[SPEAKER_01]: You are listening to Blessed and Boston, presented by Anchor DeMedia.
[SPEAKER_01]: In entrepreneurship podcasts for Christians, all about how to make God the CEO of your business.
[SPEAKER_01]: Get ready to be inspired, challenged, but well equipped to live and build your destiny, his way.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hey guys, welcome to another episode of The Blessing Balls of Podcasts.
[SPEAKER_01]: Today we are continuing on with our book club pick, The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're actually going to close out this book in the next few episodes.
[SPEAKER_01]: This book we're in part three where we are talking about the principles on how to live in unhurried life.
[SPEAKER_01]: We diagnose the problem.
[SPEAKER_01]: We understand fully.
[SPEAKER_01]: while we need to stop being in a rush so now we're at the house.
[SPEAKER_01]: Last week we talked about silence and solitude and I have a testimonial of sharing a second about that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Today's episode we're going to be talking about the Sabbath.
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't hear about the Sabbath often and Christian spaces these days and so I'm excited for us to dive deep into that and have that very necessary conversation.
[SPEAKER_01]: But before we get there, I want to remind you guys that I'm moving.
[SPEAKER_01]: And with that, as I've been packing up my home, I'm going through the garage and I have boxes on boxes of physical resources that I've created for women like you, my books, my journals, my planners, I don't want these things to sit in a storage unit you guys and I don't want to call the recycling folks to come in for me to throw them away.
[SPEAKER_01]: I want these products that I have left to get in the hands of the women that the Lord led me to create them for.
[SPEAKER_01]: So here's what I'm doing.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm selling everything for only five bucks.
[SPEAKER_01]: These are products that have missed out for 20 30 50 60 bucks when they were first created, but I'm selling everything for just five dollars plus shipping shipping will still keep your total order under 10 bucks.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's it
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's what I have available.
[SPEAKER_01]: First, I have the God is my CEO, a prior journal for entrepreneurs.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is a beautiful limited edition version, gold spiral binding, hard cover, full cover printing.
[SPEAKER_01]: There are tabed sections and pockets.
[SPEAKER_01]: so many different necessary sections for any Christian entrepreneur.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to put a link in the show notes where I did a walkthrough, so you can see exactly what it looks like.
[SPEAKER_01]: I also had the podcast planner.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you've been thinking about starting a podcast,
[SPEAKER_01]: I have been doing this for over nine years now.
[SPEAKER_01]: I've helped over 150 people launch, grow, and monetize their show.
[SPEAKER_01]: And everything that I teach is within the pages of that planner.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it is a physical planner, a physical product that you can use to actually write and take notes in.
[SPEAKER_01]: I also did a video walk through of that one and I'll put the link in the show notes to that as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: Third is my book, my last book she is uncompromising.
[SPEAKER_00]: This book is for anyone and who wears multiple hats and you're struggling with how do I do it or how do I
[SPEAKER_00]: have this total life harmony that I keep here at Tatum talk about.
[SPEAKER_01]: Grab this book is in the show notes.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then fourth, I found some more of my business meetings with God devotional.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a 90-day devotional camp for Christian entrepreneurs.
[SPEAKER_01]: This one comes with access to two bonus master classes, one when I teach.
[SPEAKER_01]: how to have a business meeting with God in the second with a time management class from my girl Roslyn, who's a friend to the show.
[SPEAKER_01]: And also I didn't mention in my shoes on compromising book when you purchase a book you also get access to a master class that I did as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: Everything's first come first served.
[SPEAKER_01]: I got inventory that is updated on the website and once it is gone, praise the Lord, these things are God.
[SPEAKER_00]: The books will still be available and like Amazon and things like that, those come from a separate warehouse, but the planner, the prayer journal, those are limited edition products that I have one hand and then once they're gone, they're gone.
[SPEAKER_00]: The last thing that I
[SPEAKER_00]: a women's ministry, a small group, a sorority, a community organization, anybody.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to talk to you because I'm sending bulk orders.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to bless communities of women who want to utilize these books and prayer journals as tools to help you grow together closer to the Lord.
[SPEAKER_00]: So here's how I have it set up.
[SPEAKER_01]: If your order has over 10 of the products,
[SPEAKER_01]: all you're going to pay for is shipping.
[SPEAKER_01]: I want to bless specifically community of women even more by just giving you the products for free.
[SPEAKER_01]: I just asked that you cover shipping, that's it.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's nothing extra that you have to do.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you order more than 10, the cart will automatically update to your order being zero and then you just paying for shipping.
[SPEAKER_01]: And again, shipping is pretty reasonable.
[SPEAKER_01]: So shipping won't even be unless you're international,
[SPEAKER_01]: So that's it for my announcement on products.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you for everybody who has purchased products so far.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, some of y'all were buying like four or five different products.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_01]: All of those orders have gone out already.
[SPEAKER_01]: There might be a little delay with like the holiday, but the orders are with the post office.
[SPEAKER_01]: You should have already gotten an email with tracking.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you have any questions, you can always email me,
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, testimony.
[SPEAKER_01]: Remember last week, we talked about the important, or earlier this week, we talked about the importance of silence and solitude.
[SPEAKER_01]: And in living out everything that we discussed, I had a really beautiful moment with the Lord this past week.
[SPEAKER_01]: I told y'all that I was slowing down and because I just wanted to get close to him
[SPEAKER_01]: Just for me, not to produce anything, not to pull out to anybody else, but I just want it to sit as God's daughter.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I find myself now that I'm done with this semester of school, things are back to more of like my normal life without law school.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, still busy with like business and family and stuff, but just the rhythm is more regular than like this huge undertaking with school being put on top of it.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I found myself kind of detoxing a little bit from that pace.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, my pace is crazy with school.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm up at 4 a.m.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm studying and then I get help the kids get ready and get myself ready for school, get them out of the house.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I have an hour and a half commute to school.
