How can ‘rhythms of seven’ help your church?

Everyone doing ministry in your church needs a three-month break every seven years or so.

This includes your minister, elders or PCC, ministry leaders, youth team and Sunday School teachers. Why? Because the Bible commends it, and it is good for us.

1. The Biblical foundation for rest

First, the Bible commends it. When Jesus asked His friends to ‘Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest’ (Mark 6:32), He was speaking from a heart shaped by His upbringing. At any point in His younger life, He was looking forward to a rest every seventh day, and on the three major religious festivals in the year; and every seven years there was a Sabbath year when the land was to rest. For sure, there would be seasons like seedtime and harvest when everyone was working flat out, but the law of God (an expression of His grace) would force people to stop. That rhythm of sevens seems baked in to our psychology and these patterns in Scripture carry a simple message for all of us – do the same!

2. It's good to be rested, refocused, renewed

Second, it’s good for you. Every seven years the land had a rest. The seventh-year rest was known in Hebrew as ‘shmita’, which means release. It was a rest for the land, but it was also a change of pace and purpose for the people. Their workaday focus on cultivation shifted to gathering and eating what the land produced without their help.

This is the core value of a sabbatical for a Christian leader; the pace and purpose of their work changes so that they may be rested, refocused and renewed. For an extended season that leader stops sowing, weeding, reaping and threshing. Their focus shifts entirely to gathering, building up a savings account of material they can draw on in their future ministry.

We are God’s creatures, and this is how we are designed to function. Try not getting that seventh-day rest for a sustained period of time and you will suffer psychologically or physically. We have different festivals, and different holidays, but the principle is the same, they are there for our good.

The idea of a sabbatical is so powerful that secular organisations are beginning to embrace it. In his lovely book, Recovery, the lost art of convalescence, Gavin Francis, an Edinburgh GP, writes:

‘In my own GP practice, my colleagues and I have formalised a compromise into our contracts as a three-month break every five years. I return from my own sabbaticals relaxed, reinspired, and energised by the time away. I can’t rewrite my patients’ employment contracts to make sure that they can access sabbaticals, but I do encourage them to find ways to try.’

Along with Paul Coulter of Living Leadership, I have spent a lot of the last year talking with people in Christian ministry about their sabbaticals and writing a Sabbatical Toolkit, which is now available from the Living Leadership website. Our passion is to enable people in ministry to keep going and enjoy serving the Lord. We see these rhythms of seven as essential for effective Christian work. Why not raise this issue with your leaders and start thinking together about how the life of your fellowship may be enriched and its impact enhanced, not by working harder but by learning to rest?

Achieve more by doing less and doing it better. To do this you all need a sabbatical!