What if our greatest problem is the inability to do nothing?
We would not be the first. God’s Sabbath rest (Genesis 2:2, 3) was echoed in the Law of Moses (Exodus 31:13; Leviticus 26:2). But Israel ignored the command not to work the land every seventh year and to rest one day in seven. As prophesied (Leviticus 26:33-35), they were exiled for not resting, by faith, in honor of God.
We are not “under the Law” today, as explained in Galatians and Hebrews. Instead, the “Law of Christ” (love for God and others) guides us, a love which fulfills the Law without destroying it (Matthew 5:17; Romans 13:8-10). But what does that mean for the command to “Remember the Sabbath Day, to keep it holy”?
We must avoid the legalism of the Pharisees who totally missed that the Sabbath is a gift, not a burden (Mark 2:27). To get it right, we look to Jesus as Lord of the Sabbath (Mark 2:28), and fulfillment of the Law. Taking refuge in Him, we find the repose for which the Sabbath was a mere shadow (Colossians 2:16, 17).
So our inability to rest may stem from unbelief, not cabin fever. Just as the Jews needed to believe that God could get them through a year with no harvest, we need to trust Him to provide for us spiritually and physically apart from our own endeavors (Matthew 6:25-34). Ironically, trusting itself requires exertion of the will, and so Hebrews 4:11 instructs us to “make every effort to enter that rest.”
That means our present, enforced slow down actually can foster faith, if we “work at it!” When you trust Jesus, you enter His Sabbath (Hebrews 4:3) “for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from His” (Hebrews 4:9, 10). In Him are the green pastures and quiet waters many seem never to find.
Lie down, little lamb, lie down.
“Father, you have promised us rest in Jesus, and we ask now for the grace to claim that promise for our needs, both physical and spiritual. We want to be diligent when we are working, and just as diligent in trusting when we are not. In the name of Jesus. Amen.”