The Revolutionary Sabbath
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This morning, let’s start out in Genesis chapter 2.
“Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array.
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.”
God rested. Let that sink in for a minute. God rested. “Yeah but I’m so busy. You know me. I’m type A and I love my job and I really feel like I gotta. GOD RESTED.” After 6 days of hard work God himself said enough is enough It’s time to rest. I’m going to teach you some hebrew because that’s how I roll. The word ‘rest’ in hebrew is the word Shabbat. Can you say that with me? Yeah Good, You learned some hebrew this morning. Happy Mother’s day. That’s my gift to you mothers. It’s where we get the word sabbath. It can be translated as to stop or to cease or to be done and interestingly enough it can also be translated to celebrate. The idea behind the sabbath is an entire day set aside to slow down to stop to take a step back and celebrate. Celebrate the world and your life in it and above all God himself. Now the sabbath is not the same thing as a day off of work. Hopefully you know that by now. On a day of you do all the work you don’t get paid for. You run errands, you pay the bills, you go to the bank, if you have an apartment or a house you get work done around that you clean whatever, if you have kids all of those things but on steroids. You go shoppings you buy you sell you visit that boutique you meant to go to you play you go out and do whatever it is you do. Watch that movie you’ve been meaning to watch you or binge Netflix or you finally get to the gym.
And that’s all great. But the sabbath is something else. It is an entire day, that is in the language here of , and the language of God, a day that is blessed and holy. It is a day when God has my wrapped attention. Where I create space to just sit and be with him. It’s a day when I am fully available to my family and friends no phone no distaraction no work no errands to run just there in the moment. It’s a day to reconnect with who God has called you to be and to focus on what really matters. And it is a day to wake up to all that is Good and Beautiful and True that God has made. And to celebrate it as an act of worship.
And in the story. God worked for six days and then he rested for one and in doing so God built a rhythm into the fabric of creation. By rhythm I mean there is a way that the creator set the creation everything from the human body, to society, the ecosystem there is a way that the creator set creation to flourish and thrive. In this symbiotic relationship between work and rest.
If your life is all work then overtime either you become grouchy and stressed out and on edge. Or you grind your soul into the ground you become a machine, just another cog in society. Hollow and empty behind the eyes. On the flipside if your life is all rest, and that is a problem for some of you. God bless you. This is Southern California. I love it to death but it can be a lazy hedonistic city. The cost of living is high but so many people still just just hang out. Especially filipinos. I have a friend in New York city and she said “Man I love LA but it’s so weird people there just hang out. I’m like yeah what do you mean. She said Yeah in New York I mean we work all the time my apartment is 400 square feet and costs 4 grand a month. We don’t have time to hang out we have jobs you guys just hang out in LA. And I said yeah well. We work too. I work, part-time. Don’t worry about it. Y’know
For some of you though that might be your life. Maybe you’re in between jobs or maybe youre living at home or maybe you’re not working right now because you’re pursuing a hobby. And if that’s how you live, then overtime life starts to become drab and you’ll begin to struggle with remaining interested with anything and struggle with feeling significance. You were made to do more than just hang out. You were made to participate in the kingdom work of the King. You were made to contribute and partner with God to take the city of Carson and this world forward.
My point is that both overwork and underwork rob us for the capacity to live to the full. So this rhythm of six days of work and one day of sabbath six days of work and one day of sabbath. This is the kind of rhythm that God set into motion from the first minute of the first hour of the first day. Which is why, later on, when God calls out a people, if you know the story of the Old Testament. The story of Israel. When God calls out a people he actually commands the sabbath. Turn to Exodus chapter 20. One book over to the right.
This is what we now call the ten commandments. God is at the top of Mount Sinai, Israel is at the base and God spoke all these words.
“I am Yahweh God who brought you out of the land of Egypt. Out of the land of Slavery. You shall have no other God’s before me. You shall not make for yourself an image. You shall not misuse the name of Yahweh, your God. Then listen to commandment number 4. It’s right there Exodus chapter 20 verse 8.
“Remember the Sabbath Day.” Don’t forget about it. Don’t get sucked into the Rat race to the crazy hectic busy way of life particularly in the late modern west. Remember there is a day. It’s blessed it’s holy it’s set aside. It’s vital and it was made for you. Remember that.
How?
