Latest / Prayer Before Work / S01E32 - REST AS TRUST "Stopping Is an Act of Faith"
Transcript
- Sean Graver: Hey, welcome back to Prayer Before Work. I am so glad you're here because we're going to slow down for a few minutes before the pace picks up. ⁓ And we're going to talk about something that's a little counter-cultural today. So, let's read a little scripture and then let's pray. We're going to be in ⁓ Exodus chapter 20 verses 8-10, Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it. you shall do no work." Now this is one of the Ten Commandments, which means it's not a suggestion or a best practice, it's a command. And it's placed right alongside things like don't murder and don't steal. So this means that God considers rest to be in a moral category, not a wellness category per se. The refusal to rest isn't just unhealthy, it's actually disobedient. Now that reframe changed something for me when my failure to obey this was pointed out a few years ago. We talked about ⁓ this in an earlier episode as rest, as something you need, restoration, recovery, the whole Matthew 11 invitation. But this episode is about rest as something you choose. It's an act of faith and even defiance because here's what rest actually says. I trust that the world will keep turning without my input for a day. I trust that my value is not entirely located in my productivity, and I trust that God is working even when I'm not. Now, that's harder than it sounds in a culture like ours that measures worth by your output. I mean, taking a real Sabbath, putting the phone down, stepping away from work, this feels like falling behind. And that feeling is the whole point because pushing through it is what builds the muscle of trust. But rest isn't the reward at the end of a productive week. It's the act of faith in the middle of one. So God, I want to be someone who actually rests, not just collapses at the end of the week, but genuinely intentionally stops. Because I trust you with what I'm setting down. Help me to see. rest not as lost time but an act of obedience, a declaration that you are God and I'm not and that work doesn't ultimately depend on me never stopping. So this week help me to build in that stopping to protect it, to treat it as seriously as you do because you thought it was important enough to command. So I trust you with what I can't control when I rest. That's the whole point. Help me live in it. In Jesus name I pray, amen. Go make today count.