In 2005, a store called MinneNAPolis opened in Minnesota’s Mall of America. It rented comfy spots where weary shoppers could take naps for only 70 cents a minute. The new store included themed rooms such as Asian Mist, Tropical Isle and Deep Space. The walls were thick enough to drown out the sounds of the mall outside. The company’s website said, “Escape the pressures of the real world into the pleasures of an ideal one.” “It’s not just napping,” read the press release. “Some guests will want to listen to music, put their feet up, watch the water trickling in the beautiful stone waterfall, breathe in the positive-ionization-filtered air, enjoy the full-body massager and just take an enjoyable escape from the fast-paced lifestyle.”
Sunday isn’t a day of rest for those of us with worship leading responsibilities. Some of us are probably wondering if we have enough in the tank to do it all again next week. So if Sunday isn’t our Sabbath, when is? Most worship team players and singers are volunteers with full-time jobs outside of their worship leading responsibilities. So they don’t have the freedom to take off the Monday after or Friday before Sunday like some of those in full-time ministry do. So if we don’t establish a regular rhythm of rotating players and singers in to allow them to catch their breath, then how can we expect them to lead others to a place they no longer have the spiritual, emotional or physical resolve to go themselves?
Jesus said, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. All of you take up my yoke and learn from me, because I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matt 11:28-30). Offering permission for regular rhythms of rest means we are helping each other remove our self-made yokes.
The word rest in this passage is better translated as refreshment. As a college student I worked a couple of summers installing aluminum siding, screen rooms and even an aluminum swimming pool enclosure. The pool enclosure was installed around and over a pre-existing pool that was full of water. Screws driven into the structure with powered screw guns held the aluminum joists and panels together. Inevitably some of the screws fell into the pool. So it was my job to dive into the pool several times each day to retrieve those screws so they wouldn’t clog up the pool filter and drain system. I certainly understood that word rest for a few minutes in the July Oklahoma heat.
Refresh means to renew, revive or reinvigorate. Refreshment is not idleness, it isn’t exemption from responsibilities and it’s not laziness or a free pass. It is instead an intentional deep calming physical and spiritual peace. Isaiah also spoke of this kind of rest, “Do you not know? Have you not heard? Yahweh is the everlasting God, the Creator of the whole earth. He never grows faint or weary; there is no limit to His understanding. He gives strength to the weary and strengthens the powerless. Youths may faint and grow weary, and young men stumble and fall, But those who trust in the Lord will renew their strength; they will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary; they will walk and not faint.”
Jesus wasn’t challenging us to do something he didn’t practice himself. He said, “Learn from me” (Matt 11:29). After feeding the five thousand he perceived that the crowd would try to come and take him by force to make Him King. The text says Jesus withdrew again to the mountain by Himself to be alone (John 6:15). Indicating he had been there before. After John the Baptist was beheaded Jesus encouraged the disciples who had been working very hard and were grieving to “come away by yourselves and rest for a while” (Mark 6:31).
It is evident in chapter 12 of Matthew that Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath, we aren’t. Chapter 11 ends with him reminding us take his yoke because it is easy and his burden is light (Matt 11:29-30). A good yoke is formed to the shape of the neck of the oxen. It should cover a large area of skin to distribute the stresses widely. It is smooth, rounded and polished with no sharp edges so that no point will endure too much stress. When the yoke fits perfectly, the oxen can haul heavy loads for years and their skin will remain healthy, with no pressures sores. This text is a great reminder for us to lead worship with margins of recovery by bearing his yoke instead of those stressful burdens of our own making.
This article originally appeared here.
