March 21, 2023
A Day of Rest
Beloved, I set aside one day a week for you to rest to be refreshed so your creative juices will flow without blockage. That day a week is a gift from Me to you! One Sabbath day as Jesus was walking through some grain fields, His disciples began breaking off heads of grain to eat. But the Pharisees said to Jesus, “Look, why are they breaking the law by harvesting grain on the Sabbath?” Jesus said to them, “Haven’t you ever read in the Scriptures what David did when he and his companions were hungry? He went into the house of God (during the days when Abiathar was a high priest) and broke the law by eating the sacred loaves of bread that only priests are allowed to eat. He also gave some to his companions.” Then Jesus said to them, “the Sabbath was made to meet the needs of people, and not people to meet the requirements of the Sabbath. So, the Son of Man is Lord, even over the Sabbath!” (Mark 2:23-28) What was Jesus saying? He created the Sabbath to serve you – not for you to serve the Sabbath. It is a blessing! It’s like tithing. People who are tithers know that 90% will go farther than 100% will go.
People who rest one day a week know they can get more done in six days with God’s blessing than they can in seven days without His blessing. It’s that simple; it’s a matter of ‘trusting God.’ Jesus also said, if your ox falls in the ditch on the Sabbath, pull it out. (Luke 14:5) I love what I do, but when you work seven days a week, burning the candle at both ends, you will end up exhausted, and it will impact your health.
I know too well. My biggest struggle as an adult has been working too much and not taking time to restore. It has exhausted me to the point in 2012; I was attacked with a severe case of shingles in the nerves around my eye and ear, losing my hearing with blurred vision on the left side of my face. The doctor ordered me to bed, and he said, ‘if you do not go to bed and rest, you may lose your eyesight permanently!’ The diagnosis was exhaustion, which triggered the shingles.
During the six months, I had to take off work for recovery, the Holy Spirit began speaking to me, saying, ‘Enter My rest!’ I didn’t have a clue what that meant! I asked the Holy Spirit to teach me. When you enter the rest of God, you enter a place of peaceful trust in God. I do not know how I made it through those six months without working, but I will tell you God provided everything I needed, and He healed me in the process while I rested. We need balance in our lives. It is a blessing to take the Sabbath off and rest to be refreshed. You must be intentional about taking the Sabbath off once a week! Pray, and ask the Holy Spirit, ‘what are you saying to me through this message?’
