Rest of God

As part of my required reading for the program I am in, I read The Rest of God. It took me longer to get through this because I wanted to put into practice what I was reading and REST! It is one of the best books I have read about the Sabbath. It is written in an easy to understand way. 

"I don't know how many books I've read or sermons I'e heard (and too many I've preached) that have helped me think better but not live better" (10).

"... simple tasks -- preparing sermons, cooking soup, cutting grass, growing corn -- when done in the same spirit, are holy. It is all the Lord's work. Virtually any job no matter how grueling or tedious -- any job that is not criminal or sinful -- can be a gift from God, through God, and to God" (24-25).

"Busyness makes us stop caring about the things we care about" (48-49).

"[S]ome facets of God we glimpse only through motion.... But other facets of God we discover only through stillness" (49). I like the idea that we have to be people of action, but we also have to slow down enough to learn new things about God.

"Sabbath is camping out in one place long enough for God to wound us and heal us" (99).

"Some of the most gifted people I've met are also some of the most broken" (118).

One of the hardest chapters for me was entitled: "Play: Stopping Just to Waste Time". I'm a pretty serious person most of the time and am thankful for the people who remind me to have fun. "Play and Sabbath are joined at the hip, and sometimes we rest best when we play hardest" (142).

I appreciated Buchanan's honesty with his own struggle in keeping the Sabbath. As he wrote, he shared personal stories of how being too busy would cause him to miss out on Sabbath. At the end of every chapter is a liturgy, a suggestion of what to put into action.