Where do you find rest when the journey is not yet over? In this contemplative episode, we pray with Luc-Olivier Merson’s Rest on the Flight into Egypt, a powerful image of exhaustion, refuge, and compassion. Through scripture, silence, and guided reflection, we encounter a Christ who knows the road of suffering and meets us there.

Matthew 2:13-15

What does it mean to rest while still on the run? This episode invites us into Luc-Olivier Merson’s Rest on the Flight into Egypt, a painting that stands in stark contrast to familiar scenes of Nativity joy and adoration. Here, the Holy Family is not surrounded by celebration, but by exhaustion, uncertainty, and the harshness of the desert. Their journey toward safety allows only the briefest pause before they must continue on.

Merson’s composition draws our attention to the vulnerability of this moment. There is no stable, no shelter — only the massive form of the Sphinx, a symbol of Egypt, offering just enough refuge to survive the night. The painting asks us to enter into empathy: to consider what it means to flee danger, to collapse from weariness, and to rely on whatever shelter can be found. It also invites us to open our hearts to those who seek refuge in our own time.

As the scripture from Matthew reminds us, this journey was not accidental or optional. It was a matter of survival. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph become refugees, and in doing so, Christ comes to know firsthand the trials of displacement, fear, and exhaustion. The painting gently assures us that we are not alone in our own desert places — Christ meets us there, offering compassion born of lived experience.

Through guided prayer and reflection, we are encouraged to gaze deeply at the figures in the painting: Joseph’s weariness, the donkey’s stillness, and Mary and Jesus resting beneath the shadow of the Sphinx. As we return to the scripture, we are invited not simply to hear the story again, but to listen for what God may be speaking personally to us.

The episode closes by reflecting on the role of art in prayer — how it can serve as a doorway into encounter, even when we eventually close our eyes and rest in God’s presence alone. Whether our eyes are open or closed, the invitation remains the same: to pause, to listen, and to trust that God meets us with compassion on every weary road.