Maybe I Need to Stop

It’s hard to slow down. Life is busy and demanding. Relentlessly so. Every morn rises with the needs of life pressing hard into my mind.

There was a time not long ago when my first thought each morning was of the incredible man God had brought into my life. To love and to cherish; to have and to hold. And we do. Still.

There was a time not long ago when my first thought each morning was of the beautiful child God had given to our care. Train up a child in the way (s)he should go; children are indeed an inheritance from the Lord. And we do. And she is.

There was a time not long ago when my first thought each morning was pure gratitude that I hadn’t stopped breathing through the night. Let everything that has breath praise the Lord. And we do. Because we can.

There was even a time…not long ago…when my first thought each morning was something like pure, unfiltered love for Jesus.

But right now, at this moment of my life, my first thoughts each morning are overwhelming pressures of all I need to accomplish. All I failed to accomplish yesterday and still somehow need to get done without falling behind on all of today’s responsibilities. All I’ve been failing to accomplish for days…weeks…months. I will never catch up. I will never be done. And it weighs heavier on me each morning.

I need a sabbath.

A lot of times, as Christians, we don’t want to talk about sabbath. It opens the floodgate to questions we feel ill-equipped to answer. That’s okay, I think. I would rather honestly hear a Christian tell me they don’t know, and they struggle to understand, than to simply ignore the topic altogether, as if the idea of sabbath itself doesn’t (or shouldn’t) shape our entire concept of a savior. We can and should talk about a sabbath. We can and should talk about a savior. We are in desperate need of both.

But that’s the true beauty of all of it. I need a sabbath. I need rest. I need to recognize that I will never measure up. None of us measures up. The best of us in our greatest moment fails to measure up.

From the shores of Wicket Lake;