I Have "Nothing" to Do for the "Rest" of the Weekend

After a string of really full weekends, this past weekend is what counts for a relatively lightly scheduled weekend:

Saturday
4a-5a Pray
5a-6a Exercise, check emails
6a-7a Grocery shopping
7a-8a Breakfast with kids
8a-9a Lowes run with kids
9a-10a Bring car to shop, take El to YMCA
10a-1p Soccer and swimming at YMCA
1p-2p Lunch with kids, boss brings over hand-me-downs
2p-6p Call friends, drop off stuff at secondhand store, hang up house numbers, Dryel suits, do laundry, put away laundry, vacuum, clean windows
6p-7p Dinner with kids
7p-8p Bedtime with kids
8p-9p Read, bedtime

Sunday
4a-5a Pray
5a-6a Exercise, check emails
6a-7a Go through mail, pay bills
7a-8a Breakfast with kids
8a-9a Haircuts for Aaron and me
9a-10a Come home, do baths, off to Sunday School
10a-12p Sunday School and then church
12p-1p Lunch with kids
1p-2p Some free time!
2p-6p Small group Bible study with couples from church
6p-7p Dinner with kids
7p-8p Bedtime with kids
8p-9p Read, bedtime

Despite all that, I didn't get to everything I wanted to do. I had on my to-do list to clean our air conditioner filters, call a bunch of other friends I hadn't talked to in awhile, bleed our radiators, sweep our sidewalk, and clean the Brita filter. To say nothing of that nagging paint job or that basement clean-up project I never seem to be able to get to.

This coming weekend, I am challenged to have something else to do: nothing. As a Christian, I believe in the importance of rest, and in particular God's command, which He practiced Himself, to rest. Rest, in other words, is something God gives us, and insists on us taking. Not to do so is to be disobedient. And not to do so is usually out of a lack of trust that that rest is good and necessary and allowable.

This coming weekend, I will have many things on my to-do list. But I have put "nothing" at the top. Hopefully, I will in fact do "nothing," so that I might claim the rest God has for me.