Refreshing Exhaustion

This Friday at 6am, I leave with my home church to Mexicali for a week. It is a full day of driving straight through to set up a week of partnership ministry with the local churches in the city. Then it will be a long drive back home just in time for the Saturday Easter services at First Cov.  A few nights ago, Tonya and I were chatting about this week and the things which need to get done. She said, "I'm looking forward to you going to Mexicali so you can come back refreshed."

It struck me weird, and I had to respond inquisitively, "You DO know I'm going to come home exhausted, right?"

My wife spoke wisdom...AGAIN. "Yes, you will come home physically exhausted, but you are going to come home refreshed in ministry just like you did last year."

She was and is very right. (obviously! It's a spiritual gift wives have: always-right-ness)

I am reaching a similar threshold I was reaching last year at this time; one that is overwhelming in all the demands of maintaining ministry. The spinning plates are starting to totter. Tonya added, "You're starting to forget things and drop things that just aren't 'you' to drop."

Though there is a lot of work to be done in Mexicali, I can ONLY do the work of Mexicali. Away from my computer. Away from my iPhone. Away from my leadership team (whom I love). Away from the church I serve (and love). Away from my coffee shop office. Away from my meetings. Away from coffees with disgruntled people. Away from...

Yes, we will run our bodies dry and weary in Mexico, but sometimes we need that sort of removed exhaustion to come home refreshed.

Looking forward to it.

Jesus Prayer: breathe it in

This week I am revisiting what is known as the "Jesus Prayer". It is one very simple prayer, in one thought, which communicates and professes a myriad of things. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

The prayer was formed by the early Desert Fathers, and it eventually became a classic and common form of prayer.  You see a similar statement in Luke 18:35-43 with the blind beggar, and you commonly see historic uses of it in rhythm with your breathing. (Inhale "Lord Jesus Christ....Exhale "have mercy on me...")

I am reading and praying the Jesus Prayer this week with refreshing realizations. In one simple prayer, you profess adoration and attrition. You profess the glory of God and the sinfulness of man. It is penitential while also being joyful and confident. It is fundamentally Christilogical.

It is simple enough to begin as we realize the most common block to prayer is the act of simply beginning. The prayer is discursive: it does not move from one thought to another. Yet, some have said, it sums up the whole Gospel.

It professes the Lordship of Jesus Christ and the reality of the Incarnation by addressing Jesus. It is a profession of what Jesus is; Son of God, which opens a profession of the Trinity (SON to the FATHER; something we'd only believe with the help of the SPIRIT).

It also professes and confesses our dire need for mercy and grace, which theologians stuffily refer to as "depravity". The prayer leads our thoughts to the life of Christ while facing us with the story of our helplessness. It is a petition of a poor, humble, and recognizably sinful soul. It is a CRY for mercy.

In most cases, it is intended to be repeated frequently throughout the day to help accomplish what Paul challenged us to do; PRAY CONSTANTLY (1 Thess. 5:17). When repeated frequently, it can lead to a real life change. It reorders our priorities.

It can be practiced and prayed anywhere at any moment. It does not have to be vocalized, and at different times, can find its deeps soul-connection in the silent meeting of the heart. C.S. Lewis wrote, "I still think the prayer without words is the best--if one can really achieve it."

I intend to write it out, to vocalize it, and to silently drive my soul to pray it as constantly as I can muster.

LORD JESUS CHRIST, SON OF GOD, HAVE MERCY ON ME, A SINNER