The last week I have been wrestling with a feeling of restlessness. You know when you plan charts and goals in your mind but instead God says “rest”. Most people think resting is easy, but actually it’s really difficult. Sometimes you compare yourself, you see celebrities and insta-famous people “progressing” and you think to yourself “what am I doing?” as if your life is measured by fame and money.
Resting is difficult because society drills “you’re not there yet, you’re not enough” into your mind. It’s everywhere, this message.
This message is the voice of the slave master, the devil himself.
But God says “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” Matthew 11:28
The slave master has entered the minds of spiritual people too by telling them to go to yoga everyday, and if not, they can’t enter rest. The slave master has told people of faith to serve like slaves at churches or temples, to the point of exhaustion….I was there once, when I was a teenager. I would go to church at 7am, “do worship practice”, teach sunday school at 9am, lead worship at 11am, then I had youth group leader leadership meeting sometimes until 5pm.
This slave mentality took me through my time in the fashion industry, into entrepreneurship, but finally, God set me free.
He taught me how to be a child again.
Up until then, I defined my worth by how much I could accomplish. Growing up in a single parent home made me want to achieve more, somehow I needed to prove myself and help my family. If I could become someone or something, then I would be worth loving.
This slave mentally has the whole world bound.
Most Christians don’t even understand the Gospel because it is attached with “and make sure you serve at church”.
Not everyone is called to serve at church. Not everyone is called to serve yogurt at snack time.
If the Gospel means Jesus has freed you 100% and totally, you are a free person. You don’t need to do anything out of obligation, if it’s not desired in your heart, it’s not from God because God wouldn’t force you to do anything.
“Well, I should want to feed the homeless right?”
No, because God does not give the same desires to everyone. Maybe you are called to write music because it will heal souls. There is no better way or prescribed path for everyone.
I personally love traveling but I realize that traveling is often a way for me to feel like a free person, that anything is possible….that I am not bound by time, money, or location.
But I can feel free now by realizing that “there is nothing to do, nowhere to be”- why?
Because Jesus paid it all.
It is finished.
There is nothing to do because it is finished. I am complete. I am not lacking, I am whole in Christ Jesus. When God sees me, I’m not a work in progress, I’m righteous and whole.
There is nowhere to be because going there wouldn’t make me more whole or complete, I am complete now.
It has taken me 30 years of my life to truly grasp this.
I received Jesus into my heart when I was 12, but I grew up going to church. Now, I realize most of what I saw was just a bunch of people trying to please God not knowing that God already accepted them via Jesus’ finished work on the cross.
This slave mentality exists inside and outside the church. It is a prominent culture in America.
This message of “you’re not enough” will lead to death.
The message of “you are enough because Jesus redeemed you” will lead to life. This message of grace will liberate you and break the chains of slavery that torments your mind.
If you don’t live by grace, you will work and create out of lack and lack is just exhausting. Living out of “you’re not enough” will suck you dry.
When you rest in God, you are drawing out of eternal abundance. There is never a lack of supply.
I pray that these words will set your soul free.
