When your mind will not slow down, it can feel exhausting in a way that is hard to explain. Your body might be still, but your thoughts keep moving. You try to rest, but your head fills with reminders, worries, conversations, plans, and fears. One thought leads to another and then another. Before you know it, you feel overwhelmed and worn out, even if you have not done anything yet.
You want to pray, but it feels hard to focus. You want peace, but your mind keeps running back to everything you need to do, everything you forgot to do, and everything you are trying to figure out. It can make you feel distant, distracted, and tired.
God understands what it feels like to carry a restless heart.
In Psalm 94:19 it says, “In the multitude of my anxieties within me, Your comforts delight my soul.” That verse does not pretend that the thoughts are not there. It says a multitude. A mind full. Thoughts layered on top of each other. And right in the middle of that, God’s comfort is still present.
You do not have to wait for your mind to be perfectly calm to come to God. You can come with all the noise. You can come with every anxious thought. You can come when you feel scattered.
Isaiah 26:3 says, “You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in You.” Peace is not something you force. It is something God holds for you. When your thoughts start running in every direction, you can gently bring your attention back to Him again and again. Even if it lasts only a few seconds at a time.
2 Corinthians 10:5 says we can bring “every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.” That does not mean you will never have anxious thoughts. It means you are allowed to hand them over, one by one. Every fear. Every pressure. Every what if. You do not have to carry them all by yourself.
And in Philippians 4:7, there is this promise: “The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.” Not peace that makes sense. Not peace that comes because everything is figured out. Peace that stands guard over your mind when it feels like too much.
If your mind will not stop racing, you are not failing. You are human. You are carrying a lot. And God is not standing far away waiting for you to get it together. God is near in the middle of it.
Even if your prayer is just a deep breath.
Even if your prayer is just, God help me.
Even if your thoughts are still loud.
God meets you there, in the middle of the noise, and holds you with a gentleness that does not rush you or shame you.
- Ellie Mont