[SPEAKER_01]: then I'm in class all day, but I stay in study a little bit, then I have an hour that has commute home, could dinner, go to sleep, start over again the next day.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a lot in an add-in extra study and all the other stuff on top of that.
[SPEAKER_01]: So there's just this pace that I've been used to,
[SPEAKER_01]: with school and so now having this break, I've almost felt like I had to detox and I slowly come back to myself.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like my husband says after exam to take me like a week to realize exactly where I'm at at any given moment, but it's true.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so this past week as I've been really committing to even more time with the Lord, I found myself not really knowing what to pray.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's kind of strange because of course I have all the things that I want to talk to God about or I have like my pain points and areas that I want to hear from him and but again I'm in this this period of slowing down not to get anything from God but just to exist closer to him and all of the things that I have to bring up are not news to him so I just was choosing
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'm like, okay, I can't even fully wrap my mind around what to even say or pray outside of like my needs.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I had went to my daughters' room and I just laid on the floor on my face.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I just started speaking in tongues.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so what happens with me when I'm...
[SPEAKER_01]: Speaking in tongues a lot of times I don't know what I'm saying out my mouth of course, but with what I hear in my mind is almost as if I'm interpreting my tongue.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's it's hard to explain and it may sound a little funny, but it's my experience so I'm doing all the raw top stars out my mouth, but then in my head I'm hearing what it is that I'm praying.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so as I'm doing this, just speaking of tongues, just speaking of tongues, and then interpreting my tongue, y'all, I just thought it bawling, this sounds so crazy.
[SPEAKER_01]: I just thought it bawling crying my eyes out, but what I was hearing, it just boils down to a girl who wanted the presence of her father.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like how my kids would just come and they just want to lay up under me or they want to lay up under my husband.
[SPEAKER_01]: They just want the presents to comfort the love of their parent at any given time for whatever reason.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's where I was.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it was as if my heart was just crying out to just be close to my father.
[SPEAKER_01]: All of the...
[SPEAKER_01]: baggage, the weight that I may carry on a day to day to things that are on my mind, the responsibilities that I feel, all the walls that I may have built up as I go out into the world and do whatever, all of it just came crashing down and I just want it to be close to my father and I just bald my eyes out.
[SPEAKER_01]: And without me not say any word in the English, the Lord just ministered to my heart and restored me in that moment in a way that is just so beautiful.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I can't fully articulate because it's something that you just have to experience.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I'm grateful for us reading this book together because it's not just something that we're reading because it sounds good or because it's something you could share or tweet about or talk to your home girls about, but if we actually apply the things that we're learning
[SPEAKER_01]: and we allow these things that are ministering us to then allow us to take that next step.
[SPEAKER_01]: Of implementing it, we, I believe, will experience a level of closeness to the Lord that are so long for.
[SPEAKER_01]: My soul longed for almost like a hug for my father.
[SPEAKER_01]: and by me just prioritizing that silence and that solitude, even when I didn't even know what to say, I still was so wrapped up in hurry, I didn't even have the words to articulate what to say to God.
[SPEAKER_01]: I didn't have the language.
[SPEAKER_00]: And as eloquent or as good of a communicator as I can be, I wasn't in that moment and I didn't have to be.
[SPEAKER_01]: He knew what my soul needed and he restored me in that moment.
[SPEAKER_01]: It was beautiful.
[SPEAKER_01]: And even outside of that time, as I just continue to have been spending my silence and solitude, quiet time, some revelations that I've gotten at that is especially important for
[SPEAKER_01]: entrepreneurs, and I'll probably incorporate this into maybe a full episode or maybe a master class or whatever, but this is just me sharing the raw revelation with you because I think that this is a point that is going to be meaningful for a lot of you as Christian entrepreneurs.
[SPEAKER_01]: I've been doing this for quite some time.
[SPEAKER_01]: doing business the Lord's way, making God the CEO of my business.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is something I've been doing for a minute, at least nine years.
[SPEAKER_01]: Having long this show comes out, this show is kind of like a marker for that transition for me.
[SPEAKER_01]: So let's say nine years, I've been doing business God's way.
[SPEAKER_01]: And in a way, I've gotten used to it, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm used to going and fasting and praying and sit on with the Lord on behalf of my business and him giving me the plan.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I come out of the prayer and I execute the plan.
[SPEAKER_01]: I see the plan, be successful.
[SPEAKER_01]: I see the fruit of it.
[SPEAKER_01]: I see the lives change.
[SPEAKER_01]: I see the profit margins and crease and the money and revenue and all of that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then we go back and we just continue to do it.
[SPEAKER_01]: I, I, this working relationship that I had with the law is one that I'm used to and not used to in a sense of where I'm complacent, but there's a rhythm and a flow to doing business God's way and it's something that is like muscle memory to me at this point because we've been doing it for so long.
[SPEAKER_01]: But one thing that I realized, because I was trying to figure out, like, why do I feel like there's closeness with God just as his daughter, is an area that I feel kind of, I felt deficit, and I couldn't figure it out.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because I haven't been in sin, and I haven't gone away from the Lord.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm still following him and allowing him to order my steps.
[SPEAKER_01]: But there that, that crying out that I had, there was a void that was there.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so what I realized is similarly to if you work with a spouse, if any of you have worked with a spouse or family and business.
[SPEAKER_01]: You get used to your work in relationship, but if you don't tend to the personal relationship and the closeness, that cussuffer.
