Overwhelmed?

Has life ever felt overwhelming to you? I am thankful that God knows you and me and the struggles we have in this earthly life we live. Jesus Himself was, “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief”(Isaiah 53:3)

But, unlike you and me, our God can never be truly overwhelmed, because there is nothing beyond His power or control. He grieves over our sin, sorrows over the pain and suffering we bring on ourselves, and longs for us to turn to Him and find peace and joy. Yet, despite the fact that our eternal God can see all of eternity in a single glance, it is never too much for Him.

With this in mind, it is even more amazing to me that God, knowing our emotions and how life would sometimes seem like just too much at once, gave us an example of what to do when we are feeling overwhelmed. In Psalm 61, the psalmist prays,

“Hear my cry, O God; attend unto my prayer. From the end of the earth will I cry unto Thee, when my heart is overwhelmed: lead me to the rock that is higher than I.” (vv.1-2)

When we feel overwhelmed, we cry to God, and He helps.

It’s very simple, but not necessarily easy. Sometimes, that feeling of overwhelm paralyzes us, like a rabbit, frozen with fright. Sometimes we are overwhelmed because life is so busy, we can’t think how to carve out a few extra moments to take it all to the Lord. And sometimes, well—sometimes we let ourselves throw a pity party, and we don’t want to cry out to the Lord, because we would rather complain and be miserable. Foolish creatures, aren’t we?

That is what struck me about this passage when I ran across it this week: that there are times we need help running to the Lord.

I had always read the verse as, “when my heart is overwhelmed, lead me to the rock that is higher than I.” But that isn’t actually what it says.

“Hear my cry, O God; attend unto my prayer. From the end of the earth will I cry unto Thee, when my heart is overwhelmed: lead me to the rock that is higher than I.” (vv.1-2)

We cry to God when we are overwhelmed—I think that’s the key, because once we put our troubles, our emotions, our pity parties before the Lord, then He can lead us to that high rock, the place of restful dependence on Him.

I have noticed that I frequently need to be led when I am feeling overwhelmed. I usually know what the path back upwards is, but I struggle to get my spiritual feet moving. When I cry to Him, He doesn’t just show the way: He leads me there Himself—but I have to be willing to follow.

When I am overwhelmed, often one of the first things God does to help me get back to the high rock is to remind me of what He has done for me in the past. In fact, the very next verse in our passage says,

“For Thou hast been a shelter for me, and a strong tower from the enemy.” (v.3)

The psalmist was overwhelmed, and cries out, trusting that God will lead him to safety because of how God has been there for him in the past.

Our God is unchanging. Just like the psalmist, we can cry out to God when we are overwhelmed, and just like the psalmist, we can trust that He will be there just as He has all along.  

Dear Reader, are you feeling overwhelmed? Cry out to God, let Him lead you to the higher ground where the waves cannot reach you, because you are safe within His loving care, held fast by His faithfulness and sheltered by His presence.

“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; Though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof. Selah” 

Psalm 46:1-3