"God's Rest is the Cure for the World's Busyness", Will DuVal | 12/7/25
Various Texts | 12/7/25 | Will DuVal
This morning we’re continuing our mini-Advent series “The Antidote: God’s CURES for the World’s CONTAGIONS”. So far we’ve considered how God’s TRUTH is the cure for the world’s LIES; God’s PEACE is the cure for the world’s WORRY. But this morning we turn our attention to what may very well be the most widespread - at least in the CHURCH - of ALL the infections we’re gonna be considering throughout this series: BUSYNESS. And I thought I might start by asking you to help me PROVE it: I’ve got a 1-question, true or false POLL for you - and be HONEST; this is a “safe space”; no one’s casting STONES here; don’t you lie in CHURCH! Okay:
I want you to consider your life over the last week… month… and raise your hand if you would admit: “I think I am TOO BUSY”. Raise your hand… Thank you for your honesty… keep ‘em up…
Okay, now parents of young children, like me: look around at whose hands are NOT raised; THAT’S who you wanna call for free babysitting! 😉
Okay, keep ‘em up; whatdya think? ___% of us? Too busy?
In one recent survey conducted by the Pew Research Center, about 60% of U.S. adults said that at least sometimes they felt “too busy to enjoy life.”; for parents with children under the age of 18, the numbers jumps to 74%; at times, too busy to even enjoy life (https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2020/02/05/how-americans-feel-about-the-satisfactions-and-stresses-of-modern-life/ ).
Over half of Americans (52%) report they are usually trying to do more than one thing at a time; they’re MULTI-tasking, more often than they’re NOT (ibid).
66% of Americans admit they do not have a healthy work-life balance; and 48% of go so far as to self-identify as “workaholics” (Small Biz Trends, BLS, CNBC)
62% blame being too busy as the cause for their feelings of loneliness.” (Harvard, 2024)
But this may be the most TELLING stat of them all: “Over one third of Americans (37%) say that they feel guilty or anxious when they aren't busy”. And “asked whether people ever exaggerate how busy they are to make themselves look better, 63% say they think people DO” (YouGov, 2014; I got help finding/summarizing stats on busyness from ChatGPT & Gemini)
A THIRD of us feel guilty when we’re not busy, and TWO thirds say we EXAGGERATE our busyness to look BETTER. Church: is it safe to say our culture IDOLIZES busyness? We wear it like a badge of HONOR, don’t we: “I must be super important, cuz I didn’t even have time to sit DOWN today…”
Let me ask you: is it even possible to be led by the Lord, by the Good Shepherd, the One who “makes me lie down in green pastures”, who “leads me beside still waters”, who actually COMMANDS us - #4 on his “Top Ten” list! - is “Thou shalt REST”; is it POSSIBLE to be led by him if we’re not only too busy to sit down, but we’re actually PROUD of it?!
Now, I promised not to cast stones, so let me easeup for a minute and point out that my hand was up too. I’ve told y’all before: I’m ALWAYS preaching to MYSELFfirst; I am convinced that every single sermon I’ve ever preached here, I needed to hear just as much as any of YOU did. And that is especially true this MORNING. And the fact that me saying that almost FEELS like a “humble brag”... that’s a PROBLEM. I thought about listing for you, as part of my sermon intro, my “to do” list from one day this past week - FRIDAY, when I was trying to write the sermon, prep for the annual meeting, and oh by the way, help get our house ready for 50 women to come over for the progressive dinner - but then I thought, “Ehh, better NOT; that’s gonna make 37percent of you feel GUILTY that I’m BUSIER than you”!
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Friends: we got a PROBLEM, don’t we? Busyness HAS to be toward the very TOP of the list of “respectable sins”; remember that great book by Jerry Bridges? Exposing the sins we not only tolerate, but perhaps even CELEBRATE? I think busyness might take the cake for most celebrated AND most pervasive, which in my estimation, that combo - celebrated AND pervasive - makes busyness arguably the most DANGEROUS of sins as well. And in case you need even more convincing, we’re also gonna see this morning the dire CONSEQUENCES of busyness - the IMPACT it has, the TOLL it takes on our lives, and especially our relationship with GOD.
