How often I think “today is too hard” or “today is too long.” For me, Thursdays are very long. Just yesterday, I was helping a gentleman with some grocery shopping. He was the last person on my schedule and it had already been a long day of helping people with meals, exercising, household tasks, checking medications, and completing special errands. We went shopping as planned. His list of needed items was not that long but he really likes to take his time spending five to ten minutes choosing each item. Today, he seemed to take longer than usual.  I am very tired from the long day  I already had endured and now was growing frustrated that it was about to become much longer than I originally thought.

I try to politely encourage him to make his selections a little faster but that didn’t work. Then I tried setting a time limit saying that we needed to be checking out of the store by a certain time. He moved along a little faster but not by much. He enjoys looking around the store and does not want to be rushed. The more I tried to hurry him along, the more he deliberately slowed down! So, although I am very tired and very anxious to be done for the day, I slow down too letting him take as much time as he wanted.  As we went along, I’d quietly pray asking God to give me his gentleness, calmness and patience I needed to finish this day. We finally made it home where i help him prepare supper and he completes a few more tasks for the day.  And I thought, “this day was too long!” But really, it wasn’t.

Because God was with me the entire time helping me as I helped others all day long. Sometimes I look at the day and think, “This is too much!” But when I just concentrate on a small part of the day and so break the day into small steps then it becomes more doable. And often that is what God wants me to do. Just look along my daily , windy, path one corner at a time and my journey will end in God’s planned time. And in God’s good time, I am able to rest before facing another day, another journey with Jesus leading the way.  In this manner, God makes my yoke lighter as I learn from him and let him lead me. As I contemplated on this, the words of Jesus in Matthew 11 came to me:

Matthew 11:28-30 (Holy Bible English Standard Version):

“Come to me all who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and lowly in heart and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”