Hello ,

 

Listen to the following account from Dave Slagle of Atlanta, GA:

 

A few years ago, I received a phone call at my desk. A girl in the college department called to say that her car had broken down and she was stranded about two miles from the office. So, I drove over to the location and found her leaning against her car, looking flustered.

I leaned against the car next to her and asked what happened.

"Well, I was just driving down the road and it quit running," she said. "So I pulled off to the shoulder."

"Could you be out of gas?" I asked.

"No, I just filled it up."

Well, that one question pretty well exhausted my automotive diagnostic abilities, but I persisted. "What happened? Did it make any noises?"

"Oh, yeah," she replied. "As I was driving down the hill, it went 'brump, brump, brump, POW!'"

In an effort to be an active listener I reflected back to her, "You say the car went 'brump, brump, brump, POW!'?"

"Yep."

I was feeling a little more confident, so I asked, "When was the last time you changed the oil?"

She gave me this quizzical look and said, "Oil?" 

As it turned out, she had owned the car for a year and a half and never changed the oil.

 

As comical as this illustration may sound, it's really a very serious situation, especially when it is applied to the spiritual aspects of our lives.  Rest is as important to human beings as oil is to a motor vehicle. If we don't have the emotionally "lubricating" effects of rest in our lives, it doesn't take long for us to break down spiritually, emotionally, and sometimes even physically. 

 

"Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest."  Matthew 11:28

 

We take on God's rest in a number of different forms, but one of the best is to allow Him to bless us with a weekly Sabbath rest.  Our creator knows what is best for us, and He commands us to take the time in our lives on a regular, weekly basis to rest, rejuvenate, and spend time with our families and with Him.  It can have a spiritually, emotionally, and physically "lubricating" effect on the quality of our lives.  

 

If you haven't done this before, let me challenge you to look up the word "sabbath" every time it occurs in the scriptures.  Very quickly you will see a pattern of what God expects from us, and how to properly get the "Sabbath rest" that we all so desperately need.

 

 

Have a great day and God bless!

 

 

 

Pastor Mike / The Open Word