Cement trucks rumble down the road to building sites beyond the trees. Diggers and earth movers block lanes while shirt-less builders lay block and brick, set windows and roof, drill wells and erect fences. The warm months of the summer are a busy time for building and repairs. And yet in the frenzy of activity there comes a point when the work ceases and the Mongols stop to admire their work and rest.

Food is gathered, twigs and wood arranged with care in a circle of stones. The men wash their faces in the cooling river while the women light the fire. Children, carefree and bare, jump and dive in the shallows sending shoals of fish retreating to the shadows beneath a bankside tree. A heron, his orange feet submerged beneath the water, eyes the crowd warily; one false move on their part and he’ll be gone.

After the meal families settle, chatting and playing games, drinking and singing. The evening light mutes the hills and some take blankets and sleep beneath the stars. These days have a rhythm to them, activity and rest; friends and family, in log cabins in the woods or new homes beside the river, all enjoying the outdoors.

I watch but the simplicity of downing tools and relaxing sometimes eludes me. There is unrest in my soul that all the holidays in the world cannot satiate and I’m left feeling that my work is never enough, or perhaps it’s that I think I’m not enough.

God worked and He rested too. He also looked at His work and was satisfied with what He had accomplished. All the work He needed to do had been finished and He saw that it was good.

I believe Jesus calls me to hand all my labours to him and that He promises me rest. He is the Lord of rest. But there are moments when I miss it. Stumbling over my humanness I intuitively find myself doing good works to earn God’s blessing, or meet my own exacting unrealistic standards. It is exhausting as inwardly I never make the grade and, if I’m not vigilant, the cycle of trying to prove myself worthy never ceases.

On the seventh day God rested from his work completely satisfied with what He had done. If Jesus gives meaning to my life then He will enable me to rest. And His rest is different from mine; it is a deep rest which doesn’t bind me as a slave but gives me liberty because I do not rest on my accomplishments but His, and His work is good. He has given me everything necessary for me to say that my work is finished.

Learning to rest in Him I begin honouring His image within me and realise more deeply that I am no longer defined by my job, accomplishments or qualifications. I am defined by Christ. I rest utterly satisfied in what He has done for me. But it is an act of trust which requires that I acknowledge that I am not god of my life, He is.