“So take and eat

All the work is done.

Stretch out your feet

In the Sabbath sun.

With this bread, old ambitions break.

As we pour the wine, we feel our hungry hearts awake

To the meal we could not make.” -Son of Laughter

It has been a full week. Caroline has been sick for much of it. She kindly passed the germs along to Margaret, who is now experiencing her first illness. We are also in full-on, sweat equity mode for our house.  We are attempting to finish it by the end of May, which adds the stressor of a pressing deadline.  This also equates to Ben spending the majority of his free time away from us, working at the new house. Having Ben away takes its own toll, especially on Caroline, who in turn takes out her 2-year-old emotions on me. On two of my three work days this week, her first words to me as I walked through the door at the end of the day were, “Mom! I don’t want you!”  I also haven’t gotten a normal night’s sleep in over a week and a half.

This morning, we were debating whether we should go to church.  Both girls are still pretty croupy and snotty so we didn’t want to put them in the nursery.  Ben graciously encouraged me to go to church by myself.  He would stay home and have some quality time with the girls and I could get a breath of fresh air.

The sermon was on Sabbath.

More specifically, Robbie made the point that in Leviticus 25, we see that God rescued the Israelites from Egypt and is now presenting to His people a new way of life. He asks His people to work six days and rest on the seventh day of the week; and to likewise work six years and then observe a Sabbatical year.  In this new patten of life, God’s people are called to rest in the Lord’s provision, but not just for their own benefit. They are to use this margin to serve and care for those around them. Their unharvested fields were meant to feed the poor and the foreigners among them. This God is not a slave master, like they experienced in Egypt, but a giving and caring Father.

They sermon left me longing for Sabbath. Right now we don’t have any margin. (I really should not even be writing this post. The girls are asleep and there’s a pile of laundry taunting me.) We are having to pause many of our former commitments until the house is finished. We keep reminding each other that this is just a very full season that will eventually pass. But often I question whether building this house was the right decision. It’s taken much longer and turned out grander than the 2000 sqft cottage we intended it to be.

Yet I also recall that we started down this road because we loved the idea of intentionally designing our own home. From the start of our marriage, we have felt called to use our home in service, as a place for hosting and loving others. We have built a house that has hosting at the core of its design. We wanted it to be a place that welcomes in.

And so we will hunker down for the next several weeks, rest in the Lord’s provision/timing, and look forward a new chapter in our lives, which will hopefully include seasons of rich sabbath and service.