The "Good Kind" of Tired

Right now I am settling in for a nice Saturday evening. I am exhausted from a day of hauling giant posts, digging giant holes, placing those giant posts in those giant holes, and then taking the dirt that I had just removed to make the hole back in the hole and tamping it with large metal rods. Seems hard to imagine that all that work has a purpose, but it does. Soon that labor will result in a nice new fence.

That kind of labor is tiring, and I am tired; but it is the "good kind" of tired. The kind of tired where you sleep well at night. The kind of tired where you know things have been accomplished. The kind of tired that you know you'll feel again, and you don't mind. Because it is good. Labor with a purpose, labor that leads to something constructive. Labor that is not in vain. My dad declares that this work, "Will make a young man old, and an old man young." He has a point, it is hard to be a boy, do that work and stay a boy, but yet a man that works hard can stay younger longer, than if he allows his body to become weak and plump.

The psalmist says: "For thou shalt eat the labor of thy hands: Happy shalt thou be, and it shall be well with thee." Labor should make one happy. But it is not just labor that is physical in nature that can please the soul. Labor that is of a mental or spiritual nature can result in that "good kind" of tired. Similar to the physical work, if one exercises one's mind it may result in extended life, or at least their mind may stay sharper longer.

God has set for us a spiritual labor. He has given us fields to harvest. "And let us not be weary in well-doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not." We have plenty of time to rest our weary eyes, and soothe our aching backs. Let us work while the day is here, for soon we will have no more time to labor.