By keeping it holy. Here’s another hebrew word. The word holy in hebrew is kadosh. And it can be translated set apart for or dedicated to. We read six days you shall labour and do all your work but the seventh day is the Sabbath to Yahweh your God. It’s not just a day for rest. To take a nap, read a novel, sleep in. Yes that. But it’s also a day for worship. It’s holy, it’s set apart and dedicated to Yahweh God. An entire day out of work week to set aside to focus your mind your heart your body your life onto the God who made you.
When I sabbath i run everything through that grid. Is this rest and then is this worship. If the answer to either of those two is no then I hold off. There are six other days for all that stuff. If the answer to both is yes. This is rest and this is worship then I step into it with Joy. Notice one of the best things about the ten commandments is each one is in the negative. Meaning telling you what not to do. That’s actually a good thing because it creates more space for creativity, human delight and life that brings joy to the heart of God. Think of the difference between a commandment about what exactly you have to do that a kind of a tyrant dictator, this is what you do command versus a don’t do this, don’t do this, don’t do this, this creates boundaries and inside those boundaries is this wide open space for freedom. So the boundaries around the sabbath are one side, rest and on the other side is worship. Anything in between that wide open space of rest and worship have at it with delight. That’s why there’s no formula in the Old Testament or anywhere in the New for how to Sabbath. If you don’t agree, be my guest look. Because believe me I live and breathe literary research. It’s not in there.
So much of it is based on who you are as a human. My friend Tim Scroggins is an introvert. He spends some time with friends but quickly gets tired out then he goes to the library which i hate, and he just sits and reads and writes and then he just stares out the window to watch birds fly through the trees in the library courtyard. But he absolutely loves it. If you ever walk into the library and he’s often just there staring out the window. It’s so weird but i know its exactly what he needs. Or maybe are you an extrovert like me? Then Sabbath can look like trying a new coffee shop with friend. Eating some donuts over coffee and having a laugh with a friend. Grabbing a meal one of my best friends and then going to see my next best friend and then my next bestfriend who I really just met. And then you all go out to lunch together. So much is based on your personality and your stage of life are you single, do you have a roommate do you have fourteen of them or one of them do you have a husband or wife do you have little kids at home which basically means you dont get a sabbath unless you have in laws. You have highschool kids Whatever. And it can even depend on the season. Summer is different than winter different things are possible.
Whatever. But my point is that there’s all this open space and freedom anything that is restful worship and worshipful rest is fair game for you on the sabbath. Now notice the commandment goes on. On it you shall not do any work neither you nor your son nor your daughter so you parents so you can’t make your kids make you dinner. Nor your male and female servant nor your animal. So all of you who want to make your ox or pack mule haul a load to the market you just can’t on the sabbath. Nor any foreigner residing in your town. So the point here is that the sabbath is for everybody. It’s not just for the rich who have extra time and money to blow on a nice vacation in Hawaii. This is for the rich and the poor and the young and the old for the legal and the illegal for the refugee and for the citizen. This is for the entire community to flourish and thrive.
Listen and pay attention to this next part. Listen to the why behind the commandment. It’s so very rare to get a look behind the curtain in this way. Where we get a glimpse at the logic of God saying this is my logic this is my thinking. For or here’s why. In six days, Yahweh made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them. But he rested on the seventh day. Therefore Yahweh blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
God here goes back to the story of and he basically makes the same story. I set the standard for how the sabbath functions in creation. There is a rhythm to creation. You work for six days you rest for one. Now notice before we move on. That commandment number four, look down at your Bible, it is by far the longest commandment of the ten commandments. It is expounded the most and explained the most. In fact if you were to translate the ten commandments into a pie chart the sabbath commandment would make well over 30 percent of the pie. Meaning to God this is really really important. This is where Yahweh says yes all of this is extremely important but I’m going to really hit this home for you guys with the Sabbath. You really need to catch this. I have extra stuff to say. It really matters.
Now stick with me, I wanna show you something that I think is really really cool. Turn over to Deuteronomy chapter 5. Keep going to the right of your Bible. So the first 5 books of the Bible if you’ve ever read it, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. The first 5 books are usually called the Torah. Torah is a Hebrew word that means law or teaching or something like that. But technically, if you want to get really particular there are two Torahs, one from , the ten commandments all the way to the end of Leviticus. And then there’s another one that comes later here in Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy, that title comes from two greek words. Deutero meaning second and nomos meaning law. Deuteronomy literally means the second law or the second torah. And here’s why. The law that you have from to Leviticus. That law was written by God from the top of mount Sinai, Israel is at the base in the desert. Israel was literally days out of slavery in Egypt. Okae?
