The Nap I Scheduled on My Calendar and Canceled Anyway
The Nap I Scheduled on My Calendar and Canceled Anyway
I actually did it this time. I opened my calendar on Tuesday and blocked off twenty minutes at two in the afternoon, typed the word "rest" into the little box, and felt almost proud of myself for treating my own body like an appointment worth keeping. When two o'clock came, a notification popped up right on schedule, and I looked at it, looked at the three unanswered emails still sitting in my inbox, and clicked it away without a second thought. I told myself I would reschedule for tomorrow. I have told myself that most Tuesdays for longer than I want to admit.
I spent years running myself into the ground before I ever touched a drink, and then I spent more years using the drink to force my body to stop when nothing else would. That was its own kind of exhaustion management, crude and destructive, but at least it worked in the short term, at least it shut the engine off for a few hours. Eleven years sober now, and I have never fully replaced that shutoff switch with anything healthier. I just got better at pretending exhaustion is a problem I can out-schedule, that the right calendar block will finally convince a body and a mind that have been running on fumes for a decade that it is safe to stop moving.
What I have noticed, slower than I would like, is that I do not actually trust rest. Somewhere along the way I started treating tiredness as proof of usefulness, so that canceling my own nap felt less like a failure and more like evidence I was still needed. That is a strange thing to be proud of, being too depleted to sit still for twenty minutes, but pride finds a way into almost anything if you leave the door open long enough.
Jesus did not aim His invitation at people who had earned a break. He aimed it at people who were simply worn out. "Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest" (Matthew 11:28, NKJV). Labor and heavy laden, not accomplished and deserving. He goes further in the next verse, and this is the part I keep skipping past when I quote it too fast. "Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls" (Matthew 11:29, NKJV). A yoke is not a vacation. It is still work, still a harness, but shared with Someone whose own strength never runs low the way mine does.
Isaiah names that difference directly, and I need reminding of it more than I need another productivity trick. "Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the LORD, The Creator of the ends of the earth, Neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable" (Isaiah 40:28, NKJV). I faint. I get weary, often by early afternoon, sometimes by nine in the morning if the night before was rough. He does not, and the verses that follow are not addressed to the tireless, they are addressed to people exactly like me. "But those who wait on the LORD Shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint" (Isaiah 40:31, NKJV). The renewal comes from waiting on Him, not from a better-optimized calendar.
David's shepherd psalm has a line I used to read as scenery and now read as instruction. "He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters" (Psalm 23:2, NKJV). Makes me lie down. Sheep left to themselves will graze until they collapse, and the shepherd has to intervene, has to lead them somewhere quiet on purpose, because left alone they will not choose rest for themselves any more than I choose it when the notification pops up. And when Moses pleaded for God's presence to stay with a weary, wandering people, the answer he got was not a strategy. "And He said, 'My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest'" (Exodus 33:14, NKJV). Presence first. Rest as what follows it, not what precedes it.
Here is where my own planning always runs out of road, because I am genuinely good at scheduling and genuinely bad at actually stopping once the time arrives. Willpower can block a calendar square. It cannot make a depleted soul believe it is allowed to be still. Jesus described the only thing that actually produces that kind of fruit, and it was never effort. "I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing" (John 15:5, NKJV). Abiding is not one more task added to an already full day. It is staying attached long enough to stop generating my own strength and start drawing on His, the way a branch does nothing but hang on and still ends up heavy with fruit it never worked to produce.
Paul learned this from a weakness he begged God to remove and never got to lose. "And He said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness'" (2 Corinthians 12:9, NKJV). My strength was never going to be the sufficient thing. His grace already is, precisely in the places where I have nothing left. And He does not shame the tired for growing tired. "And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart" (Galatians 6:9, NKJV). Due season, not this afternoon, not by two o'clock, in His timing. Jeremiah records God's own promise to the worn out, spoken to an exiled, exhausted people who had nothing left to offer Him in return for it. "For I have satiated the weary soul, and I have replenished every sorrowful soul" (Jeremiah 31:25, NKJV). Satiated, not scolded for needing it.
I put another block on the calendar for tomorrow, same time, same word. I do not know yet if I will keep it, but tonight I sat in the recliner for ten quiet minutes and let it be enough without justifying it to myself first. God is alive tonight, and He already knows exactly how tired you are, more accurately than your own body does. He has a plan for you that was never dependent on you staying productive enough to earn it, and He will never leave you to run on empty alone.
RedeemedExistence daily devotional — September 28, 2026
Scriptures used (NKJV): Matthew 11:28-29; Isaiah 40:28; Isaiah 40:31; Psalm 23:2; Exodus 33:14; John 15:5; 2 Corinthians 12:9; Galatians 6:9; Jeremiah 31:25.
