God said ‘Rest’ and they all slept late
Those are the closing words from When the World was New by Alicia Gracia de Lynam; a wonderful retelling of the biblical accounts of creation for children.
‘God said “rest” and they all slept late’ is an expression of God’s rest on the seventh day of creation. (In another of my children’s books on creation, God is depicted putting his feet up on a planet on this seventh day! Can you tell that I love children’s books?)
This is not the only time that God models or mandates rest, of course. Keeping a sabbath – a day without work – is one of the Ten Commandments, and there is rest for the land, too; every seven years a jubilee when the fields lie fallow, wildlife is undisturbed and all of creation ‘sleeps late.’
After the joyful intensity of ordinations and the tearful end-of-term rituals for every child moving on to new educational settings, or to work; after the re-creation of an earlier England in the church fete, and the high-octane competition of the village show, we might find ourselves moving into a more fallow season when we breathe more deeply; have time to consider the lilies of the field.
And exhale…
To all of you gearing up to lead holiday clubs or to host many summer weddings, who may now be laughing with deep irony – I see you and hear you! Thank you for making your summer a time of service. Even so, I hope that everyone’s summer has some space for idling away the hours; for settling a knotted handkerchief on your head and paddling in the sea; for reading a book in the shade; for napping like your Nanna; to be ‘busy doing nothing’. Exhale.
And I hope that your learning of leisure over these weeks can be applied to every week. Not just a day off a week, but 36 hours – not including sleeping time! – has been mandated by General Synod for clergy and this should be the absolute minimum for busy lay people too.
To rest is holy
To rest in this way – and to go on retreat, and to take all your holiday – is good stewardship of the life that God has given you. To rest is holy. And it is worship; an acknowledgement that God has ordered the world this way, that the kingdom isn’t dependent on your industry; that when you stop, still God’s work advances.
Over recent weeks I’ve had the joy of hosting Berkshire clergy and their partners who have school-aged children for supper. There we’ve had great conversations about the priority of family life; about how being a priest doesn’t trump being a partner and a parent or, for that matter, a child of God. Instead, these vocations should be woven together, held in balance, where one serves the other, where going to your child’s dance competition (or darts match) is as important as the PCC, where honouring your parents preaches as clearly as any well-crafted sermon. (And, for that matter, where your sermon might be silenced if there’s no integrity between how you live and what you preach.)
So can we become a people who hold one another to account for this integrated, holy life, where resting is honoured, where pause and pace are privileged parts of our lives together, where we celebrate stopping as well as honouring sacrifice.
And now – pull up a stool (or a planet) and put your feet up and know that this, too, is living as God intended.