Fifth Principle: Work is
Rhythmical
If God in heaven rested on the seventh day, why on earth can't we?"
— Anonymous
Even though God enjoys the advantage of unlimited energy and inexhaustible resources for His Creation, He followed a daily cycle of work and reflection as well as a weekly cycle of work and rest. His purpose was to give us an example for the rhythm of work. If God chose to pace His work, reflection, and rest, do we not need a pattern that permits us to work, worship, rest and play? Here again we are up against the truth about work that bears directly upon the quality of our spiritual life. To be spiritually whole, we must be vocationally balanced.
Work needs rhythm. Otherwise, it can be detrimental to the fulfillment of our human nature as created in the image of God and to the fullness of life as promised by Christ in His redemption. Because work is honorable, we can use it as our excuse to neglect the worship, rest, and recreation which are essential to spiritual balance.
The cycle is prefigured in physical nature when God divided the light from dark and set the sun, moon, and stars in place to govern the seasons of the earth. As the cycle of the
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seasons — summer, winter, spring, and fall — keeps physical nature in balance, the cycle of work, worship, rest, and play is intended to keep human nature in balance. A rhythm is also implied. As the writer of Ecclesiastes reminds us, "To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven" (Ecclesiastes 3:1). A poetic listing of the timely nature of human activity follows, ranging all the way from "a time to be born" to "a time to die" (3:2). Then we learn that the writer of Ecclesiastes specifically has work in mind when he asks, "What profit has the worker from that in which he labors?" (3:9) Answering his own question in terms that reach back to Creation and forward to Redemption, he says.
I have seen the God-given task with which the sons of men are to be occupied. He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also He has put eternity in their hearts, except that no one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end. I know that there is nothing better for them than to rejoice, and to do good in their lives, and also that every man should eat and drink and enjoy the good of all his labor — it is the gift of God (3:10-13).
While the writer of Ecclesiastes relates that satisfaction of work with the cycle of the seasons, the rhythm of music seems to express the relationship even more meaningfully. Work, worship, rest, and play are melody and harmony, point and counterpoint in the musical composition of life. The inter-relationship among the elements is so finely tuned that no part can get out of balance without breaking the rhythm or causing discord. So, if we overwork, overworship, overrest, or overplay, we upset the balance and rhythm of our God-given nature. At the same time we must acknowledge that there is no single
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musical score for all persons. The rhythm varies by individual, by age, and by situation. During my graduate study, for example, I worked effectively for hours into the night. Now in middle age, my most productive work time has shifted from night to morning. Likewise, my rest cycle has expanded from four to eight hours and my recreational rhythm now requires regularity to regain perspective, avoid the bulge in front and pain in back. Worship has also changed from the hit-and-miss episodes of my career-climbing days. Spiritual sustenance is now bread and butter, not appetizer or dessert.
Twenty-nine years ago I began my career in the college presidency — just a fresh-faced kid who had the dubious and short-lived distinction of being the youngest college president in the nation. At that time, the tenure of college presidents averaged a little over four years. The average has fluctuated dramatically through times of crisis and calm during the past twenty-nine years; but generally speaking, I would qualify as a senior survivor in this role.
People who see the college presidency as a task of high stress and low satisfaction often ask me, "How can you survive?" Their question betrays their bias. They might better ask, "How do you thrive?" I would answer two ways. First of all, I have found joy in doing the will of God. My tenure of twenty-nine years includes moves from a college to a university to a seminary. It all began, however, when I responded to God's call and made Christian higher education the focus of my ministry. While far from perfect and sometimes wavering, I have never turned back from that call. The ministry of administration is still my joy.
Complementing the joy of my calling is the rhythm of my life during the past twenty-nine years. As a graduate student, I read a study of genius. To my surprise and encouragement, I learned that persons who were identified as geniuses did not necessarily excel in intellectual aptitude. Rather, they exhibited
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two special abilities, one natural and the other learned. They had the natural ability to find creative solutions to common problems. But they learned how to work when they worked, play when they played, and they did not confuse the two. I was encouraged. Knowing that my intellectual ability did not qualify me as a genius, I decided to exercise the insight over which I had control. Throughout the past twenty-nine years as a president, with only a few lapses that got me in trouble, I have worked when I worked, played when I played, and rested when I rested. Productivity in my work and re-creation of my spirit have been my rewards.
