On Wings of Eagles

Isaiah 40:28-31
28 Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
The Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
And his understanding no one can fathom.
He gives strength to the weary
And increases the power of the weak.
Even youths grow tired and weary,
And young men stumble and fall;
But those who hope in the Lord
Will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
They will run and not grow weary,
They will walk and not be faint.

This was written for the Israelites while they were in exile but it is an encouragement for us as well. Like the Israelites we often get tired of where we are in life. Life is difficult, fraught with physical and emotional pain. Or it's just plain boring.

My life is less then exciting to report. I have to laugh when someone asks what I’ve been up to because there is really nothing new that I’ve done since I had my last child. I get up every morning, fix breakfast and clean the kitchen just in time for lunch to start, and make an attempt to finish the laundry. I spend half of my day worrying about bills and how to put food on the table and the other half asking God to forgive me and thank Him when he’s done it all. Who really cares to hear about the hum drums of life? I have another 15 years at least of days just like this one.

Just like the Israelites we live one day at a time, dealing with traumas, trying to find some kind of hope in a hopeless world. Sometimes we even wonder, in our darkest moments, if our Savior has been defeated because we can’t seem to see him working in our lives. I grow weary. I grow tired. I don’t want to keep walking when every day looks like the day before and tomorrow looks like today.

A couple of years ago Josh and I were in a bad job/financial crisis and what I hadn’t noticed was my walk with the Lord was in a crisis as well. I was questioning His trustworthiness in my life. Especially when I looked around and it seemed everybody was doing well but us. People were leaving for vacations we could never afford, buying toys for their kids we could only dream of and living in big homes with room to walk around in and not step on each other. I was so frustrated with the Lord. I was weary of looking to Him for the answer, tired of walking His path when it seemed it was getting us nowhere. I was the young man stumbling and falling. I was bitter, frustrated, and angry at the Lord and at our situation.

One night I came to the end of myself. After learning the fate of a famous celebrity the reality of Hell hit home for me. I could only imagine this woman burning for all of eternity and it sent a chill down my spine. It was then that I realized that God had saved me from eternal damnation. I don't know why after 20+ years of being a christian I would finally realize what Christ did for me but that's what happened. For the first time I grasped the fact that He didn’t save me because it would be nice for my Mom and Dad’s sake or because I was the Pastor's daughter. He saved me simply because He loved me. It was His will that I live with Him for eternity and it had nothing to do with what I could do for Him or who I was related to.

I dropped to my knees on my bedroom floor weeping over my sins and thanking Him for saving me. When I stood up that night I was exhausted from crying but renewed in my spirit. My hope was no longer in the world, the superficial happenings going on around me. My hope was in Christ. It stopped mattering to me who was making the money or buying a new house or traveling to Hawaii. I was blessed simply because I belonged to Christ.

This, I believe, is what it means to be renewed in our spirit. It comes at times when I'm weary and don’t think I can take one more step in the direction he’s leading me. That’s when He reaches down, takes my hand and gently leads me on. When my hope is in the Lord I have strength to press forward even when I didn’t feel like it before. After that night I did soar like an eagle. The weight on my shoulders fell away and I could breathe again. I could walk and run and not feel the weariness that once encumbered me. In fact, spiritual truths took on new light and I looked forward to seeing what the Lord would do for us instead of be frustrated at what He was doing for some one else.

The only way to get through this life is to be renewed in the spirit, by God. So how do we go about being refreshed in this exhausting world? I don’t have an exact answer. I really don’t. Every person is unique and the Lord connects with us in different ways that meet us where we’re at. For me, I had to keep doing what I was doing. I continued to go to church even when I didn’t want to. I continued to sing the songs even though my lips were the only thing moving, my heart wasn’t in it. I can’t tell you how many times I would show up for the outside services purposely late, keep my sunglasses on so as not to make eye contact with anyone. I even toyed with the idea of going to another church for a while. But I didn’t. Usually by the end of the service I was okay enough to talk to people and have a decent conversation but it took me the entire hour and a half of the sermon to get to that point. I did this for about six months at least.

But my renewal didn’t come during a worship set, or specific group prayer time, or during a sermon. He spoke to my heart when I was alone, in my bedroom, with the background noise of the TV from the living room. The kids were sleeping and my bed had a pile of laundry on it as usual. I had no halo, in fact I don’t know if I had a shower that day. But that is where the Lord chose to meet me, reaching through the chaos of my life, to awaken my heart’s eyes to see exactly what gift he had given me. A gift of a life beyond this one, a hope for something more beautiful and magnificent then I could ever imagine having here on this earth. A hope that this wasn’t all there was to life, I actually had something to look forward to beyond the here and now.

I don’t know how or where the Lord will meet you; I only know for sure He will. He knows your heart, your inner person that he created and he knows how to intimately touch your soul and give you the strength to keep pressing forward. He may reach you during worship at church or in a small group Bible study. Your renewal may come on a tropical island or at a day retreat. Or it may come on a lonely night when you cry yourself to sleep.

But, my friend, be rest assured that it will come. On that weary path when we stumble and fall we must cling to the knowledge that his understanding goes farther than we can imagine and he never grows tired or weary of hearing our cries. He gives energy to the weary and power to the weak. He will reach down, lift our eyes up to Him and renew our strength. He will make us soar on wings like eagles, He will help us run and not grow weary, walk and not faint.