Clarity With Charity

Hello friends! 

Today we continue our series on the Sabbath which was inspired by a reader question about how to find rest in the midst of a hectic life.  Here is Part 1 if you missed it.   http://claritywithcharity.com/?p=20#comment-26

I want to sit here with my journal and a cup of coffee.

Practically this is how I made/make Sabbath happen.

Choose a Day! I chose Saturday as my Sabbath day.  (I worked M-F, 8-5 and spent about 6 hours every Sunday at church, so that is how I chose Saturday.)  I would strongly recommend if you are leading and serving in your church in a substantial way that you NOT take Sunday as your Sabbath, because you are working whether you get a pay check for it or not.

Plan Ahead.  I thought about my week and month every Monday with the thought at the forefront of my mind, how can I get EVERYTHING done I need to do by Friday night so that Saturday is refreshing to me.  Planning ahead helped me be able to accomplish this goal.  (stay tuned…I mean subscribed!  In the coming weeks we will take a more detailed look at how to plan your day)   It also meant that I spent a lot of Friday nights working on things for the children’s ministry so that I could be ready for my rest on Saturday.

Communication.  I told people that Saturday was my Sabbath.  When I trained my Children’s church volunteers I told them Saturday was my Sabbath and to please not call, text or email unless it was an emergency.  I told girls I was mentoring,  that Saturday was my Sabbath and so if it wasn’t an emergency and to not expect a response to their text or call until the next day.  I didn’t check my email and often turned my phone off or turned it to silent.  I was amazed how encouraging and supportive people were of this.  If anyone did call or text they always apologized for doing so on my Sabbath.  I also was surprised to find that somehow miraculously there weren’t a lot of crises or emergencies on Saturdays.  I really believe that God protected this day for me, because I was doing my best to obey His commandment!

If only my garden looked like this!

Self Awareness.  I determined what was restful for me (this can vary so much person to person and season to season).  In the church planting/working full time season I am referencing it was relaxing to me to clean my house, garden, cook or bake.    This was a way to let a different part of my brain work, because in that season I didn’t spend a lot of time at home.

People don’t have a beginning or end.  Like you, I tend to take on the emotions and stress of other people, which makes me wonderful at extending empathy but horrible at emotionally resting.  Completing a project on my Sabbath, really helped me deal with situations in life that didn’t have a nice and tidy beginning and ending.  Sometimes I didn’t go to parties or social gatherings on that day, because during the week I was consistently meeting and interacting with at least 10-20 new people per day.  This meant that by Saturday, I (although I am extroverted) literally felt out of words.  I didn’t want to try to make conversation with anyone unless they were in a very close and small circle of friends.  I would usually go to a coffee shop or park that day and have a date with Jesus.  I would spend a lot of time journaling, praying or reading.  Sometimes I would go to Barnes and Nobles and read kids books (because they always make me happy and fuel my creativity!)  Sometimes I would sit and watch tv shows that I had dvrd earlier in the week and I felt great about totally vegging out. 

In my current season of life as a newlywed wife living in a new city and working on a blog, I am not around very many people in the week.   What is often refreshing to me on my Sabbath is the opposite of what it was in the last season.  I usually want to try to get people together to play games or have dinner.  I definitely don’t want to clean the house or cook because I do those things everyday.  So I have made Friday my house cleaning day so I can start my Sabbath with a clean house.  This way I am not constantly looking around thinking I need to clean something.   I try to cook extra food ahead of time or have really simple, quick meals that we can make on the weekend (think hamburger helper, frozen pizza).  My husband is also amazing and usually we eat out once or twice on the weekend.   I don’t write for my blog on my Sabbath.   I try to use that day to rest,  connect with my husband and the Lord.  I do this by napping, listening to a sermon podcast, laying outside to tan while reading a good book,  playing bocce ball, wandering around Home Depot with my hubby making remodeling plans for our house.

Our Sabbath on series continues next week where we will talk about  Superwomen…and if YOU are trying to be her!

