Greater Things
A podcast about how faith fits with your everyday life. Matt interviews various speakers from around the globe and invites them to share their own experiences. For those who are asking big questions around faith, religion, church, and life.
https://www.greaterthingsinternational.com
Greater Things
Divine Rest: Finding Peace in Sacred Rhythms with Ben Armstrong
That breakthrough you've been praying for might be waiting—not in your striving, but in your sleeping. Divine rest isn't a luxury or an afterthought; it's foundational to how God designed us to function in relationship with Him.
Ben Armstrong brings profound wisdom to our conversation about sleep, dreams, and the prophetic. He highlights how in the creation narrative, each day began with evening—a divine rhythm suggesting we should live from rest toward activity, not desperately racing toward rest after depleting ourselves.
When the Holy Spirit was poured out at Pentecost, Peter quoted Joel's prophecy that dreams and visions would be key languages of the Spirit. Yet many believers have lost touch with this vital spiritual channel. Through biblical examples like Jacob receiving identity and direction through a dream, Ben illustrates how God often speaks most clearly when we're at rest.
Modern science confirms what Scripture teaches—our bodies undergo crucial restoration during sleep, and most growth in nature happens at night. High cortisol levels from stress inhibit rest, while practices like reducing screen time before bed improve both sleep quality and dream recall. Even nutrition plays a surprising role in our ability to rest well.
Perhaps most challenging is Ben's observation that we often "spiritualise our dysfunction," pushing through exhaustion while framing unhealthy patterns in religious language. Jesus modelled something different—communion with Father first, followed by purposeful action with more than enough resources for the day.
The conversation concludes with a practical challenge: identify one small daily habit that acknowledges rest as vital to your life. This simple act of stewardship invites God's grace and can transform your entire approach to living in His kingdom.
What divine breakthrough might be waiting for you in the place of rest you've been avoiding?
BEN ARMSTRONG
The Overseer of Prophetic Ministry at Bethel Church, Redding, where he and his wife, Heather Armstrong, both serve as pastors.
Through teaching and preaching, Ben equips people with the skills and tools they need to bring the kingdom of heaven to earth. He has a passion to see individuals fully equipped in living a prophetic lifestyle, as well as walking in the revelatory gifts. Ben has a passion for the pursuit of God’s presence, seeing worship reach new heavenly realms, dreams and interpretation, healing, and living a prophetic lifestyle.
They have three amazing children; Conner, Kira, and Madison. Ben, Heather, and their children are passionate about living the kingdom and bringing the supernatural in their family life and equipping others to do the same.
https://armstrongministries.com/
www.greaterthingsinternational.com
In today's podcast I'm back with Ben Armstrong from Bethel Church in Reading in the USA. This man has a brilliant heart for dreams, for the prophetic and for the body of Christ, and today I'm hosting a conversation with him around the idea of divine rest. Hope you enjoy, around the idea of divine rest, hope you enjoy. Well, here we are today, back with the Greater Things podcast and with a guy who's becoming a good friend of Greater Things and myself in the. Ben Armstrong, how are you, mate?
Speaker 2:I'm wonderful, excited to be with you. As always, I've got my notes here on the side, so if I'm viewing over here, I've got notes and we're going to have fun today. Always good to be with you, yeah.
Speaker 1:I've always enjoyed these conversations. The authenticity you sit in is something that inspires me. It's something that speaks to me and, just, I feel like my life is richer after each conversation that I have with you, mate, and I can only imagine the people that surround you, the people that live with you as well that this becomes a normal.
Speaker 2:Thank you. Thank you, I appreciate it Super fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, today we're going to chat around, well, we're going to start in a place of rest and see where the conversation goes from there. Of rest and see where the conversation goes from there. This is something that I've been chatting around for a bit now, and I feel like this topic is only growing in my spirit, not shrinking. I feel that for the longest time in my own Christian walk, I've often taught about rest, but the modeling of it is the place where it needs to be seen, and so we can teach and teach, and teach and teach until the cows come home. But it's when we model it and I guess when I say we model it, it's those deep rhythms of home that it becomes normal for us in those places of marriage and places of family and places of community. And so I'd just love to have a conversation with you, mate, about what is rest for Ben.
