How to Rest (Even with 55 Days til Christmas)

Getting past Halloween means one thing and one thing only: we have now entered the holiday season. Most people will white knuckle it through October 31st before they go all in with their Thanksgiving and Christmas decorations. Let's be honest most people blow right by Thanksgiving and deck the halls instead. Maybe we're afraid of losing steam and just giving up on the whole thing if we don't keep barreling ahead at breakneck pace. I think that's the whole point of the song: "we need a little Christmas. RIGHT THIS VERY MOMENT... put up the tree before my spirit falls again."

Truth be told, my spirit falls a little just thinking about it. I actually prefer the non-holiday season of the year. In the church we call it "Ordinary Time." Even the word relaxes me. Ordinary.

There's no fuss. No extra decorations. No need for Pinterest.

The more I come to know Jesus, the more I find Him in the most ordinary moments of life. The less "right this very moment" frantic I am, the more He shows me how to live in the present and experience His love, joy, and peace.

"True restfulness, though, is a form of awareness, a way of being in life. It is living ordinary life with a sense of ease, gratitude, appreciation, peace and prayer. We are restful when ordinary life is enough."

Ronald Rolheiser

This chronic state of restlessness known as the human condition meets its match in Jesus, who says, "come to me all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest" (Matthew 11:28).