Basking in the Sonshine by Steph Beth Nickel

I wrote the following post for HopeStreamRadio, and it seems to fit with this month's theme quite nicely. I gave it the title "Treasured Rest," but "Basking in the Sonshine" works as well. Be encouraged.

As I write this, I am officially on holidays. Although I have a very full day ahead of me, getting things done around the house, primarily in my home office, I look forward to a couple of weeks of rest and relaxation. As I finish up this devotional, I am approximately eight-and-a-half hours away from taking off for Alberta.

While I am thrilled for this opportunity to visit the Rockies with my husband of almost 35 years—and know he and this trip are gifts from God—that is not the kind of rest the Lord is referring to in Matthew 11. This is a more amazing type of rest, one that we can enjoy while on vacation or in the midst of our most busy, demanding day.

God's Idea of Rest

In verses 28-30 of Matthew 11, Jesus says, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (ESV).

If we come to Jesus and accept the gift of salvation He purchased, it’s highly unlikely He will remove all the people and circumstances from our life that we find burdensome and exhausting. However, we can discover a peace that overshadows even the most challenging task or individual.

An Amazing Example

There is a dear senior saint in our congregation who will likely go home to be with the Lord before I return from holidays. Although I haven’t gone to see him in hospital, our pastor has—several times. And his report? That Harry never fails to be an encouragement. He has a big smile on his face and reassures everyone that he is ready to enter eternity. Even his wife and daughter shared this with me recently. That’s the kind of peace that surpasses human understanding.

And that same peace is will be what sees his family and friends through the challenging days ahead.

Invitations and Commands

Although the verses in Matthew 11 read as a wondrous invitation—and they are—there are actually three commands in the passage. We are to come to Jesus. We are to take His yoke upon us. And we are to learn from Him. These are not suggestions. They are imperatives.

We must come to Him, originally for salvation and then day by day for comfort, guidance, direction, etc. We will not experience His ongoing gift of true peace and rest if we neglect our time with Him and our fellowship with other believers.

Second we are to take His yoke upon us. Remember what Jesus says in Luke 9:23: If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.

In human terms, we think of rest as a break from our routine, possibly to sleep in, sit on the beach, and read a book. While all of these may, in one way, be restful, they have little, if anything, to do with taking up our cross.

As we learn what the Lord would have us do with our life, and we willingly lay aside our own agenda, we will experience a rest that makes vacationing seem insignificant in comparison.

The last command the Lord gives in this passage is the directive to learn from Him. And that will take a lifetime.

Learning from the Lord's Example

How do we learn from Jesus?

We study the gospels. John is my personal favourite.

Next, we must prayerfully ask the Lord to show us how Jesus’s example translates into our own life. 
We must seek to live according to His example and instruction. This won’t happen in our own strength. We must rely on the Holy Spirit to give us the desire to do so—and the insight as to how to follow the Saviour’s example.

We ask for forgiveness when we fail to do so. As believers in Jesus, we can rest assured that He has already done so. Talk about a cause for peace!

Whether we’re on vacation or in the midst of our busiest time of the year, these pursuits are crucial.

A life of godly rest may or may not include a vacation in the mountains. It will, however, include sacrifice, denying oneself, and hard work. But even more than that, it will mean partnering with the Lord Himself, walking side by side with Him, and finding deep soul rest because of His grace.

What Is Beautiful To You? Alan Anderson

This is a simple little post but I trust it is worthwhile to give us cause to reflect a bit.

A lot goes on in life that may perplex or cause concern.  Some things may trouble our hearts so much that is seems things will never change or get better.  In spite of the many things in our world and in life that remind us of the ugliness of sinful human nature there is still beauty to behold.

Whatever became of beauty? Well, nothing!  Beauty is all around us and is really never far away. Where I live in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia there is beauty in abundance.  For instance, I can look from my porch and see beautiful mountains covered by cedar trees and on a regular basis eagles fly overhead.  Now and again I can hear the eagles as it were calling to each other.  They provide some of the music of nature that God has set in motion for our pleasure.

