He Won't Let Us Grow Weary

He won’t let me grow weary. I’ve seen the truth of that in this season of my life. When I lean into striving, Jesus corrects me. He reminds me that I was made to go slow. I’m not supposed to jump out in front of Him and take the lead. Where He is leading, I am meant to be following. All my worst ideas start with me thinking I can do better than Him. The Lord has taught me a lot about this through Abram (Abraham) and Sarai (Sarah).

In Genesis 16, Sarai is struggling to conceive a child. Since God hasn’t given her children of her own, she convinces Abram (her husband) to sleep with their slave, Hagar, in the hopes that she will conceive a child and Sarai can build a family through her. Abram agrees with Sarai, marries Hagar, and sleeps with her. After this, she conceives a child. Eventually, Hagar and Sarai begin to despise each other and loathe the situation they find themselves in, and Hagar flees from Sarai. Hagar encounters an angel and ends up having Abram’s son, whom they name Ishmael. Later, in Genesis 21, Sarah becomes pregnant herself and gives birth to a son named Isaac. God did what He had promised. Following Isaac’s birth, Sarah makes Abraham send Hagar and Ishmael away to the desert. This banishment is the last we hear of Hagar and Ishmael. 

I find that Sarah and I are similar. Sarah knew that God had promised Abraham offspring. As his wife, that made her part of the equation. Her job was to wait for God to fulfill what He had promised, but Sarah got tired of waiting. She decided to take matters into her own hands. She thought she knew better than God, and she didn’t. She didn’t know how to wait on the Lord, so she settled for less than what He had for her. How often do I do the same thing? How often do I take control when God isn’t giving me what I want? How often do I create results when they aren’t coming fast enough? Sarah wanted what she wanted, and she wanted it right then. I do too. There’s no denying that waiting is hard, but dealing with the consequences of our own impatience and disobedience is much harder. Sarah was going to have a child of her own; she just needed to be patient and wait. For you and me, God is going to do what He said. He’s going to show up. Deliverance is going to come. We just have to wait. And the good news is, we don’t wait alone. We don’t wait on our own strength or on our own willpower. He sustains us while we wait. 

Isaiah 40:31 says, “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.” 

What a blessing. I love that Isaiah first tells us who God is. Then, once God’s character has been revealed, he tells us what He does for us as we wait on Him. Isaiah shows us where our strength comes from. On our own, we grow tired and weary. On our own, we stumble and fall. But when we wait on the Lord and put our hope in Him, we soar on wings like eagles. It’s smooth sailing; not because the circumstance is easy, but because we’re facing it with the everlasting God whose strength is endless. 

It truly is a joy to wait on Jesus. We don’t just wait on Him; we wait with Him. He makes us strong as we wait. He makes us look more like Him as we wait, and what He has is always worth waiting for. I’ve learned that I truly know nothing. I don’t know what’s right. I don’t know what path to take. I don’t know what decisions are best. But Jesus knows everything. He has the answers that I don’t have, and I know that He is worth waiting on. I know His plans are to prosper me (Jer 29:11). I know He doesn’t withhold good things from His kids (Ps 84:11). I know He’s working all things out for my good (Rom 8:28). I know His ways are higher than mine (Isaiah 55:8-9). When I know these things, I can rest. When I know these things, I don’t have to be weary or tired. I can delight in Jesus as I wait on Him. Eventually, He will make good on His promise, and it will be better than what I could’ve ever imagined. 

What do we do, though, when we make ourselves weary by striving and making our own way? We come to Him. Matthew 11:28-30 says, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” When we exhaust ourselves with our own disobedience, He is there to pick us up. We can come to Him with our mess, and He will take our burden and give us rest. He’s just that good.

So, we wait on the Lord. We trust in Him to do what He said He’ll do. When we fail, we run to Him, and we receive His rest. With Jesus, we can’t lose. He won’t let us grow weary.