But Deuteronomy was written 48ish years later to that generations kids. After the very long detour in the desert that I don’t have time to talk about but really want to talk about. That generations kids are now no longer out in the desert but on the edge of the Jordan River about to step into the land of Canaan and become for the first time a nation eventually with a king and a kingdom and government and a temple and a law, before all of that. They are right on the cusp right on the verge of a whole new reality wildy significant moment for Israel. And so what Moses does is he calls everybody together and he starts to retell the salient points of the law to this next generation. He retells them their story so far. Because either they were not there or they were on a baby sling on the front. Like a cart with a camel or something. And he retells the salient points of the law to this new generation who has no clue but are about to inherit everything. Now here in chapter 5 he retells the ten commandments. And I want you to see what he is up to.
Chapter 5. Skip down to commandment number four in verse 12. Observe the sabbath day by keeping it holy as Yahweh your God has commanded you six days you shall labour and do all your work but the seventh day is a sabbath to yahweh your God. On it you shall not do any work. Neither you; nor your son or your daughter; nor your male or female servant; or your ox your donkey or any of your animals; or any foreigner residing in your town so that your male and female servants may rest as you do. Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the Lord your God brought you up out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore, that’s why Yahweh your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day. Now notice this the first half of the commandment is almost identical. Just one word is changed in that opening line from Remember the Sabbath Exodus to Observe the Sabbath in Deuteronomy.
So if you come from a Jewish background or if you practice any kind of a jewish tradition around sabbath you know that there are two candles for sabbath. You’d do this a little before the sun goes down on a Friday night. You light two candles one candle is symbolic for remember the Sabbath and the other is symbolic for this command right here to observe. The sabbath.
So for the Sabbath you not only remember. You remember and what? Observe. Think of it the way that you observe Christmas or Easter. So most of you unless youre really crazy laid back and irresponsibly. Not that those are the same thing even though they kinda are. Most of you get ready for Christmas. You don’t just wake up on Christmas and think oh what should I do today. I don’t know. Go to our parents? Most of you think about Christmas in advance. You gear up you prep for it. You shop for it. You get food you think of ways to make it special with family or friends or food or drink or a fireplace or a trip. You treat that day very different than your average Monday. It stands apart.
It’s like a Holiday. Holiday. Holiday. Holy Day. It’s like a Holy Day. That comes once a week but without all the stress of Christmas or Thanksgiving or whatever. We treat it in such a way that it stands apart we make it special. We remember it and don’t forget it. We don’t get sucked in to the pace of life. And we also observe it. We pay special attention to how we celebrate this weekly holiday or Holy Day. That’s changed at the beginning and then it’s basically the same until the end. And it’s really interesting because Moses changes the ending. And you can do that by the way when you’re Moses. You’re not so don’t.
Anyway he changes the ending. In Exodus the ending is, “For in six days yahweh made the heavens and the earth and all that is in them. And he rested on the seventh day therefore yahweh blessed the sabbath day and made it holy. But here in deuteronomy. There’s a little but about male and female slaves. And then it’s remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that Yahweh your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore, that’s why Yahweh your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.
On Mt. Sinai, the command is grounded in the story of creation. But here in Deuteronomy the command is grounded in the story of the Exodus. On Mount Sinai, the sabbath is an art form. But here in Deuteronomy it’s an act of defiance against Pharaoh and his slave drivers. At mt Sinai it’s an invitation from God hey come join in my rest and delight in my world. But here in Deuteronomy it’s a warning to stay from Egypt and its system. Deuteronomy is chock full of warnings to stay away from Egypt. Why is that? It’s because that Egypt is somewhere you never want to return to. A little bit of background to frame this up for you. In the story of the Exodus if you ever read that or watch the Prince of Egypt there is all sorts of language about restlessness. For example here are a couple of lines from half of one chapter. Quote “Why are you taking the people away from their labour, get back to your work.” Quote “Get back to your work.” Quote “You are stopping them from working.” Quote “Make the work harder for the people so they keep working.” Quote “Pharaoh said lazy that is what you are lazy that is why you keep saying let us go and sacrifice to yahweh now get to work. You will not be given any straw yet you must produce the full quota of brick.” By the way this is just from half of a short chapter. In the story Pharaoh, the character, is implacable and relentless. He is ruthless and cruel, a tyrant. No matter how hard the Hebrews work it’s never enough. It’s never enough. They lived under the oppressive yoke of the daily quota. More More More. All in the name of a flourishing Egypt. And it wasn’t just Pharaoh. It was Egypt as a whole. Their whole economic system. We read that the Israelites were making brick to make what. Supply cities. Not cities. Supply cities. Entire cities just for Pharaoh and all the rich to store their extra stuff. Egypt’s appetite for more was insatiable. There was never enough. Never enough stuff and never enough food. They needed more and more and more. And the economy of Egypt was a slave economy. The whole system was built on the backs of slave.