[SPEAKER_01]: You could still do good work together, but your closeness and connection and your intimacy with them as just people can suffer if you don't pour into that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so for me, what I've found is, I've gotten used to the rhythm of working with the Lord
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm filling the effects of that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm like, man, that is such a good point because a lot of Christian entrepreneurs, you're in that space of, well, how do I know if this a God idea versus a me idea?
[SPEAKER_00]: How do I know how to make God a CEO of my business?
[SPEAKER_00]: How do I know how to do business God's way?
[SPEAKER_00]: A lot of folks are in that beginning stages of trying to reconcile
[SPEAKER_00]: Christian entrepreneurship versus worldly entrepreneurship, but as a veteran in this, I want to also give you wisdom from this side of the journey to say, Hey, while you're doing it, and I have plenty of resources from this podcast, but I'm journals that told you all about my YouTube channel, so many different resources to teach you that rhythm and flow, but do not forget this, make
[SPEAKER_00]: Building with the Lord, you're also cultivating your closeness of just being his daughter.
[SPEAKER_00]: As you're growing in ministry, as you're growing in doing works for the Lord, do not neglect pouring in that personal relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's necessary, it's necessary to restore you, to build you up, and to give you the comfort, the peace, the confidence, and all the things, the wholeness,
[SPEAKER_00]: in my quiet time this week so I wanted to just bring that here.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think that's a great way for us to go into today's chapter about the Sabbath because really taking seriously with the author is talking about with the Sabbath is going to make sure that you're doing just that.
[SPEAKER_01]: The author opens up this chapter talking about desire.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says, what would it take to feel satisfied?
[SPEAKER_01]: What will satisfy our desire?
[SPEAKER_01]: The answer is this, everything.
[SPEAKER_01]: We will have to experience everything and everybody and be experienced by everything and everybody to feel satisfied.
[SPEAKER_01]: We will eat at every restaurant, travel to every country, every city,
[SPEAKER_01]: Experience every natural wonder, make love to every partner we could possibly desire, when every award climbed to the top of every field, own every item in the world, etc.
[SPEAKER_01]: We would have to experience it all to ever feel okay, that's enough.
[SPEAKER_01]: Sadly, even if we had access to unlimited funds, time and space, still have a pesky way of getting in the way.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says the reality is that desire is infinite.
[SPEAKER_01]: It has no limit.
[SPEAKER_01]: No point at which it is ever satisfied.
[SPEAKER_01]: The problem is we are finite.
[SPEAKER_01]: We have all sorts of limits, remember?
[SPEAKER_01]: So the result of that desire in our limited nature is rustlessness.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says we live with chronically unsatisfied desires, like in itch that no matter how many times you scratch, doesn't go away.
[SPEAKER_01]: No matter how much we see, do, buy, sell, eat, drink, experience, visit, we always want more.
[SPEAKER_01]: The question for us as apprentices of Jesus, or really as humans is simple, what do we do with all of this pent-up unsatisfied desire?
[SPEAKER_01]: The restlessness.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Jesus tradition will offer this.
[SPEAKER_01]: Human desire is infinite because we were made to live with God forever in His world and nothing less will ever satisfy us.
[SPEAKER_01]: So our only hope is to put desire back in its proper place, one God.
[SPEAKER_01]: and to put all of our desires and their proper place below God, not to detach from all desire as in stoicism or Buddhism, but to come to the place where we no longer need blank, to live a happy, restful life.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is so important for us as entrepreneurs to always have in check.
[SPEAKER_01]: our desire for success.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is why I always say that the first lesson the Lord gave me when I came to him gave my life to him and wanted to do business his way was I had to redefine success from what I wanted which was things, money, all of what was on my vision board.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I had to redefine it from that.
[SPEAKER_01]: to pleasing God and that's it.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I had to be comfortable with that and not just the lip service, but I had to in my heart be satisfied with my desire simply being pleasing the Lord and that's it.
[SPEAKER_01]: And like the author said, it's not that the ambition goes away, it's that the ambition is just kept in check.
[SPEAKER_01]: And this is something that isn't done one time.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is something that has to get done continuously, while we have to be self-aware enough to know when our definition of success or our goals and our ambition are starting to get above God so that we could real ourselves back in repent, and then put it back in its rightful place.
[SPEAKER_01]: Perfect example of something that came out of my quiet time this week.
[SPEAKER_01]: I've been thinking a lot about my YouTube channel.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's a lot that I want to do and a lot that I want to discuss, especially as I've been putting together these orders to ship out.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was looking at she is uncompromising my book and thinking about where I was when I wrote that book.
[SPEAKER_01]: I wrote that book in 2021 before I had my or write excuse me after I had my first son.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's when I wrote it.
[SPEAKER_01]: It didn't it came out.
[SPEAKER_01]: I want to say, I don't know if I was pregnant with my middle son yet or not, but it came out like a year after that.
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, probably that.
[SPEAKER_01]: It came out like a year after that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I was thinking about how as women who are ambitious,
[SPEAKER_01]: Once we start having children, I feel like the first place that we get to is like this clash, this identity clash of so far we have focused on building, whether it's our careers, our businesses, we've been focused on our ambition and some type of achievement.
[SPEAKER_01]: But then when you have, when you decide to start your family and you have your first child,
[SPEAKER_01]: Now there's this new responsibility in your trying to reconcile like where does this fit and how does this all work together in the grand scheme of where I don't lose myself, but I also honor this new role that the Lord has given me and a lot of times we deal with those emotions, we feel less.
