Category Archives: Rest and Relaxation

Daily Riches: Sabbath, The Wisdom of Dormancy (George MacDonald, Wayne Muller, Mark Buchanan and Rob Bell)

Posted on by under Embracing Losses and Limits, Rest and Relaxation, Sabbath Rhythms, Self-care, Striving and drivenness

‘It is our best work that he wants, not the dregs of our exhaustion. So many seem ambitious to kill themselves in the service of the Master–and as quickly as possible. Come with us to God’s infirmary in the country and rest for a while.”  George MacDonald

“Sabbath honors the necessary wisdom of dormancy. If certain plant species, for example, do not lie dormant for winter, they will not bear fruit in the spring. If this continues for more than a season, the plant begins to die. If dormancy continues to be prevented, the entire species will die. A period of rest . . . is a spiritual and biological necessity.” Wayne Muller

“Sabbath is  . . .
. . . taking a day a week to remind myself that I did not make the world and that it will continue to exist without my efforts.
. . . a day when my work is done, even if it isn’t.
. . . a day when my job is to enjoy. Period.
. . . a day when I am fully available to myself and those I love most.
. . . a day when I remember that when God made the world, he saw that it was good.
. . . a day when I produce nothing.
. . . a day when at the end I say, ‘I didn’t do anything today,’ and I don’t add, ‘And I feel so guilty.’
. . . a day when my phone is turned off, I don’t check my email, and you can’t get a hold of me.”
Rob Bell

“’Six days you are to gather it, but on the seventh day, the Sabbath, there will not be any [manna].’
Nevertheless, some of the people went out on the seventh day to gather it, but they found none.
Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘How long will you refuse to keep my commands and my instructions?
Bear in mind that the Lord has given you the Sabbath;
that is why on the sixth day he gives you bread for two days.
Everyone is to stay where they are on the seventh day; no one is to go out.'”
Exodus 16:25-30

Moving From Head to Heart

  • Is everyday the same to you?
  • Are you out “looking for manna” on the seventh day?
  • Does your life reflect the biological necessity of dormancy?
  • Are you rested enough to give God and others your best?

Abba, help me honor your ordained rhythms.

For More: Notes From an Unhurried Life by Alan Fadling

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Thanks for reading my blog! Please extend my reach by reposting on your social media platforms. If you like these topics and this approach, you’ll like my book Wisdom From the Margins.

“I practice daily what I believe; everything else is religious talk.”

Daily Riches: Sabbath…Emerge Elated and Refreshed (Mark Buchanan)

Posted on by under Rest and Relaxation, Sabbath Rhythms, Self-care

“We all know how unsatisfying mere leisure can be. We’ve all known what it’s like to return to the classroom or the workplace after a time spent in revelry or retreat, in high jinks or hibernation: typically, we go back weary and depressed, like jailbirds caught. The time away from work wasn’t time sanctified so much as time stolen, time when we escaped for a short-lived escapade. The difference between this and Sabbath couldn’t be sharper. Sanctifying some time adds richness to all time, just as an hour with the one you love brings light and levity to the hours that follow. To spend time with the object of your desire is to emerge, not sullen and peevish, but elated and refreshed. You come away filled, not depleted. …We resist that which six days of coming and going, pushing and pulling, dodging and weaving, fighting and defending have bred into us. What we deny ourselves is our well-trained impulses to get and to spend and to make and to master. This day, we go in a direction we’re unaccustomed to, unfamiliar with, that the other six days have made seem unnatural to us. …Sabbath is time sanctified, time betrothed…. We are more intimate with it. We are more thankful for it. We are more protective of it and generous with it. We become more ourselves in the presence of Sabbath: more vulnerable, less afraid. More ready to confess, to be silent, to be small, to be valiant.” Mark Buchanan

“If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath
and from doing as you please on my holy day,
if you call the Sabbath a delight
and Yahweh’s holy day honorable,
and if you honor it by not going your own way
and not doing as you please or speaking idle words,
then you will find your joy in Yahweh….”
Isaiah 58:13-14a

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • When you return from time off are you “weary and depressed” or “elated and refreshed?” Why is that?
  • Is God speaking to you through any of these words about Sabbath? Which ones? Saying what?
  • Would you benefit from blocking out one day a week to be “with the object of your desire?” Will you take your calendar and do it now?

Abba, thank you for the life-giving oasis of Sabbath rest.

