God Made Sabbath an Equipping Tool For Suffering
I waved goodbye to my husband and one-year-old son as I pulled out of the driveway. I was looking forward to a retreat with my Bible study group and desperately hoping this weekend away would spark some change. God was beginning to use my exhaustion to get my attention.
I had tried literally everything to heal our marriage, and nothing was working. Counseling, dates, lingerie, books, sermons, white-knuckling, prayer, community, retreats, classes, conferences, therapy, Bible study, friends, guy time for him, girl time for me. Every road led to a dead end. To quote Mark Buchanan, “All our doing had turned to undoing” (Rhythms of Rest, 11).
I had been praying God would bring revival and change to our marriage. More specifically, I hoped he would change me into the kind of wife my husband wanted. Instead, God intended to change me into the kind of daughter he wanted.
On the second day of the retreat, the Bible study leader held up a book as a giveaway. I saw the title and somehow knew I would win. I’m not claiming to be psychic, but something in me, maybe the Holy Spirit prompting, knew that I needed this book and that God would give it to me. (If I was wrong, I decided I’d buy it regardless.) My name got pulled out of the hat, and a book titled Rhythms of Rest by Shelly Miller was placed in my hands.