[SPEAKER_01]: bossy for like a little bit of where less driven when we are in or focusing on motherhood.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that's a reality of the emotions that we feel sometimes.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so there's this like identity crisis.
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel happens when you have your first kid and I feel like as you grow in motherhood, as you have more children or even as your child gets older,
[SPEAKER_01]: you start to blossom into a new identity to wear a lot of the things that mattered prior to this phase of life.
[SPEAKER_01]: Just don't really matter as much anymore.
[SPEAKER_01]: If I think about where I was before I had kids, I wanted to have a million dollar business with the next step.
[SPEAKER_01]: I had already done the first six figures.
[SPEAKER_01]: I already did a few more after that.
[SPEAKER_01]: The next step was for my business at least to have a seven figure business.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so when I had my first son, it was like great.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Lord has blessed me with him.
[SPEAKER_01]: After my fertility challenges, he gave me this beautiful baby boy.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm on her that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I'm also though.
[SPEAKER_01]: we still want to get these ends.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's where I was.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I know that I could have those things together because those are the things that the Lord has called me too.
[SPEAKER_00]: However, as the years have gone by, the end matters a whole lot less to be honest because if I think about the reality of things,
[SPEAKER_00]: My children will cash out whenever I pass away.
[SPEAKER_00]: My insurance policy is top tier.
[SPEAKER_00]: These kids will cash out.
[SPEAKER_00]: They have their own policies that they can pull from as they get older that are crews cash value.
[SPEAKER_00]: We have properties that my kids will inherit.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I may not have
[SPEAKER_00]: built a singular business that crossed seven figures within a 12 calendar month year.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the reality is what the ultimate goal of building wealth and generation of wealth, that's still very much so established.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the M at this point is more of an ego boost and something to check off my list, then anything beyond that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that has just come with wisdom, come with maturity and then when I go back to building in my builder phase, it'll happen by virtue of me just committing to what God has called me to not by me focusing on the dollar amount.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I want to have these conversations and because there's so much that I've learned over the years and so I'm thinking about all of this
[SPEAKER_00]: And how I want to present myself, I told y'all how I believe that the Lord is called us to be thought leaders and not content creators.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I'm always thinking from a thought leadership standpoint, that's why you always hear me speak with a lot of fine works and concepts, not just here's what I eat today, like no, no.
[SPEAKER_00]: No.
[SPEAKER_00]: But, so I'm thinking about my YouTube channel and I'm planning some things out again on my summer break, so I'm like, yeah, you know, I can record sometime throughout the summer, and then I'll start releasing the videos on this frequency.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm using AI, I specifically use for
[SPEAKER_00]: search-based brainstorming or planning type of things.
[SPEAKER_00]: I like to use Google Gemini because Google and YouTube are the largest search engines in the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm going to use their AI software when I'm brainstorming and coming up with strategy.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm using Google Gemini.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm coming up with the plan for my YouTube channel.
[SPEAKER_00]: And my plan is beautiful.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like it, I am very excited about what I plan to do on the channel from just the branding to the topics to how the videos will be done, releasing them at a frequency that makes sense for the time that I have to give to it and so I had all of this organized, but then remember I had this moment of me weeping.
[SPEAKER_00]: for my father.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I had to sit with the wisdom of what the Lord showed me as it relates to working relationship and then pouring into the personal relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I've made a decision that I wasn't going to do anything with the playing.
[SPEAKER_00]: My ambition and my drive and my excitement to create
[SPEAKER_00]: I have this desire to pursue this plan that has been created.
[SPEAKER_00]: But that desire has to be subject to him.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so the Lord, it can give me that revelation for no reason.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, I have to be obedient.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I said, you know what, God, I'm actually going to take the summer.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm just going to spend time with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Once we get around August time,
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll see how I feel, and do I feel comfortable to where I have that void is now being built back up of just my personal relationship with the Lord.
[SPEAKER_00]: If so, then maybe I can go back to building.
[SPEAKER_00]: That will be a decision that has to be made in prayer and wisdom, but the right now decision has, I have this desire, but I'm going to put that desire to the side because was
[SPEAKER_01]: is this closeness with my father, not the working relationship, but what's more important is the personal relationship and that's just where we're going to sit for a little bit.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so that's an example of we have these desires, but they have to be put in a rightful place which is second to the Lord.
[SPEAKER_01]: The author goes on to say, ultimately nothing in this life apart from God can satisfy our desires.
[SPEAKER_01]: Traditionally, we continue to chase after our desires.
[SPEAKER_01]: The result, a chronic state or restlessness, or worse, angst.
[SPEAKER_01]: anger, anxiety, disillusionment, depression, all of which lead to a life of hurry, a life of busyness, overload, shopping, materialism, careerism, a life of more, which in turn makes us even more reckless and the cycle spins out of control.
[SPEAKER_01]: To make a bad problem worse, this is exacerbated by our cultural momentum of digital marketing
[SPEAKER_01]: in accomplishment.
[SPEAKER_01]: Advertising is literally an attempt to monetize our restlessness.
[SPEAKER_01]: They say we see upward of 4,000 ads a day.
[SPEAKER_01]: All designed to stoke the fire of desire in our bellies.
[SPEAKER_01]: By this, do this, eat this, drink this, have this, watch this, be this.
[SPEAKER_01]: And today as well, we see that through the straight up ads and then also through just this this growth of content creation as well, everything has an agenda, everything is marketing, everything is advertising and everything is trying to poke our desires and to make us restless and restlessness leads us to the hurry and to the anxiety.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says, and when our innate human restlessness collides with the digital age, the result is a culture-wide crisis of emotional, unhealthy and spiritual death.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says so, is there a practice from the life and teachings of Jesus to mitigate against this chronic restlessness of our condition and culture and to tap into Jesus's rest for our souls?
