The importance of rest

The month of March has flown by without much rest or time for reflection. It started with a week of studying hard for our week of exams. We had visitors from Friday-Monday 2 weekends in a row. Last week I had a non-stop Wednesday (normally a more relaxed day off) and then Saturday we skied all day with a language partner from church at his invitation for the last day of good skiing. Sunday night I was up late with a weekend exam. Monday, Sydney started going to the nursery half-time (meaning a change to our morning routine), our class shared a meal on Monday at noon, and then I stayed up late Monday night to prepare a devotion for class on Tuesday. Those are the details, but in essence, I had only taken 1 day of genuine rest in the past 4 weeks. And when standing in front of my class on Tuesday, dog-tired, my brain was simply a fog trying to formulate some spontaneous French conversation. Ironically, my devotion was on discouragement and dissatisfaction in full-time missions. I finally just opened the discussion up to the class because I had nothing left. I found myself discouraged about my progress in French and dissatisfied.

The devotion actually turned out well, thanks to my classmates who made it a great discussion. We talked about our expectations vs the reality and how this relates to discouragement and level of contentment. As I walked back to our house that evening, I just collapsed on the couch. I hadn't been this tired since residency ended. I glanced down at my phone and realized that I had a message from my teacher. It brought tears to my eyes. She expressed her concern for me and asked if she could do anything to help. In the busyness of all she has on her plate, she stopped to encourage me.

This lesson I am learning (in the process of, not past tense) is hard for me because I like to do everything. But as God mentions in the Bible multiple times, it is important to take a day of rest, to reflect on the goodness of God. It is important also to have time to not only keep up with today, but to look to the future and plan ahead. Many times I do just enough to get through today. This is a great survival tactic in residency and probably also on the mission field; however, if possible, it is far better to say no to some things and to spend time reflecting on what has happened and look and plan and dream of the future.

I took the advice of my teacher and relaxed that evening, slept in the next morning while Ryan took care of Sydney, and caught up on laundry and grocery shopping on our Wednesday off. Not surprisingly, my grumpy tired apathetic self has been renewed by this day of rest. Conflict and difficulties and French all look a little more manageable. And I hope to continue learning the lesson of the importance of rest as I look to the great amount of work we have to do in preparation of our move to Congo and, ultimately, the workload ahead of me as the only OB/GYN at Vanga.