*Excited to share on DaySpring’s (in)courage blog today:
As I watched them play on the driveway, I longed for an ounce of their energy. Five kids were playing chase. Two were playing basketball. It was a beautiful day, and I could hear their laughter from the other side of the window. I should’ve felt joy at the scene before me, but what I really felt was exhausted, depleted. I was running on fumes and clinging to my third cup of coffee.
For years, I operated like this, drinking lots of caffeine but pouring from an empty cup. Somewhere I bought into the narrative that it was my job as a Christian woman, mom, and wife to pour out and then pour out some more. Serve others. Put them first. Sacrifice and sacrifice some more. These are the ways of Jesus.
It took me many years and many tear-soaked conversations with God to finally realize that His command is to love others, but to love them as myself. While I was following the first half of that sentence, I was skipping over the second half. I was forgetting that I had to care for myself well in order to care for others well.
Soul care and nourishment are not good ideas or luxuries. I have learned they are necessary if I am going to live out the ways of Jesus. Love and grace have to come in before they can spill it out.
What’s interesting, though, is that when we think about nourishing our souls, we usually think the answer is consumption. An empty cup needs to be filled, so we consume. We do Bible studies, read devotions, and listen to podcasts and sermons. All of that is good and necessary, of course, but what those years of depletion and exhaustion taught me was that the real reason I was tired was that I was trying to carry too much. My hands were full and holding too tightly to a world I was trying to control. Clenched hands are not a posture of receiving anything, including God’s grace.
So, for me, soul care starts with surrender. This means literally laying my worries at the foot of the cross. Sometimes, I name them one by one. Sometimes I lay them down in a jumbled mess that can’t be put into words. Either way, the process is never as easy as it should be.
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