Good News for the Tired and Broken

This morning, I listened to a message about how awful the Tribulation period will really be. I believe, as did this preacher, that those who have trusted in Jesus Christ for salvation will not suffer through this awful time in which God’s wrath on rebellion and sin will be poured out on the earth. We will be taken to heaven. Yet for those we love who will be left behind, our hearts should break.

At the end of the message, the preacher gave a challenging encouragement: If in all of the discouragement, disappointment, and increasing trials to live for Christ in this ungodly world we feel like giving up, now is not the time to let go of the plow! We must keep going, we must keep “sowing the seeds” and working while it is day. For night is coming, when no one can work. Jesus is coming soon.

But how do we keep working when we are so tired and weak? The first thing is to acknowledge that we are tired and weak. The world will teach you to suck it up and keep going. God, however, asks us to face reality: We really don’t have the strength in these human bodies, especially not to fight the spiritual battles that are all around us and are indeed behind even those trials that present themselves physically each day.

And that’s the first step to success. Because only when we give up our own wills will we be able to fully embrace His, and find victory far beyond our wildest dreams.

We will still go through tough times. But tough times only serve to bring us back to the One who promises life, and life more abundantly. The One who gave us the Holy Spirit as our Guide, Empowerment, and Down Payment for eternal life. As a result, our hearts will break even more for those who are persisting in unbelief or outright rebellion against our Creator and the rescue He offers.

But it is through that brokenness, through those splinters and cracks, the light of Christ in us will shine ever brighter. Time is short. We don’t know the day or hour that Christ will return. Though we will see signs, we don’t know how much longer we really have to urge our loved ones, and even those strangers walking among us each day, to turn to the Savior before it’s too late.

So this is me, admittedly tired and broken, leaning on my Savior, asking the Holy Spirit to fill every part of me so that the Light of Christ - the only hope and way and truth and life - shines through to all of you.

If you are a believer: Don’t give up the fight, but also don’t ever try to fight in your own strength. You are a beautiful vessel, chosen by God, meant to pour out the hope of Christ within you to every human being within your influence. It is not your will, ideas, or feelings that are to be poured out…but God’s will and promises alone, because He alone can save. He alone is what we all need.

And for those who have not yet believed: I hope you see the Light and Life seeping from this broken vessel that is continuing to learn that I have nothing to give unless He continues to be the One to fill me up. And, He can fill you up too, to overflowing.