Today’s devotion is from “The Weekly Rest Project,” published by Zondervan.
The entire world runs on cycles. Day becomes night. Night becomes day. Winter melts into spring. Spring blooms into summer. Summer fades into autumn. And autumn freezes into winter. Years pass by, and people are born and eventually die, but these cycles that God created remain the same. He set each cycle moving at creation, including the ones that govern our days. The Bible models this cycle for us. It is a rhythm of work, play, worship, and rest. Days for work, nights for rest, Sabbath each week, and everyone pausing to come together to worship and celebrate for holidays and feasts. Everything in balance to keep us healthy physically, mentally, and spiritually. The seasons have always played a role too. Work was limited by daylight and the weather until very recently. There was less outdoor work to be done in the winter and more time to rest. Now, of course, thanks to technology, we can work anytime and anywhere, even when we shouldn’t. Our modern, busy, go-go-go, I’ll-rest-when-I’m-dead mentality doesn’t truly disrupt or circumvent the cycle God provided us, even if it feels like working around the clock is some sort of cheat code to getting to the good life. It may lead to financial success, but it always comes at a cost — usually our health and overall well-being. We’ve turned away from living in community and working together to carry the load in favor of doing it all on our own, in our own ways. As a result, we’re a society of people who are sick, unhappy, burned out, lonely, and overwhelmed. And that is definitely not God’s plan for us. Prioritizing rest is about more than catching up on sleep. It’s about living our lives in sync with the rhythms God laid out for us that are designed to bring us closer to Him.
To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under Heaven. [Ecclesiastes 3:1]
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