REST area!

For anyone who knows me, you'll be nodding your heads rapidly in a second.  I'm not a very good vacationer!  I don't do days off very well at all.  As a matter of fact, I tend to fill my days off with so much work that I'm pretty much non-stop from the time I get up in the morning to the time I go to be at night.  I don't like to "waste" my days off.  This means that I have a big problem with one simple word - REST! 

This fact makes today's verse so difficult and yet very much needed for me to meditate on.  The verse is from Hebrews 4 - There remains, then, a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his.  Now think about that for a minute - in order for us to truly find our rest in God, we have to stop doing!  Interesting...

I've read a book recently that really drove home this idea of a Rest-Area, a place where you find your peace and rest in God.  The book was titled, "Emotionally Healthy Spirituality."  I know the book makes it sound kind of psyco-babblish but it's a good book and has a lot of great points.  I believe the premise of this verse from Hebrews 4 isn't that we need to work hard at taking a day off - because that makes our day of rest into a day of work.  This concept of finding our rest in God isn't as much a law as an invitation to experience the truth of the Gospel of Christ! 

The writer of the book of Hebrews reminds us - if we are going to enter God's rest, we must put our doing aside and simply BE in the presence of God.  Perhaps a day is too long and torturous for you, as it is for me.  God wants us to take the time to reconnect with him and get filled up by his word and promises.    So here's today's challenge for you...Find some time to stop doing and just be.  You are a human-BEING not a human-DOING!  Take a couple of slow deep breaths and just think about the rest that God wants for you.  Recite in your mind several times your favorite bible verse.  If you're able close your eyes, if not then stare into space somewhere.  Just be with God - you and him and no one else.  Take just the next couple of minutes and rest in him. Then get back to what you're doing.  You'll be happy you did - if in fact you completely block everything out. 

Lord today I pray that you guide me to use my time to please you.  Help me to find rest, not in my doing but rest from all of the doing that I might just be!  AMEN.