"The Commandment we Most Often Break"

(Common English Bible)

      Remember the Sabbath day and treat it as holy. Six days you may work and do all your tasks, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. Do not do any work on it-not you, your sons or daughters, your male or female servants, your animals, or the immigrant who is living with you. Because the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and everything that is in them in six days, but rested on the seventh day. That is why the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

      Of all the ten commandments, the fourth commandment---to remember the Sabbath and keep it holy---is the one I am most likely to consistently break. I have a good excuse. How can the pastor not work on the Sabbath? I suspect this commandment is also one of the hardest for you to consistently honor, too.

      Today we begin three sermons exploring God's Sabbath---what it is, what it means, what it can do, how we might honor it. I have spent a lot of time thinking, reading, and praying about the Sabbath in recent weeks. Until I delved into the Sabbath this deeply, I would have told you that I do a decent job of keeping the Sabbath holy. Now, however, I am not so sure. I have a much deeper understanding of what Sabbath is and what is at stake and I am not very sure at all that I have kept a good Sabbath very often in my life.

      There are many, many things which make it difficult for us to keep the Sabbath holy. We will get to that, but first and most important is that I don't think we understand what Sabbath truly is, and what Sabbath truly isn't.

      When you think of Sabbath, what do you think of?

      Sunday? Worship? Prayer? Boredom? Lots of rules? Sitting around doing nothing fun? Something so old fashioned or antiquated as to have absolutely no relevance for us today?

      Abraham Heschel once said the Sabbath is a "fence around time". Sabbath is fundamentally about a different approach to time. Sabbath is about stopping. The Hebrew word, shabbat, means "Stop". Stop doing. Stop doing everything that distracts us, that keeps us busy, that preoccupies us, that fills up our Saturdays and Sundays with endless chores and shopping and activities so that come Sunday night we drop into bed exhausted and dreading the return of the routine of Monday, whatever it may be.

      Scripture is quite serious about Sabbath. The Sabbath regulations of the Old Testament are intended mainly to reinforce the provision of Sabbath as a day of rest. No work is to be done on the Sabbath (Exod. 20:10; 23:12; Deut. 25:13-14). Even in harvest time the Sabbath is to be observed (Exod. 34:21). No burdens are to be carried or loaded onto animals on that day (Neh. 13:15; Jer. 17:21-22). Food to be eaten on the Sabbath is to be prepared the day before, just as the manna for the Sabbath was gathered on the preceding day (Exod. 16:5, 23-30). No food may be bought from Gentiles (Neh. 10:31; 13:16, 20-21) nor a fire kindled on the Sabbath (Exod. 35:3). The penalty for an individual breaking the Sabbath was death (31:14-15; Num. 15:32-36). For the whole nation, Sabbath-breaking was one of the offenses that led to exile (Neh. 9:13-14; Jer. 17:24-27; Ezek. 20:23-24).¹ I told you scripture was serious.

      There are those who argue that Sabbath keeping is a strictly Jewish practice. However, as Christians, we acknowledge the Hebrew Bible as God-inspired, and we would be hard pressed to simply eliminate one of the ten commandments.

      The Sabbath command to rest one day out of seven is drawn from the creation account in which we are told that "God rested" on the seventh day. Even God took a day off! But Sabbath is not just a "day off" from our regular work. Sabbath is not a day to clean the garage, mow the lawn, do the laundry, catch up on emails, bills, or paperwork, in short, to accumulate more "things" or to take care of all our "things" that we don't have time to take care of during the work week. I think most of us might understand this about Sabbath. We get this.

      What may be harder to get is the concept that Sabbath is to be holy. This time is to be different, a time set apart, something completely different than our usual way of being in the world. To that end, it can be argued that Sabbath is also not a day to watch TV, go to the lake or the ball game or the movies, to surf the internet or go shopping (even if this is enjoyable to us!).

      Which gets us to the command that the Sabbath is not only about stopping work, but about holiness. This is where the power of God's Sabbath can enter into our lives. Holiness.

      When we look at what the Bible means by 'holiness' we come up with two major meanings: #1: the complete otherness of God, and #2: the idea of separation, being set apart.

      Obviously the command to keep the Sabbath day holy refers to the second definition. A day set apart, a day which is unlike any other day. A day in which we simply stop. We stop because God commanded it. We stop because we need to stop. We stop because it is only in the stopping we can rest, delight, be still, and listen. It is only when there is room and space we can deeply connect with our loved ones, we can pray and play and nap and make love. Sabbath time allows us to turn off distractions, to delight in the natural and sensual world, to pray or read or simply slow down. We honor God through worship and prayer, but that is only part of a Sabbath day, probably the easier part for us because it is easily defined.

      There are many, many things pushing against Sabbath today. Besides all our competing demands and the endless possibilities of how we can spend our time, there is the cultural press to always be busy, productive, accomplishing something. How often do you greet someone (even on the Sabbath) and you ask "How are you?" and their reply is "I am so busy. . ." There is this sense we are running as fast as we can and we simply cannot stop or we will fall hopelessly far behind.

      We believe we are what we do. We believe this, instead of believing we are who we were created to be---children of God. "I am always tired." This is a common complaint of both the young and the old. We have put our busyness, our sense of the utmost importance of what we do, above God's command. We act as if we know better than God what is good for us. When we disobey the fourth commandment, we do nothing less than put ourselves above God. We think we are so important that our work/chores/activities cannot do without us. We act as if we do not need rest.

      No wonder we are always tired.

      There is something different, though, a different way, a road less traveled, and that is the way of Sabbath. Maybe we need a different word for it today, a word that captures the ideas of rest and peace and wholeness, of joy and celebration. I think we need a different word for it, so we may reclaim the Sabbath and redeem it back to the holy way God intended.

      Let me warn you, though Sabbath holiness is not easy to start. Sabbath stopping is unsettling. You may find yourself casting about, wondering what to do. I would be surprised if you didn't. You may want to begin with a Sabbath afternoon or a Sabbath evening. Draw a fence around a period of time in which you will do very little but enjoy very much. Take a walk, take a nap, sing a song, play the piano, eat a cookie, read a poem out loud, play hopscotch or dominoes or charades.

      Mark the beginning of your Sabbath observance with some kind of ritual, a particular prayer or hymn, the lighting of a candle, the turning off of lights. Turn off your electronics (all of them, that includes your phone!) and allow there to be silence in your space.

      Sabbath, like holiness, is not easy for us to do. It can be a bit scary if we are not used to it. It is a bit scary to open ourselves up to the holiness and the power of the Living God, the God who wants very much to be present with us and to make us God's own. We are about to sing this song, in which we acknowledge our need for Sabbath holiness:

      Holiness, holiness is what I long for
Holiness is what I need
Holiness, holiness is what You want from me
Holiness, holiness is what I long for
Holiness is what I need
Holiness, holiness is what You want from me
So, take my heart and form it
Take my mind and transform it
Take my will and conform it To Yours, to Yours, oh, Lord

      Make us different, Lord, set apart. Remind us that it is OK if for just one day a week to stop, rest, do nothing productive. Remind us that we need to allow you space to speak to us, to experience quiet and joy and the connection of loved ones and nature. Remind us, Lord, of the joy and holiness of your Sabbath.