It's Always Time to Love

Today, I have been in a very weird mood.  The beginning of the day was rather low, getting up early and frantically driving to a new job.  Then it went on, very slowly, as I trained for CPR.  Then, as I sat in my car in the rain, I recognized the wonder and beauty of the Lord.  Coming home from a full day of work, I felt exhausted.  I sat on the couch and didn't even want to play tetris!  I was that tired.

Now, as I have come to notice in the years past, summer is a very exhausting time for me.  My job usually requires me to "go, go, go!" and be up and alert in every situation.  Then, once I return home, I either hurry to another job or hurry to go and hang out with friends.  Either way, I exhaust myself.  As soon as I become exhausted, I seem to back away from God.  I'm too tired to invest my heart and mind in His word.  I'm too exhausted to pray and think about the troubles that I don't want to think about.  This usually begins on the first day of camp, and the whole summer goes down from there.

Today, on the first day of training, I already became exhausted when I got home.  I just wanted to eat.  I just wanted to watch television.  I just wanted to sleep.  Yes, I considered getting in the Word.  In fact, I kind of wanted to, but I just was too tired.

Only through Christ did I choose to read my Bible tonight, and the story I read gave me a very interesting and odd realization.

The passage that I read was Matthew 14:1-21.  The first section talks about the death of John the Baptist, and the second section talks about Jesus feeding the five thousand.  Now, both of these stories are pretty familiar to me, and I really did not expect to glean anything different than I already knew--but of course, God had something different in mind.

What came to my attention was this verse:

"Now when Jesus heard [that John the Baptist had died], he withdrew from there in a boat to a desolate place by himself.  But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns.  When he went ashore he saw a great crowd, and had compassion on them and healed their sick." -Matthew 14:13-14

Jesus went to be by himself in a desolate place, because he was mourning the loss of one of his best friends.  He was sad, and wanted to be alone.  Yet, the crowds came and followed him.  Okay, lets put ourselves in that position.  Your best friend dies, and a bunch of people come up to you and want you to give them advice or help them.  What would you do?  I can tell you what I'd do!  I would get very annoyed and angry, ignore them, and go anywhere that I could to get away from them.  But lets pull out the WWJD!  What would Jesus do?  He had compassion on them and healed them.

This summer, I am going to be tired.  I am going to have things that are distracting me from camp.  I am going to have issues.  But, I have a job to do.  Not only a job at camp, but a job for the Lord.  My job is to put Christ before my feelings, my issues, and my wants.  My job is to have compassion on the kids at camp and those around me that need the love of God.  My job is to stay fervently in the Word, even when I feel so tired.  My job is to be a strong spirit in Christ, even if my body is weak.

Give me strength to do Your will and stick it out this summer.