Eagles or Hens

When we think we ready to mount up with wings like eagles and end up waddling on the ground like an overweight hen, it might be a good time to get on the roost for a spell and figure things out.  Many have been the times when we see something that needs doing for the Lord, find ourselves filled with a desire to get at it, and do for awhile only to just run out of steam way before the work is done.  In those moments it appears to us that we are not nearly as faithful to God as we thought in the beginning.    

It is likely in such moments that we have forgotten some of the basic things about Christian ministry or service.  If our service is driven by human need, we are candidates for exhaustion.  There is always going to be one more mouth to feed, one more thirsty soul in need of a drink, and one more caught up in some catastrophic moment of life.  No matter how many it is that we offer care and compassion, there will be another.  If our service or ministry is need based, we are not going to make it.    

The measure of our faithfulness to God is not found in what we do, but why we do it.  I Corinthians 13 is a wonderful chapter of Scripture, but one often forgotten by those of as we get caught up in acts of service.  "If I speak in the tongues of men and angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong...If I give away all my possessions....but do not have love, I gain nothing."  (Corinthians 13:1-3).  The real measure of our faithfulness is not what we do, but our love for God.  If we do what we do because of God's love, then we "shall mount up with wings like eagles,...run and not be weary."  (Isaiah 40:31).  The inexhaustible need will finally wear us out, but the inexhaustible love of God will always strengthen us.