A Sabbath Check-Up

It’s been one year since my church community started seriously thinking about the practice of Sabbath in our lives. While exploring the daily and weekly rhythm found in Genesis 1-2 we decided that our whole lives, not just our home life, would need to pay attention to rhythm and rest while we fulfilled our vision.

Last Sunday we did a Sabbath check up!!

How were we doing? Is Sabbath just a vacation? Is it only about taking time off? Is there more to it?

Exodus 16 tells us the story of Israel just after they escape from years of slavery and persecution in Egypt. Israel was forced to work insane hours to satisfy Egypt’s demands and greedy pleasures. God raises Moses to deliver Israel out of this situation (Exodus 1-15).

We find Israel during their 1st days in the desert. Wondering where they’re going, God leads them with a cloud of smoke by day and fire by night. Complaining about food, God provides manna in morning and meat at night. They quickly realize that their journey would require a dependent trust on God to lead and provide for them.

What strikes me most about this is the 1st instruction God gives them in the desert. Some might think he’d set some boundaries down early to make sure they have a good journey with little upsets. Instead, God re-institutes the Sabbath with 2 commands:
1. