How Sabath Frees Us(Mar.8,2009)
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Mark M4 Sermon Notes March 8, 2009
Title: How Sabbath Frees Us
Text: Mark 2:23-3:6
Big Idea: We are set free through the Lord of the Sabbath.
This past week I saw the movie, Man on Wire, which just won the Oscar for best documentary film. Man on Wire tells the story of how Philippe Petit performed one of the most astonishing stunts of the late 20th century. On August 7, 1974 he strung a thin cable between the two towers of the World Trade Centre, and walked back and forth across from one building to another several times, and did a nerve-racking series of knee bends and acrobatic movements on the cable.
The New York Port Authority policemen immediately arrested Petit for the act, prompting many to call Petit’s stunt “the artistic crime of the century.”
In the documentary we are told that Philippe, as a boy, had a strict upbringing and he loved to push boundaries. As a boy he loved to climb trees and walk on ropes and break the law.
Some of us, though perhaps not as extreme as Philippe, can relate to him. As a boy, I also experienced pleasure in pushing boundaries, whether it was climbing the electrical towers that supported the power lines, or joy-riding in cars temporarily “borrowed” from the gas station, or shop lifting, or playing “truth or dare.”
One of my assumptions, as an adolescent, as I have shared before, was that committing my life to the way of God would somehow bind and restrict me. One of the biggest surprises that I have discovered in my following Jesus Christ across the years is the real freedom that he brings.
Jesus said in John 8 that “if you hold on to my teachings, you are really my disciples; and you will know the truth; and the truth shall set you free.”
Today, as we look at Jesus’ teaching on the Sabbath, we will see how the Sabbath sets us free.
As we explore this text, I am aware that there are a number of us here who are either unemployed, or fear the possibility of unemployment, because of our current recession. The Sabbath is something that is especially important for a person who is out of work because most people who are out of work, are looking for work (which itself is work--looking for a job can be a full-time job; and when you are out of work, if you are like most people, you are not in this place of inner rest and Sabbath). You feel like you ought to be working.
In between my time living in Southern California and living in Vancouver, I lived in White Rock for about 10 months and for most of that time—I was out of regular work. Although I was living in a condo with a friend from high school, right there on Marine Drive near the peer overlooking the ocean, and though you would think that it would have felt like a vacation for me, I had this feeling of inner restlessness, sensing that I ought to be doing something more productive. Sabbath was especially important for me then.
If you have your Bibles, please turn to Mark 2:23.
Jesus Is Lord of the Sabbath
23 One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grainfields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. 24 The Pharisees said to him, "Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?"
25 He answered, "Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need? 26 In the days of Abiathar the high priest, he entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread, which is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions."
27 Then he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for people, not people for the Sabbath. 28 So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."
Jesus Heals on the Sabbath
1 Another time Jesus went into the synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there. 2 Some of them were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath. 3 Jesus said to the man with the shriveled hand, "Stand up in front of everyone."
4 Then Jesus asked them, "Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?" But they remained silent.
5 He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, said to the man, "Stretch out your hand." He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored. 6 Then the Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus.
Here in Mark 2 we see that Jesus was going through some grain fields. As he and his students walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. The Pharisees ask Jesus, “Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?”
Now when the Pharisees asked why Jesus’ students were doing what was unlawful on the Sabbath by picking some heads of grain, they were not referring so much to what the Scriptures actually said, but to the way the Jewish teachers of the law interpreted the Sabbath command.
According to Jewish tradition, there were 39 different ways to work and thus 39 ways to break the Sabbath command. Jewish tradition had so multiplied the requirements and restrictions for keeping the Sabbath that Sabbath-keeping began to feel like a burden, rather than a gift.
Jesus counters the Pharisees’ accusation that he was breaking the Sabbath by using Scripture. He cites the example of David from 1 Samuel 21. David and his companions were hungry and ate the consecrated bread which is lawful only for priests to eat. David also gave some of that bread to his companions. Jesus points out that David and his men’s hunger and well-being took precedence over ritual law.
Then Jesus says the Sabbath is made for people, not people for the Sabbath.
The Sabbath is made for us, for our good.
Jesus says in verse 28: “The Son of man (Jesus) is Lord, even of the Sabbath.”
Right after this story, Mark us tells of another time when Jesus went into the synagogue and a man with a shriveled hand was there. “Some people who were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath. Jesus said to the man with the shriveled hand, ‘Stand up in front of everybody.’ Jesus asked them, ‘Which is lawful on the Sabbath, to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?’ But they remained silent. (Mark 3:1-5). He looked around at them in anger, and was deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, and said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He stretched it out and his hand was completely restored.”