But before we get there, first we’re gonna need to actually DEFINE “busyness”, cuz I’ve used the term 10 times already and I suspect we all have slightly different understandings of what technically CONSTITUTES “busyness”. So we’ll try and get on the same page. Then we can diagnose the PROBLEM with busyness; am I overstating the issue? Or as we look to God’s WORD for guidance, should busyness really rise to the level of concern that I am suggesting? How serious IS it? And then finally, third: once we know WHAT it is, and WHY it’s such a problem, we’ll let Scripture prescribe the CURE for us; HOW do we heal, and AVOID busyness going forward?
I invite you to STAND as you’re able, for the reading of God’s word. We’re gonna bounce around quite a bit this morning. Typically we’re very expository here at West Hills, meaning we like to camp out in one book of the Bible and work our way through it chapter-by-chapter, verse-by-verse. But every once in a while, it can be helpful to tackle a particular issue head-on, more topically, and trace it thematically through the whole Bible. That’s what we’re doing in this 5-week series, with FALSEHOOD and then with ANXIETY last week and now with BUSYNESS. The Bible’s got a LOT to say about it, but perhaps NO passage is more pertinent than Luke 10:38-42. So that’s where we’ll START this morning, if you wanna turn their in your Bibles and follow along (if you don’t HAVE a Bible… Info Bar… words on SCREEN as well); hear the word of the Lord:
“Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone?! Tell her then to help me!” But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.””
This is the word of God… Seated…
Alright, first things first: what IS busyness? The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as “the state or condition of having a great deal to do”. Similarly, Merriam-Webster: “the state of having or being involved in many activities”. Dictionary.com adds a secondary meaning to its definition, though, that comes closest to how WE’RE gonna define busyness this morning: “lively but meaningless activity”. That’s actually a bit HARSHER than JESUS’s definition here in Luke 10, which is simply “unnecessary activity”. What does he tell Martha, “you are anxious and troubled about many things, but only one thing is NECESSARY”, or NEEDED, required, essential.
Now, admittedly, Jesus doesn’t explicitly USE the word “busyness” in this passage; as a matter of fact, you won’t find it ANYWHERE in the Bible, at least not in the ESV translation we use. Nevertheless, you can pick any one of the FOUR definitions I just gave you for “busyness” and MARTHA here in Luke 10 epitomizes it. She has a “great deal to do; many activities”. BUT, Jesus says, “only ONE of them is actually NECESSARY”. Not just “GOOD”; Jesus commends Mary for choosing the “GOOD portion”. But interestingly, what was “good” for Mary was in fact NECESSARY for Martha. It may be “good” for some of us to avoid alcohol, but NECESSARY for others to avoid it, if you’re an ADDICT. Martha was addicted to busyness. And some of US are too, if we’re honest. Consider the “10 Signs of Addiction”, as they apply not just to something like alcohol, but to BUSYNESS:
* “It gets in the way of real life”: life is found in CHRIST; “I am the way, the truth and the LIFE”, he declared. So when GOD walks in your house, and your response is to immediately run into the next ROOM, to cook and clean… something is BADLY wrong. Something’s getting in the way of “real life”. If your “LIFE” is so BUSY, shuttling the kids from one activity to the next, that you’ve gone three… four consecutive nights without sitting down to eat DINNER together at the same TABLE (and the MINIVAN doesn’t COUNT!), your BUSYNESS is getting in the way of “real life”, the life God WANTS for you and your family.
*”When it starts to damage relationships”: Martha’s busyness puts her at odds not only with MARY here (“Why aren’t you HELPING!?”), but with JESUS too (“Lord, don’t you even CARE that she’s not helping me?!”). You think your RELATIONSHIPS are gonna feel it, if you are regularly going days at a time without that dinner table? And if you don’t even have time for your own FAMILY, how in the WORLD are you gonna have time for your FRIENDS? For the NEIGHBORS God is calling you to reach with his love?
