For the Sake of Your Lives, Rest - March 16
Today’s Readings: AM Psalm 97, 99, [100]; PM Psalm 94, [95]; Jer. 17:19-27; Rom. 7:13-25; John 6:16-27
Today’s Reflection
Thus says the Lord: For the sake of your lives, take care that you do not bear a burden on the sabbath day or bring it in by the gates of Jerusalem. And do not carry a burden out of your houses on the sabbath or do any work, but keep the sabbath day holy, as I commanded your ancestors. Yet they did not listen or incline their ear; they stiffened their necks and would not hear or receive instruction. –Jeremiah 17: 21-23
In our multitasking, open 24/7, always plugged-in U.S. cultural context, sabbath-keeping—taking just one full day out of every week to rest—could not be more counter-cultural. Other cultures reinforce the benefits of taking time off much more than U.S. culture does. For instance, European countries require employers to provide employees with at least 20 paid days off—and some mandate 25-30—while the average in the U.S. is only 10, and that is not mandated but varies by employer. Not only do people in the U.S. have less opportunity to take time off from our labors, but many of us do not take off as many days as we could. Forbes magazine reports that “Americans are taking less vacation time than at any point in nearly the last four decades.” In a study called “All Work and No Pay,” researchers concluded that “America’s work martyrs aren’t more successful.” So why do we find it so hard not to take a rest from our labors, even when we can do so with pay?
And then there are those times when life decides we need to rest. This past Sunday afternoon, I received my second COVID-19 vaccine. But then, nine hours later, at 10:45 Sunday night, just as I was hoping to fall asleep, I started to ache, feel chills, and began to sense that I was experiencing side effects of the vaccine, as some people do.
By 1:45 a.m., I still had not fallen asleep. I couldn’t get comfortable and by this point, I was pretty sure I had a fever—and made myself get up to find the thermometer and see if we had any acetaminophen I could take to help some of the symptoms subside, even if temporarily, so that I could finally get some sleep. I did finally fall asleep, but woke up four hours later, just as the medicine was wearing off, and I felt miserable. I couldn’t pull myself up to make my usual cup of tea or to help my children get ready for school—but thankfully they rose to the occasion and managed to get ready with none of the usual help from me. We even managed to get out the door on time.
When I arrived back home to the empty, quiet house, I propped myself up on the loveseat in our living room, stretched my legs out on the ottoman, and that’s where I have been pretty much all day. I realized that it wouldn’t be in my best interest to push myself to go to the office to work today, or even to lead a Bible study group on Zoom. My body was telling me that, though it is a Monday, today would need to be an extra day of rest for me this week. While I did manage to eek out several emails, for the most part I just rested. I turned on the television, falling in and out of sleep, as our beagle snored in a nearby chair. As I told my family when they got home later, you can tell how sick I must be because I slept during the day—which only happens when I am very sick.
Taking a sabbath day—or even just a sick day—not only helps restore our physical health, our emotional wellbeing, and our spiritual balance, but so too can it help us to gain new perspective as we sit things out instead of pushing ourselves to keep going. As Cardinal John Dearden put it so well in his poem, “Prophets of a Future Not Our Own”:
It helps, now and then, to step back and take a long view.
The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts, it is even beyond our vision.
We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent
enterprise that is God’s work. Nothing we do is complete, which is a way of
saying that the Kingdom always lies beyond us. …
We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.
This enables us to do something, and to do it very well.
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an
opportunity for the Lord’s grace to enter and do the rest.
—Becky+
Questions for Self-Reflection
When have you chosen to take some time off to rest? And when have your own circumstances forced you to take a rest? How did taking time for rest and renewal—whether chosen or forced—influence you when you entered back into your usual work and life routines?
Daily Challenge
Read “The Data-Driven Case for More Vacation” in the Harvard Business Review to help you continue to reflect on the importance of rest and time away. And if you enjoyed the excerpt of Cardinal Dearden’s poem above, you can read the full text of “Prophets of a Future Not Our Own.”