It’s hard to believe that we are approaching the end of the church year! As I begin planning for spring rituals and preparing reports ahead of our annual meeting, I find myself reflecting on how hard you all have been working. I arrived on the heels of three busy years of interim work and yet you did not hesitate to hit the ground running with me. The activities you have engaged in with thoughtfulness and commitment are numerous—from the new Right Relations team and Committee on Ministry, to a wildly successful stewardship drive, a lay-lead revival of our social justice activities and an engaged mission and vision process. Meanwhile, you kept important day-to-day church functions, like our beloved fellowship hour and pastoral care team, going strong. This is good and vital work you all have been doing. I am proud, grateful, and blessed.
I am also compelled to remind you that rest and play are holy! Yes, it takes work to keep church running, but I think we are also called to make church a place that values respite, creativity, delight and imagination. In fact, I think this is a unique and especially sacred calling for a church community. In a world that values productivity, urgency, and profit, we can provide a different kind of space—one that recognizes the inherent worth and dignity of each person beyond any utilitarian purpose. We can make space to marvel at the mystery and miracle of our existence and assert that meaning is found beyond what can be measured or accomplished.
And it’s not just me saying that! There are well-developed theologies that point us towards rest and play as divine callings. The practice of keeping the Sabbath is the most obvious. God rested and invites us to rest too. In his excellent book, Sabbath as Resistance: Saying No to a Culture of Now, theologian Walter Bruggemann writes, “The Sabbath rest of God is the acknowledgment that God and God’s people in the world are not commodities to be dispatched for endless production.” Bruggeman ties Sabbath practices not only to love of God and care of self, but also to love of neighbor. He asserts that the Sabbath invites us to refrain from demanding labor from those around us and rather make space for deep and relational connection.
In the movie Bull Durham, Susan Sarandon’s character Annie Savoy famously says, “I believe in the church of baseball.” While we might not all treat our hobbies with this level of religious fervor, an appreciation for play is an idea with deep spiritual roots. Jewish and Christian thinkers point to God’s delight in the act of creation as evidence that time spent in play and creativity are divine. Christian theologians turn to the stories of Jesus’s friendships, playful storytelling, love of dinner parties, and willingness to turn water into wine to develop their theology of play. Hinduism has the concept of “Lila,” which asserts creation is an outcome of divine playfulness. Theologian Brian Edgar goes so far as to write that, “play is the essential and ultimate form of relationship with God.” Embracing fun, pleasure, and play is one way of honoring the divine spark within each of us and recognizing we are made in the image of a loving, resting, playful creator.
Rest and play are central to our identities as humans and children of God. They are our birthright and we do not need to do anything to earn them. But if we did, I promise that you have. So, I hope this spring, you will make time to engage in rest and play. I also hope that you will see First Church as a place where you are invited into these holy activities. Together we can make space for ease, quiet, laughter, imagination, creativity, connection, joy, and even a little mischief.
One of the scripture verses above our pulpit is from Matthew 11: 28-30 and reads “Come to me, all you who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.” May ours be a sanctuary, where all who are weary can find rest for their souls.
In faith,
Rev. Danielle