For More: The Rest of God by Mark Buchanan

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These “Daily Riches” are for your encouragement as you seek after God and he seeks after you. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it. My goal is to share something of unique value with you daily in 400 words or less. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

“I practice daily what I believe; everything else is religious talk.”

Daily Riches: What Happens in Stillness (Mark Buchanan)

Posted on by under Being and Doing, Busyness, Rest and Relaxation, Sabbath Rhythms, Self-care, Stillness

“Sabbath living orients us toward that which, apart from rest, we will always miss. The root idea of Sabbath is simple as rain falling, basic as breathing. It’s that all living things – and many nonliving things too – thrive only by an ample measure of stillness. A bird flying, never nesting, is soon plummeting. Grass trampled, day after day, scalps down to the hard bone of the earth. Fruit constantly inspected bruises, blights. …a saw used without relenting – its teeth never filed, its blade never cooled – grows dull and brittle; a motor never shut off gums with residue or fatigues from thinness of oil – it sputters, it stalls, it seizes. Even companionship languishes without seasons of apartness. God stitched into the nature of things an inviolable need to be left alone now and then. The primary way people receive this aloneness and stillness is, of course, through sleep. We can defy slumber only so long … past a certain point, we collapse. We must submit to sleep’s benign tyranny, enter its inescapable vulnerability and solitariness. …The tricky thing about Sabbath, though, is it’s a form of rest unlike sleep. Sleep is so needed that, defied too long, our bodies inevitably, even violently, force the issue. Sleep eventually waylays all fugitives. It catches you and has its way with you. Sabbath won’t do that. Resisted, it backs off. Spurned, it flees. It’s easy to skirt or defy Sabbath, to manufacture cheap substitutes in its place – and to do all that, initially, without noticeable damage, and sometimes, briefly, with admirable results. It’s easy, in other words, to spend most of your life breaking Sabbath and never figure out that this is part of the reason your work’s unsatisfying, your friendships patchy, your leisure threadbare, your vacations exhausting. We simply haven’t taken time. We’ve not been still long enough, often enough, to know ourselves, our friends, our family. Our God.” Mark Buchanan

“There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God….” Hebrews 4:9

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • Do you bring your best self to your projects? your relationships?
  • If not, are you too exhausted or preoccupied even to care?
  • Have you “been still long enough, often enough” to know yourself, your friends, your family – your God?

Abba, help me relax and enjoy the rest you offer.

For More: The Rest of God by Mark Buchanan

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These “Daily Riches” are for your encouragement as you seek after God and he seeks after you. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it. My goal is to share something of unique value with you daily in 400 words or less. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

“I practice daily what I believe; everything else is religious talk.”

Daily Riches: The Value of Mental “Down Time” (John Hersey)

Posted on by under Busyness, Rest and Relaxation, Self-care, Silence, Solitude, Stillness
 “Fifty-eight percent of American adults have a smartphone today. The average mobile consumer checks their device 150 times a day, and sixty-seven percent of the time, that’s not because it rang or vibrated. …all you really have to do is go outside and see how many people can’t even walk without staring at a screen. …one thing is clear: Paying attention to our smartphones through so many of our waking moments means our minds don’t spend as much time idling. And that matters! We talked to boredom researcher Sandi Mann [who said]… ‘You come up with really great stuff when you don’t have that easy lazy junk food diet of the phone to scroll all the time.” Mann’s research finds that idle minds lead to reflective, often creative thoughts…. Minds need to wander to reach their full potential. During bouts of boredom our brains can’t help but jump around in time, analyzing and re-analyzing the pieces of our lives, says Jonny Smallwood, professor of cognitive neuroscience at the University of York. …inspiration strikes in the shower because it’s a moment when we’re not really looking at or focusing on anything else. Researchers have only really started to understand the phenomena of ‘mind-wandering’ — the activity our brains engage in when we’re doing nothing at all — over the past decade or so. ‘There’s a close link between originality, novelty, and creativity… and these sort of spontaneous thoughts that we generate when our minds are idle.’ [Smallwood] But when mental stimulation is a touch of the phone away? ‘That’s where daydreaming and boredom intersect,’ Smallwood says. ‘What smartphones allow us to do is get rid of boredom in a very direct way because we can play games, phone people, we can check the Internet. It takes away the boredom, but it also denies us the chance to see and learn about where we truly are….'”
 .

