The Sabbath - An Old Tradition?

If you are old enough, you remember the days when all stores were closed on Sunday except perhaps the occasional gas station with a few items inside.  Offices were closed, factories were closed and the day was spent with family and friends.  I remember stopping on the way home from church with my parents at the little gas station and getting to pick out a quarter's worth of candy.  (Now I am really showing my age!)  There was no grocery shopping, no errands, no runs to Lowe's for yard work and house work.  I also remember Sundays at my grandparents' farm where everybody got together and visited (and ate and ate!)  I also remember learning the ten commandments of which one was clearly "keep the Sabbath".  In my youth I didn't really understand Sabbath except that it meant the Lord's Day which was "go to Mass on Sunday" to me as a young Catholic.  What has happened to us as a nation?

To the vast majority of Americans Sunday is another work day - either on the job or at home.  "There are only so many hours in the week to get done what needs to be done."  Working mothers juggling the stress of home and job.  Laboring dads having to hold down two or more jobs to make ends meet.  Kids being scheduled to the max with sports commitments, music lessons and recitals, packed social calendars.   For some families "church" happens only if it does not interfere with the other commitments.  Honoring the Lord's Day is an afterthought if that.  How many of us truly embrace what the Lord was commanding when He gave us that commandment?  Exodus 20:8-11 "Remember to observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days a week are set apart for your daily duties and regular work, but the seventh day is a day of rest dedicated to the LORD your God. On that day no one in your household may do any kind of work. This includes you, your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, your livestock, and any foreigners living among you.  For in six days the LORD made the heavens, the earth, the sea, and everything in them; then he rested on the seventh day. That is why the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and set it apart as holy. 

Many people feel caught in a quandary.  If I don't work on Sunday, I will be fired.  Look at our pastors - their very jobs focus on working on Sunday.  The Lord did not specify which day of the week had to be your Sabbath, although Jewish tradition put it at the end of the week on Saturday.  I wonder what would happen if we all took this seriously.  Chick-Fil-A is a company that has determined from the beginning that the Sabbath would be honored and they would not put their employees in the position of having to choose jobs over honoring the Lord.  It certainly does not seem to have hurt their business.  They are a highly successful franchise operation with excellent employees.  Personally I always choose this fast food establishment if I must eat fast food.  I honor what they honor, rather I honor WHO they honor.

Isaiah 58:13-14 "Keep the Sabbath day holy. Don't pursue your own interests on that day, but enjoy the Sabbath and speak of it with delight as the LORD's holy day. Honor the LORD in everything you do, and don't follow your own desires or talk idly. If you do this, the LORD will be your delight. I will give you great honor and give you your full share of the inheritance I promised to Jacob, your ancestor. I, the LORD, have spoken!" Consider when you do take a Sabbath.  Do you do as the Lord told Isaiah?  Do you honor him in everything you do?  I know that I cannot answer yes to that.  I want to be clear that I am talking to myself here as much as I am to anyone else that may be reading this.  I am guilty of cramming as much as I can into my waking hours and I am sure that I am not always listening to the Lord as to what I am to be doing.  A weekly Sabbath is a much needed change in my life.  One thing that I am becoming more certain about is this: just doing what makes me feel good is not an adequate definition of the Sabbath.  The scripture above states: don't follow your own desires or talk idly.  What does that mean?

Mark 2:27-28 Then he said to them, "The Sabbath was made to benefit people, and not people to benefit the Sabbath.  And I, the Son of Man, am master even of the Sabbath!"  Wait a minute - Sabbath was made to benefit me?  How am I to interpret that against the scripture cited above?  We must look at the totality of scripture when it comes to every matter contained within.  If we only look at one aspect, then we risk becoming legalistic and missing God's intent.  When we look at the initial command and then implementation of that command, the law was the keeper of the boundaries for God's covenant people.  By the time Jesus arrived on the scene, though, the legalists had made a mockery of the intent of God's law.  Thus when Jesus challenged the thinking of the Pharisees through His healing and good works done on the Sabbath, He was ostracized by the elite as a rebel.  The truth however was that He was trying to guide His people back on track with the intent of the original command. Remember His promise?  "The full share of the inheritance I promised to Jacob"  So not only do we draw closer to Him but we open the door for the abundance of His blessings on us.  I am not speaking of material blessings although often that is a component of His abundance.  I am speaking of the total Shalom that reigns over our lives when we are living in the perfect peace that comes only from Him.

I believe that there are correlations between tithing and honoring the Sabbath.  Until you begin to tithe, you just don't know how you are going to manage financially when you give up that 10%.  Yet once you consistently tithe with a joyful heart, without explanation there is enough to go around.  Your needed bills are paid and you meet the needs of your family.  Notice I said "needs".  God does not promise to meet our wants.   There are abounding testimonies of how people's lives changed once they began tithing.  I believe the same principle applies to honoring the Sabbath.  When we give the Lord His day, he responds by helping us manage the other six better.

I know the few times that we took a Sabbath (sadly usually out of exhaustion) the rest of the week did go better.  Getting into the habit though will take a deliberate decision to make it a priority.  What an incentive we have to do it!  The Lord says, we will be His delight and He will honor us.  Imagine that - the Lord honoring us because we honored Him.  Sounds like a win-win to me.  I want to embrace this command of my Lord's and I eagerly await the shift in my life as I draw even closer to Him. I hope that you are encouraged to rethink the way you spend your weekend or your day off if you must work on Sundays.  I pray that you will see a wonderful shift in your relationship with our Lord and what He wants to accomplish in your life.