To get to the lifestyle of a pharaoh or an egypt you need what historians call cheap labour. Which is a nice way of saying workers you can underpay to maximize your ability to rest and enjoy life. Slaves, now here’s the thing about slaves. Slaves don’t get a sabbath. Pharaoh denies them rest. Slaves are a commodity to buy and sell and they only have value in what they can produce. They work all day. Everyday until they die. It turns out that rest is a byproduct of freedom. No freedom no rest. Freedom Rest. So the command in deuteronomy is “Hey Israel. Remember that you’re not slaves anymore because of what i did for you. You’re not in Egypt, you’re free. So rest.” Sabbath was a way for Israel to stay free from Slavery and listen to this. Really listen to this. This is a take home put it in the back of your pockets for safe keeping. I am actually proud of this little point. Sabbath was a way for Israel to rest, stay free from slavery and to never become the slave drivers.
Here the commands about how you treat your male and female servant, your work animal, the foreigner and immigrant. Sabbath was a line in the sand saying we will never go back the way of Egypt. Never and we will never become Egypt. As inherit the land and become Israel the people of God we will never become Egypt. And we need Sabbath now more than ever before. I would argue, because Pharaoh is alive and well in the world. And so is Egypt. At work in our midst, in our communities, in our families.
And guess what, who is Egypt now, it’s us. Like it or not the global economic system of which we are a part of. This week i was caught off guard by an infographic representing hat economists call the global pyramid of wealth. I’m not interpreting numbers or making a political statement of who to support. I am merely asking you to look for a moment with me. At the bottom of this pyramid is just about 70% of human life making up about 3.3% of the worlds wealth. And at the top is 0.6 percent of humanity that make up just about just shy of 40 percent of the world’s wealth. Now where are we as individuals in America we’re not at the top. But it’s likely you’re standing on top of 70% of Image Bearing Human Life. If you’re at the top. Then all I have to say to you is please start tithing. Okae. Most people in America are not at the top but were near the top. And here’s the thing. Egypt is really lousy if you’re a slave. But it is not half bad if you’re an Egyptian.
At the bottom of the pyramid is upwards of 4 Billion people, a vast swath of humanity. Who make a good amount of our t-shirts and our shoes and our iphones. You all might know this but there are 28 million known slaves in our world today. And that’s way more than were ever involved in the African slave trade a century ago as heinous as that was. 28 million slaves? In the 21st century? That’s the byproduct of the spirit if Egypt at work in the tech savvy 21st century.
This is the world that we live in. Now i’m gunna step off the soapbox of talking about the economic system. Because it’s not just an economic system. It’s a culture that we live in. A culture of restlessness. You all will feel this today as you walk out of the doors of this church. Some of you are already on your phone answering an email or have stepped out once in this gathering to answer a work call. Some of you have zoned out of this message thinking about the work you have to do next week. We have so much but we never feel like we have enough and there’s always more work to get done. In this culture there is an endless unquenchable lust for more. Here in the US we work more than ever before. The Japanese have a phrase koroshi which means death by overwork. They have a phrase because its currently ravaging young men and women in japan. There’s a documentary called Salarymen by Allegra Pachecko who spent time in Japan making chalk outlines in the street of the hundreds of men each night passed out near death on the street after a long stint at the office.
But here’s the thing American on average work 137 more hours per week than the Japanese. And 260 more hours per year than the British. And then 499 more than the French. We work more than any other nation in the world. This is due in large part to technology so called labour saving devices the smart phone and the internet which is like an office you carry around in your back pocket. I am just barely old enough to remember a time when the office was only something you go to to do work and no where else. Now to go the office many of you just have to roll over in the morning and check your phone.