Speaker 2:Yeah Well, this is one of my all-time favorite subjects is rest, sleep, the night season, dreams and dreams. You know, dreams are such a, I think, primary language of the Spirit. If you look at Acts, chapter 2, when the Spirit of God is poured out and tongues of fire land on the heads of you know, these individuals who've been waiting on the Lord pursuing the promise of the Holy Spirit, you know, some crazy things start happening. They start speaking in other languages and everyone's like these guys, they've got to be drunk. Like, what's going on, like this is just crazy. And you know, peter declares we're not drunk, as you suppose. But this is what Joel prophesied. And what did he prophesy? He's? He actually prophesied what's going to happen in the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. Is there's going to be any uses, different demographics, right, he says you know your young daughters, your young men, your old guys, even your bond servants. He goes through this list. And what's the list? Prophecy, dreams and visions are going to be primary ways that God speaks through an outpouring of the Spirit. So when we're baptized in the Holy Spirit, prophecy, dreams and visions should be languages that increase and should be normal as a believer. So all believers should be operating in the gift of prophecy should be regularly. It's regular to have dreams and visions.
Speaker 2:Unfortunately, this isn't taught very much as primary, but that all comes from, especially the one of dreams. I think all of it comes from communion and communion started in the creation story. So Genesis, you know, god creates the heavens and the earth, and there's this whole creation story. And it's interesting how in the creation story every day after creation it says and there was evening and there was morning the first day, second day, there was evening and morning the second day, and then on the sixth day mankind was created, adam and Eve were created by God. And it says and there was evening and morning the sixth day. And I love this because in Hebrew culture and from the beginning, god instituted something that we live our life we should be living from rest towards our day, not from our day towards rest. So our day actually starts at night and that starts with the communion. And if you're in your bedroom you have your bed right. The bed is for two things. Number one, the bed is for rest and the night season is for rest, but number two, if you're married, it's for intimacy, right, and intimacy is the place where seeds are planted that produce new life in us, and I believe that's dreams. So, number one for rest and number two for that intimate place of dreams where we have the dreams of heaven, the wisdom of heaven imparted.
Speaker 2:You know, know, this is, uh, jacob in genesis, chapter 28, where jacob's kind of he's in concern. Genesis, chapter 27. He's like I gotta leave this place because my brother's trying to kill me. Mom's like you better go. So he's going and uh, I like to say this, he's in such a panic he forgets his pillow. Right, the bad, bad jokes. But how do I know? He forgot his pillow? Because he laid his head on a stone.
Speaker 2:And you know, I think this could probably be metaphoric for a lot of us. For a lot of us, we go to bed with worries, we go to bed with problems, we go to bed from the exhaustion of the day and overwhelmed with thoughts, concerns, worries of life, the cares of life, and we forget that we're supposed to actually live, casting our cares on him. We're supposed to live from a place of rest and communion. So we have more than enough for our day. And Jacob lays his head on a stone, goes to sleep, has a dream, sees angels ascending and descending on this ladder. Descending and descending on this ladder, god's in heaven calls out to Jacob a whole new identity, reaffirms the promise that he gave to his father and his grandfather, abraham and Isaac. And it's this whole incredible promise of nations and influence and God being with him. It's incredible. He wakes up and he says surely God was in this place.
Speaker 2:I didn't know it. Now, of course, jacob's talking about the literal location, because he changes the name of that location from Lutz to Bethel, house of God. But I love this story because he sees something happening in this dream. I think Jacob was not just declaring location, but surely God was in the place of rest, sleep and dreams. And I didn't even know it, because he got the answers to problems and concerns while he was sleeping.
Speaker 2:Scripture promises honor your father's commands and they will watch over you even while you sleep. And this is where we honor our you know the testimony, the prophetic declarations over our life. We honor the rest season and God speaks to us in dreams and angels ascending and descending. That's a picture of I think it's Psalms 103, verse 20,. Talking of angels, he says they hearken to my voice and carry out God's commands. Angels ascending and descending, and God is speaking. So they're ascending, hearkening to his voice. This is what I declare over Jacob.
