What IS Sabbath/Sunday for? Have you thought any more about that question? Have you considered being more intentional in the way you "remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy?"
In the Hebrew Scriptures, we see a development in thought about Sabbath - starting as a day to rest, as God rested in creation (Exodus 20), then as a way to celebrate freedom (Deuteronomy 5), and later as an identifying characteristic of God's people (Ezekiel): Who are the people of God? The Sabbath-keepers. Holiness, social justice, identity.
What gets in the way of your own sabbath-keeping? How would your life and schedule the rest of the week need to change in order for you to truly have a day off every week? Would it mean less TV on Tuesdays so that you could take a nap on Sunday? Getting the laundry and shopping done on Friday so that the to-do list doesn't get in the way of worship?
What blessings might you find in honoring sabbath? I know that I enjoy looking forward to a day with no "have-to's," or even "need-to's." Honoring sabbath reminds me that I'm not the one responsible for keeping the world spinning - not even my little corner of it. Keeping sabbath offers rest from the week before and fuel for the week ahead. Not that I'm always that good at it, but when the rhythm of my life includes a weekly day that is totally unlike the others, my life is better, and I'd venture to say I'm a better person to live and work with.
In Practicing Our Faith, Dorothy Bass writes,
What, besides churchgoing, is Christian Sabbath keeping? The answer must be
tailored to specific circumstances and will vary considerably in different
cultures and stages of life. It will be helpful in each circumstance to reflect
carefully on both what is good and what is not.
What is not good on Sabbath, or in Sabbath time? We would do well to heed
three millenia of Jewish reflection on the Sabbath commandment. Not good are
work and commerce and worry. To act as if the world cannot get along without our
work for one day in seven is a startling display of pride that denies the
sufficiency of our generous Maker. To refrain from working - not every day, but
one in seven - opens the temporal space within which glad and grateful
relationship with God and peaceful and appreciative relationship with nature and
otehr people can grow. Refraining from work on a regular basis should also teach
us not to demand excessive work from others. Commerce? Buying and spending are
closely related to working too much; they depend on work, create the conditions
for more work, and often are work. We could refrain from shopping on
Sundays, making a choice that might complicate the weekly schedule at first but
should soon become a refreshing habit. And worry? It may be difficult to banish
cares from our minds altogether, but we can refrain from activities that we know
will summon worry - activities like paying bills, preparing tax returns, and
making lists of things to do in the coming week.
And what is good on a Christian Sabbath? Most important is joyful worship
that restores us to communion with the risen Christ and our fellow members of
his body, the church. For Christians, every Sunday is Easter Sunday, a time
to gather together with song and prayer, to hear the Word proclaimed, and to
recognize Christ in the breaking of the bread. It is a festival, a spring of
souls, a day of freedom not only from work but also from condemnation. At
times, worshiping communities lose sight of this: hymns drag, elders judge,
children fidget, fancy clothes constrain, and the minutes tick
slowly by. In other congregations, joyful prayer and song burst
through the seams of the worship service, and hours pass before anyone is
ready to leave. The contrast suggests that we all need to remember that
Sunday worship is not just about "going to church"; it is about taking part in
the activity by which God is shaping a new creation. It is a foretaste
of the feast to come.
In Sabbath, Wayne Muller writes,
Our lack of rest and reflection is not just a personal affliction. It
colors the way we build and sustain community, it dictates the way we respond to
suffering, and it shapes the ways in which we seek peace and healing in the
world. I have worked for twenty-five years in the fields of community
development, public health, mental health, and criminal justice. With a few
notable exceptions, the ways problems are solved is frantically,
desperately, reactively, and badly. Depsite their well-meaning and generous
souls, community and corporate leaders are infected with a fearful desperation
that is corrosive to genuine helpfulness, justice or healing. As Brother
David Stiendl-Rast reminds us, the Chinese pictograph for "busy" is
composed of two characters: heart and killing.
Posts
2 comments:
love it! such a fantastic way to bring what happens on sunday into the week with me. too easy to listen and dispose of. this is an impetus for reflection at a later point after thoughts have had some time to simmer. it's in my RSS feeds, so it comes to me! thank you very much.
mr. anderson
Glad you like it, Ian! We'll do our best to post something like this every week...
Perhaps when Leah preaches YOU can write the reflection post for her!
Post a Comment