YouVersion

Johnson Bowie, at http://www.fusionatl.org/p/12081/Default.aspx, opens his message with a summary about how the end of the year seems to accelerate. Thanksgiving comes, then Christmas, then New Years and bang, you are a year older. But anyway, this time of year can sometimes be a time when we are most disconnected from God. We are so busy or the time reminds of what should be or its a time when we are trying to escape our problems, so ironically, we find ourselves forgetting what this time of year is really about. Johnson reminds us that God "leads me beside still waters" in the midst of our busy world. When is the last time we rested in Him so that he could do this and "restore" our souls? How do we stop and rest? "Be still and know that I am God." In Genesis, God rested from all that he had done. This day of rest was the Sabbath or kadesh (spelling?). The FiRST thing that was ever called "Holy" was a day, the Sabbath. In the Old Testament, God called any man who did not observe the Sabbath to be stoned!! What's with that? If we look further into it, we find that God rested after creating US. God actually commands us to rest. Many expect God would give us marching orders, but He says we are to rest on this day. In fact, in Deuteronomy 5, when God rehashes the 10 commandments, he spends a full third of the text prescribing rest to us. God's people didn't get a rest as slaves. This day is what separates a life of freedom from a life of slavery!! Slavery can be to work, of opinion of people or of the love of money. When Moses experienced the burning bush, it wasn't simply something that was created before Moses. It was something that Moses noticed and then ventured to observe. It was in his pause that God could speak to Moses. So often we can't hear God because of everything around us that distracts us. We need a day to rest and do nothing. Our culture so prevents us from that because it is so accomplishment driven. With rest, it allows us to live from fullness rather than for fullness. The Chinese use characters for work are "killing" and "heart". This seems to be true. Work can kill our hearts. A counselor once asked Johnson, "What is it that shows Summer (his wife) that she is second only to God?" What a great time, on the Sabbath, to relax and focus on things that we care most about.