* “When you can’t stop even though you want to”: an alcoholic can’t HAVE just one drink. Martha couldn’t SWEEP just one FLOOR. And some of US can’t RESTRICT ourselves to just one ACTIVITY. I took a couple days off last week with Thanksgiving (SO nice), but the last regular week when I took a day off was a few weeks BEFORE that; actually it was on HALLOWEEN, I remember, cuz it was a FRIDAY and the kids had school off (Fridays are always MUCH easier for me take off). So that Thursday night, after we got the kids in bed, I asked Polly, “What do you wanna DO tomorrow?” The forecast looked PERFECT; I’d already arranged to play VOLLEYBALL in the morning, and of course we had plans for trick-or-treating that evening, with friends and family coming over…
Polly said, “Well, I guess we could go out to Eckerts Farm if you want, after you’re done with volleyball… pick pumpkins, do the rides… the kids liked that last year…”
I said, “Yeah! I LOVE it; let’s DO it!”
And I thought about it for a minute… then I asked her, “...So what do you wanna do in the AFTERNOON?” Cuz in MY mind:
Volleyball is 7 to 9
Eckerts is 10 to 1
Trick-or-treating doesn’t start til like 5:30
So that leaves a good 3 to 4 HOURS un-ACCOUNTED for in the afternoon.
Polly’s like, “Do we need to fill every single minute of the DAY, when we got a big activity in the MORNING now and a REALLY big one in the evening?? The kids are gonna need some DOWN time, to RECOVER… REST.”
And I thought to myself: “Hmff! Spoken like someone who’s NOT addicted to BUSYNESS!” Cuz I can’t stop even when I WANT to.
And I could keep listing the REST of the 10 signs (“you experience withdrawals… it’s your only ESCAPE…”), but you get the POINT: what makes it busyness, and not just “being BUSY”, is when it becomes TOO much of a good thing. It’s EXCESSIVE. Staying busy can be really GOOD. Just like alcohol, money, sex… MOST of the things we get addicted to - Tim Keller famously said “the best things make for the most pernicious idols”, precisely BECAUSE they are the best things; he defined “idolatry” as a “GOOD thing that’s become your MAIN thing”. You don’t just WANT it anymore; you NEED it. “UN-necessary activity” has become NECESSARY for you.
Even when it’s GOOD activity. Are cooking and cleaning GOOD? You better say, “Yes,” or I don’t ever wanna get invited over to YOUR house! YES! Cooking and cleaning are good. In fact, I think we could even argue that they’re NECESSARY!
But it’s all about CONTEXT: are cooking and cleaning necessary activities when JESUS is in the room next door, explaining the deepest truths of the universe to all who can sit still long enough to LISTEN.
No, cooking and cleaning are VERY “UN-necessary activities” in that context.
So we need to be clear: it is NOT a sin to be BUSY. God’s word COMMANDS us to “Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not [just] for men” (Col 3:23). There is work - GOOD work - to be done here, that rightfully oughta keep us BUSY, working HEARTILY.
“Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with [all] your might, for there is no work… in [the Afterlife], to which you are going.” (Ecc 9:10)
As a matter of fact, embedded within God’s very COMMAND to us to REST, that I mentioned earlier, Commandment #4 - “HONOR the Sabbath”, keep it HOLY, by RESTING, doing no work - but let’s not MISS: included WITHIN that command is ANOTHER command: “SIX DAYS you SHALL labor”! Listen: some of you have bought into the modern - it’s only been in the last hundred years now, that the TWO-day weekend was invented; it became LAW under the “Fair Labor Standards Act” of 1938 - and SOME of you would rather obey MAN’S law (two days off per week) than GOD’S law (ONE day off). So before you judge me, cuz I know I’m gonna get some emails (“Pastor, you really SHOULD be taking a day off every week…”); yeah, probably, and YOU should be WORKING an extra day, too. But here’s the GOOD news: Jesus CHRIST - who was and is the LORD of the Sabbath - He fulfilled the Law for BOTH of us, such that now we don’t have to be legalistic about keeping it; “One person (might) esteem one day as better than another, while another (believer) esteems all days alike” (Rom 14:5). What’s important is that WHATEVER our rhythm, we take God’s command to WORK seriously… AND we take his command to REST seriously.
Jesus himself kept busy… MOST of the time that we encounter him in the Gospels. But whenever Jesus’s “busy” started to verge on busy-NESS, he would “withdraw… to a desolate place by himself” (Mt 14:13). He called his disciples, after they had returned from a particularly BUSY missions assignment he’d sent them on, to “Come away with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest” (Mk 6:31).
