From the Rector

Dear Friends in Christ,

This week, the boys and I are on a short trip to the mountains to hike, rock climb, and the like. It’s one of those normal summer things families used to do to take advantage of slower summer months.

But it doesn’t seem like there are slower months anymore, does it?

I’ve noticed that it gets harder and harder to schedule “free” time with friends and family. There’s always something going on.

Right after the pandemic ended, it seemed like things were re-calibrating a bit. People were prioritizing family, friends, nature, and down-time a bit more.

But now I get the sense that down-time is part of our “to do” list. It seems like "family time gets added to the obligation list rather than being something we do because it is, in and of itself, a right and joyful thing.

Sabbath is the churchy term we apply to intentional rest. We hear that God rested after making the cosmic order. Rest was built into the very nature of God and the nature of all things.

But in our rush to emulate God I think we’ve second guessed him in American culture. We’ve taken the essential elements of life, family, and friends—all the things that last and define us—and sandwiched them into busyness. We might rest but it will be on a tight timetable!

I think we’ve made true quality time dispensable and with that shift made real, deep relationships dispensable, too. We’ve got our phones after all and there are plenty of people to argue with on those!

But who we are is defined by who we’re with. We need time with God. We need time with nature. We need time with family and friends. We need all of that to remind us of who we were made to be: creatures of deep relationships and lasting purpose and promise.

That promise won’t be found in our labors. That promise will be found in resting in God’s labor. It will be found in the intentional enjoyment of all that we’ve been given as a lavish gift from God.

In that rest and return we will return to ourselves.

We rediscover who we are made to be and in that discovery, we find again and again that God has called it, and us, good.

If we’re made in the image of God then let us rest like him that we might find the peace and connection to love like him, too.

Yours in Christ,

—Fr Robert