“I’ll sleep when I die,” a type-A friend of ours joked. They laughed. I pondered.
The joke squirreled its way into my heart. I was 21 and already had tasted the first fruits of my labor. It was sweet. My professors welcomed me as an interlocutor in class and on paper. The fruit of my hard work? Respect.
“Who wants to play?” was the refrain of my school-teacher dad. My sister and I leaped when my dad arrived home from work and joined us for a football game with our neighborhood friends. I was the envy of my friends; everyone loved my dad. He was gentle and kind, and he loved to play.
I discovered something more powerful than love as I entered my twenties: respect. And I grew embarrassed over my father. He wasn’t serious enough. Where was the gravitas? Where was the respect? He was loved…sure. But was he really respected?
“I will become respected,” I vowed to myself.
It was something I could earn, I learned. If I worked hard enough, made enough sacrifices, I could taste the sweet fruit of respect.
If five days of hard work could produce good results, what would six do? If six was better yet, then what about seven? If I didn’t rest, I could produce, and delivering value bought me respect.
The fruit of the labor of my twenties ripened and then spoiled.
“Will you stop and play?” my wife asked again and again. “Later,” I dismissed her.
I drank down the dregs of a spoiled wine of my own making.
Respected, but not loved.
She broke, and I broke with her. And then, God mercifully restored.
Sabbath is an overflow of the play of our Maker. On the seventh day, our God smiled, laughed, and rested. He walked the Garden, splashing in the waters of the Pishon, chasing rabbits, and tasting tart mangoes.
“Who wants to play?” the Lord called to Adam and Eve.
And they came out, laughing, walking with him in the cool of the day.
Rest and play, my soul. For the Lord is good.
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