The title might make you think I’m writing about a game, a sport, or gambling odds. What I’m writing about is God’s prescription for a weekly rhythm. I just finished a 12-week sabbatical, a wonderful gift from my congregation, to rest and get refreshed from ministry. During that time, I read a lot about pastoral need for rest and refreshment. I saw the burnout statistics, the correlation between physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health, and I could see that I was rapidly moving down that road.  

I was particularly challenged in that reading concerning my theology (what the Bible says about a subject) of rest. I had come under the conviction numerous times that I should be taking a sabbath rest, one day of rest in seven, but never put it into practice. Since the sabbath rest is in the Old Testament it’s easy to overlook. We live in the New Testament and the covenant of grace through Christ. However, I knew that God gave this one-day-in-seven pattern at creation (Genesis 2:3), BEFORE the law was given, but I allowed the demands of ministry to keep putting it off. In a culture that values production more than inner depth, it’s hard to cease work one day out of every seven.  

What is a sabbath rest? Well, it isn’t a day to lay around and do nothing, a whole day to plow into our favorite recreation, or 24 hours of prayer and Bible reading every seventh day. It is a day to set aside the busyness of work and home responsibilities in order to enjoy God. Resting, reading and prayer, and recreating are all valid uses of some of the time in the day of rest, so long as the focus is enjoying God, listening to God, and worshiping God.  

I was presented with a very clear and convicting truth — it’s a faith issue. Did I really think I was that important, and that I knew better than God what was most important for me to do each week? Can I trust God to fill in where I don’t have time? Will I trust God to direct me to the most important things for the next week, that I can get done, in a six-day workweek? 

I’m writing about the one-in-seven sabbath rest because this isn’t only God’s prescription for those in ministry, it’s for every human being! The busyness of our lifestyles is undoing us in multiple ways. Feeling stressed? Feel like you can’t get everything done? Is it possible that what you, or others, think is important isn’t the same as what God thinks is important? Jesus said, “Come to Me all who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest,” (Matt 11:28). Are you going to Him, and receiving His gift of rest? We might be surprised how much healthier, and truly productive, we all would be if we had a one-in-seven recalibration. Though it isn’t easy, I’m now doing my best to make a one-in-seven-day sabbath rest part of my weekly rhythm. Please consider it for yourself as well!

— Reflections appears regularly on the religion page. The column features a variety of local writers, coordinated through the Monroe Area Clergy Group. Dan Krahenbuhl is pastor of Monroe Bible Church.