To the core......

Are you tired today?

I recently was reading a book for nutrition and the doctor who wrote it used the words "bone weary". I became excited because I could identify with those words on a very deep level! I have felt bone weary many times in life and I'm sure you can relate.

Where does this weariness come from? Are we burdened beyond what we can bear? Are we being tested? I believe much of our burden comes from inside. In other words, we do it to ourselves....

Hang in there with me! I understand we all have different lives. We all have a certain spot on this earth to fill with God's glory. My personal problem is that sometimes I am shoulder deep in fatigue and feel as though His glory gets put on the back burner. Am I alone here? I imagine not.

As women, we tend to wear many different hats. I do not think we work harder than men, but we tend to hold onto more and have a harder time letting go. We honestly feel as though the whole world will implode if we miss a load of laundry, do not cater to our children's needs immediately, keep a clean house when we know someone is on their way over, and try to look less than disheveled when our prince charming comes through the door. If you weren't tired before, I bet you are now!

In my line of work I see overworked moms and wives all the time. We all try to live up to the Wonder Woman standard of doing it all and in doing so we always fail at something. We may get the house to look spotless, but we completely forgot to shower and now we just can't even. We may tote our kids and their friends everywhere, but somehow we forget to eat lunch ourselves. We work overtime at our job, but we neglect our own physical health and opt to sit for hours on end. We are making ourselves weary...

Luckily, we have guidelines that can help us in these times. I encourage you to take the first five minutes of your day (before phones, texts, emails, showers and maybe even coffee) to read in God's Word. Instead of feeling like a time of devotion doesn't count unless it's thirty minutes, why not start with five? In fact, I have a great resource for you:

Proverbs 31 now has an app for that! I kid you not :) a mobile app that gets you connected to the ONE Who promises rest for the bone weary. You can find it here: http://first5.org/ and I encourage you to start right now. Set your alarm for just five minutes earlier tomorrow morning and expect something to happen. Finding our way into His presence daily will take the burdens from our shoulders. It won't change the course of everybody else's day or erase family needs, BUT it will change the way we respond to stress and help us stay connected to our Supporter all day long.

So, I offer up a challenge to you, bone weary sister: commit to spend the first five minutes of your day with God for the next five days straight and just see what burdens can be lifted. The core of our heart desires a peace only He can provide, but we must first be willing to accept that peace.

As always, I am listening! Leave your comments below on how the challenge is going for you and what has changed. I am faithful and confident that God will move.

In love,
Michelle