I wish I could say that I worship when I worship. This is my failure. Work tends to violate my worship and I am the poorer for it. Yet, when I discipline myself to give full attention to the worship experience, even poor music and bad preaching do not rob me of some spiritually meaningful moment. I thrive doing the will of God when I sense that I am in sync with the rhythm of work, worship, rest and play.
THE RHYTHM OF WORK
In the Genesis story, God's daily work preceded His evening reflection. Likewise, our work precedes our worship. Not that work is more important than worship. Rather, work sets the stage for our worship as the time when we reflect upon the meaning of our life and vocation in reference to the will of God. The point is that work is so basic to our existence that its "beat" sets the basic rhythm for our lives. A few years ago, we talked with half-envy about workaholics, for whom work had become an obsession. Generally speaking, we thought highly of a person who succeeded on the job but failed at family fun, games, and small talk. Today, overwork has been classified as an addiction with negative effects similar to other addictions such as drugs, sex, gambling, and violence. The problem with
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this viewpoint is that addiction has become a wastebasket word to collect everything from original sin to inherited weakness. Also, I suspect that the term addiction is loosely employed to increase the clientele for professional counseling. To qualify as an addiction, overwork would have to pass the three-D test - diplomacy, denial, and debilitation. This means that a person would be dependent upon work to cope with reality, deny that dependence, and show debilitating effects in the quality of work and life itself. Defined this way, work is not part of the rhythm of life but is rather, the whole of life. Work addiction is an extreme form of spiritual disequilibrium and is, in fact, idolatry.
Nonetheless, work can be personally or socially debilitating without affecting the quality of work itself. One of the most successful men I know says, "I never learned to be a father." A woman whose career took her back and forth across the country confessed, "My children have always thought of me as coming or going, never as a fully present mother." A college president I know never slept through a full night. When he awakened in the morning, a notepad on his nightstand listed all of the things he had to do that day. A heart attack cut short his career. In each case, overwork upset the personal rhythm and interpersonal relationships of life.
Work and work-related activities such as getting ready in the morning, breaking for lunch, and commuting occupy eighty percent of our waking time. For executives, the percentage will rise to ninety percent! Sheer reality tells us two things: our work must be meaningful or we will be miserable. We must set aside inviolable time for worship, rest, and play or our work will make us zombies or idolaters.
THE RHYTHM OF WORSHIP
Work and worship sound harmonious notes in the rhythm of life. In work we are fulfilling God's commandment to be producers,
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caretakers, and masters of nature. The power is heady. Before long we can get the notion that we are independent of God's wisdom and will. Three fallacies of human achievement follow.
The first is the notion, Progress is unlimited. Quite in contrast with the cyclical view of human history which dominates the Eastern mind, our Western civilization entertains the notion that history is a straight line ever moving upward in human progress. Sooner or later, we will learn that progress is neither unlimited nor inevitable. Instead, the myth of Sisyphus will come true. Sisyphus was forever condemned to roll a stone toward the top of a mountain only to have it roll down to the bottom again just as he reached his destination. In so many fields of human progress, we are learning the meaning of Ralph Waldo Emerson's axiom, "Society never advances." Almost every step of progress has its trade-offs, some of which are evil.
Another fallacy is, Whatever the human mind can conceive, it can create. Behind this notion lies the assumption that creation is mechanistic and finite — capable of being conquered by the human mind. Given time, it is assumed that science will solve all of the mysteries of the universe — physical, mental, and spiritual.
Still another fallacy is the insistence, Whatever can be done, must be done. Presumably, human invention has a momentum which knows no moral boundaries. The nuclear bomb, for instance, is a classic example of an invention that should not have happened, even though it could be done. Under the compulsion of doing the possible, physicists who first triggered that atomic bomb ignored the calculation of mathematicians who reported that the explosion could set off a chain reaction that would destroy that atmospheric envelope around the earth upon which human life depends. Though they gambled and won, Robert Oppenheimer, father of the A-bomb, spoke apocalyptic truth when he witnessed the unleashed force and said, "Physicists
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have now known sin." Ahead of us lies the never-never land of bioengineering which will permit us to tamper with the genetic structure of human beings. Have we learned our lesson? Sooner or later, when the prospects for evil outweigh the good, a moral line must be drawn, and human invention must be stopped.
