Why Start With Rest?
Five years ago, I began to work with my wife on a disciple-making plan for our church plant. We were reaching people who’d never practiced spiritual disciplines before, and I wanted to think about how to lead them to build the essential habits of the Christian life into their lives.
We started with a surprising habit: rest.
Technically, it’s the second habit, following one that talks about making time. We started with making time to build habits and then resting for a practical reason and a theological reason. I’m glad we did.
A Practical Reason to Start With Rest
Everyone I know is tired. We’re all too busy, which is why we asked people to start by making a small amount of time in their lives to practice key habits. And we’re all exhausted. It’s very difficult to make progress in your walk with God if you begin from a place of exhaustion.
We looked at our people and realized that many of them hadn’t built healthy patterns of rest into their lives. Most of them — even Christians — had never considered practices like Sabbath, or if they had, they considered it to be an impossibility. Even when they take time off, many practice pseudo-rest, spending time on screens and pursuing other activities that don’t leave them feeling rested and energized.
We need rest. Just as rest is key to a good physical training program, rest is also key to our pursuit of God. Rather than beginning with a list of more to do, I wanted to begin by helping people rest, and out of that rest to build other necessary habits in their lives.
A Theological Reason to Start With Rest
We also started with rest for a theological reason: because of all that Scripture teaches us about rest.
Day 7 of creation, the day after Adam was created, was a day of rest. Humanity began with rest, not work. God wove Sabbath into the fabric of creation from the first pages of the Bible, and made Sabbath a key command in his covenant with Israel. Even if you think that the Sabbath command no longer applies to us today, I agree with Christopher Ash, “Even if the Sabbath is no longer an old-covenant religious obligation, we are simply foolish to behave as though we no longer need a day off each week.” According to Scripture, rest is multifaceted and points to our ultimate rest in which we enter into all of God’s promises (Hebrews 4:1-11).
Because of Jesus, we begin the Christian life out of a place of rest. He has done everything necessary for our salvation. We add nothing. Out of that rest, we begin to work out our salvation as we grow in our obedience to him.
People are exhausted. They need rest. And God has graciously provided us the rest we need, not only in Sabbath but ultimately in Christ.
The disciple-making plan we developed became the book 8 Habits for Growth, which is being released next Tuesday. Habit #2 is still “Rest and Refresh.” In my books, it’s still a good place to start.
(Preorder bonuses for 8 Habits are available until midnight on August 2. Find out more.)