Speaker 2:Okay, now we're going to resource that, and I love how it actually mirrors that great scripture out of the Psalms, or maybe Psalms mirrors that story itself. But yeah, there's practicals in this. Isn't it interesting that when you look at nature, romans chapter 1 says God's invisible attributes, his divine power, or his eternal nature and divine power, can be clearly seen through what he's created? If you look at creation I'm looking out my window here and most growth in nature comes at night, and it might be interesting to know that maybe, just maybe, a bunch of the growth that we are all looking for and breakthrough we are striving for and staying up late to produce produce might be hidden in the place of rest.
Speaker 2:Psalms 127, verse 2, declares there's a couple different versions of this, but one of them says God provides for his beloved even while they sleep, is beloved even while they sleep. So that tells me this my job at night is to rest and God's job is to be Jehovah Jireh, my provider. The problem is I don't know about you but Matt, sometimes I try and be a provider, but I'm taking God's place and anytime I try and do God's work for him, I am a poor version of Jehovah Jireh, like I made in his image. Yes, I'm supposed to be a provider for my family, I'm supposed to be a contributor to my community, but Lord, if I don't rest, but Lord if I don't rest, then I'm not actually giving God his spot.
Speaker 2:So this is where I administrate the scripture of taking every thought captive into obedience to Christ. Usually we think of that as negative thoughts. No, in this context is saying this hey, take every thought captive. That is actually distracting from what Christ wants to do and accomplish in your life. And so, when it comes to rest, worry at night concerns about trying to figure out my next day. Today has enough current concerns for itself, like let tomorrow take care of tomorrow, let the past be the past. Cast your cares on him, take your thoughts captive.
Speaker 2:So one of the great principles I do is, when my mind is chaotic at night and rushing, I immediately turn on the Bible. I play the Bible app over me and I just come in alignment with what the Word of God says. It helps silence the noise in my head, helps me step straight into communion. My head helps me step straight into communion. So I said a lot, but we can say a lot more. I've got a lot more thoughts and even principles that I start with. I love how even our very first day, mankind's very first day with God he created mankind right on the sixth day the seventh day was a day of rest where mankind actually rested with God from his work. So we rest from the finished work of God and Christ redeemed us and we rest from the finished work of Christ Jesus at the cross and Jesus himself, right Hebrews talks about. He has become our Sabbath rest and we live from that rest.
Speaker 1:I love all of that, mate. There's so many thoughts that fire in my head when you chat that idea of rest in Genesis. Years ago, when I was studying Hebrew at college, that word for me I got really curious about it and in the Hebrew it's apparently very closely linked with the word abode or home, and so I coined the phrase that when God rested, he made himself at home. How did he do that? He walked in the cool of the evening with those he was in relationship with. And ever since I've been hosting this conversation in my head of what does this actually look like, so that it can go from bible into practical. And I wish I could say that all those years ago I actually learned the lesson and I learned how to rest. But three, three burnouts later and here we are. But this is what I love, like the idea of, because I know how much dreams are important to both yourself and myself and helping people through that place of understanding them.
Speaker 1:Going to bed with worry, going to bed with shame, going to bed with concern these are all things that I think happen to many, many people on the planet on a daily basis, and often I wonder whether even the church or the kingdom has given people help in navigating that sort of place. And I love how you picked up on Jacob's story. It's much like with Jesus, with Peter, at the end of John. Both times these men were in places where they'd done some stuff that they weren't brilliantly proud of, and Jacob deceiving his dad, deceiving his brother and, like you say, his head's on a rock, but God doesn't remind him of his sin. I love that. It's like with Peter Jesus didn't remind him of his sin. What did God and Jesus do in both of those places? Restore relationship and actually lift shame out of the conversation altogether, to say, actually we're not even going to talk about shame, we just want to talk about who you are.