Worship is the only check-and-balance upon work which will save us from ourselves. In worship, we become recipients of grace rather than the producers of goods, confessors of need rather than controllers of nature, and servants of God rather than slaves of technology. Most significantly, in worship we enter the overwhelming presence of God, His greatness, and His goodness. Not that God is absent in our work. Quite the contrary. His presence hallows our work on the job. The difference in worship is that our total and undivided attention is brought into God's overwhelming presence. Awe moves us to wonder, sin brings us to confession, grace leads us to forgiveness, and faith lifts us to a love that takes us back to the joyful service of God. Like the pulsating voices of an antiphonal choir, work calls us to worship and worship sends us to work.
THE RHYTHM OF REST
Why did God rest from His work on the seventh day? Several answers centering on the meaning of rest apply directly to us.
Rest is a natural phase in the rhythm of all creation. Whether in the cosmic
rhythms of the galaxies, the seasons of the earth, or the biorhythm of human
nature, there are periods of rest. While baby-sitting with our grandchildren,
I noted that natural rhythm of creation firsthand. Marshall is a high-energy
five-year-old, who rises at dawn going full speed with total intensity and
vivid imagination for his childhood projects. He has to be coaxed to eat
and resists any interruption. Periodically he asks me if I approve of his
work. Otherwise, he seems to
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regard me as a part of the furniture — which he takes for granted. Only at bedtime will he let me into his world. We watch the stars together and talk about mysteries beyond our bedroom perch. Suddenly, I feel a head on my lap and get no answers to my questions. Marshall is asleep, as totally at rest as he was totally at his work. In the natural rhythm of his young and uninhibited life, he rests as well as he works.
Rest is the final act of Creation. We tend to think of the seventh day as
a cessation from creation. True, He stopped the work cycle but did not stop
the creative process. The word rest in the Genesis story is a positive
term which suggests the final stage of creation when all other parts and
products of God's work, including human nature, come together in perfect
harmony in relationship to God as the center of the universe, when the morning
stars sing together (Job 38:7). Just to write these words helps me to better
understand what Augustine meant when he said, "Our souls are restless till
they rest in Thee." Deep within each of us is a homesickness for the harmony
of all creation with God in order that we might be "at rest."
God set aside a day just for Himself. God didn't need such a day, but we
do. As always, God had us in mind when He "rested" on the seventh day. We
read in Genesis that "God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it" (Genesis
2:3). In the rhythm of Creation which makes rest natural to the life cycle,
God blessed the seventh day as a special gift to us and also sanctified the
day as a special time for Himself.
If God in heaven rested on the seventh day, why on earth can't we? Much could be written about the relationship between rest and keeping the seventh day holy. In fact, a case could be made for the fact that the stress which is the bane of our contemporary existence, the symptom on which clinical and pastoral counseling thrives, and even the status symbol for high-achieving Christians, derives directly from the failure to keep holy to the Lord the seventh day and enjoy the blessing of His
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rest. Every psychological theory of healing, every technique for therapy, every remedy for wellness, every religious cult has one attraction in common: to offer "rest" for our souls. Whatever the name may be — "harmony," "wholeness," "nirvana," "peace,"or "perfection" — it is synonymous with "rest."
How, then, do we sort out the biblical meaning of God's rest from the promise of counseling and cults? As God's revelation unfolds, we see "rest" in Genesis becomes God's promise to the Children of Israel when He leads them out of the bondage of Egypt, through the Sinai Desert, and into the Promised Land where they will enter into His "rest." A sense of harmony with God's purpose and plan brings with it the promise of His peace and perspective as they honor Him and His holy day.
God's "rest" was extended again in the Mosaic Law when the Israelites were commanded to let the soil lie at "rest" from planting every seventh year. The commandment was far more than a symbolic use of the number seven. The soil needed rest for the restoration of nutrients depleted in six years of planting. Today, this same concept of "rest" is used in colleges and universities where professors are given a "sabbatical" every seventh year in order to advance their learning, restore their energies, and enable them to return renewed to teaching.
