Don't Live Your Life Like A Drowning Rat

2.7.21 Isaiah 40:27–31

27 Why do you speak, O Jacob? O Israel, why do you say, “My way is hidden from the LORD, and justice for me is ignored by my God”? 28 Do you not know? Have you not heard? The LORD is the eternal God. He is the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired, and he will not become weary. No one can find a limit to his understanding. 29 He is the one who gives strength to the weak, and he increases the strength of those who lack power. 30 Young men grow tired and become weary. Even strong men stumble and fall. 31 But those who wait for the LORD will receive new strength. They will lift up their wings and soar like eagles. They will run and not become weary. They will walk and not become tired.

Who would you say were the most tired people in the Bible off the top of your head? I think of Moses. Here the poor guy was 80 years old, married and settled faraway from his past problems in Egypt, 40 years gone. God then calls him from a seeming retired life of watching sheep and tells him that he has to move two million people from slavery and into a Promised Land. It ends up taking 40 years. The people whine and complain the entire way and accuse God of purposely leading them out into the desert to starve them to death. And what does Moses do? He said to them, “Listen, you rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock?” He sounds angry, tired and worn out by them. Who wouldn’t be?

Think of Elijah. He’s just won a mighty battle against the prophets of Baal. God sends fire down from heaven. The prophets are put to death. The people are convinced! It is obvious that the LORD is the only true God. But the battle isn’t over! What does Queen Jezebel do? She vows to put Elijah to death! Elijah has to run for his life. So he runs from it all. What does He say when He gets to Beersheba in Judah? He came to a broom tree, sat down under it and prayed that he might die. “I have had enough, LORD. Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors.” Here is a man who is tired and worn out. He’s done.

Read through the Psalms. It is the hymn book of the Old Testament. One of the continuing refrains is, “How long?” This is a true reflection of life. How long? Finish it already.

There are two words that are repeated three times in today’s text. “Tired” and “weary.” The Israelites were going to be sent into the Babylonian Captivity. They said, “My way is hidden from the LORD, and justice for me is ignored by my God.” So that’s why they were tired and weary.

You can see this weariness in our youth today who have their schools and sports closed to them. They miss their friends. They don’t have a routine. Some of them lived for their sports, and as a result have even committed suicide. I find it sad that they put so much importance on sports that they would kill themselves over a form of exercise, entertainment, and competition, especially when there is so much more to live for in this world. But it goes to show the effect this constant fear over a virus has caused on people, being kept in the confines of their homes. Now there are new variants of the virus awakening another wave of fear, and people are tired and weary.

Those two words could describe lots of us, even without the virus.

• Spouses grow tired and weary with each other over time. They grow tired of the same arguments. They grow weary of the same annoying habits.

• Parents grow tired of having to tell their children the same things over and over and over again, also of the complaining and whining. And children grow tired of their parents making them do homework and chores day after day.

• If you’ve ever had a nagging back ache or constant headaches, when you can’t sleep or you can’t move without pain, it makes you tired and weary.

• Imagine having to wake up day after day without your spouse by your side because of divorce or death. There is a tremendous loneliness and darkness to life that literally wears people out: a feeling of failure or a feeling of abandonment. What am I doing here?

• We also grow tired and weary as we witness our society grow worse and worse. What is going on in this world? How long?

I hate to linger on it. But it’s very real, especially in today’s world. You can try to divert through Netflix or entertainment. But after binge watching Cobra Kai you think to yourself, “What did I get accomplished in that 12 hours? What good did I accomplish? Absolutely nothing.” So we even get tired and weary from doing nothing: from having no purpose.