“Pay attention, Job, and listen to me;
be silent, and I will speak.”
Job 33:31

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • We all have our reasons for moments of obliviousness to others. Is your phone one of your reasons?
  • Can you embrace some moments of boredom, or must you distract yourself? Can you be “reflective?” What does your answer say about you?
  • Can others get your undivided attention? Can God?

Abba, meet me in “off” times when my mind is at rest.

For More: “Bored and Brilliant”

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These “Daily Riches” are for your encouragement as you seek after God and he seeks after you. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it. My goal is to share something of unique value with you daily in 400 words or less. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

“I practice daily what I believe; everything else is religious talk.”

Daily Riches: Everyone Around You is Exhausted … Are You? (Wayne Muller and Mark Buchanan)

Posted on by under Busyness, Hurry Sickness, Rest and Relaxation, Sabbath Rhythms, Self-care, Striving and drivenness

“I have visited the large offices of wealthy donors, the crowded rooms of social service agencies, and the small houses of the poorest families. Remarkably, within this mosaic there is a universal refrain: I am so busy. It does not seem to matter if the people I speak with are doctors or day-care workers, shopkeepers or social workers, parents or teachers, nurses or lawyers, students or therapists, community activists or cooks…. As their work all piles endlessly upon itself, the whole experience of being alive begins to melt into one enormous obligation. It becomes the standard greeting everywhere: ‘I am so busy.’” Wayne Muller

“And something dies in us. Too much work, the British used to say, makes Jack a dull boy. But it’s worse than that. It numbs Jack, parches Jack, hardens Jack. It kills his heart. When we get too busy, everything becomes either a trudge or a scramble, the doldrums or sheer mayhem. We get bored with the familiar, threatened by the unfamiliar. Our capacity for both steadfastness and adventure shrivels. One measure for whether or not you’re rested enough … is to ask yourself this: How much do I care about the things I care about? When we lose concern for people, both the lost and the found, for the bride of Christ, for friendship, for truth and beauty and goodness; when we cease to laugh when our children laugh (and instead yell at them to quiet down) or weep when our spouses weep (and instead wish they didn’t get so emotional); when we hear news of trouble among our neighbors and our first thought is that we hope it isn’t going to involve us – when we stop caring about the things we care about – that’s a signal we’re too busy.” Mark Buchanan

“Today, if you hear his voice,
do not harden your hearts.”
Hebrews 4:7

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • Does your life feel like “one enormous obligation?” Do you feel like a slave?
  • Are you too busy and tired to “care about the things you care about?”
  • Are you able to believe the good news that God wants to save you from such a life?
  • If you’re not already keeping a Sabbath day, would you try it one week? for one month?

Abba, help me protect this day for myself – and my salvation.

For More: Sabbath by Wayne Muller

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These “Daily Riches” are for your encouragement as you seek after God and he seeks after you. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it. My goal is to share something of unique value with you daily in 400 words or less. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

“I practice daily what I believe; everything else is religious talk.”

Daily Riches: Snow Day – Rest Day or Work Day? (Thomas Merton, George MacDonald, Brent Bill)

Posted on by under Awareness, Being and Doing, Busyness, Rest and Relaxation, Striving and drivenness

“Our being is not to be enriched merely by activity and experience as such. Everything depends on the quality of our acts and our experiences. A multitude of badly performed actions and of experiences only half lived exhausts and depletes our being. …when our activity is habitually disordered, our malformed conscience can think of nothing better to tell us than to multiply the quantity of our acts, without perfecting their quality. And so we go from bad to worse, exhausting ourselves, empty our whole life of all content, and fall into despair. There are times, then, when in order to keep ourselves in existence at all we simply have to sit back for a while and do nothing. And for a man who has let himself be drawn completely out of himself by his activity, nothing is more difficult than to sit still and rest, doing nothing at all. The very act of resting is the hardest and most courageous act he can perform; and often it is quite beyond his power.” Thomas Merton

“Work is not always required. There is such a thing as sacred idleness.” George MacDonald

“When we discover the secret of being inwardly at worship while outwardly at work, we find that the soul’s silence brings us to God and God to us.” Brent Bill

“my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Jesus, in Matthew 11:30

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • Are you aware of activity in your life that “depletes your being”, leaving you exhausted, unhappy or guilty because of its “disordered” nature?
  • When you feel that way, is your response to simply multiply “the quantity” of your acts? (more “badly performed actions” and “experiences only half lived”)
  • Are you able to “do nothing at all?” to practice “sacred idleness” in order to “keep yourself in existence?”
  • What practice could help you to “find the soul’s silence”, both in work and in rest?

