Are You Feeling Spiritually Tired and Weary?
For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds (Hebrews 12:3 KJV)
Physical fatigue is an integral part of life on earth. Even Jesus was physically tired and needed water to refresh Himself( John 4:6). However, bodily exhaustion is only one part of the story; the other part is fatigue or weariness of our hearts—emotional, mental, or spiritual tiredness. We will briefly review what this state is and how to overcome it.
Fatigue occurs when we run out of strength. In contrast to God, who is spirit, human beings living in the flesh can run out of strength. Isaiah said:
“Hast thou not known? hast thou not heard, That the everlasting God, the Lord, The Creator of the ends of the earth, Fainteth not, neither is weary? (Isaiah 40:28–29 KJV)
God can never run out of strength. Imagine how dreadful it would be if God ran out of patience with us! However, we can run out of patience or any of the virtues of our hearts. How many of you have been able to bear a problematic situation for a few days but watch your patience wanes after a couple of weeks?
As discussed in a prior devotional, spiritual strength is the ability( usually of the heart) to be or do what God commands us, such as loving people, saying no to sin, believing the Word, praying without ceasing, and forgiving when we are hurt, etc. Just as we can run out of bodily strength after exerting ourselves, we can also run out of spiritual strength. Some believers start their Christian journey loving Jesus with fiery zeal, just to find this zeal put out as though a spiritual firefighter extinguished the fire—they became spiritually weary or faint, irrespective of the reasons.
Do you feel overwhelmed by the sinfulness around you? Or have you run out of the passion for praying or reading the Bible? Or are you asking yourself how long you will last as a Christian? These and many others are symptoms of spiritual fatigue.
What did Jesus do when He was physically exhausted? He went to the well to drink water. Why do you think Jesus often got up early in the morning while others were asleep to spend time with His Father? (Mark 1:35). The people came later in the day to see the miracles, but very few knew what Jesus did when the crowds were not there. If the Son of God constantly needed spiritual water to refresh Himself, we would do well to learn from Him.
You combat spiritual fatigue and weariness by constantly replenishing in the presence of the Master. Many of us will chide an Olympic athlete who went to the competition without eating and was so weary they could not continue. Yet many believers do not realize they are driving the cars of their Christian lives on empty tanks.
Revive your devotional life. Overcome spiritual fatigue or dryness.
What is spiritual or emotional fatigue as described above?
Symptoms of spiritual fatigue are diverse. Some believers just stop praying, attend Church, return to attitudes they had given up, etc. ministers might quit ministry or just become sluggish. Irrespective of the cause of the symptoms, we will all be challenged by this condition, and we should proactively overcome it.
Ask the Father to help us overcome the spirit of weariness or fatigue.
Read & Watch
Christ Our Strength
Devotional prayer: learning from our Lord Himself
Spiritual dryness-how to end the cycle
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Amen. Really need replenishment. Its exhausting to try and fail 99% of the time. You need to pray more but you are held back. You need progress in physical life but you are not making any headway.
The Lord indeed replenish and strengthen you Simon.