Dear Theophilus Archive: Dec. 2000

Rage Against the Fatigue

Every year, Life Conference is an event that my heart longs to experience but my body dreads going through. Allow me to explain.

I've been serving on the Life Conference praise team each of the last four years. God never fails to touch our church during our gathering and my soul is refreshed so abundantly. My body, however, takes a beating as if I were a Piņata.

Last year, I fell ill immediately after the conference and couldn't recover until New Year's Day. This time around, I braced myself for the worst. "God, it's okay if I get sick until spring. Just bless our church." But instead of falling sick at the conclusion, the physical trial came during the conference.

In preparation for Life 2000, my daily routine consisted of working all-day long and heading straight to church immediately afterwards. At the end of tedious three-hour rehearsals, I would go home exhausted, ready to receive the gratification that my warm bed would provide. I'm no Bill Murray spending Groundhog Day in Punxatauny, but the next day would be the repeat of the previous. This went on for a little more than a week.

In the mist of the crazy schedule, my prayer was for God to show me more of His heart for our church. That He would break my heart with the things that break His heart. That He would give me tears for the things that make Him cry. It was an intimidating and scary prayer request at the beginning, but as God was answering my request, I realized what a blessing it is to have a burden for my dear Emmanuel family.

As my heart became increasingly anguished over the trials that my brothers and sisters were going through, my excitement for Life Conference grew more intense. I wanted God to do something really special during those three nights. I wanted to see lives being changed. I wanted to see our Emmanuel family worship without pride and without self-consciousness.

Meanwhile, my body was shutting down on me. By Thursday night, my engine was running on fumes. My right leg, which needs to provide a firm and steady beat of the bass drum, was cramping up on a regular basis. My contacts were drier than the Sahara Desert and my arms felt like I went weight lifting with my small group leader Scott. It was a pathetic sight.

In the corporate prayer time, I wanted to cry out to God that He would wash away our worldliness and soften our calluses. During worship time, I wanted every beat of the drum to be a call for our church to march courageously. But instead, my body could barely stay alert during prayer time and my drumming was a struggle just to stay on beat.

When Pastor Paul would yell, "just the drums!" I was yelling inside, "oh, nooooooooooo! Emmanuel is already rhythmically challenged. We don't need a narcoleptic drummer to throw people off even more. Lord, have mercy!"

I remember praying to the Lord immediately before Saturday night's meeting. My heart cried out in desperation, "Lord, my body is so tired. I can't even think straight. You know that I want to do my absolute best for you - give it all I have when I serve you. I want so badly to see a revival occur in our church. But the weight of that burden is something I cannot carry. I can't handle even a portion of it because it's crushing me." There, God ministered to my heart.

He was telling me that the burden I was trying to carry for Emmanuel is too much for me to bear. I need to trust that in His time, there will be revival sparked by the sovereign work of the Holy Spirit. My role is to just walk with Him and be faithful in my service to His people, even to the point of physical exhaustion.

So, Life 2000 was a humbling experience for me. Yet, I feel greatly encouraged to continue serving God because I saw through my dry contacts great things that He was doing. God reminded us of our need for the gospel through our speaker, Pastor Rich Craven from Church of the Savior. I also feel so thankful that He would minister to me personally, not despite my fatigue but through it.