In the teaching of the Jewish legal scholars, people weren’t allowed to initiate minor medical cures on the Sabbath, but it was permissible to save a life. The rule against minor cures on the Sabbath, according to Jewish tradition, applied to physicians, but not to healings brought about by God.
The Pharisees disputed among themselves as to whether it was permissible to pray for the sick on the Sabbath. So Jesus’ opponents in this story are taking a considerably stricter line against Jesus than the standard Jewish rules of their day would dictate. So Jesus asks the question, “Which is lawful on the Sabbath, to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?”
When Jesus challenges the Pharisees’ interpretation of the Sabbath, he is not trying to abolish the Sabbath. He doesn’t say “I have come to do away with the Sabbath”; he says, “I am the Lord of the Sabbath.” I am not abolishing the Sabbath, I am here fulfill or fill-full the meaning of the Sabbath.
Jesus in these stories affirms the wisdom of the Sabbath command (which is the 4th of the Ten Commandments). What he is opposing, however, is the way that the Pharisees have interpreted the Sabbath commandment. He’s against the fact they have generated so many extra rules for the Sabbath that the Sabbath is no longer a joy for people, but a burden, no longer a delight for people, but a dreary obligation.
In these passages Jesus teaches us the commandment to take Sabbath was something that God made for people, for us, for our flourishing. The Sabbath was made for people—not people for the Sabbath.
Perhaps for a few of us here Sabbath was a dreary day as we were growing up. Though this was not my experience, I have heard people talk about how they were raised in strict Christian homes where the Sabbath day meant no playing hockey or baseball, no playing Scrabble, no chewing gum. Sabbath was a day they had to sit quietly in the house and read the Bible.
And on the other side of the continuum there are people who regard Sabbath, if at all, as a quaint, unrealistic luxury. In Japan, where I worked for a couple of years, I remember how people would typically get only one week of vacation time a year (and often not take all their vacation) and then in many cases would work during the weekend. To them life is work and work is life.
Though we are not as extreme in our work habits, with our advances in technology, with our laptops and the internet, our Blackberries and i-phones we can be working all the time.
Thomas Friedman, the columnist for the New York Times, points out that with our capacity to take our electronic devices and work with us wherever we go: “We are never ‘out’ anymore. We are always ‘in’. And if we are always ‘in’, we are always ‘on’. And if we are always ‘on’, what are we most like—a computer server.”
We know that a rigid, small-minded, tight-fisted, self-righteous legalism will squeeze all of the juice out of life. It is really clear to us how misguided the “legalists” are.
But we can be equally misguided on the other side of the spectrum by not taking time for Sabbath.
On the one hand, rigid rule-keeping that goes beyond what God requires will kill us; but, on the other hand, a relativism which assumes “anything goes, I don’t need to honour the Sabbath” will also kill us.
It is Jesus’ way that transcends both a rigid, rule-keeping legalism on the one hand, and“anything-goes” relativism on the other, that brings real life and freedom.
Jesus’ intention for us is to always bring life and freedom.
In one of my favorite verses, John 10:10 (and one of Stu Gardner‘s favorite verses) Jesus says, “The thief (meaning Satan or the personal force of darkness in the world) comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that you might have life, and have it to the full.” This verse is one of my favourites because it’s the verse that really caused me to give my life to Christ. I believe I was 15 years old and I had a sneaking suspicion that if I really gave my life to Christ, I would somehow miss out on the fun of being a teenager. But someone explained to me that Jesus didn’t come so that life would be boring, but we could experience life to the very maximum. That caused a powerful shift inside me and made me want to experiment with what it would be like to follow Jesus.
I thought that to really follow Christ I would be less free, but Jesus said in John 8, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. 32 Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."
Following Jesus’ way, brings life and freedom.
This is true as we follow his teaching on the Sabbath.
How so?
In Deuteronomy 5:15 when the Lord commands his people to keep the Sabbath he says, “Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the LORD your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the LORD your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.”
The Lord tells them to keep the Sabbath day as reminder that they are free people.
Up until that point in history, no society that we are aware of had a “day off.”
Keeping Sabbath day reminds us that we are not slaves, but we are free people--people who have been freed by God. One of the markers of a free people, one of the markers of the people of God is that we keep Sabbath.
How do we know we are people who have been set free by God? We know it as we make Sabbath a part of our rhythm.
