I have only let it happen once. One day in college I was running late, jumped in my car to drive to my classes and saw the gas gauge glaring at me, the dial pointing at the brightly illuminated “E” for empty. I thought, “I don’t have far to go, so surely I’ll make it.” I didn’t make it. My car ran out of gas and instead of being late to my class, I totally missed it.

We do this…keep running, keep going, even when our bodies feel empty and are souls completely depleted. Running on empty is not admirable, but emptying our lives of that which drains us is.

Sabbath is an important Spiritual discipline. It is a discipline of emptying–emptying ourselves of the notion we can do all things, emptying ourselves of the notion that things cannot happen without us, emptying ourselves of the notion that our busyness and pushing of boundaries and space will somehow save us.

Sabbath for me is embodied in church. Going to church takes some doing though and one my wonder, isn’t it just one more thing on a long list of things to do? Why do I go to church (other than the fact that I am clergy) when I could stay at home on Sunday mornings? I go to church because church is a way of emptying myself of those things that drain me. Hearing and engaging in Scripture helps me to listen for the Divine (who I call God). Prayer allows me to honestly open up to God and to rest in God’s presence as I name and think about the joys in my life, the challenges and the people and places of concern. The Communion Table reminds me of the divinity and love of God shown forth in the particular person of Jesus…and how that concern for the particular translates to love for everyone and to the power to hold us together in the midst of diversity.  The Singing of hymns not only draws us to thoughts about God, but according to study conducted by researchers of the Sahlgrenska Academy at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden and published in the Frontiers of Neuroscience, singing together calms us down, lowers our respiration and causes our hearts to become synchronized.

It is important to find ways to empty yourself of that which is draining in order to be re energized for the life you live. If you are feeling close to empty and thinking, “surely I can go just a little farther,” stop and rest.