Tuesday, June 21
The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. John 10.10
It is vain for you to rise early, come home late, and work so hard for your food. Yes, he can provide for those whom he loves even when they sleep. Psalms 127:2 NET
Bret talked on the weekend about rest as it pertains to work. The idea is that rest is as important to doing a great job at work as skill, knowledge, and ability. High-performance athletes get high-performance sleep and rest. They have learned through scientific research that working hard works better when you rest hard too.
The productivity industry is growing as people are trying to squeeze more and more out of their work day and are bombarded continuously by distractions. You can buy software that will block Facebook for a certain time to help you focus on work. You can devote hours a day to learning about how to not be distracted!
Just like we can be distracted in our work and not do good work, anxiety and worry can pull us from a good rest and prevent us from truly resting. Getting upset from Facebook while we’re trying to chill can be as counter-restful as a broken computer can be counter-productive at work.
What if we worked as hard at resting on purpose as we do at working productively? Nobody ever says “I’m going to sit and stare at Facebook on my phone for the next hour and a half.” Instead, we try to do some other restful thing and break it up with another restful thing. Multi-tasking your rest is hard work!
Jesus talked about abundant life. Abundance. That means so much of enough that it’s almost too much!
Abundance.
Few of us could argue that we have a lot of life going on. But what if our definition of life isn’t the one that Jesus had in mind? Jesus broke the Sabbath all over the place but rested and relaxed many times when other people were wearing themselves out. His rest was as intense and dedicated as His work.
What if today you rested on purpose, and with intensity? What if, like Jesus sleeping in the stern of a boat during a thunderstorm, you rested for a little bit, deliberately, on purpose, and despite your surroundings?