Thank you, God, for rest.
Is that the end of today’s journal entry? Well, I thought about it. Go rest now. Jesus took naps—be more like Jesus.
However, I will keep writing. (I don’t want anyone to call me lazy.)
Talking about rest in the middle of the week is kind of funny. I am tired today. Some mornings, I don’t want to get out of bed—the covers feel so good. But once the day gets going, the work itself feels pretty good too.
So, thank you, God, for work.
But then, around 2:00 p.m., the slump hits again. Sometimes it takes until the next day to fully shake it off. Hopefully, as the weather gets nicer, that will be easier to do. It usually is.
God programmed rest into our very being—woven into our DNA and into the creation story itself in Genesis. We know we need it, though some of us are better at taking it than others. I am notoriously bad at napping, but I’m really good at sleeping through the night.
But rest isn’t just about sleep. I think it includes anything that recharges us. Though, to be fair, even those things should be done in moderation—because some activities that refresh me can also wear me out. Yesterday, for example, I came home still in my midafternoon slump. I worked on a bicycle, which recharges me. I played guitar, which is also usually refreshing. It was a great evening.
And yet, I know that as the weather warms up, I’ll be out riding my bike, working outside, doing archery—any number of things. I’ll feel fantastic in the moment, only to come home exhausted and wonder why I’m so tired.
Now that we are thanking God for work, isn’t that also part of the creation story? Isn’t that part of who we are as human beings?
So, where does the gratitude land? The more I write and reflect on it, the more I realize the answer is both.
Thank you, God, for rest. And thank you, God, for work.
Actually, if I flip that around, it fits the creation story better—and it looks better on a bumper sticker or T-shirt:
Thank you, God, for work worth resting from.
What’s maybe most interesting is that I started out thinking I was just going to write about rest. And now, I realize that even if rest and work don’t always go hand in hand, today they do.
In some ways, I feel like a grumpy old man asking the youth, What on earth have you done that you need rest from? But the truth is, we all rest differently. We all recharge differently. We all get stressed differently.
So, what do you need to rest from? How do you need to recharge?
Do you need a nap? Or do you need to pursue a hobby?
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