“Thou knowest, not alone as God, all knowing;
As Man, our mortal weakness Thou hast proved:
On earth with purest sympathies o’erflowing,
O Savior, Thou hast wept, and Thou hast loved:
And love and sorrow still to Thee may come,
And find a hiding-place, a rest, a home.”

H.LL.

If it were possible to weary our Lord’s ear, I’d be hanging my head in guilty shame. But He’s not the one who grows weary. It’s me. I’m the weary one and for reasons understood only by the Almighty, He rejoices to hear all about it.

Are you also feeling wearied these days? It often feels like tribulations come in waves, one right after another. Merciless sets of crashing water pouring over and into your salt caked throat. I remember one year when I was about 16. My mom and I had taken a kayak or dinghy out in Lake Michigan. Somehow the waves flipped us out and around, facing back towards the sea. One after another, those 2-3 foot waves washed over us while we clung to our little boat. Each one left us a little weaker, a little more desperate, a little more fearful. Neither of us are the greatest of swimmers. But suddenly, there was my dad. Strong, confident, unafraid. The craft was suddenly upright again. The paddles were in. He boosted us inside. Then he pulled us back to shore. I’ll never forget that day. I’ll also never, ever forget how many times I’ve been tossed out of the dinghy of my life into those ceaseless waves and seen the Savior come so sweetly, so mightily and draw me back into the safety of His arms.

The waves started with the blessing of pregnancy. After losing a two month old baby, being told (wrongly) I’d die if I ever got pregnant again and just a year ago, a miscarriage, the last 8 months have been fraught with trauma, with what-if’s, with frantic checking that all is still well. I’ve been afraid to decide on a name, chilled by the thought of renewed grief. I’ve been left emotionally wearied by it all, desperate for my little baby to be here safe and sound.

Then came coronavirus. Lupus and pregnancy made me afraid. We stayed home before anyone told us to. Then the conflicting news. The constant bad news. The constant strange news. Who and what to believe? How to respond? I became wearied of the guessing, of the monotony of the days.

With the quarantine came virtual meetings. I’m not a techie person. I don’t enjoy phone calls or messaging. My heart became heavy for believers all over the south, from Cancun all the way down to Oaxaca. I just wanted to hug them. Cry with them. Lift them up. Do what you do with your sisters in Christ. And I couldn’t. I became weary in my helplessness.

There came from the far north all the way to the far south, news of people suffering injustice from fellow members in the body of Christ. Godly men and women, persecuted by their brothers, suffering upon suffering. Oh, the spiritual weariness of it, to stand tall against the wrong!

Wrongful murder. Hate speeches. The words white and black. People feeling guilty for a crime they never committed. Looting and burning in the falsified name of justice. Schools and parents failing to be honest with their kids. Expose the horrors of colonialism to them, a brandished cross without the Christ!! Let them know its effects carry on today, even in the hearts of some christians. Why did (do???) our schools always have Black History Month? Why weren’t those wonderful people simply incorporated throughout the year, chronologically in history like everyone else? “Who cares what color you are,” my heart has been screaming. I’m sallow, my husband is white, my kids are tanned brown from the south Mexico sun. We live around brown, light, dark and darker people. And? So what? We’re all just humans. Thank God for His wisdom in creating equatorial inhabiting people with greater amounts of melanin. There’s a reason the Vikings were pale and Mansa Musa dark. No one goes to Greenland to enjoy the sunshine. The repeat of history, the ignorance and sin of mankind has wearied my soul.

In the middle of all this world-wide mess, two state governments here in Mexico have passed education reform laws. In one, they have taken control of all the private schools and in the other, they have revoked parents’ right to choose how to educate their kids. As a mother who homeschools, I find these changes downright scary. I homeschool mainly because we travel. But, I also pulled my kids out of public school for some very valid reasons. Namely, my daughter’s 3rd grade teacher arriving to class inebriated multiple times. Verbal, emotional and physical abuse in the classroom. My son’s teacher yelling all day long. His sensitive soul left him crying every morning that he did not want to go. All aside from the questionable quality of the education itself. Please, please pray for Mexico and for us. I cannot face the possibility of my children being torn from the joys of homeschool and forced into a politically charged environment. I have felt wearied all day by the world and its ungodly ideals.

Those have been (most) of my waves. You have yours. Yours are likely larger and more frightening than mine. There is sickness, grief, loss. There are family feuds, relationship breakdowns. There are threats and bribes and helplessness.

I invite you to journey with me to the place of the skull. To stand again beneath the cross of Jesus, that shadow of a mighty rock within a weary land. Our home within the wilderness. Our rest upon the way. A rest from the burning noontide heat and the burden of the day (Elisabeth Clephane). He, too, has wept and been wearied in the journey. He too sat beside a well. His ear is ever open to the weary, for it has been opened with the eternal aul of divine love to broken man.

It is shameful to admit that my heart cried this afternoon, “oh, come Lord Jesus!” Shameful because I don’t cry it every day. Shameful because it’s only when I’m wearied. Shameful because normally I’m pretty content in this old wicked world.

Thank God for a little weariness to bring us back to Him. Thank God for a Savior who was wearied but never wearies of neither you nor I.