Just because you’re a teenager, that doesn’t give you a reprieve from needing to rest.  Your body and mind just like everyone else’s, and that means you need to give both a break from time to time.  Yes, maybe you have more energy, and maybe you have more desire to keep going, but without rest, things start to break down from your immune system to your spiritual life.   

When we talk about rest, it’s important that we don’t mix up needed rest and relaxation with laziness.


  Too often we think taking a break is the same as being lazy, and it’s not.  Laziness, and its sister sloth, involves apathy and putting off important things.  Rest, however, means taking a break to rejuvenate.  It means we know there are important things to get done, but we need to take a moment to enjoy what we have around us, the things God has provided.  Even God rested after creating the world.  We all deserve a rest once in a while, and in fact, we all need to rest from time to time.

Here are some reasons why rest is important:

Rest Means a Healthier Body
Your body needs time to rejuvenate. This is why sleep is so important, and with your body still going through those ever fun adolescent changes, you need more sleep than the adults in your life.  Even relaxing a little bit gives your body a chance to catch up to you.  It benefits your heart, immune system, muscles, metabolism and more.  We need rest as much as we need exercise to build healthy bodies.

Rest Means a Sharper Mind
When we don’t time time to rest, we often build up stress levels which then causes problems for our brains.

  Stress kills brain cells and also keeps us from creating new ones.  Not taking time to rest means we don’t always think clearly.  We get cloudy, depressed, or form other mood problems.  We make better decisions when we take time to rest, and our memories improve.

Rest Equals Better Relationships
Not resting is also detrimental to our relationships.  First, when we rest, we think more positively.  This means we are able to bring more joy into our relationships with others.  We also need to have time for our friends, family, boyfriends, girlfriends and more.  No one likes to think they’re second best in your life.  Also, you’ll be a little more friendly.  When we don’t rest, we get edgy, which means it’s easy to snap at others.  

Rest Gives Us Clarity
We all face significant conundrums from time to time that require significant thought.  We know that stress and not relaxing impacts our brains so we don’t always make good decisions until we slow down.  Rest and relaxation give us quiet moments to clear our minds of all those other things clogging it up.  We’re able to focus more and see things we may not have given ourselves the time to see. 

Rest Brings Us Closer to God
God knows we’re busy people, but He also desires a relationship with us.  When we let our busy lives get in the way of what He desires for us, we move further away from Him.  When we rest in God, we just spend important time with Him.  He doesn’t require much, but sometimes His comforting presence is all we both need to grow closer.

Rest Makes Us More Productive
We know that rest makes us healthier, smarter, clearer, and stronger in God.  This means that we can be far more productive when we come out of our rest and relaxation time.  Some companies have begun to add resting time into the work day, because they have found they get far more out of workers who take some time to rest.  It may seem illogical to rest so we can get more done, but it does work.