Just Come

I’m trying something new this year and that’s picking out a word for the year. The word I feel like the Lord kept putting in my heart was the word REST. If you know much about my life in Haiti, then you know that the last year of my life has been filled with lots of UNrest. 2019 might have been the hardest year that I have ever experienced and the word REST seems more than fitting as a mindset for 2020. 

This morning, Matthew 11:28 was on my mind. “Come to Me all who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest.” Weary is the word I would use to describe me the majority of the last six months. Maybe you’ve been feeling that way too. This is a fairly well known verse, but the thing that struck me this morning was that all we have to do is come. JUST COME. There’s no other strings attached. So often I know that I find myself putting non-existent expectations on myself. There’s nothing that I, or you, have to do to receive the rest that God so desperately wants to share with us. We only have to show up. 

I know that sometimes seems easier said than done because of the expectations that WE put on receiving a gift. Maybe we don’t feel worthy or deserving of rest. Maybe we don’t know how to rest. Maybe we don’t know what that looks like. I don’t claim to know...I think that’s part of why that’s my word for the year. So that just maybe, I can learn. The good news is that even when we’re trying to fight the weariness and the burdens on our own -- God is still there waiting. I’ve done a lot of trying to fight life on my own and I reached the place that I couldn’t do it anymore. I shouldn’t do it anymore. Only God can fight our daily battles with us and for us. We just have to let Him. Let me tell you, I already feel lighter.

Just show up. Run to our Heavenly Father.  Give it all to Him and sit back and see what He can do.