So, work: GOOD; OVER-work: BAD.
Being busy: can be really GOOD; but busy-NESS (the NEED to stay busy ALL the time, with UN-necessary activity): is BAD.
And why IS it so bad? We’re gonna address the real ROOT issue with busyness in point #2, but we’d be remiss to move on without first recognizing the problem with busyness that we find here in MARTHA’s example from Luke 10. And I should say “problemS”, plural, because we really observe THREE burdens of busyness here.
The FIRST is the EMOTIONAL burden. Busyness ROBS us, emotionally. Martha is described here as “distracted”; Jesus points out that she is “anxious and troubled about many things”. Pastor Thad unpacked Philippians 4 for us last Sunday, where we are exhorted NOT to be anxious about anything, “but in everything by prayer and supplication… let your requests be made known to God”, who, in Martha’s case, just happened to be STANDING 15 feet AWAY in the next ROOM! But she was too BUSY to NOTICE.
But let’s not be too quick to judge her; after all, God’s even CLOSER than that to US now, isn’t he! If you’ve been born again by grace through faith, that means the Holy Spirit now lives INSIDE you! Which means we have access at any given moment, in ANY given circumstance, to all the peace of Jesus CHRIST Himself. “Peace I leave with you,” he promised, “my peace I give to you… Let not your hearts be troubled” (Jn 14:27).
But busyness ALWAYS manages to find something to be fussing over. We all know people like that, don’t we? Mark Sayers says that pastors, and really ALL Christians, should be what he calls a “non-anxious presence” in the lives of others. But we ALL know folks who are just the OPPOSITE; they’re an ANXIOUS presence. Whenever they’re around, whenever you’re talking with them, they ALWAYS seem to find something to fuss over, fret about. If the fruit of the Spirit is PEACE, the fruit of BUSYNESS is WORRY.
By the way, Martha may be the quintessential example of busyness in the Bible, but she definitely wasn’t the ONLY struggler. I love the story of Jesus’ Transfiguration, from Matthew 17 (1-5):
“Jesus took with him Peter and James, and John, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. 2 And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light. [Jesus is revealing himself to them in all the resplendent GLORY of his DEITY - as much as they can humanly take in, without having their FACES melted off!] 3 And behold, there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. 4 And Peter said to Jesus [ready for it?] “Lord, it is good that we are here. [“Uhh, THANKS Peter; I’m glad that you approve of my decision to bring you…”] If you wish, I will make three tents here, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah.” [Friends: THAT’S busyness! When you can behold the second person of the Trinity in the fullness of his glory, and your RESPONSE is: “I better start making some TENTS, cuz it’s gonna get COLD up here in a few hours once the SUN sets”; Peter, you IDIOT: Jesus IS the Son! His face just turned INTO the SUN, right in front of you; this is not a time for you to make tents, or actually, for you to open your MOUTH at ALL…] 5 As he was still speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.” (“Peter- SHUT UP!” No, God wouldn’t say that; he’s too GOD-ly… but kinda he did. 🙂)
Second, busyness robs us SOCIALLY as well. We highlighted it already: Martha’s busyness cost her good will and relational harmony not ONLY with her sister MARY, who she BLAMED for sticking her with all these unnecessary chores… but she accuses JESUS as well, of not even CARING. What starts as an internal dis-ease - distraction, anxiety, trouble - soon spreads outward into an inter-personal problem. It might manifest itself as RESENTMENT, toward those NOT as busy as you, as in Martha’s case here… OR, perhaps even more common, it could be JUDGMENT, condescension, toward them - “Ugh, these Gen-Z co-workers with their ‘mental health days’, am I right?” or “Y’all get HOW many weeks of paid “PARENTAL” leave, at Boeing? Not maternity, but PATERNITY?! TWELVE weeks?! No WONDER China is winning!”
And we look DOWN on others who DO rest.
But THIRD, and worst of all, busyness robs us SPIRITUALLY. The saddest part of this story isn’t Martha’s inner stress. It’s not even her inter-personal bitterness. The saddest part is that she completely misses out on the “one necessary thing”, the “GOOD portion” that can NOT “be taken away” from us - what’s that?