[SPEAKER_01]: You already know the answer, yes.
[SPEAKER_01]: And the top of the list is the Saturday.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says the worst Saturday comes to us from Hebrew, Shabbat.
[SPEAKER_01]: The word literally means to stop.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Sabbath is simply a day to stop, stop working, stop wanting, stop worrying, just stop.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says, but the Sabbath is more than just a day.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a way of being in the world.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a spirit of restfulness that comes from abiding, from living in the Father's loving presence all week long.
[SPEAKER_01]: You can frame it like this.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's the list A of restfulness.
[SPEAKER_01]: margin, slowness, quiet, deep relationships, time alone, delight.
[SPEAKER_01]: enjoyment, clarity, gratitude, contentment, trust, love, joy, peace, working from love, and work as contribution.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now here's the alternative on relentlessness, busyness, hurry,
[SPEAKER_01]: anger, melancholy or sadness, anxiety, working for love, and work as accumulation and accomplishment.
[SPEAKER_01]: He said, which list best describes you?
[SPEAKER_01]: If you resonate more with list B, again, zero guilt trick, human nature and a digital age form of foreboding alliance against a spirit of restfulness, we all struggle in his area.
[SPEAKER_01]: No wonder the writer of Hebrews speaking of Sabbath and in its spirit of restfulness called us to make every effort to enter that rest.
[SPEAKER_01]: Notice the irony of that comment.
[SPEAKER_01]: We are to work hard to rest well.
[SPEAKER_01]: Have you ever been in a position?
[SPEAKER_01]: This is for my busy bodies.
[SPEAKER_01]: Where resting is hard.
[SPEAKER_01]: the middle.
[SPEAKER_01]: I see rest as the middle.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm good at either being busy and get things done like focus, locking in, discipline, doing what I got to do, or doing absolutely nothing.
[SPEAKER_01]: I very much so can write in the bed watch all the documentaries order Uber eats all day.
[SPEAKER_01]: Straight children.
[SPEAKER_01]: The in-between, I believe, is where the Sabbath is.
[SPEAKER_01]: This place of rest where you're still doing things, but...
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not from that hurried and that busy and that anxious place.
[SPEAKER_01]: I struggle with the middle.
[SPEAKER_01]: Cause I'm either locked in and getting it done or I'm not doing anything at all.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's so it does take work to operate from a place of rest.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so if you are that busy body like me, your mind is always moving and you find that middle ground of rest difficult,
[SPEAKER_01]: We have to work for it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Sounds crazy, as he said, but we have to work for it.
[SPEAKER_01]: We have to plan for it.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know something that worked really well for me was I used to always plan my weeks a week in advance.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I would take usually Thursday while I'll take a second and I'll like evaluate my week and I'll think about what went well.
[SPEAKER_01]: What didn't go well?
[SPEAKER_01]: How can I improve the next week?
[SPEAKER_01]: I look at like my calendar thinking like, all right I didn't give myself enough time to do my tasks.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'm gonna only do three things a day versus the six things a day the following week or I woke up early, but that made me crash by like three p.m. so instead of waking up at four I'm gonna wake up at six so that I could have a bit more stamina throughout the day.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I was just take a very
[SPEAKER_01]: And a little cool look at the week and then I would play in the following week.
[SPEAKER_01]: I Always and I do this even now.
[SPEAKER_01]: I always order groceries on Friday I did that mostly because on the weekends if I didn't we'd be running right out of food by Friday And then we're eating out all weekend and all the money that I spent from us eating all weekend
[SPEAKER_01]: could have just gone into groceries.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I started ordering groceries on Fridays so that we can get through the weekend and it also would be prepared for the upcoming week.
[SPEAKER_01]: But what that did was even though my intent of operating this way wasn't necessarily for the Sabbath,
[SPEAKER_01]: I experienced a more restful weekend when I did that.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'm not like worrying about what's happening next week on the weekend.
[SPEAKER_01]: My Sundays aren't a planning day.
[SPEAKER_01]: I didn't did that already.
[SPEAKER_00]: I did that during the week and already know once I clocked into my business or whatever on Monday, I already know what it is that I'm doing.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have it planned out.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have it scheduled out and I'm just executing that saves time, that saves energy,
[SPEAKER_01]: and it allowed me to be that much more efficient.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I've seen how that has worked practically, but this made me think like if I take it a step further and not just do this for efficiency sake, but if I operate by honoring the Sabbath for my spiritual sake, how much more efficient can I be?
[SPEAKER_01]: And efficiency, not just from a productivity standpoint, but how much more aligned can I be?
[SPEAKER_01]: How much more precise can I be with what the Lord has for me to do?
[SPEAKER_01]: So if you're struggling, I gave those practical things because if you struggle with,
[SPEAKER_01]: practically resting.
[SPEAKER_01]: Those are some things that you can do.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know for me it was it was a lot easier to slow down on the weekends because I took care of a lot of things already.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's hard to rest when you got 50 million pending things going on.
[SPEAKER_01]: So whatever loops you can close in my corporate speak before the Sabbath comes, do that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's one of the ways that you can work to create this
[SPEAKER_01]: The author says there is a discipline to the Sabbath that is really hard for a lot of us.
[SPEAKER_01]: It takes a lot of intentionality.
[SPEAKER_01]: It won't just happen to you.
[SPEAKER_01]: It takes planning and preparation as we just discussed.
[SPEAKER_01]: He said it takes self-control.
[SPEAKER_01]: The capacity to say no to a list of good things so that you can say yes to the best.