Abba, may my soul find peace with you in both my work and my rest.

For More: No Man Is An Island by Thomas Merton

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These “Daily Riches” are for your encouragement as you seek after God and he seeks after you. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it. My goal is to share something of unique value with you daily in 400 words or less. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

“I practice daily what I believe; everything else is religious talk.”

Daily Riches: The Soul Needs It’s Rest (Tim Keller, Pope Francis and Judith Shulevitz)

Posted on by under Ego Issues, Rest and Relaxation, Sabbath Rhythms, Self-care, Striving and drivenness

“In Deuteronomy 5:12–15, God ties the Sabbath to freedom from [Egyptian] slavery. Anyone who overworks is really a slave. Anyone who cannot rest from work is a slave—to a need for success, to a materialistic culture, to exploitative employers, to parental expectations, or to all of the above. These slave masters will abuse you if you are not disciplined in the practice of Sabbath rest. [And] Sabbath is about more than external rest of the body; it is about inner rest of the soul. We need rest from the anxiety and strain of our overwork, which is really an attempt to justify ourselves—to gain the money or the status or the reputation we think we have to have.” Tim Keller

“The second [illness] is …excessive industriousness; the sickness of those who immerse themselves in work, inevitably neglecting ‘the better part’ of sitting at Jesus’ feet. Therefore, Jesus required his disciples to rest a little, as neglecting the necessary rest leads to stress and agitation. Rest …is a necessary duty and must be taken seriously: in spending a little time with relatives and respecting the holidays as a time for spiritual and physical replenishment, it is necessary to learn the teaching of Ecclesiastes, that ‘there is a time for everything’.” Pope Francis

“Most people mistakenly believe that all you have to do to stop working is not work. The [Jewish and later Puritan sabbath] rules …were meant to communicate the insight that interrupting the ceaseless round of striving requires a surprisingly strenuous act of will, one that has to be bolstered by habit as well as by social sanction.” Judith Shulevitz

“…for anyone who enters God’s rest
also rests from their works,
just as God did from his.”
Hebrews 4:10

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • Are you a slave to the “need for success, to a materialistic culture, to exploitative employers, to parental expectations…?” What can you do to be more free?
  • Do you provide “inner rest” for your soul? Do you do it routinely? (Sabbath keeping is the ultimate routine.)
  • If “interrupting the ceaseless round of striving requires a surprisingly strenuous act of will, one that has to be bolstered by habit” then is what you’re doing to “stop working” sufficient? Is it strenuous? willful? habitual?

Abba, deliver me from slavery from within and without. Help me to rest in you.

For More: The Sabbath World by Judith Shulevitz

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These “Daily Riches” are for your encouragement as you seek after God and he seeks after you. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it. My goal is to share something of unique value with you daily in 400 words or less. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

“I practice daily what I believe; everything else is religious talk.”

Daily Riches: “Don’t Just Do Something, Stand There” (Philip Simmons, Robert Barron, and Eugene Peterson)

Posted on by under awe and wonder, Hurry Sickness, Rest and Relaxation, Silence, Simplicity, Stillness, The Sacrament of the Present Moment

“… our busyness—whether of body or of mind—is often a distraction, a way of avoiding others, avoiding intimacy, avoiding ourselves. We keep busy to push back our fears, our loneliness, our self-doubt, our questions about purposes and ends. We want to know we matter, we want to know our lives are worthwhile. And when we’re not sure, we work that much harder, we worry that much more. In the face of our uncertainty, we keep busy.  …What is it, then, that restores us to a better version of ourselves, that returns us to our firm sense of goodness—both our own and the world’s? Perhaps it’s a question of grace: a reflected sunset flares in the windows of a skyscraper, a sheet of newspaper takes flight down an empty street, and suddenly we find ourselves in a world made luminous with wonder. … And so it is: the world itself can call us out of our preoccupations, our worries, our lists and agendas. In such moments our attention is arrested, quite literally stopped, and the world seems to say to us: “Don’t just do something, stand there.”  Philip Simmons

“It is a commonplace of the spiritual masters that the deepest part of the soul likes to go slow, since it seeks to savor rather than to accomplish; it wants to rest in and contemplate the good rather than to hurry off to another place.” Robert Barron

“When we are noisy and when we are hurried, we are incapable of intimacy–deep, personal, complex relationships. …like children lost in the woods, the more lost we feel, the faster we run.” Eugene Peterson

“Do not be afraid, little flock,
for your Father has been pleased
to give you the kingdom.”
Jesus in Luke 12:32

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • Are you able to do nothing, to just “stand there” rather than “hurry off to another place?”
  • If you’re always rushing, can you begin to ask God to show you why that is?
  • Does your pace of life allow for “deep, personal, complex relationships?” for awe?

