A couple of years ago, I signed up for a major bicycling event - the Lu Lack Wyco Hundo metric century. Miles and miles of countryside, gravel, and grueling hills. I didn’t know what I was really getting into, but I went for it anyway.
Some of the hills were short and sharp; others were just long, slow ascents. I attacked ‘the wall’ and made it, huffing and puffing, but wholly elated! I scarfed a waffle and chugged my way up a long drag. The scenery was breathtaking, the new friendships were energizing, and the rest stops were like a small oasis in the desert. It was an amazing day.
And then came ‘the hill.’ The longest on the route, and surprisingly steep. It was too long to walk and I had no choice but to keep on riding. I think most athletes have felt how I felt a time or two - where the work is so hard and so grueling you end up in a deep, dark, internal cave, affectionately (or not so affectionately) known as the hurt locker.
I don’t remember much of the scenery along that hill. My new friends dropped off, one by one, taking breaks, walking, or veering off on alternate routes. They did what they needed to do to survive the hill.
All I remember is being alone with my darkness, the burning, the fast, shallow breaths, and the exhaustion when I got to the top. We were ‘supposed’ to celebrate with tacos and Coke, but my stomach was in knots, my legs limp like wet noodles, and my head pounding from the efforts. For a moment, I wondered how I would finish the route. I didn’t want to be embarrassed and have to call for the SAG wagon to drive me back to the finish line.
And then, out of the blue, I found friends that I didn’t even know were there that day. A crew from my local bike club showed up just when I needed reinforcements, and helped me feel refreshed and ready to go again. Before long, we were chatting, sharing stories, flying down gravelly descents, and taking pictures of the farms around us.
This is exactly what happens in our pursuit of social justice. We start with “Holy Anger” and an internal fire, ready to dismantle the cliffs of poverty, racism, and exclusion. But the terrain is vast and steep, and the hills never end. The roots of systemic poverty run deep. And if we aren’t careful, we hit a wall where compassion turns into apathy—not because we’ve lost our morals, but because we’ve lost our breath and burned out.
The Circuit Breaker of the Soul
In the world of social justice, we often talk about burnout, but I prefer the term Compassion Fatigue. It is the state where your heart has seen so much suffering and felt so much indignation that it simply shuts down to protect itself.
When we look at the news and see the stagnant water of apathy in our systems—when we see children in poverty, the exclusion of our LGBTQ+ siblings, or the “thorns” of a church that prefers fences over open tables—it is overwhelming. If we try to carry the weight of the entire system on our shoulders, our internal circuit breaker flips.
We become immune. We walk past the unhoused neighbor without making eye contact. We stop speaking up when we hear the racist joke because we just don’t have the energy for the fight today. We become the “polite Christians” we promised we wouldn’t be, just so we can get through the week without shattering.
The question is: How do we stay aware of the needs without becoming a casualty of them?
We often imagine Jesus as a tireless engine of compassion, but the Gospels show us a man who was acutely aware of his own limits. He was the ultimate “weed-puller,” yet he was also the master of the “exit.”
In Mark 4, after a long day of teaching and healing—a day of intense output toward the marginalized—Jesus tells his disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.” He literally leaves the crowd mid-need. He gets in a boat and falls so deeply asleep that even a storm doesn’t wake him.
Jesus knew that to stay “soft-hearted” for the Woman at the Well or the Gerasene man, he had to be “hard-edged” about his rest. He understood that apathy is the shadow side of over-functioning. When you try to be the Sun, you eventually burn out and leave everyone in the dark.
But when you realize you are just a gardener tending one specific patch, you can stay in the dirt for the long haul.
The Samaritan and the SAG Wagon
If we are honest, most of us read the story of the Good Samaritan and immediately cast ourselves in the lead role. We want to be the one with the oil and the wine, the one with the extra donkey and the bottomless bank account. We want to be the hero who sees the need, jumps in to help, and fixes the brokenness.
But in the hurt locker of systemic injustice, we often find ourselves identifying more with the religious elite who walked by on the other side.
The priest and the Levite are usually the villains of the story, the polite Christians who value their own ritual purity over a human life. But I wonder if, on that particular day, they were simply in the middle of their own grueling metric century. I wonder if their hearts were so limp and their heads pounding from the sheer effort of maintaining their systems that they simply didn’t have the capacity to stop.
When you are in the hurt locker, your peripheral vision disappears. You can’t see the neighbor in the ditch because you are focused entirely on the two inches of gravel in front of your tire. You aren’t being evil; you are being depleted.
