FollowI’m setting a course. I’m pursuing a goal. I have determined to adopt a lifestyle of an overwhelming nature. Now, I am not alone; many are the overwhelmed. Long has it been an affront to me, but now I am running after it.
Thanksgiving will arrive inside four weeks, and some of you know exactly how many shopping days are left until Christmas. I have a to-do list which inexplicably balloons when I sit down to cross off finished items. I have a yard littered with branches, leaves, cones, and needles, and grass that seems to grow while I am cutting it. I work full time and sometimes a little more. My car is overdue for an oil change and tire rotation, needs a windshield replacement, brake check, and suspension check, while my home needs furnace filter replacements, hose bib, sprinkler system and air-leak check winterizations. My computer has been upgraded with a new modem/router, but the system has recently crashed, leaving continuous program access less than acceptable. I tried to print out instructions for a fix I found online, but as I did so I realized I just ran out of ink. I have books and projects I am currently engaged in or thinking about starting, and others that have been sitting on the back burner for a year or more. I’m thinking about where to move money and who wants some of it next. Oh yeah, and I’m currently battling a virus.
As you get a peek at my partial list, is your anxiety level rising? Does it remind you of obligations, desires, achievements, and strivings—in sight, but out of reach? Do you have goals that you just haven’t been able to accomplish for the daily grind that keeps wearing against you? In other words, are you feeling overwhelmed?
Ah! Here’s where I misuse Scripture and tell you that, “I can do all things through Christ,” meaning, “Keep going! You can do it! Run, rabbit, run! Live your best life now!” And when you find the end of all your efforts, harness some more resources and leverage what you can grasp, to fight through one more time! Redouble your resolve! Hunker down and dig in! Repeat statements of success. Don’t let any negativity enter your mind—only the thoughts of a winner, because that’s what you were born to be!
So what on earth am I proposing? I tell you that we will all be overwhelmed in this life. We do, however get to choose the nature of the flood. You can pursue the end of a task list or a promotion, or financial goal or human relationship, or even “survival,” but if that is where you place your eyes and your hope, it will falter.
Consider your place in this life in light of your place in eternity. I invite you to be overwhelmed by the astounding story being told by God and lived by you and others both now and forevermore. How is it that God would choose me to live forever in His presence? Think about entering Heaven for the first time. Will God have planned a reunion? A celebration? Time spent with just you … so that He can tell you face to face how much He loves you—enough to die? What is He accomplishing even now through me, though I can see it not with mine own eyes? Be overwhelmed by this God we serve and who loves us beyond imagining!
Sing with me and never stop:
I stand amazed in the presence of Jesus the Nazarene
And wonder how He could love me, a sinner condemned unclean.
Oh how marvelous, oh how wonderful, is my Savior’s love for me …
(“I Stand Amazed/How Marvelous”)
His oath, His covenant, and blood
Support me in the whelming flood;
When every earthly prop gives way,
He then is all my Hope and Stay.
On Christ, the solid Rock, I stand;
All other ground is sinking sand…
(“My Hope Is Built on Nothing Less”)
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