Sabbath reminds us that there is more to life than work and broadens our perspective—it gives us in the words of Abraham Heschel a “sanctuary in time.”
Getting away physically of course can broaden our perspective, but spending time in a new way also frees to see life in a new way.
Sabbath also frees us from our need to work all the time.
In Exodus 20 we read, "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God.”
We are made to work (we had a series on work in the fall) and can work up to 6 days a week, but we are called to take a Sabbath day once week—even if it is Sunday or Saturday.
Sabbath gives us permission—in fact a command—to not work one day in seven.
Mark Buchanan, a pastor and gifted writer on the Island, says that the Golden Rule for the Sabbath is to cease from what is necessary and to embrace that which gives life.
So the Sabbath golden rule is to cease from what is necessary and to embrace that which gives life.
When we read the Gospels, we see that Jesus chose life on the Sabbath: he healed people; he fed them; he supported rescuing animals that fell into wells on the Sabbath.
He honored the Sabbath by choosing life.
Mark Buchanan in his excellent book, The Rest of God, writes,
“Sabbath… is a reprieve from doing what you ought to do, even though the list of oughts is infinitely long and never done. Oughts are tyrants, noisy and surly, chronically dissatisfied. Sabbath is the day you trade places with them: they go into the salt mine and you go out dancing. It is the one day when the only thing you must do is to not do the things you must.
You are given permission--issued a command, to be blunt--to turn your back on all those oughts… You get to willfully ignore the many niggling things your existence genuinely depends on--and is often hobbled beneath--so that you can turn to whatever you’ve put off and pushed away for lack of time, lack of room, lack of breath. You get to shuck the “have-tos” and lay hold of the “get-tos.”
Isn’t it great to have a day—when we shuck the “have-tos” and do the “get-tos”!
Part of embracing life is not do our “have tos” on the Sabbath and the stuff we normally do the other 6 days.
I have a professor friend whose work involves a lot of mental effort. He teaches, he researches, he writes. For him, on Sabbath, though he might not use the term Sabbath, he loves to fish. It is very restorative for him. Now if this person were a fisherman, fishing probably wouldn’t be restorative for him. So part of what Sabbath involves is doing something different from what we would normally do, what we normally do in our other 5 or 6 days of work.
If you’re a student, reading a textbook you have to read may be violation of the Sabbath, but going to the gym because you want to exercise, PE may be a good way to celebrate Sabbath.
Sometimes, as I’ve said before, what we can and can’t do on Sabbath isn’t necessarily black and white. Shopping is not a restful or enjoyable experience for me (as I have shared before). Going to Costco is not my idea of a good time—even with all the free sample…. But on my Sabbath day we will often go to a store we can walk to not far from our home, pick up some food at the deli for dinner, might buy some fruit, some baby food. A little bit of shopping, and I emphasize a little bit of shopping does not seem to violate the Sabbath for me, but if I do a lot of shopping, if I generate a list of all the things we need since we are at this store anyway for the coming week, then for me it starts to feel like work, starts to feel like I am violating the Sabbath…for me.
I think we can sense intuitively when something crosses the line and becomes work.
It is important to be honest with ourselves.
Nancy Woodhull, the founding publisher of USA TODAY, was a highly successful executive with a very busy and varied life: “I am not the kind of person,” she once explained, “who can just sit around the pool and not do anything, so I take a Dictaphone to the pool, and when I have ideas I can record them. Not being able to do that would be very stressful for me. People will say to me, ‘Nancy, why don’t you relax and recharge your energy?’ I reply, ‘I am being energized by getting these ideas down.’ Having access to a Dictaphone allows you to be more productive. So does having a cell phone. And so does having a computer. You take all these tools and there is really no need for down time. Anyone can find me anywhere, any time.”
Less than a decade after she described this—her modus operandi—she died of cancer. She was just 52 years old. There is no way, of course, of determining conclusively whether there was any relationship between Woodhull’s work habits and her early death, but her profile was not significantly different from many Japanese people who die from karoshi (death from over work). (p.42, Loehr and Schwartz). So we have to be careful to not rationalize the fact that we so love work that it is restorative for us. I love work in general, and I love my work in particular here. And I definitely have workaholic tendencies, but to disregard the Sabbath for me would not only dishonour God, but it would also dishonour his design for me…diminish my life.
Sabbath frees us from our need to work the way we do in our other six days, and to do what brings life to our self and for others as we serve them as an instrument of healing. This month the youth group will be serving the homeless and coming alongside underprivileged kids in New York City. One of the ways we honor Sabbath is by bringing life to others.