Abba, help me understand the worry and hurry that drives me. Help me stop for wonder. Restore me to a better version of myself.

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*For More: Learning to Fall: The Blessings of an Imperfect Life by Philip Simmons

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These “Daily Riches” are for your encouragement as you seek after God and he seeks after you. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it. My goal is to share something of unique value with you daily in 400 words or less. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

“I practice daily what I believe; everything else is religious talk.”

 

 

Daily Riches: “Sitting Down on the Inside” (David Whyte, Emily Freeman, Karl Barth, Bernard of Clairvaux)

Posted on by under Busyness, Contemplation, Rest and Relaxation, Self-care, Stillness, Striving and drivenness

“To rest is to give up on the already exhausted will as the prime motivator of endeavor, with its endless outward need to reward itself through established goals. To rest is to give up on worrying and fretting and the sense that there is something wrong with the world unless we are there to put it right …we are rested when we let things alone and let ourselves alone, to do what we do best, breathe as the body intended us to breathe, to walk as we were meant to walk, to live with the rhythm of a house and a home, giving and taking through cooking and cleaning. When we give and take in this easy foundational way we are closest to the authentic self, and closest to that self when we are most rested. To rest is not self indulgent, to rest is to prepare to give the best of ourselves, and perhaps, most importantly, arrive at a place where we are able to understand what we have already been given.” David Whyte

“In deference to God, to heart and meaning of his work, there must be from time to time an interruption, a rest, a deliberate non-continuation, a temporal pause, to reflect on God and his work and to participate consciously in the salvation provided by him and to be awaited from him.” Karl Barth

“Action and contemplation are very close companions; they live together in one house on equal terms; Martha is Mary’s sister…If you separate the two, then you do wrong… When I am at rest, I accuse myself of neglecting my work; when I am at work, of having disturbed my repose. The only remedy in these uncertainties is prayer; entreating to be shown God’s holy will at every moment….” Bernard of Clairvaux

“Truly my soul finds rest in God…”
Psalm 62:1

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • Are you able to work hard, and also to truly rest?
  • Do you rest so you can give “the best of yourself” to work and to others?
  • Do you pause deliberately to “reflect on God and his work” and wait upon him for salvation?

Abba, may my days be characterized by sitting down on the inside.*  May my soul find deep rest in you.     *(Thanks for this phrase to Emily Freeman.)

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For More: Consolations by David Whyte

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These “Daily Riches” are for your encouragement as you seek after God and he seeks after you. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it. My goal is to share something of unique value with you daily in 400 words or less. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

“I practice daily what I believe; everything else is religious talk.”

Daily Riches: Do Nothing … and then Rest (Anne Wilson Schaef, Soren Kierkegaard and Mary Oliver)

Posted on by under Being and Doing, Busyness, Hurry Sickness, Rest and Relaxation, Solitude, Striving and drivenness

“How beautiful it is to do nothing, and then rest afterward.”  Spanish proverb

“For many of us the thought of doing nothing is terrifying. We can’t imagine what life would be like if we were not slaving away at our projects. Not to have our projects waiting for us is like trying to live with parts missing. We have become so dependent upon the security of the next project that they are not longer our projects. We are owned by them. Workaholics often experience some depression when they complete a task. Instead of dealing with the natural feeling of letdown, we overlap completion with a new beginning. Hence, like the relationship addict, we never have to deal with separation or beginnings and endings. In fact, we never have to deal with anything.” Anne Wilson Schaef

“The press of busyness is like a charm. It is sad to observe how its power swells, how it reaches out seeking always to lay hold of ever-younger victims so that childhood or youth are scarcely allowed the quiet and the retirement in which the Eternal may unfold a divine growth.” Soren Kierkegaard

“I asked the boy beneath the pines.
He said, The master’s gone alone
Herb-picking somewhere on the mount,
Cloud-hidden, whereabouts unknown.’”
Chia Tao – 8th Century

“Whereever I am, the world comes after me
It offers me its busyness.
It does not believe that I do not want it.
Now I understand why the old poets of China
went so far and high
into the mountains,
then crept into the pale mist.”
Mary Oliver

“… in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth,
and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed.”
Exodus 31:17

Moving From Head to Heart

  • Can you imagine living without “slaving away at your projects?” Are you “dependent upon the security of your next project” to anesthetize yourself to painful feelings or realities?
  • Are you able to “do nothing … and then relax?” Have you learned how to creep “into the pale mist?”
  • If it’s “quiet and retirement in which the Eternal may unfold a divine growth”, are you determined to regularly retire quietly … “gone alone?”

