Word of the week - Rest, Recreation, Renewal
“Come to me, all of you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, ad you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light”. Matthew 11:28-30
I am just returning from a 12-week Sabbatical, see “Word of Week – Sabbatical” from April 30th for context. It has been an amazing time of rest, recreation, and renewal. During this time of extended sabbath rest I enjoyed: 1) Extended times of prayer and fellowship with God during my first fruits abiding. I was able to take long prayer walks and just spend more time with God in His word allowing me to go deeper and feel more connected, 2) I spent extended time with my wife Amy on a few trips but mainly just having longer more casual visits over meals and at random times of the day or week, something that is very out of the ordinary for me. Our relationship definitely has grown deeper and stronger during this time, 3) I was able spend some quality time with my kids and grandkids enjoying simple things at a much slower pace. One of my favorite times was our week down at Dauphin Island with all the kids and grandkids, 4) I was able to connect with some of my good friends at a deeper level on a few trips to the farm, lake and abroad, 5) I took the opportunity to take some bucket list trips with family and friends and travelled to Italy, Brazil Peacock Bass fishing, Argentina bird hunting and Rwanda Africa with Bridge2Rwanda, an amazing leadership development ministry that I have the privilege to support and serve as a board member. Not to mention the time I spent doing the simple things I love like clearing trails in the woods at my farm, catching bass at sunrise or walking 9 holes of golf after dinner on a cool summer evening as the sun went down. I could go on and on but you get the picture, see a few pics below.
I am so very grateful to be blessed with such a great team that afforded me the opportunity to take this time of extended Sabbath. I did not have any major epiphany, but I can honestly say I have experienced soulful rest at a level like never before and it is deeply refreshing. It is like I hit a reset button giving me renewed energy and excitement towards the future. The good news is that even before I started my Sabbatical, I was living at a healthy rhythm and pace and taking a weekly sabbath, so I was not living anywhere close to the line of burnout like I experienced a little over a decade ago when I took my first sabbatical that literally saved me from burnout. This time around, I started my sabbatical from a great place after working hard to plan and host a multiday event celebrating our firm’s 20th Anniversary, see “Word of Week – Celebration” from April 16th.
As I reflect over the past 12 weeks, I wanted to share a few insights from my sabbatical:
Rest – What is soulful rest? I believe it can be different for all of us, but for me soulful rest is when I get to a place where the internal voices and external expectations that drive me are quieted, and I find respite. Rest is defined at intermission or cessation from motion. For me, this is not so much a physical thing as it is mental and emotional. One simple goal I had as I started my sabbatical was to be able to wake up in the morning without having a mental to do list that popped into my head before I got out of bed. This is very hard for me because I love to produce and accomplish things, it makes me feel good. If you are wired this way, it takes meaningful faith and trust to let go of your innate need to be productive and simply let go of those desires and fully trust God and rest in Him. Getting to a place where you know all is well with your soul even though you are not really “doing” the things that make you feel like all is well, like working to accomplish and produce. “Be still and know I am God” Psalm 46:10. It took me about 3-4 weeks to wind down the list in my head and start to find my footing in a rhythm of rest, but I was able to get there and discover a new level of pace and serenity that was meaningfully refreshing. Simply put, I believe soulful rest is when we experience deep inner peace, and the driving voices are quieted. This allows us to be more present before God and others.
Recreation – I love this word. It is defined as refreshment of strength and spirit beyond work. “Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment”. 1 Timothy 6:17. God blesses us so we can be a blessing to others, but He also gives provision for our enjoyment. As we recreate, we are being renewed and refreshed and it is good for the soul and spirit. I think it is so cool how God created us with all of this in mind. He created us to be responsible and productive in our vocation and calling, to work diligently unto to Lord and add value to others, but He also created us with a deep need to enjoy Him and His creation. I used to think having hobbies was a negative because it competed for my time in areas that I believe to be more meaningful and important like work and family. Now I see it much differently and greatly value my hobbies and time spent recreating, although I probably have too many hobbies 😊! I now see recreational time in a similar way that I see the time I spend working on my physical fitness. To maintain a healthy body, most people need an exercise routine to stay in good physical shape. Similarly, to maintain a healthy soul, we must invest time in recreational activities that we enjoy, so we can be refreshed and find space between work and fulfilling our day-to-day responsibilities. Of course, different seasons of life will influence how much discretionary time we have for recreational activities. If you are in your mid-30’s with small kids and an aspiring professional career, you will need to be more thoughtful about how you use your time, because there are lots of demands during this season of life. For example: I hung up my golf clubs when I was 36, because we decided to have another child, our sweet daughter Isabella. Fifteen years later I pulled them back out, based on my game may have been a mistake, but I am now in a season of life where I have time to enjoy golf. The bottom line is that we need a healthy and balanced rhythm of recreation in our lives to maintain a healthy soul. This reality was reinforced during my sabbatical.
Renewal – “Therefore, we do not lose heart, but though our outer man (flesh) is decaying, yet our inner man (spirit) is being renewed day by day” 2 Corinthians 4:16. God made us multi-dimensional in body, soul and spirit, and our spirit is the part of our being that is most important because it is the part of us that can connect with God and will last forever. God’s desire for each of us is that our spirit would come alive through the process of spiritual regeneration, when we make Jesus our Lord and King, we are born of the spirit of God. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away, the new has come.” 2 Corinthians 5:17 But this is just the beginning of our walk with Jesus into the abundant life He speaks about in John 10:10. God has designed us to be continually renewed in the spirit, which means we are made new and have new energy and excitement in our relationship with Jesus and walk of faith. We cannot force this, but we can posture ourselves and set the table by taking away the distractions and creating the environment for God to show up and renew our hearts, minds, and spirit. When we set aside extended time and make ourselves available with a desire to hear from the Lord, He is known to respond and give us the gift of His presence, which renews our soul and spirit. During my time of sabbatical, I was able to experience extended times of less distracted fellowship with the Lord, which renewed my spirit and deepened my relationship with Jesus. The biproduct of this is experiencing more spiritual fruit, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, faithfulness gentleness and self-control in my life. I am not where I want to be but I have surely come a long way.
The most exciting thing is how much my time of extended sabbath helped me realize how blessed I am in every way. My heart is filled with gratitude, and I am counting my blessings. Just to mention a few: My amazing wife Amy of 31 years, who I love more than ever; who loves me, and may even like me more since my sabbatical 😊! I have 3 godly daughters, 2 sons by marriage who are great men, and 7 grandkids who are all healthy and love Jesus. I have loving and supportive extended family who I love spending time with. I am part of a phenomenal church family at COH led by one of the most humble and gifted leaders I know. I enjoy brotherly friendship with some amazing men of God who encourage and challenge me to keep getting better. I am equally yoked with godly business partners, and we get to grow and lead a world class team of professionals toward becoming the Gold Standard in our industry. I live in a great country, even with all of its challenges, I feel blessed beyond measure to be a U.S. citizen especially after spending so much time travelling aboard. Ther is no place like good ole Birmingham, Alabama, USA. I could go on and on, but I will spare you because I am sure you get the point and this Word is getting way to long!
I pray we all can enjoy the benefits of Sabbath and enter into soulful rest in Christ, whether on a sabbatical or just enjoying a weekly sabbath. It is healthy and good for the body, soul and spirit.
I hope you have a blessed week.
-Duane