[SPEAKER_01]: But Sabbath is the primary discipline or practice by which we cultivate the spirit of
[SPEAKER_01]: The Sabbath is to a spirit of restfulness what a soccer practice is to a match or a brand band practice is to a show.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's how we practice, how we prepare our minds and bodies for the moments that matter most.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says, built into Jesus' life rhythm was a core practice and entire day, every week, set aside just to slow down, to stop.
[SPEAKER_01]: He goes on to say, the Sabbath was made for man.
[SPEAKER_01]: It was created, designed by God himself, and it's for us, a gift to enjoy from the creator, to the creation, to gratefully receive.
[SPEAKER_01]: He goes on to quote Genesis 1.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says, so the story of the Bible starts with, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
[SPEAKER_01]: But after six days of hard work to get the universe up and running, we read the following.
[SPEAKER_01]: By the seventh day, God had finished work.
[SPEAKER_01]: He had been doing.
[SPEAKER_01]: So on the seventh day, He rested from all His work.
[SPEAKER_01]: Then God blessed the seventh day, and He made it holy, because on it, He rested from all the work of creating that He had done.
[SPEAKER_01]: Did you catch that?
[SPEAKER_01]: God rested.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I'm not really into the Sabbath.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm an extrovert.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just like to stay busy and God rested.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I like the Sabbath thing, but I work a demanding job that I love and I just can't make the time because God rested.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, but I have two little kids at home and just not really do over right now, maybe later when and he says, do I need to say it again?
[SPEAKER_01]: God rested.
[SPEAKER_01]: And in doing so, he built a rhythm into the DNA of creation, a tempo, a syncopated beat.
[SPEAKER_01]: God worked for six rested for one.
[SPEAKER_01]: When we fight the work six days, Sabbath one day rhythm, we go against the grain of the universe.
[SPEAKER_01]: this small check to our excuses of just saying God arrested.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think it's something that we should remind ourselves of as many of us may struggle with truly being able to rest because we may have a lot of the same excuses that he said.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have kids.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have work.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have a demanding this and insert whatever you have going on here that makes it difficult for you to rest.
[SPEAKER_01]: But God arrested.
[SPEAKER_01]: nobody is doing more than creating the entire universe.
[SPEAKER_01]: Nobody.
[SPEAKER_01]: And he rested.
[SPEAKER_01]: It seems almost silly when you put what you have to do up against him.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I don't know if it's putting the background on your phone and says, God rested.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know if it's set of reminders to go off in your phone every other, every other, whatever.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's to say, God rested.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know if it's sticky notes that you should put around your home and says, God rested.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whatever reminder that you need, I think that you should really think about this week over the next couple of days.
[SPEAKER_01]: how to make it happen.
[SPEAKER_01]: When I was reading this chapter, all I was thinking about was man, what would the Sabbath look like?
[SPEAKER_01]: And the author gave an example of what his looks like.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I'll talk about it once we get there.
[SPEAKER_01]: But this whole time I'm thinking like, how do I make the Sabbath a way of life?
[SPEAKER_01]: Whether it's putting, blocking off my calendar and probably naming it something like God rested, that's probably what I'll do for that reminder.
[SPEAKER_01]: But for those of you who struggle again with resting, figure it out, put it somewhere, and remember God rested.
[SPEAKER_01]: You can too.
[SPEAKER_01]: The author says the last time a society tried to abandon the seven-day week was during the revolution in France.
[SPEAKER_01]: They switched to a ten-day work week to up productivity.
[SPEAKER_01]: The rise of the proletarian and disaster, the economy crashed, the suicide rate skyrocketed.
[SPEAKER_01]: And the productivity it went down.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's been proven by study after studying.
[SPEAKER_01]: There is zero correlation between hurry and productivity.
[SPEAKER_01]: In fact, once you work a certain number of hours in a week, your productivity plummetes.
[SPEAKER_01]: Want to know what the numbers say?
[SPEAKER_01]: 50 hours.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm running.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's about a six-day work week.
[SPEAKER_01]: One study found that there was a zero difference in productivity between the workers who lost 70 hours and those who lost 55.
[SPEAKER_01]: Could God be speaking to us even through our bodies?
[SPEAKER_01]: And reference to this rhythm he says, if you fight it, fight God.
[SPEAKER_01]: Fight God fight our own souls.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, what does the writer of Genesis mean by rested?
[SPEAKER_01]: Was God tired?
[SPEAKER_01]: Was He burned out?
[SPEAKER_01]: As I've said, the Hebrew word, Shabbat, means to stop, but it can also be translated to delight.
[SPEAKER_01]: It has been this dual idea of stopping and also enjoying in God in our lives in His world.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Sabbath is an entire day set aside to follow God's example, to stop and delight, to delight in the world, in our lives in it, in a bubble in God Himself.
[SPEAKER_01]: When I read this translation, Delight, it made me think about, I don't know if I said this on a podcast or just like in private conversations.
[SPEAKER_01]: But it made me think about how my daughter taught me a lesson in how the Lord Delights in us, to where it's so cute, how her siblings, her brothers just love her.
[SPEAKER_01]: My son, my older son, told me another day, he said, Mommy,
[SPEAKER_01]: You used to be the cutest, but since the baby, I'll call it a baby, but he said her name.
[SPEAKER_01]: Since the baby would more, she's actually the cutest, and I was like, okay, thank you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Scutes me, but everybody is just obsessed with her around here.
[SPEAKER_01]: When she wakes up, we all fight over who gets to take her out the crib.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whenever she comes down, everybody rushes, whoever brings her down, everybody else rushes to go give her hugs and kisses, and she's really the princess of this house.
