Just Be

 “Just give grace.  People are exhausted by life right now.”

That quote which I found on social media hit me hard.  I shared it on my time line and said, “I’m feeling this,” with the share.  I’ve had numerous of my friends like and some have commented.

So, what is it with “life right now” that drives people to exhaustion?  Surely, we’ve never had it so good…whiz-bang technology, instant communications, great medical advances over the years, the wealthiest nation on earth…on and on we could go.  Yet life for many seems to be less than good…less than enjoyable…less than contented.  What is it that’s making life so difficult right now?

I’m old enough to recall the worst of the cold war age when we as kids had to practice “duck & cover” in school.  Somehow, the radiation from the atomic bomb wouldn’t hurt us if we only covered our heads and hid  under our desks.  I recall the advent of the polio vaccine and what that disease had done to countless people over the centuries…now being tamed.

I remember the Cuban Missile Crisis and the fact that we were on the brink of thermonuclear war…except for the fact that JFK used the military in a diplomatic sense as much as a show of might and power…and the Soviet Union capitulated and withdrew its missiles from Cuba upon assurances from us regarding other nuclear weapons in Europe.

I remember the assassinations of John Kennedy, his brother Robert, and Martin Luther King, and the attempt on Gerald Ford.  I recall the demonstrations against the VietNam war that sometimes turned violent and people were killed.  The draft evaders who fled to Canada, the VietNam veterans who returned home to anger and frustration, Watergate, the stag-flation of the late 1970’s when interest rates were over 20% on the best mortgages.

Yet it seems that with all that history…and I could go back into the Korean conflict, World War II, and other notable points in history…today it seems that we’re totally exhausted from all of the stress, pain, and worry.

Could it be that our technology, instant everything, wealth, and status has been a double-edged sword?  Yes, those things of themselves are wonderful blessings.  But they also have the capability to isolate us from one-another…break up relationships…create grief and sorrow…and make loneliness a common malady in today’s culture.

Families don’t look like families looked some decades ago.  The basic unit of society…the family unit…is largely fractured, splintered, and grossly dysfunctional.  The “traditional” intact nuclear, functional family unit of an loving father and mother along with kids is in the minority now.  The actual numbers vary depending on who one checks, but the general consensus is that less than 1 in 4 family units are of the traditional variety.

Could there be a correlation?  I’m not smart enough to know the answer to that.  Could there be other issues?  Of course.  But I have to go back to the traditional nuclear family unit…that is functional…not dysfunctional…and say that it sure looks a lot like there’s something there that may be causing the general exhaustion that so many experience.

Other factors?  Yes.  The work culture.  The necessity for both parents to work rather than one stay home.  The political turmoil that is rife on all levels…international, national, state, and local.  Instant news that brings us the latest information on a mass shooting, terrorist attack, or weather disaster.  Our penchant for isolating ourselves in our phones or computers…and in so doing block out the rest of life and living.  Ideological extremes and unwillingness to communicate with one-another on an adult, compassionate, and intelligent level.

Of course, there certainly are other factors at work as well as these.  But I think you get the idea.  There IS a temptation, even though we know it just makes the stress and strain continue on in our lives…to keep on indulging in these.  It’s a sort of addiction.  We have to know the latest news from Capitol Hill.  We must keep abreast of what our friends are doing on social media.  We have to work so we can afford the eight dollar coffee, the fifty dollar dinner, and the sixty thousand dollar pickup trucks.

It just never seems to end.

“Be still, and know that I am God.”

“The Lord is in His holy temple.  Let all the earth keep silence before him.”

“Stand still and consider the wonders of God.”

Maybe we need to back off, take a deep breath, and just “BE” for awhile…just “BE” with the God of the universe.

Maybe, just maybe, our state of exhaustion will see some relief.

 

Blessings.