Relaxing can be Hard Work!

Slowing down sounds good and in most ways inviting yet there is a darker side to getting away from it all and that is the serious effort it takes to actually stay away from it all.  Often I have found that whenever I take personal retreats it takes several hours just to slow my mind and heart down enough that I could actually say that they were calm.   I hear parents on a regular basis tell their out-of-control child to “calm down” which is usually followed either a threat of some sort of punishment or some form of reassurance that things will be “OK” eventually.  Then there are the people who are built to relax by being busy doing something other than work.  Just the thought of sitting around doing nothing hangs around their necks like a death sentence!  But even these eager beavers need to learn the art of “calming down”.  Several times in the Bible God has to tell his people to “be still” or in other words “calm down”, calm your mind, calm your heart, calm your fears, calm your worries, calm you anxieties, calm your hands, calm your feet, really take a deep breath, stop looking at your watch or phone for the time, and work at calming yourself down.  I think our modern age of text messaging, emails, mobile phones, tablets, iPads, laptops and personal computers does not help the situation.  In fact, if memory serves me correct I seem to think that these gadgets originally were meant to give us more time for what is important but in the end I believe they steal more time away from what is important.  It is a never ending flow and pursuit of information and it can interrupt us at any time, even in the middle of good conversation, or alone time, when the notification goes off on the phone it just became the top priority.  All these distractions can make getting away and staying away really difficult.  When the Children of Israel were facing the Red Sea in front and mountains to the sides and the Egyptian horde racing towards them armed to the teeth God said, “Calm Down!”  When the people of God heard the Word of God taught for the first time in a long time they kept weeping to the point where God told them to “Calm Down!”  When the people were fretting because it appeared that evil people were succeeding God told them to “Calm Down!”  When war was raging all around and the people of God were fearful God said “Calm Down!”  The Psalm writer reminds us that it is not solely about calming down it is about placing your situation, the stress, the worry, the fear, the emotional rollercoaster, the enemy that attacks or the friend who betrays, the overwhelming work load, family stress, financial drain, or physical ailment, anything really, directly into God’s hands and waiting patiently for him without fretting. (Ps.37:7)  The art of calming down is really the art of trusting God.   It is this simple yet profound truth that brings our heart rate down, decreases our blood pressure and actually enables us to calm down.