cease and desist!

I stared at the laundry pile as though it had horns and an evil little tail. I promise you it breeds while I sleep.  Laundry (along with 85% of all housework duties) is something you just have. to. stay. on. top. of.  And, I like to take my weekends for my family and go out.  So, something happens and I promise you, our little family creates laundry every weekend to put to work my poor little (very little) washing machine for the entire week.

Life with two babies and a school-aged girl keeps me on my toes and it has taken me quite a while to adjust.  Something was always being left behind.  If it wasn't housework, it was Jesus, if it wasn't Jesus, it was the kids.  Something just seemed to be off-balance all the time.  But then, four months later, life began to have a semblance of normal again and I started to catch up and learn balance with three children (well, at least a bit of a routine and a whole lot of discipline).  And I realized that this mothering, wivering and homemaking business sure is a lot of work and that it required actual effort on my part.

So, that's what I do now.  I work.  Hard.  From the moment I wake up to the moment I fall asleep.  I'm working and serving and communing with the Lord simultaneously in some sort of miraculous testimony of Jesus (because it takes a whole lot of grace to sustain me).  But then, there's days like today.  Days where I'm exhausted beyond the point of delusion, when I've been up most of the night with my teething son and sick big-girl.  When I chose to go to bed late last night in an effort to maintain a clean home but it backfired on me because then today, I can't see straight.  Days when I choose to serve our brothers and sisters from our House of Prayer community in the ministry of hospitality but aren't quite sure where my strength will come from.  Days like today, Jesus reminds me to rest. Even He rested after the glorious work of Creation. As a man, He often left the crowd for the stillness and solitude of the morning in an effort to rest upon His Father.

I'm pretty sure rest is important to Him since He practiced it Himself, commanded an entire day of rest be recognized in His 10 Commandments (I mean, it's up there with idolatry, murder and respecting the parents!) and continues to remind His friends today of that very commandment.

Rest

In the original Hebrew, to rest was the commonly used word of Shabath. Its literal translation is to cease and desist. Stop and let go!  In American English, we use the phrase when a command is given in a law enforcement job.  Cease and desist. Stop. Let go and don't do anything else.  

What a magnificent reminder to this OCD Mama. Yes, the practical ministry of homemaking is important and it musn't be neglected.  But the commandment to rest still lives today and we are to obey it.  I am on a mission and I choose rest.  Maybe not today (Sundays tend to be busy) but some time this week.  I will choose Sabbath.  I will unplug, stop. Cease and desist and listen to the gentle, violent voice of the Holy Spirit. 

I pray you will too. 

Agape,