Rest

What does it mean to rest? Why do we need it? How can we get it? Immediately when I think of the word rest I think of the Sabbath. This is the day that is mentioned in the Old Testament as the day 7th day. On this day Jesus rested. He created the world in 6 days, saw that it was good and then rested on the 7th day. We are expected to do the same if we have a relationship with Christ. I think these days rest is thought of as being lazy, we are so conditioned as a society to work, work, work as hard as we can to make the most money. This characteristic is true of our culture, and only ours. Back in Jesus’ time they used to have something called gleening. This was a restraint on work so people didn’t over work themselves. They believed if you worked hard on certain things for a certain amount of time it would be done better and more efficiently. This is still true, but is not practiced at all. To rest is to set aside time from your normal schedule to spend time doing something you normally don’t. We need to get into the habit of having deep rest; with out this type of rest we will never be satisfied. We need rest because Christ says we do. The only way to get this rest is through Christ. He calls us to it, says we need it and gives it to us.