Rest typically comes last for me. Rest comes after the chores are done and the errands are run. Rest comes after every item on my to-do is checked off. I rest once my obligations and responsibilities are accomplished.
This approach to rest, however, is not God’s way. It’s not his way for himself, and it’s not the way he desires for us. Sure, God rested on the seventh day, after he’d created light and oceans, the stars in the sky and the land beneath our feet. But the fact is, God took that day of rest in the middle of his work. God is still working. He is still creating. He took a day of rest after six days of work, and then, he took up his work again.
Somewhere along the line, I forgot about this rhythm. I forgot that God desires that our work be punctuated with rest, even when our work is not finished.
Last week I picked up Shelly Miller’s new book Rhythms of Rest: Finding the Spirit of Sabbath in a Busy World. I’d already read her book this past summer, when I received an advance copy in order to write an endorsement. I enjoyed Rhythms of Rest immensely the first time I read it, but truth be told, the reason I picked it up again last week was that I knew I was going to write this blog post to go along with a giveaway, and I wanted to refresh my memory.
I didn’t expect to read Rhythms of Rest cover-to-cover again. I didn’t expect it to impact me so deeply. I didn’t expect it to change my weekend…and my life.
Here’s the truth: I was all in on Sabbath rest a couple of years ago. I believed in it and was committed to it. But somehow, as weeks passed into months and months passed into years, I chipped away at the edges of my Sabbath practice until finally, there was nothing left. Without even being aware of it, my Sundays became another day of chores, errands, social media and catching up on email.
These past few months, I’ve come to understand in a new and deeper way that what God desires most is relationship with us. He doesn’t care nearly as much about what we do and what we accomplish as he does about who we are, and, more specifically, about who we are in relationship with him. God wants us to know him; it’s really as simple as that.
What I’ve come to understand – and what Shelly’s book reiterated for me — is that in order to know God in the way he desires, we need to make space and time for him. And in order to make space and time for him, we have to quiet ourselves. We have to cease our constant busyness, our constant doing and accomplishing.
Practicing Sabbath rest makes time and space for us to be in relationship with God.
Shelly puts it like this:
“How much of our faith journey is firsthand experience and not just what we know about him? Information helps us know about God, but Sabbath allows us to encounter him.”
Sabbath allows us to encounter God.
This past Sunday I intentionally practiced Sabbath rest for first time in a long, long time. I sat with my son Noah on the back patio and talked as we ate lunch. I leisurely walked the dog around a nearby lake and admired the changing leaves and the golden sunlight. I rested in my lounge chair on my back patio, Rhythms of Rest open in my lap. I kept my computer closed and my phone on my nightstand. I didn’t do a single dish for the day until 8:30 p.m.
And you know what? It was the best day I’ve had in a long, long time. It wasn’t special in any extraordinary way. But it was beautiful. It was replenishing and restful. It was Sabbath.
I am delighted to be able to give away TWO copies of Shelly Miller’s delightful book Rhythms of Rest. Enter the random drawing below for a chance to win {email readers: click here and scroll to the bottom of the post to enter the drawing}:
Shelly Miller is a veteran ministry leader and sought-after mentor on Sabbath-keeping. She leads the 