Sunday, August 26, 2007

Finally...a nap...



We recently made a big decision to move our worship services from Sunday evenings to Sunday mornings. I've been against this decision for a long time, but as it turns out, I'm a big fan.

For the past three years Sundays have turned into 12-13 hour work days for me. I would get up, immediately fine tune all the details for church, but it would literally take all day. Knowing that I had Sunday as a work day was really nice. However, what I didn't realize was how exhausting it was to work all day and then preach or lead worship.

Additionally, Sabbath rest has been a hard thing to come by. It's real easy to justify that certain meetings are really important, or that a certain video has to get done. It's easy to prioritize meeting with and helping people to the detriment of preparing for Sundays - which pushes preparation to times that would otherwise be Sabbath. Here at the three year mark of the church, one word best describes how I feel. Tired.

What I didn't see coming was that Sunday mornings would give us the opportunity for rest. Today for the first time in over three years, I took a Sunday afternoon nap. While watching the Astros, cuddled up with my sick 5 year old, with my wife on the other side of him reading a book - all in our bed, I noticed something - we were resting. Resting to the point of relaxing and relaxing to the point of falling asleep even when I didn't think I was tired.

I don't know why I'm surprised that the Lord always takes care of us and has given us great opportunities to rest. I'm grateful that we stumbled on to something that we've needed for three years.