If you want to know what's most important in life, go to a funeral. Now I know that's not a happy invitation. But funerals are important because what we do at funerals actually reveals to us what we want most in life and what we most wish to avoid. That's a powerful thing. Funerals are powerful experiences. Because what often happens at a funeral? Well, people tell those that they love that they love them. Like they say it out loud and they express how much have you been to funeral, you know how many times that day you end up saying I love you and receiving I love yous to the people who matter most to you. People who are spending too much time at work and engage in frivolous things at the end of a funeral, they vow to spend more time with their family. They've vowed to spend time with the people who matter most to them. Here's another thing that happens at funerals, people have an intimate encounter with their regrets. They have an intimate encounter with the feeling of regret for having held a grudge, having said something they shouldn't have said, or for having wasted so much time on things that didn't matter on withholding forgiveness. Funerals are very powerful and very revealing. And they're so important to today's reading because today's reading is one of the most used passages at funerals for a very particular reason. It speaks to a deep desire within the heart of every person. And that deep desire can be summed up in one word. Rest. It says, "Come to me. All you 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."
If you think about it, what state do you want your loved ones to be in once they die? Well, we say rest in peace, right? We want people to be in the state of peaceful rest. And if you bring yourself to thinking about the type of end that you would most likely find best for your own life, you would probably describe it as a peaceful end and a restful afterlife. Rest, rest is a critical aspect of life. It's a critical aspect of God's dream for humanity. God rested. God rested for many reasons, but one of the most important and the one that you and I will talk about today is that the things we need most in order to flourish in order to become who God made us to be, they can not emerge out of busyness. They can emerge, though out of rest. Growth and character deepening of love in a relationship, great conversation, the answer to life's biggest questions. None of those things emerge out of chaos or busyness. They only emerge out of a place of rest. Awareness of a change that needs to be made in your life, that comes out of a tent of silence, a place of rest. Deepening of love between two people occurs through carefree timelessness, where the two people aren't worrying about agendas or what to do or how to do it or what they're going to do next or what they're going to have for lunch. They just are together. And it's restful. Great conversation doesn't arrive out of a tense overly scheduled environment where at 8:01, you're going to talk about this at 8:14, you're going to talk-- no, great conversation emerges organically naturally, when you're relaxed and you're resting. You're just allowing the Holy Spirit in the moment to take things where they need to go. The same is true for answering the questions of your heart. The answers don't arrive when you're so full of life that there isn't enough time to stop and simply be. I mean, think about when you're trying to get somewhere on the road, and you're lost, what do you want? You want silence. You need a restful sort of peaceful place so that you can let sort of the anxiety and frustration of the moment come down low enough that you can actually let the answer that needs to come to you come and find a welcoming place. The answers that you need in life, they don't find busyness a welcoming environment. But they do find a restful environment a welcoming environment. So if we take time and really pause and check in with our heart and our soul, if you really entered in the classroom of science for a little bit, what would emerge in all likelihood is a sense of restlessness. So many people are wondering where that restlessness is leading them. And most of the time it's leading them to a place of rest. You're feeling restless. You're looking for rest. You're looking for peace. And yet, rest is almost never talked about. You don't see a book with the title rest on the bestseller list. You don't see blog posts blowing up about it. It's never trending. You don't even hear homilies on it. There are a lot of books and resources about doing and how to and other things like that, but there's almost no books, podcasts, blogs, homilies, anything on rest. And yet rest is essential.
I did this random poll here at Dynamic Catholic, asking the team what gives you rest? What brings you to a state of rest? And here are just some of the answers. They said, "Reading a good book in a quiet place, or a leisurely walk on a beautiful day. Prayer in an empty church. Enjoying a great meal with great people, having a great conversation. A long drive, journaling, golf, singing." And the list went on and on. But when I asked, how often do you do those things that bring you rest? You can imagine the silence, and the answer essentially being not as often as I'd like. So what gives you rest? What place does rest have in your life? Better yet, what do your Sundays look like? Is a Sabbath a true day of rest for you? Do you feel rejuvenated at the end of a Sunday? If I'm honest, my answers to those questions, not that great. What gives me rest is quiet time in a church. But rest is at the bottom of my priorities. My Sundays, they are chaotic. And the to-do list, that's long, gets done on Sundays. The Sabbath isn't as honored as it could be, and I am tired at the end of Sundays. And yet, I'm yearning for something far deeper and far more satisfying than just a couple of hours sleep. It's time for me to reclaim rest as a central part of my spiritual life and as a central part of my Sabbath experience. But how about you? What role does rest need to start applying or continue to apply in your life?
