Embracing the Sabbath
Rest. We all require rest. Rest isn’t for the weak… God Himself made it a priority. He set us up an example. When He finished creation, He rested and blessed the day of rest as holy – or set apart for Him. So great an importance did God place on this day of rest that He included it in His top ten rules for His people. Exodus 20:8-11 includes “Remember the sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work; but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God; in it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your manservant, or your maidservant, or your cattle, or the sojourner who is within your gates; for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and hallowed it.” From the very beginning, God has been looking out for our best interest.
How tempting it is to fill every moment of every day with some sort of business. There is never an end to the things that need to be done. Even the things we do for enjoyment can become burdensome when we place pressure on ourselves to complete them or spend a certain amount of time working on them. The idea of a day of rest, and God’s instruction to make it holy, keeps us centered on what is important. The sabbath was intended to be a day of rest and reflection, a day to devote our minds to God and our bodies to healing from the work of the week.
Unfortunately, like most things, humanity found a way to twist even this gift so that the sabbath became a burden and not a gift. Rules were added to God’s original command and fear of punishment tainted the joy of reflecting on God’s gifts. Jesus attempted to teach the people of his time about the correct importance of sabbath rest. Matthew 12 records his exchange between himself and the Pharisees on the subject. The Pharisees complained that the disciples picked grain and ate it as they walked through a field. Yet Jesus reprimanded them saying, “And if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless. For the Son of man is lord of the sabbath.” (verses 7-8).
From the field, Jesus then went to the temple. Here, he healed a man with a withered hand saying, “What man of you, if he has one sheep and it falls into a pit on the sabbath, will not lay hold of it and lift it out? Of how much more value is a man than a sheep! So it is lawful to do good on the sabbath.” (verses 11-12) These words, spoken first by God the Father and then by God the Son, help us understand God’s will for us through the sabbath. The sabbath is a gift from God to us, but it can also be a gift from us back to God. There are many ways in which we can keep it holy and honor the Lord this day: resting, learning, teaching, helping. This is more than a day set aside for watching football and putting our feet up. It is a day to honor the Lord.
Let us honor the sabbath and keep it holy by giving it to the Lord. Let us do His work and rest from our usual burdens; looking forward to the future rest waiting for us. Hebrews 4:9-10 tells us, “So then, there remains a sabbath rest for the people of God; for whoever enters God’s rest also ceases from his labors as God did from His.”
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