Intimacy with GOD! Closeness, friendship with JESUS.
Listen, I’m not gonna ask for a show of hands of how many of us carved out time to read our Bibles and pray every day this week, prioritized a daily “quiet time”, for the simple reason that we risk reducing our spiritual lives to just MORE busyness. At least SOME of the folks who would have their hands raised (“Yep! 20 minutes a day! Just me and Jesus...”) they’re actually just as guilty of busyness as those of us who MISSED a few quiet times; theirs is just a SPIRITUAL busyness, which may be the most dangerous kind of ALL. Confusing spiritual activity FOR God with spiritual INTIMACY with Him. Martha was no doubt a DEACON at her church. She led the Hospitality team, oversaw the custodial team, ran the party planning committee… I’m sure Martha got a HALF DOZEN t-shirts on Volunteer Appreciation Sunday, for all the different ministries she had a hand in. And yet she completely MISSED JESUS. The “GOOD portion”, the “one NECESSARY thing”; the one essential PERSON, relationship in her life.
Church: is that some of US? Do not confuse spiritual activity FOR God with spiritual intimacy WITH Him.
Now, how do we know the DIFFERENCE? And not just in our “spiritual” lives; let’s broaden it back out, and get really PRACTICAL here for a minute: how do we discern whether a particular “activity” is a NECESSARY one, or an UN-necessary one… when a healthy “BUSY” turns into an UN-healthy busy-NESS?
Well, I think we can start our diagnostic litmus test with those 3 questions, the three CATEGORIES of “burden” that we just identified here in the story: emotional, social, and spiritual.
ASK yourself: “What is this activity costing me emotionally, socially and spiritually?”
Emotionally: if I can’t clean, organize, decorate the house JOYFULLY, with an inner peace, even gratitude - “THANK you, women’s ministry, for giving me an excuse to pick up around the house and get my Christmas decorations up that I needed to put out ANYWAY”; throw some Christmas TUNES on and spread the cheer by singing loud for my whole family to hear… - if INSTEAD it’s “distraction, anxiety & inner trouble”, I’m too busy STRESSING to be singing, I’m too busy GRUMBLING to be grateful, I’m too busy WORRYING to be WORSHIPING - then friends, that is an activity that I need to say “NO” to.
Now, that said, OFTEN the real problem isn’t so much a matter of the quantity of our tasks, but rather the QUALITY of our HEARTS, Amen? If some of us waited to do the LAUNDRY until we could do it JOYFULLY, we’d run out of clean clothes REAL quick - talk about costing you SOCIALLY; your friends would start smelling you COMING!
Perhaps that chore DOES belong on the “to do” list, it IS a “necessary activity”, and what needs to change isn’t the list, but your ATTITUDE.
So just keep that in mind: the litmus test I’m suggesting here isn’t fail-proof. But it is HELPFUL.
“Is this activity robbing me, SOCIALLY?” How many nights now, since our last family dinner? What needs to come off the schedule, to make it happen? How long has it been since I’ve made time to SPEND time with my friends? Have I allowed myself to get too BUSY for those relationships? Do I build MARGIN into my daily, weekly routine, for unstructured time to interact with my unsaved neighbors? I can’t control THEIR busyness - if they wanna stay too busy for ME, that’s THEIR thing - but if every time that I see them, I’m rushing out the door to the next thing, or I’ve only got an hour to get the yard mowed; “Sorry, can’t stop to talk…”, I probably need to slow down. Something’s gotta come off the plate, to build in margin.
MOST of all, ask yourself: “is it robbing me SPIRITUALLY?” Of my JOY, of the peace that Christ promised me. Of peaceful, unhurried time WITH him? If I’m not getting THAT, regularly, DAILY, then something’s gotta GO.
But moving on now, the Bible makes it clear that the REAL root problem with busyness, the most troubling symptom, and actually, it’s more like the root CAUSE of busyness than it is a mere symptom – it’s not just what it COSTS us, emotionally, socially, and spiritually, but what it REVEALS about us, deep down, namely, our FAITHLESSNESS. And I think we can even state the case more strongly than that, and say that busyness not only REVEALS it; but busyness IS faithlessness. That’s really what it amounts to. What do I mean?
