E28 False Rest vs. True Rest: How to Find Renewal That Actually Restores Your Soul

SHOW TRANSCRIPT:

Jen Cudmore (00:00)
Welcome to the show. Thanks for joining in as we learn to move away from a shallow existence and move into abundant life led by the spirit. Do me a favor. If you have not signed up yet for my newsletter and email announcements, go ahead and click the link in the show notes and go ahead and get signed up. I’m going to be sending out a newsletter in September. So I wanna make sure you’re signed up and I’ve got your email so you can be up to date on all the things going on with the podcast.

Okay, so let me ask you question to open up. Have you ever tried to lay down for a nap or even like just when you’re going to bed at night and you just lay there and you toss and you turn and you just cannot sleep? A lot of times it’s because we can’t turn off our brain, but sometimes we don’t even know what it is that keeps us from falling asleep and actually getting some rest. I know that has happened to me a lot. I mean, it’s normal, right? When we’re human, we’re going to have times where we just can’t sleep, but

What I want to address is what are those common things going on below the surface that keep us from getting true rest? I’ve discovered that we can do a lot of things that feel like they’re rest, feel like we’re relaxing, but actually we don’t come away refreshed and renewed and restored. And so it’s really just a waste of our time. But I think that we have to learn to understand

what works well for us, what true rest looks like versus false rest. And so that’s what I want to get into today. Let’s make sure we’re doing this well so that we can become the best version of ourselves. So what is real rest actually look like? I used to think it was just simply not doing anything, that it’s just simply making sure you find a way to relax. ⁓ I remember one day where I was out sitting on the beach.

and actually stop into me a couple of times where like the beach is one of my most favorite places in the whole world. I’ve said that before and I don’t even care necessarily which beach it is. Just get me there so I can sit and enjoy the sound of the ocean. And so I remember like reflecting one day on this and just thinking, man, the beach is my favorite place. Like it’s, I just love it here. So why do I feel so agitated? Like, why can’t I relax? Even I’m just sitting here doing nothing.

And I can’t enjoy this beautiful space, this beautiful area that God has created. What is going on? And I’ve discovered that that actually happens to me quite often where I would try to rest, but instead of resting, I would feel like this inner turmoil. I would feel a lot of restlessness. And I thought, this isn’t working. I’m supposed to be relaxing. What is the problem here? And I…

I had told myself that I was resting. I had told myself I was relaxing. And so I assumed that I would get the benefits of that, but I wasn’t. And so what I’ve come to discover is that rest is so, so much deeper than just simply not doing anything or just simply finding ways to relax. True rest is actually the rest of God as it’s described in the Bible in a couple of different places. So

True rest is the peace that passes understanding. It’s having our hope anchored in Jesus. It’s completely trusting God, completely depending on God. It’s when we’re healed and we’re free of a bunch of baggage and junk. It’s not about simply doing nothing. It’s not about stopping the busyness.

It’s about doing something that’s actually restorative, something that’s actually refreshing. It could be something like light exercise, like taking a walk. It could be meeting a friend for coffee and that connection just gives you a lot of peace. It could be taking a road trip. Tim and I love to ⁓ go for drives. I’ve said that multiple times. That’s very restful for us, just hanging out together, even just being quiet and not talking, but we’ll listen to music or listen to a sermon or whatever it is that we happen to

to feel like doing that day. That is restful. Rest can look so many different ways, but things that we do that we think are restful might not be. And so I wanna show you how we can get caught up in that trap of false rest. So what exactly is false rest? Really, it’s just a counterfeit. It’s something that we think is restful, but it’s really not bringing us rest, but we have to learn to recognize it. So…

It could be watching TV. It could be reading a book. It could be scrolling through social media. It could even be napping. Those things that seem like they would be restful, but when we do them, we actually don’t come away restored. So the the results of the activity is what you want to look at. When I finished doing that thing, did I come away feeling refreshed? Did I like? True rest is soul deep.

