Rest: Lessons from a Tree of Life

Living out of a Bust Cycle

“We are a do-it-yourself culture…with a constant compulsion for workaholism, and seeing our activity being what proves we have value, meaning and purpose in the world […] We live in a culture that has reversed the biblical order of being and doing. They are related, but we have to get the order straight. Our doing flows out of our being. Our relationship with God, not our doing, is the source of our being.”
M. Robert Muholland Jr., Invitation to a Journey: A Roadmap for Spiritual Formation (paraphrase)

Autumn is a season that gives me pause to consider the nature of rest. In the book of Hebrews, the author encourages that we make every effort to enter into rest. Not merely rest we enjoy from an afternoon nap or holiday, but a Sabbath-rest.

A Sabbath rest is a being found with God. This rest alludes to eternity, our nature as being created in God’s image, a gift for God’s children, a rest that penetrates bone, marrow, soul and spirit. Sabbath rest is a promise, but it also takes effort.

My Personal Tree of Life

We have a towering white oak in our backyard. We’ve lived here for five years and it’s never produced many acorns, until this year. Apparently oak trees have boom and bust cycles of life. This year happened to be a ‘mast’, or boom year for our oak tree, meaning every 2-5 years oak trees will mass produce more acorns than predators can eat ensuring new oak trees to seed.

Due to this booming production of acorns, we’ve enjoyed every critter imageable in the mid-West making every effort to fatten up for the long winter’s rest. At night we hear families of raccoons rummaging through the branches and crunching away like someone with a mouthful of corn nuts. Their ‘left-overs’ blanket the ground making an easy treat for eager ground hogs, deer, turkeys, chipmunks and squirrels. It’s like we are running a 7-Eleven. If ever I’d imagined a picture of the ‘tree of life’, this would be it. In the Bible, the ‘tree of life’ is a symbol of God’s life-giving presence and the fullness of eternal life available in God. ¹

Our nut-producing ‘tree of life’ does nothing more than exist; hold a steady, giving presence that spans our yard. Out of its merely ‘being,’ all life gathers to taste of its goodness. The acorns offered have been so irresistible; each animal has made relentless effort to attain the fall treat whilst we’ve simultaneously tried to shoo them, scare them or chase them away to no avail. Nothing we’ve tried has stopped them from gathering the nourishment they desire from the tree in order to prepare for rest.

The Worth of a Bust Cycle

For five years we’ve wondered what was wrong with that oak tree. Its unproductiveness seemed abnormal, but come to find out, it was waiting, resting, building up for a fruit-bearing extravaganza. The ‘tree of life’ had exorbitant life to give because it spent time resting. What a powerful message of truth for us. It should cause us to consider the value of our frantic to-do lists, need for productivity, the pace of our ‘busy’ life, our workaholism—what fruit does endless, non-stop doing produce? Mediocre at best? Sub-par work? Just enough to get by? Food for thought.

God himself enters and holds rest for us as explained in Hebrews 4, “for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his.” God instituted a balance for work and Sabbath rest for the good and health of all creation, but often our culture considers rest a waste of time and money, or complains, “I can rest when I’m dead.”

Countercultural to that neck-breaking speed of finding value, identity by what we do is a new message from Jesus, “Come to me all who are weary and burdened, I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your soul.” Is your soul at rest?

The animals who’ve been gorging themselves on the over production of acorns are enjoying a gift only birthed from years of rest known as bust cycles. It’s an ironic name that reflects the nature of our culture which believes not producing makes life and ourselves a bust. If we are honest, how often do we feel our life amounts to nothing unless we are making money, working, producing something, have a busy schedule, or hold endless degrees and titles?

It is out of many bust cycles that the oak tree can provide a bounty of goodness for creation around. God’s Sabbath-rest is a gift that can fill our insatiable hunger and need for rest. We know we are starved when we feel tired, worn, depressed, irritable, empty, joyless, and lost.

We can learn a thing or two from creation. The animal’s efforts, hunger, to eat of the ‘tree of life’ come from knowing the future holds months of hibernation, dormancy and the leniency of winter. They know they need to feed on the source of rest in order to be sustained in rest so that they can produce new life in the spring. When we are nourished in God’s rest, we discover that it births sustainable life in us and for the sake of others. Rest in God reframes how we view the cycle of life. It changes how we live from doing out of self to doing out of being.

What amazing imagery for what a life of “doing flowing out from our being” can look like. As the animals have made every effort to be nourished by the tree, we too should make every effort to by nourished in God’s rest. When we rest in the presence of the Triune God we find the true source of life, identity, purpose, service, and hope for the future.

“Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will perish by following their example of disobedience.”
Hebrews 4:11

Questions to Ponder

Do you have a sense that your soul is at rest? If not, consider what effort you have put forth over the past few months, years to make resting with God a priority?
Make a list of what is restful to your spirit.
What effort can you make to engage with 1-2 of those items you listed over the winter months? When I say effort, I don’t mean toil or work or a discipline for the sake of doing something for God. I mean an intent, a sacred time or space set apart for you to experience conversation, silence, alone-time with Jesus that refreshes your soul and fills you with joy, purpose, love and hope. In this way effort means setting everything in your busy life aside in order to be in a relationship with the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit; to feed on the ‘tree of life.’
Is there anything in the imagery of God as the ‘Tree of Life’ who offers rest to feed your soul that spoke to you. Share that with God in prayer.
What might make having an annual cycle of Sabbath-rest possible in your life?

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