Tom's Message: I will rest you.
Wow!! Who saw THAT coming??
Who knew we were gonna get THAT much snow??
Hang on…let me check…(google…google)…”wbir”…(google)…”weather forecast for Sunday Jan 14, 2024”…click…
“A wintry weather system is heading to East Tennessee that will potentially bring several inches of snow to Knoxville and the surrounding areas…The main concerns will be heavy snow on Monday, particularly in the afternoon, and some bitterly cold temperatures that follow Tuesday and Wednesday…”
Oh.
I guess they DID see it coming!
It’s been a lot! But not the most!
When was the most snow ever “ ‘round these parts”? The “blizzard of ’93”?
Nope! That was 15 inches…
But the most in one day was on Feb 13, 1960…17.5!!
By then, our fam was mom and dad and seven kids in a one bathroom C house on Maple Lane with only three network channels and probably four or five days of...
getting bundled up...
getting out...
getting soaked...
getting frozen...
getting dried out...
and probably getting on each other's nerves after a week of snow days!
Y’know, it has actually been an awesome few days down here in the “Springs”!
I thought I had so much to do and so many places to go and it turned out…I didn’t!
‘Cause I couldn’t!
We were pretty stuck for a coupla days!
Someone got their huge tractor trailer stuck on Monday night right in front of my driveway so I super couldn’t get out if I was wanting to try to!
Then on Tuesday night they got a couple of neighbors’ tractors to pull him out and away he went! So, on Wednesday morning I was slippin’ and slidin’ down the road to freedom and found out he’d somehow gotten it stuck sideways, entirely straddling…and blocking!…the only road out!
“Lord, are you telling me something? About myself? Do you want me to possibly just be…still for a couple of days? Because I think I don’t really get a choice!”
After a few deep breaths, I turned around and surprisingly, enjoyed the quietness!
And the reading…
and the peacefulness…
and the beauty of it all…
and the naps…
and the time with my girl together…
and the stillness…
and most of all, the rest.
The rest I didn’t know I needed but did!
It took a bit to take a breath and quiet my heart (with its dial set on “get busy, bud!”) but after a while, I was nothing but thankful!
So, I read something early in this snowy week that I didn’t know I’d need as much as I did! Ready?
Matthew 11:28 and 29…
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and 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 souls…”
So, because I’m nosey, I wanted to nose around a bit. A few of us are going through a first year seminary New Testament Greek book together and I’m remembering stuff from literally 44 years ago!
I was kind of shocked at what I found!
When I read it in that language, I realized that when Jesus said, “I will give you rest”, the “you” is in the accusative case and not the dative case!!
(Isn’t that amazing, Wednesday guys??)
What that means is that the word “you” isn’t an indirect object, as in, “I will give rest TO you”! It’s the direct object!! The word “give rest” doesn’t have the word “give” in it! It’s the active verb “rest”! With “you” as the direct object!!
“I will rest you!”
If He offers to give rest TO you, you could take it or not!
But this says, “I will rest you!”
And sometimes that means, “Get ready! You’re about to get a rest, whether you think you need it or not!
Because sometimes…in fact, absolutely all the time…He knows better than me exactly what I need!
When He kind of insists you stop…rest…be still…
you might strain a little under the "stoppage time"...
and it might take a day or so...
but there’ll come a moment when you’ll take a great big breath and say,…
“Ahhhh! Thanks, Lord Jesus! I didn’t know it but…
This is exactly what I needed!!”
“Tuesday will see highs in the 50s, with lows in the upper 30s Tuesday night…”
Sniff…