Go back to the SABBATH for a minute. Why does God care SO much about the Sabbath? About his people taking one day off every seven? God went so far as to say through prophets like Jeremiah that the whole reason he sent Israel away into EXILE in BABYLON was for their failure to keep the Sabbath. What’s the big deal? Did God just really want to be WORSHIPED every Saturday? Cuz that’s how they were SUPPOSED to spend the day off, instead of working or pursuing their OWN pleasure; it was to be a day for pursuing intimacy with the LORD. And God certainly deserves that, even demands that, in His commanding us to observe the Sabbath.
But it’s about MORE than that. And God HINTS at it in the SECOND half of his command: “For in six days the Lord made [EVERYTHING], and he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.” What’s He DOING? God is reminding us that since the beginning of time, He has only rested a grand total of ONE day, and that was just to set an example for US; it wasn’t cuz He was TIRED. No, “The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth,” Isaiah 40:28 declares; “He does not faint or grow weary”. Jesus assured us in John 5:17, “My father is ALWAYS working”. He doesn’t TAKE days off.
And the question the SABBATH puts to US is: “Do we TRUST Him to? To KEEP working, even when WE rest? Can we rest - can we SLEEP, peacefully, trusting that Psalm 121:4, “he who keeps [us] will neither slumber nor sleep”? Can we walk away from the office, from OUR work, even if we didn’t get to every last item on the “to-do list”, trusting that it’s all gonna be okay, because OUR work doesn’t keep the earth spinning, we don’t hold the UNIVERSE together; GOD does that. And we can trust Him to KEEP doing it - the sun is still gonna come up tomorrow, even if I DON’T get to all of MY work, because my work is modest. But GOD’s work is a MUST, and yet He NEVER misses a single BEAT of it.
I’m trying to get better about actually PRACTICING what I preach. Sometimes it’s just so OBVIOUS even I can’t miss it. I already told you it was a really busy week, after taking half the week off prior, the Annual Meeting, renovation preparations… I usually try and start manuscripting the sermon by Friday morning. I walked into the office yesterday, Saturday, with not much more than an outline of an idea: “What busyness is, why it’s a problem, how it gets CURED”; 3 points, 3 passages: that’s it. 5,700 words to go! As Polly was going to bed last night, 10:30, I still had - I dunno, 2,000 words left to write - so I said, “Pray for me; I’m afraid I’m not gonna get much SLEEP tonight. I gotta stay up ALL night writing…”
And then it DAWNED on me - God HIT me with it like a TWO by four, this conviction, this revelation, this QUESTION: “What if I DIDN’T?!” What if I just… went to BED, got some REST, and trusted GOD with the sermon in the morning. After all, we do PRAY every Sunday before I even step INTO the pulpit: “God, may these NOT just be Pastor WILL’s words, but YOURS”; what if all my wordsmithing is actually getting in the WAY of what GOD wants to say? I mean, I’ve got friends who pastor charismatic Reformed churches who wake up Sunday morning, sometimes step into the PULPIT, without so much as an OUTLINE, cuz they wanna leave THAT much room for the Holy Spirit to lead and speak. Maybe some day I’ll have THAT much faith, but for NOW, I’m grateful the Lord bears WITH me in my doubt and worry, and He speaks and leads on SATURDAYS (and early on Sundays too; I still woke up at 3:30 to finish the sermon. What can I say: I’m a work in progress; even going to BED was a step of faith for me!).
Here’s the POINT; let me try and GET to the point… and PUT a fine point on it for us:
Busyness says “I do”; faith says “I’m trusting God to do it”
Busyness says, “I feel like I’ve got the weight of the WORLD on my SHOULDERS right now…”; but faith sings, “HE’S got the WHOLE world, in HIS hands…” and faith REJOICES at it, knowing, trusting that God’s hands are the ONLY ones big enough, capable enough for the job.
And here’s the real danger: when we TRY and shoulder the weight of the world, and juggle too much all at once in OUR tiny hands, we only make things WORSE. I picked Psalm 127, vv1 & 2 as our key passage for point #2 here:
“Unless the Lord builds the house,
those who build it labor in vain.
Unless the Lord watches over the city,
the watchman stays awake in vain.
2 It is in vain that you rise up early
and go late to rest,
eating the bread of anxious toil;
for [God] gives to his beloved sleep.”
