is so much easier to believe that all of the feelings in our own heads are what is really true.  I tend to be the kind of person who doesn’t want to allow others to know my problems, since I know that they have their own lives to handle, so it isn’t uncommon for me to hold things inside for longer than I should.  When I do share something with one of my brothers or sisters, it is so deeply encouraging.  When I am distressed about the pressures of the enemy, or about a difficult thing the Lord wants me to do, just the honest “Yep, that sounds like what the devil would do,” or “Wow! He is calling you to something great!” is enough to remind me that I am trusting my life to the One with all of our best interests at heart.  It does often happen that I cannot reach anyone at the time of my distress, but Jesus is still there with me.  There have been numerous times that I have been so exhausted in my spirit that all I can do is ask the Lord to have someone else be praying for me at that time.  I can usually feel the burden eased almost instantly.

Remember too that distress will not always lift instantly.  It can be something that the Lord uses to remind us to be in prayer for someone, or as part of the process of really, truly understanding something about His character that we may have known on paper, but not experienced with Him before.  However, this does not mean that we have to be pulled back and forth by the whispers of doubt that come up, prompting “did God really say…?”

If you are struggling, and would like prayer or a chance to work through something with us, please leave a comment or an e-mail.  Also, if you would like to share a Scripture verse that has been a faithful friend to you in the midst of your distresses, please let us know in the comments below.  We love being able to connect with you.