Ep 130: Rested and Relaxed

Brian explores one of Jesus’ most surprising traits—how deeply relaxed He is—and why that matters for deep discipleship.

Building on this season’s portrait of Jesus (emotionally secure, living as the Beloved, relationally shrewd, just, and gentle), Brian shows how Jesus moves calmly through storms, conflict, and pressure without losing agency or love.

The invitation? If we’re becoming like Jesus, we’ll grow in that same inner ease—rested, present, and at peace.

Instead of rewriting the past or controlling the future, we practice living in the present, so our hearts loosen their grip and rest in God. It’s not emotionless; it’s anchored. As we receive our identity as the Beloved, we learn to relax from the inside out—even when life isn’t.

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TRANSCRIPTION

Rested and Relaxed like Jesus

Today, we’re going to explore one of Jesus’ most fascinating characteristics – the fact that He is so… relaxed. 

When theologian Dallas Willard was asked to describe Jesus in a word, he said: “Relaxed. When we see Jesus, we don’t see someone in a rush.”

The main purpose of Soil & Roots is to encourage us to become people of depth, or what we call “deep disciples.” A deep disciple is someone who is increasingly awake or attuned to God, others, themselves, and the world around them, including creation and culture.  In other words, someone who is increasingly like Jesus. 

Another way to see it is that our purpose is to help resolve The Great Omission – the fact that modern Christianity talks about making disciples but struggles to do so. It finds it difficult to help people become more like Jesus from the inside out – thinking, acting, relating, and loving more like Him. 

As philosopher Dallas Willard claimed, we live in an age where it seems entirely possible to be a Christian but not a disciple.  Certainly, if everyone who claimed to be a Christian were a disciple, the world would be a much different place, and the kingdom would come that much quicker.

So, the solution to The Great Omission is deep discipleship. 

This season, we are grappling with a critical question in our spiritual journey: if we are to become more like Jesus, what does He look like? Who is He?  What is the object of our formation?

Jesus So Far…

We could try to answer these questions by looking at passages like the fruits of the Spirit or the beatitudes. These are, after all, qualities of Jesus. 

Instead, we’ve chosen to examine aspects of Jesus by observing Him in the Gospels, rather than simply reading instructional texts.  We’ve watched Him as He talks with His Father, and He interacts with people, healing, instructing, engaging, and expressing Himself.  It’s been a fascinating journey so far.

We discovered that Jesus is the most emotionally secure person in human history.  He operates from such a firm, rock-solid sense of identity.  Then we observed how Jesus navigates life through His experience of being the Beloved.  He exists in the love of His Father.  He rests in it, operates from it, and extends it to those around Him. It’s remarkable.

We also discovered that Jesus is hardly a straightforward communicator.  He is often paradoxical, vexing, puzzling, and mysterious.  He’s nuanced and sometimes subversive.

That led us to conclude that Jesus is relationally shrewd. He doesn’t give His heart and trust to everyone. He discerns and understands the intentions of our hearts. He customizes the way He relates to people based on their motives and desires. He knows when someone is humble, and He knows when someone is trying to use Him. Jesus never loses His agency. He remains in complete control, even as He heads to the cross. 

Jesus judges.  He always does so from a position of love, but that doesn’t mean He isn’t very direct and sometimes purposefully offensive.  He makes decisions, He evaluates hearts, He calls a spade a spade (or a brood of vipers a brood of vipers).  He is emotionally free – He expresses joy, encouragement, happiness, grief, frustration, anger, wit, and sadness. 

And He is gentle.  He purposefully restrains His power often to extend empathy, compassion, mercy, and grace. Just think about the woman caught in adultery, or the fact that He indeed could have called down legions of angels to destroy His enemies as He endured the cross, but chose otherwise. 

And Jesus appears remarkably relaxed. He isn’t in a hurry, isn’t stressed, and isn’t dwelling on the past or obsessing about the future.  He is exceptionally calm with few exceptions.

So, if we are to become like Jesus, do we find ourselves becoming more like Him in these areas?

Are we emotionally secure?  Do we rest in our identity even if people don’t like us, or if we aren’t popular, or if we aren’t people pleasing?  Are we okay even when those around us aren’t?

Do we exist in the reality of being the Beloved? Do we wake up and go to bed experiencing God’s love and delight in us?  We may intellectually agree with that, but do our hearts follow suit?  Do we feel safe in God’s universe, regardless of where we are and what we’re doing?

