What’s Your Hard?

Some days are just plain hard. We’ve all had them. Perhaps you face a tough diagnosis, a difficult relationship, an unexpected loss, or a long trial with no end in sight. It may not even be “yours,” but the suffering of someone you love, and you cannot find a way to help them, though you’ve tried everything you know. (Sometimes the most difficult trials to bear are when we feel unable to fix things for those we care about the most.)

I’ve been a little surprised when a friend or even a relative stranger has occasionally said, “That’s a lot. That sounds really hard!” Yet when I pause to consider, I remember that we all have faced our own “hard” in the past few years. The details differ and the extent might differ, yet no one is immune.

So may I ask a question today? What do you do with your hard? Have you named it? Acknowledged that it is hard, and that sometimes you grow tired? We are not built to carry those hard things alone and just pretend as if they are feathers on our shoulders. That is not the way our Shepherd intends us to live. We are to bring our burdens to him, to roll our cares and anxieties onto him. (1 Peter 5:7)

God is big enough for all of our “hard things.” Do you still wonder? Listen in as the prophet Jeremiah shares, “Ah, Lord God! It is you who have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and by your outstretched arm! Nothing is too hard for you.” God responds, “Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh. Is anything too hard for me?” (Jer. 32:17, 27)

Lord God, I do believe that you are big enough. Forgive me for the times when I doubt you. Help me to accept the truth that you do care for me, enough to answer me when I cry out to you. Help me run to you in my time of trouble and distress, and to do my part when you call me to hard things, knowing you will walk with me through them. Thanks for your strength, comfort and grace. Amen.

Throughout this day: He invites us to come to him, and he will give us rest! (Matthew 11:28-30) Today, if you face something that seems hard or overwhelming, thank God for his presence and trust him to walk with you through any difficulty you may face. At the end of the day, thank him again for his presence and his rest, knowing that there is nothing too hard for him.