In our context here in British Columbia it would be easy to assume that Sabbath is essentially leisure. Leisure is important, spending time in creation and nature is restorative, but leisure alone will not bring us the deepest kind of rest and the most profound kind of life. Only God can…only the Lord of the Sabbath can.
Jesus says, “Come to me, all you who are weary and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble of heart; and you will find rest for your souls.”
In order to really deeply rest, we need more than simply the absence of work. We need absence from work, but we need something more than that—we need to experience internal rest. It is possible to sleep, but if we don’t experience REMs, rapid eye movement (which we typically experience about 90 minutes into sleep), we won’t feel deeply rested. It is not just sleep, but the quality of the sleep that matters.
And so it is with our lives. We need not just rest—we need deep inner rest, rest from the inner murmur that says, we are defined by what we do, or have or who we know. Rest from the voice of self-condemnation.
As we looked at earlier in message in the Mark series, Henri Nouwen has said, “Most of us are far more busy than we need to be.”
Henri Nouwen, in his book, The Beloved, says this:
There is absolutely no reason for most people to be as busy as they are….
If you are busy, very busy, ask yourself, “Why am I so busy? Perhaps you want to prove something. Why are people so busy? Perhaps they want to be successful or they want to be popular or they want to have some influence. If you want to be successful, you have to do a lot of things; if you want to be popular you have to meet a lot of people; if you want to have influence, you have to make a lot of connections… Sabbath frees us from our drive to have success: more money, more popularity, more influence.
Part of the reason why we are so busy is because we are trying to validate our existence to ourselves or to other people.
We wear a heavy yoke of our own making.
Sabbath…
One of my all-time favorite movies is Chariots of Fire.
I love Scotland. I love to run. I had even considered the possibility of applying to St. Andrews University because it is in Scotland and it has a great running beach and it is where Chariots of Fire was filmed!
POWERPOINT IMAGE
The movie, Chariots of Fire, is based on a true story of Eric Liddell. He is a devoted follower of Christ who represents Great Britain in the Olympic Games in Paris 1924. Liddell lived in a time and place where people believed that the Sabbath was to be observed on a Sunday. As a committed Christian, Eric Liddell refused to run in the Olympics on Sunday. As a result he chose to withdraw from the 100-meter race, his best event and the one for which he was expected to win the gold medal. I am sure that Liddell was disappointed that he was not able to compete in that race because he wanted to represent Great Britain and because he loved to run. But he was at peace with that because his life was not defined by winning a gold medal at the Olympic Games, but by the fact that he was beloved by God.
(Although Eric Liddell was not able to run in the 100-meter race, he was able to run in the 400-meter race. Someone withdrew from the race so Liddell could run in it. Now the 400-meter race was not Liddell’s forte, it was not his strongest suit, but he wanted to run it anyway. As Liddell went to the starting blocks, someone slipped into his hand a piece of paper with a quotation from 1 Samuel 2:30: “Those who honour me, I will honour.” Liddell ran with that piece of paper in his hand, and not only won the race, but broke the existing world record.)
But Liddell was the kind of person who didn’t need the gold medal to validate his worth, because he knew that he was loved by God. His life was filled with such great peace and joy and went to become a missionary to China.
In stark contrast to Eric Liddell was another person competing in those Olympic games, Harold Abrams. Harold Abrams did not have Eric Liddell’s faith. He was intense and driven. At one point in the movie, when asked why was it so important for him to win the 100-meters, Abrams says, “I have ten seconds to justify my existence.”
For many of us here, you relate more to Harold Abrams because we feel we have to do something to justify our existence. Or Rocky Balboa who in Rocky I said, “I am going to go the distance with Creed. Then for the first time in my life, I will know that I am not just another bum from Philly.”
So many of us feel like we have to do something, or have something, or to be seen in a certain light, or have something to justify our existence. So even when we are “resting,” we are not really resting. We are not experiencing the REM of the soul.
Part of the reason why worship is such an important part of Sabbath, what we are doing here, is to remind ourselves of the great story that in Jesus Christ, the Lord of the Sabbath, we find that we are beloved, that our life is not ultimately something that we achieve, but something that we receive. When we understand that, we can experience rest in our souls.
Jesus’ way doesn’t restrict us, as I had thought as young person, but sets us free.
Jesus says in Matthew 11:28, “Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.”
If we come to the One who says, “Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy-laden,” we can find rest for our souls. We can find relief from the burden of our sins and shame (as we were reminded of last week by Darrell) and find rest for our souls.