I am not anti-technology. Not at all. I am a tried and true millenial. I am an apple fanboy. I am wearing a black apple watch, with an iphone X in my pocket preaching a sermon from an Ipad that was written on a Macbook pro with scribblings in the manuscript from an apple pencil. I believe it does a ton of good in the world but I very much believe that every generation since the dawn of time has its blind spots and I think that digital addiction is at the top of the list for everybody in this room.
And I think that some of you with little kids right now might grow up at think my dad was always on his phone. My mom never listened because she was more interested with instagram and facebook or pinterest than she was in me. The millennials rebellion was we all got tattoos and became suspicious of church and rules. But I think the next generation will get flip phones. Just to stick it to mom and dad. Or maybe a rotary phone.
Here’s an idea here’s a challenge for you, this coming week. This is a crazy challenge only for the few and the brave. Take your phone, if you have an iphone it’s on the upper right hand side. Push it down and hold it for a minute. swipe to the right. And power it down. Take it and put it away in a closet or in a drawer and go do something with some friends. Do something. Read your Bible. Don’t take an instagram of you kinda reading your Bible for 30 seconds.
No. Be present in the moment. Or just see how long it is before you don’t know what to do with yourself. That’s a good sign that you have a crutch in your life. I did a while back with a group of friends and we all failed. It’s really hard. But we grew in awareness of our dependence and i value people more.
My point is that we work more than ever before and on top of that we have more than ever before. America makes up 4% of the world’s population but over 22% of the world’s economy. We work more than ever before and we have more than ever before but we are just as unhappy as ever. In fact sociologists have observes that happiness in America hit a peak in the 1950’s and have been on the decline since grandma and grandpa were in highschool. That’s interesting to me because that’s right around the time that we America started to open things up on Sunday. You can talk to some of the older more grandpa like professors at my school and they remember when Sunday’s nothing was open. You could not get anything or purchase anything on Sunday because they were all closed. There was hardly anyone around who didnt regularly attend church. And one of my professors said the me. Benjo. Seven Eleven. That was the beginning of the end. A convenience store open seven days a week. It was the first of it’s kind.
That was so strange. Because All i can really remember is materialism. Sunday is the day for groceries after church or maybe a shopping day at the mall. As Abraham Joshua Heschel said “There is happiness in the love of labor, and only misery in the love of gain.”
So we work more than ever before and have more than ever before but are still stuck. It’s egypt all over again. We carry the yoke of overwork and in turn we step on who we can. Here’s the thing that I want you to see this morning.
Sabbath is an act of Resistance. Sabbath is a way of saying no to Pharaoh and his slave drivers. As a good friend of mine puts its like the middle finger to Egypt and it’s way of life. And if that’s offensive to you. That’s a quote i did not say that. So you can get his email from me. He said that but i love that because its exactly that its a rebellion. An act of defiance to the way the world has just been progressing. Its an insurgency an act of war a line in the sand it is a way of saying enough is enough. Work is a good thing but its not the thing itself. We were not made for productivity but for life with Yahweh and with each other. Sabbath is a way to break our addiction to work and to gain and to accomplishment. And enough stuff. Stuff isn’t bad but most of us don’t really need another thing you thought you needed. Which is hard for me because I HAVE AMAZON PRIME. FREE NEXT DAY SHIPPING ON ALMOST ANYTHING?! Ridiculous.
