Stretch Out Our Hands

Acts 17:27 “His purpose was for the nations to seek after God and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him—though he is not far from any one of us.”

When we get overwhelmed with all there is to do, we can easily give up and shut down. When we are rushing to finish something last minute, everything else seems to happen as well. Stress takes over and we look for an escape route. Emotions kick in and we begin to feel guilty or angry or sad.

Getting overwhelmed can cause stress. We may have too much to do because of poor planning and saying yes to others all the time. We can’t do everything and be everything to everyone. Knowing what we are supposed to be doing, planning ahead and learning to say no will help us not to get overwhelmed with things in the future.

Another cause of getting overwhelmed is addictions. We all have our escape that we go to when we need to get away whether it’s television, the computer, hobbies, alcohol, drugs, etc. These escape routes can get us off track and keep us from doing what we need to be doing. Then when the time comes to have something completed, we are in that overwhelmed stage again trying to get it all done.

We can get overwhelmed with emotions as well. Emotions can cripple us at times. Fear can cause us to freeze and do nothing. Sorrow can make us feel so down that we don’t feel like carrying on. Guilt can consume us and lock us down so we aren’t thinking clearly.

It would be a good idea to track when we are overwhelmed and think about what happened, why it happened and how we can do things better next time. It could be that we should have started earlier on a project. It could be that we should have said no to something that we agreed to do. It could be that we spent too much time playing games on the computer for a few nights. It could be that we can’t get over someone that has hurt us and get it out of our minds. Thinking back on things that didn’t go well will help us to learn.

The best thing to do when we get overwhelmed is to know that God is not far away from any one of us. We need to stretch out our hands so that he can take it and lead us to do what he feels is most important. He knows all that we have to do and will guide us to do what needs to be done. Some things we think are important to us may not be important to him. God can help us to see the big picture of why we are here and he can help us to get back on track if we stretch out our hands to him. God’s purpose is for us to seek after him, find him and include him in all that we do. When we stretch out our hands to him, we will allow us to stretch out our hands to help others.