The sky is grey and my mood is grey as I try and wrestle out some insipid piece of writing about the properties of granite and stony hearts and God’s promise of hearts of flesh.

I open a fresh blank writing field, muster all my honesty, and try again.

My frustration comes from the fact that some metaphor about what my stony heart is, doesn’t cut quickly enough to the why my stony heart is.

That is, most days, I am so immensely wearied by the world.

I’m not angry, or indignant, or offended by the evil that closes in around us as I should be.

I am simply weary.

And in my weariness, all I find is a desperate hum of a prayer underlying the comings and goings of each of my days:

Yes, Lord, I know my heart is stony. Can’t you see why? I’m too tired to feel anything. I’m exhausted by the onslaught of information I’m presented with day in, day out. My eyes and ears are assaulted all day long by images and videos of politics and politicians, and content creators making jokes, and house renovations, and travel vlogs, and cats being pranked, and parenting advice, and celebrity drama, and, and, and, and, and …

the information keeps coming and coming and coming and never ends.

And yes, I know it comes by very own hand, swiping next, switching apps, swiping over and over again.

And the day ends, and I am numb. I have no capacity to feel anymore.

And I know You call me into relationship, relationship with You and relationship with others. But the thought of spending one more ounce of energy in Your Word, or on my neighbours, or friends, or even my family, seems only a promise to drain me of what little energy I have left. So, I hoard it for myself and enter the cycle of scrolling mindlessly once again, heart hardening a little more.

But my thoughts don’t always tell me the truth, and I need You correct my wayward thinking.

I need you to remind me that You do promise a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 36:26), one that is warm and alive and feels and cares deeply for the sorrow of the world.

I need You to remind me that though the internet never sleeps, neither do You (Psalm 121:3-4). I can reach for You as often and as frequently as I do my phone and You will be there.

I need You to remind me that You promise to renew the strength of those who place their trust in You (Isaiah 40:31) and that Your plan for your beloved humans is a life filled with the abundance of Your goodness (John 10:10).

I need You to teach me how to give my time wisely, so that it can be given generously to the flesh and blood lives in my day to day life, not squandered on self-serving activities that will ultimately drain me.

My prayer halts, suspended in the frenzied list of I need Yous.

Having printed my petition onto the page, I wish I could say that all becomes cured, that my world weariness evaporates. But it does not. This prayer is not a magic wand, but more a magnet, and in the uttering I am pulled closer to the heart of God.

Here, in proximity to the warm and beating heart of the Creator of the Universe, the Spirit adds an epilogue to my troubled prayer. A simple line from an old hymn. A statement of what is true and what can be relied upon in this time of constant noise:

There is a place of quiet rest, near to the heart of God.