A Sabbath rest

By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done. Genesis 2: 2 – 3

Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labour 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, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. Exodus 20: 8 – 11

It is very interesting how much attitudes towards Sunday have changed.  Fifty or more years ago in Britain, Sunday was a very quiet day with some Christians not permitting their families to go out or do anything including watching what little television there was, going to the cinema or even reading books.

Attitudes loosened in all areas of society during the sixties and gradually the matter of Sunday trading became more and more prominent in the UK. This led to various battles between government and big stores. In 1994 everything came to a head between mainly the big supermarkets and the Keep Sunday Special campaign. Finally a law was passed enabling big stores to open for six hours on a Sunday and smaller convenience stores opening for much longer. One interesting little addendum is that big stores cannot open at all on Easter Sunday.

This was definitely the opening of Pandora’s box as far as Sunday being a day of rest is concerned. Sunday is now another shopping day and life in Britain has fundamentally shifted. Now it is not just shops open all week but builders and others working every day. Instead of having a day a week to rest and spend time with family and friends, Sunday has become a day to catch up on the chores and do the weekly shopping.

The question is: should this matter to us as Christians?  I think the answer is ‘Yes’.  Many Christians have absolutely no problem with working or shopping on a Sunday. They go to church and then they go shopping. However the Bible is quite clear that God has a definite view about this.  When God created the universe he worked for six days and rested on the seventh.

This was long before the Ten Commandments where God reiterated his desire for his people to rest on the Sabbath (and the word Sabbath has its roots in the word rest) and do no work so that even their servants and the animals could also rest. The reason for keeping the seventh day special, set apart or holy was because God himself rested on the seventh day from his labours. This is the example he set.

Society needs basic and emergency services manned seven days a week but I believe it is vital that everyone gets one rest day a week.  We need one day that is different from the other six to rest and re-charge our batteries.

In Russia some years ago they changed to a ten-day working week to boost productivity. The result was disastrous. People could not cope with it at any level; physical or emotional. Our bodies and minds are programmed to the rhythm of a seven-day week. However I also believe we are programmed to have one day a week of rest because that is what our Creator did and we are made in his image.

Somehow a subtle lie seems to have infiltrated the Church that because we are under grace not law we can pick and choose which commandments we keep. We don’t stone people caught in adultery though the Bible is quite clear that adultery is wrong and some of the health and hygiene laws in Leviticus are no longer appropriate but the Ten Commandments where God gave the instruction about the Sabbath is a basic set of laws appropriate to any society. We need to see them not as shackles but as liberators for good healthy living and relationships - for all.

In our work obsessed societies, the word rest has become almost synonymous with lazy. This is the greatest lie of all. Now it is not just shops and garden centres that are open on Sunday but builders, plumbers, carpet fitters and so on like to fit in an extra day of work. We had an extension recently and our builder wanted to work on Sunday. We declined. This was not from a deep religious conviction but because firstly we don’t want people working in our house when we are resting and secondly we don’t want to be the cause of someone else working on a rest day. If they choose to work elsewhere that is their prerogative.

Personally I think churches and Christians need to look again at the whole issue of Sundays.  Family life is seriously undermined on all sides and I think we should do all we can to protect and promote it. Some people have to work but how much are our lifestyle choices undermining other people’s need for a day of rest with family and friends?

As Christians I believe it is time we stopped fitting into the culture and instead created a culture based on what the Bible teaches. God has a very definite view of the Sabbath day of rest – maybe we should too?

The Passover Sabbath

We do not know much about the Passover Sabbath (the Saturday) of that Easter week but we can glean something of what was happening from the Gospels. As evening drew near on Friday, Joseph of Arimethea went to Pilate to ask for Jesus’ body and Pilate granted it to him. Joseph took the body wrapped it in linen and placed it in a new tomb near to the site of the crucifixion. He then rolled a big stone in front of the tomb and went home. Some of the ladies watched all of this before also going home (Matthew 27: 57 – 61).

The Sabbath started at dusk on Friday and ran till dusk on Saturday. For 24 hours they all rested as commanded by the law. (Luke 23: 56). No one had any anticipation of Jesus’ rising from the dead. For all the disciples and the ladies this must have been a terrible day. If you have lost anyone dear to you for the first few days you can feel devastated. But for the disciples this was Jesus, the Messiah, that had been crucified like a common criminal and yet he had done nothing wrong.

