STOP!

Does anyone know what "rest" is?
By definition it seems that the world describes the word to means things like; inactivity, breathingspace, downtime, ease, idleness, nap, peace, quiescence, refreshment, relief, respite, standstill, stop, tranquillity and vacation.
I am going to focus on one description because it is the one that I feel God gave me approximately 4 years ago. Four years ago my life looked very different than it does today. Four years ago, my Mom and Dad were alive and well...I was in school, painting, working at Curves and….and….and......
The trouble started with a pain in my neck! Literally!
My neck began to give me trouble and nothing would bring relief. I tried advil, massage, sleep, tiger balm and a number of other rubs, but to no avail. The pain got worse by the day. My doctor suggested that painting at my age was probably not the best thing I could be doing for my neck, and reminded me that school required much reading and writing which would also agravate the condition that was labeled "degenerative disc disease".
I didn't like that label so I refused to accept it and carried on doing what I was doing.
One day, the pain in my neck was so bad that tears were threatening as I was driving to Curves early in the morning. I let the Lord know how absolutely miserable I felt and pretty much yelled at Him in my car, "What am I supposed to do about this stupid neck!!!!!!"
Believe it or not, an answer came immediately. Now whether I heard it in my head or in my car I'm not sure, but I definately heard it...."STOP!"
"Stop the car" I said, "Stop painting for people, stop working....stop studying, stop what!" I yelled.
That was it, just "stop".
I went to work and pouted behind the counter because I could barely stand due to the pain in my neck. I excused myself to the ladies at Curves, explaining my sore neck to them and picked up a book that I kept under the counter for times when it was slow. I held the book with my right hand and my neck with my left, opened to the chapter that I had left off with and proceeded to read a story of a woman who was driving from California to Alaska. She was driving by herself, much to her families chagrin and found herself in the middle of a wicked blizzard. She was scared as she couldn't see ahead of her but didn't want to stop because she didn't know if anyone was possibly behind her. She suddenly heard loudly, the word, "STOP!"
No, I'm not kidding you. I read the paragraph over 6 times to be sure.
She stopped, got out of her car for fear of being hit from behind and saw that she was two feet away from a cliff's edge. She was heading off the road and over the cliff. Her response to the word spoken over her brought her to her knees in the middle of the blizzard. She knew God has stopped her.
I stopped just for a minute that morning and prayed, "Lord, am I heading for a cliff?"
The book by the way is called, "Prepared to be God's vessel,Lessons from the life of Mary", by Henry and Carrie Blackaby.
So, you would think that I would have listened to the voice and did as I was told wouldn't you?
I didn't.....maybe "wouldn't" is a better word to describe what I didn't do.
"Do" is another word that I am very familiar with.
And there are more.....like, "work, keep moving, you'll feel better if you just get going, maybe you should get two jobs (there was a time in my life where I had three!), if you work harder you will get ahead, you can do anything if you put your mind to it"....you get the picture. If you looked up "busy" in the dictionary, you would have seen my name there.
Four years ago, it was suggested to me, by my doctor and naturopath, husband and parents, to "stop". And then, If I am honest, I believe it was a command from God.
I will save you four years worth of the process of pruning and refining that I have gone through and just say this.....I drove off the cliff!......but I didn't know I had driven off the cliff.
It has taken me four years to understand that the command was given to save me, not to stop me from doing what I wanted to do. God said "stop" and I said, "No!"
I didn't say it out loud, but I said it with my actions. It seems that even a picture of driving off a cliff was not sufficient to stop me from "doing".
He let me drive off a cliff, and yet, He has tethered Himself to me in ways that I don't understand, but am beginning to see, and in doing so he has protected me from the jaws that were waiting for me at the bottom of that cliff. (One day I will elaborate on the story of Jesus tying Himself to me)
It is humbling to see that despite your deliberate disobedience, grace is still being portioned out. His gentleness and tenderness is ever before me, rubbing up against the rough edges of who I have been and slowly but surely softening those edges and changing me into the one He has always known me to be.
I have said this many times but will say it again...I have noticed over and over that the Lord never raises His voice to me. He speaks, corrects, rebukes and disciplines, but it is always done under the blanket of His covenental love. I don't understand this love in my humanness, but I am beginning to understand it in my spirit,....in the place where Christ Himself dwells in me. His Spirit in me, helping me to understand who He is and the great love that He has for me.
His words to me never carry an edge. "I told you so" is not in His vocabulary, but it certainly is in mine.
I would have told me, "I told you so!"