Speaker 1:And this, to me, is one of those design features of the kingdom of God. It is rest. But how does that look? For each of us is a unique conversation. Things like shame worry. These are unique conversations that happen in those deep, dark times and they become often really problematic in the person's own rhythm of life. Like two o'clock in the morning you're waking up and all you can think of is everything you did wrong the day before. Your soul's not at rest, your spirit's not at rest, your mind's not at rest, and when that's not at rest, your body is struggling in that place of healing, it's struggling in the place of growth. So I love that you've picked up on these ideas and concepts, but I wonder how you feel about God making himself at home.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, I think this is it what Jacob Laises had on the stone of problems, the stone of worry, the stone of shame, the stone of guilt, the stone of what is my life, what's my future. Or, you know, god shows up and says, hey, I've got a plan in future, and Jacob wakes up and the stone is now the rock of his salvation. So we can lay our head on the stone of worries, or the rock of our salvation, jesus Christ, and we can make our home in him. What does that look like? It's called the abiding relationship. It's called the abiding relationship, it's called communion. And this is even you referenced it.
Speaker 2:You know God would walk and talk with Adam and Eve in the cool of the evening, so from communion towards our day. And Jesus modeled this so well for us in that he says well, you know, he would go away from the disciples, spend time with God. Right, this is communion. It was, it was many times evening time when he would do this and he would live from that place of communion. And he said I only do what I see my father doing, I only say what I hear my father saying. Like this is from, I just had abiding. And then he lives towards his day. You know, we get stories like when they're about to go across the water and Jesus says, hey, we're going to the other side. So he makes a declaration that he got from his father. He knows his purpose, he knows what. So he goes to sleep. Why? Because he's resting in communion. He's made his home in a heavenly spot. So when earth starts getting out of control and my situation doesn't look like heaven, well, I live up here towards Earth. Jesus gets, reprimands the disciples first. He's like peace, be still, and he's got guys. Why do you have so little faith? You know what, what, what's, what's, what's going on. Why are you so afraid? Like you, you need to do something about this, and it comes from making your home in Jesus and or, in his case, in the father, that abiding relationship which gives him so much authority in that place. This was and we get it modeled even as Paul and Silas in the prison in the book of Acts. What did they do? They decided in that dark place at midnight, the time of communion, the time of, you know, abiding with God. They're actually, instead of looking at their circumstances, they're like no, I'm going to make this a place of worship, even though we're beat up physically, we're going to rest in worship and we're going to remind ourselves of who he is and pretty soon the foundations of the prison get shaken. Why? Because there was a frequency released from communion, from that abiding relationship. A frequency is released where now the reality of heaven, where there's freedom, there are no chains, there are no closed doors, it gets superimposed over that situation.
Speaker 2:I think some of our problems just need a good night's sleep, but a good night's sleep in communion. So making your home with God and him making his home in you means anti-thoughts or thoughts that don't line up with his nature. His promises over your life are illegal. So you have to fight. You have to fight with the prophetic words once made over your life, so that with them you'd fight the good fight of faith and have a clean conscience. That means clean conscience there isn't. It isn't always talking about sin, it's saying do you think about yourself the way God thinks about you? Are you resting in God's promises? Are you resting in his nature? You resting in the character he has prophesied and declared over you, or are you worried about, are you focused on that? And we spend a lot of time doing this and we don't a lot of time doing this and we don't even just practically, physically.
Speaker 2:In 1 Kings you have a story of remember Elijah and the prophets of Baal and Asherah, and he destroys all these guys, but then he's running in a panic right after a great victory. Why? Because he's tired and hungry. What does that tell me? A lot of the physical things I or supposed spiritual things I face are actually related to practical, physical things that I need to do and take care of. The angel kicks him, wakes him up, says eat. He eats. He falls back asleep. Angel kicks him again Wake up, eat, because the journey is too long for you, for all of us, the journey's too big for us if we don't actually care for our physical bodies.
Speaker 2:There's practicals. That means there's certain dietary things that are healthy for me, that cause me to rest. You know a high concentrations of vitamin b6 and b12. One of those are directly connected to serotonin levels in our body which help regulate our sleep cycle. So actually food can help us sleep better or not sleep. Cortisol is an anti-sleep chemical in our body and that's that's the stress hormone. If we've got too much cortisol, we're not resting. In god, casting our cares on him. We're gonna amp that up and nowadays, right matt, I can be on this yeah all the time I've got screen time.
