This last month I’ve been tired. That kind of body, mind, weary that drags at your heart and your soul until your eyelids want to follow. Sometimes at about nine in the morning. It seems no amount of sleep helps. Every morning I wake up and it’s still there. Dragging eyelids down creating fuzzy edges and slowing what seems like my every move. Unfortunately, the world keeps moving at a break neck pace and I’m left with the feeling that I’m never fast enough. Never getting enough done. Never ENOUGH.

I pray for more strength. For more endurance to run this race. For more patience. For more of me to go around. Enough for a family of five. For enough of me.

A dear soul, a sister in Christ, a friend, pointed out to me that I have indeed, been running a race. For two years. With every new symptom, test, appointment, and endless mountain to climb I’ve been running to find an explanation, a diagnosis, a way to make it through the latest roadblock and hold onto Jesus.

I know that our brand of suffering is very rare, but suffering in itself is universal. I know that I’m not the only one surrounded by it in this fallen world. I have only to check my text messages, social media or catch a tidbit of the news for my heart to be further weighted down by the heaviness of broken hearts and broken lives of everyone around me. Aren’t you TIRED?

Does it feel like it’s just too much and we’re just not ENOUGH?

Yesterday I hit the wall. Not literally, but figuratively. Test results came back for our oldest son and he has not responded to treatment. In my beloved kitchen, staring at his results I got a return phone call from the ophthalmologist to make an appointment to check his vision again for signs of damage from the CTX because he’s having vision problems. My toddler is screaming because I cut his strawberries and he wanted them “big”, and our daughter is asking me for the fourth time that morning what day it is so she can figure out how many days to her play date and we need to be out the door for therapy in ten minutes. The dishwasher is running for the second time today and the twelve year old is panicking over a double booked Saturday and can’t decide what he wants to do more. In a stellar parenting moment, I tell the nine year old with the short term memory impairment, “I just told you five minutes ago it’s Friday!”, tell the toddler, “Fine! Don’t eat them!”, and the anxiety filled twelve year old,”I’ll decide for you and you won’t go to either!”. Holding my head trying to hold in the tears I schedule the appointment with the sympathetic secretary and hang up in time to realize the time I picked means I’d have to miss my Bible study that week. We’re five minutes late leaving, everyone is upset and I look down to see a toddler still in pajamas in need of a diaper change I meant to do when I switched the laundry….a half hour ago.

I’m not enough.

I step outside trying to fill my lungs with air, my soul with peace. As chaos ensues inside, I pray. For MORE of me. Resigned to being late, I stare at a yard filled with scattered toys and discarded shirts from a water fight the night before and I’m blessed with a reminder.

I’m NOT enough. I’ll NEVER be enough. I shouldn’t be praying for more of ME, but more of Him. I will never find rest in myself.

Father, please help me to rest in YOU. I am so very tired and on my own I’ll never be able to run this race with endurance. Help me to make more of YOU, and LESS of me! 

I’ve had it backwards lately. I’ve forgotten that He is enough for me, for my family of five, for every chaotic moment. He alone can redeem every parenting fail, every scheduling mistake, every exhausting day. And with that reminder, I can dry my face, walk back in amidst the chaos, apologize to my children and accept the amazing grace poured out on me every day. I can herd unruly cats into a van in five minutes with a bag of “big” strawberries and answer questions again. I can listen to a perfectly timed song, “Just Breathe”, and remember that I can truly rest, just be, at His feet. Thank you Jesus!

Matthew 11:28

²⁸ “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.