August 2026

August at Bethany House of Prayer has traditionally been a “Sabbath” month.  As Bethany House’s ministry has always been in partnership with the Sisters of Saint Anne, that ministry has always benefitted from seasons of rest and rhythms of restoration that the Sisters model in their monastic life.

Much of the Christian world has lost touch with Sabbath as a spiritual practice.  Personally, I never considered Sabbath as an individual or communal practice until I took a class on spiritual practices in seminary.  Sabbath wasn’t part of any conversations in church that I remember growing up.

I’ve come to understand that there is something vital to taking seasons for replenishment in life and in ministry/service.  In a Resolution that passed at the United Church of Christ General Synod in 2021 called “Becoming a Church of Contemplatives in Action,” the Resolution speaks to the need for balance in our lives: 

“Contemplation without action fuels narcissism, and action without contemplation is a recipe for bitterness and spiritual depletion.”

In Wayne Muller’s Sabbath book, he points out that for persons of a certain generation, Sabbath had a very different feeling: “many of us chafe at the memory of such stringent Sabbath restrictions, and actually prefer to work rather than be forced to rest in such a dry and gloomy fashion.”  (p.31)

In the Old Testament, the prophet Isaiah speaks about Sabbath as a “delight.” (Isaiah 58)  That was a revelation to me!

When spiritual practices are held as requirements, they tend to lose the energy and power of their original intention.  They become “shoulds” we feel we have to do, rather than invitations that we can prayerfully consider and integrate, as we choose.  Held as an obligation for too long, Sabbath has felt legalistic and energy-draining, rather than freeing and life-giving. 

If Sabbath is about delight, how would our relationship to rest as a spiritual practice shift?  How might we bring more intentionality into our rhythms of connecting with God, others, and self?  MaryAnn McKibben Dana, who wrote Sabbath in the Suburbs, shares: “With a focus on delight, the invitation is to check oneself along the way: ‘Does what I’m doing right now bring delight?’ (p.32)

Dr. Dan Allender’s Sabbath book invites us into a similar paradigm shift, moving from Sabbath as rule to Sabbath as secret playground (p. x). 

Though it feels like the summer months are too quickly ebbing to a close, the invitation to a Sabbath practice is year-round.  We are invited into rest, because we remember that for all our action, we cannot change the world alone, certainly not by our own efforts alone.  So we, like Jesus, take time and step away from the crowds at regular intervals to commune with God, being replenished in body, mind, heart, and soul for the work of repairing the world.  As the Resolution says:

“Jesus’s public witness of creating inclusive community, exemplifying self-giving love and service, forming disciples, making peace and engaging in nonviolent resistance to the powers-that-be is all made possible because of his prayerful “union with the Father” (John 10:30). His life of integrated contemplation and action touches all aspects of Christian life individually and communally.”

This practice is simple, but not easy.  Like a gardener, it takes patience and sacred waiting.  As long-time Bethany House ministry partner Kathleen Hirsch says in her book A Sabbath Life, “this is why we need to honor the invisible work of the seasons in us.  We need our hours of quiet, invisible preparation, gathering the cell memories, the wisdom of the spirit, to see us through.” (p.178)

We are grateful to walk with you in these summer months, as we balance giving and receiving, contemplation and action, inner peace and outer peace.   May you find sacred balance in your own life, in the lives of the communities you serve, and may you know how grateful we are to accompany you on your journey of rest and prayerful action.

In peace and gratitude,

Rev. Matt Carriker and LaToya Staine Carriker