Wisdom Wednesday: Restless Hearts

Readings for two of my classes this week overlapped in an unintended way. In each class we read this classic quote from Augustine:

“You have made us for Yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in You.”

We need rest. We need the joy, the peace, and the flourishing found in and through rest. So much these days stands in the way of rest. We have work, home, and other responsibilities. The constant barrage of various forms of media relentlessly knocks on the door of our hearts for attention. Rather than setting limits around media, rather than humbly accepting our limits as finite and dependent creatures in the different domains of our lives, we often commit to more than is good for us and those we love.

Augustine has an answer for this, too. His view is that we need to have rightly ordered loves in order to rest in God. If we love God first, then the other good things in life will ultimately be put in their proper place. Love for God, with our heart, soul, mind, and strength, informs not only what else to love, but how much to love it. Family, friends, work, hobbies, entertainment, the created order - all of life - is put in its proper place as we focus our attention and efforts on loving God. We can’t do this alone. We aren’t meant to do this alone. But do it we must. Rest, true rest for our souls, is waiting.