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I was reading the other day from Eugene Peterson’s, The Message of Matthew 11:28-30. It captured my attention and helped me to reaffirm what I have been sensing from God throughout this whole year. Peterson writes,
The first two questions, I was able to answer in the affirmative. With the third question of being “burned out on religion” I had to think about it a little bit. It is easy to make something that is good to turn out into something that is bad and eventually become a hindrance to our relationship with Christ. How often have I made my relationship with Christ into some kind of religious duty that puts the attention more on me? This makes us restless.
In Peterson’s translation, Jesus says, “walk with me and work with me.” It is only by walking with someone that you are able to see and witness how they do things. It is incredible that Jesus invites us to work with Him. Maybe this is the reason why we get so tired and burnt out from ministry – instead of working with God, we try to do everything by ourselves.
If there was anyone that was busy doing ministry it was Jesus, but He did ministry so effortlessly and with so much power. This is something I need to keep on learning over and over again.
The “unforced rhythms of grace” is something that God wants to teach us and it is something that I need to learn again. I guess it is sometimes like riding a bicycle. After we don’t do it for a while, it might take us a few minutes but we catch on to it again very quickly.