Breaking the Routine: Reclaiming Rest

Before anything beautiful grows, there is a season of unseen work. The soil must be broken. The seeds must be planted. And then comes the waiting, the watering, the weeding, the trusting. Our hearts are no different. Sometimes God has to break our routine so He can tend to the soil of our lives.

The other day, I dropped my phone. The moment it hit the ground, I knew my screen had shattered. I let out a huge sigh because I didn’t want a broken screen to shatter the rest of my day. Lately, I’ve been moving at such a fast pace that if one thing goes wrong, I’m ready to throw the whole day away.

Have you ever noticed how one bad thought or distraction can set the tone for your entire day?

Sure enough, I picked up my phone and the glass was cracked into pieces. I kept trying to use it, but the more I swiped and typed, the more those tiny broken pieces started cutting my finger.

And that’s when God showed me something: the shattered pieces I tried to ignore on my phone were like the shattered pieces I sometimes ignore in my own life. I didn’t even stop to assess the damage of my phone. I just assumed it would be okay and I could keep on with my same routine. I planned on getting it fixed eventually. But the more I tried to use my phone, the more those little pieces began to irritate my fingers. It made me question: was I ever going to stop and assess the damage of what my routine was doing to me?

That’s the truth for all of us, if we don’t stop, those little broken pieces from past hurts, disappointments, and distractions will keep showing up, chipping at us, causing small wounds, until we look up and wonder, When did it get this bad? We have to get to a point where we stop to rest and assess the damage, physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

I failed to mention that I was in a car accident on Labor Day weekend. And only now, two weeks later, am I really feeling what happened in my body. I didn’t rest enough to assess the damage that had been done. I couldn’t help but feel like my shattered screen was now a reflection of me and I couldn’t ignore that it reflected my unhealthy routines. After that realization, I decided to take my time to slow down and allow my body and mind to heal. You see, slowing down feels unproductive, but it isn’t. Slowing down is God’s invitation to rest, reset, and break our bad routines.

Our unhealthy routines can take our mind, body, and spirit captive, and we have to do our part to reclaim them. When I need to rest, the Holy Spirit brings me back to one of my favorite chapters to meditate on, Psalm 91. It’s been known to bring peace in times of warfare. We may not be in physical warfare, but we are certainly in spiritual warfare. For women especially, our minds and hearts can often feel like a battlefield.

Have you ever felt overwhelmed by the noise of social media, like it’s consuming your thoughts, the distractions, the stress, the anxiety?

If that’s you, rest is a posture we must reclaim by resting to reset. Rest is warfare against exhaustion, distraction, and noise. The enemy tries to unsettle our minds because if our minds are shaken, our hearts follow, affecting our faith, prayer life, relationships, and even our families. But here’s the truth: we don’t fight fair fights—our fight has already been fixed! We serve a God who has already declared victory over every distraction and every battle in our lives.

Psalm 91:1–2 reads: “Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.’” In the midst of spiritual warfare, how can we rest in God? I dug deeper into the names of God in these verses. The psalmist calls Him El Elyon — God Most High, possessor of heaven and earth. If He possesses it all, He possesses your situation too. He is El Shaddai — The Almighty, more than enough, the promise keeper. He is also Yahweh — I Am Who I Am. Not just a God who has power, but the God who is Power.

So here’s my question: which name of God do you need to lean on in this next season? The God who holds you, the God who provides, or the God who simply is everything you need?

Resting in God doesn’t mean the battle stops, it means you stop carrying it in your own strength.

If you feel like grief, loss, or distraction has buried you, remember this: before anything beautiful grows, there is a season of unseen work. Seeds only grow when they’re buried. But with God, burial doesn’t mean the end, it’s the beginning of new life. What feels broken or buried can become the very soil where God grows something new in you.

So as you step into this next season, may you reclaim rest as your posture, lean on the God who is everything you need, and trust that He is working in the unseen soil of your life.