Rest in the Midst of a New School Year
Dear Momma,
One week of school is in the books and a new year reminds me to be grateful for fresh starts and a new chapter to be written. I’m thankful (and a little bit proud) to be entering into my 16th year as an Educator. I’ve been a classroom teacher, an Instructional Coach, Assistant Principal and now I have the amazing opportunity to serve as a proud Principal in my new building. Nearly 20 years ago, I had a ‘nudge’ a thought, a potential ‘goal’ dare I say to one day be the Principal of a building. As I sat in each stage of my career, I typically thought “no, I would not do that” or “I’m not sure if I could do that”. That doubt can creep in. That ‘yeah right, ME lead?’ thought was real. “Can I really do that?” was something that crossed my mind. Yet, I had never forgotten that nudge, voice, goal from nearly 20 years ago. Similar to how the serpent tried to twist God’s words in the Garden, I see how he tries to still do this to humans today. I’m thankful that I’m reminded to “resist him..and to..stand firm in your faith” because the enemy is already defeated.
No matter what role I’m serving in, I know that each year can bring a different type of exhaustion. Before I step into week 2 of this school year, the Lord is actually pulling me away from my typical, full-force, jump in at a million miles an hour approach. Rather, He’s pulling me into more Rest. He’s pulling me closer to Him. This is not what I was expecting as I step into perhaps, and arguably, one of the more stressful roles in the Educational field. Rest? Really, Lord. Really?
As He’s nudging me into more rest as I step into this school year, I’m realizing how much I took on my own throughout these 16 years in Education. Nancie Guthrie writes that “we have to admit that there are times when our hearts really aren’t set on that home. Sometimes we are so tied to this world, so enamored by it, so invested in it, that we yawn at the promise of being at home with God”.
Wow.
Lord, please forgive me. I think that has been me. I am so, very sorry.
Guthrie, in Even Better than Eden, reminds me that “one of the most amazing things about the story we read in the Bible is that it is much more about God’s desire to dwell with His people than about His people’s desire to dwell with Him.” I’m so thankful God is who He is. Without Him, and the work of the Cross, I am simply, so unbelievably unworthy. And I’m thankful that “God’s intention to dwell with a holy people in a holy land could not be thwarted by human sin. Instead, God began working out His plan to make it possible for sinners to be made clean and holy in order to live in His presence” (127).
Do you remember what happened on the day of Pentecost? People saw fire, “which they recognized as a symbol of God’s presence, but this fire didn’t rest on a bush or a mountain or over a tent as it had in Moses’s day, or on the temple as it had in Solomon’s day. This fire came to rest on the people. God was demonstrating in a visual way the reality of his presence coming to dwell in them. They were just beginning to understand that they had becoming living, breathing, walking talking temples in which God dwelt with His Spirit” (138).
This brings me to the Old Testament and endless information regarding how the temple was to be built. I just couldn’t do it. I literally couldn’t read about the dimensions and specifics of how the temple was to be built, what needed to be included, etc. It was a painful experience and I loathed sitting through these details. Y’all, I mean it has been a rough go for me to read through these details.
Yet, again, I’m humbled He continually gives me fresh eyes. I’m realizing that I was reading this text through the “what does this have to do with me” lens and not through the eyes of “Lord, why is this important to you?” lens. When Guthrie wrote this, it felt like a spear directed right towards me. “When you see how many chapters in the Bible are devoted to building the tabernacle and the temple and staffing it and everything surrounding it, do you not get the sense that the pace where God intended to dwell among his people is a really big deal to Him?” I’m seeing more clearly how important His people are to Him. It’s amazing how meticulously He’s been planning for us all along. It’s always been about relationship with Him. His meticulous plan for the temple represents the meticulous and unwavering plan, vision and care He has for you and me. I wouldn’t have this revelation if I didn’t take the time to sit with Him.
Wow, Lord. I missed that.
I still don’t get what this has to do with rest, Kassie…
God’s desire to dwell in you and me has been His plan all along. It’s what He desires. Ezekiel 11:16 states the “I will be a sanctuary to them”. In Psalms, He reminds us that He has been our “dwelling place in all generations”. And yet again, and I love this book so much, Guthrie beautiful reminds me that “we’re beginning to understand through this story of the Bible that our longing for home is a longing not for a place but for a person”. Him.
What does any of this have to do with rest, Kassie?
Stay with me.
Our ancestors remind us that through the Spirit, we have the living God dwelling within us and this matters very much to God.
Because Nancie Guthrie so beautifully captured where I’m sitting at during this season, I’m going to continue to highlight her words again from her book, Even Better than Eden, because they pierced me, and I don’t want to forget them.
“If you have become joined to Christ by faith, you too are part of a living, breathing, walking, talking temple in which God dwells by His Spirit. Peter writes that we are living stones that are being built up as a spiritual house (I Pet. 2:5). And Paul writes that we are “being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit” (Eph. 2:19-22). God is, indeed, working out his plan to dwell with his people.
Living water is flowing from the temple as the gospel is proclaimed and embraced and lives are healed and made whole, just as Ezekiel saw in his vision of the new temple. God is even now building his new temple, the church, not with limestone hewn from quarries in the Middle East, but with living stones, the lives of ordinary believers like you and me.”
The amount of time, meticulous planning, preparation and vision he poured into you and me, similar to how He planned meticulously with the tabernacle and temple, humbles me. Time with Him produces fire and rivers flowing of His fruit and yet, time with Him allows for Rest. It was in His divine plan for us to Rest in Him from the beginning.
So Here’s what I’m reminded of as I step into this new role and this new year:
You and I are the temple, His temple. His Holy temple is important to Him. His Spirit dwells in us. (This still just blows my mind, y’all. This is wild to me! The Spirit of the LIVING GOD is within ME!)
We won’t find our true Rest from any particular place, but rather from Him.
He promises to give us rest and safety.
We rest, because He rested first.
We (Holy Temple) + sitting with the Lord (access to Him)= Rest
Stepping into this school year, I want to sit in and encourage you to sit in Rest with Holy Spirit. Here’s where I’m starting:
Devote one day to doing zero work.
a. This is not my idea. Look up the Sabbath. As a Principal, it’s easy for me to keep my email/work next to me at all times. I’m devoting one day of being work free this school year and spending more time focusing on how He’d like for me to use time on His day. My good friend, Rachel reminded me of its importance.
Pray about viewing and valuing the Sabbath how God does. Study what He says about it.
a. It’s easy for me to easily read Scripture with the lens of “what does this have to do with me, Lord” and I want us to contine to read through the “why is this valuable and important you you Lord” lens.
b. “God has given is the gift of a day-one day different from all of other days in our week-to push away from the table of the word that fills us up with its amusements and technology and weighs us down with its expectations and commitments. This gift invites us, instead, to pull up a chair at the table where God Himself wants to fill us up with himself and to take on himself all the things that are weighing on us (94).”
Place notes in places you’ll see daily to remind you of His promises and what He says about what He’s placed on your heart.
a. Sometimes in the midst of busy, the moments of pausing and remembering these things can change everything.
I pray this is the best year of Rest yet for you and I hope that you read this book because it’s a really fantastic read!
Let’s turn our Eyes to Jesus because it’s all for His Glory.
In love,
Kassie Leigh