I have often heard the phrase, “I need a vacation from my vacation” and I know it is totally true when I think about my most recent Christmas vacation. We cram as much as we can into our vacations, we wade through the crowds (literally at Disneyland), and find our busy lives at the other end of an extremely hectic vacation. Our vacation is not even over yet, and we start planning the next one (Disney World anyone?). What if we approached it different? Instead of just running from one vacation that does not meet our need for rest to another, what if we practiced God’s design for rest.

The Bible refers to this rest from work as “Sabbath”. In Exodus 20 verse 8 it is referred to as part of the rhythm of Creation (part of God’s great Creative work was rest) and in Deuteronomy 5:12, it is part of the deliverance from slavery in the Exodus story (the people were liberated from slavery and in their freedom God gave them rest). Do not miss this, vacation is not Sabbath because a vacation is not devoted to God. Randy Harris, professor at Abilene Christian University puts it this way: “Sabbath is closely connected to God…[and] contains two key elements: playing and praying.” You need to learn to play again, to have something completely dominate your entire attention. Do you remember being on the court, or in the field, running and your heart was beating “pass, over here…GOAL!” Your mind and body are in unison moving together. God created you to play, but we have allowed ourselves to be reduced to poor multi-taskers. The rules regarding the Sabbath were to help people focus on rest and on God. We rest best when our minds and bodies are aligned, we call this play. Play helps us rest in turn enabling our attention to God’s presence.

God is always near, the trick is to hear. “Mama” Maggie Gobran a coptic Orthodox Christian lady in Egypt said this in 2011:
“Silence your body to listen to your words
Silence your tongue to listen to your thoughts
Silence your thoughts to listen to your heart beating
Silence your heart to listen to your spirit
Silence your spirit to listen to His Spirit
In Silence you leave the many to be with the One”

Sabbath is so much more than rest from work, it is an opportunity to be with “the One”, Creator, Savior, Lord, Almighty, God who gives true rest! Are you chasing rest and coming up empty? Perhaps a Sabbath of play and silence is in order.

May the Grace of the Lord Jesus, the Love of God our Father, and the Friendship of Holy Spirit be with you always!

-Lars