Speaker 2:Brain scientists uh, we had a, a brain doctor come to bethel church and train all of us, instructors and teachers, and they said, at least two hours before you go to bed you need to cut off your screen time Because the light on the screen is telling your brain the sun's still up, messes with your circadian rhythms. Circadian rhythms is your sleep cycle. So there's practical things we can do. A lot of people stay on this until they're so exhausted they pass out from exhaustion. That's the only way they can go to sleep because they have chaos and noise continually. And then we wonder why there's many people who don't remember their dreams. Science says we all dream. Not everyone remembers their dreams and many times it's because we're too exhausted to actually remember.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:We can switch some things up.
Speaker 1:Well, here's a tip for you mate Vegemite, very high in vitamin B.
Speaker 2:Bro, I don't know if I can do that. Three years ago, Matt, it was hilarious In the dream, Benny Johnson came to me this was before she went to heaven. And she shows up in the dream and she says Ben, if you want to have more dreams, you'll eat a steady diet of liver. And I knew right away this is a demonic dream Because I ate liver. That is gross. So I go to my good friend, Google the next day and I Google this. I'm like what does liver and sleep have to do with each other? And if I come to find out high concentrations of b6, b12, and you know, I'm like okay, okay, so this is, this is something.
Speaker 2:So that night I went and bought two pounds of beef liver and tried to find the best recipe. It was straight trash, it was garbage. And that night I couldn't remember any of my dreams. I'm like God, what's up? So I go to my dream interpretation class that week and the lady raises her hand and she's like why didn't you just take the multivitamin? And I thought, man, this reminds me of that scripture. God sits in the heavens and laughs at Ben Ock. I'm like oh, that's funny. But Vegemite okay, didn't know that.
Speaker 1:Have you tried it? You ever tried Vegemite.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I have. It's super salty and just it's not my jam bro.
Speaker 1:Literally not your jam yeah.
Speaker 1:I love how, the practicalities that you bring to bear, and I love because I love the science around the body. I love the science around dreams as well, because there's so much there. For me there's a catastrophe standing behind you and for me the creativity is part of my rest cycle and so yesterday I've got a friend going through a really difficult time at the moment and just been interceding for her in all different kinds of ways and thoughts and prayers and I just felt to pick up my guitar and over an hour of just worshipping and singing and playing this song drops into my spirit and I felt like it's that moment. You know, there's so rich creativity, it's so powerful in what it can do for you, but for me it slows down my spirit, it allows me, and even when I'm singing and playing, you know, every thought captive to Jesus. This is one of the very practical ways I do it. When I'm singing, when my mind is on God, when I'm worshiping, in that way the worries seem to be closed outside the door, like even for the health issues of this wonderful friend of ours, and I find myself in that place of just connecting with God, in a place of a rhythm that helps me, and it's like words are dropping into your spirit. And to me, ben, at times it's like the gifted tongues.
Speaker 1:You spoke about it earlier. There's these words dropping from heaven that are coming out of my spirit, that weren't there five seconds beforehand, and I find these sorts of moments extraordinarily helpful in these places of rhythm. It does take you away from your phone and the screen time and all of that sort of stuff, and for me it's like spending enough time. How much is that, tom? I don't know. It's that time where your spirit can find that, walking in the cool of the evening with God and not hiding from him and just allow yourself to be seen. And so one of the other big things I've been on is not just rest, but what does creativity in rest actually look like? And you've spoken about a whole range of things, even getting creative around liver. I'm not sure that would be something you're going to do twice, but what do you think about that?