Abba, “Set me free from the laziness that goes about disguised as activity when activity is not demanded of me.” Thomas Merton

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For More: Meditations for Women Who Do Too Much by Anne Wilson Schaef

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These “Daily Riches” are for your encouragement as you seek after God and he seeks after you. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it. My goal is to share something of unique value with you daily in 400 words or less. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

 

Daily Riches: Activism Requires Contemplation (Wayne Muller and Chris Heuertz) *

Posted on by under Being and Doing, Being the Beloved, Change Yourself First, Contemplation and Activism, Hurry Sickness, Rest and Relaxation, Sabbath Rhythms, Self-care, Social Justice

“I have sat on dozens of boards and commissions with many fine, compassionate, and generous people who are so tired, overwhelmed, and overworked that they have neither the time nor the capacity to listen to the deeper voices that speak to the essence of the problems before them. Presented with the intricate and delicate issues of poverty, public health, community well-being, and crime, our impulse, born of weariness, is to rush headlong toward doing anything that will make the problem go away. Maybe then we can finally go home and get some rest. But without the essential nutrients of rest, wisdom, and delight embedded in the problem-solving process itself, the solution we patch together is likely to be an obstacle to genuine relief. Born of desperation, it often contains enough fundamental inaccuracy to guarantee an equally perplexing problem will emerge as soon as it is put into place. In the soil of the quick fix is the seed of a new problem, because our quiet wisdom is unavailable.” Wayne Muller

“My rhythms have become clearer over the years. I know I need:
Sabbath for Rest
Retreats for Reflection
Vacations for Recreation
Sabbaticals for Renewal.
“And if I don’t make rhythms for rest, reflection, recreation and renewal then all of these opportunities will inevitably be wasted on recovery.”
Chris Heuertz

“This is what the Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel, says:
‘In repentance and rest is your salvation,
in quietness and trust is your strength,
but you would have none of it.’”
Isaiah 30:15

Moving From Head to Heart

  • Years ago Lewis Grant coined the phrase “sunset fatigue” to describe the exhausted state in which many arrive home at the end of a day. Do you often feel like you’re done before the day is?
  • Exhaustion sabotages much of what we do, not only at home after “sunset”, but in business settings, community service or in the work of social justice. Can you relate?
  • Muller and Heuertz both insist that we need to regularly stop, rest, delight and contemplate – essentially that self-care must precede any kind of usefulness. Does your life reflect this truth?

Abba, lead me regularly into the sabbath rest you have for me, and help me to live out of that. Impress upon me the need to care for myself well if I’m to be of any use to others.

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For More: Sabbath by Wayne Muller

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“I’m for truth, no matter who tells it. I’m for justice, no matter who it is for or against.” (Malcolm X)  I love these words of Malcolm X , but I don’t agree with everything he’s said, written or done. The same is true for those who show up on the pages of Daily Riches. Eventually, writers and teachers from many diverse backgrounds will make an appearance here, and I offer their insights to you without any kind of vetting for “orthodoxy.” Sometimes we learn the most from those with whom we differ, and to turn only to those who are always right or reliable would eliminate everyone. My working assumption in Daily Riches is that the spirit of God will lead you into all truth. So I hope you’ll read, seeking to have your “truth” challenged, critiqued, and improved – and that a priori you’ll be for the truth no matter who tells it. That’s difficult but always worth the effort. Thanks for reading and sharing my daily blog. Bill (Psalm 90:14)

Daily Riches: Sabbath and the Rhythm of Rest (Nancy Schongalla-Bowman and Mark Buchanan) *

Posted on by under Being and Doing, Busyness, Hurry Sickness, Rest and Relaxation, Sabbath Rhythms, Self-care