Added to their intense grief must have been extreme bewilderment and anger especially aimed at the chief priests and leaders of the Jewish people. We know they were behind locked doors, fearful of the Jews (John 20: 19). I expect they had great difficulty eating anything on that Sabbath and the one word running round and round in their minds must have been ‘Why?’ Why did he die, why did he allow them to kill him, why had it happened? Why? Why? Why?  I wondered if anyone mentioned that Jesus had said he would be raised from the dead. There was certainly no expectation from anyone when the ladies went to anoint the bodies with spices on the first day of the week. All the disciples struggled to believe he had been raised even when they were told it by eye witnesses.

There was however one rather surprising group who remembered that Jesus had said he would be raised from the dead on the third day. In Matthew 27: 62 we read, the next day, the one after Preparation Day, the chief priests and the Pharisees went to Pilate, ‘Sir,’ they said, ‘we remember that while he was alive that deceiver said, ‘After three days I will rise again.’ The only people who remembered what Jesus had said he would rise on the third day were the very people who had arranged to have him crucified. Now they were determined to make sure he stayed dead and no one could steal his body from the tomb and say he had risen.

It is amazing that the religious leaders went to Pilate on the Sabbath – it was prohibited by the law to do any work on the Sabbath and this must surely be classified as work, but they were so worried about a possible resurrection – real or fake – that they persuaded Pilate to seal and put a guard on the tomb. Again they missed the point that if someone is really raised from the dead, a stone over the door of the tomb – sealed or not – will not be an obstacle to the miracle.

The disciples were people just like you and me and yet they did not remember or recognise what God was doing even when he had clearly told them before hand what would happen. In the same way we may have forgotten or not understood some things that God has said to us in the past. Today let us encourage ourselves by re-visiting personal or church prophecies or Scriptures that we may have forgotten or have not yet come to pass. Let us ask God to open our eyes to what he is doing and bring fresh revelation to us to day so we will be ready and prepared for anything that may come in the days ahead.

A Sabbath day of rest

Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labour and do all your work but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God.  Exodus 20: 8 – 9

Busyness is one of the greatest deceptions of modern life. There is almost a virtue of being busy.  Christians on Facebook will tell their friends all about the wonderful things they have been doing and how busy they are. However, I am not saying that laziness is a virtue either but as the old saying goes, ‘we are human beings not human doings’. Who we are is more important than what we do.

Busyness sounds so fulfilling and satisfying with not a minute to spare but that is the very problem. When over busy, we have no time to think, meditate and often pray and read our Bibles. We are too busy to stop and if we do stop we feel guilty that we are not doing something.

That is why God instituted the Sabbath day of rest and he not only commanded it, he also did it. Right at the beginning God rested on the seventh day after spending six days creating the universe and our wonderful planet. The Sabbath was given to the Israelites before the 10 commandments (Exodus 16:23). Indeed the origin of the word Sabbath is rested. It is good to rest and God commanded the Sabbath as the fourth of the Ten Commandments. 

This is where the howl goes up that we are not under law but under grace but God in his graciousness has given us a day of rest. I believe it is to the detriment of both individuals and society that we have thrown away our rest day as casually as we throw out the rubbish. 

Several times in the Bible God warns us that when the cares and worries of life take over, we will miss out on what He is doing. In the parable of the sower, one lot of seed never came to fruition because the cares and worries of life choked it (Matthew 13: 22). Busyness fills our life with cares and worries – we have so much to think about that we have trouble thinking about God and the life he wants for us.  In Luke 21 Jesus was talking about the end times and again warns that the cares and anxieties of life cloud our vision from what is going on (Luke 21: 34). Jesus is always alerting us to watch and pray. Busyness crowds that out.

Making a conscious choice to keep one day of the week separate (holy) to the Lord is vital for believers. The busyness of modern life will choke our minds and hearts from what God is saying and doing unless we choose each week to set aside a day to rest and re-group. This is not a day to necessarily spend being all spiritual or at church all day but a day to spend with God, family and friends; a day to clear our minds of the clutter of the week and to think about other things.

Let us unashamedly grasp hold of our day of rest and use it as that – a day of rest – not a day to catch up on the chores but a day of rest. I guarantee that as we honour God with our Sabbath, he will help sort out our priorities for the week and there will always be time to get those things done that need to be done AND we will be refreshed in every way and our lives enriched. I can recommend it wholeheartedly.