In other words, all the busyness and hard work in the WORLD without GOD behind it, is utterly FUTILE. It’s HEVEL. It’s actually WORSE than useless; it’s like eating STRESS for BREAKFAST (“the BREAD of anxious toil”).
But if God IS in it - if HE’S building the house, watching over the city - if it is GOD’S will, executed in God’s WAY - His PLAN, using his processes, by his POWER, for His PURPOSE, His own good PLEASURE… then no matter HOW badly you and I may FAIL along the way, ultimately THAT plan - that house, that city… that LIFE!, that man or woman of GOD, who is TRUSTING in God, and leaning not on their OWN understanding and strength, but looking to HIM for wisdom and power… will be DESTINED to SUCCEED.
We get a wonderful PICTURE of this - this stark CONTRAST between the “doomed to fail” houses we try and build ourselves, vs. the “destined to succeed” houses that GOD builds - in the PROPHETS. Specifically, how the prophet Haggai rebukes his fellow Israelites, in contrast to ISAIAH’s beautiful, GRACE-filled invitation to them. Haggai declares:
“Thus says the Lord: Consider your ways. You have sown much, and harvested little. You eat, but you never have enough; you drink, but you never have your fill. You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm. And he who earns wages does so [only] to put them into a bag with holes. “Thus says the Lord: Consider your ways. Go up to the hills and bring wood and build the house, that I may take pleasure in it and that I may be glorified, says the Lord. You looked for much, and behold, it came to little. And when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why? declares the Lord of hosts. Because of my house that lies in ruins, while each of you busies himself with his own house.” (Hag 1:5-9) – They were neglecting God’s TEMPLE, which was the symbol of and indeed the MECHANISM for God’s WORSHIP. So as a result, God says, “You can BUSY yourselves all you WANT; but you’re laboring in VAIN.”
Now let’s contrast quickly that with ISAIAH’s invitation to come and ENJOY - FEAST yourselves - on that which you didn’t even PAY for, cuz you couldn’t AFFORD it, but God provided anyway:
““Come, everyone who thirsts,
come to the waters;
and he who has no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without price.
2 Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread,
and your labor for that which does not satisfy?
Listen… eat what is good,
and delight yourselves in rich food.” (Isa 55:1-2)
What is Isaiah TALKING about there, friends?
In a word: GRACE. Receiving a good gift that we don’t deserve, we couldn’t AFFORD.
And that’s the biggest problem of ALL with busyness, Church:
Busyness says, “I can EARN, with my hard WORK”; but Faith acknowledges, “I have to trust God to provide what I have not, what I COULD not earn”
And that brings us to our final and shortest but most important point: (#3) HOW busyness is cured. Answer: by resting in JESUS (Mt 11:28-30). In His finished work for US.
We can ONLY be freed of busyness when we learn to “Be still, and know that [HE is] God” (Ps 46:10).
Friends: you WILL not be able to REST until you know - truly KNOW, deep down, and BELIEVE it all the way to your core - that your worth is found not in what YOU do, but in what’s been DONE FOR YOU, by Jesus. Until we believe that, we are CONSTANTLY gonna be reaching for the next thing, the next activity, the next “to do”, to try and VALIDATE and PROVE ourselves, our worth. “See, I’m IMPORTANT! I MUST be, look at how BUSY I am…”
But when you know that your worth is found not in ANYTHING that you’ve done or COULD do, but in EVERYTHING that was done FOR you on the cross - when we finally BELIEVE Jesus, when he said, “It is FINISHED”! - then and ONLY then, can we finally REST.
“So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God,” Hebrews 4 invites us, “for whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works” (Heb 4:9-10). In other words, quit trying to EARN Heaven (God’s rest) with your WORKS; THIS feast cannot be BOUGHT. Not with YOUR currency anyway; you don’t have the spiritual BANK account, friend.
But there’s is One who DOES. And he is BECKONING you this morning: “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (Matt 11:28-30)
I once heard a pastor quip that “BUSY” is an acronym for “being under Satan’s yoke”. There’s a BETTER yoke for you, friend.
Come to Jesus and find rest, ETERNAL rest for your soul.
Let’s pray…