God in My Everything: How an Ancient Rhythm Helps Busy People Enjoy God

We don’t read the Bible, pray, or perform some “spiritual task” so we can check them off our to-do lists. The practices, rather, create space for us to enjoy company with Jesus. They enable us to receive the life of God and are thus aptly called “a means of grace.”

Ironically, attempting too many spiritual practices at once can actually keep our relationship with Jesus on the surface because we are not able to experience him deeply in any of those activities. It’s like speed dating. You can’t have a significant conversation with any one person even though, or rather because, you’re doing a lot of “dating.”

“See to it, brothers and sisters, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called ‘Today,’ so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.”9

Part of the reason we can’t truly find rest is that we are trying to validate our existence to ourselves or to other people. To experience full rest, we need to be free from the voice of self-condemnation.

Saint Benedict’s rule was designed with “a little strictness in order to amend faults and to safeguard love.” His rule is also famous for its gentleness and flexibility. He insisted that “in drawing up its regulations, we hope to set down nothing harsh, nothing burdensome.”7

The truth is that we may be busy because we feel a need to validate our worth. Sabbath gives us a chance to step off the hamster wheel and listen to the voice that tells us we are beloved by God.

We feel we have to do something to justify our existence. At school, at work, or as parents in the home we feel like we need to outrun our peers to validate our worth.

In Jesus’ day, the teachers of the law multiplied the rules and regulations around the Sabbath so that it was no longer a joy, but a burden; no longer a delight, but a duty. Jesus responded to this dreary view by saying, “The Sabbath was made for people, not people for the Sabbath.”

says author Alan Deutschmann in his book Change or Die, it is impossible for us to experience lasting change unless we are in some kind of relationship.