I'm not overwhelmed with things to do (although the laundry came close to that today; thankfully it's now all done and folded and put away!)
I'm overwhelmed with needs. Some of these are my own needs - planning our school year which is supposed to be starting now, finding some magical solution to bedtime issues for every single person in this house, finding a way to get everything done that needs to be done, figuring out how to manage and then recover from a lot of anger I'm carrying around, etc.
Mostly it's the needs of other people though. My brother is deeply in need. His children are even more deeply in need I think. Two of the families whose blogs I follow faithfully have children deeply in need. Various friends have serious life situations going on and are in need.
It's just overwhelming to think of all of these needs. It's hard to pray for them; maybe I'm not doing it right. I tend to pray with solutions in mind, as if God needs suggestions from me or something. Most of these situations don't have solutions that I can see. For people like me, that's really scary because it's just praying for the Lord to just take control. I'm not so great at praying for the Lord to take control and then taking my hands off. Honestly, I know very few people who are good at that though, so maybe I'm not so rare.
I was thinking on all of this earlier today and remembered a song we used to sing when we went to Breakaway at Texas A&M. It's by Ross King and called "In Need". I looked for a youtube but couldn't find one, so I'll just put the lyrics here.
In need of grace, In need of love
In need of mercy raining down from high above
In need of strength, in need of peace
In need of things that only You can give to me
In need of Christ, the perfect Lamb
My refuge strong, the great I Am
This is my song, my humble plea
I am Your child, I am in need
This is perfect. It's not a solution for each of these overwhelming problems that I need. It's Christ. The things I need really are things that only He can give to me. All of my "solutions" are useless. I need his grace, love, mercy, strength, peace. I am desperately in need. In need of things that only He can give to me. Whether I get solutions to these problems or not, I need Him.
2 comments:
What an amazing post.. yes, we DO need Christ. He IS the only solution. All this other STUFF that is cluttering our brains, hearts and lives just needs Jesus washed all over it. On my way home last night from picking up M I heard James Dobson talking about letting all this STUFF frazzle us and even causing us to become sick... stuff that won't matter in twenty years... whether the laundry is caught up, whether the kids are ___... I really needed to hear that because lately STUFF and the need to take care of it and thinking about ALL the serious needs around me has had me in chains.
The Holy Spirit is the great comforter. I am being reminded of that alot lately. I can only do what the Lord has me do and nothing else. He loves the other people with needs more than I can even phathom so I can leave "it" with Him. And if I have the opportunity to be His hands or feet or arms I'll put the laundry down or step over that pile of toys to gladly do it!
Thank you for posting this. I love you. I pray for you without ceasing.
Mel, I was liturgist a month ago at church and our New Testament passage that I read one Sunday came to mind from your post. Matthew Chapter 6 beginning with verse 5 talks about prayer and the latter part of verse 8 was what I remembered because of Troys situation and my need, your mothers need, Troys need and his kids need. "for your Father knows what you need before you ask him" I don't mean to preach but its a great read when need is important. Dad
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