When you feel like you’re mentally and emotionally exhausted, there is one major thing you can do.

REST!

Now please don’t scroll away.

I know this may seem simple or like the most basic answer in the world, but trust me it is a lot harder than you think!

If it wasn’t hard, I think there would be a lot more relaxed and peaceful people. So many people wouldn’t feel emotionally drained.

What is rest?

Rest is defined as several things — One definition says “cease work or movement in order to relax, refresh oneself, or recover strength”.

Another definition states “be placed or supported so as to stay in a specified position”, and the last definition is similar to the first one, “an instance or period of relaxing or ceasing to engage in strenuous or stressful activity”.

The best things that I like about these definitions are the words refresh, recover and be supported.

Those are the words that truly stand out to me when I read up on the definitions of rest.

Because many of the time, when you recognize that you or someone else needs rest, it is usually for one or all of those purposes.

When you go into a state of rest, you realize that the you have been working constantly but your mind and/or your body have reached a point where it can no longer carry out the task that you have given it to do.

Your mind and your body likewise run out of energy, similar to how a car (no matter how great of a condition it is in) will run out of gas, if you keep driving it non-stop.

You taking care of the physical aspects of your car is not going to prevent it from running out of gas when you need to use it.

The Importance of Rest

So you should look at your body and your mind in the same way.

No matter how well you take care of yourself, while you are working hard and moving about through your everyday life, you will get tired.

That is normal and part of the way your body and mind work.

So part of taking care of yourself, is resting — in the same way, that part of taking care of your car is filling up the tank with gas so that you don’t run your engine into the ground and kill it off before time.

As Christians, we tend to get caught up in all the things that are going on in the world around us and in our lives and in church or our ministries, that we forgot that we sometimes we need a break from the things that we are doing.

You may not realize it, but part of the benefits of separating yourself to speak with the Lord is the fact that you can be still and rest as you converse with the Heavenly Father.

You need to be able to set things aside every once in while to do the things that I listed before in the definitions of rest: to refresh yourself, to recover your strength and to be supported.

You will be able, in these moments of rest, to refresh your mind and your spirit so you can get new ideas on how to move forward in your life, work and ministry.

You will be able to recover your strength, because you are no longer putting any more strain on your mind and body to continue doing that work or assignment; you have actually physically stopped doing it.

And also, you will be able to be supported both the Holy Spirit and by others.

When you stop being in charge and in control of everything, you allow God the opportunity to show you where He already had everything under control and you will be able to receive the help other around you at work and in church.

They will be able to fill in in your absence, so that the work can still get done and/or the ministry can still move forward.

Hopefully, with this short breakdown of what rest is you are able to see how important rest is to each and every single human being - especially you.

You need to rest.

I know it is way too easy to get caught up in the running and the back-and-forth of your everyday life and everything else you might have to do, but you need to take a step back and evaluate whether it is time for you to take a break.

Is it time for you to rest?

Why Aren’t You Resting?

There will be many times in your life where you will have to stop and consider whether you should be taking a break.

You are constantly working, running from here to there; there is so many much to do, you’re staring to feel overwhelmed and you can’t seem to catch your breath.

If this feels or sounds like you then, maybe you need to consider taking a break - or as I have been calling it: Resting.

There are many ways of how you can rest, and they go beyond your typical getting some nightly sleep - although, that is included and it is important.

But getting rest is not just sleeping, because I’m sure there have been times when you have slept, but still woke up the next morning still feeling tired…

And that is because your mind did not get the opportunity to take a break.

Consider regularly checking in with yourself to see why it is that you may not be resting, and make a change.

You can’t fully rest if your are constantly worried about what will happen if a certain thing doesn’t get done.

Will the earth stop spinning? Mostly likely not.

Will someone be in danger? Most likely not, unless you are a surgeon who has to perform a delicate surgery.

Then, your stress makes sense. Even then, there are ways you can bring yourself to remain calm.

But if that is not the case for you, then you can probably temporarily step away from whatever it is you feel like “you have to do”.

How Should You Be Resting?

There may be other reasons that you have that may be preventing you from taking a break.

Do you feel like you might be seen as a failure because you stopped doing what you feel like other people, expect you to do?

What about the goals you want to achieve, and more importantly have you thought about what God might expect you to do?

