Most kids have no idea what a gift summer really is or how desperately their minds, bodies, and souls need it. It’s only after years of the work, the responsibility, and the bone-deep weariness of #adulting that we begin to appreciate the wisdom of a season built for rest.
So how do we help our kids steward the gift of summer? How do we help them use it to rest after a year of hard work? Because they do need help! Rest isn’t passive. It’s not simply the absence of work—or school. Nor is it, I believe, simply doing less. True, restorative rest is found in turning away from things that distort, drain, or distract us in order to connect with the one who made us (Acts 3:19-20).
A few years ago, my husband and I had the gift of a three-month sabbatical. Looking back, it felt a little like being a kid again. Freedom from schedules, deadlines, and regular obligations. It was glorious. But what surprised me was how much intentionality it took to rest well that summer.
Three lessons from that season have shaped how I’m thinking about helping our three girls rest this summer.
1. Rest Has an Arc
The first stage of rest isn’t always peaceful. Sometimes it’s emotional, irritable, and restless. When structure and expectations disappear, it takes time to adjust—especially for kids. This is what it means to decompress. We always have the inevitable wave of sibling conflict and big emotions that will hit our house during those first couple of weeks of summer. Something you can resonate with? But only after our kids decompress are they able to rest.
After decompression comes newfound capacity and space for joy, curiosity, and connection. That’s where our opportunity as parents lies. Not in finding the perfect balance of camps, structure, and free time, but in helping our children fill this space with rest. To shed some of the noise and distraction that fills the school year and to find the quiet where they can be reminded that they are deeply loved by their Maker. “In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength” (Is. 30:15)
Eventually comes the end of the arc: reentry. School supplies, class lists, and new shoes mark this stage for many of us. My hope is that reentry won’t simply be a hard turn back into the pace we just spent the summer recovering from. Instead, I hope it includes a desire to hold onto some of the patterns that facilitated rest.
Maybe a weekly Sabbath suddenly feels attainable for your family in the fall. Maybe nightly prayer lingers a little longer, and family dinner conversations become a little less rushed and a little more pointed at eternal realities, rather than just “how was your day?” At the very least, this stage gives us an opportunity to consider what we want to carry forward from the summer.
2. Create a Plan for Rest And Hold It Loosely
During our sabbatical, we had goals for how we wanted to rest. To do this, we first looked at the values we have as a family (hospitality, exposure, rest, play, connection, and humility) and developed goals for how we would spend our time, schedule activities, and plan trips around those values. We got out a white poster board and went to town. Dreaming, planning, ideating—all the things that sounded restful went up on the board in Sharpie.
Then we tore it up.
Our prayer as we did so was simple: Lord, you know our plans and desires, but ultimately we trust you to direct our steps. And he provided above and beyond what we’d hoped for! That experience has me wondering what it would look like to help my children think about summer the same way. What do they want to learn this summer? What are they excited for? And what do they wish they could do during the school year that maybe they can do now? I’m asking them to set goals—not because I want to optimize their summer, but because I want to help surface the things that bring them joy.
Maybe you just hit the top of the arc and are still tiptoeing around the fresh carnage of the decompression stage, so you need to catch your breath before tackling goal-setting with your kids. Or maybe you hit the top a few weeks ago, and the invitation to you today is simply to take note of where and what your kids are already giving their time, energy, and emotions, and join them! Come alongside them with encouragement, intentionality, and truth to help them achieve rest amidst whatever they’ve naturally been drawn to. The summer is far from over. Enter when and where you’re able.
One goal I’m setting for our family is reducing some of the technology that tends to fill empty pockets of time. We have one TV in our house, and we’re taking it down for the summer. We have a small projector we can pull out of the closet if we want to watch something, but my hope is that removing the easy option will create more space for pursuing true rest. And then, just like our sabbatical plans, we’re going to loosely hold our summer plans before the Lord and see what happens.
3. Coach Rest
One thing my husband had during his sabbatical was a coach. Someone who periodically checked in and asked questions.
We’re going to do that one-on-one with our kids this summer! So we put check-ins on the calendar to take them out individually and ask some questions: How are you feeling? What’s been life-giving? What’s been draining? Do you need more of something? Less of something?
As parents, we spend so much time coaching achievement and behavior, but I wonder if coaching rest is just as important—if not more so. Rest and space often allow new things to bubble to the surface. Joy. Exhaustion. Anxiety. Gratitude. Questions. Sometimes things we’ve been trying to push down finally have room to be acknowledged. Helping our kids ride those waves is part of helping them rest. And continually pointing them back to what God says about them is our job as their coach.
Remind Your Kids What It Means To Be Human
I think our longing for rest is part of what it means to be human. We all desire a “break,” a vacation, a chance to escape the rat race for a while. As Christians, we know the deeper reason we universally pursue rest. Scripture begins with a God who created and then rested. As people made in his image, we are created for that rhythm too—now and forever (Heb. 4:9).
That truth feels especially important in an age increasingly defined by technology, efficiency, and productivity. One of the things that makes us uniquely human is our willingness to embrace the limits God gave us (Ps. 46:10). We don’t have to earn our value through endless output because Jesus secured our worth.
The gospel reminds us that our identity is not determined by how much we accomplish. We are loved because we belong to him. Through his work—not ours—we are welcomed into the family of God. Our identity as his sons and daughters is secure. That freedom allows us to embrace rest not as a reward for working hard enough, but as a transformative reminder that we are more loved than we can ever imagine. Something we, as adults, constantly forget or question—and something our children need to learn.
Summer always flies by—you can’t change that. But maybe what you can do differently this summer is help your kids experience the restoration that comes from knowing and being known by Jesus. “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matt. 11:28-29)
God With You is a 52-week, chronological devotional exploring God’s story. Through it, teenagers will experience Jesus as the lifter of their burdens and the source of their rest and hope.