So when you walk away from that activity, when you finish that activity, how do you feel? Do you feel just as heavy, just as restless or agitated as you did when you started? Or do you actually feel different? Does your body feel lighter? Are your limbs and muscles more relaxed, right? So beginning to recognize ⁓ how you feel physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually after you finish that activity, that’s what’s going to tell you the difference between

false rest and true rest. False rest often shows up as avoidance or escapism. It’s those kinds of activities where I’ve talked about before where we’re numbing out or zoning out. And we do that from a motivation of trying to avoid something that’s painful or uncomfortable. That is not what true rest is. That is not the rest of God. Hebrews chapter four is a good place to go,

if you’re looking to understand what is God’s rest look like? How do I understand it? And I believe that God takes us all on a journey of understanding ⁓ true rest isn’t just simply not doing anything one day a week. And we call it honoring the Sabbath. It’s so much more than that, but I think because each of us are different and we need different types of things that bring us relaxation, that bring us joy.

It’s a little bit of a journey to get to know ourselves and figure out what works and I believe that’s something that you that God will take you on But you have to want it you have to be interested in it As a follower of Christ as a believer in Jesus like we are not meant to be busy all the time We’re not meant to be agitated We’re not meant to have a heaviness or an oppression around our neck all the time it in Matthew chapter 11 it talks about how

His yoke is easy, his burden is light. And so if you’re feeling a lot of turmoil or heaviness, if you’re struggling to rest or struggling to sleep, I would recommend that you dig into that because rest without peace, rest without true freedom and healing, rest without fully trusting God, it’s just avoidance in disguise. It’s not true rest.

There’s actually a lot of hidden reasons why we might feel exhausted and overwhelmed or unfulfilled all the different types of things that might be going on below the surface that we’re not noticing. It’s gonna take a little bit of time and effort to pull back and be like, okay, what is really going on here? So.

When we feel restless, when we struggle to actually get real rest, it’s because there’s something, some kind of baggage that we haven’t dealt with, something that we haven’t addressed that needs to be taken care of so that we can get to that place of refreshment and renewal. So that’s gonna look like a lot of different things. Maybe there’s unresolved conflict and you just need to let it go. You need to be able to walk away and trust the Lord that he’s gonna fix that for you.

which can be difficult and it can take practice. But if there’s something that you’re holding onto that’s not resolved, in order to rest, you’ve got to be able to let that go and just set it aside. It could be performance. This was a huge one for me, man. If I didn’t do enough things so that I could feel good about myself, if my to-do list wasn’t checked off, ⁓ I couldn’t rest. I couldn’t sit down. I had to make sure that I took care of those things.

or I couldn’t feel good about myself, I couldn’t slow down. And I think there’s a lot of people that get stuck in that trap actually. And that ultimately led me to burnout, which is how I learned to rest appropriately. anyhow, so there could also be a hurtful situation that you need to ⁓ forgive or get past. It could be that there was maybe some sort of betrayal or, ⁓

a wound or offense that was done against you. But unforgiveness is huge when it comes to not being able to sleep. ⁓ Unforgiveness causes us a lot of physical problems and we hold on to unforgiveness a lot more than we think we do. So I would really challenge you to dig into that. The scripture says in the New Testament and a couple of the gospels, it talks about how if we don’t forgive,

then that opens the door for the tormentors to come and make our lives miserable. it’s definitely something that you want to look into. If you’re having some inner turmoil, if you’re feeling oppressed, ⁓ definitely look in your heart and see if there’s any offense or unforgiveness or bitterness that needs to be taken care of. There could be lingering fear or anxiety. This is also a huge thing. we’re…

worried about an upcoming situation that’s making us uncomfortable, it can be really hard to rest and relax. So again, we have to learn how to be able to take a breath, set that aside and just trust the Lord with the outcome of that and move away from that and stop focusing on it. And again, that can be easy for small things, but for big things that might take you a little practice. But you’ve got to learn how to let things go.