God is intentional, and everything He allows us to experience and/ go through is with a purpose.

So we need to make sure that every decision we make is intentional as well.

Are the tasks that you are performing or the work you are handling leading you closer to God and to your purpose in God?

If not, you might want to reconsider whether you should be taking a break from stressing out about the thing, and maybe even consider taking a permanent break from that task or assignment all together, if it is at all possible.

Part of being able to properly rest is being able to understand and accept the things that are into your control and the things that are not in your control.

The things that you can change, make a plan around how you can work on them. And the things that you can’t control, remember that they are in the best of hands — they are in God’s hands.

So pray about those things and leave them in God’s hands. Trust me, He’s been God for a looooong time, so He knows what He’s doing. (LOL)

Going back to being intentional, another part of being able to rest is understand the power you have over you.

I know that sometimes it feels like you can’t help some things you do, because your mind has built in habits and behaviors into your everyday life.

But ultimately you control and decide what you do on a day-to-day basis, on a minute-to-minute basis, and down to a second-to-second basis.

You control you.

So in those moments, when you realize it is time for you to rest you need to command your mind to rest.

Try it!

It might feel silly, weird or strange at first, but try saying out loud to yourself, “I will rest now.”

And lay down, take several deep breaths, and talk to God as long as you can until you can get your mind to slow down or even get yourself to fall asleep.

Sometimes your mind needs to hear some instructions out loud in order to obey; the Bible says that ‘the power of life and death lays on the tongue’ (paraphrased from Proverbs 18:21).

So you speak life in yourself by commanding yourself to rest, so you can relax and recover.

Then, get back to what God has called and purposed for you to do.

What Does the Bible Say About Resting?

Now the best part of every one of these topics: what does the Word of God say?

Well, we will be looking at two scriptures that beautifully talk about rest and how you should be resting. The first scripture says, in Psalm 127:1-2 (NLT):

“Unless the Lord builds a house, the work of the builders is wasted. Unless the Lord protects a city, guarding it with sentries will do no good. It is useless for you to work so hard from early morning until late at night, anxiously working for food to eat; for God gives rest to his loved ones.”

In this scripture, the Word clearly tells us there is no use in worrying about anything or trying to plan anything if we don’t put our trust in the Lord.

We can…

worry,

worry,

and worry,

but the only way we can have and find rest is by surrendering everything over to God.

Now, I didn’t say to not do anything with your life.

I said that in what whatever you do, give it over to God first and trust Him to direct your steps with His Holy Spirit.

Don’t worry when things don’t get exactly as planned, God has everything in His control.

That is how you can have rest: when you stop worrying and trust God.

The scripture can be found in Matthew 11:28-30 (NLT):

“Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.”

In this scripture here, we see Jesus Himself is speaking to us and instructing us that we can find rest in Him by taking on His yoke and light burden.

In other words, He is saying you can try to do everything by yourself in your life if you want to, but it is much easier if you let me carry your burdens and your cares, and you follow Me.

Do what I command of You, trust in Me (this is the Lord speaking) and I will take care of the rest.

The results, your goals, your plans may not end up looking exactly how you want it to look, but it will be perfect for you and will be exactly what you need, according to God’s will for your life.

So through these two scriptures, what is the Bible telling us about how you can find rest?

By trusting God.

Simple: Let go, and let God.

This the simplest way of how you can stop worrying, stop being anxious and actually rest (have peace in your life).

It may not be the easiest way; it is definitely easier said than done, but it is the simplest way.

The Takeaways

• What is rest? Rest is being able to cease work, so that you can relax, refresh oneself, or recover strength.

  • Being able to rest is important because you will give yourself the chance to see what is important in your life, and be able to give your mind and your body a well-needed break.
    
    

• The way you can rest is by knowing your mind and your body, and knowing when it is time to step away from something.

  • Also, by being intentional about how you rest without distraction or worry.

    
    

• The Bible teaches us as Christians, the truest and simplest form of resting is by trusting in God and surrendering all of our plans, cares, and worries over to Him.

  • Jesus reminds us that by focusing on Him, we don’t have to worry about carrying heavy burdens of stress and worry on our own. He will carry them, and also give us strength.

When you let God have control of all the areas of your life, you will see that taking a step back and being able to rest will come naturally.

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