Rest is Worship.

The only strategy you need this year!

Many of you know I gave a TEDx talk in August 2025, but few know that “Rest” wasn’t my original topic. My original topic was about pain as purpose in disguise—how everyone who’s made an impact has walked through a deep, dark season. (But more on that later!)

So why did I pivot to rest? Because for years leading up to that moment, I was wrestling with an impossible question: Who am I when I’m not producing?

I wanted to be present for my daughter. I wanted to build something meaningful without my body or my family becoming a casualty to my success. But underneath all of that was a more terrifying question: If I slow down, if I stop achieving, do I still matter?

Better yet, if I disappear for months at a time on social media will I be forgotten.

Our culture screams that the answer is no. That your worth is measured in output, in achievements, in visible productivity. But God whispers something different: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest... For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28-30)

Rest is holy work.

And I mean that literally. Rest requires you to resist every urge to hustle, to work yourself into burnout. It demands that you lay down everything you can do with your own hands and give it to God. Rest is where God is glorified most—not us. It’s where He revives our bones and comforts us in the most sacred places.

I have read many articles and books around rest, and while many are true, what I am finding is that we cannot abstract the idea of rest without mentioning the Father who invites us into a holy rest. We cannot create ideas and images of “soft life” feminine aesthetics around rest without clinging to a God who is rest—the only true source.

Rest isn’t a lifestyle brand. It isn’t candles and bath bombs and perfectly curated moments of stillness with your Bible on the gram. Those things aren’t bad, but they’re hollow when disconnected from the One who said, “In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength.” (Isaiah 30:15)

Rest without God becomes just another thing we have to perform. Another thing to achieve. Another way to measure whether we’re doing enough, or being enough.

But rest with God? That’s surrender, and trust. That’s remembering that you are held even when your hands are empty.

So here’s my invitation to you today, ready? (This is a reminder for myself!)

Stop striving. Just for a moment.

Not because you’ve earned it. Not because your to-do list is complete. But because you are loved before you produce a single thing. Let God meet you in the stillness. Let Him remind you who you are when your hands aren’t working.

Rest isn’t weakness. It’s worship.

Sincerely,

Ashley Joy

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