What is the Meaning and the Method of True Rest?

My not-quite-two-year-old grandson had an extensive vocabulary, and one phrase that is serving him well these days is, “Do it self.” Instead of holding his mother’s hand on the slide: “Do it self.” Climbing the stairs or building a block tower with Bam: “Do it self.”

Clearly, he was both lovable and capable!

However, what is adorable and even laudable in a brown-eyed toddler can turn devastating in an adult who has lost sight of her limits, or a nation that has forgotten its God-ordained purpose. When Israel sent spies into the Promised Land, they ignored all its benefits and God’s promise of rest. Instead, they focused on their fear of the unknown. Their lack of trust in God’s goodness and providence earned them a forty-year walking tour of the wilderness around Kadesh-Barnea.

Then, in a colossal “do-it-self” move, they changed their mind and decided that maybe they could take on the Amorites single-handedly–against Moses’s warning and God’s command to the contrary. Naturally, they were chased back down the mountain again in utter defeat. Instead of earning God’s approval and immediate entrance into God’s promised rest, they earned God’s displeasure, and that generation died in the desert, never to experience the rest they craved.

A Busy Striving After Rest

God was not after Israel’s performance or valor. He was after their hearts.

Reading through the book of Deuteronomy, I hear his gentle rebuke about my own striving, for isn’t all our busyness a striving toward whatever “promised land” we crave? Ironically, so much of our busyness is a striving after rest.

Productivity becomes an idol we serve as we project an image of effectiveness, competence, importance, and relevance. Our people praise us for it, reinforcing the false worship, and we keep ourselves going with false promises of eventual rest:
“When I finish this project…”
“When my kids are all in school…”
“When I reach this milestone…”

Instead, can I find grace to believe that God is not after my performance? He is after my heart.

The Paradox of True Rest

The rest God invited Israel to experience–rest from their enemies, rest from danger, rest from their wandering–would be a God-glorifying experience resulting in worship, and the people of Israel would "rejoice before the Lord their God."

The irony of God’s call to rest is that nowhere in Scripture does God say that effort is our enemy. On the contrary, he invites us into a yoke, an instrument designed to facilitate the hard work of pulling:

Matthew 11:28-30 (ESV): "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

As Jen Michel wrote in A Habit Called Faith, “Jesus offers us a path to knowing God that isn’t strenuous–but also not effortless.” The meaning of true rest in a following life may look like a 5:00 a.m. rising time to meet one-on-one with God in a quiet house. Or it may mean saying no to a “great ministry opportunity” in order to make room for better self-care or focused family time.

Romans 8 assures me every time I read it that God did not give us His Spirit with the intent of making us his slaves. His concern for us is that of a Father, not a task-master, and his requirements are intended to carve out space in our lives for intimacy with him, not to place us under a burden.

Let's be trusting for grace to slaughter our idols of productivity and effectiveness, all the while asking God for wisdom to know and then to do what’s most important with the energy and ability he provides. Together, we're going to be learning about soul rest.