Confession: I’ve become scheduled Susie, checklist Charlie. I study color-coated calendars and rearrange blocks of time in hopes the next day will run more smoothly than the last. This is what it takes to be me.

But for the Fourth of July I landed at my husband’s parents’ ranch. Unscheduled. Unplanned. Unbelievably good for all of us.

The Fourth gave me permission to stop time and make a huge priority out of watching my boys play in the field.

I kept wondering why I was so calm.

“I don’t care who you are,” Papa said one morning over steaming coffee while cows mulled in the field, “Everyone needs rejuvenation.”

Hammock strung between two trees, walks long and languid, feet-up-face-to-the-horizon, fan whirling, dirt bikes whirring, birds squirreling, flag-flapping, strewn afternoons and sweet morning rises, and we are all refreshed and made new in the play and in the quiet.

You need play. You need quiet.

You need strings of stillness — that do not include to-dos and time scheduled to a T.

Every time my brain wanted to think to-do lists and calendars, my spirit said, “Rest.” Wasn’t this a command?

So here’s my advice: whether you are taking an official “vacation” this year or not — take one.

Take the rest. Seek peace and pursue it (Psalm 34:14).

Rest is good for your weary heart, friend — for I know you are weary.

Stillness is found when you pursue it.

Look for the landscape that stills your soul, and linger there.

Listen to the crickets, the whir of the fan, the music that centers you. Chase the sunset, the dragonfly.

There are some mountains we move by waiting.

As He says in His Word, “Be still, and know that I am God” (Ps 46:10). Even in the midst of the deepest trial, we can put our feet up on the dock and trust that He will accomplish His purposes for us.

He knows.

He carries you, and He is intimately familiar with all your tribulation, more than anyone around you.

To be still is to know that He is God and we are not — that although we long for solutions and answers to our pressing needs, if we just place the tangled knot of worries and fears into His hands, He’s got it.

He’s got it.

Find your retreat: seek peace and pursue it.

Center yourself in being away from it all–  and take it in like fresh clean water only He can give.

You need rest, and rest is good!

Enjoy Summer!