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These days, I’m the kind of tired I feel guilty talking about. I’m tired because there are plenty of good things going on, and I want to do them all. I’m tired because I have a busy family I love, a job which is also a career and a vocation, hobbies to engage my brain and body, and friends I want to play with. I have good things, and I’m tired.
Some of my friends and colleagues are tired like me, and some of them are tired in other ways: tired from the stress of a job search; tired because of money troubles, inflation, and a sense of precarity; tired from caring for aging relatives and ailing children; tired from grief; tired from racist, mysoginist, or xenophobic systems that make life more difficult than it ever should be; tired from the anxiety and worry over climate change, war, and global instability.
When I’m tired, for whatever reason, I yearn to rest in God. I cling to images and prayers that bring me comfort and remind me that, in the end, all I have to do is abide in God’s love. One of my favorite images, one I’ve mentioned before, is that I imagine what it would be like to be God’s houseplant. I take this from the Psalms: But I am like a green olive tree in the house of God; I trust in the mercy of God for ever and ever (Psalm 52:8). When I feel overwhelmed with too many things, when stress keeps me awake, when there’s simply too much to get done, I pause and imagine being a houseplant on God’s windowsill. All I have to do is soak up the sun of God’s love, let my roots dig into the soil of God’s solid, unchanging presence. I am fed with bountiful water, and I flourish.
Another favorite and classic image comes from Julian of Norwich, in The Book of Showings. Julian imagined all that God has made as something as small and round as a little nut, sitting in her hand. She wondered how it could last, since it was so small. “And I was answered in my understanding: It lasts and ever shall, for God loves it. And so have all things their beginning by the love of God. In this little thing I saw three properties. The first is that God made it. The second that God loves it. And the third, that God keeps it.” I can rest in the joyful truth that God made me, loves me, and keeps me.
Friends, rest is holy work, and we forget our duty to God and one another when we wear ourselves to the bone. Rest might look like silent prayer in the early morning. It might look like a walk, or a few minutes reading, or even a nap. When you are tired, remember that God made you, and loves you, and keeps you, and invites you to rest.
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