The weary
need rest the most yet they are the least likely to recognize it. You actually have to come to in order to recognize your need for rest. I love the way Jesus’ words are ordered in
Matthew 10:31: Come to me, all you who are
weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. When I need rest, I literally need to follow
Jesus’ instructions word by word.
First,
I need to come. Rest doesn’t just
happen. I have to come away from what I
am doing to find rest. I have to cease
the frantic direction that consumes my current focus. I am constantly going unless I am
coming. I’m going to places, people and
things that promise contentment but never satisfy. It takes a lot of work for me to stop and
rest, and the only reason I even give it a try is because I come.
In
the act of coming, I come to. I come to
the awareness that I am actually weary.
I get tired of carrying the load myself and trying to make life work on
my own. I get tired of being my own god. I’m not very good at it. I’m sure God is tired of my being my own god
too. I have to come to my senses that
the way I’m trying to make life work is just leaving me weary and in great need
of rest.
It’s
then that I turn from my wearying activities to see the Me behind the voice
that beckons me to come. It is
Jesus. He is there just as He
promised. He is the Son of God. He is the Savior I need. He wants me to have rest and not be
weary.
He
has something to give me, and it is exactly what I need. It is that for which I have been
searching. It is that for which my soul
longs for. I find in Him rest—true,
honest, soul-giving rest. It’s here that
we review all the programs and pipedreams I have been chasing. I see how distorted they are and how much
they keep me from truly enjoying the life I have been given on this earth. I start to notice how nice it is to have free
oxygen to breathe. I walk outside and
see the beauty of the summer and the cool evening breeze that refreshes my
soul. I see that a casual walk with my
dog refreshes my soul.
In
a fallen world, we must work to find rest.
Some of us work for work. I love
how God showed the importance of rest as He rested on the seventh day of
creation. When He formed the nation of
Israel, He gave the gift of rest and Sabbath to them in the commandment to keep
the seventh day holy and the seven years of rest for crops and seven groups of
seven years of rest add up to the Year of Jubilee. God wants to be part of every day, but he
wants me to build in one day to stop the treadmill of work to consider all that
He has given me in the six days before and just enjoy the full moon that fills
the night sky.
Without
rest, I make life way harder than it is meant to be. God cares how I manage my time. Each day I need sleep to stay healthy and
alert. My body was created to find a
rhythm of rest and work.
When
I get to heaven, I will enter God’s complete rest; but here on earth I want to
take all the rest He longs to give me. I
don’t want to miss out on the gift of rest.
Copyright © 2015. Deborah R Newman teatimeforyoursoul.com All Rights Reserved.
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