“I thought you were dead.” That’s what my friend said when I finally returned her call.

Not dead, but in paradise—sort of.

Years ago, when I unexpectedly found myself teaching first grade, I landed in both an inferno (due to my inexperience in classroom management) and a paradise as I reveled in God’s Word and God’s world with a delightful and rambunctious class. The curriculum included learning the continents, so we tramped across North America—walking on the floor of the Arctic Sea to gather mussels when the tide was out, tromping with Paul Bunyan to form the Great Lakes, and acting out Central American folktales. We trekked through South America—delighting in the Amazon rainforest and giggling through Peruvian trickster tales. We traversed Europe—swimming the English Channel with Gertrude Ederle and doing Italian Commedia dell’arte with an Italian actress. We picnicked in Kenya, shopped at a market in Nigeria, and pulled a lion’s tail in Ethiopia. We hiked the Great Wall of China and read stories written entirely in haiku. We went on a walkabout with wombats and danced the didgeridoo. We spent a day as Antarctic penguins.

I was so used to running through my school days that I made the mistake of telling one of my students to run down the hall to see the newly hatched chicks from the second-grade embryology studies. As he stood to obey me, he sweetly asked, “Did you mean walk?” (Obviously, he was not the student who cartwheeled across the classroom before I could fly to stop the shenanigans.)

Although there was rarely a minute for lunch, I feasted on Christ as I fasted through my days. One of the highlights of my time in first grade was presenting the feast of grace from the book of Romans. To my delight, the children were riveted by its message. We long-time Christians sometimes fall asleep to its power, but my first graders loved playing with dynamite. 

When I was desperate to calm my class, I simply began retelling a story. They loved The Selfish Giant, especially the part when the little boy, who melted the giant’s hard heart and brought spring in the midst of winter, stretched out his nail-scarred hands, and said, “You let me play once in your garden, to-day you shall come with me to my garden, which is Paradise.” As a teacher, I worked in partnership with God to create a garden for my students, with the prayer that they would play in God’s garden forever.

One day, I woke with a startle and flew out of bed. It was 7 AM. I calculated how quickly I could pull myself together and run to school before my first graders began filling my classroom, my day, and my heart. Then I remembered. It was Sunday—my day of rest.

Sabbath rest is a shadow (Colossians 2:17); Christ is the body that casts the shadow. So, as we run through our busy days, we do so in his shadow of his rest. Because Christ has finished his work, we work from his rest. Whatever garden God has called you to work and keep, may you rest in him even amid the thorns and thistles of the Fall. May you work in partnership with the Spirit, yoked to the Christ who calls, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:28-30).