It could be something like guilt or shame or condemnation. Like you’re upset over something that you did wrong that you wish that you would have done better. You’re disappointed in something that you did or a situation that didn’t go your way. And you’re like, man, I wish I would have shown up as a different version of myself or I’m so stupid for making that mistake. Those kinds of things can really cause a lot of inner turmoil and that can keep us from true rest. And so we need to get away from

hanging on to that guilt and shame and condemnation, because the scripture’s pretty clear. There’s no condemnation in Christ Jesus. If you sinned and repented, it’s done, it’s over. The scripture says that your sins are as far as the east is from the west, and God doesn’t think about them anymore. So you’ve got to learn to forgive yourself. You’ve got to learn to let that go again. Instead of criticizing and berating yourself and holding onto that, ⁓ work through it and let it go.

Overthinking is another huge one for me. Man, my brain will just go and go looking for solutions. And I have learned that there’s a lot of situations I can’t control. So I’ve got to stop trying. I’ve got to stop trying. So ⁓ I don’t need to figure things out. God already knows the answer. He knows the solution. And I need to trust him and wait on him to bring that about. So how do we find true rest? We’ve got to

Identify what’s going on inside us and begin to deal with that inner turmoil. So stop and ask yourself What is making me restless? What is making me feel overwhelmed or agitated or worried or whatever it is and and sometimes you might have to pause and go like what am I actually feeling you might not know in the moment so You might want to start with that question. What am I feeling and then why am I feeling this way? What happened? What situation is driving me to to

Stir up all of this internal turmoil and then what do I need to do to let it go? Do I need to take an action? Maybe I need to just simply journal. Maybe I just need to pray and talk it out with God maybe I just need to capture a lie label or limiting belief and then reframe it with the truth and Maybe maybe I need a call of friends Maybe somebody needs to process the situation with me so that I can fully get it off my chest And not so much venting but just processing and walking through it

Sometimes another human’s perspective can be super helpful or we just need accountability, someone that can challenge us and remind us ⁓ that we have wrong thinking. So there’s lots of different things that we can do and you’ll have to figure out what works for you. So the more you practice this, the more you’ll begin to understand, okay, this is what’s going on inside me. So this is what I need. This is how I need to take action to resolve it. And so…

When I first started this process, it took a lot of time and energy because I was like, I don’t know what I’m doing. But now it comes super easy to me. When I begin to notice that restlessness, when I am trying to relax and I see that I can’t, ⁓ I have learned to be able to go, okay, something’s wrong. Let me talk to the Lord and figure out what’s going on inside me. So how can you experience real rest that actually renews your spirit?

You’ve got to make a regular habit of digging inside yourself and dealing with those issues, learning to handle them properly in a way that’s going to propel you forward instead of keeping you stuck. So regularly check in with yourself. I would recommend doing this daily or weekly. You can’t let the baggage stack up because then it becomes a huge problem and it’s so much more difficult to deal with. So if you’re setting aside space,

weekly or daily for some reflection and prayer over what’s going on inside my heart and what might need to be resolved. Rest is going to come much more easily when it’s time to do that rest because you’ve already taken care of the things inside that can keep you from rest. So I definitely recommend a regular practice of reflection and prayer so that you are working through those things that prevent you from resting well.

So why, why does this matter? Why do we need regular rest? mean, like, who cares? Some people get so much enjoyment out of being busy. Raise my hand, that used to be me. I just couldn’t feel good about myself unless I was extremely busy and extremely productive. And people wear their busyness like a badge. I know I’ve talked about this before. ⁓ But eventually being super busy is gonna catch up with you. Your body can only handle so much.

we need rest emotionally, mentally, spiritually, as well as physically. It’s a whole package, it goes together. And so if we’re not taking care of ourselves by getting that rest that we need, we’re gonna hit a place of burnout. And burnout is, again, It’s all of those areas. So.

Why does it matter? would say, first of all, the Bible tells us to take a Sabbath one day a week. And that’s still really good advice.

And what’s fun is that ⁓ science actually backs up this claim. There’s been a lot of studies that show the benefits of when you take one day a week to get some rest where you’re not being productive, you’re not being ⁓ active or doing responsible things, your mental health, your emotional wellness, your mental capacity, all of those things are strengthened when you are taking regular time out of your week to get.

true full rest. You definitely can go do a search if you want, but science backs up what God has already taught us and God himself modeled that. He, you know, he worked for six days and then he took the seventh day off. That’s what it tells us with creation. And ⁓ even though the concept of Sabbath, a lot of people will argue is more of an Old Testament thing.

