The Gift of Rest

Rest is interesting, I often view it as an obstruction to my life, I view it as an obstruction to being productive, and getting the things that I need to do done.

In our world, we push our bodies to the max, the successful person is the one who can get the most sales, the best numbers at work, the most milestones in thier workplace. We aim to get the maximum out of ourselves, viewing our body as a resource that can be taken for granted, used and abused. We live for the bottom line, for the profit, while forgetting that there is a bigger picture. We live exhausted lives, and think that it is the way to live, not realising that it is unhealthy.

Rest is needed for us. We did a reflection on sleep at Mosaic tonight. Sleep is an amazing moment in our lives. It allows us to to recover, to heal and defrag from the day. Our group reflected on the fact of how anxious we would be in our lives if we did not sleep. The act of sleeping allows us to actually process through issues and gives us a sense of clarity when we wake up. It is no wonder that people who do not sleep can end up irrational or end up suffering from psychosis.

Rest makes us realise we are human, that we are not god like.

Often the sabbath has been viewed as a religious activity, but in fact, it is a gift, a gift to be taken to help us recover, to reflect, to remove the tanons from our mind and to heal from the pains inflicted from the week.

Rest is hard in our world, we are pushed to stretch ourselves. We are told to work longer, harder for a more profitable economy, for the sake of the health of our communities, but we need to rest, it is a spiritual discipline that is counter cultural in our busy broken world. We can not be agents of change if we are bitter, anxious people, rest is essential to us being healthy, vibrant aware people bringing about shalom.