This past Sunday started with me teaching a lesson on the Sabbath and the importance of rest in our lives. Then I came home and spent the afternoon working like a prisoner on a chain gang, trimming crepe myrtles and dragging their bones to the road. The afternoon gave me a lot of time to ponder the words I taught on that very morning:
Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work . . . . You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day. (From Deuteronomy 5:12-14)
I do believe in a Sabbath rest. Like most of my fellow 21st century Christians I don’t observe the traditional Jewish Sabbath from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday. I do observe The Lord’s Day, the first day of the week, resurrection day, Sunday.
But just like the Jewish Sabbath, The Lord’s Day is intended for our benefit. It is a gift from God--an opportunity for spiritual renewal and rest before the start of another tough week.
God created us to live to a certain rhythm of life—work, work, work, work, work, work, then a sweet period of rest, reflection and no work at all. You can take your Sabbath rest on a Saturday, a Sunday or a Thursday, just as long as you get into the sublime rhythm the Lord intended.
The Sabbath is a reminder of the liberty God offers his people. It is the one day when we should be free from the tyranny of obligation to anyone other than God himself. So it is a day for worship, whether in church or out. It is also a day to pursue anything that frees our hearts and opens our minds to the reality of God and the blessing of our place in his creation.
Which brings me to the crepe myrtles and the question of whether it is right to do that kind of work on the day of rest.
Unlike the nomadic herders and hardscrabble farmers of old Israel, I work most days in front of a computer. Basically I work with my head and sit on my butt. Acting like a lumberjack for a few hours on a Sunday can be some of the best non-work a white-collar dude can do.
My experience might be compared to a Jewish farmer who, free of obligation in his fields for a day, finds time to sit and compose some poetry.
Probably more important, my cutting those myrtles was a blessing to my wife. She was thrilled that I cut those 10 trees and she didn’t have to. It reminded me of the words of Jesus when he confronted the Pharisees and asked, “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good?” (Mark 3:4). Then, of course, he did great good. Doing something for someone else is an excellent form of Sabbath keeping
Most of us get an abundance of leisure. A few hours of television a night, a movie on the weekend, NetFlix, Xbox, e-books, iPods. We get so much leisure it is easy to discount the value of rest. Leisure is not rest. Rest is found in the near total absence of all the stuff we experience the other six days of the week.
Keeping The Lord’s Day, or the Sabbath or whatever you want to call it, requires discipline. In the days of Moses the Jews were told to get ready for the Sabbath by preparing double food the day before. Keeping the spirit of the Sabbath today requires similar forethought and preparation. If we approach it like any other day we will fill it with the same thoughts and actions that wear us down every other day of the week.
Recently the Lord gave me a beautiful picture of why we need a Sabbath rest. I was driving at night through mountainous north Georgia, when I noticed the sky was beautifully clear and brilliant with stars. There were so many stars that I was actually startled. I had to pull to the side of the road to look at them for a while.
Living in the city, I routinely see only a few dozen stars, even on the clearest of nights. I had forgotten how many stars are actually up there. I needed to be reminded of the glory of the heavens.
The Sabbath rest, whenever we take it, is intended as just such a reminder. In the routine of work and world, it is easy to forget who God is, the glory of his creation, and the beauty of all he created us to be. The day of rest is our opportunity to stop, remember, refresh and enjoy.
Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work . . . . You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day. (From Deuteronomy 5:12-14)
I do believe in a Sabbath rest. Like most of my fellow 21st century Christians I don’t observe the traditional Jewish Sabbath from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday. I do observe The Lord’s Day, the first day of the week, resurrection day, Sunday.
But just like the Jewish Sabbath, The Lord’s Day is intended for our benefit. It is a gift from God--an opportunity for spiritual renewal and rest before the start of another tough week.
God created us to live to a certain rhythm of life—work, work, work, work, work, work, then a sweet period of rest, reflection and no work at all. You can take your Sabbath rest on a Saturday, a Sunday or a Thursday, just as long as you get into the sublime rhythm the Lord intended.
The Sabbath is a reminder of the liberty God offers his people. It is the one day when we should be free from the tyranny of obligation to anyone other than God himself. So it is a day for worship, whether in church or out. It is also a day to pursue anything that frees our hearts and opens our minds to the reality of God and the blessing of our place in his creation.
Which brings me to the crepe myrtles and the question of whether it is right to do that kind of work on the day of rest.
Unlike the nomadic herders and hardscrabble farmers of old Israel, I work most days in front of a computer. Basically I work with my head and sit on my butt. Acting like a lumberjack for a few hours on a Sunday can be some of the best non-work a white-collar dude can do.
My experience might be compared to a Jewish farmer who, free of obligation in his fields for a day, finds time to sit and compose some poetry.
Probably more important, my cutting those myrtles was a blessing to my wife. She was thrilled that I cut those 10 trees and she didn’t have to. It reminded me of the words of Jesus when he confronted the Pharisees and asked, “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good?” (Mark 3:4). Then, of course, he did great good. Doing something for someone else is an excellent form of Sabbath keeping
Most of us get an abundance of leisure. A few hours of television a night, a movie on the weekend, NetFlix, Xbox, e-books, iPods. We get so much leisure it is easy to discount the value of rest. Leisure is not rest. Rest is found in the near total absence of all the stuff we experience the other six days of the week.
Keeping The Lord’s Day, or the Sabbath or whatever you want to call it, requires discipline. In the days of Moses the Jews were told to get ready for the Sabbath by preparing double food the day before. Keeping the spirit of the Sabbath today requires similar forethought and preparation. If we approach it like any other day we will fill it with the same thoughts and actions that wear us down every other day of the week.
Recently the Lord gave me a beautiful picture of why we need a Sabbath rest. I was driving at night through mountainous north Georgia, when I noticed the sky was beautifully clear and brilliant with stars. There were so many stars that I was actually startled. I had to pull to the side of the road to look at them for a while.
Living in the city, I routinely see only a few dozen stars, even on the clearest of nights. I had forgotten how many stars are actually up there. I needed to be reminded of the glory of the heavens.
The Sabbath rest, whenever we take it, is intended as just such a reminder. In the routine of work and world, it is easy to forget who God is, the glory of his creation, and the beauty of all he created us to be. The day of rest is our opportunity to stop, remember, refresh and enjoy.
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