[SPEAKER_01]: I am interested to see the personality she developed as a result of this, all of this admiration.
[SPEAKER_01]: but she taught me a lesson about like, man, this is how God delights in us.
[SPEAKER_01]: He loves to see us enter into his presence.
[SPEAKER_01]: He loves to just watch us grow and develop and change and draw near to him.
[SPEAKER_01]: He delights in us.
[SPEAKER_01]: And this invitation to the Sabbath is inviting us to delight in him and all that he is doing in our lives.
[SPEAKER_01]: If we take a second to touch grass, to look around us to feel in touch and smell and appreciate.
[SPEAKER_01]: I wonder,
[SPEAKER_01]: how restorative that will be for our souls and the author talks about it, how the Sabbath will prepare you to be able to even go through your week a lot more rested because you took the time to stop but also delight in the Lord.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't think we do that enough.
[SPEAKER_01]: How much more will we trust him when he gives us an instruction as uncomfortable?
[SPEAKER_01]: How much more will we spend time in his word?
[SPEAKER_01]: How much more will we speak to him throughout the week and pray for him and pray to him and pray for people?
[SPEAKER_01]: How much more how much better will we serve him if we took the time to truly delight in him?
[SPEAKER_01]: The author goes on to say, but notice what else God did.
[SPEAKER_01]: He blessed the seventh day and made it holy.
[SPEAKER_01]: Two things worth noting here.
[SPEAKER_01]: First, the Sabbath is blessed.
[SPEAKER_01]: And the Genesis story, three things are blessed by God.
[SPEAKER_01]: To start with, God blessed the animal kingdom with an invocation, be fruitful in multiply.
[SPEAKER_01]: Then he blessed humanity the same way, be fruitful in multiply.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then God blessed the Sabbath.
[SPEAKER_01]: way.
[SPEAKER_01]: So God blessed animals humans and then a day.
[SPEAKER_01]: What does that mean?
[SPEAKER_01]: It means and
[SPEAKER_01]: ashtrix here.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think this is what the author is saying.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not quite so old on this is what the actual text means, but you know, hey, nevertheless he says it means that the Sabbath just like an animal or human being has the life giving capacity to procreate, to fill the world up with more life.
[SPEAKER_01]: Life is tiring.
[SPEAKER_01]: You get to the end of the week and even if you love your job, still your worn down on every level, emotionally, even spiritually.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Sabbath is how we feel our souls back up with life.
[SPEAKER_01]: Recently, I read a survey done by a doctor who cited the happiest people on earth.
[SPEAKER_01]: Near the top of the list was a group of Christians called Seven Day of Venice.
[SPEAKER_01]: They are religious, literally, about the Sabbath.
[SPEAKER_01]: This doctor noted that they lived 10 years longer than the average American.
[SPEAKER_01]: I did the math.
[SPEAKER_01]: If I Sabbath every seven days, it adds up to wait for it.
[SPEAKER_01]: 10 years over a lifetime, almost exactly.
[SPEAKER_01]: So when I say the Sabbath is life-giving, that's not empty rhetoric.
[SPEAKER_01]: If this study is to be believed every day you Sabbath, you are statistically
[SPEAKER_01]: From that one, I'm Sabithing 3 days a week, and not only will you live longer, even more importantly, you'll live better.
[SPEAKER_01]: So first, the Sabbath is blessed.
[SPEAKER_01]: Second, it's holy.
[SPEAKER_01]: So there is a day that is blessed and holy, a rhythm and creation, six and one.
[SPEAKER_01]: And when we tap into this rhythm, we experience health and life.
[SPEAKER_01]: But when we fight this rhythm, ignore it, suppress it, push past it, bully it, make excuses, look for a way to get out of it, we've reached the consequences.
[SPEAKER_01]: Consider the mind.
[SPEAKER_01]: We grow mentally, lethargic, numb, uncreative, distracted, restless, emotional unhealthy becomes our new normal.
[SPEAKER_01]: We'll consider the body.
[SPEAKER_01]: We get tired and worn out, our immune systems start to falter.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like our nervous systems are trying to get our attention.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says, maybe that's why God eventually has to command the Sabbath.
[SPEAKER_01]: Does that strike you as odd?
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like commanding ice cream or live music or beach days.
[SPEAKER_01]: You would think that we'd all be chomping at the bit to practice the Sabbath, but apparently there's something about the human condition that makes us want to hurry our way through life as fast as we possibly can to rebel against the limitations of time itself.
[SPEAKER_01]: Due to our immaturity, dysfunction and addiction, God has to command His people to do something deeply life-giving.
[SPEAKER_01]: Rest.
[SPEAKER_01]: for the sake of time.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think we understand the importance of rest.
[SPEAKER_01]: We understand what the Sabbath is.
[SPEAKER_01]: We need to live it out, though.
[SPEAKER_01]: The author gave some lessons that he's learned from Sabbath and also some examples as to how he lives it out that I want to make sure that we touch on.
[SPEAKER_01]: And make sure you get this book.
[SPEAKER_01]: I do skip around sometimes for the sake of time, for the podcast, but make sure you get the book for yourself to fill in any gaps that I might leave here on the show.
[SPEAKER_01]: But the author goes on to say, one of the surprising things I learned when I began to practice habit is that to really enjoy this seventh day, you have to slow down the other six days.
[SPEAKER_01]: You can't go 90 miles per hour all week running the pedal to the floor,
[SPEAKER_01]: And then expect a slam on the brakes for Sabbath and immediately fills in in awesome.
[SPEAKER_01]: You have to find the rhythm.
[SPEAKER_01]: As we used to say when I played indie rock bands, you have to find the pocket.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, quick side note, I'm from the DC area.