Sabbath is a way to break our addiction to accumulation. Out of the sabbath command in Deuteronomy is a call to justice for those we might take advantage of in our work week. It’s a day of gratitude not entitlement. It’s a day of contentment not discontentment. A day to celebrate and thank God for and Enjoy all the stuff we have and not think about the things we dont have much less that we want. And it’s not that accomplishment and accumulation are evil. It’s that there is a rhythm. Work and rest and work and rest. A limit that Yahweh wants you to take note of. To say enough is enough. No more climbing up in the company. I don’t need to work more hours. I don’t need to gripe for a promotion or a bonus or a raise. I don’t need another commission. I don’t need the perfect score. I spend too much time at school. Yes I am talking to you youths. I don’t need to go to college God doesn’t actually mind if you dont go over to UCLA even though your parents want you to because they have dreams they want to fulfill through you. I don’t need to take this internship if it means i spend less time with my family and my friends and my church. I don’t need to earn the love of my family. I am a son or a daughter of the Father of everything and after he created that everything he set aside a day to cease and to celebrate the good work. I have nothing to prove. My value as a human doesnt come from my grades, where I went to college, my job title, whether or not i have a degree, my net worth, or speak perfect english or know a lot about the bible, or my grade point average, or how young i am holding my position in this company, or the car i drive. That is not who I am. I don’t need more stuff I dont need to buy more or sell more I dont really need another pair of Jeans. I don’t need to experience everything. Young men and women. This ones for you. I don’t need to ever ever ever ever ever get married. For you parents you don’t need for your kids to go achieve what you want them to achieve. You don’t have to have your kids do sports all year long. You don’t need them to focus on school. You just need them to learn. For leaders in the church you don’t need to get everybody serving or doing just as much for UBC that you do. We thank you for your service but enough is enough. I dont need flatter abs although that wouldn’t be remiss. AND I DON’T NEED TO GET EVERYTHING THAT I WANT. ITS ENOUGH. I need to rest. There is no daily quota in the kingdom of God. Pharaoh is dead. Egypt is in the past. The only slave drivers are the one in my head. I am not a slave anymore. Jesus made sure of that on the cross. I am free and I am a part of a different kingdom now. With a different king. Sabbath is a way of saying no to pharoah and his egypt but it’s also a way of saying yes to yahweh and his kingdom. Yahweh is nothing like Pharaoh. Turns out he’s actually Jesus. He is a sabbath keeping, sabbath giving God. And the practice of sabbath a weekly day set aside or rest and for worship is how or at least one of one the ways from America’s i mean egypts gravitational pull. Intentional or unintentional? Hmm I don’t know. You’ll never know. It’s how we break from Egypts pull and into orbit around life in God.
Now before we end. To wrap up. It is my belief that i could preach this message every sunday verbatim and in 6 months your life will not have changed and you will not have budge an inch towards practicing Sabbath. Maybe kind of sort of you will. My friend who I quoted earlier calls this kind of sort of sabbath Sabbish. Kinda sabbish. And he thinks that most people attend sunday worship and its kinda sabbish kinda sorta restful kinda sorta worshipful. It’s sabbish. But not actually full on Sabbath. Can I even say that at church? Can I be honest with you guys. No show of hands no guilt and no shame just straight truth. Most of you guys probably don’t practice sabbath. And honestly here’s my heart no guilt no shame none of that “im the preacher man and im more spiritual.” It’s not passive aggressive. I just wanna call out the elephant in the room. Most of you know about this. You know where to find resources you’ve heard teachings on sabbath and youve been called into it. And most of you will say thats great but im just too busy. And all I want to say to you guys this morning, no guilt. You are missing out.
I am telling you that sabbath is one of the best things on offer in the kingdom of God. Sabbath has become one of the best things that I struggle to keep a part of my life. It has become one of the most important spiritual disciplines in my life right up there with reading scripture. It has become a vital mandatory part of my health as an individual. 9/10 the time i spend practicing Sabbath is the best part of my week. And I want that for everybody in this room for our community. I want us to be a community that takes both work and rest and worship seriously. A prophetic word to you in your lives. There is a way of the kingdom that you can walk in. And no guilt no shame. Why won’t you practice sabbath? WHY? Well I’m busy. Somebody asked me this last week. I work 96 hours a week. He works in Advertising in New York City. He said i work 96 hours a week. How do i keep a healthy work life balance. YOU STOP WORKING 96 HOURS A WEEK. HANG OUT SOMETIME. Why are you not practicing sabbath?
Jesus said this. The sabbath was made for man and not man for the sabbath. Love that line. And in context if you know the story he’s dealing with the religious people of his day who lost the meaning of sabbath and turned it into a legalistic devoid of joy ritual and they lost sight of God’s heart for it. So he’s dealing with the pharisees. Now I think that first century Jews needed to hear the second part of that saying. Not man for the Sabbath. But now 21st century american need to hear the first part. The Sabbath was made for man. There is a day that is observed and it is blessed and its holy. Scholars debate back and forth is the command for the sabbath still valid do we have to or not have to. Frankly I don’t even care. It still stands as wisdom. God set it up to be enjoyed and vital. Don’t miss out on it.
If you do the math. 1 day a week adds up to 52 days a year. You multiply that by the average us lifespan that adds up to well over 10-12 years of life. If you take out or add 10-12 years of worship you end up with a very different kind of life.