We Can Rest

And He said to them, “Come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while.” For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat. 

Mark 6:31

---

And now we are the ones coming and going. Living by our lists of all the things we need to get done. We are our own slavedrivers.

Busy, busy bees is what we are and we hold up our constant doing as though it is worthy of commendation.

We are tired, are we not? Exhausted from the keep up, stay on top of it, don’t get behind whip that keeps stinging our back. Tired of trying to be enough and keep it all together. Tired from saying yes because we don’t know how to say no and be ok with someone else’s disappointment.

Some of us are tired of our inability to walk in freedom. Bone weary of trying harder only to find that all it amounted to was failing harder.

And some of us can’t stop because stopping means we’re alone with our thoughts. Alone with our failure and our pain and our past. Slowing down leaves us too much time to think and feel and be overwhelmed by our life. So we pick up our pace in an effort to outrun what we just don’t have the energy to face.

We wrestle with the lies we’ve been taught to believe. Rest is lazy. Rest is unproductive and weak. It’s for the unmotivated and the under achievers. If you have time to lean you have time to clean. Good things happen to those who hustle.

We need to walk in truth so we need to know truth. We can rest.

“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28)

“And He said, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” (Exodus 33:18)

“Six days you shall do your work, but on the seventh day you shall rest; that your ox and your donkey may have rest, and the son of your servant woman, and the alien, may be refreshed.” (Exodus 23:12)

“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters.” (Psalm 23:1)

We are invited to stop so that we can be refreshed. To lay ourselves down in His abundance and His care for us. To be with Him. To cease our striving. To find healing in Him. To live with peace.

To learn how to rest.