It’s been almost two years since my counselor first suggested I take a break from institutionalized church. From time to time, she would recommend it, and I would reply that I wasn’t ready. After all, I was in church nine months before I entered the world, and have missed very few Sundays and Wednesdays in my lifetime.

I knew she was right. I knew I needed the break, but I couldn’t imagine not showing up at a church building.

I’ve spent the last several years breaking out of my religious box, yet every time I went to church, I felt like I was being forced back into it. I’d sit in the pew each week and listen with a critical ear, trying to discern truth. In addition, any questions I voiced were usually met with disapproval. Instead of leaving church renewed each week, I left frustrated and weary.

But I wasn’t ready to take a break.

God knows what’s best for us, and has a way of making that happen. He knew I needed a break, and that I was unlikely to make the decision on my own to take it.

Events unfolded, and now my family and I find ourselves on a church break. It’s only been a couple of weeks, but it’s been a relief.

These verses from Matthew 11 keep showing up in my life:

Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me–watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly. (28-30)

I’ve been tired, worn out and burned out from religion. But I’m already starting to feel the rest only He can supply. The struggle I’ve grown so used to being part of my life seems to be coming to an end. I sense a coming freedom to be who I couldn’t be inside the confines of the church where I’ve spent the last five years, and the denomination in which I grew up.

Sometimes God calls us to live in such a way that religion will never approve. And that’s what He’s showing me. He has things for me to say and do that I didn’t have the freedom to say and do as long as I was trying to meet the criteria laid out for me in the church ministries where I was.

I’m seeing that whatever I do in Him is rest, and that’s equivalent to my heart being fully alive. My heart wasn’t fully alive as long I was bearing the weight of religion.

Will I go back to church at some point? Probably, although I don’t know what that will look like. For now, I’m learning to live freely and lightly in the arms of the One who teaches me the unforced rhythms of grace.