Are You Tired of the Grind of Adulthood?
Life can be hard, and the constant pressures can wear you down. When this happens, turn to Paul's words in Colossians 3.
“Dad, I think I like being a kid and don’t want to be an adult. They do too much work.”
I couldn’t help but laugh as I heard these words from my oldest son, Zeke, because I found it hard to disagree. There is a sort of mental fatigue that can set in with adulthood. So many pressures, so many commitments, and so little “me-time.”
This weight carries over into our spiritual lives.
To quote Daniel Henderson for the two thousandth time, “The hardest part of being a Christian is that it is so daily.” You wake up, go to work, and be there for your family. And if you’re not careful, the weight of these daily pressures can rob you of your joy in Christ.
Perhaps one reason we wrestle as we do is that we realize our role in this universe is not nearly as large as our minds would lead us to believe. In the words of Miroslav Volf, “Humans are neither the Alpha nor the Omega. We are and always will be in the middle of the story.”[1] And it’s in this messy middle that the grind of life can take its toll.
I first noticed this toll in my early thirties.
It wasn’t one thing, but rather a combination. The church I’d started in my twenties closed, I switched careers, and due to struggling with depression, I had the hardest time sitting in church—dark settings, loud music, and bright lights still set me off.
Life wasn’t always this way, and there was a time when I loved everything bigger, faster, louder. “The speed of the leader is the speed of the team,” “always call your people to something bigger than themselves,” and “have a vision so big it scares you,” were all common mantras I embraced.
When I was a pastor, I had a natural motivation to read my Bible, pray, and live a strong personal life of integrity. Stepping away from the limelight put this commitment to the test. Like every Christian, I’ve experienced my share of church hurt, hypocritical Christians, and general wariness of leaders who say one thing in public and then act another way in private.
You could say I feel the grind of life more deeply today than I ever have. While difficult, one thing it’s done is it’s made me much more empathetic.
As a pastor, I thought in much more general, simplistic terms. I assumed the guy at church who never seemed to engage just couldn’t commit, rather than recognize he was doing everything he could to just show up. I was quicker to offer solutions to the skeptic who had questions about God’s existence than I was to hear their story. And I spent far too much time thinking about how a person could help “fulfill the mission of my church” rather than simply being a friend.
It took stepping away from a full-time role and having dozens of conversations with people not as their pastor, but as their fellow Christian running buddy, for God to shift my perspective. And along the way, God began to confront the ways I had viewed people as metrics on a board, rather than as relationships to build.
So if you’re in the grind of life and you feel like you’re losing your way, I don’t have any profound words of wisdom for you today, but I would offer Paul’s words in Colossians 3 as a building block.
The Power of the Gospel
In verses 1-3, he writes, 1 “So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. 3 For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”
Theologian Peter O’Brien writes, “Because the readers have been raised with Christ, their lives are to be different: they have no life of their own since their life is the life of Christ. So their interests must be his interests.”[2]
For someone who has been raised with Christ, the natural progression should be to do as Verse 5 instructs and “put to death what belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desire, and greed, which is idolatry.” In place of these attitudes, they should, as verses 12-14 state,
12 “put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, 13 bearing with one another and forgiving one another if anyone has a grievance against another. Just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you are also to forgive. 14 Above all, put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity.”
In verses 18-22, Paul shows how this changes every form of relationship—both family and work. “Paul’s main concern,” David Garland writes, “is not that these virtues be joined together in a perfect unity. Instead, he is concerned about diverse individuals—Greek, Jew, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free—being joined together in one community.”[3]
Paul wants them to realize that the gospel really is for everyone. It breaks down all societal barriers and brings people together in a way that nothing else can. It’s good news that works in bad times and in good. In the joys of life, and in the grind.
Here’s Why This Matters
The longer you’re a Christian, the more resolute you will need to become that Christ really is enough and that living in community is life-giving. People can be mean, life will knock you down, and the enemy of your soul will do all he can to root out the good work God has started in your life.
Maybe you’ll hit a wall of depression, struggle with demobilizing anxiety, or live with a sense of perpetual hopelessness for months on end.
If this is your current reality, stand firm.
“Put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.” Bear others’ burdens, go deeper in your love, and do all you can to live in unity with others.
Recognize that in the grind, God is not only revealing the depth of your character and getting to the core of your true motivations, but he is also building you into something far greater than just a better version of yourself. He’s helping you become more like him. He’s systematically using the pains and toils of this life to prepare you, his beloved child, to spend eternity with him.
Don’t resist this process. Let it shape and establish you. And keep your eyes on Jesus.
[1] Miroslav Volf and Ryan McAnnally-Linz, The Home of God: A Brief Story of Everything (Theology for the Life of the World) (Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos Press, 2022), Kindle ed., p. 20.
[2] Peter T. O’Brien, Colossians, Philemon, vol. 44, Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1982), 160.
[3] David E. Garland, Colossians and Philemon, eds. Terry C. Muck, The NIV Application Commentary. Accordance electronic ed. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998), 211.
