Seven Types of Sabbath for Our Modern Culture!نموونە

Engaging in Creative Rest

It’s amazing to me that in the very first chapter of the entire Scripture God prioritizes rest. He creates for six days, including the land, the seas, and all the animals. Then He creates us, mankind, in His own image, describing us as very good. The fulfillment of all His creation is created, and His immediate response is to take an entire day of rest. Another way of saying that might be that God reached a climax-point in His creativity, and then for a whole day, He ceased from creativity.

This brings us to the first type of rest that we are going to explore in this series, Creative Rest. To truly take an example from the Father about rest, we have to first acknowledge that ceasing from creating, or working, is God’s first definition of rest. Many people that I know, myself included, find that creative work actually produces an innate life of its own. There is a divine pleasure that is found in creating something beautiful or powerful. It’s a part of our divinely-designed DNA that leads us to create and work. However, failing to rest from creating is setting yourself up for creative burnout. We actually need creative rest in order to refresh our ability to create. Also, if we never stop and rest, we never get to fully enjoy what we have created.

Part of the problem here is not completely understanding that Jesus broke the curse of sin and death off our lives. As born again believers, we are no longer held captive by an endless need to perform or work. God has declared us valuable and treasured right now and worthy to have rest for our souls. This is part of the great victory of the cross.

So today, ask yourself this question: Am I getting a good amount of creative rest, or am I overworking myself?

Prayer: 

God, thank You that you established the blessing of creative rest. I’m grateful that You’ve made that available to me by nature, and then again because of the cross. Would You help me create a good amount of space in my life for rest from my creativity and work? I look to You and Your strength to lead the way, in Jesus’ name, amen!