Apathy often starts as a survival mechanism for people who have forgotten how to ask for help.
Learning to be the One in the Ditch
To stay soft-hearted in a world of weeds, we have to do the one thing strong activists hate to do: We have to be willing to be the person in the ditch.
The magic of the Lu Lack Wyco Hundo wasn’t that I gritted my teeth and conquered the hill alone. The magic was that I was failing, and a crew showed up to pull me out of my internal cave. They were my “Good Samaritans” on two wheels. They didn’t judge my limp legs; they just rode beside me until the wind was back in my lungs.
In social justice work, we often treat the marginalized as projects to be fixed, which is just another way of building a fence. But the Good Samaritan story reminds us that we are all part of the same ecosystem of care. Sometimes you are the one with the bandages; sometimes you are the one bleeding on the side of the road.
If you refuse to be the one in the ditch—if you refuse to admit when you are burning out or when you need a “SAG wagon” to carry you for a few miles—you will eventually become the person who walks by on the other side. You will become immune to others’ suffering because you have become immune to your own.
Breaking the Numbness
If you feel yourself becoming immune to the suffering around you, it is likely that you’ve been riding solo for too long. You’ve been trying to “Hundo” your way through social justice without a crew.
To stay aware without burning out, we must practice three “Survival Rhythms”:
1. The Rhythm of the SAG Wagon (Humility)
There is no shame in the SAG wagon. In the Kingdom of God, admitting you can’t finish the hill on your own isn’t failure; it’s honesty. To stay soft, you have to allow others to minister to you. If you are always the helper, you are actually maintaining a position of power that keeps you separate from the outcasts you claim to love.
2. The Rhythm of the Crew (Solidarity)
Social justice is not an individual sport. We need the “bike club”—the friends who show up when our stomach is in knots, and our head is pounding. We stay aware of the world's needs by staying connected to each other's needs. When one person is in the hurt locker, the rest of the crew provides the draft.
3. The Rhythm of the Tacos and Coke (Celebration)
Even if you can’t stomach the celebration immediately, don’t skip it. We fight the bindweed because we love the flowers. If we lose our capacity for the magic of the finish line—for the joy of a small victory or the beauty of a farm at sunset—our justice work becomes a chore rather than a calling. Joy is the oxygen that keeps the slow-burning coal of Holy Anger from going out.
Conclusion: The Long Descent
Social justice is a marathon through the mud, and some of the hills are steeper than we ever imagined. Staying aware of the world's needs is a radical act of vulnerability. It means keeping your heart “unfenced” even when it hurts.
But remember: you are not the Savior of the garden, and you aren’t the only rider on the course.
The God who meets Hagar in the desert is the same God who sends a crew of bikers to find you in your darkness. You don’t have to be the Sun. You just have to be a gardener who knows when to ask for a lopper, a cyclist who knows when to draft off someone else’s wheel, and when to get in the boat and go to the other side of the lake for a rest.
The Garden is in good hands. And sometimes, the most “faithful” thing you can do for the world is to stop at the next oasis, scarf a waffle, and wait for your friends to catch up.
The Garden Notes
📚 On the Nightstand
This month, I’m looking to read God of the Oppressed by James H. Cone. Because we all need to think about the Bible from the perspective of the oppressed to get a fuller understanding of what social justice really is, especially in our current political climate that is rife wiht racism.
🌿 From the Shop
If you want to take this week’s reflection deeper into your own life, I designed the Cultivating the Word specifically for this
“We become immune to the suffering of others when we refuse to acknowledge the ‘hurt locker’ in our own souls. Sustainability isn’t about being a hero; it’s about being a neighbor who knows how to both give and receive a draft.” — Grace in the Weeds
The Greenhouse Preview
If Tuesday’s article felt like a confession from the ‘hurt locker,’ Friday’s Greenhouse is the gear-check for the long haul. For my paid subscribers, we’re doing a ‘Draft & Fuel’ Audit and practicing a Liturgy for the One in the Ditch—tools to help you stop trying to be the Savior and start being a neighbor. Upgrade today to get your survival kit for the long descent.
The Closing Question
When was the last time you had to admit you were in the ‘hurt locker’? Who was the ‘bike club’ that showed up to help you finish the route? Let’s talk about the beauty of needing each other in the weeds.
P.S. If you are in between churches, or just don’t feel comfortable attending a physical building, but you are looking for something more, join us at Streams of Grace. You are welcome here!
