Dear Eve,
I noticed one last thing in Genesis that I wanted to share. We were created to rest. Genesis 2 states that God rested on the seventh day after working for six. Pastors often use this verse to support parishioners having a Sabbath of their own (whatever it looks like in each season, even if it’s a Monday). This verse also supports sabbaticals and time off of work. We rest to avoid burnout.
Think about it- you and Adam were walking along in the Garden, tending the grounds to Paradise. It was warm, but not too hot; it was tropical, but likely not full of annoying mosquitoes coming for your lives; you and Adam were so nestled in this place that the Word states you didn’t even have skin until the Fall. (The Hebrew word for “skin” also means “light” so this could imply knowledge, not just physical skin or clothing). This picture is painted of a perfect place where you slept well every night & laughed every morning. There was harmony and there was rest.
When you ate the fruit the game changed, like Goldschlagger the nights we tell ourselves “just one drink!” (If you know, you know) The need for labor increased with the enlightenment of the knowledge of good and evil. God (Yahweh, for the people in the back) literally told Adam about this increase when He said, “You just made it harder on yourselfi” (MJ’s Ebonics; actual is Genesis 3:18-19; “you’ll get your food the hard way.”)
I don’t think this is only about our labors in the work place that earn us our money for bills either. It’s also for mentally running on 1,000 with no break. It’s for not taking the time to let the walls down with the people we love & living like it’s all “Stepford Wife” all the time. It’s that perception that perfection is juggling 1,000 plates without dropping them, and forcing ourselves to maintain a perfect image in all we do, all the time.
So, I’m just thinking if you were created to model God; you walked the Garden with Him DAILY (another cool conversation for another day); there was zero sin exposed to the world… what else makes sense in reference to people being so obsessed with the hustle that they end up with health problems? Or people thinking that image is everything while their mental health is tanking? Some body needs this today: Instagram is not real life.
Yes, we need to work and it is OK to want to work for nice things. Ask the Tory Burch in my closet. Yes, we need mental resilience for life; for our purpose; and for the many hats we are called to wear. I just don’t think we were created to work so hard that we ignore our body’s signals to slow down, mentally or physically. Instead, we were created with specific triggers to tell us when enough is enough.
May today be the day we let the walls come down, whichever walls we need them to be. No
xx, MJ
maryjuner 