Waking, and walking, day after day after day after day when you carry a heavy load can feel like it is too much. My life is hard. Not so hard as others, to be sure, but hard none the less.
With 5 kids who homeschool, a disabled husband, a job, a million animals, a house, a half acre and a few small gardens, there are so many things to juggle. When I went back to work, quickly and unexpectedly, after 5 years of staying home, I lost what little freedom I had in time to myself.
The moments when I paused to fill my soul with things that were just for me are now spent pouring into young athletes and trying to keep my head above water. Starting 2021 I told the Lord that I was surrendering to letting him carry me. But sometimes the weight of it all distracts me from the truth that I am not carrying this load alone. I desperately long for tangible, physical hands to come alongside, slide their arm around me and say, “I got you-we can walk this together.”
When you carry hard and heavy loads alone, especially if you have carried them for a long time, you get good at managing. I’m well skilled at looking like I’ve got this thing figured out. But just because no one sees the heavy, doesn’t mean it isn’t dragging you down. A pandemic certainly limits the ability to find trusted friends who are available to join the walk, and so I walk, mostly alone, with a heavy weight that no one sees but my Jesus, trying to keep waking, and walking, one more day until there are physical, tangible hands and arms to hold me up and lighten the load.
Until then, I will keep speaking life back to my own soul. Reminding myself that I am not alone, even I feel alone. And that the one who paints the skies, is carrying this load with me.
Living Simply Surrendered 