Letting the Ground Rest
A reflection on my upcoming sabbatical
This May marks 20 years of full-time ministry for me.
That sentence feels strange to write. Two decades of preaching, pastoring, leading, building, walking with people through joy and heartbreak, and trying—imperfectly—to be faithful to what God has placed in front of me.
And for the first time in those 20 years, I’m stepping into a significant sabbatical. From May 1 to August 1, I’ll be intentionally stepping away from the normal rhythms of ministry.
I’m meeting this sabbatical season with both optimism and a little bit of fear.
There’s a notebook I keep in my Evernote files called “Content to Develop.” It’s all the articles, speaking engagements, sermons, papers, etc. that are coming down the road. For the past few years, that file has been overflowing each week. Constant content - the never-ending cycle of needing a new, fresh word. While I’m grateful for the opportunities, I’ve felt myself becoming weary trying to keep up.
There’s a rhythm in Scripture that I haven’t always paid close enough attention to. In the Old Testament, God didn’t just command His people to rest—He commanded the land to rest. Every seventh year, the ground was to lie fallow. No planting. No harvesting. No striving to produce.
And it wasn’t because the land was useless. It was because rest was the very thing that would make it fruitful again. That kind of rest requires trust.
Trust that God can provide without constant output. Trust that fruitfulness doesn’t come from endless effort. Trust that stepping back is not the same thing as falling behind.
A lot of people have asked me lately, “How are you feeling about it?” And the honest answer is—I’m not entirely sure. Part of me is excited. There’s an anticipation I can’t quite explain. A sense that God may want to do something deeper than what happens in the weekly rhythm of preaching and leading.
But if I’m being honest, part of me is also a little afraid. Because when you slow down… when you step away from the noise, the opportunities, the momentum… you start to see things more clearly. And sometimes that clarity is uncomfortable.
It’s easy for me to stay busy. Ministry has a way of doing that. There are always sermons to write, people to care for, opportunities to step into, voices to influence. And if I’m not careful, I can begin to draw more from the doing of ministry than from simply being with Jesus.
It’s much harder to sit still long enough to ask deeper questions:
Where is my identity actually rooted?
What am I carrying that I was never meant to carry?
Have I allowed ministry to define me more than Christ has?
Those aren’t questions you answer in a hurry.
If I’m honest, the younger version of me would have resisted this. There’s too much to do. Too many people to reach. Too much momentum to risk slowing down. The spiritual things you say to justify why you won’t allow yourself to rest.
But the older Matt is learning something different. I’m learning that unceasing movement doesn’t produce lasting fruit. I’m learning that Sabbath is not a luxury—it’s a form of trust. And I’m learning that sometimes the most faithful thing you can do is let the ground rest. Because rested ground is not unproductive ground. It’s ground that is being renewed beneath the surface.
So, I don’t know exactly what these next three months will hold. I don’t have a detailed roadmap for what God will do or reveal. But I’m stepping into this season with a quiet, eager anticipation. That He will meet me. That He will reveal things I couldn’t see while moving so quickly. That He will draw me closer to Himself—not as a pastor, not as a leader—but simply as His son.
If you think of me over these next few months, would you pray for me?
Pray that I would have the courage to slow down.
Pray that I would be attentive to the voice of God.
Pray that whatever needs to be uprooted, healed, or restored—God would do it fully.
And pray that when the season comes to step back in… the ground would be ready to bear even more fruit.
Grace and peace.
Matt
We discuss my sabbatical in our latest episode of our Reflections on Now Podcast: