How do you rest?  We all know we need rest, but that it can be hard to find, schedule, enjoy and protect.  Resting doesn’t always come naturally, even though it should.

That’s what we’ll look at this week, because our strategies for rest don’t always work.

How many times have you said “I need a vacation?”  Unfortunately, it’s not always the best thing for us!  Did you know that studies have shown going on vacation, you face an increased risk of road or sports accidents, and depending on where you go, digestive ailments.  Employees with high levels of stress show a greater incidence of colds, poor mood and minor physical ailments in the first three days of vacation.

Sometimes we need a vacation after the vacation.  Earlier this year, my family had a return flight bumped on us, and we could move it to the day before or the day after, and either shorten our time away by a day or lengthen it.  We loved our time away, and were having fun, but still voted to shorten it and enjoy a day or two of recovery from vacation before everyone went back to work and school.

We needed a vacation from the vacation!

Question: How do you find rest?

Ryan Sim - April 17, 2013

Wednesday - Change - Perfection

Jesus said, "Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect." If the Sermon on the Mount was just about a list of rules for us this would be discouraging, hopeless. But it's not. It's about Jesus - his blueprint for his life - showing us what God is really like. We are meant to see that Jesus looks like God. It's not just about how to behave, but how to discover the living God in Jesus, and reflect that into the world. He is the pattern, blueprint for our lives as well. Perfect in greek is teleioi. A word about Identity, where perfection relates to love. God is love…all loving. Some scholars say "all embracing" is what that perfect word means. To be like God is undiscriminating and undifferentiating love toward all. Even those who don’t deserve it. He’s loving and merciful. Of course love doesn’t mean endorsement, or uncaringly saying “I don’t care what you do”. Sometimes God’s love means he protects us, stops us, redirects us, and more. We show we are children of God when we show Christlikeness. All embracing love. Connection back to love last week - Love is not sporadic, but who we are. Even with enemies. "To return evil for good is devilish, to return good for good is human, to return good for evil is divine." - Alfred Plummer Even with Jesus' example, we can be discouraged. He WAS God, so being godly was no great feat. What about us? We'll see tomorrow why there is hope for us being perfect(ed). Question: Jesus actually lived the perfect, loving life he commands us to live. Does this encourage, or discourage you? Why?

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