Are we relationally shrewd? Do we always give a response to a question, or are there times when we follow Jesus’s example—answering a question with a question? Refusing to give up our hearts or information when not healthy?  Only giving our inner selves away when we decide it’s best and right, versus when someone else demands it?

Are we self-aware judges?  We all make determinations and conclusions every day – do we do so by first examining ourselves?

Are we gentle?  We all have some measure of power.  Do we carefully restrain it, maybe in our words or actions, when God calls us to be gentle?

And are we relaxed? Or do we suffer from some sense of inner anxieties, fears, and a need to control circumstances and people?

R&R

Obviously, I’m attempting to paint a picture of the inner life of a deep disciple that probably differs from what we might assume.  We find Jesus to be a person who is entirely at home with Himself because He is entirely at home with His Father, and that is precisely the type of life that God intends for us. Not just when we’re dead, but right now.  This is the abundant life; the perfect peace He offers us.

So, let’s take a look at what it means to be relaxed, to be at peace, to be at rest – even when life is none of those things.

A simple read through the Gospels reveals a Jesus who is at peace and in control wherever he is.  When the boat He and His disciples are on is being tossed and turned on turbulent seas, where is Jesus? Perfectly sound asleep. 

For most of us, it’s a bit hard to imagine what it might be like to be accosted by someone who is possessed by a demon.  I don’t watch horror movies, but I’ve seen a few scenes of exorcisms and people being attacked by evil spirits.  It’s Hollywood, but it seems like it might be pretty scary.  How does Jesus respond?  A simple word here, a command there. He directly and firmly casts away demons while caring for their victims.

When do people laugh at Him?  He responds and goes about His business.  When they seek to kill Him? He avoids their attempts, slips away, and continues His mission.  When huge crowds have no food? He creates it out of nothing.  When are His disciples perpetually worried? Sometimes He gets on their case, and sometimes He comforts them.

When the religious elite demand answers or a sign? He calmly tells them no. Or He deftly outthinks them.

He doesn’t seem very relaxed when He is turning the tables in the temple, though He is self-controlled. And He is deeply agitated and distressed in the Garden of Gethsemane. But it appears that, as soon as Jesus acknowledges His father’s will to go to the cross, He sets His face in that direction with determination and poise.  His conversations with Pilate and His betrayers indicate someone of sound mind, emotional control, and conviction. 

Overall, Jesus just seems at ease with Himself, God, and others, and when “the others” are out of control. 

Is that sort of restful, relaxed spirit even attainable for those of us who aren’t God?

The Critical Journey

Several seasons ago, we looked at a book called The Critical Journey. It theorizes that the discipleship adventure can be broken down into six stages.  The modern church well covers the first three. As we discovered, the last three are rarely explored or explained, yet those stages are what we here refer to as deep discipleship.

Here are the six stages: being introduced to God, learning about Him, engaging in service, the inward journey (which includes “the wall”), the outward journey, and a life of love.

A deep disciple intentionally moves with Jesus toward this life of love – stage 6. A deep person is usually somewhere in stages 4, 5, or 6. This is not a value judgment – people in stages 1, 2, and 3 have the same worth – they simply haven’t yet experienced the caverns and cervices of an inner life with God.  

Just listen to how the book’s authors describe someone who lives in Stage 6 and see if we recognize the type of inner, relaxed state we are exploring.

“The life of love is easily summarized. At this stage, we reflect God to others in the world more clearly and consistently than we ever thought possible. We let our lights shine in such a way that God is given the credit and the thanks.  When we reach stage 6, we have lost ourselves in the equation, and at the same time, we have truly found ourselves. We are selfless. This factor allows us to do the most extraordinary things.  We may figuratively wash other people’s feet or give our very lives in the service of God (at times that means we die to self; at times it has meant and can mean that we die literally). We are at peace with ourselves, fully conscious of being the person God has created us to be. 

Our times alone with God come during the quiet times away as well as in the everyday, unceasing conversations.  We have little ambition to be well-known, rich, successful, noteworthy, goal-oriented, or spiritual.

When at stage 6, we still experience pain or shock, it tires or angers us, but we can simultaneously experience God’s grace, humor, and comfort in the midst of it all.  We do not fear pain, trauma, disappointments, or even death, because God is there to provide and to lead us on.”

It’s essential to sit with this for a while, because what the authors describe is so counter to what we assume a deeply spiritual person is in Western Christianity.  “We have lost ourselves in the equation, but truly found ourselves. We are selfless.” “We have little ambition for being well known, rich, successful, noteworthy, goal-oriented, or spiritual.”             

