This message is from  Pastor Chris Durso, our guest speaker for Revival Sundays.  

In Matthew 11:28-30, Jesus extends an invitation that cuts through the noise of religious performance: "Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you'll recover your life" (MSG).

The word "recover" carries significant weight. It suggests we once had our lives but somehow lost them along the way. The invitation is extended to those who find themselves burned out on religion.  This is a stark reminder that we can be surrounded by the things of God and yet feel distant from Him.

Jesus continues: "I'll show you how to take a real rest," implying there's a counterfeit version we've been settling for. The activities we engage in, thinking we're finding rest, are often just coping mechanisms. He then says, "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."

When God Hits Pause

The book of Joshua presents a critical moment in Israel's history. After 40 years of wandering in the wilderness, the Israelites finally stand on the brink of stepping into everything God promised them. The promised land is within reach. But before their first battle, before they take possession of their inheritance, God stops them at a place called Gilgal, right at the edge of the Jordan.

On the cusp of their breakthrough, God does something unexpected: "After the whole nation had been circumcised, they remained where they were in camp until they were healed" (Joshua 5:8).

Notice the precise language: "until they were healed." Not "as they were healing," but until the process was complete.

This brings us to a fundamental truth: The promise has a pause.

Promises That Never Change

The promises of God are not up for debate. They are not fragile, uncertain, or dependent on circumstances. They are firm, unshakable, and guaranteed. Every single promise remains true, regardless of who we are or where we've been.

God has not forgotten us. Whatever He spoke over our lives still stands:

• Jeremiah 29:11 assures us our future is secure in Him. 
• Psalm 37:23 declares our steps are ordered by Him. 
• Philippians 1:6 confirms that what God started, He will finish. 
• Isaiah 54:17 promises that no weapon formed against us shall prosper. 
• Romans 8:28 declares God is working all things together for our good.  
• 2 Corinthians 1:20 affirms that His promises are yes and amen.

These are not theological abstractions, they are unchanging realities we can build our lives upon.

The Part Nobody Likes

While declaring the promises of God brings joy, the pause before the promise presents a challenge. The in-between season, the waiting period where nothing seems to happen, where the promise feels close but remains just out of reach.  This is where faith is tested.

We don't mind walking toward the promise. We struggle with waiting inside of it.

Yet Jesus' instruction in Matthew 11:29 is clear: "Walk with me and work with me. Watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace." The promise is about readiness, and readiness comes through process.

This is where many struggle. We know how to walk in faith but not how to remain in trust. We know how to believe for breakthrough but not how to stay faithful during the wait. This explains why people experience breakthrough but lack the capacity to sustain it. It's why new opportunities can become overwhelming burdens. It's why doors open but we lack the discipline to keep them open.

Walking gets us there. Healing allows us to stay.

The Process We Want to Skip

The Israelites had done considerable walking.  They walked out of Egypt, through the wilderness, across the Red Sea, and now toward the promised land. Just as they anticipated leaving the past behind, God instructed them to wait. Before the battle, before taking possession of the promise, God required a pause. "After the whole nation had been circumcised, they remained where they were in camp until they were healed."

The promise came with a pause because stepping into promise unprepared leads to failure.

The very process we resist is often the process designed to refine us. We celebrate the God who delivers but resist the God who develops. We appreciate His rescue but resist His requirements.

Everyone desires the promise. Few embrace the process.

Before God releases us into what's next, He stops us to prepare us. The pause isn't rejection, it's refinement. Before release comes preparation. And preparation begins with trust.

Walking and Working

Jesus didn't simply say, "Walk with me." He said, "Walk with me and work with me." Both elements are essential and inseparable. Walking represents movement; working represents formation. Walking is about leaving behind; working is about preparing for what's ahead.

Church attendance, prayer, and service in ministry are valuable expressions of faith. But they may not represent the deeper work God wants to do within us. Walking with God and serving Him is important, but positioning ourselves to receive His transformative work is equally crucial.

God desires to work in us.  He wants to address lust, deceit, bitterness, anger, and frustration. It would be inconsistent to pray for revival while harboring thoughts of revenge. He wants to remove the petty responses, the bitter reactions, the victim mentality that keeps us stuck.

This doesn't minimize what others have done to us. The divorce may have been unjust. The friend may have failed us. The betrayal may have been real. But fixation on past wrongs transforms us from victors into victims. When we release our pain into God's hands, He works out the brokenness, the fractures, and the insecurities, and He promises to handle what was done to us.

Praying "God, heal our lands" while maintaining toxic hearts is counterproductive. When Scripture speaks of lands, it refers to the soil of our hearts, our minds, our behaviors.

Don't Miss Your Miracle

Some find themselves in the middle of a miracle but miss it because they remain focused on the previous chapter's pain. God has already closed doors, removed certain people from our lives, created distance from harmful situations. Yet we keep hearing their voices because we keep replaying their words in our minds.

God's invitation remains: "I want to walk with you and work with you. I want to work their brokenness out of you."

Arrival Without Development is Dangerous

The Israelites assumed reaching the promised land meant they had arrived. But arrival without development creates vulnerability. God wasn't holding them back.  He was strengthening them for what lay ahead.

Some are about to enter significant business deals or reach new levels in their careers. Stepping into new opportunities with unchanged mindsets creates problems. Strategies that worked in previous seasons may not translate to the next level.

Prayers for blessing in marriage and intimacy with a spouse require corresponding growth in character. Reflecting the King of kings means learning to serve rather than seeking applause. It means finding ways to affirm others rather than waiting for recognition.

God wants to remove what restricts us from inheriting what He has prepared. Financial blessing without financial wisdom leads to waste. Revival without character leads to collapse. We need both the blessing and the capacity to steward it well.

The Wrong Kind of Rest

Comfort zones cannot transfer into promised lands. Some activities pursued in the name of rest aren't rest at all, they're coping mechanisms. True rest comes from getting away with God.

"Walk with me and work with me" doesn't align with typical definitions of rest. Rest often conjures images of leisure and entertainment. But God's rest operates differently. When He works behaviors and patterns out of us, we don't just rest for a week, we rest for a lifetime.

The dread we feel in various areas of life, like marriage, parenting, work, and ministry, often stems from unaddressed internal issues rather than external circumstances. When God addresses the root problems, the external situations become manageable.

There are seasons when ministry demands create overwhelming pressure and isolation. God's response to burnout isn't more activity; it's an invitation to step away and learn genuine rest. This means confronting the unhealthy patterns we've normalized, the bottles we reach for, the pills we depend on, the habits we've romanticized.

Time to Get Up

Another group needs a different message: the resting season has extended too long. God has already done the healing work. Fear of returning to old patterns has created paralysis. Years of faithful service were followed by burnout, leading to withdrawal from ministry entirely.

The sympathy for that burnout is genuine. But extended rest can transform a temporary stopping point into a permanent residence. Gilgal was meant to be a pit stop, not a permanent address. Hospitals serve an important function for recovery, but they make poor long-term housing.

It's time to get up. Healing from pain was meant to launch purpose, not create permanent retreat. The healed can date again, serve again, invest again, show up again, open their homes again, allow people back into their world again.

The work God has done is for those in similar situations who are in chapters we've already navigated. Others need the proof that healing is possible and life continues beyond pain. Proverbs 3:28 reminds us that our hands become God's hands for others. Just as He didn't withhold help from us, we shouldn't withhold help from others.

Revival is coming. Awakening is coming. The only question that remains is this: will we be ready?