Our title words come from the end part of the Methodist funeral service but they take on added significance for me as I write this thought on All Saints’ Day, 1st November. The Christian life can feel a bit like a slog at times. It can be demanding and we shouldn’t be surprised at that. Jesus had times when he needed to take himself off to find rest in lonely places away from the crowds.
You may also be wondering why the accompanying photograph shows a swimming pool without its most necessary ingredient – water. It’s a place where people come for fun and recreation; for exercise, destressing and peace; for healing therapy. None of that can happen when it’s dry.
Somebody recently used the word ‘exhausted’ in my presence and my mind ran to questions about word derivation. The front ‘ex’ suggests the word ‘out – to be out of something – but what about the ‘haust’? Turns out that our origins are in a Latin word, ‘haurire’, which means to draw out, like when you draw water from a well. So, the word ‘exhaurire’, which becomes our English word ‘exhaust’, means to draw out completely or to drain. Just like the swimming pool!
When you think about It, we have many different expressions for when we’re feeling really tired. We are exhausted and drained. We are worn out. We are totally spent. We are knackered (from an original meaning of ‘castrated’). We are running on empty. We are out of juice. We are dead on our feet. We are sapped. We are frazzled (which meant worn to threads). We are pooped (broken down or fizzled out). We are done in. And so the list goes on. All of them are vivid word pictures pointing towards us being used up or depleted.
Maybe you’re feeling like that right now and the idea of resting from your labours is a really, really attractive one. It’s a lovely thought that all will be heavenly peace and resting from our labours when we go to be with Jesus at the end of our lives, but we also need to learn from Jesus in the here and now. If Jesus needed to cultivate habits of rest and replenishment then how much more do we.
I want to follow in Jesus’ footsteps and bring fun and peace and healing to those around me but, like the swimming pool, I can’t offer those things when I’m empty. I need to be filled both with life-giving energy and with God’s Holy Spirit.
That might seem like an impossible dream to you in your present situation but I pray that God will help you find those ways and strategies that put life back into you. If your ‘labours’ are God-given then trust that God will also provide the means for you to work through them with joy, comfort and fruitfulness.
Prayer: Lord God, Forth in your name I go, your daily labours to pursue. Please give me increasing clarity to see those things that are of you and, therefore, of vital importance and those things that can be set aside. Teach me how to spend time in recharging and refilling that I may enjoy life in all its fulness and may bring that fulness and enjoyment into other people’s lives as well. Amen.
Photograph © Sydney Moore from Unsplash