Rest? What's that?

Matthew 11:28  "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest."

Exdodus 33:14  The Lord replied, "My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest."

Levitcus 23:3   There are six days when you may work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of rest, a day of sacred assembly. You are not to do any work; wherever you live, it is a Sabbath to the Lord.

I don’t know how to rest. I really don’t. I know how to be lazy. I know how to do very little. I know how to slack off. I know how to goof off. But rest? Not sure I’m equipped for that.

My doctor said I needed at least two weeks of good rest. I countered I had to work three days next week. She came back with basically, do less.

So out went the trip to Chicago last Thrusday. Out goes Zionsville excursions. Out goes a trip to Kansas City I wanted to take next weekend.  Out goes my small group (lots of kiddies). Out goes any Wednesday nite Bible study cameos.

Out goes BSF, though I'll probably cheat and show up for my small disscussion group so I can get next week's notes & lesson.  I may even have to cancel my trip in a few weeks to Kentucky, but I'm aching to see my parents and what's gotten done on the house.

However, there is next to nothing that will stop me from going to Iowa in mid November to see my family there.  I already cancelled a couple months ago because I was sick.  By then I should be much more rested and able to do it.

Overall, this is really frustrating. My body is not cooperating with me. I’m sick for the third time in about a month.  First a 24 hour bug, then a big ‘ol nasty flu and now a sinus infection developed from a cold last weekend.

Ask anyone who knows me—I’m a go-go-go-go-go-girl. I’m on the move, the girl with plans, literally places to go and people to see. Not out of necessity, but I enjoy the time with people I care about. People are important to me.  There may be some deeper meaning to my busy schedule.

Lev 25:4    But in the seventh year the land is to have a sabbath of rest, a sabbath to the Lord. Do not sow your fields or prune your vineyards.

Psalms16:8-10   I have set the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will rest secure, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay.

Psa 62:5   Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him.

Psa 116:7   Be at rest once more, O my soul, for the Lord has been good to you.

Something I learned recently on my retreat was that I do not like silence or solitude or being by myself. I’m taking it on faith that I am not by myself. God is always with me. But silence and solitude are going to take a while to get used to.  (Granted with a roommate, weekends I'm hardly by myself)

Perhaps I book myself up with so many people, places, trips and volunteering so that I don't have to worry about having much 'alone' time.  It's not hard to fill up a schedule to the point where you have to start planning days of relaxation. 

I was at that point a few months ago.  Medina first suggested it to me.  I tried to plan some days like that.  Guess what happened?  Things came up.  I helped a friend with a home project.  A party got scheduled on that date over there.  An appointment needed moving to this date here.  So the 'rest' days that were scheduled for Sept-Oct-Nov-Dec have all been thrown out the window by something.

Silence and solitude seem to go hand in hand with rest. That’s why I bring them up. I think I’m going to try to have some of my time off be devoted to study and silence (i.e. less TV) and solitude.  I have a Pen Pals Booklet to finish putting together today.  So far this weekend, the TV thing has been struggled with.  Hopefully I can keep it off more Monday when I'm home alone.

Isaiah 57:20   But the wicked are like the tossing sea, which cannot rest, whose waves cast up mire and mud.

Jeremiah 6:16   This is what the Lord says: "Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. But you said, 'We will not walk in it.'

Matthew 11:29   Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

Add to this the recent thought that I don’t like rest because I don’t want to act depressed. When I hit the lowest of my depression all I did was rest. Sleep and watch TV in my room at college. Mostly the same at home.  There was some reading too.  I didn’t skip a lot of classes but I did some and there were days at a time that I didn’t leave my room. It was too easy to order pizza to be delivered and venture out only for the bathroom.

The principle that I've picked up from a number of sources, most of them through pastors or other Christians, is "acting your way into a feeling"  It's very true that actions can dictate your emotions.  I don’t want to just sit on the couch or sleep in bed because at least subconsciously I’m scared of encouraging old bad attitidues and feelings. I think I know that I won’t become depressed but the doubt kind of looms in the back of my thoughts.

In my mind for me to rest is to be unproductive. That’s just not something I can let myself be. I can’t slow down but I don’t understand why. So the next couple or few weeks will be very interesting and very, very hard.  This past week has already been difficult.

I’m going to have to say no a lot in the next week and half. I can’t suggest a lot of activities.  I probably need to do less for the rest of the month, if not year.  Hopefully I can be productive in a different way, as I pray more, study more, and listen to God more.

Half of me is scared I won’t know what to do with myself. The other half of me is scared I’ll have a life changing experience. The other half of me wonders if I can do it. The other half of me wonders how I got fours halves…

Mark 6:30:32   The apostles gathered around Jesus and reported to him all they had done and taught.  Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, "Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest."  So they went away by themselves in a boat to a solitary place.

Hewbrews 4:9-10  There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his.

1 John 3:18-19   Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence.

P.S. The photo link from the post's title is located at The Holcomb Planetarium and Observatory.