Mark M4 Sermon Notes March 8, 2009
Title: How Sabbath Frees Us
Text: Mark 2:23-3:6
Big Idea: We are set free through the Lord of the Sabbath.
This past week I saw the movie, Man on Wire, which just won the Oscar for best documentary film. Man on Wire tells the story of how Philippe Petit performed one of the most astonishing stunts of the late 20th century. On August 7, 1974 he strung a thin cable between the two towers of the World Trade Centre, and walked back and forth across from one building to another several times, and did a nerve-racking series of knee bends and acrobatic movements on the cable.
The New York Port Authority policemen immediately arrested Petit for the act, prompting many to call Petit’s stunt “the artistic crime of the century.”
In the documentary we are told that Philippe, as a boy, had a strict upbringing and he loved to push boundaries. As a boy he loved to climb trees and walk on ropes and break the law.
Some of us, though perhaps not as extreme as Philippe, can relate to him. As a boy, I also experienced pleasure in pushing boundaries, whether it was climbing the electrical towers that supported the power lines, or joy-riding in cars temporarily “borrowed” from the gas station, or shop lifting, or playing “truth or dare.”
One of my assumptions, as an adolescent, as I have shared before, was that committing my life to the way of God would somehow bind and restrict me. One of the biggest surprises that I have discovered in my following Jesus Christ across the years is the real freedom that he brings.
Jesus said in John 8 that “if you hold on to my teachings, you are really my disciples; and you will know the truth; and the truth shall set you free.”
Today, as we look at Jesus’ teaching on the Sabbath, we will see how the Sabbath sets us free.
As we explore this text, I am aware that there are a number of us here who are either unemployed, or fear the possibility of unemployment, because of our current recession. The Sabbath is something that is especially important for a person who is out of work because most people who are out of work, are looking for work (which itself is work--looking for a job can be a full-time job; and when you are out of work, if you are like most people, you are not in this place of inner rest and Sabbath). You feel like you ought to be working.
In between my time living in Southern California and living in Vancouver, I lived in White Rock for about 10 months and for most of that time—I was out of regular work. Although I was living in a condo with a friend from high school, right there on Marine Drive near the peer overlooking the ocean, and though you would think that it would have felt like a vacation for me, I had this feeling of inner restlessness, sensing that I ought to be doing something more productive. Sabbath was especially important for me then.
If you have your Bibles, please turn to Mark 2:23.
Jesus Is Lord of the Sabbath
23 One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grainfields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. 24 The Pharisees said to him, "Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?"
25 He answered, "Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need? 26 In the days of Abiathar the high priest, he entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread, which is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions."
27 Then he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for people, not people for the Sabbath. 28 So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."
Jesus Heals on the Sabbath
1 Another time Jesus went into the synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there. 2 Some of them were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath. 3 Jesus said to the man with the shriveled hand, "Stand up in front of everyone."
4 Then Jesus asked them, "Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?" But they remained silent.
5 He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, said to the man, "Stretch out your hand." He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored. 6 Then the Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus.
Here in Mark 2 we see that Jesus was going through some grain fields. As he and his students walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. The Pharisees ask Jesus, “Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?”
Now when the Pharisees asked why Jesus’ students were doing what was unlawful on the Sabbath by picking some heads of grain, they were not referring so much to what the Scriptures actually said, but to the way the Jewish teachers of the law interpreted the Sabbath command.
According to Jewish tradition, there were 39 different ways to work and thus 39 ways to break the Sabbath command. Jewish tradition had so multiplied the requirements and restrictions for keeping the Sabbath that Sabbath-keeping began to feel like a burden, rather than a gift.
Jesus counters the Pharisees’ accusation that he was breaking the Sabbath by using Scripture. He cites the example of David from 1 Samuel 21. David and his companions were hungry and ate the consecrated bread which is lawful only for priests to eat. David also gave some of that bread to his companions. Jesus points out that David and his men’s hunger and well-being took precedence over ritual law.
Then Jesus says the Sabbath is made for people, not people for the Sabbath.
The Sabbath is made for us, for our good.
Jesus says in verse 28: “The Son of man (Jesus) is Lord, even of the Sabbath.”
Right after this story, Mark us tells of another time when Jesus went into the synagogue and a man with a shriveled hand was there. “Some people who were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath. Jesus said to the man with the shriveled hand, ‘Stand up in front of everybody.’ Jesus asked them, ‘Which is lawful on the Sabbath, to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?’ But they remained silent. (Mark 3:1-5). He looked around at them in anger, and was deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, and said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He stretched it out and his hand was completely restored.”
