On Fire, yet Not Burning Up

Have you ever experienced a season where you feel completely overwhelmed? Just too much to juggle and not enough rest. Thoughts that race continually. Feeling like you are treading water and not getting anywhere, no matter how hard you work or how much you try. Stress and worry at every turn. No end in sight to the daily battle of just trying to keep going.

Life can be so overwhelming. Circumstances often get handed to us that are simply out of our control. Situations will surprise us out of nowhere. A crisis hits and rocks our world and shatters our routine. A diagnosis is given that changes life as we know it. There are many times throughout our life when we feel like we can’t handle all that is handed to us. Losing a job, relationships that fall apart, constant responsibilities of all. the. things.

Burnout seems inevitable when we find ourselves in seasons like this. Whether it creeps up on us slowly or happens suddenly, we just try to keep going as long as we can, knowing there is no way to keep it up long term. Feeling burnt out can happen often and in so many different ways throughout our life. It’s something that we know is a possibility, but we rush along at full speed anyway, full of our own thoughts and opinions, chasing our own plans, dreams, and goals. So confident that we have it all together…until we don’t. 

It is when we find ourselves in the midst of times like these that we realize just how easy it is to slip into a mindset of thinking that we have more control than we actually do.

The Bible tells us that God’s thoughts are higher than our thoughts. His ways won’t always match up with how we think things should go. (Isaiah 55:9)

We simply can’t fathom the things He knows and why things happen the way that they do sometimes, but then again, we aren’t supposed to. How easy that is to forget! How often we slip into thinking that we have more control over our own lives than we actually do.

So how do we avoid this? How do we prevent getting burnt out from the speed of life over and over again? Let’s look at the story of how God called Moses. If you need a refresher, this account can be found in Exodus 3. Essentially, Moses is up on a mountain, out in the wilderness watching his sheep. All of a sudden, he sees an amazing sight! A bush was completely engulfed in flames, but it wasn’t burning. Can you imagine how surreal it would be to see something like that? If that wasn’t bizarre enough, the voice of God spoke to Moses from the burning bush, and they had a conversation! 

This story is seriously so fascinating to read. I could go on, but let’s circle back around to the part about the burning bush. The interesting thing to catch here is the fact that the bush was on fire, but it wasn’t burning.  It was being fueled, but it wasn’t using itself as that fuel. The truth we can learn here is that, oftentimes, we try to run on our own fuel. Most of the time we don’t even mean to, but we haven’t slowed down enough to ask ourselves the question: “Where we are drawing our strength from?” We have limited resources in and of ourselves. Our supply of strength isn’t infinite. It’s so easy to slip into the self reliance of depending on our self for the energy and fuel needed to live our life. 

The main cause of getting to a place where we burn out and can’t keep going is from trying to run on our own strength. We are using up ourselves as fuel instead of resting in the limitless power of our God. We can draw on His strength instead of our own by abiding in His Word daily. Live IN Him like you live in your house. Your home is your safe place, it’s where you go to recharge and to rest. Your home is where you can find comfort and peace from the craziness of the outside world. If life is overwhelming and you feel like you’re just been  spinning your wheels and not getting anywhere, then it’s time to take a step back and reevaluate. Where are you drawing your source of energy from? Are you burning yourself out by trying to stay on fire on your own? Or are you allowing the strength of God to fuel your life so that you are engulfed in flames? Shining brightly for the world to see. On fire, yet not burning up.