I actually did it this time. I opened my calendar on Tuesday and blocked off twenty minutes at two in the afternoon, typed the word "rest" into the little box, and felt almost proud of myself for treating my own body like an appointment worth keeping. When two o'clock came, a notification popped up right on schedule, and I looked at it, looked at the three unanswered emails still sitting in my inbox, and clicked it away without a second thought. I told myself I would reschedule for tomorrow. I have told myself that most Tuesdays for longer than I want to admit.
I spent years running myself into the ground before I ever touched a drink, and then I spent more years using the drink to force my body to stop when nothing else would. That was its own kind of exhaustion management, crude and destructive, but at least it worked in the short term, at least it shut the engine off for a few hours. Eleven years sober now, and I have never fully replaced that shutoff switch with anything healthier. I just got better at pretending exhaustion is a problem I can out-schedule, that the right calendar block will finally convince a body and a mind that have been running on fumes for a decade that it is safe to stop moving.
What I have noticed, slower than I would like, is that I do not actually trust rest. Somewhere along the way I started treating tiredness as proof of usefulness, so that canceling my own nap felt less like a failure and more like evidence I was still needed. That is a strange thing to be proud of, being too depleted to sit still for twenty minutes, but pride finds a way into almost anything if you leave the door open long enough.
Jesus did not aim His invitation at people who had earned a break. He aimed it at people who were simply worn out. "Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest" (Matthew 11:28, NKJV). Labor and heavy laden, not accomplished and deserving. He goes further in the next verse, and this is the part I keep skipping past when I quote it too fast. "Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls" (Matthew 11:29, NKJV). A yoke is not a vacation. It is still work, still a harness, but shared with Someone whose own strength never runs low the way mine does.
Isaiah names that difference directly, and I need reminding of it more than I need another productivity trick. "Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the LORD, The Creator of the ends of the earth, Neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable" (Isaiah 40:28, NKJV). I faint. I get weary, often by early afternoon, sometimes by nine in the morning if the night before was rough. He does not, and the verses that follow are not addressed to the tireless, they are addressed to people exactly like me. "But those who wait on the LORD Shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint" (Isaiah 40:31, NKJV). The renewal comes from waiting on Him, not from a better-optimized calendar.
David's shepherd psalm has a line I used to read as scenery and now read as instruction. "He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters" (Psalm 23:2, NKJV). Makes me lie down. Sheep left to themselves will graze until they collapse, and the shepherd has to intervene, has to lead them somewhere quiet on purpose, because left alone they will not choose rest for themselves any more than I choose it when the notification pops up. And when Moses pleaded for God's presence to stay with a weary, wandering people, the answer he got was not a strategy. "And He said, 'My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest'" (Exodus 33:14, NKJV). Presence first. Rest as what follows it, not what precedes it.
Here is where my own planning always runs out of road, because I am genuinely good at scheduling and genuinely bad at actually stopping once the time arrives. Willpower can block a calendar square. It cannot make a depleted soul believe it is allowed to be still. Jesus described the only thing that actually produces that kind of fruit, and it was never effort. "I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing" (John 15:5, NKJV). Abiding is not one more task added to an already full day. It is staying attached long enough to stop generating my own strength and start drawing on His, the way a branch does nothing but hang on and still ends up heavy with fruit it never worked to produce.
Paul learned this from a weakness he begged God to remove and never got to lose. "And He said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness'" (2 Corinthians 12:9, NKJV). My strength was never going to be the sufficient thing. His grace already is, precisely in the places where I have nothing left. And He does not shame the tired for growing tired. "And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart" (Galatians 6:9, NKJV). Due season, not this afternoon, not by two o'clock, in His timing. Jeremiah records God's own promise to the worn out, spoken to an exiled, exhausted people who had nothing left to offer Him in return for it. "For I have satiated the weary soul, and I have replenished every sorrowful soul" (Jeremiah 31:25, NKJV). Satiated, not scolded for needing it.
I put another block on the calendar for tomorrow, same time, same word. I do not know yet if I will keep it, but tonight I sat in the recliner for ten quiet minutes and let it be enough without justifying it to myself first. God is alive tonight, and He already knows exactly how tired you are, more accurately than your own body does. He has a plan for you that was never dependent on you staying productive enough to earn it, and He will never leave you to run on empty alone.
RedeemedExistence daily devotional — September 28, 2026
Scriptures used (NKJV): Matthew 11:28-29; Isaiah 40:28; Isaiah 40:31; Psalm 23:2; Exodus 33:14; John 15:5; 2 Corinthians 12:9; Galatians 6:9; Jeremiah 31:25.
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