“According to a Greek legend, in ancient Athens a man noticed the great storyteller Aesop playing childish games with some little boys. He laughed and jeered at Aesop, asking him why he wasted his time in such frivolous activity. Aesop responded by picking up a bow, loosening its string, and placing it on the ground. Then he said to the critical Athenian, ‘Now, answer the riddle, if you can. Tell us what the unstrung bows implies.’ The man looked at it for several moments but had no idea what point Aesop was trying to make. Aesop explained, ‘If you keep a bow always bent, it will break eventually; but if you let it go slack, it will be more fit for use when you want it.’” Have you ever felt like that always bent bow? Like you are on the verge of breaking? That was how the disciples were feeling as they returned from the work Jesus had sent them to do. They were exhausted, weary, and hadn’t even had time to eat. So Jesus said to them, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.”

Perhaps God is speaking those words to us this morning as well. Maybe we, like the disciples, have been hard at work on something we’ve been called to do. And even if the work is rewarding, it can still be exhausting at the same time. Those are not mutually exclusive things. So, perhaps we need to unstring our bowstrings and find a quiet place to rest and recuperate. The great Leonardo DiVinci once said, “Every now and then go away, have a little relaxation, for when you come back to your work your judgment will be surer, since to remain constantly at work will cause you to lose power of judgment…Go some distance away because then the work appears smaller, and more of it can be taken in at a glance, and lack of harmony or proportion is more readily seen.” Rest is important.

Yet sometimes rest can be very difficult to come by, as we see in our passage from Mark 6 for this morning. Immediately after Jesus tells his disciples to go someplace quiet to rest, they all get in a boat to head to a deserted area. But the crowd follows them on foot all the way across the lake, just so they can bother them on the other side. This story reminded me of the saying, “No rest for the weary.” In looking this phrase up online, it seems that this phrase is a modification of the phrase “no rest for the wicked.” “No rest for the wicked” is itself a modification of a verse from Isaiah 57. Isaiah 57 says, “But the wicked are like the tossing sea that cannot keep still; its waters toss up mire and mud. There is no peace, says my God, for the wicked.” No peace for the wicked, sounds a bit different than no rest for the wicked. Those who live in perpetual sin have no wholeness, no shalom, no peace in their hearts. No REST for the wicked has a similar connotation, that the wicked cannot find rest and peace because of their sins. I think we, as humans, can at least somewhat relate to that idea. When we are doing something that is harmful to us or others, there is often something inside us that makes us feel unsettled about it. It may not be enough to cause us to change..or we may be able to do things to numb us to those feelings..but that innate sense of unrest.

Now, “no rest for the weary” has a slightly different feel to it. But I think it too is something relatable to us. In fact, this week was an illustration in my own life of this very statement. As you saw at the beginning of worship this morning, we hosted Vacation Bible School this weekend on Friday night and Saturday morning. I also helped with a prayer gathering on Thursday evening. I spent all day Thursday going back and forth between preparing for VBS and preparing for the prayer gathering. Then, on Friday morning, I was right back at it in the morning, doing more to get prepared for VBS that night. I spent nearly every moment of the day prior to the start of VBS working to get ready for it. That first night was a blast and I enjoyed being around the kids and singing the songs and just enjoying all that we’d worked for. And when the night was over, I was tired. I wanted to just sit and relax. But I couldn’t because we had VBS again on Saturday morning and there were things I needed to do to prepare. In my mind, I thought to myself, “There’s no rest for the weary.” Have you had an experience like that? You threw all of your energy into something and then when it was over you just wanted to relax, but there was still more to do. That is exactly what the saying means, “There’s no rest for the weary.” Sometimes we have to keep working, keep plugging away, no matter how tired we are.

At the same time, we must be careful not to take that to the extreme. As humans, rest is necessary for our health and well-being. If we neglect our rest, we will harm ourselves long-term. Jesus seems to recognize that when he tells his disciples to find a quiet place all alone to rest. And Jesus himself often goes off on his own to rest and recuperate. Rest is important for us. And we need to know when to push ourselves despite our tiredness and when to stop and rest. That can be a difficult balance to strike, but one I think we all should be striving for. Speaking of rest, I “saw a right angle resting under a tree this [morning] and thought…. Wow! 90 degrees in the shade!” Sorry.

So, how do we know when to rest and when to press on? I am going to very briefly suggest two things to keep in mind from this Mark text as we consider this question. First, rest in the in-between times. When the disciples arrive back after going out to heal the sick and teach about God, Jesus tells them to come away for a bit. Then they get in a boat. Now, when they get off the boat, they are bombarded with folks wanting to be healed and whatnot. But that time IN the boat was an opportunity for rest. You know, for me, driving has always been a resting place. When I was in high school or college and I needed a chance to get away for a bit and just think things through, I would always go for a drive out in the country. It was not so much physically relaxing as it was mental relaxing. It was calming and helped me get the thoughts in my brain sorted out. Find those moments and activities for you, the things that help you relax your mind and sort things out. Those in-between times can be so helpful.

And second, no matter where we go, our problems usually follow us. Jesus and the disciples were followed all the way around the lake by the crowd that was wanting to get to Jesus. The things in our lives that we want to get away from or avoid, tend to follow us wherever we go anyway. Sometimes resting is less about getting away from our stressors and problems and more about finding ways to re-energize ourselves to deal with those issues. And the solution for that is different for each of us. Getting away for a bit is often helpful, but usually we have to do more than just attempt to escape. Usually we have to find things that help us to decompress and rest even in the midst of our stress and worries and struggles. That’s easier said that done and oftentimes getting away is what we need in order to have the space to find those re-energizing activities.So, today, when you leave this place, find time to rest from the busyness of life and find activities that help you to decompress and recuperate. There is often “no rest for the weary,” but let’s be intentional about grabbing at the opportunities we get to rest. Because we all need rest. And rest gives us the strength to be better at what we do and it helps give us the courage and fortitude to be who we are. So,  “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” It could make all the difference. Amen.