Dreaming Beneath the Spires

Anita Mathias's Blog on Faith and Art

Those who Wait on the Lord will Renew their Strength: A Guest Post by Rhoda of Living to Please God

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This week’s theme is a verse from Isaiah

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. (Isaiah 40 :31).

Have you experienced this? Has this been true in your experience? Tell me your story. Email me at [email protected] or contact me through the comments.


Today’s guest post is from Rhoda, the wife of an American missionary and pastor, and a homeschooling mother of three little ones. She is English and they live and minister in Wales in the UK. Her blog is Living to Please God .
Rhoda suggests you check out Compassion

My Journey out of Continual Tiredness


I went to a retreat last year, knowing that my struggle above all else, was tiredness… continual tiredness from caring for three small children. Then I saw this verse come up on the screen overhead and it suddenly hit me.

‘Those that wait on the Lord will renew their strength, they will mount up on wings like eagles, they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not faint.’ Isaiah 40:31

It is a promise from God – ‘those that wait on the Lord will renew their strength’. He will renew our strength IF we wait on Him. I KNEW these verses, but I hadn’t applied them to my situation… and when I did, it was life-changing.

Promises from God never fail because He is eternally faithful. I realise that some people have physical illnesses which go hand in hand with tiredness, and that’s not what I think this is talking about, or that we will never be tired again. But I believe God was telling me I don’t need to live like this!

So if waiting on God would renew my strength, then I had to find out how!

I have come to the conclusion that at least two practical things are needed in waiting on God:

1. Time spent with Him in prayer and reading His word

2. Taking time to find out what He wants us to do concerning our decisions, schedule and commitments.
Spending Time with God

Ever since we had our first newborn baby, I had decreased my time that I spent with God, and it was a bit haphazard. I would try to do it in the morning, but often fail because of being too tired to get up early. Then later on in the day, I didn’t have a set time for it, so it was squished in somewhere and not as good.

After the retreat I came to the conclusion that this verse meant I needed to spend more time with God if I am tired, not less! So I increased my devotional time and made a special slot for it in the afternoons when the children were up in their rooms. That way if I didn’t manage to get up early, I would have a scheduled time in the afternoon to doit.

The change has been amazing! It took a few months before the tiredness started easing, but it did, and I know it is due to this change more than anything else.

Finding God’s Will

I also prayed and thought hard to try and figure out what God wanted me to do with my time and before committing to anything. This has meant that I have sacrificed doing some things I would have liked to have done, but in the end I would rather be in God’s will.

There are a tonne of good things we can do, but they may not be the best things, and we can stretch ourselves so thin that we’re not doing our most important jobs well.

I love that now when people ask me how I am, I don’t have to say either “I’m tired”; or “I’m fine” but not really mean it! I am able to enjoy my children, and be more joyful and hopefully more fruitful.

Maybe if you are struggling with tiredness you could figure out how to spend more time with God every day, and pray to make sure that you are doing the things that He wants you to be doing?

Have you ever found that spending time with God has helped give you more strength during busy seasons? I would love to hear about it if you want to share in the comments.

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Comments

  1. Thank you Dana, I used to always run out of time, but now it's more energy too, ever since I got married really!

    Jennifer that is so true that He can multiply time and make it stand still, I think we forget that He is in control of time as well as everything else!

  2. Rhoda, tired, who can possibly be tired?! Wonderful, wise words on spending MORE time with the Lord when you least appear to have the time. I love that God is the master of time, can multiply time if He chooses, or even cause it to stand still on our behalf, for our strength and renewal.

  3. What a wonderful post and an excellent reminder. I, too, often struggle with tiredness and fatigue. Most people complain of running out of time, but I run out of energy long before I run out of time. Some days feel like a race where I run and run and still end up going nowhere. But I, like you, have found that if I take the time to be still and dwell a while in God's presence, I have both the time and energy to accomplish the day's tasks. It's not easy, and I often have to remind myself of what I know to be true.