“Despite the commandment, despite the day of rest and savoring that closed the creation story, many of us struggle to maintain a rhythm that includes intentional times of play and “non-doing.” Having just finished nature’s season of Sabbath we are reminded that spring, creativity, newness of life, are preceded by fallow time when it appears that nothing is happening. Prayer too is a time when it appears that nothing is happening. But Sabbath and prayer provide necessary opportunities for us to re-align with God and to remember that our purpose is union, faithfulness, and delight, not perfection or productivity.” Nancy Schongalla-Bowman

“”The Exodus command, with its call to imitation, plays on a hidden irony: we mimic God in order to remember we’re not God. In fact, that is a good definition of Sabbath: imitating God so that we stop trying to be God.” Mark Buchanan

“Six days do your work, but on the seventh day do not work,
so that your ox and your donkey may rest,
and so that the slave born in your household
and the foreigner living among you may be refreshed.”
Exodus 23:12

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • Many of us sense the need for “realigning with God” during each day (e.g., Daily Office) and in the course of each week (Sabbath) – and yet we “struggle” with these practices. What do you suppose accounts for that?
  • Even if the Sabbath command is no longer binding today, can you hear God’s heart in Exodus 23 – to give the gift of rest to his people and those who work for them – even to animals? Do you see value in rest and “fallow time” in the world?  in your life?
  • Do you agree with the statement that our purpose “is union, faithfulness, and delight, not perfection or productivity?” Even productivity? Have you built elements into your regular schedule that reflect this claim?

Abba, sometimes it seems like everyone else is running, striving, and grasping – chasing the brass ring, measuring by accomplishment, affirmation and efficiency. I want union with you more than I want those things. Help me to develop a rhythm of regularly recalibrating my relationship with you and your purposes.

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For More: ”Sabbath: Keeping a Rhythm of Rest” by Nancy Schongalla-Bowman

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“There grows in me an immense dissatisfaction with all that is merely passively accepted as truth, without struggle and without examination. Faith, surely, is not passive, and not an evasion. And today, more than ever, the things we believe, I mean especially the things we accept on human faith—reported matters of ‘fact,’ questions of history, of policy, of interpretation, of wants—they should be very few.” Thomas Merton   These Daily Riches are designed to encourage examination of convictions, of faith, so that we increasingly trust in the God who is really there, and less in our ideas of Him. Thanks for reading and sharing my daily blog. –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

Daily Riches: Take a Deep Breath and Relax (Peter Scazzero and Dallas Willard)

Posted on by under Being and Doing, Busyness, Contemplation and Activism, Rest and Relaxation

“When we sleep, God works. God wants to sow this seed into the soil of your heart and mine. If we can slow down and receive this one truth of how He works, thirtyfold, sixtyfold and a hundredfold, fruit will come forth (Mk. 4:20). Our personal lives, our marriages, our leadership, our sermons, our churches will be transformed. God holds the universe together. We don’t have to. God holds the oceans in His hand. He gives drink to every living creature. …He grows the grass and waters the trees. He cultivates every plant and flower. …God invites us to lay aside our bread of anxious toil and receive sleep as His beloved. He alone “builds the house,” not us.  God illustrates this with the creation and growth of a child. We engage in one brief moment of sexual intercourse and He then takes over to grow a fetus, a baby, and eventually an adult human being who engages the world (Ps.127). God does 99.9999% of the work. The kingdom of God grows “all by itself” – even when we sleep (Mark 4:26). Take a deep breath. Sit at Jesus’ feet, remembering that His love brought you into existence and sustains you today. He is working all over the world at this very moment building His kingdom – apart from you and me. Ask Him what small, small part He may have for you to do today.” Pete Scazzero

“Suppose our failures occur, not in spite of what we are doing, but precisely because of it.” Dallas Willard

“Unless Yahweh builds the house,
They labor in vain who build it;
Unless Yahweh guards the city,
The watchman keeps awake in vain.
It is vain for you to rise up early,”rel
To retire late,
To eat the bread of painful labors;
For He gives to His beloved even in his sleep.”
Psalm 127:1,2

Moving From Head to Heart

  • Think about how relaxed Jesus was. Are you relaxed? If not, what does that say about you?
  • It’s counter-intuitive to think of your seemingly imperative labors as “vain” – so what is God saying to you in the quote from the Psalm?
  • Could your striving and laboring actually be hindering God’s work? Explain how that could be. What needs to change?

Abba, what small, small part to you have for me to do today?

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For More: Emotionally Healthy Spirituality by Pete Scazzero

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Thanks for reading! – Bill (Psalm 90:14)