“Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.” Psalm 46:10
“Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee.”
― Augustine of Hippo, Confessions
Have you ever noticed that people only say “just breathe” when it is the most difficult time to actually do it? When you are anxious, you can become tense all over. When my anxiety attacks were frequent, I realized that even when I wasn’t having an attack, I was tensing my muscles in my jaw and legs. It was like I was always bracing for impact. If you are always tense, how do you rest?
Be Still
In the height of an anxiety attack, I either want to curl into a ball or fidget. Sometimes it was both at the same time. However, I found that doing things like coloring helped calm me because when you color, you sit still and focus on something else. Psalms 46:10 says be still, but it can also be translated to cease striving or stop fighting. If we want rest, the first thing we have to do is stop striving and be still, physically and mentally.
Take His Yoke
Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.
Matthew 11:28-29
The second step to rest sounds like a contradiction: Take His Yoke. Wait, doesn’t taking on a yoke mean working? A yoke is when two animals are hooked together to share a heavy load. When we take on Christ’s yoke, he bears the heavy part of the burden that we were never meant to bear. It relieves us so that we can rest even in working for Him.
Remember the Sabbath
And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
Genesis 2:3
God created the Sabbath and at the same time he created Menuha or rest. In Priscilla Shirer’s Bible study Breath: Making Room for Sabbath, she writes that rest is not just the cessation from work; it is also the creation of tranquility, serenity, peace, and repose. God commanded the Israelites, and us, that we should rest on the Sabbath day. It is our time to recenter ourselves through worship and fellowship, but it is also a time to be still and breathe.
Breathe
Six days ye shall gather it; but on the seventh day, which is the sabbath, in it there shall be none. Exodus 16:26
When the Israelites were set free from slavery to Egypt, they had to be reminded that they were free. Years of slavery can do that to any of us because it affects your mindset. Modern culture seems to be enslaved to busyness, productivity, and accumulation. We are running here and there, filling our calendars so that we aren’t wasting time. Somewhere along the way we have been taught that resting equals laziness, but rest is as necessary to our physical and spiritual health as work or exercise. It’s as necessary as breathing oxygen. We need time to breathe in God and exhale stress and worry. When we are still with God, we have true rest –tranquility, serenity, and peace.
Just Breathe
If we look around at the world, we see the effects of a lack of rest. People are burned out, exhausted, and anxious. Their way is not working. God’s ways are best and meant for our good. So, let’s make room for the Sabbath and rest. Be still, take up His yoke, remember the Sabbath, and just breathe.
Peace Be Still (feat. Lauren Daigle) // The Belonging Co // All The Earth – YouTube
Related Posts:
Rest – The End Of My Yarn (lindalyle.com)
Rest – The End Of My Yarn (lindalyle.com)
Amen. Keeping my hands busy and mind occupied is the easiest way for me to combat anxiety and the general uneasiness, this world brings forth. Yoking ourselves to Christ is such a wonderful picture of working in peace, isn’t it? Great piece Ms. Linda, with real-world applicability. Thank you.
Breathing tends to be a natural occurrence for mankind, but we don’t often realize when we breathe too little. I’m 74 and find myself realizing I’m not breathing enough.
A health nut friend explained that as we age our brain vessels start to harden. The harder they get, the bigger the issue when we need oxygen to our brain to operate. He showed me a way to hyper load the hemoglobin cells, literally swell them with oxygen. This will cause one to faint because the swollen cells jam against the hardened vessels.
Doing this breathing lesson multiple times a day will help soften the vessels and get more oxygen to the cells that need it.
All in all, God designed us to live, and breathing is certainly the best way to allow His spirit to reign over all of our trials. Amen.
Thanks for reminding me.