Shalvah

I love words.  Not quite as much as I love Jesus or my husband or my children but I love words.  This is a new one for me.  

Shalvah.  

It is Hebrew and is roughly translated as security in most places in the Bible.  But get this, the root meaning is leisure. So how can it be translated as security and how does leisure fit in.  I am so glad you asked!

Eugene Peterson puts it this way, "The root meaning is leisure - the relaxed stance of one who knows that everything is all right because God is over us, with us and for us in Jesus Christ."  We are secure in God so we can be at leisure (not on a sailboat somewhere in the Caribbean with an umbrella drink in hand) because God's leisure isn't dependent on physical or earthly things.  This is the picture that comes to mind.  A warrior riding horseback entering the castle gates while the enemy ravages outside the walls.  He is weary, the battle is not finished but as he sits in the throne room of his king he can relax.  The king will protect him.  The walls are thick.  Nothing can harm him here in the presence of the king.  That I think is what God's shalvah is, but all the time everywhere we go.  His throne is in our hearts.  He is over us, with us and for us in Jesus Christ every moment of every day.  We can rest there, at His throne, in His arms.  He is always with us in the heat of the battle, in the monotony of the day to give us His rest, His leisure.

I need to change my definition of leisure because mine pales in comparison to Biblical shalvah.  I need to put God in the middle of my leisure, my rest.  One of the things God has been working on in me is breaking the lie of Satan that says I have to make my own rest, my own leisure from earthly things that are only a shadow of what God has for me.

"It is the leisure of the person who knows that every moment of our existence is at the disposal of God, lived under the mercy of God."

Eugene Peterson