So last week after my spiel on productivity, most of y’all spent Friday and Saturday watching funerals on TV.

I’m no better than y’all. While I didn’t watch a single second of either the Queen of Soul’s home-going celebration, or Maverick McCain’s final farewell, I did spend a fair amount of the holiday weekend lying on the couch and binge watching “This Is Us.” (I watched the second half of season two. It was still shorter than the Friday’s funeral.)

Anyway, I got some much needed rest on Labor Day. That seems ironic, but as I laid on my couch in my PJs, I skimmed through my Bible and realized the rest and labor are inextricably linked.

Rest is the reward for labor, And labor suffers without rest. We see it in the world around us. We feel it deep down in our bones.

For the past couple months, I’ve been avoiding my trainer, because she wants to talk to me about rest. I already know what she’s going to say. I don’t want to hear it. I want her to be happy that I managed to squeeze in a workout, or that I chose to stick with my nutrition plan. I do not need another adult to tell me to go to sleep.

Except maybe I do. My husband, my mother, and now my trainer weren’t getting through to me. And then one of my YouTube pastors preached this timely sermon:

I heard this sermon Friday night. It majorly informed my decisions for the rest of the weekend. I’m trying hard to incorporate rest into my already jam packed schedule. But it’s not just because the aforementioned folks told me to. It’s not just because i’m Dead-tired. It’s not because I feel like I deserve a break.

But I’m teaching myself to rest, because The Creator, Himself, rested, and I have no higher purpose than to be more like him.

Rest well. To the living and the dead.

Mama Radford