Redeeming Rest

Matthew 11:28 “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.”

This is our theme verse for the next several weeks as we begin a new series on Redeeming Rest.

I have found it very interesting that when you ask most Christians if the Ten Commandments are still valid, they typically agree. We should still only worship and serve the Lord. Those commands about lying, stealing, killing, and adulterating still apply. But when asked about the  commandment to keep the Sabbath, there are often blank stares. Isn’t that just an OT thing? This commandment is very inconvenient. But if the injunction to not kill is still a binding regulation, why not a day of rest?

It’s no secret that Americans live life at an unsustainable pace. We work more hours that almost every other culture in the industrialized world. Almost 20% more than our European neighbors. When we aren’t working, we fill our schedules with activities - sports, hobbies, entertainment. We create our agenda, and then our agenda controls us. We’ve become a slaves to our schedule.

We wear busyness like a badge of honor. How often when seeing an old friend and asking how they’re doing the response is, “Busy”.

We have even confused leisure with rest. We often take the same frenzied schedule that governs our normal life and carry it into our leisure time. “Everybody’s workin’ for the weekend.” We cram as much as we possibly can into our free time. How often have you heard someone say, after returning from a vacation, “I need a vacation from my vacation”?  How often have you said it?

Mental health pandemic in our country…Is our mental health crisis partially because we’ve forgotten how to rest?

Quote from The Rest of God page 18… It’s not just a pastoral problem...

Because God knew of our proclivity to ignore rest to our own harm, he did something unique among all the gods of the ancient near east - he demanded a day of rest for his followers. He didn’t offer it as a good idea - even though it is - he embedded it in the law-code of ancient Israel.  It’s called the Sabbath. As we will see, one day out of seven they were required to cease from their daily concerns and rest. This word “rest”, or Sabbath, is loaded with meaning that is still applicable to us today.

This morning I want to look at sabbath-keeping - resting - and our identity. God did not give us an identity of “human doers” but “human beings”. Our value to God, and our identity, is not centered on our production capacity. When we lose the ability to rest, we lose something essential to our identity.  This morning we begin a journey of reclaiming our identity - and our mental health - by reclaiming rest through Sabbath-keeping.

Reclaiming our identity through Sabbath keeping

Genesis 2:1-3

Deut. 5:12-15

If we were to walk through Genesis 1 we would see that God made everything that exists. Then we see in chapter 2, after he pronounces everything “very good”, he rests. That seems like a weird thing for God to do. Is he tired? We know God doesn’t get tired. The act of creating the entire cosmos took literally nothing out of him. So we need to look a little deeper, and here is where we find application for our lives.

The words “rest” and “sabbath” in these verses are the same Hebrew word, šābat. It can mean both “to cease” and “to rest”. I want to look at both of these connected ideas as the way God intends for us to reclaim our identity.

To cease

First, lets look at the idea of “ceasing”. In Genesis, the first idea of God resting is that he ceased from his creative work. His act of creating was finished. So his rest doesn’t imply inactivity, only that his creative work is finished.

It’s clear in the Deuteronomy passage I read that sabbath for us means imitating what God did - resting from our creative work. Work is good and can still be a blessing, but there is a time where we must say “no” to work and cease from our labor. God gave this commandment to people who had been rescued from slavery in Egypt. As slaves, they were never allowed a time of rest. Now, as free people, God demands that they observe the freedom he has given them by ceasing from their normal labor.

For those of us raised in religious homes, the idea of a sabbath has negative connotations. It usually meant going to church - twice! - and avoiding anything fun. No activities, no friends. Just sitting around contemplating your sinfulness. But this is not the idea associated with sabbath in scripture. Yes, it was a day to say ‘no’ to regular work, but it was so you could say ‘yes’ to delight.

Like that pastor’s story I read to you, the truth is that we often become enslaved to our work:

Often we become slaves to our work due to fear of lack or insecurity. We are driven by fear of going without.

We are prone to attach too much importance on our work. We sacrifice ourselves - and sometimes our family - to a false sense of urgency regarding the work we do. In many ways this justifies in our mind the time and energy we give to it.

We are prone to derive too much of our own personal sense of self-worth from our work. Our work becomes who we are, and how we judge our life is often tied to how successful we are at work.

Just like with the Israelites, I believe God is re-emphasizing his will that we rest from our work. Through rest we denounce a false identity of slavery. We say “no” to allowing our work or our schedule to be our master. For one day we “cease” from our labor because, as God’s image bearers, we are free people, not slaves. For one day, we sit back and trust that God can run the world, and our life, just fine without our input.

Where have you become enslaved to your work or an over-committed schedule? Where might God be telling you to establish new boundaries or new habits? Are you willing to set aside one 24-hour period to leave regular work behind so that you may delight in his freedom?

To rest

When God calls us to rest, to sabbath, it means we cease from being slaves. The other meaning of šābat is to “rest”, but that does not mean what we normally associate with it. It is closely connected to a word for “seat”. In Genesis 1 God speaks to the chaos of initial creation to bring order and function out of disorder and dysfunction. The image is of a warrior God, who having pushed back the forces of chaos - driving our darkness with light, pushing back the primordial waters to create earth and sky - now ascends his throne to begin his reign. God is pictured as a king sitting upon his throne having subdued his enemies. And so his “rest” is not inactivity or absence, but an active reigning. He has ceased from his creative labor, but now he enters an active reign over his labor.

We see this same idea several times in the OT applied to God’s people when Israel’s kings would subdue enemies so that the land was “at rest” from war. Their throne was secure and now they could reign over their kingdom.

I want to suggest that, Through rest we resume our original God-given identity as reigning image bearers. God created human beings to have dominion over creation - not independent of God but as co-regents. This says something profound about who you are in God’s eyes. About your dignity and worth. Not only are you not a slave, you are a ruler. When you observe a day of rest, you metaphorically sit upon a throne to reign over the work of your hands. This is how you bear God’s image. In rest we can experience the same sense of completion and well-being that God did in his creation. We enjoy and delight in the fruit of God’s work and our work.

Entering into rest

Matthew 11:28 ““Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.”

When humankind fell into sin, we lost our identity. We became subject to slavery - slavery to sin and to death. Jesus came to restore our identity. He is our Sabbath rest. Come to me and I will give you rest...

Is your life marked by rest, or are you restless? Is your life characterized by peace and joy, or are you constantly living with a short fuse, a bomb that is ready to go off at any moment? Jesus wants to restore your identity… (next steps slide)

Friends, we ignore God’s intentions for sabbath at our own peril. It’s making us sick - physically, mentally, emotionally. We must restore sabbath keeping as part of our essential identity as image bearers. Not in a slavish way that has been practiced in the past. But as a day to set aside our normal work so that we may delight in God and in life. My own habit of taking Monday as my sabbath…

Challenge them during this series to set aside one 24-day each week to rest. The day doesn’t matter. Sabbath is a day on the calendar, but even more it is a disposition of the heart.

Pray the sabbath blessing from Lectio 365.