Selah

When I say that I want to take this break to rest, where does your mind initially go? Does it go to sleep? Does it go to sitting in bed watching  Netflix and Disney+ all day? Does it go to reading your favorite book? Does it go to spending time with God? Somewhere else?

Personally, I have found that our culture has confused what healthy rest looks like. To so many of us, we think that rest equates to laziness, unproductivity, mindless activities, and sleep. But what if I told you that is not healthy rest at all? What if I told you that rest could look like walking through so much of God’s promises to you?
 
To me, when I think of a healthy view of rest I think of the biblical word “Selah.” Selah is used all throughout scripture to signify a time to pause, process, and think; to prepare for what is next. To me this means that you can actually find rest and still “process” and work through things with God; but without striving to “figure everything out” and have an exact answer to every detail of your life. To me, rest simply means returning to basic intimacy with God and allowing yourself to be in a position to walk through the next thing that is coming your way.

I think the confusion we have with rest vs. process comes with how we have turned process into striving for answers and idolizing hard moments to signify growth. We think that to show we are growing everything has to be so intense and stretching. Sure, hard moments definitely grow you, but they are exhausting. Our lives were not meant to be one long intense moment - there is still growth in times of rest and deep intimacy with God. Both ends of the spectrum are significant in our walk with God, so we can’t negate one to focus on the other. In order to be productive and actually see the breakthrough, we must incorporate both in our lives.
 
This break, I encourage you to take time to actually rest. To Selah. Don’t just block God out because you think that tackling anything deep will exhaust you. And don’t run yourself ragged trying to use this time of break overanalyzing every little thing that God has done this past semester. Instead just sit with Him. Lock eyes and ask Him what He is doing. Thank Him for being near. Worship with Him. Be still. There is no specific key with Him to what the next level of healing or breakthrough will be. There is no right way to process things. So let’s stop striving to find the right way to do it. Instead, we should pause and return to the place of intimacy with God - it is in that place that each door that is in front of us will unlock. So we can rest and enjoy God’s presence, knowing that because of his kindness we never have to frantically search for the “right way” to figure things out.

As you sit with God, your heart will begin to align with His. This will lead you in the direction you need and will equip you to walk through each obstacle that comes your way with ease. Rest actually partners with process when you do it this way. As you incorporate healthy rest in life, you will find that the things you have been searching for are way closer than you think and you will walk in so much more of God’s abundance.

Author | Tori Kramer