The Epistle to the Hebrews extends the analogy of God's "rest" one step further. Sabbatical rest, the historical promise to the Israelites, is now advanced to soul rest for those who believe in Jesus Christ. The writer to the Hebrews minces no words when reminding the reader that the Israelites who failed to reach God's "rest" in the Promised Land failed because of unbelief. Therefore, with the strongest words, the writer to the Hebrews says, "Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall after the same example of disobedience" (4:11). For every Christian, there is a creative rest in which we are fully at peace with God and ourselves. In Wesleyan circles this "soul rest" is called "holiness" — not a sinless perfection, but
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a wholeness of heart that is motivated by love.
We have come full cycle. In Genesis, God rested on the seventh day from His finished work in order to enter into sabbatical rest in harmony with His created world. Generously, then, He invited His people, the Children of Israel, into a caravan rest from the weariness of Egypt and the wilderness of Sinai, as they, by faith, entered the Promised Land. There, they learned the values of the "sabbatical rest" for their land and for themselves. The culmination, however, comes in Christ. As we believe in Him, not only are we made the new creation of God, but we enter into the soul rest of harmony with God and His holiness. Sin is incompatible with God's rest. Until we are reconciled with God through Jesus Christ, all of our striving for harmony, healing, and holiness will be fleeting moments followed by deeper emptiness and more desperate need.
We see, then, why rest is so essential to the rhythm of work. Far more than relief from our work, we need to set aside the Sabbath Day for recentering our souls in God and receiving the blessings of re-creative rest which He has reserved for us. God's rest includes worship, but there are many other ways we can bring body, mind, and spirit into harmony with Him. When we do, we will experience the peace of His presence.
Careful reading of the Creation story will show that there is no evening mentioned at the close of the seventh day. Some scholars suggest that after God finished His work, He continued His rest to this day as an open invitation to us. Yet, our work is not yet finished. Like my grandson, Marshall, when we fall asleep with the "sweet amen of peace" in God's rest, we rise to work again — refreshed and ready.
THE RHYTHM OF PLAY
Our spiritual rhythm is not complete without play. Contrary to our usual thoughts, play is not the opposite of work. Rather, it
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is an essential complement to work — another note of harmony. If play is defined as "a spontaneous activity with a satisfying end," we begin to understand how much we need play as a part of our lives. Yet, to come to that understanding, we must first get over some misconceptions. One is that God did not play, as part of His creative process. While it is true that play is not specifically mentioned in the Creation story, it is wrong to assume that God has no playfulness in Him. In the Book of Job, we are informed that God does some things for a special purpose and for specific results. But other things He does because of "His soul desires" (Job 23:13). Later in the Book of Job, God Himself challenges Job to think about the hippopotamus, a member of God's creation, who is deemed worthless for all practical purposes. Yet, God tells Job, "I created him along with you." What a blow to the idea that God has no playfulness in Him. With an animal as ludicrous as the hippopotamus, He is telling us about an area of His creative activity that is spontaneous, free-ranging, and measured not by its usefulness but by His satisfaction.
Still, work and play are two separate realms. To expand our definition, play is spontaneous in action, free form in structure, venturesome in spirit, satisfying in outcome, and valuable in itself. Work, on the other hand, is a planned activity within a structured setting conducted according to present rules, rewarded by compensation, and measured by production. In this contrast we can see the truth of the adage, "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy." Play puts the spark into life. We all need regular times when we are free to be spontaneous, creative, imaginative, experimental, and adventuresome. One of my grandsons took me by hand to show me the city he had built out of Lego blocks. Initially, he pointed out the buildings, streets, bridges, automobiles, trains, and planes. Then, after he peopled his city, his imagination set it in motion — cars moving, planes flying, doors opening, and children playing. With a
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healthy view of reality from his limited experience with cities, and with a fantasy that knew no bounds, he created the lively and joyful City of God all over again.
Play is not only for children. If Jack grows up to all work and no play, he will still be dull. Worse yet, he will be incomplete. Competitiveness sports and fitness programs will not do. By definition, they are more work than play. Competitive sports and fitness programs are planned, structured, regulated, and measure by the output of energy — another criterion for defining work.
