March 17, 2022
It’s a beautiful morning, because you woke me up. I didn’t even realise I had fallen back asleep, but you know what? I am thankful. Thankful for the opportunity to rest. Truthfully not everyone has that opportunity and not everyone has that ability. It still makes me happy that I am able to sleep at night without artificial sleep aids (which always gave me headaches) so I’m going to be thankful and probably jump for joy because it’s an awesome feeling. Thank you for a new day, thank you for your love and grace that you’ve granted unto me. Your gifts that make lives possible. Where would we be without your grace? Without your love?
Thank you for your provision everyday, your strength every day. Thank you for choosing us and for dying to save us. Great and marvellous is your name but not just your name – you. You are worthy to be praised. You are mighty, honourable and anyone who tries to take your place would fall short. Thank you for your unique love for me. For holding me close.
Yahweh, thank you for bringing Cap home safely. His results aren’t back as yet, but I pray that it would be favourable. Help him to choose a life that is acceptable to you. That he will rest – take the time to rest, both physically and in you. Thank you Yahweh. It is a beautiful thing to rest in you.
Matthew 11: 28 – Come to me, all who are tired from carrying heavy loads and I will give you rest.
I don’t think it’s possible to speak about God’s promised rest and not mention the scripture. It’s beautiful in its simplicity. Yahweh says to come unto him – to move towards him, to draw near unto him because he wants to give us something that we can’t give ourselves. He beckons to us (you know like when a friend wants to whisper a secret to you? “Come closer nah”), he wants to share a secret with us. All the work that we are doing? All the hours and the worry and the stress of life that you want to hold on to? He has a better solution. Rest in him. He will take our burdens that weigh us down in exchange for rest because what he carries is light.
But too many times, we try to take it back. Because in our human eyes, it can’t be that easy or rather that simple (because it’s actually not that easy). We have gotten so used to life being complicated that we distrust simple. We keep looking for the catch and because we keep looking, we lose out on the rest that is offered.
Rest: To cease from action; to be free from anxiety or disturbance, to remain confident.
I think the last definition truly startles me, but it’s a good surprise. He always says repeatedly to have confidence in him and resting in him is like having that confidence twice over. He desires to give us a mental rest from all the cares of life and there are definitely times when he called for a physical rest. Because it is needed.
Psalm 127:2 – It is useless to work hard for the food to eat by getting up early and going to bed late. The Lord gives food to those he loves while they sleep.
No, it might be easy to assume that all we need to do is sleep all the time and Yahweh will provide all you need. But that’s not it: it is useless to do all that and Yahweh is not in the centre of it. And if he is in the centre of it then you don’t have to stress about it. But we do have to be diligent about what we have to do (go to the ant thou sluggard). Yahweh is not calling us to be lazy, but he’s calling for us not to worry. He’s calling for us to trust him and allow him to do a good work in us, instead of us working ourselves to the bone. To put it in human terms, “work smarter, not harder (in ourselves).”
Isaiah 30:15 – This is what the Almighty Lord, the Holy One of Israel says, “You can be saved by returning to me. You can have rest. You can be strong by being quiet and by trusting me, but you don’t want that.”
Yahweh is pleading with us to come to him. What he offers is better than what we can do for ourselves. We can finally rest. We can stop running from everything that threatens us. We can be strong when we rely on you, by trusting you.
Verse 18 – The Lord is waiting to be kind to you; he rises to have compassion on you. The Lord is a God of justice. Blessed are all those who wait for him.
Yahweh so much wants to give us rest that he waits for us. He doesn’t say, “Ah fed up” though we would. He waits (eagerly in my book) for us to come to him and then leads us to the table he has prepared, where we can sit and be refreshed. But he does not leave us there to be by ourselves. He sits with us, shares with us and the things of this world that stresses us out, passes by. He shows us when we have to do something and brings us right back to the table to rest and refresh. But he’s the one leading, not us getting up and rushing away. The life that he desires of us is one where we have to trust him.
Psalm 16: 9 – That is why my heart is glad and my soul rejoices. My body rests securely.
When Yahweh is by our side, we can rejoice, we can be secure in him.
