The Highest and Sweetest Rest

We seem to live in a very busy time, where people often feel pulled in different directions. That certainly is not God’s plan for His children!

There was a time in the past that I found myself very busy. I was up almost every night doing a lot of mental work, watching and praying for our nation and the world, and toward the end of the week I didn’t have my usual joy and was feeling tired. Any time we feel that way, that’s the time to pay attention to it and do some work for ourselves.

In praying and studying for myself at that time, I turned to something in Gilbert Carpenter’s book Precepts 4, where he quotes Mary Baker Eddy: “If there is any lack of progress in our Cause, it may be directly traced to a lack of group mental support by its adherents.” We are reminded in the Daily Duty “Alertness to Duty” not “to forget nor to neglect” this sacred duty. She writes in Science and Health “The struggle for Truth makes one strong instead of weak, resting instead of wearying one.”

Carpenter continues, “Surely if one finds himself disliking to sit down and do a half hour of mental work for the Cause, seeking to think with God and to relate, in his thought, God’s children to their heavenly parent in a scientific, healing way, that student should know that something is wrong. He should recognize that error is striving to make him believe an impossible supposition, namely, that one can be wearied in thinking God’s thoughts. … When this false argument of work in regard to right thinking is handled, one will find complete rest and great joy in thinking with God.”

After thinking about that and realizing how I had been duped into thinking any kind of spiritual work can make one tired, I woke up and my joy and energy returned, which I am so grateful for. Certainly, it goes along with what Mrs. Eddy says in Science and Health “The highest and sweetest rest, even from a human standpoint, is in holy work.” (p. 519-520) Doing this work is a great privilege, and it can only bless those who do it!