08.21.2022 - The Mission Field - Holy Work

Scripture: Luke 13:10-17

Luke 13:10–17 NRSV

10 Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath. 11 And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and was quite unable to stand up straight. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.” 13 When he laid his hands on her, immediately she stood up straight and began praising God. 14 But the leader of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had cured on the sabbath, kept saying to the crowd, “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day.” 15 But the Lord answered him and said, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger, and lead it away to give it water? 16 And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the sabbath day?” 17 When he said this, all his opponents were put to shame; and the entire crowd was rejoicing at all the wonderful things that he was doing.

Holy Work

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The Good Old Days

What did your Sundays look like growing up? I grew up in an old house built somewhere in the mid-1800s. 100 years ago, that had been the edge of town. So it had a big yard with some really big old trees. Since Mom and Dad worked 6 days a week at their various jobs, that meant that from about April to September, Sunday was yard work day. We mowed, trimmed bushes, picked up sticks, raked leaves, and kept the yard looking good all year long. Most of that was not hard work and allowed time to watch TV or play outside with the neighbor kids if the weather was good. During the summer months, we had to scrape, sand, and paint the porch while mom and dad worked on scrubbing the siding to get the mildew off. The porch was huge, and so was the rest of the house, so that ended up taking a lot of our time on our Sundays. In my high school years, we were pretty good about fitting in a couple of hours at church in the morning, but for the most part, Sundays were a day of catching up on all the work that needed to be done because we were at work the other 6 days of the week. That was a normal Sunday where I grew up. When I became a pastor, I found out there were different Sunday rules for us. Several years ago, I was out mowing the parsonage lawn on a Sunday afternoon. Suddenly a car pulled off the street, and a man I had never met got out and told me that I should not be mowing on a Sunday. I didn’t realize I had done anything wrong, and I started wondering:

Does it count as work if you enjoy doing it? Do preachers even have a Sabbath day since some people think Sunday is the only day they actually work? Is this man telling me my family raised me wrong? I never mowed on a Sunday ever again at that parsonage. I was too worried about who was watching in my neighborhood. Over the years, most of my conversations about Sabbath time fit into two broad categories. The first is that Sabbath is about fulfilling a checklist. Here is a list of things you are supposed to do: God to church, read your bible, pray... check! Here is a list of things you are not supposed to do: Go to work, do yard work (apparently), have too much fun, or make too much noise... uncheck those boxes! The second category has more to do with doing what feels good to you. This newer part of the conversation around Sabbath time advocates doing what makes you feel refreshed, renewed, and full of joy. They also advocate having your Sabbath day be any day of the week you can fit it in. This second understanding of Sabbath time frees us from a checklist, allows us to fill our Sabbath time with whatever brings us joy, and it also may be part of why Sundays are filled with every sport and hobby in the world today. There’s got to be a better way, a more complete understanding of why God wants us to take time off and what He wants us to do with that time. Our scripture today does not answer that question completely, but it offers us a piece of the puzzle and shows us that our Sabbath practices shape the way you serve on the mission field.

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What we do

What you do on the Sabbath is as important as what you don’t do. If you grew up with the checklist, the do’s and don’t’s; you may the impression that it is more important not to do certain things than it is to do them. Our Sabbath practices changed in 2020. Sunday, March 15th, I was leading a men’s retreat in Elizabethtown and had been very busy all weekend long coordinating worship services and leading a team of pastors, speakers, and musicians. It was easily five times more work than a typical Sunday, and it was exhausting. Bekah was busy that weekend shopping for important household supplies because the next week, everything everywhere was shut down as we tried to contain the spread of COVID. The next week we started a shift to pre-recorded services. Sundays, I stayed home and watched the services along with everyone else. So we didn’t have a Sabbath day. We had a Sabbath year. I was unchecking all the don’t do boxes, but there were no active habits or traditions for Sabbath keeping. The time off gave us the opportunity to meet and talk to our neighbors, but overall, it felt lazy, not necessarily life-giving. We had a lot of time to sit and meditate and pray, but stopping everything did not instantly bring everyone closer to God. The Pharisees were very picky about what people did on the Sabbath, from picking up a stick or reaching out and taking grain off a stock to eat. However, they never stopped to ask whether teaching on the Sabbath was considered “work”. They taught and debated on the Sabbath all the time. Why could you carry a scroll of the Word of God to be read but not your blanket or mat that you slept on if you were begging in the streets? Jesus saw the Sabbath as something bigger than an individual need or duty. He treated it as a time to gather the people of God together into God’s presence so that they, and we, would remember that God is the source of all of our blessings and the One who shapes our identity.

God did not command his people to worship at the Temple every Sabbath day. Instead, they were expected to practice the Sabbath whether they were at home with their Jewish or Christian family or away, deep in the mission field. The Sabbath was not optional to Jesus, but it was not one of the “Thall Shalt Not” commandments. It was one of the positive and active ones. “Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy.” Remembering is one thing. How can we make something, let alone a day each week, and keep it holy?

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Seeing the People

This is an example of what every Sabbath day could look like. What if part of what made a Sabbath day holy was the healing of the broken and the rescue of the lost? This wasn’t a healing service or an evangelistic crusade. It was Jesus and His people spending time receiving and sharing that grace and healing with others who were hurt and held back from God. Some hurts, like the one this woman had, are visible. Some of them are not. Physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual hurts can all be hidden under the surface. Sometimes we misperceive them as well. All of these things, visible and invisible alike, can keep us from having and growing our relationship with God. They do more than keep us out of a building. They disconnect us from relationships with the people, the true Church that holds us up to God. If we are stuck trying to figure out what to do with our own Sabbath time, we may not even see these people. They can fade from our focus and become noise and shapes in our backgrounds. But Jesus saw this broken woman, and He called her out. She suffered for 18 years, but no more. Jesus saw her and set her free to join Him in remembering the Sabbath and, by His work, that Sabbath day was made holy.

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Setting People Free

The leader of the synagogue was indignant. For Jesus to stop mid-teaching and bring up this woman for healing turned this respectable establishment into a spectacle. In his anger, he said something really foolish. “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day.” I’m not sure that the synagogue was open the other 6 days a week, and if it was, this woman would not have come there for healing. Maybe during the first year of her ailment, but after 18 years? Certainly not. Help was not offered there. In his anger, the synagogue leader revealed that he had nothing to offer this woman other than judgment. He could not help her. But Jesus saw her, helped her, and taught His disciples to do the same. He taught them that focusing only on themselves on the Sabbath caused them to miss opportunities to serve God by seeing and helping others. And the truth is, when we miss seeing and helping others on Sundays, the one day a week we pay extra attention to God, we really miss them on Mondays and the other days of the week that we naturally focus more on ourselves and our not-so Holy Work. Sorry, sir, I know you are the synagogue leader and probably were raised in the family leading this synagogue, but you are doing it wrong. The Sabbath is not about you checking your boxes, and it is not about doing what you enjoy most. It is refocusing us all on loving God and loving others and launching us from that focus into the rest of the week, redeeming the rest of our work. How do remember the Sabbath and keep it holy? We need to pray that God would open our eyes to see the people around us. Really see them. Then we invite them into the same grace and healing we receive from God. What has God given you that you can share with those around you? Our work is redeemed and made Holy by God when we open our eyes to those around us and allow God to work through us so that we come to God together rather than trying to come to God alone. There are 6 days a week for work that does not focus on the mission of God. Will you allow God to shape what you do on your Sabbath and who you do it with to transform you into a vessel of grace and healing?