Last weekend, I was looking for my BBQ grill tools. For the first time in months, I went into my camping trailer. The trailer smelled. It smelled wonderful! It smelled of good memories, relaxation, and rest. It seemed to call out “Get away!” Our lives have been crazy over the past months, and this summer brings with it hope for refreshment. Lisa and I love to get away but the funny thing is that after a summer getaway, we are wiped out. We did rest, we were refreshed, and the memories remain rich but in the end, these getaways do not completely deliver a lasting refreshment. I think it’s right to admit that they cannot deliver. Not yet.
In his article “Setting Our Minds on Things Above in Summer” John Piper wrote the following to his church on, May 31, 1995:
“Every season is God’s season, but summer has a special power.” “God made summer as a foretaste of heaven, not a substitute. If the mailman brings you a love letter from your fiancé, don’t fall in love with the mailman. That’s what summer is: God’s messenger with a sun-soaked, tree-green, flower-blooming, lake-glistening letter of love to show us what he is planning for us in the age to come — ‘things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, and which have not entered the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love him’ (1 Corinthians 2:9).” “Jesus Christ is the refreshing center of summer. He is preeminent in all things (Colossians 1:18), including vacations, picnics, softball, long walks, and cookouts. He invites us in the summer: ‘Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest’ (Matthew 11:28). This is serious summer refreshment.”
Jesus truly “is the refreshing center of summer.” Yet we forget this. A Christless summer will not satisfy. Please, don’t get me wrong. Vacations, park days, ball games, camping, fishing, riding, and hiking are all wonderful and can be God-glorifying if done right. We do enter the summer season weary and heavy-laden and we hope for a break. But if we approach this season without keeping Christ and His church in view, then we will soon find regular devotions give way to busy travel schedules. Our tithes give way to those summer expenses. Study and prayer get lost at the beach. We find ourselves physically spent and suddenly church gatherings are neglected. Piper nailed it when he said, “Jesus Christ is refreshing, but flight from him into Christless leisure makes the soul parched.” “Don’t let summer make your soul shrivel.”