Starting With Rest: A Reflection on My Conversation With Angela Finet
This week on Faith in Process, I had the gift of sitting down with my friend, pastor, and author Angela Finet, to talk about Sabbath, rest, and God’s call to peace. What I didn’t expect was that the conversation would turn one of my long-held assumptions completely on its head.
You know the creation story: God creates for six days and rests on the seventh. For most of my life, I assumed the message was simple—we work hard for six days, and then we rest. But Angela invited me to see something I had never noticed: humanity is created on the sixth day… and our very first full day on earth is a day of rest with God.
That simple realization—hiding in plain sight—stopped me in my tracks.
Maybe God isn’t saying, work first, then earn your rest.
Maybe God is saying, begin your life in rest, in relationship, in peace—so that your work flows from that center.
Angela pointed out the sacred rhythm woven into the creation story itself: “And it was evening, and it was morning…” Evening comes first. The day begins in rest, not in the rooster’s crow. She even sets a bedtime alarm—not a morning one—to remind herself that sleep isn’t something she collapses into at the end of a long day, but something she prepares for so she can begin her next day rooted and renewed.
That’s a paradigm shift.
And honestly? I’m still chewing on it.
Sabbath as Preparation, Not Escape
One of the things Angela said that stayed with me is that the Torah’s Sabbath practices were never meant to stress people out. They weren’t created to produce anxiety (“Did I turn off the lights? Did I walk too far?”). Instead, they were crafted as an act of justice—a way of preparing so that no one had to work: not the women, not the servants, not the foreigner, not even the animals.
Sabbath wasn’t just for the privileged.
It was a community-wide pause in the machinery of production.
Angela prefers to call the Sabbath practices “invitations” rather than rules. The lighting of a candle isn’t about fulfilling a requirement—it’s about awakening our awareness of God’s nearness. Turning off our work at sundown isn’t about legalism—it’s about being fully present with the people around us, and fully present to the God who abides with us.
And that makes me think:
How much of our exhaustion today comes from treating rest as optional, or worse, as something we have to earn?
Rest For—Not Rest From
This is where Angela flipped my imagination yet again.
Most of us think of rest as a break from life. A nap. A veg-out moment on the couch. A moment where we don’t have to relate to anything or anyone.
But in a Jewish sense, rest is deeply relational.
You rest so you can connect:
—to God
—to creation
—to family
—to community
Sabbath isn’t avoidance.
It’s engagement.
It’s presence.
It’s delight.
Angela said it beautifully:
“It’s not what we’re resting from. It’s what we’re resting for.”
What if the rest God invites us into isn’t passive at all?
What if it’s the most active form of love we practice?
Young Adults, Boundaries, and the Pharaoh of Productivity
Our conversation eventually turned toward the pressure young adults face—pressure from employers to be available at all hours, pressure to prove themselves, pressure to keep producing without ever pausing to breathe. And Angela named something I think we all feel:
Most of our modern work structures are built like tiny Pharaohs—demanding endless output without ever being satisfied.
Her challenge to young adults (and honestly, to all of us) was simple but courageous:
Learn to set boundaries early.
Not as an act of laziness, but as an act of faithfulness.
Not as a rejection of work, but as a protection of your relationships, health, and peace.
Healthy rest is not a luxury.
It is part of a healthy work ethic.
It is part of a faithful life.
Beginning Again
As we wrapped up our time, I found myself returning to that Genesis rhythm:
Evening and morning. Rest and work. Abiding and acting.
In that order.
What would my life look like if I really practiced that rhythm?
What would my ministry look like?
My relationships?
My own soul?
What would yours?
Maybe this is the invitation:
A chance to begin our days—and our lives—from a place of rest, trust, and belovedness.
A chance to realize that God is not asking us to exhaust ourselves into holiness, but to rest our way into fullness.
Sabbath is not the reward for finishing our work.
Sabbath is the place from which we start.
And perhaps that is the peace we’re all longing for.
Rev. Angela Smith Finet is pastor of Mountville Church of the Brethren in Pennsylvania and author of the 2025 Covenant Bible Study, Sabbath: God’s Call to Peace. Her ministry links Sabbath practice with peacemaking and public witness, inviting congregations to move from rest to reconciliation in their communities. Book: Sabbath: God’s Call to Peace.