In the teaching of the Jewish legal scholars, people weren’t allowed to initiate minor medical cures on the Sabbath, but it was permissible to save a life. The rule against minor cures on the Sabbath, according to Jewish tradition, applied to physicians, but not to healings brought about by God.
The Pharisees disputed among themselves as to whether it was permissible to pray for the sick on the Sabbath. So Jesus’ opponents in this story are taking a considerably stricter line against Jesus than the standard Jewish rules of their day would dictate. So Jesus asks the question, “Which is lawful on the Sabbath, to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?”
When Jesus challenges the Pharisees’ interpretation of the Sabbath, he is not trying to abolish the Sabbath. He doesn’t say “I have come to do away with the Sabbath”; he says, “I am the Lord of the Sabbath.” I am not abolishing the Sabbath, I am here fulfill or fill-full the meaning of the Sabbath.
Jesus in these stories affirms the wisdom of the Sabbath command (which is the 4th of the Ten Commandments). What he is opposing, however, is the way that the Pharisees have interpreted the Sabbath commandment. He’s against the fact they have generated so many extra rules for the Sabbath that the Sabbath is no longer a joy for people, but a burden, no longer a delight for people, but a dreary obligation.
In these passages Jesus teaches us the commandment to take Sabbath was something that God made for people, for us, for our flourishing. The Sabbath was made for people—not people for the Sabbath.
Perhaps for a few of us here Sabbath was a dreary day as we were growing up. Though this was not my experience, I have heard people talk about how they were raised in strict Christian homes where the Sabbath day meant no playing hockey or baseball, no playing Scrabble, no chewing gum. Sabbath was a day they had to sit quietly in the house and read the Bible.
And on the other side of the continuum there are people who regard Sabbath, if at all, as a quaint, unrealistic luxury. In Japan, where I worked for a couple of years, I remember how people would typically get only one week of vacation time a year (and often not take all their vacation) and then in many cases would work during the weekend. To them life is work and work is life.
Though we are not as extreme in our work habits, with our advances in technology, with our laptops and the internet, our Blackberries and i-phones we can be working all the time.
Thomas Friedman, the columnist for the New York Times, points out that with our capacity to take our electronic devices and work with us wherever we go: “We are never ‘out’ anymore. We are always ‘in’. And if we are always ‘in’, we are always ‘on’. And if we are always ‘on’, what are we most like—a computer server.”
We know that a rigid, small-minded, tight-fisted, self-righteous legalism will squeeze all of the juice out of life. It is really clear to us how misguided the “legalists” are.
But we can be equally misguided on the other side of the spectrum by not taking time for Sabbath.
On the one hand, rigid rule-keeping that goes beyond what God requires will kill us; but, on the other hand, a relativism which assumes “anything goes, I don’t need to honour the Sabbath” will also kill us.
It is Jesus’ way that transcends both a rigid, rule-keeping legalism on the one hand, and“anything-goes” relativism on the other, that brings real life and freedom.
Jesus’ intention for us is to always bring life and freedom.
In one of my favorite verses, John 10:10 (and one of Stu Gardner‘s favorite verses) Jesus says, “The thief (meaning Satan or the personal force of darkness in the world) comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that you might have life, and have it to the full.” This verse is one of my favourites because it’s the verse that really caused me to give my life to Christ. I believe I was 15 years old and I had a sneaking suspicion that if I really gave my life to Christ, I would somehow miss out on the fun of being a teenager. But someone explained to me that Jesus didn’t come so that life would be boring, but we could experience life to the very maximum. That caused a powerful shift inside me and made me want to experiment with what it would be like to follow Jesus.
I thought that to really follow Christ I would be less free, but Jesus said in John 8, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. 32 Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."
Following Jesus’ way, brings life and freedom.
This is true as we follow his teaching on the Sabbath.
How so?
In Deuteronomy 5:15 when the Lord commands his people to keep the Sabbath he says, “Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the LORD your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the LORD your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.”
The Lord tells them to keep the Sabbath day as reminder that they are free people.
Up until that point in history, no society that we are aware of had a “day off.”
Keeping Sabbath day reminds us that we are not slaves, but we are free people--people who have been freed by God. One of the markers of a free people, one of the markers of the people of God is that we keep Sabbath.
How do we know we are people who have been set free by God? We know it as we make Sabbath a part of our rhythm.
Sabbath reminds us that there is more to life than work and broadens our perspective—it gives us in the words of Abraham Heschel a “sanctuary in time.”