That one sentence bucks against much of what we find in culture and in the church.  Little ambition for being well-known, rich, successful, or spiritual? 

“We do not fear pain, trauma, disappointments, or even death, but God is there to provide and to lead us on.”

In other words, we are relaxed. We are resting. We are at peace.  This isn’t a once-in-a-while experience-it’s how we live from the inside out. 

Is this even possible?

White Flag

You may recall that we talked all about the Forgotten Kingdom in Season 4. The kingdom of darkness can often be described with words that begin with “de.” Destroy, desecrate, demean, death, denigrate, degenerate, devolve. 

The Kingdom of Light can often be described with words that begin with “re.” Redeem, recreate, reconcile, resurrection, renew, and so forth. It’s no wonder that this characteristic of Jesus, relaxed, also starts with “re.”

Dr. Tim wrote most of the episodes for this season, but I decided to take this one on myself. Although he couldn’t help but weigh in, he did what he always does – he started looking up words and definitions. 

He wrote, “The English word ‘relax’ derives from the Latin ‘relaxare,’ which means ‘to loosen, stretch, or widen again.” Originally, it had a transitive meaning (like ‘relax your grip’), but it later adopted its current meaning of rest and relaxation in the 20th century. 

There’s a lot of figurative overlap here with letting God stretch us, loosening our tight hold on certain things, and being “re”-laxed—made flexible again—or calm, centered, and at peace, just as we were in the Garden and are meant to be still.”

And so, Tim guides us to the heart of the Tootsie Pop. A person whose inner life is relaxed, calm, peaceful, and restful is someone who habitually loosens their grip. They let go. In other words…they surrender. 

The Present as a Present

And so we come to the tough stuff – the fact that the most relaxed, calm, purposeful people are those who aren’t attempting to wrestle control from God, others, or themselves. 

The word “surrender” isn’t always used in a favorable sense today.  The losing team surrenders to the winning team.  The losing faction in a war surrenders to the winning faction.  Surrender is often portrayed as the failure to conquer the more powerful foe.

But in this case, surrender is actually life-giving, not life-stealing.  It means we have joined the winning side, from the inside out. 

So what does this concept of surrender look like?

We could dedicate several episodes to exploring what it means to surrender as we pursue an inner life of relaxation, calm, and purpose.

And I want to be careful here, because the phrase “surrender” or “surrender our hearts to God” is often used to describe conversion.  We surrender our hearts to Jesus and ask Him to forgive us.

But I’m not talking about a one-and-done event that may or may not lead us to become more like Jesus.  I’m referring to a lifestyle of surrender that leads to perfect peace and an abundant life. 

Here’s one practical example.  A life of surrender means we don’t attempt to rewrite the past or control the future.  A relaxed person lives in the present.

Now this seems obvious, considering we all live in the present.  But do we really live in the present?

Albert Haas writes, “The vast majority of us suffer from amnesia of the present.  We think that the real action is somewhere else.  Some of us have lost touch with the present moment because we prefer to live in the past.  We are forever mulling over yesterday – regretting it, analyzing it, or glorifying it with nostalgia.  Sentimentality, regret, and guilt are the prices we pay when we live yesterday today. 

Others of us are always jumping ahead to the future: anxious about next weekend, planning next month, wondering about next year.  With antacids in our pockets and ulcers in our stomachs, we race toward tomorrow.  Anxiety and worry are the prices we pay when we leave the home of the present moment and try to live in tomorrow today.”

Let’s take a look at his descriptive words again.  Someone who lives in the past experiences sentimentality, regret, and guilt. Someone living in tomorrow experiences anxiety and worry. 

But someone who lives in the present is at home.  Home is where it’s safe and secure.  Home is where we rest, relax, and become calm. It’s familiar.

Where do we find Jesus living?  Is he obsessed with the past, or is he attempting to control the future? On the contrary, He is deeply present and deeply attuned to the people and events right now.  Sure, He brings up stories from the past and occasionally predicts the future – but He doesn’t live there.  He is perfectly content with where he is right now.

Back to the Future

Like some of you, I am very well acquainted with attempting to rewrite the past and control the future.  There are whole swaths of American culture designed to draw us and keep us in both places.  It might be beneficial to visit both places, but don’t plan on staying overnight.

I’ve spent more hours than I can count going back and reliving conversations or exchanges I’ve had in attempts to perform better, win an argument, or pick up on something I had missed.  And I spend time in the future attempting to control factors over which I have no control.  Why?  Because I want to be safe or financially secure. I want to remove risk, avoid pain, or stay clear of suffering.