[SPEAKER_01]: The pocket isn't a go-go beat.
[SPEAKER_01]: So although he's all about indie rock bands, but the pocket, I'm talking about is on a nice bounce beat.
[SPEAKER_01]: But nevertheless, he says because the Sabbath isn't just a 24-hour time slot in your weekly schedule, it's a spirit of restfulness that goes with you throughout your week.
[SPEAKER_01]: a way of living with ease, gratitude, appreciation, peace, and prayer, a way of working from rest, not forrest, with nothing to prove, a way of bearing fruit from abiding and not ambition.
[SPEAKER_01]: This was really good.
[SPEAKER_01]: Let me repeat this in case you missed it in my little side track to the bounce beat.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says, because the Sabbath isn't just a 24-hour time slot in your weekly schedule, it's a spirit of restfulness that goes with you throughout your week.
[SPEAKER_01]: It is a way of living with ease, gratitude, appreciation, peace, and prayer, a way of working from rest, not for rest, with nothing to prove.
[SPEAKER_01]: a way of bearing fruit from abiding and not ambition.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's why the Sabbath is on day seven, not day three or four.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not a break in a week to rest up so we can get back to doing what really matters.
[SPEAKER_01]: Work is the climax, the uh, what the entire week has been leading up to.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you aren't practicing the Sabbath, you're missing out on the best day of the week.
[SPEAKER_01]: He then goes on to describe what this looks like for his family.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says, nine times out of ten, Sabbath is the best day of my week, no exaggeration.
[SPEAKER_01]: Every Friday night after Sabbath dinner, we baked a giant cookie in a cast iron pan, a full square foot of chocolate yumminess, then we dump a carton of ice cream on top, let it melt a little and eat it all straight out of the pan.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's some kind of symbolic night to both our unity as a family and our collective love sugar.
[SPEAKER_01]: As we indulge, we go around the table and share our highlight of the week.
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel like a broken record because I almost always say last Saturday.
[SPEAKER_01]: Something spectacular usually has to go down to beat out the previous week's Sabbath for joy.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says to us to begin just set aside a day.
[SPEAKER_01]: Clear your schedule, turn off your phone, say a prayer, and invite the Holy Spirit to pass through you into his presence.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then rest and worship.
[SPEAKER_01]: And whatever way is life giving for your soul.
[SPEAKER_01]: He says, my family and I do this every week, just before sunset on Friday, we finish up all our to-do lists and homework and grocery shopping and responsibilities, power down all our devices.
[SPEAKER_01]: We literally put them in a box and sew it in a closet and gather around the table as a family.
[SPEAKER_01]: We open a bottle of wine, lights and candles, read a song, pray, then we feast and we basically don't stop feasting for the next 24 hours.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's the coma way that's his last name.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I might add the Jesus way.
[SPEAKER_01]: We sleep in Saturday morning during coffee, read our Bibles, talk, laugh, in the summer we walk to the park, in the winter we make a fire, we get lost and good novels on the couch, cuddle, we nap,
[SPEAKER_01]: He says, honestly, I spend a lot of time sitting about the window just being.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like a less stressful Christmas every week.
[SPEAKER_01]: And something happens about halfway through the day, something hard to put language to.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like my soul catches up with my body.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like some deep part of me that got beat up and drowned out by meetings and email and Twitter, I feel free.
[SPEAKER_01]: free from the need to do more, get more, be more, free from the spirit, the evil demonic spirit of restlessness that enslaves our society.
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel another spirit, the Holy Spirit, a restful calm, settle over my whole person.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I find that my ordinary life is enough.
[SPEAKER_01]: And on Saturday evening when I turn my phone back on and re-enter the modern world, I do so slowly.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's where we'll end.
[SPEAKER_01]: This book had me thinking, I'm glad that he gave examples.
[SPEAKER_01]: I wish he would have given more examples about what the Sabbath looks like for different demographics of people.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I think this is a good opportunity for us to take this to God and prayer and ask him.
[SPEAKER_01]: Lord, what does the Sabbath look like for me?
[SPEAKER_01]: I think this is a good time for you to even sit and be self-aware.
[SPEAKER_01]: What does rest in worship look like for you?
[SPEAKER_01]: Of course, many of us have the retain of going to church, but in addition to that, what else is it?
[SPEAKER_01]: Is it sleeping in?
[SPEAKER_01]: Is it, instead of going to eight o'clock service, going to 11, just so you can sleep in?
[SPEAKER_01]: Is it going for a walk in the park?
[SPEAKER_01]: Whatever it is for you, do it, set aside that time.
[SPEAKER_01]: fight for that time, be intentional about that time, protect that time the same way you protect the silence and solitude we talked about last episode and watch how the Lord will restore you.
[SPEAKER_01]: I notice this is going to be a topic for me in my prayer time and my quiet time this week because this is something I would like to implement.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not necessarily something that is
[SPEAKER_01]: want to Jesus came?
[SPEAKER_01]: He didn't undo it, but it isn't necessarily a commandment that we have to do, but even still we should.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a best practice if you will.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'll go ahead and end it here.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you guys so much for listening to another episode of the Blast and Boss that podcast.
[SPEAKER_01]: We have two more chapters, two more principles.
[SPEAKER_01]: The next one will be on simplicity.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then the last one is on slowing.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I look forward to covering those with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you guys so much for listening.
[SPEAKER_00]: To another episode of the Blessed Embalk, the podcast, please get those products, the link is in the show notes.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you have a small group, I want to gift you those products for free.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you order more than 10, the discount is already applied.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love you guys, and I'll see you in the next one.