Category Archives: Sabbath

Mother Teresa’s Nobel Prize Winning Rhythm

In Stephen W. Smith’s recent book, Inside Job, he cites the Rule of Life Mother Teresa laid down for her nuns in their work among the sick and dying in Calcutta. It reads as follows: The Sisters shall spend 1 day in every week, 1 week in every month, 1 month in every year, 1 year in every 6 years in the Motherhouse, where in contemplation and penance together with solitude she can gather in the spiritual strength, which she might have used up in the service of the poor. (p. 344, Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light) Imagine 1 Sabbath day every week, 1 Sabbath week every month, 1 Sabbath month every year, and 1 Sabbath year every 7 years. What I like best about this is 1 Sabbath week every month! Every one of us ministers among the sick and dying. Yet we consistently underestimate how much emotional/spiritual life is flowing out from us.. Read more.

The EHS Course: Stories of Transformation

The EHS Course is now being used by hundreds of churches as their core way to introduce people to a deep, beneath the surface spirituality with Jesus so they in turn can transform the world. At New Life Fellowship, I recently led the course with about 125 people meeting in 14 small groups. Click below to watch a video of some of the stories we captured during the course: Consider preparing now to launch The EHS Course in your church this January. Go to https://www.emotionallyhealthy.org/the-ehs-course/ and lead your people into a deep formation in Jesus so they can impact the world for Him! The EHS Course: An introduction to a deep beneath the surface spirituality that transforms people who transform the world.

EH Leader Podcast:Practicing Sabbath Delight

What does it mean to lead out of your Sabbath? In this month’s Emotionally Healthy Leader Podcast, Pete Scazzero and Rich Villodas share their thoughts on Sabbath and its impact on their lives and leadership. Pete and Rich discuss Sabbath as a counter cultural concept and core spiritual formation discipline which has direct impact on how we lead. You can read more in depth on Sabbath and leadership in The Emotionally Healthy Leader book. Watch the conversation by clicking the image below. We encourage you to share with others.

4 Steps to a Meaningful Sabbath

All work — paid and unpaid — is good, but it needs to be boundaried by the practice of Sabbath. The problem with too many leaders is that we allow our work to trespass on every other area of life, disrupting the balanced rhythm of work and rest God created for our good. Sabbath is a twenty-four-hour block of time in which we stop work, enjoyrest, practice delight, and contemplate God. 1. Stop. Sabbath is first and foremost a day when we cease all work — paid and unpaid. On the Sabbath we embrace our limits. We let go of the illusion that we are indispensable to the running of the world. We recognize we will never finish all our goals and projects, and that God is on the throne, managing quite well in ruling the universe without our help. 2. Rest. Once we stop, we accept God’s invitation to rest. God rested after. Read more.

EH Leader Podcast: Slowing Down for Loving Union

In this episode of the Emotionally Healthy Leader Podcast Pete Scazzero and Rich Villodas discuss slowing down from our busy schedules, lives and “doing” for God to actually be with God. This conversation comes out of Pete’s most recent book The Emotionally Healthy Leader. To watch the conversation click the YouTube video below or to listen click on the podcast button: EHS Podcast on iTunes

Turning Vacations into Sabbaticals

Each of us takes a vacation every year, for one, two, three, or more weeks. The problem, however, is that we take on the culture’s view of “vacations,” treating them simply as days off away from work. Let me suggest a larger biblical perspective, one that sees them as Sabbatical gifts from the Lord our God. Once Geri and I began to do so 12 years ago, it completely transformed the way we prepared and planned. We began to receive our vacations as annual gifts from God that resembled the ancient Jew’s participation in the festivals of their day (the three national feasts of Pentecost, Booths, and Passover). We simply applied the four characteristics that defined our weekly twenty-four-hour Sabbaths – stopping work, enjoying rest, practicing delight, and contemplating God – to our vacations. Remember, the purpose of all earthly life and matter is to lead us to communion with God. The entire cosmos. Read more.

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