Speaker 2:I think creativity naturally connects us to God in that he is the creator and in the beginning God created and God, which means creativity, is the quickest way to access his nature, or one of the quickest, most potent ways to access his nature, if that creativity is focused on him. So that could be, you know, like you said, just work in worship and then songs, strong moments of that. Why? Because you're communing with the creator in a form of worship, even in creation. I go, my wife and I love walks, communion in nature. We live on four acres here, have a little country lane and we walk this whole area and sometimes it's just sitting listening to the song of creation. That once again recalibrates things and stress and anxiety just release out of your body. We talked about liver. Yeah, it could be as easy as my son-in-law, evan. One of his biggest creative outlets is cooking. It's food, which you know. You cook food, you enjoy food. All of a sudden there's a pleasure that you're enjoying with God. But there's creativity and the nuance of that. There's taste and see that the Lord is good. Okay, and then hospitality was a giant portion of value that Jesus Christ displayed in serving his own disciples. So there's something that's being released. It creates home, it creates family. You know all these places Sometimes my wife is.
Speaker 2:She loves parties, so some people may think it's work to actually set up for a party and make a space and place beautiful. But that's a pleasure and that's an outlet for her, and then the work is not effort, it's a gift unto the Lord, it's a gift unto others, and then she finds God in that and then the work is not effort, it's a gift unto the Lord, it's a gift unto others, and then she finds God in that and she finds pleasure in that. You know what's the saying If you find pleasure in what you do, you'll never work a day of your life. It means your work won't be toil, your work will be rewarding, your work will be fulfilling. And I think that's where a lot of people are missing out that creative aspect, that whole enjoyment aspect, that pleasure in it. Now our work is toil and I'm overwhelmed and I'm slogging away doing ministry all the time and I'm burnt out and it's like, wow, that's, that's a, that's a bummer, because you you're not able to stay in that abiding relationship where you feel pleasure, with wind on your face and the creative nature of God, when the flowers grow in your garden and in the difference of seasons and all of those things.
Speaker 2:And then I would say as well, you know, you look at creation and the creation story. We have seasons, right, you have spring, you have summer, you have fall and winter. And if we're not careful, we redefine seasons through a negative lens when no season was supposed to be negative. With God, each season has a purpose. Oh man, I'm just in a winter season. Oh, matt, I'm just in a winter season. I'm like, oh, you're hanging out with your family feasting on the fruits of your, your harvest and all the work of the year. That's awesome, that's a great rhythm.
Speaker 2:And when we got away from agriculture and kind of that, that rhythm of seasons where you would sow and then spend the summertime strengthening the crops and then you spent the fall time reaping the harvest, bringing it in and then putting it in the storehouse and home and celebrating the fruit of all of your work and feasting from that towards your, your next season, you know, you got your seed from that and you got your bread from that.
Speaker 2:And, uh, and and, and I think we need to, we need to win some of that back. Yeah, and that may be slim, simplistic things like I go to bed between eight and nine every night. That's my rhythm. I get up earlier than most, but God seems louder when everyone else is asleep, so I choose to try and shoot for between seven and nine hours of sleep a night, but that means I go to bed on a pretty consistent basis. If you go to bed, science says if you go to bed at the same time and wake up at the same time, your body knows it's going to get rest and it functions better off that.
Speaker 1:I love that there's so many parts of our design that it feels like the church is catching up on, like we've often ignored the science behind, like our dreams, our body, our thoughts, our rhythms, all the things that you're speaking about.
Speaker 1:But for me, like every, all the things that you're speaking about, but for me, like every one of those things has a supernatural, like it combines supernaturally to help us function, not just as humans, but in our design, in the image of God, helping us understand who we are. And so this idea of rest, like you're saying, it's intrinsic, it's not the optional extra that when you get time you'll rest, and I love. Even right at the start you said we start from rest, not head towards rest. I say the same thing about freedom we start from freedom rather than striving for freedom. Because if we're always striving for rest, striving for freedom, it's like when do we arrive? When do we get there? How do we know? And so we have a generation, at times, of Christians that are in that striving place of discovery, and maybe it's time for us to slow the conversation down and, like you say, find that rhythm of rest. That's a divine rhythm.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. And it takes discipline. Like anything in the kingdom. God is discipling us. You know he's not punishing us, he's not angry with us, but he knows our behavior can sometimes be self-destructive and our behavior steal away. So he gives us blueprint in scripture for health and wholeness. I love sometimes, you know, even just playing through the Psalms or Proverbs when you go to sleep at night is good too. Night is good too, because there's such a soul health that happens throughout the psalms that are, I think, vital to us too. You know many of us will, will work out, you know we may go to the gym, do stuff for our body, and we may eat well, we, uh. But we need soul health too.