We need an adult version of my grandson's play, with moments of free and spontaneous activity when imagination runs free, creative impulse are stimulated, and experience renews the spirit. For me, sailing is that kind of experience. Once I set my boat free from the dock and head into the wind, I change worlds. Quite in contrast with the highly structured, time-urgent, and goal-oriented nature of my executive work, sailing puts me at one with the wind — I go where it goes, move in its time, and find meaning in its motion. How well I remember the first time I experienced the exhilaration of being at one with the wind — sails filled to the slightest fluff, the hull leaning in perfect balance, and white water churning in the wake. That day I knew what Jesus meant when He used the analogy of the wind to describe the mystery of His new creation, "The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit" (John 3:8). In thinking of God's redemptive action as His work, we may be missing God's redemptive play. Long before God put His plan of redemption into its "work" phase, we see His mind "at play," moving spontaneously over options, imagining the creation of a good world, struggling with the risk of human freedom, reacting against the thoughts of sacrificing His Son, and yet foreseeing the time when human redemption would be a reality. Dante had it right
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when he called the drama of redemption "the Divine Comedy." Redemption is "play" at its highest and best — God exercising the freedom of imagination weighing the options for action, foreseeing the risks of His choice, living with the divine/human paradox, and coming to the satisfying decisions that He would send His Son to save the world. In rare moments, we too know how creative play leads to creative work. I find that the quality of my play directly affects the quality of my work. When I play well, I work better.
No two persons play in the same way. A garden may serve as well as a golf course, an art gallery as well as a book. Just as each of us must find the natural gift which becomes our work, the quiet sanctuary which leads us to worship and the holy time which gives us rest, so we must discover the kind of play which sets us free and satisfies our souls.
The rhythm of life has an integrity of it own. If we are to be whole in body, mind, and spirit, we need the balance of work, worship, rest, and play. In a washing machine, if the laundry is balanced, the machine works on a smooth whir. But if the load is out of balance, the thump of the cycle not only reduces the effectiveness of its operation, but can damage the machine itself. Likewise, if we have a thump in the rhythm of our work, worship, rest and play cycles, the imbalance will begin to reduce our spiritual effectiveness and do long-term damage to our souls.
On the other hand, the naturally balanced rhythm of the work, worship, rest, and play cycle carries with it unlimited promise. Students of health and human behavior are preoccupied with the search for "wellness" as the total life concept in which physical, mental, and spiritual health are balanced for maximal enhancement of the person. The more the search goes on, however, the closer it comes to the transcendental and supernatural dimension that can only be fulfilled in Jesus Christ. When we come to that dimension, we dare not fall back upon
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faulty human solutions. One teacher of wellness, for instance, who is an evangelical Christian, brings a spiritual dimension to his theory, but permits "God" to be the Person revealed in the Scripture or any identifiable object outside ourselves which can serve as the centering force for our well-being. From there it is only a short step to the religious cults that prey upon our transcendental and supernatural needs, offering false solutions such as karma, godlikeness, and reincarnation.
Our prevention against therapeutic fads, substitute gods, and false cults is to hold fast to the truth that the fullness, balance and wholeness of life comes only through the person of Jesus Christ. He and He alone can fulfill the promise "I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly" (John 10:10).
FROM DOING TO BEING
Jesus' promise of abundant living takes us back to another meaning of God's rest on the seventh day of Creation. It is a mistake to assume that the creative process was limited to six days followed by inactivity on the seventh day. Such an assumption misses the full meaning of the word rest and does injustice to the character of God. When He rested on the seventh day, God moved from doing to being and entered into creative rest. Note again that there is no evening for the seventh day.
Profound truth follows these insights into Scripture. First of all, on the seventh day God entered into "creative rest." He did not become the great watchmaker of the Deists who claim that God created the watch, started it, and then left it to run itself. Such a view is contrary to everything we know about the character of God. Rather, we believe that creation continues on the seventh day with God assuming a different, but not an indifferent role.
Second, the nature of God's creative rest is to move from "doing"
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to "being." After the six days of creative "doing," God surveys His work and pronounces it "very good." For the moment, at least, the "doing" is over and the "being" begins. What, then, is the creative nature of God's "being" on the seventh day? There is no mystery. On the seventh day, God sets His humanity free for creative "doing" with the assurance of His creative "being" — expressed in His unfailing presence, His unconditional love and His unmerited grace.