Someone said, "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder!" What beauty do you behold? What is beautiful to you? What moves you so much that beautiful is all you can say about it?  What takes your breath away? What or who in your world, your life, is so breathtakingly beautiful that tears are brought to your eyes? What in your life causes you to be speechless due to the depth of its beauty? Perhaps you can take some time and ponder this. Perhaps you may pause just for a few minutes and glory in what is beautiful.  Breath, ponder and just "be" as you bask in beauty.

Writing is beautiful don’t you think?  When I read posts of our InScribe group I see beauty!  I see all sorts of writing coming from beautiful minds God has gifted.  Some of the writing is poignant and stirs the heart while some is funny and causes one to giggle or at least grin from ear to ear.  At times I’ve read something that has caused me to pause and reflect on my life.  Some writing is fiction and some non-fiction.  It is all beautiful and makes me grateful to be part of a group like this.  

It is also beautiful to know God loves us!  That may seem such a simple thing to say yet how profound it is also.  How beautiful it is to know and yes to feel the love of God.  I pray your life and the days you are given remind you of something beautiful!

Stop and Smell the Flowers – Bonnie Way

“Nature is not primarily functional. It is primarily beautiful.” 

–John and Stasi Eldredge

High on the mountain slopes of the Canadian Rockies bloom some of the most beautiful flowers in the world.  Part of their beauty comes from the amazing fact that they grow where they do.  Surrounded by jagged rocks and towering mountain peaks, a tiny, delicate flower, struggling to grow in the handful of soil that it has found to put its roots into, seems rather out of place.  This is a world of extremes, of ruggedness and harshness, until you see the gentle, beautiful flower blooming there.

Some of these flowers find shelter in the forests, growing deep in the shade, their delicate stems springing from deep, soft moss.  Their bell-shaped flowers hang from slender stalks, a burst of yellow or red among the deep greens, browns, and blacks of the forest.  They seem vulnerable to every passing footstep, yet they flourish here, sheltered among the pines and spruces that tower above them.  Among the giants of the forest they grow, daring and almost audacious.

Others grow in the alpine meadows, where not even the giants can take root.  Stand in a meadow, and survey the rocks and the spriggy green heather, and you will think that no flower could possibly survive there.  Every passing wind would sweep them away, and the late and early snows of every season would freeze any plant so delicate.  Then look again, and you will see the sparks of colour among the green.  Tiny flowers grow here, red and white, dotting every inch of the alpine meadow.  They cling close to the ground, hiding among the sturdier plants for shelter, and yet they brave the snows and the winds and flourish there.

Some hide themselves next to other shelters, growing close to the boulders that are scattered over the meadows.  Beside a jagged rock that has jolted down from some peak far ahead, these flowers spring up, pushing their roots down into the cracks next to the rock.  Here they wave their buttercups, sheltered from the winds, and so smile at the sun that smiles back at them.

I think sometimes of all the flowers that will bloom here unseen.  Some come for only a day or a few days’ time, and then are gone again.  I walked into one valley and came out again two days later, by the same trail, to find that the lilies had sprung up along the trail.  There were only a handful, in a stretch of trail perhaps twenty steps long, which had not been there the two days before.  How long they lasted I do not know, but I do know that I was there to see them when they bloomed.

There is something about these flowers, tenaciously clinging to the little bit of soil that they have found, fighting against the climate and the mountains for their very existence, that draws me.  I have to smile when I see them, springing up in a place that seems to support no life.  Their very existence appears impossible, and yet they are there, inspiring every passing hiker, who has to be as daring and hardy as they are just to get to the places where they grow.

Delicate beauty in a place of rugged harshness.  A brief flowering among rocks that have stood for centuries.  Life in places where life seems impossible.  Take time to stop and admire the flowers and contemplate the message they speak to you.

~ © Bonnie Way