[easyazon_image add_to_cart=”default” align=”left” asin=”B00VEYXCWO” cloaking=”default” height=”160″ localization=”default” locale=”US” nofollow=”default” new_window=”default” src=”http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51p4BG7eaoL._SL160_.jpg” tag=”douloschristo-20″ width=”107″]Kindle[/easyazon_image]PAGE 2: Paul Heintzman – Leisure and Spirituality
Leisure as Signpost
All of life, in its social, physical, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual dimensions, is to be lived before God. This includes our experience of leisure. Leisure and Spirituality reminds us that leisure is not an end in itself, but rather, it is a signpost.
When Christian people engage in leisure in a spirit of joy and thanksgiving, expressing a love and appreciation for the goodness of the creation and evidencing an abiding peace before one’s neighbor, this is but a small act of witness to the reality and grandeur of God.
When we cease from our work and purposefully undertake what Heintzman describes as a leisurely spirituality, we acknowledge before the world that the ultimate work was accomplished on the cross, a gracious enactment of divine love accomplished apart from human strivings that has extended for us an invitation into a true and deeper Sabbath.
The gospel is not only an evangelistic message. The gospel entails an evangelistic life. Rather than experiencing guilt during times of rest and play, confusing Sabbath with sloth, we are invited to glory in our Creator, to revel in his goodness, to celebrate his work. To worship.
Next time you run through a field, or throw a Frisbee, or join a friend for coffee and conversation, be filled with gratitude, and give thanks to God, who created us neither first for work nor for play, but rather for him, so that in everything we do, we might experience the joy of his companionship.
C. Christopher Smith is the founding editor of The Englewood Review of Books. He is also author of a number of books, including most recently How the Body of Christ Talks: Recovering the Practice of Conversation in the Church (Brazos Press, 2019). Connect with him online at: C-Christopher-Smith.com
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