Mark 6:30-34, 53-56
Time after Pentecost – Lectionary 16 July 19, 2015
“Come, all by yourselves, and rest for a while.” Jesus was responding to the disciples after they had told him all that they had done. When have you gone away for vacation? This week, I was on the beach for a day and a half in Duck, NC, researching our texts for today. Does that qualify?
According to an article I read recently, a survey by the U.S. Travel Association found that Americans take fewer vacation days than they did 15 years ago. Forty percent of people don’t take all the vacation days that they have earned. Seven out of ten respondents to the study confessed that they skip their children’s activities, birthdays and vacations to work more. We fall short of creating a good work-life balance.
Dr. Sue Varma, a clinical assistant professor of psychiatry at NYU Langone Medical Center is concerned. “When [not taking time to rest] becomes a pattern, you start to burn bridges with key relationships in your life,” she writes. “We don’t look at time as a resource, and that’s the problem — a lot of times we look at money as a resource,” said Varma[1]. We live in a culture that professes direct consequences for the work we do. Relaxation isn’t productive. Working long hours makes us a success. Children attending the right preschool, taking dance lessons, piano lessons, playing soccer, and waking hours without a moment to spare will grow up to be the best and brightest and have everything could ever want. College students researching, writing, studying who don’t see the light of day will graduate summa cum laude, and that will be the tangible sign that they are successful. It is all so black and white.
It is until you start looking at reality instead of our if/then, deeds/consequence paradigm. Research shows that taking vacations slows down employee turnover. For every forty hours of free time, employees stayed at a company eight months longer. Ernst and Young found that people who used more vacation days received better performance reviews[2]. We are not performing at our best when exhausted.
Rest and relaxation is important even for those who are not employed. Daily demands of caring for others, paying bills, meal preparation, washing, cleaning, volunteer activities and all of those things that we do for others can be wearing. For students, it is the pressure of making good grades and engaging in extracurricular activities. Life’s interruptions are certain to derail us when we are too busy to stop and breathe. All of it can be physically, spiritually and emotionally draining.
Jesus knew this. His twelve disciples had just come back from preaching, casting out demons, and tending to the sick. “Jesus, do you know all the good stuff we did? We went here and did this, then there and fixed that. We helped hundreds of people. We ate lunch at our desks! “ Jesus doesn’t tell them, “Good job! Your performance reviews will be excellent this year! A sixty-hour workweek is to be commended! And, hey, if we publish your cell phone numbers, we can take it to twenty-four/seven!”
No, Jesus did not say those things. Jesus said to them, “Come away and rest for a while.”
There is something to be said about time in solitude. On this occasion, after the disciples worked together two by two to accomplish their given mission, Jesus called them to be in community while they rested and recharged. Maybe they went to the beach and built a sand castle, or cast their fishing rods to catch dinner. Maybe they went on a bike ride, or to the movies.
Our church staff comes together every day at noon to worship and then eat lunch together. You are welcome to join us! The demands of the day are set aside. We talk about movies we’ve seen, favorite foods, children and grandchildren. It is a time of brief but intentional Sabbath in which wearied spirits and relationships are refreshed. Even if our conversation is trivial, our time spent talking and breaking bread together is meaningful. We are a better team when we play together. Families are stronger when they ride Busch Gardens’ Tempesto together, or laugh while playing Apples to Apples. Gathering together for meals is an important part of life together.
Jesus said to his disciples, “‘Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.’ For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat. And they went away in the boat to a deserted place by themselves. Now many saw them going and recognized them, and they hurried there on foot from all the towns and arrived ahead of them.” We don’t know how many days they were in the deserted place, and how much time they had to recharge before the world resumed and people interrupted their Sabbath time. However long it was, their time of rest was enough.
“As [Jesus] went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them.” To have compassion for people is to step outside of the deed/consequence model. If we live our own lives thinking that our twenty-four/seven results in success by our definition of success, don’t we think the same for others? To enter into other’s struggles with heart, you have to put aside the philosophy that we reap what we sow. You-made your-bed-now-you-can-lie-in-it cannot co-exist with compassion. God reaches beyond that, restoring and sustaining relationships.
God calls us to renewal through of practices of Sabbath keeping, and Holy Communion. We re-form ourselves as the body of Christ. We gather today as family at the table, to share bread and wine. “Come,” Christ bids us. “Rest for a while.”
~Pastor Cheryl Ann Griffin
[1] http://www.today.com/health/americans-are-taking-less-vacation-time-ever-its-hurting-their-t32371
[2] http://www.today.com/money/want-raise-try-taking-vacation-1D80109607