Getting away physically of course can broaden our perspective, but spending time in a new way also frees to see life in a new way.
Sabbath also frees us from our need to work all the time.
In Exodus 20 we read, "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God.”
We are made to work (we had a series on work in the fall) and can work up to 6 days a week, but we are called to take a Sabbath day once week—even if it is Sunday or Saturday.
Sabbath gives us permission—in fact a command—to not work one day in seven.
Mark Buchanan, a pastor and gifted writer on the Island, says that the Golden Rule for the Sabbath is to cease from what is necessary and to embrace that which gives life.
So the Sabbath golden rule is to cease from what is necessary and to embrace that which gives life.
When we read the Gospels, we see that Jesus chose life on the Sabbath: he healed people; he fed them; he supported rescuing animals that fell into wells on the Sabbath.
He honored the Sabbath by choosing life.
Mark Buchanan in his excellent book, The Rest of God, writes,
“Sabbath… is a reprieve from doing what you ought to do, even though the list of oughts is infinitely long and never done. Oughts are tyrants, noisy and surly, chronically dissatisfied. Sabbath is the day you trade places with them: they go into the salt mine and you go out dancing. It is the one day when the only thing you must do is to not do the things you must.
You are given permission--issued a command, to be blunt--to turn your back on all those oughts… You get to willfully ignore the many niggling things your existence genuinely depends on--and is often hobbled beneath--so that you can turn to whatever you’ve put off and pushed away for lack of time, lack of room, lack of breath. You get to shuck the “have-tos” and lay hold of the “get-tos.”
Isn’t it great to have a day—when we shuck the “have-tos” and do the “get-tos”!
Part of embracing life is not do our “have tos” on the Sabbath and the stuff we normally do the other 6 days.
I have a professor friend whose work involves a lot of mental effort. He teaches, he researches, he writes. For him, on Sabbath, though he might not use the term Sabbath, he loves to fish. It is very restorative for him. Now if this person were a fisherman, fishing probably wouldn’t be restorative for him. So part of what Sabbath involves is doing something different from what we would normally do, what we normally do in our other 5 or 6 days of work.
If you’re a student, reading a textbook you have to read may be violation of the Sabbath, but going to the gym because you want to exercise, PE may be a good way to celebrate Sabbath.
Sometimes, as I’ve said before, what we can and can’t do on Sabbath isn’t necessarily black and white. Shopping is not a restful or enjoyable experience for me (as I have shared before). Going to Costco is not my idea of a good time—even with all the free sample…. But on my Sabbath day we will often go to a store we can walk to not far from our home, pick up some food at the deli for dinner, might buy some fruit, some baby food. A little bit of shopping, and I emphasize a little bit of shopping does not seem to violate the Sabbath for me, but if I do a lot of shopping, if I generate a list of all the things we need since we are at this store anyway for the coming week, then for me it starts to feel like work, starts to feel like I am violating the Sabbath…for me.
I think we can sense intuitively when something crosses the line and becomes work.
It is important to be honest with ourselves.
Nancy Woodhull, the founding publisher of USA TODAY, was a highly successful executive with a very busy and varied life: “I am not the kind of person,” she once explained, “who can just sit around the pool and not do anything, so I take a Dictaphone to the pool, and when I have ideas I can record them. Not being able to do that would be very stressful for me. People will say to me, ‘Nancy, why don’t you relax and recharge your energy?’ I reply, ‘I am being energized by getting these ideas down.’ Having access to a Dictaphone allows you to be more productive. So does having a cell phone. And so does having a computer. You take all these tools and there is really no need for down time. Anyone can find me anywhere, any time.”
Less than a decade after she described this—her modus operandi—she died of cancer. She was just 52 years old. There is no way, of course, of determining conclusively whether there was any relationship between Woodhull’s work habits and her early death, but her profile was not significantly different from many Japanese people who die from karoshi (death from over work). (p.42, Loehr and Schwartz). So we have to be careful to not rationalize the fact that we so love work that it is restorative for us. I love work in general, and I love my work in particular here. And I definitely have workaholic tendencies, but to disregard the Sabbath for me would not only dishonour God, but it would also dishonour his design for me…diminish my life.
Sabbath frees us from our need to work the way we do in our other six days, and to do what brings life to our self and for others as we serve them as an instrument of healing. This month the youth group will be serving the homeless and coming alongside underprivileged kids in New York City. One of the ways we honor Sabbath is by bringing life to others.
