From the beginning of time, God’s Story has had time for work and time for rest.
After the time of Creation, God had a time of Rest and Sabbath; not because He was tired, but because He wanted to lead His Creation finding the Rhythm of Life. To not only Exhale (Creation) but also Inhale (Sabbath).
In the Ten Commandments, God invites us to “Remember the Sabbath Day to keep it Holy.” Remember… as if we would tend to forget… which we often do!
In the three short years of the life of Jesus, we find Jesus regularly slipping away from the busyness of ministry to be alone. To Pray! To Remember! To Inhale!
Even though we see multiple messages in the Bible on the importance of finding the sacred rhythms of life, too many times we try to exhale… and exhale… and exhale… until we are exhausted (like we talked about last week!). Our bodies are not designed to exhale ALL the time. In the same way, our souls are not designed to exhale all the time.
Have you noticed whenever you are swamped and double-booked with life and you exhaustedly say to your friends, “I am SO stinkin’ busy!” instead of giving you the sympathy that you were hoping for, they just begin to tell you how busy THEY are! It’s like the busier we are… the more important we are! So, we just put our head down and work harder and exhale more!
Question: How’s that working for you?
Finding times of Sabbath Rest means finding times to stop what we are doing so we can inhale the life-giving Spirit of God. Wayne Muller, in his book, Sabbath, says this: In the relentless busyness of modern life, we have lost the rhythm between work and rest. Doing something – anything – is better than doing nothing. Because of our desire to succeed, to meet these ever-growing expectations, we do not rest. Because we do not rest, we lose our way. And for want of rest, our lives are in danger.
Even if you can’t imagine carving out an entire day of Sabbath, what if you could begin during Lent to find bits and pieces of Sabbath?
On your ride home from work or school.
A brief prayer of thanks before a meal.
When is the best time for you to grab a moment of Sabbath?