We don’t just get rid of all the Old Testament law. There’s still a lot of benefits to doing things those way and we don’t want to be rigid about it, right? ⁓ It’s not like you have to do it on a Saturday or you have to do it on a Sunday. There are some Christians who believe that the day of the week matters. Personally, I have found that the day of the week doesn’t matter as long as you’re doing one day a week where you’re intentional about getting rest and pulling back from work. You’re going to get those benefits. So

That is something you need to work out with the Lord. The scripture tells us to work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. It’s not going to look exactly the same for everybody. But I guarantee that you will find if you take one day off a week where you’re not doing anything, where you’re not doing work, you’re not being doing things that have to be done and even putting away your electronics and staying away from them for one day a week is extremely beneficial.

I have found for myself, when we implemented this in our family, man, years ago, let’s see, the kids were still in elementary. We were not taking seriously the whole concept of Sabbath. But then I realized, ⁓ well, I’ll rephrase it, God showed me why that was necessary. And so I began to really hold that seventh day sacred. And for us,

It kind of shifted a little bit. A lot of times it was at Sunday afternoons, but ⁓ sometimes there were other days of the week that worked for us as a family. So the more I implemented that, the more I began to recognize, man, my emotional wellbeing, my physical health, like things were changing. I felt lighter. ⁓ Monday mornings I used to dread because I could hardly get out of bed. I was so tired from being busy.

I now actually love Monday mornings. And I think people might call me crazy, but I actually love it because ⁓ right now I typically take Sundays as my Sabbath, my rest day. And I feel so empowered when I wake up Monday morning. I feel so energized and refreshed. I cannot wait to get to my week and get things accomplished because I have taken the time to rest my mind, body.

that has been extremely beneficial for me. It has helped me immensely. So I definitely recommend it. you’re not doing one day a week, give it a shot. You’re going to notice a difference and you’re going to be really glad that you have made that a priority. So for me, that looks like getting outdoors. It looks like maybe doing a movie marathon with my husband, maybe taking a nap. I do like to take a nap on Sundays, but I don’t always get to it. But I don’t always need it either. ⁓

A lot of times I’ll just read a novel and we might like go sit out on the back patio or even we got a hammock last year and so we’ve used that a couple of times. It’s fun to get out there and share the hammock. it could be a few different things. Those are the types of things that typically work for me where I feel really refreshed.

A lot of times I like to spend extra time with the Lord. I’ll just spend more time in worship or journaling because that is very refreshing for me as well. It gets my mind off myself and gets my focus on Him. And so those are some different ideas if you’re looking for ideas that those things work for me. So you just, you may need to like practice a little bit, try a few different things and see what works for you.

⁓ what makes you feel rested. And then once you figure it out, you can start intentionally doing those things more often. So benefits of doing, of taking off one day a week is super incredible. I’ve experienced it. I guarantee if you do it, you will as well. So as you go about this week, let’s explore the depths of this final thought. Where are you falling for that counterfeit of false rest?

What kinds of things are you doing that you think are restful that seem to be relaxing, but you don’t actually come away refreshed and renewed? This week I want you to pay attention. When you are tempted to zone out, what’s happening? What’s causing that? What is the underlying motivation? And so instead of doing those things that make you want to zone out,

pause and ask, what do I really need right now? Is there something going on inside of me that needs to be addressed and needs to be taken care of? Maybe there are some things that I need to deal with. Let’s dig in. Let’s make it a habit to start digging into that inner turmoil. Those things that you’ve been carrying around that you don’t realize are super heavy and you need to let them go. You’re going to be surprised at what God shows you when you start leaning into this habit of

asking yourself what’s going on, what am I feeling and why am I feeling this way? And I think you’re going to be surprised at the rest he gives you in return ⁓ because you dealt with those things and you let them go. So that’s it for today. Have a great week everybody.