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Rest is what we often long for, but I think I hear less about rest than work. One of the great hopes of the Christian is that we will be able to rest because we will live with God forever in the new creation.
We are used to rest and work being in a context of sacrifice and trade. I give up the time that I could have rested to work, trying to earn something. Sometimes I even work to gain some rest or access to some leisure activity. Every moment of resting or working costs us something here. Much of this comes down to the way that our time here is.
Work appears to be part of perfect life for humans, after all, we were caring for the garden before the fall – before we sinned. Work is frustrated now; we do not easily find satisfaction or success in it and it is often hard. I think our rest is similar. We rest perfectly when the frustrations of the broken world do not weigh on us (and they always will at least to an extent in this life).
If work will be perfected, so to we should be glad that rest will be perfected.
Time is in many ways against us. The apostle Paul, writing to the Ephesians says ‘…the days are evil’ (Ephesians chapter 5 verse 16b) when trying to encourage wise living. There is not much time to use for rest or work, and we are so often unable to do all that we ought to have done. We should live wisely now with the time that God has given us, but also remember that time will not always be like this.
Spending eternity with God, enjoying him forever, – heaven – will have restored time. We will not come to the end of the day mourning that we could not do what we wanted in the new creation. Working and resting will not come at a loss to us.
Rest and work
Time may be against us here and now, causing a great part of our difficulties in rest and work, but we only have to live one life here. Keeping in mind how great heaven will be and how limited the current pain and trials are can help us to persevere. Monotony, struggle, boredom, etcetera will have an end, and all that is good in work and rest will be amplified beyond what we can currently comprehend.
Moreover, there is also some additional hope for these days on earth as we know it. We can already do part of what we will be doing in the new creation. We know some of what we humans will be doing in heaven, which appears to be praising God and enjoying him. God has revealed enough of himself to us for us to praise him, and he dwells with us by the Holy Spirit.
While we should try to live in praise and joy (and God is helping us), this will not always be easy to us. Like how rest, work and time will be perfected, we need to be perfected by God, and thankfully that too is part of God’s plan for those who believe.
Alexander Gillespie is an Arts Honours graduate of the University of Sydney. Particular fields of interest include Nineteenth-Century migration history, conceptual philosophy, social policy and ecclesiology. He currently lives in Sydney with his wife and enjoys researching and writing.
Alexander Gillespie is an Arts Honours graduate of the University of Sydney. Particular fields of interest include Nineteenth-Century migration history, conceptual philosophy, social policy and ecclesiology. He currently lives in Sydney with his wife and enjoys researching and writing.