Tending the Roots: When You Realize You’ve Been Languishing

“How am I really doing—spiritually, emotionally, mentally, and physically?”

That is the question I have found myself sitting with lately.

And if I am being honest, I am struggling in all of the above.

Ever since I started teaching Christine Caine’s The Faith to Flourish Bible study, I feel like God has been walking me through each week’s lesson personally.

Not just teaching it.

Living it.

And lately, I feel like I am drowning.

Not necessarily because one catastrophic thing has happened, but because life has felt relentless. Before I can catch my breath from one thing, something else erupts and demands my attention, my energy, my emotions.

And somewhere in the middle of all that doing, surviving, teaching, working, helping, serving, and managing life, I have come face-to-face with a painful realization:

I have not been delighting myself in Jesus.

When the Rhythm Changes

I moved in May of this year, and since then, I have struggled to find a new rhythm with Jesus.

I struggle to read His Word.

I struggle to write.

I struggle to be still.

Even the things that once helped me connect with God have felt harder to reach.

And I know Jesus hasn't moved.

But somehow, I have found myself buried underneath the weight of everything else.

There are days when I feel like I can't get a moment to breathe before something unexpected happens and takes whatever little energy I have left.

So I survive.

I handle what is in front of me.

I keep going.

And eventually, survival begins to feel normal.

But survival and flourishing are not the same thing.

Sometimes we can still be functioning on the outside while something underneath the surface is slowly drying out.

Languishing

There is a word for what I have been experiencing:

Languishing.

Not completely falling apart.

Not completely giving up.

But not flourishing either.

Just... existing.

Going through the motions.

Doing what needs to be done.

Trying to keep everything from falling apart while quietly realizing that something inside of me needs care.

And when I become overwhelmed, I recognize an old survival instinct beginning to rise again:

Disappear.

Hide.

Pull away.

Shut down.

Get somewhere where no one needs anything from me.

It is a familiar response for me. When everything feels like too much, hiding feels safer than tending to what hurts.

But this week, I felt God asking me something different.

What if you stopped running from what hurts and tended to it instead?

Tending the Roots

The problem is, when I look at my life right now, it feels like everything hurts.

Spiritually.

Emotionally.

Mentally.

Physically.

So where do you begin when everything seems to need tending?

I don't think Jesus is asking me to fix everything at once.

I think He is inviting me back to the root.

Back to Him.

I keep hearing this thought in my spirit:

Jesus had compassion on the crowds and began to teach them.

Mark 6 tells us that when Jesus saw the crowd, He had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd.

And what did He do?

“So he began teaching them many things.”—Mark 6:34

That stopped me.

Because I often think of compassion as rest, comfort, relief, or someone taking something off my plate.

But Jesus looked at people who were weary, scattered, and needy, and one of the ways He showed them compassion was by giving them truth.

His Word.

And suddenly I began wondering:

What if opening my Bible right now isn't another responsibility?

What if it is an act of self-compassion?

What if listening to Scripture while I drive is tending my roots?

What if meditating on one verse instead of trying to read five chapters is tending my roots?

What if sitting quietly with Jesus for ten minutes isn't one more thing on my to-do list, but medicine for a soul that has become exhausted from constantly doing?

Maybe the Word of God isn't another demand on my already overwhelmed life.

Maybe it is part of the cure for the sickness of busyness that has been polluting it.

Delight Before Discipline

Psalm 1 describes the person who flourishes:

“But whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night. That person is like a tree planted by streams of water…”—Psalm 1:2–3

I have read that Scripture many times.

But this time, one word stands out:

Delight.

Not perform.

Not accomplish.

Not prove.

Not push harder.

Delight.

I think somewhere along the way, my relationship with Jesus became another place where I felt behind.

I should be reading more.

I should be praying more.

I should be writing.

I should be hearing God more clearly.

I should be doing better.

But you cannot shame a thirsty tree into flourishing.

You water it.

You tend the soil.

You give attention to the roots.

You bring it back to the source that gives it life.

And maybe that is what Jesus is asking of me right now.

Not to become stronger.

Not to try harder.

Not to pretend that I am flourishing when I am actually languishing.

Just to come back to the water.

Jesus, Come Find Me

There is something humbling about realizing you need rescuing again.

I have walked with Jesus long enough to know His faithfulness. I know His Word. I have seen Him bring me through wilderness seasons before.

And yet here I am again.

Feeling blind.

Feeling overwhelmed.

Feeling like I somehow fell into a pit while I was busy taking care of everything else.

And I need my Savior to come find me.

Maybe you understand that feeling.

Maybe you love Jesus deeply, but lately you haven't felt close to Him.

Maybe life has become so loud that His voice feels distant.

Maybe you have been taking care of everyone and everything while ignoring the quiet ache underneath the surface.

Maybe you are functioning.

Showing up.

Working.

Serving.

Parenting.

Helping.

Smiling.

But deep down, you know:

I am languishing.

If that is where you are, perhaps the invitation isn't to fix your whole life today.

Maybe the invitation is simply to tend the roots.

Drink from the water again.

Open the Word—not because you need to check a spiritual box, but because your soul deserves to hear the voice of the One who loves you.

Sit with Jesus.

Tell Him where it hurts.

Let Him tend the places you don't know how to tend yourself.

Because flourishing isn't something we manufacture.

It grows from abiding.

“Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine.”—John 15:4

So today, I am not promising Jesus that I will do better.

I am simply admitting:

Lord, I need You.

I need You spiritually.

I need You emotionally.

I need You mentally.

I need You physically.

I need You in the places where I am exhausted and in the places where survival has taken over again.

I don't know how to tend everything that hurts.

So, Jesus, meet me at the roots.

Find me here.

Pull me out of the pit.

Lead me back to the water.

And teach me how to delight in You again.