Church Worker Wellness – Week 55 devotion: Emotional wellness

“Building Up the Body: Worker-to-Worker” is a series of church worker wellness devotions. Visit lcms.org/wellness for more resources.

By Darrell Zimmerman, pastor and program director at Grace Place Wellness

Easter is for YOU

When the end of Lent draws near, Easter is upon us. Church workers plan for months and months.

There are great hopes and expectations for the best Wednesday Lenten series ever, hopes for being well-prepared for Holy Week long before it arrived, and hopes that this year you’d take care of yourself and your own family before trying to take care of everyone else.

What you offer up in service to His kingdom smells like Jesus to our Father in Heaven.

I hope you remain excited for Easter and all of its celebration [though our celebrations are different this year, due to gathering restrictions]. Jesus’ resurrection is worthy of celebration!

Satan would love for you to feel discouraged and disappointed about the planning and stress, rather than focused on what God has done for YOU.

When we plan and when we prep, God intends the same wonderful peace we communicate to those around us, that comes only from Jesus, for each of us.

I’m not sure how you’re feeling about yourself, but I have no doubt at all how the Lord Jesus feels about you.

He loves you. He has already forgiven your past failures, mistakes and sins. He’s wiped your fingerprints off of everything you’ve done, and His shine.

He sends out the great good news of that perfect love through you, with all those you encounter.

If you’re feeling not quite up to the task, that’s good. That’s a great, dependent place to be. He’ll carry you and bless your proclamation.

Christmas, Easter, and the Cross is for YOU. Christ is with YOU this week and every week.

The Rev. Dr. Darrell Zimmerman was called in 2012 to serve as the first full-time program director of Grace Place Wellness Ministries. Zimmerman and his wife, Carol, attended the first Grace Place retreat in 1999, and he has 30-plus years of parish pastoral experience.

“Building Up the Body: Worker-to-Worker” devotions and prayers will be released Monday mornings on the LCMS Facebook and Twitter pages. Church Worker Wellness devotions will also be archived online.

LCMS church workers and their families are invited to offer encouragement to other workers and families by submitting a 500-word devotion for the Synod’s worker-to-worker wellness devotion series. Email questions and submissions to workerwellness@lcms.org.