Most of my life, I’ve been exhausted.
In high school, I worked all day to get scholarships and other necessities for school.
In college, I worked all day to be able to afford my first apartment — and my wedding.
After college, I worked all day to build my writing career and take care of my kids.
Get up. Work. Rest as reward for the effort. Rinse and repeat.
Sound familiar?
It’s the rhythm of the world.
Are you rewarding or refueling?
But if we look at Genesis, there’s something quirky in the creation story.
As God’s making everything, there’s evening first. Then day.
Why the flip of the script?
Do you put gas in your car to reward it for all the miles it’s gone, or do you put gas in your car to make sure you can get where you want to go?
Rest was never meant to be a reward. It’s meant to be fuel. Every time we get in bed, konk out, and let our body and mind downshift, we prepare for what’s to come. The more prepared we are, the more likely it is that we’ll succeed in what we’re trying to achieve on God’s behalf.
Does that mean we should be extra prepared and sleep 20 hours a day? Nope. Our time on this planet is limited, and Jesus was clear that the night when we can’t work anymore in the Great Commission is coming. There’s urgency in that.
But it does mean that we have to respect our own fragility and grasp what the work ahead is going to take out of us.
When Elijah fled Jezebel, he slept and took some nourishment not once, but twice. After everything he’d been through, the break was necessary not just to recover, but also to make sure that Elijah could continue to Mount Horeb and, after getting some direction and clarity from God, go back to fight the 450 prophets of Baal (1 Kings 19).
Do you think ahead to the fight that hasn’t happened yet?
Do you know yourself well enough to judge how much preparation you will need for the battle?
Obey and prepare, even in the struggle
Even after we come to understand what we need to be well prepared, there’s often a separate struggle to get it. The world preaches how necessary it is to be ready, but then accelerates so hard we get dizzy and miss the target. Nearly every system trains us to ignore our own physical and mental cues, and rest fits into whatever time remains, rather than being the center of the strategy.
But struggle and obedience to God often go hand in hand.
Just because fighting to be able to prepare is difficult doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it, or that it’s not the right thing to do.
Pay attention to yourself. Listen to what God is telling you. Complete the preparation even if it must be hard-won, because none of us are here to do only small things.
This content will be syndicated to faithfulontheclock.com June 3, 2026.