Speaker 2:And David modeled something in being honest before God. Like you said, walk with God in the cool of the garden. That was when Adam and Eve were naked. It would bear everything before God. God hears me.
Speaker 2:I love how, in the Psalms, david declares God, you know my waking up, my laying down, you know when I come in. You will know when I go out. You know everything about me. And even though God knew everything about him, david still, every day, shared everything that was going on deep in his soul day shared everything that was going on deep in his soul, and so that that and that. That's why I think God called David a man after his own heart. He's like even though I could see everything about you, you voluntarily gave it to me. That's real friendship. And that level of friendship, that level of abiding, that level of soul care. It's not I'm complaining about my life all the time. I'm like woe is me, here's all my bad stuff and I stay there. No, I lay my cares at his feet because he cares for me and then I leave them there. And that's a good exercise, is doing a spiritual and a soul kind of cleansing.
Speaker 2:Many times we take showers at the end of the night. We're ready to use the restroom and the toilet throughout the day. Why? Because we're getting rid of that which does not belong in our body, that which is not beneficial. But we rarely cleanse our soul like that. Maybe we'll do it when we've blown up our life, when I have a mental breakdown, when I have burnout, when I've fallen into sin or whatever it is, then I'll do soul care.
Speaker 2:But what if we just made it a regular part of our rhythm to actually truly do what God declares Cast your cares, cast your worries, cast your anxiety, cast all, even the good things that you're trying to accomplish. Cast it on me, leave it rest in me, find your home in me, come back to God, pull up a chair, lay down in bed and lay with the Spirit of God, that abiding thing, and then watch how things are solved of God, that abiding thing, and then watch how things are solved, because many times in my own soul and spirit, things are solved in my sleeping. And I didn't even get a drink. It's just something happened and it wasn't as big of a deal as I thought it was. You know, I needed a good nap.
Speaker 2:Elijah's like God, just kill me, take my life. I'm not going to commit suicide, but, lord, if you just take me to heaven, that would be awesome. And he's like man, you need some food, you need a rest, someone needs a nap, right? Someone's cranky, someone's cranky, and and and then we spiritualize our dysfunction and you know, even our frustration with our children or our frustration with our spouse, and, and many times it's just because we don't live from rest, we're exhausted, and now we're taking it out on everyone else and I'm functioning inappropriately because I didn't care for me. Well, whose fault is that? Mine, that's my fault.
Speaker 1:I think I want to do another podcast. It's spiritualizing our dysfunction. Like that, mate, that's rich. There's something in that for me. So for Trish and I, mental health is a very big part of the work that we do with Greater Things as well, and 20 years in pastoral ministry that phrase, so I will that's a rabbit hole that I'm just going to park that one to the right now. But spiritualising our dysfunction is something I'm going to pick up with you again soon. Think of the thought that I kind of want to and I love this. This is for you and I. It's the longest podcast I do and it's just the conversations keep rolling.
Speaker 1:But the idea of David being authentic I think authenticity is a language in the kingdom of God. We talk about these ideas and we talk about thoughts and we can make religion out of them. We can make and say here's how Ben does it or here's how Matt does it. We've got to do it that way. There's something about David that breaks the mould of authenticity and allows us into the rhythm of his heart and his spirit.
Speaker 1:And yeah, some days he has some pretty dark days there in the Psalms and when I talk about some of those things to people. They can't believe that his brain has gone to such dark places, but as humans we do. But the thing that I love about authenticity, it's the not hiding piece and, like you know, adam and Eve in the garden. God comes along and says Adam Eve, where are you? As if he didn't know where they were. But it's the concept that when we think that we're hiding, we're losing our authenticity and when we lose our authenticity, particularly as Christians, very easy to drift back to religion and the language of religion or the language of church, if it's that way as well, and we can say the right things, but we're no longer in that right rhythm. I know this might be again another rabbit hole, mate, but I just wonder if there's any thoughts you could land us on with this.
