John 4:34 - For those who are weak...

John 4:34 - "My food," said Jesus, "is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.

Matthew 11 (NLT) - 28 Then Jesus said, "Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke fits perfectly, and the burden I give you is light."

Matthew 11 (NIV) - 28 "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

Sometimes I feel weak... really weak...

Every find yourself flicking through channels because you don't feel you've got the energy to do anything else? Not that you're necessarily tired, but you just can't seem to leave whatever it is you're doing because that would mean facing the world. Or maybe it's just me.

Today's Thursday. On Thursday nights I teach new Christian courses, which is great. It's fun to watch the lights switch on for people. But it's also a huge responsibility, and so it can take a lot out of you at times. Sometimes I don't feel like I've got the energy to do it..

And so I'm left with a decision to make. Do I retreat and continue to follow the path of least resistance, do nothing? I can easily rationalise this with a theology that says "if you doing it and it doesn't feel right, it's not God's will for you to be doing it". Or do I beat my flesh, crucify the flesh and persist?

In this instance, I'm choosing the get over myself and help out. The verse that really spoke to me about this today is John 4:34 - when we step out and do the will of the father, He gives us strength. Emotional, physical, and spiritual food. And we use this to keep on going.

The scary thought in this is - what happens if we don't do the will of God? Do we become malnourished? I think perhaps so.

Matthew 11 is another good one. Verse 28 and 29 (if you read the too quickly, let's say for example if you're just trying to cover ground in your Bible reading) sound really nice and mushy... "give you rest"... "humble and gentle"... "perfectly... light".

But take a closer look at this, especially verse 30 - "my burden is light". He's not talking about removing burdens from us. That's not his strategy. His strategy is to help us grow in strength so we can carry more. Historically, what they'd do is they'd get a stronger bull and tie it (using a yoke) to the younger bull so they could work in partnership. In reality though, the stronger bull did all the work. The younger bull would get to pull just enough load to be able to develop the muscles to become stronger.

God does the same with us - he let's us experience just enough tension to pull us onward, to help us to grow in maturity. James 1:2-4 talks about this as well.

So I'm off to LDC now - it's going to be great. God is going to be there and he's going to help me grow stronger.

Hope this helps for those of you who might be struggling.