Something I’ve struggled with my whole life is rest. Getting enough rest. Learning what it looks like to consistently rest with God.
God has continually peeled me open like an onion. Layer after layer on the importance of rest. It has been a long journey and I still have a long way to go but I want to share what God has taught me through these past 8 months on the race.
Looking back at middle and high school I’ve come to realize that it was so much more than depression that I struggled with. I was never rested. Physically but mostly spiritually and how could I? I didn’t have a relationship with Christ. I didn’t know how to rest and coming on the race I still didn’t know.
I always had an agenda when coming to God. A bible reading plan. Listening to music. Journaling. I never just sat. All of Cambodia I never once sat in silence with my Dad. It intimidated me and sounded so boring. Even sitting can be exhausting because I’m expecting God to reply. To give me this huge answer and to show me Himself. The anticipation is exhausting.
Looking back to month one of the race, our days were extremely long.
Our days started around 6:15-6:30am and we went hard until around 8 or 9pm. It was so go go go and I remember being in a constant state of exhaustion. Falling asleep wherever I was. Physically I was so tired in Battambang but what made it even more exhausting was I was never, not once spiritually rested. I didn’t get up early with Him and even if I had I didn’t know how to rest in Him. Physically, Spiritually and mentally I was never rested.
Then, month 2 and three God pulled me me out of my grave Satan had dug for me. I felt so much freedom and joy. In those I felt rest. I felt more intimacy with God. I started a journey of getting to know my teammates and for the most part I was rested to the point I had ever known.
Then, our first mini debrief after month three and God taught me how to spend one on one time with Him. Alone with just Him in a hotel room for hours at a time. Learning how to process and how to rest in his presence. To choose into those moments instead of going out with my squadmates and doing fun things with my free time.
Then, Ethiopia, rest was always on my mind. I thought it was one of the reasons he brought me there but that was just another layer of the onion of rest. I remember I thought that since God asked me to surrender my family I would learn how to be in silent with Him and really learn how to be with Him. In many ways I did! I totally learned how to spend more and more time with Christ but it still was so much work. Still I never felt rested. I was always going. When we had options to rest I was with house moms. In the mornings I would walk up to main dining area and read my bible, which was exhausting to me. I never got enough sleep and eventually I got sick.
I sat down with my squad leader who always tells me I need to rest more. I was explaining how sick and tired I felt but how I was going to push through because I wanted to do more and be there for the house moms.
He turned to me and said, “Margee you need to rest. You need to rest your body and you need to spend time with God. Look around, you have 46 squad mates who will love on the house moms and the children while you rest. You don’t need to put it all on your shoulders. God has them and will use others to do what you have been doing”. He was so right. I rested for that day but kept going. That continued for most of Ethiopia. I really just didn’t know how to rest.
By the end of Ethiopia I sat down with Luis, my squad leader again. Telling him how I still never feel rejuvenated when I am with God, how it is so much work for me to sit down each morning and read my bible. How I never feel a connection to God. He turned to me again and said I was putting God in a box. That my relationship doesn’t have to look like anyone else’s. How I was not limited to sitting in that dining room and reading my bible. God had created me special and how we we’re going to connect was between me and the Lord. I remember feeling so much relief because I felt all this pressure to do the “Christian thing” when I came to God. It was in that moment that I realized I connected to God in nature. Instead of sitting and trying to read my bible I simply went for a walk with headphones in. Although, I was in such a B zone at this point I barely got up before breakfast to go on walks and spent most of days on the go so I didn’t feel all the things I was avoiding.
By the time I got to Awakening I had gone 6 months feeling unrested. Of course, I didn’t really realize that. You know what I mean, when something is going on but you don’t realize it? Well that was rest with me. In fact, I thought I knew how to rest.
Coming to Awakening I was in my hardest season of my race. Mourning leaving my family in Ethiopia but rejoicing in calling my family in America. Being so stuck in a B zone, the pit of despair. Going through the motions but feeling every emotion, letting them control me. Renee one my ministry hosts says it so well, “don’t let your emotions drive your car but don’t let them sit in your trunk either”. Being so sad and mad at the same time. One of my first real challenges of the race and for sure first big b zone.
We got to La Montana (where Awakening was held) by a half a day earlier than everyone else. We were given the morning to rest from our travel day. I remember sitting there on my bunk trying to talk to God with four other people in the room. I remembered what Luis had told me in Ethiopia so I went on a walk. It was raining so no one else was out. I had my music in and I started to wander. Eventually finding myself at the very top of the whole campus on this giant grass field. I was all alone up there and no one would find me. I took out my earphones and started screaming at God. Asking him where he was and why I was struggling so much with everything. So confused. I was able to externally process and God answered a lot of my questions. Another moment of realization that I need to literally talk to God, to be outside with him.
Then, I was sitting there during one of our messages from the amazing, Karen Dilbeck and she explained how she rested with God. She said it in such a simple manner and was probably forgotten by every person in that room but to me it meant everything. It was the answer. She said she was in the kitchen making eggs and her husband was shuffling around but then left the kitchen. God told her, “Karen put down the egg”. So she did. She did absolutely nothing until God told her to move. She wasn’t thinking about anything. She wasn’t trying to talk to God. She was simply standing, mind blank and resting in Spirit of the Lord.
It was like a light bulb went off in my soul. It was the missing puzzle piece! I started to listen to God and when He told me to rest vs. when myself or others said to rest. Literally, the first song of worship after she had finished God said rest and I stood still for at least 20 minutes. Soaking up nothing but Him. Doing absolutely nothing. Resting. It was incredible. I continued to do that and He would ask me to rest very often. Going into Nicaragua listening to God and being so, so rested.
It sounds weird to write but it works for me. This how God has me rest but I am human and I am not perfect in any way so I usually forget to ask God. We’re working on it though!
Resting is still an everyday struggle for me but God has given me tools over the months to make it easier and I believe he will continue to keep giving me tools. Ultimately, He can give me all the tools in the world but it’s my choice if I am going to be rested today or not. If I’m going to choose into self governance and self control.
God is still teaching me and still peeling layers off the onion. I’m so glad he is because there is never an end goal with God. I will probably continue to grow in this for the rest of my life!
