By Jessica Fouché
I found I had said too many yeses. The calendar was daunting with each square filled in, more things to do than time to do any of them well and cutting corners at home where I would rather have been giving my very best yeses. Can you relate? They seem to multiply by themselves in some seasons until you start feeling the weight of them, the sum total just too much. I felt God speak to me about all those yeses and the absence of margin and rest in my life. Very clearly in my heart I knew he was asking me to choose a season of rest and so I began to contemplate which of those yeses I could eliminate and even decided on a date on the calendar that I would choose to stop saying yes to anything for a few months. The date came and I quickly realized this season of rest would be something I would have to keep choosing, even fight for, because the pressures of life don’t stop even if we try to step back from it all a bit.
The first book I picked up to read and catch up on that first day of my season of rest immediately grabbed my attention. In her book Fervent, Priscilla Shirer wrote, “The primary purpose of Sabbath margins- of saying no, when appropriate- is to diminish our devotion to all other suitors and crystallize our allegiance to God. The enemy wants other things and other people to replace God’s preeminence in our schedule, in our mind, in our heart, in our home. He wants our loyalties lured away from our Creator and dispersed among a dozen others, without our even thinking about it.” There it was on the page hitting me so completely- this call to rest comes with a purpose beyond refueling for the next busy season, it’s a position of heart before God that puts him first, looks to Him first, recognizes my heart won’t be satisfied getting all the things done if it’s not centered on the one who breathes the very life into me.
When we’re tired and overwhelmed it becomes harder to see our own motivation for why we do what we do, and it can be harder to hear God’s voice.
Our value is in who God says we are- his children- not in what we do, but it’s so easy to find value in how much we can accomplish, how many things we can say yes to and check off our list, losing sight of the why behind what we’re doing. I’m a doer, so it’s easy for me to fall into this trap. I have a hard time sitting still when there’s something that could be done, and in our busy home there’s always something to do. Yet, when I step back, I realize I tend to over value productivity because it makes me feel good in a shallow way and under value time spent creating, playing, and dreaming because my values have gotten out of order. Yet our creator God made us in His image, made us to be more that our to do lists, more than what we accomplished last year. He made us for relationship and to be fully alive in Him. If anything- including saying yes to too much and living under the pressure of a life without built in rest- comes before God, then we won’t ever feel quite right in our heart.
This season of rest is also teaching me that I need to learn to build in more rest regularly so that I can continue to stay focused on the most important yeses I’m called to, no matter how busy things get. I’ve read that you can tell what people really value by looking at their calendar and what they spend their money on. Does our calendar reflect a life with the right values in place? Is there time for rest? Is there time and ways for our relationship with God to grow among the squares of those days that make up a month that make up a year that make up a life? Is there time for family? For relationships to grow? Dallas Willard puts it this way: “You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life… Hurry is the great enemy of souls in our day. It’s being so preoccupied with myself and what myself has to do that I am no longer able to be fully present with God and others. There is no way a soul can thrive when it is hurried. And nobody will come along and un-hurry your soul for you.”
The new year is a good time to re-evaluate if there’s enough rest built into the rhythm of your life to have your heart set first on God and to grow in your relationships, to say yes to the right things and the courage to say no when it would detract from your main purpose.
“My soul finds rest in God alone; my salvation comes from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will never be shaken.” Psalm 62:1