There comes a time in your life when you’re chugging along enjoying the ride, despite the bugs in your teeth, when suddenly your engine starts to sputter. As you coast haphazardly to the shoulder you realize there’s just not much left in you. You thought your life was full, but as you look around and see you’re stranded out in the middle of nowhere you realize the truth. You’ve been running on empty.
I can remember the moment I knew my tank was about to run dry, and as I sat all alone in my large, new home I felt so very small. Heck, I felt empty. Although my stomach was full of beer, and my lungs were full of chain-smoked Marlboros, I felt like a dried out leaf on the pavement. I was just waiting for a stiff wind to blow me away.
Something funny happens when you decide to go at life on your own. You realize just how little you can travel on your own devices. Sure, sometimes like myself you speed along for a decade, all across the world, but eventually you find yourself sitting alone in a corner, and you feel like the weight of the world you’ve been traveling is just too heavy to bear any longer.
I can remember lighting up another cigarette, and taking a long pull from my Miller Light, and I almost choked. It wasn’t the brew, or even the smoke; it was the lump that sat in my throat. Like an elephant depression sat on my chest, and I just didn’t think I could go any farther. In fact, I didn’t want to. And I sometimes wonder what would have happened at that moment had I had a gun in my hand. I think I would have pulled the trigger.
I’ve been on both sides of the fence of life, and there’s a lot of things I do not know. But there is one thing I believe to my very core, and without a shadow of doubt am certain. If given the choice between living life my own way or serving Jesus, I would choose him every time. Life just seems to make more sense, to have meaning, and even when bad stuff happens, because it will; it just somehow seems easier when you’re not alone.
Addiction fuels your depression, but it does it in a most tricky way. It acts in a guise of helping you to cope, and you never even notice that it’s dragging you further down. By the time you do you’re so far down you can’t even see the light of day.
Distance from God is an easy thing to do, and it seems like each step you take away from his presence makes you numb to the innate longing in your heart for a savior. It’s always there, but you don’t even know what it is. So you quell it with booze or sex, or whatever you choose. And you just keep walking away.
One day you wake up from your trance cause you’re sitting on the side of the road with nowhere to go, and no way to get there if you did know. You can only run on empty for so long, you know?
It seems there is only one true fuel in this crazy thing called life, and it’s the blood. I weep; it’s the blood.
You can waste so many years filling yourself with frivolous things, and what I wouldn’t give to have that time back. To be able to fill myself with the joy that comes from relationship with him.
Maybe it sounds silly. Or maybe you’re the lonely one, surrounded by crowds of people, but lonely nonetheless. Maybe you’re searching, and maybe you’re tired of running on empty.
The cool thing is that when you finally breakdown in the middle of nowhere you will not be alone. He’s always there. We’re the ones who run.
Denise says
I am so glad that you found Him because you fill so many with joy, hope and help us strengthen our faith, Brie. God has a special plan for each of us and I truly believe that you are fulfilling yours for Him. God bless you abundantly as you continue to help us nourish our souls.
brieann.rn@gmail.com says
Thank you so much. Your encouragement is a blessing to me.