God’s Rest
For Meditation
We’re kicking off a new sermon series for the summer this week and we’re going to be looking at food and feasting in the Bible. As we dive into these stories, we’ll see just how God nourishes us and that through meals we can experience his goodness. We’ll get a look at what kind of Kingdom God’s bringing about here and now, and ways to invite other people into it.
This week we’re starting at the very beginning, looking at Genesis one and exploring the connection between food and rest. I’m not talking about that sleepy feeling most of us get after eating a good meal, but instead how food and meals remind us that because God rested, we can rest as well.
If your experience with life is anything like mine, this is great news! Many of us probably feel that life has picked up at a harrying pace and the idea of eating slowly, with others, is something we just can’t do right now. Or perhaps your experience is the opposite, that life is moving slowly, so slowly in fact that you’re not sure what to do or how to flourish in relationships. Eating with others allows us to step out of those challenging patterns and to reflect on who God is and what’s done in and through Jesus. When we take time to do this, we can taste and see God’s rest, and it’s good!
Genesis 1:24–2:3
24 And God said, “Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds: the livestock, the creatures that move along the ground, and the wild animals, each according to its kind.” And it was so. 25 God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.
26 Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”
27 So God created mankind in his own image,
in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.
28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”
29 Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. 30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds in the sky and all the creatures that move along the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.
31 God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day.
1 Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array.
2 By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. 3 Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.