God had finished the work . . . so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. Genesis 2:2
We sat atop some beach boulders, my friend Soozi and I, watching the foam send up sea spray in arched curls. Looking at the incoming waves crashing one after another against the rocks, Soozi announced, “I love the ocean. It keeps moving so I don’t have to!”
Isn’t it interesting how some of us feel we need “permission” to pause from our work to rest? Well, that’s just what our good God offers us! For six days, God spun the earth into existence, creating light, land, vegetation, animals, and humans. Then on the seventh day, He rested (Genesis 1:31–2:2). In the Ten Commandments, God listed His rules for healthy living to honor Him (Exodus 20:3–17), including the command to remember the Sabbath as a day of rest (vv. 8–11). In the New Testament, we see Jesus healing all the sick of the town (Mark 1:29–34) and then early the next morning retreating to a solitary place to pray (v. 35). Purposefully, our God both worked and rested.
The rhythm of God’s provision in work and His invitation to rest reverberates around us. Spring’s planting yields growth in summer, harvest in autumn, and rest in winter. Morning, noon, afternoon, evening, night. God orders our lives for both work and rest, offering us permission to do both.
How would you assess the balance in your life between work and rest? When and how might you pause each day to reflect on God’s example of rhythm and rest?
Dear God, thank You that You made me to follow after Your heart, to both work and rest for Your glory and my good.
INSIGHT
All major ancient cultures have creation legends, and they often depict creation as taking place through some sort of sexual activity among the gods or through acts of violence. Genesis is startlingly different from these stories; it simply states that God spoke all things into existence (Genesis 1:3, 6, 9, 11, 14, 20, 24) and that He formed Adam “from the dust of the ground” (2:7; see 1:26). When these creative acts were completed, God established His Sabbath rest (2:2–3). This rest would later be implemented for God’s chosen people, the fledgling nation of Israel (Exodus 20:8–11). When God gave the Ten Commandments to Moses, He reminded the people, “In six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy” (v. 11).