Speaker 2:Well, I think this is why I so loved doing street ministry on the streets of San Francisco, because people were just real, like they didn't have a pretension, they didn't have a religious mask to hide behind or like, oh no, they just told you what they thought. They were out loud with their pain. They just told you what they thought. They were out loud with their pain. They were real with their dysfunction and sometimes proud of their dysfunction. And I'm like Jesus can handle that. It's when we act like whoa. How could someone think that dark? I'm like bro, you're just not honest or you're just not looking. You're like la, la, la, la, I don't hear this. And that keeps us in a place of torment. Most people they try and make even their dreams mean something about everyone else. I've been in the church long enough to where almost everyone has a dream. And they come and they're like I had a dream about the church and I'm like, no, you had a dream about you. Most, I'd say a majority of our dreams, at least 70 percent of our dreams, of our dreams, unless you've been in dreams for a long time and invited God more and more into those. They're mostly soul-based and they tell you about conditions in your soul. They tell you conditions of worry and all that kind of stuff. And unless we're honest with ourselves with those things, then we get a distorted view and we're kind of going in the wrong direction with these things. I believe God is inviting us so much into health and so much into a potential knowledge of what is really going on. If we'll pay attention to the night season, what's really going on in here. But then the fear is well, what if people know what's going on in here? And this is where we get an opportunity to bring healthy environments to the church.
Speaker 2:Like jesus jesus was not freaked out by the woman caught in adultery. No, it just was not in a panic about it. He didn't freak out about it. He didn't act super religious like all the other guys. Let's stone her, let's kill her. And he's like, hey, he who's without sin cast the first stone, but he met her right where her she was at and in her authenticity and her honesty. Then he gives her solution hey, hey, you're forgiven, but go and don't do this anymore. Like, change your lifestyle.
Speaker 2:And any time we're real in front of God, it gives us an opportunity to get free from the thing that has crippled us, free from the thing that is stealing from us and enter into that abundant life that he promised. When we say no to one thing and yes to another, romans 12, 21 says flee the no. It says do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil by doing good. So sometimes we're thinking, ah yeah, but I don't ever want to do that again. Okay, well, what do you want to do? Let's focus on what you want to do, and this is going to bring you breakthrough.
Speaker 2:Rather than all of us look at where we're unhealthy in our rest cycles with God, how about we end our time this time and ask God what's one thing I can physically do on a daily basis that says I believe rest is vital for my life? So let's point ourselves towards a healthy and let's give ourselves a spot and a marker for success so that next time we do a greater things podcast and I'm here. I could ask you straight up hey, what's one thing you've developed in your life or created a new habit for in your life when, in regards to rest? And if you've done it, I guarantee you a bunch of other things will have automatically changed because you did one thing. This is God's grace riding on your stewardship.
Speaker 2:So let's live towards building a better kingdom, not fight the devil. Let's build the kingdom, and that automatically disarms the enemy and it disempowers him. He's been trying to steal away our rest and our night season for a long time, since the garden, and even when Jesus came and redeemed us, he's still trying to keep us living in lies the night season's. For your rest, god promises. I think it's in Proverbs 3, verse 24,. He says you will lie down and you will not fear. You will lie down and your sleep will be sweet. This is a promise for all of us. So, god, we ask that we would not fear and we'd live with divine rest. Our sleep would be sweet.
Speaker 1:Amen. Well, ben, thanks so much for your time, for everyone listening. That one thing I encourage you to write it down, or to jot it down, record it in your phone and allow it to become one of those little gemstones that come along the way, that you can pick up, and one thing often becomes two things and, before you know it, a rhythm of life starts to change. But, ben mate, thank you so much for your time. It's been an absolute joy and privilege once again to hang out with the Ben Armstrong and for everyone listening. Thanks for hanging out with us. We'll be back in your ears next time. Bye, for now, you can find us on Facebook, instagram and YouTube, or go to our website, greaterthingsinternationalcom.