Engagement Without Obstacles

Greetings All,

In quiet time this morning I was reading from the book The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate.  It is an excellent book that tries to place Genesis One back into a context of the Ancient Near East rather than into our modern scientific debate.  It looks at what Genesis One would have communicated in its ancient context when they would have absolutely no concept of our modern science or even our modern desire to understand material origins.  The author John H. Walton does a great job of refocusing the discussion on what Genesis One is telling us about God rather than about the creation of the earth.  When I finish I will post a review of it, but needless to say I am really enjoying it.

Today I was reading proposition seven, which is how he has organized his chapters, and it was covering day seven of creation and the meaning of Sabbath.  He offered a description of the ancient understanding of rest which really struck me and I wanted to share it with y'all.  He writes, "[rest results] when a crisis has been resolved or when stability has been achieved, when things have 'settled down.' This is more a matter of engagement without obstacles rather than disengagement without responsibilities." (pg. 73) 

What a contrast to our modern understanding of rest.  We or at least I tend to think in terms of a nap, or a vacation kicked back on the beach with no phones ringing or responsibilities calling out; rest as a concept is a sort of escape from the daily grind of life.  Here it is described as an eliminating of the toil from the daily grind of life.  Here we still work, but without the toil that was the curse of chapter three in Genesis.  Here we are still fully engaged with life rather than escaping it; we are just experiencing it without obstacles and challenges.  What a joy that would be!  I can honestly say in my own life that it is never really the work I hate in life, it is the toil that is associated with it.  The problems that present themselves each day and that exhaust us.  As an example think of how much more tired we are after extreme emotional toil than we are after a really long day of physical labor.  After a day of physical work that is straight forward and without obstacle, like splitting wood, our bodies are tired but internally we are sort of rejuvenated with a sense of accomplishment and we set down that evening with a sense of "today was very good."  Now contrast that with a day that is marked by no real physical labor but where in the course of work we are wrestling with human drama, material problems with work, and a lack of time to accomplish what needs to be done.  We walk in the door having perhaps spent the day seated behind a desk in a comfortable chair, but we are completely exhausted and thinking in our minds, "how can we endure another day like this?"  Yes, we come in and "rest" by kicking back in our recliners or a hot bath, but our minds never stop wrestling with the obstacles.

The ancients I think had it right.  Rest as engagement without obstacle.  Rest as stability without drama.  Rest as crisis being replaced by peace.  How much different would our lives be if our rest looked like that instead of long nap or a beach vacation?  Would we be willing to trade our vacation on the sand for everyday life without obstacle, drama and toil?  How can we embrace this understanding of rest in our own lives?  Just some thoughts.

Your brother in Christ,
Faron