The underlying idea is that I have the power to change the past or control the future. Of course, I have no such power.  Why, then, do I waste my time and energy living in two places that actually don’t exist? 

The answer is, of course, that I don’t trust God and others nearly as much as I think I do. 

Think of a four-year-old little girl.  Does she worry about yesterday, or does she attempt to control tomorrow?  No.  Because she lives in the simple trust that her caregivers will be around and take care of her.  She is, in fact, surrendered to the reality of the present. 

Children are delightfully exceptional at living in the present.  It’s not until we become older that we screw it all up.  I suppose that may be why children have a lock on the Kingdom of God.

But can we get it back?  Can we return to a child-like state of surrender, of trusting that God is taking care of the past and future, and that we don’t have to?  Can we become people who receive the present as a present, and find ourselves present and attuned to whomever we are with and whatever we are doing, right now?

Becoming the Beloved

The answer is yes, though we find ourselves returning to the first few episodes of this season. We let go of the past and the future, staying relaxed in the present, just as Jesus, as we increasingly experience life as sons and daughters of God. As we accept Jesus’ invitation to be the Beloved. 

Again, this is not simply an intellectual statement – it is a state of being.

We should also note that being relaxed and calm is not a perpetual state. I’m talking about a general state.  Jesus was angry when he overturned the tables and deeply troubled in the Garden.  Paul has moments of profound anxiety and stress and may have suffered from a nervous breakdown. 

It also doesn’t mean we become unemotional. I’ve argued before that the deeper we become, the deeper we may feel.  As we become increasingly like Jesus, we feel what He feels, and He feels the widest array of human emotions. 

If we return to our toddler example, the typical child expresses a dizzying array of emotions – sometimes all at once. But chances are they aren’t obsessing about the past or attempting to control the future when they go down for a nap.  And their general disposition is one of absolute trust in their caregivers.  They may have moments of stress and anxiety, but their underlying character is one of surrender and trust. For some of us, it’s the opposite – our underlying character is one of rumination and control with occasional moments of relaxation and trust.

A child in a healthy family lives in the reality of being relationally secure.  They experience it in their hearts, in their bones.  They unconsciously know they are safe and secure and can therefore relax. 

God has provided us with an unlimited number of ways to experience this type of relational security with Him, and, not surprisingly, many of them align with how we experience rest and secure attachment with other people. So, in whose presence do I feel calm, listened to, and cared for?  How does that person treat me? How do they experience me that makes me feel this way? What about them helps me feel a sense of relational safety?

Perhaps it’s the way this person seems to delight in you. They are just happy to be with you. Maybe it’s the way they carefully pay attention to your words and your heart. Maybe it’s the fact that they always seem to be available to you.  They pick up the phone when you call.  When you need something, they are there.  Whether you’re laughing, crying, ranting, raving, thanking, asking, or lamenting, they just seem to show up and care for you.

Practicing the Present

How might God be inviting you to experience those same things with Him?  Certainly, your well-attuned friend is one way that God is relating to you. What are some other ways?  A psalm?  A nature walk?  Something you read, or eat, or experience throughout your day?

In what ways might God be inviting you to experience His relational security so that we can become more relaxed in our inner lives? Even when our lives are not that relaxed.

Here’s one last idea.  I’ve discovered that living in the present, not dwelling on the past, and not attempting to control the future, is something to be practiced. It doesn’t come naturally for many of us once we get into our teens and twenties.

First, we practice metacognition – we think about what we think about.  When we find ourselves dwelling on the past or having anxious thoughts about the future, we gently recognize that’s what we’re doing. 

Then we compassionately practice the art of bringing our minds back into the present.  We might take a moment to look around us.  What is going on right now?  How are we with?  What sounds do we hear, or what colors do we see?  This practice is called “presencing.”  We practice bringing ourselves back to the present moment while purposefully observing our surroundings.

If we start to drift into the past or future again, we gently bring ourselves back and attune to the present moment.  Over time, the heart and mind gradually relinquish the harmful habits of dwelling on the past and future and learn to relax in the present. 

This habit is a spiritual discipline.  It’s the practice of being present in the present, and it does, in fact, lead to a more relaxed, calm, inner life.  Because when we allow God to help us live in the present, we give both the past and future to Him.  We surrender. 

And in that surrender, we find Jesus handling all of the things we can’t, and we can live the abundant life, a life of peace.