In our context here in British Columbia it would be easy to assume that Sabbath is essentially leisure. Leisure is important, spending time in creation and nature is restorative, but leisure alone will not bring us the deepest kind of rest and the most profound kind of life. Only God can…only the Lord of the Sabbath can.
Jesus says, “Come to me, all you who are weary and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble of heart; and you will find rest for your souls.”
In order to really deeply rest, we need more than simply the absence of work. We need absence from work, but we need something more than that—we need to experience internal rest. It is possible to sleep, but if we don’t experience REMs, rapid eye movement (which we typically experience about 90 minutes into sleep), we won’t feel deeply rested. It is not just sleep, but the quality of the sleep that matters.
And so it is with our lives. We need not just rest—we need deep inner rest, rest from the inner murmur that says, we are defined by what we do, or have or who we know. Rest from the voice of self-condemnation.
As we looked at earlier in message in the Mark series, Henri Nouwen has said, “Most of us are far more busy than we need to be.”
Henri Nouwen, in his book, The Beloved, says this:
There is absolutely no reason for most people to be as busy as they are….
If you are busy, very busy, ask yourself, “Why am I so busy? Perhaps you want to prove something. Why are people so busy? Perhaps they want to be successful or they want to be popular or they want to have some influence. If you want to be successful, you have to do a lot of things; if you want to be popular you have to meet a lot of people; if you want to have influence, you have to make a lot of connections… Sabbath frees us from our drive to have success: more money, more popularity, more influence.
Part of the reason why we are so busy is because we are trying to validate our existence to ourselves or to other people.
We wear a heavy yoke of our own making.
Sabbath…
One of my all-time favorite movies is Chariots of Fire.
I love Scotland. I love to run. I had even considered the possibility of applying to St. Andrews University because it is in Scotland and it has a great running beach and it is where Chariots of Fire was filmed!
POWERPOINT IMAGE
The movie, Chariots of Fire, is based on a true story of Eric Liddell. He is a devoted follower of Christ who represents Great Britain in the Olympic Games in Paris 1924. Liddell lived in a time and place where people believed that the Sabbath was to be observed on a Sunday. As a committed Christian, Eric Liddell refused to run in the Olympics on Sunday. As a result he chose to withdraw from the 100-meter race, his best event and the one for which he was expected to win the gold medal. I am sure that Liddell was disappointed that he was not able to compete in that race because he wanted to represent Great Britain and because he loved to run. But he was at peace with that because his life was not defined by winning a gold medal at the Olympic Games, but by the fact that he was beloved by God.
(Although Eric Liddell was not able to run in the 100-meter race, he was able to run in the 400-meter race. Someone withdrew from the race so Liddell could run in it. Now the 400-meter race was not Liddell’s forte, it was not his strongest suit, but he wanted to run it anyway. As Liddell went to the starting blocks, someone slipped into his hand a piece of paper with a quotation from 1 Samuel 2:30: “Those who honour me, I will honour.” Liddell ran with that piece of paper in his hand, and not only won the race, but broke the existing world record.)
But Liddell was the kind of person who didn’t need the gold medal to validate his worth, because he knew that he was loved by God. His life was filled with such great peace and joy and went to become a missionary to China.
In stark contrast to Eric Liddell was another person competing in those Olympic games, Harold Abrams. Harold Abrams did not have Eric Liddell’s faith. He was intense and driven. At one point in the movie, when asked why was it so important for him to win the 100-meters, Abrams says, “I have ten seconds to justify my existence.”
For many of us here, you relate more to Harold Abrams because we feel we have to do something to justify our existence. Or Rocky Balboa who in Rocky I said, “I am going to go the distance with Creed. Then for the first time in my life, I will know that I am not just another bum from Philly.”
So many of us feel like we have to do something, or have something, or to be seen in a certain light, or have something to justify our existence. So even when we are “resting,” we are not really resting. We are not experiencing the REM of the soul.
Part of the reason why worship is such an important part of Sabbath, what we are doing here, is to remind ourselves of the great story that in Jesus Christ, the Lord of the Sabbath, we find that we are beloved, that our life is not ultimately something that we achieve, but something that we receive. When we understand that, we can experience rest in our souls.
Jesus’ way doesn’t restrict us, as I had thought as young person, but sets us free.
Jesus says in Matthew 11:28, “Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.”
If we come to the One who says, “Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy-laden,” we can find rest for our souls. We can find relief from the burden of our sins and shame (as we were reminded of last week by Darrell) and find rest for our souls.
posted by Shigematsu at 11:19 AM
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