I would love your thoughts!  How do you make Sabbath happen?  What is restful and refreshing for you on your Sabbath day?

This series comes from a question I received from a reader.  It was such a great question, with so many aspects to it, that as I began to write my response I realized it would be a great series.  Today is the beginning of the series.  Here is the question which prompted the series.

Dear Charity,

I tend to over-stockpile my plate full of obligations, responsibilities, events, church things, and social community things. They are all great and good and fine, but its really hard to find a place of rest in my heart that is not burdened by something or someone else already. Not to mention, my husband, more often than not, tends to get the last bit of my energy that’s barely existing, and It’s easy to feel like I’ve failed everyone by the time I’ve laid my head to rest at night.

How can I be responsible and faithful and yet still balance getting a day of rest without feeling lazy while doing it?

Sincerely,

Anna

Dear Anna,

I can completely relate with your struggle.   I feel like I have been on a journey with this same question for the past ten years.  I too felt that exact same way for years every night as I fell asleep, that I had failed everyone.  God has been so faithful through wise believers, His Word and His Spirit to help me be able to fall asleep at night being able to truly rest in body and mind because I no longer feel like I am living in a pressure cooker about to explode.

Let’s start by exploring the concept of taking a Sabbath day.  I lived for years thinking that taking one whole day a week to rest was at best a luxury but impossible for me.  There was a particular season where I was working full time while directing a Children’s Ministry at a church, helping lead a small group while also investing and mentoring young women in the church.  At the beginning of that two year season I did not take the concept of Sabbath very seriously.   However, I found myself quickly becoming an absolute mess!  I woke up most days feeling heavy and exhausted with the weight of tasks I had to complete along with the emotional weight of pastorally covering several ministry areas.  I felt like I was continually on the verge of an emotional meltdown and couldn’t enjoy “normal” things anymore.

It didn’t matter where I was invited to go, or what there was going on, all I wanted to do was SLEEP and not think for several hours.  Somewhere in the midst of this the Lord really spoke to my heart about the absolute necessity of taking a Sabbath, an entire day of rest once a week.  I couldn’t fathom that this could actually happen, but I had a major light bulb moment when I realized that a Sabbath wasn’t just  a nice idea or suggestion it was actually a command!  It’s a little embarrassing to admit but somehow I had missed this commandment in Exodus 20:8-11.

My favorite place to relax!

“Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns.  For 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.

It amazing how many believers miss this commandment, when we pay a great deal of attention to the other ones.   Although compared to most of the commandments God is extremely specific about this one!

If someone came up to Joe Average churchgoer and asked “Does God command us not to murder?”  Joe churchgoer would emphatically say “YES!”  And if we asked Joe if that was a commandment he tried to follow he probably would say again, “YES!”  However, if we asked Joe Average churchgoer does God command us to take a day off once a week where we rest, recharge and connect with Him?  Joe may stutter and stammer, thinking about His answer.  Even if Joe did answer “yes” if we followed up with the question, “is this a commandment you try to follow?” you may get a few more stutters and stammers.

I realized that not following ALL of God’s commandments was a sin!   Although I may never get thrown into jail for it, it didn’t take away from the weight of this commandment.  One thing I have found out about God is that He doesn’t give us commandments because He is trying to be a kill joy or controlling, it is the exact opposite.  He gives us commands because He loves us and wants us to experience fullness of life and incredible joy.

One thing was certain to me, the way I was living life was not giving me incredible joy.   Yet as crazy as it sounded, I was confident I was right in the place God wanted me and that He must have a better way for me.  So I decided to give the Sabbath a try.  And guess what it worked!  I began to feel much more refreshed every week.  Yes, there were times where I felt weary but it always helped me to know that no matter how hard the week was that I had a rest coming on Saturday!

So how did I make Sabbath happen?   I will tell you my practical steps in the next post. 

In the meantime, I would love to hear your thoughts about Sabbath.   Is it something you practice weekly?  Why or why not?  What does your Sabbath look like?