Teach Me How to Rest

“O Good Shepherd, would you teach me how to rest?/ I’m rushing on, will you make me to lie down?”

These words from The Porter’s Gate song, “Slow Me Down,” hit home. Why is it that we need to be taught how to rest? And, as we find ourselves two months into this new year, how are you doing? Do you feel that you’ve hit the ground running or have you learned how to rest? Life doesn’t have to be a frantic hurry from one thing to another. It doesn’t have to be that way. The year - and this life - isn’t a sprint. Our Maker designed us. He knows that we have limitations and He knows that we need reminding of that fact. Repeatedly.

Consider the Creation account. God set aside time for rest - and that was before sin sullied His creation. In the Ten Commandments, God reiterates the importance of Sabbath. In Psalm 23:2, David speaks of the Lord, the Good Shepherd, of whom he says, “He makes me lie down in green pastures.” And the Gospels are replete with accounts of Jesus leaving behind the crowds (and even His disciples) to spend time in a deserted place, be with His Father, and rest.

In Mark 6, Jesus and His disciples were deeply involved in ministry. Jesus sent the disciples into the surrounding villages to minister on their own. When they excitedly returned reporting the wonders of God's power through them, Jesus, knowing that His cousin John had been beheaded and that there was the feeding of the crowds to come, took them away from their busy surroundings to rest. In Mark 6:31, Jesus encourages His disciples, “Come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while.” The account goes on to say, “For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat.” Perhaps, at times, that sounds like a commentary on your own life. Are you so busy serving others or doing good things that you forget to take the time by yourself to rest and spend time with your Savior?

I’m brought to this realization: If Jesus, the Son of God Himself, needed to take time to rest, who are we to live as though we don’t? We tend to keep pushing through life as though it all depends on us. As artists, it may feel like it all depends on us; especially in regards to our art. In some sense, you could say that we are always “on the clock”. Painting, sculpting, songwriting, and other creative pursuits don’t generally come with neat “9 to 5” workdays. That can be an advantage, but also a trap. It can feel as if we should always be creating something - anything - instead of “doing nothing”. But we would do well to take our cue from the original and greatest Artist and make time to rest. We need to remember that resting isn’t necessarily selfish. It is simply one way to be a good steward of the lives God has given us.

In Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase of Matthew 28, Jesus makes this offer to His followers: “I’ll show you how to take a real rest.” How can we take a real rest? The most straightforward answer is this: Ask Jesus.

Jesus knows you well and is infinitely wise. He created every fiber of your being. Take time in quiet prayer to listen for His prompting. Ask Him to show you what tasks to lay down or pick up. Look for how He answers. You will see Jesus show up in your times of prayer, in His Word, and in little cues throughout your day.

You may find certain practices or common graces - small but meaningful reorientations that facilitate healthy habits of rest - to be helpful, too. From my own experience, I’ve found that taking a walk, ideally with no electronics, not listening to music or a podcast, allows my mind to rest while processing the events of my day.

How you wind down at the end of your day is important, too. As I've heard it said, the way that you put the horse in the stable is the way you’ll find him in the morning. There is a choice between being angry and upset or calm and peaceful. Spending at least a few minutes before you go to sleep reading and praying, instead of knocking out one more work task or checking social media, helps your heart and mind settle and prepare for rest. The same is true of the morning. Find ways to spend a few moments of quiet in the presence of your Creator before rushing into a new day. Allow yourself the grace of transitioning out of one day and into the next, rather than staying up too late then blasting into the morning.

I’ve found that eliminating unreasonable hurry from my life has become a game-changing concept for me. Dallas Willard once called hurry “the great enemy of spiritual life in our day.” An additional resource I discovered and would highly recommend is John Mark Comer’s brilliant book, The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry. In it, Comer thoroughly discusses the roots of our “culture of hurry” and gives practical ways to resist it. His words echo something that Jesus masterfully demonstrated throughout the Gospels: Hurry does not need to be a constant mode of life. It can be resisted.

In the words of the aforementioned song, we let ourselves get swept up in the “anxious drive to labor on and on” and “the restless grind.” We have to be reminded to rest. But the good news is that we can rest - we can cast our cares upon our God, who loves us (1 Peter 5:7).

So I encourage you to stop for a moment. Pause. Breathe. Come back to the moment. Choose to take our Savior at His word. He says in Matthew 11:28-29:

“Come to Me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.”