How to Restore Your Soul
How is your soul in this season? The body was not created to sustain long seasons of stress without having our adrenaline replenished. Some people thrive on adrenaline and confuse it with grace. I have been guilty of that. But eventually, adrenaline runs out. “Depression and anxiety are commonly associated with adrenal exhaustion” (Tania Flack). It's very important during seasons of high stress that we are taking time to make place for the Holy Spirit to restore our souls.
GOD IS A GOOD SHEPHERD
The picture in Psalm 23 shows a Shepherd who loves the sheep. Unlike goats, sheep are utterly dependent upon the shepherd. Having been to Scotland a few times, I have seen stressful sheep. I am obsessed with taking pictures of them, and they tend to panic and run away if I get too close. I stress them out. But a good Shepherd knows how to restore the sheep's soul. He makes them lie down in green pastures and beside still waters. God is a good shepherd.
I believe what God is trying to say through Psalm 23 is that we need to take time to be with the Shepherd so that our souls can be restored. And sometimes that can be actual green pastures and still waters, or a walk in nature, or climbing a mountain. But it can also be sitting silent for 30 minutes and focusing on God or spending a weekend in a monastery or retreat center.
The word for restore in Ps. 23 in Hebrew is yishovav ישובב from the root shuv, “return.” To return one’s soul is to bring it back to where it was pre-stress. The NIV says, “He refreshes my soul.” Scholar David Stern translates that as “he restores my inner person.”
SOUL WOUNDS NEED TIME TO HEAL
What we don't understand is that our soul can suffer wounds just like our body can. That's what my therapist told me this week when I told him that I was depressed. (Yes, I go to a born-again therapist, and he's super helpful.) For instance, imagine you’re exercising, and you pull a muscle in your back. You wake up the next day, and your back is in pain. What do you do? You rest your back, and it gets better.
In the same way, when we are in high-intensity, highly stressful situations—for example, a confrontation with someone that you once highly respected…and it gets heated. And it's public. That takes a toll on your soul. Some people get energized by such interactions. But even those people will eventually hit a wall.
In the same way that you ice your back, take some Advil, and rest until your back is better, we take our souls before the Lord for refreshing. If not, your soul will not be restored. For me, that means going out to my balcony and looking at the Mediterranean Sea, meditating on Scripture, and reminding myself that at the end of the day, I'm just a lamb who needs a Shepherd (not to be confused with Julia Roberts telling Hugh Grant, “I’m just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking him to love her.” sorry...).
SOUL TOLL
So yes, this whole situation has taken a toll on my soul. And I hit a wall earlier this week, which was my body or my soul telling me it's time to get restored, to retreat. It's unhealthy to go to bed stressed out and then wake up and start fighting. Or to read an email before I have spent time with God where somebody is rebuking me—someone I respect. One of the things I try to do every morning is make sure that I have spent time with God before checking email, WhatsApp, etc. I want to go to the green grass and the still waters before engaging with this world and all of its stress.
John Mark Comer speaks of the need for the "balance between structure and spontaneity, or in more mythological language, chaos and order.” So, in high-stress situations, in order to maintain our sense of peace with God, we need to intentionally take time to move away from that stress (or chaos) and into an ordered, structured time with God. I had to do that this week, and it was amazing. As I stepped out of the high-stress situation and dedicated focused time with the Shepherd, he ministered to my every need. After two days I was able to reengage. But before that, my energy was almost depleted.
THE DAILY OFFICE
And then, throughout the day, it's essential to check out of the race and check in with God. This was called the ‘daily office,’ coming from the Benedictine Rule of Life (500s). I got that from Pete Scazzero's Emotionally Healthy Spirituality, which I highly recommend. It comes from the monastic life, which was highly scheduled. David worshipped seven times a day (Ps. 119:164). Daniel prayed three times a day. The monks checked in with God eight times a day. “All these people realized that stopping for the Daily Office to be with God is the key to creating a continual and easy familiarity with God’s presence the rest of the day.”[1] You see if we are attending to the presence of God throughout the day, we won't come to that place of crashing where we experienced a soul wound. God will be attending to our soul throughout the day, every day.
Of course, that is a standard that I have not yet been able to keep up. But I do not live in condemnation. I just keep learning and moving forward. The key is to listen to your body and soul when it tells you to get by the still waters and allow him to refresh, return or restore your soul. Shabbat Shalom!
WARNING: I want to be clear. We all know what it's like to be told we must wake up at 5 AM and pray if we want to fulfill the call of God on our lives or have the right spouse. That is not what I'm talking about here. There is no condemnation. All that does is add stress to our lives. It's driving, and it doesn't come from the grace of God. I'm talking about a lifestyle that simply makes a place for the Holy Spirit to enter in and touch our souls. It is very different from the highly pressurized system of constantly challenging people to pray harder, longer, etc. That is not how shepherds lead their sheep. When I sat outside on my balcony, looking at the Mediterranean Sea this morning, I did not feel any pressure. It was just a joy to focus on the presence of God. The shepherd rod is indeed a weapon, but not one that he uses on his sheep, but rather wolves.
[1] Scazzero, Peter. Emotionally Healthy Spirituality: It's Impossible to Be Spiritually Mature, While Remaining Emotionally Immature (p. 146). (Function). Kindle Edition.
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