We stopped at Parkes to see "The Dish", made famous by the Australian movie of the same name…oh, and by the role it played in the first moon landing in 1969. My three boys were fascinated by the history and the size of "The Dish", but their goal was to get to Dubbo as soon as possible so we could visit the famous Dubbo zoo.
Travelling makes you weary. Being a tourist and listening to guides and reading information makes you weary. Going to a zoo and waiting, and waiting, and waiting to see a tiger come out of the bushes, or the lion to awake from its 20 hours a day slumber makes your weary. Travelling with three boys and your wife makes you weary.
Life makes you weary
I often feel caged, trapped; the world can seem too claustrophobic; I am just a prisoner of society's thrust for success or material gain. People are too poor to help; people are too rich to care.
The boys can go from caring for each other, sticking up for each other, missing the indigenous kids I taught who would often turn up to school with a plastic bag full of their worldly possessions (a football jumper and an odd pair of shoes), to fighting over a car seat or a piece of chocolate or a soccer ball (when we have 4 of them!). This makes me weary.
God hears my cry, "Lord!! Give me strength." But do I really mean it? Do I really want the Lord to give me strength? Or am I just exacerbated and using God as my last resort?
I was teaching my Grade 7 English class poetry this week and getting them to fill out a sheet to help them write their own autobiographical poem. The starting words were, "I long for…"
A girl in my class pipes up to her friend, within earshot of me, "I long for….I long for…my Mum and Dad to get back together." Teaching makes me weary.
Never wearies of me?
"For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways," declares the Lord in Isaiah 55:8. I do take comfort in these words.
He has put me here to discover His thoughts and His ways. If I knew the Bible had ALL the answers, then why struggle? If the Holy Spirit is here to guide me, then why do I need its counsel? If Jesus is the way, the truth and the life, how do I help others to find their way, live in the truth, and have an abundant life?
I may get weary physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually, but God never gets weary of me, or tires of me (I hope!). I choose to embrace these weary times, the dark times, and allow them to shape the person I have been called to be, and God wants me to be.
Russell Modlin teaches English and Physical Education at a Christian School on the Sunshine Coast. He is married to Belinda and they have three children.
Russell Modlin's archive of previous article can be found at www.pressserviceinternational.org/russell-modlin.html