Take a Vacation!

Right after the big celebration (of Trinity UM Church’s 100th anniversary – read all about it in the July newsletter available on the Trinity website), I went on two weeks of vacation. That’s why you haven’t seen anything new here for a while. Now I’m back, and raring to go!

Vacation! Is there any lovelier word in the English language? (Of course there are – love, commitment, sacrifice , and many others – but that’s for another time.)

If you read the Old Testament right you’ll understand that God commanded his people to take vacations. Not just the Sabbath, the one day in seven when God instructs us not to work. We all need to take that seriously, and if more of us did, I personally believe we’d all be a lot healthier, in spirit and mind as well as body. But God actually commands his people to take vacations.

God set aside nineteen days a year as feast days. As described in Leviticus 23, these were essentially national holidays. Two of them, the Feast of Unleavened Bread and the Feast of Tabernacles, were a week long. The others were one-day feasts. These holidays, scattered throughout the year, were specifically set aside for eating and celebrating, like Thanksgiving. Besides eating, during the week-long feast of Tabernacles, the people were specifically instructed to go camping! God understood the importance of getting away from our normal surroundings if we are to really experience mental refreshment.

We are not ancient Hebrews, so we are not subject to those particular laws. But we are God's people, so the principle applies. It is important to take time away.

We went to Shenandoah and Monticello, and visited our son Jeremiah and his family in West Virginia. It was a wonderful time. We talked, we ate, we explored, we played games, we just relaxed and spent time together. It was great. And we all came back feeling refreshed.

So if you haven’t taken a vacation yet this year – and I mean a real vacation, one that gets you someplace else for at least a few days, even if it means mooching off relatives to do it – get out there and vacate! After all, it’s in the Bible.