So what does one do when one is left hanging off a cliff?
Well, the first thing I did was cling for life to the rope that I didn't even realize was there until I stopped long enough to see it. (That’s code for I panicked!) And then, I asked the Lord a very obvious but pertinent question..."Aren't you going to pull me up?"
He didn't, not right away anyway. First I had to learn to stay still in that precarious position, trusting that He would not let go of the rope. He gave me a scripture as I hung there waiting......
The Scripture came early one morning, as I hung at the end of the rope waiting, as I opened my Bible to the place I had left off in my study of the book of John, where I have been since January.
"I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father's hand."(Jn 10:28,29)
My fear of Him letting go of the rope and me, ended with that scripture. Jesus was tied to me and both of us are held in the mighty hands of God the Father.

A gentleman named Dallas Willard has this to say about busyness.....“You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life, for hurry is the great enemy of spiritual life in our world today.”
The enemy that I saw at the bottom of the cliff, although it looked like it had big jaws and teeth was actually an enemy of my own making. I could blame Satan for where I had been, and I guess to some degree as the father of sin, he is to blame, but I can no longer look away from the choices I have made and continue to have the freedom to make every day.
There is much that I need to ruthlessly eliminate from my life.
I have started at the beginning.
"By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done." (Genesis 2:2,3)
All I can say is this....if the all-knowing, all-seeing, all-powerful God of creation rested, then what exactly is my problem. I asked the Lord one day to show me why it was so hard for me to stop doing and working and I got one of those instant answers that helps me to be patient when an answer doesn’t come immediately. God always answers, but I don't always hear.
His answer?.... "Because this is your identity."
My God given identity is to be found in Jesus Christ and His life that is lived out in me, not in what I do.
There is nothing I can do to make God love me more than He already does at this moment and there is also nothing I can do to make Him love me less.
None of this is even about me, it has always been about Him and His plan for His Kingdom, for His children!
I am called to "Be" not "Do", or as my friend often says, "we are human beings not human doings!"
So I have stopped, but not because I wanted to, it was more about having to. Sadly, it took a physical setback to make me sit down, but however it happened, I am sitting.
Guess what??? I have spent the summer going to the beach early in the morning to watch the sun come up, worshipping on that beach some mornings with a sweet friend, and my husband and I even had the privilege of baptizing another friend on that beach. I have spent more time with my family without running in or out the door. I have never been more aware of how beautiful my daughter is on the inside as well as out and I got to watch as the Lord brought dignity back to my son as he began his first job this summer. (I will be the first one to teach him about boundaries around work).
My husband and I have found the friend that we always knew each other to be. I have cleaned my house because I wanted to, not because I had to. I have played my guitar for hours and hours and hours and am really getting good. I have learned to worship with a new restful spirit and a guitar, which has brought life to my soul!
Who knows, maybe I will even get to paint my own house one of these days......I finally picked a colour!

My soul has an enemy and so does yours.
Do you know about the Son of God who died for your sin and mine?
Have you ever heard John 3:16, Here is the version from the message Bible which feels fresh and clear to me today....."This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life. God didn't go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again. Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person's failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him.

If you're reading this and your heart is doing a little flip, then let me be the first to tell you, that is the Spirit of God nudging you. You are blessed. You can put your faith in Jesus Christ right now by asking Him to come and forgive you of your sin. Open your heart and He will come in, it's that simple and then you will find rest for your soul.
Oh, and don’t forget to go and tell someone. If you don’t know someone to tell, you can write and tell me. I would love to share that with you.

Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." Jn 14:6
My soul finds rest in God alone; my salvation comes from him. Psalm 62:1

Love Tracy