As the father of an "empty nest," I think I understand a bit of the difference between God's "doing" and "being." Until the time that our children went to college and got married, I functioned as their "doing" father, providing for their needs, guiding their behavior, and monitoring their progress. Then the time came when love required that I set them free to become their own persons. Now, as I have told each of them, I cannot control them or make decisions for them; but I can assure them of my unfailing love in any circumstances, my immediate presence if they need me, and my willingness to give them everything I have if it would save them from disaster. Without setting myself up as the godly model, I join with every parent who knows what it means to move from the sixth day to the seventh day in relationship with my children. In a similar context, I also understand how God sent His own Son to redeem us when we rebelled against Him. Out of the "being" of my love, I would risk all I have to save one of my children, even if he or she had rejected me.
In this climate of God's presence, love, and grace, then, we come to our third insight into the meaning of "creative rest." There is no evening on the seventh day because we are still living in that day. This awareness offers inestimable meaning to our daily work. If we are in the seventh day of God's "creative rest," Christians are copartners with God in the continuation of His creation. While such a thought may overwhelm us at first, our second thought is to realize how worthy we are as persons in
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the mind of God and how important is our daily work in continuing His creation. God has given us the freedom to reject Him as our competitor and work for our own selfish ends, or to recognize Him as our God and work for His glory. In a very real sense, the seventh day belongs to us.
Abundant evidence from Scripture supports the "creative rest" of God on the seventh day. His unfailing presence was assured when God gave His promise to Jacob for all the generations of His people. "Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have spoken to you" (Genesis 28:15).
Our family, now scattered over thousands of miles across the United States, counts on the same promise of God's presence. If you come into the family room of what our children call "Our Ol' Kentucky Home," the President's home at Asbury Theological Seminary, you will see a Bible open to Psalm 121. We claim God's promise in the Scripture as the "McKenna Psalm" which has been handed down through four generations now. Each time that our family comes together we reclaim the promise. "The Lord shall preserve your going out and your coming in from this time forth, and even forevermore" (Psalm 121:8).
God's promise of His presence is backed up by His unconditional love. While that love comes to its fullest expression in the self-sacrifice of Jesus Christ, its promise is not absent between the time of Creation and Redemption. In the most difficult days of my career, I have often drawn upon the inspiration of the Prophet Jeremiah when he told of the Lord appearing to His people in the past with the promise: "I have loved you with an everlasting love, therefore with loving kindness I have drawn you" (Jeremiah 31:3).
Then, in my most frustrating days when I have lost out on key appointments to which I have aspired, Jeremiah has
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again been my prophet: "For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope" (Jeremiah 29:11).
Who can doubt that God's movement from "doing" to "being" on the seventh day expressed His "creative rest"? Who can doubt that we go to our daily work in the promise of His unfailing presence and within the plans of His unconditional love?
But what a trust God puts in us. When He entered into His rest on the seventh day, God took the risk and set us free. Our freedom to make moral choices for good or evil and to do work that is creative or destructive is primary proof of our creation in the image of God. From the very beginning, God gave us our freedom when He put Adam in the Garden of Eden and said to him: "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die" (Genesis 2:16-17).
All of human history is encompassed in the seventh day, a day without an evening. God is still at "creative rest," creating a climate for our daily work, setting us free to make our own decisions, assuring us of His unfailing presence, forgiving us when we fail, and showing His unconditional love by being personally interested in everything we do. His "being" is the hope for our "doing."
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SPIRITUAL REFLECTIONS
ON OUR WORK AND RHYTHM
Then God blessed the seventh day and
sanctified it, because in it He rested from all
His work which God had created and made.
Genesis 2:3
* * * * * * *
A PROVOCATIVE QUESTION
Do you feel trapped in an unnatural and imbalanced cycle of work, worship, rest, and play? What do you need to do to escape the trap and restore the rhythm?
A PRACTICAL EXERCISE
Assume that you have just received word that beginning tomorrow morning you will be given a full year, fully financed, with your family cared for, to do something you have always wanted to do. What would you choose? What does your choice tell you about yourself and the rhythm of your life?
A PERSONAL PRAYER
God of rhythm and beauty, help me to worship when I worship, work when I work, rest when I rest, play when I play — and never get them confused. Amen
