Rest In A World That Never Sleeps

It’s been a busy season—one of those stretches where every good thing still somehow adds up to exhaustion. I am very thankful for my opportunities. Yet, whether participating in doctrinal refinement with the Study Commission on Doctrine with the Free Methodist Church, serving on the Canadian Bible Society’s Board of Directors, or preparing for conferences, Bible study, or, sermons as an academic and Assistant Pastor, all of these spaces come with a level of responsibility. When they all overlap, sometimes I end up feeling like I’m behind. It’s really easy to feel like I have to keep going, keep doing, keep pushing through to next assignment, next deadline, next meeting, next sermon. And only after I do that thing, then I’m allowed to take a break. But what does it mean to rest in a world that never slows down?

Humans resist change if their method of doing things (however flawed) has worked before. For me, having a mindset of “just push through” has worked. In elementary school, high school, even university, I could just keep pushing myself towards the next assignment or deadline, because, frankly, the stakes were lower. So, as long as I could push through and complete the task—I rewarded myself with rest.

And our lives are kind of built that way, aren’t they? We take a break after the end of things. A school year, a work project, an email. We try to finish work before Christmas so we can “deserve it.” We set our vacations for “someday”: someday off in the future, after a milestone, we’ll finally rest. As an overachiever, I bought into that mentality.

But now, as a semi-fully functioning adult, there are a lot more ups and downs. And it’s not just one area of life that has our attention. It’s a merry-go-round that never ends. There’s always an end goal that never comes to fruition because there’s always something else that will that need your attention. If you wait for permission to rest, you’ll run yourself into the ground.

And by rest, I’m not necessarily referring to “Sabbath rest,” though that’s a very holy thing. I mean the everyday kind of rest that exists inside our ordinary and extraordinary days, between meetings and meals and ministry. The kind that makes the busiest of seasons possible.

Before I lose you, stay with me. I’m just someone who is still working this out in real time.

Let’s think about cars, for a moment. At some point, you will have to find a gas/charging station and fill up your tank. If you don’t, can your car keep running? No, it will it will stop, and you’ll have to pull over anyway—except with no fuel. You? Stranded. Car? Useless. Destination? Never reached. Likewise, as we live life, I’m learning we need to refuel as we go along, sometimes even in bite-sized moments.

Maybe it’s the slice of toast before you start your day, listening to a song as you clean, or enjoying the ritual of commuting to work with your own thoughts. These can be life-giving moments, although short. Yet sometimes these are not enough on our own; we’re still left drained, irritable, and overworked. We can take a day, a week, a month off. But when we come back, we find we’re still not refueled.

Perhaps instead of rest being a ritual that we do, it’s the ethos in how we live our lives. It’s a state of mind. You can fill up your car all you want, but if you never sleep, you’ll end up in an accident. We have to accept that no matter how far we push ourselves and know all the items on our agenda we have to meet, we are not in control. And sometimes, in letting go, we are able to say yes to might once have felt impossible.

A few years ago at my church, I was asked to start a weekly Bible study. My first thought was: “I don’t have time to prepare a Bible study!” I knew an exegesis paper for seminary took weeks to months to write. Even sermon preparation took me most of a week, because I cared about the fine details and contextual nuance of the passage. So a weekly Bible study felt impossible on top of graduate school and committee work. And because I tend to overthink everything, I wondered: can I answer every single question? Can I make sure the conversation doesn’t get derailed? What if I don’t know the answer? Will people think I’m stupid if I don’t know? What about the hours I can spend on other things I need to do?

I had a lot of needless worry in my head. But at the time, it didn’t feel needless. It felt very real, warranted, and loud.

But what I thought would be life-draining was life-giving. I truly enjoy leading a Bible study. I’m not perfect at it, but sometimes I know more than I realize I do, and it allows me to live out my life’s mission: to make scripture more understandable. And it speaks such life into the week ahead.

Sometimes if we focus on how much energy something takes out of us, we sometimes miss out on the energy that we are given from doing that task. We don’t want to attend an event, but by going to the event, we’re filled up with good conversation and fellowship for days afterward. If we return to the car metaphor—it takes gas to get to the gas station.

So, back to rest: I don’t think rest is simply being comatose—lounging around, having a nap, soaking up sun, watching a movie. While this can be part of rest, it’s not the heart of it. I can lounge in the sun and still feel stressed afterward, because I haven’t set my worry down.

In other words, rest, true rest, is when we trust in the Lord. Trusting that God is in control. Some days that’s not easy to do.

Sometimes rest actually looks like doing work, but work that gives us life. Work that reminds me I’m a happy participant in God’s plans, not an overworked slave. Rest means putting the outcome into God’s hands, even if others think it’s in yours. It means finding the joy in the day-to-day, not just finding tolerance. And the joy is found in reframing our days to remember that the world is not all on our shoulders, but that God has invited us to participate in His work.

Maybe if we adopt this mindset, pausing in a world that never stops won’t feel like we’re doing something wrong. It might feel like we’re doing something right.