When I read the opening chapters of the Bible, a simple fact always stands out to me: God rested. After a week of work—a workweek in which he created this world and all that is in it—he rested. It’s not that he was tired and needed to put his feet up or that he was worn out and needed to recharge his creative energy. It’s that he wanted to weave a pattern into the very fabric of this world. He wanted to establish a rhythm of labor that gives way to rest. And if the uncreated and untiring God follows work with rest, then surely created and feeble beings like us need to do the same.
When it came time for God to give his people his commandments, he established this pattern even more explicitly, binding his people to it by law. “Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work…” Of course, many Christians believe that our relationship to the Law has changed following Christ’s death and resurrection, but on this we agree: God gives us rest for spiritual purposes, to teach us to be dependent upon him, to teach us that we can ultimately only ever rest in him, and to teach us that beyond this world there is a place of eternal rest from sin. He teaches us that our rest is not ultimately a day, but a person, not ultimately an occasion, but a Savior.
But God also gives us rest for practical, physical purposes. He gives us rest because we are weak. He gives us rest because we are finite. He gives us rest because we need it and simply cannot thrive without it. We can do more good, bring more blessing, and better serve his cause if we rest. He gives us rest because he loves us, because he cares for us, and because he wants what is best for us. The fact is, God is a big fan of rest!
But here’s the thing: I find that Christians often still feel the need to justify their rest—to offer excuses as to why they are claiming it. They often feel the need to sanctify their rest, to assume that rest needs to somehow be baptized in order to be meaningful, as if the most God-glorifying rest is actually just task-switching from secular work to sacred. Some seem to think that the most holy holiday is the one spent serving at a Christian camp or that the most sanctified Sunday afternoon is the one that leaves them worn down to the nub on Monday morning. They are like children who receive a toy for Christmas, then feel guilty when they play with it and enjoy it!
Do we really need to fill our rest full of “holy” activities for it to be meaningful to the Lord? Is a good holiday the one that leaves us practically burnt out after serving the Lord so hard? Is a good Sunday necessarily the most active Sunday? I see no evidence for this in the Bible. I understand rest to be just that—the cessation of work in order to recover strength and achieve refreshment. This can take different forms for different people, of course, so we have a great deal of freedom to rest in the ways that best suit our personalities and circumstances. One person’s path to rest may be another person’s path to burnout.
There is a world of difference between rest and laziness, or between refreshment and idleness.
But it’s important to understand that there is a world of difference between rest and laziness, or between refreshment and idleness. I don’t see any difference between sitting at the lake and teaching VBS, provided both activities bring rest. I don’t see any difference between having a good nap on a Sunday afternoon and inviting people into your home, provided that both are received as good gifts from the Lord and done for his glory. We deny ourselves a good gift of God, and a gift he means for us to take, if we refuse to rest in the ways that, to us, are truly restful. Not only that, but we deny others the benefit that comes when we have well and truly rested.
So now that summer is upon us, be sure to rest! Rest to admit that the world is not yours to save, but God’s. Rest to remember that you are not divine, but human. Rest to establish in your own mind and others’, that you are not infinite, but finite, and that God made you for rest in just the same way he made you for work. Both are his idea. Both are his command. Both are necessary to serve his purposes. God is a big believer in rest, and you would be wise to be one as well.
