Get Some Rest: How Limits Bring a Spacious LifeSample

The Challenge of Rest

The gospel shows us that the good life—the only thing that will give us a stable and contented identity—is found by living within the loving limits of our God and King. Whether or not we call ourselves Christians, most of us do not practically live under the reign of King Jesus. 

Instead we choose to leave behind rest because it doesn’t feel like we’re accomplishing anything. So we choose harder, faster, and stronger to characterize our days. 

But what if our limits weren’t something to surmount or overcome? What if we didn’t approach rest as if it were another thing to check off? Can we find a more spacious life in our actual lives?

The freedom we find in the way of Jesus is abundant life, a life Jesus said he came to give to us, a life dripping with satisfaction like milk and honey, a life with the sustenance and delight of bread and wine, a life where there is a peace that passes understanding. Jesus offers us a spacious life, where no matter our circumstances, we are upheld by a love that created the cosmos and came to earth in order to rescue us and bring us home. A spacious life is a life of contentment that you can access no matter your work-life balance, or how zen you are, or your new workout routine and vitamins. 

Sounds a lot better than the hustle that keeps us moving in the day and the anxiety that keeps us up at night, right?

Maybe when we’ve been trying to push past our limits—our limits of time, ability, passion, purpose, life stage—we’ve been kicking against the wrong door. What might happen if we tried embracing our limits as gifts for our flourishing rather than barriers to our success? I think we’d find we were beginning to walk in the kingdom way. 

But to experience this spaciousness of soul, we have to do small and practical things too: go to bed on time, pray in gratitude for the gift of our bodies that need sleep, choose to not obsess over the looming deadlines. And we have to practice entrusting our limits to our unlimited God. 

As you pray this week and meditate on this passage from Matthew 28, ask for a more spacious life to be formed in you.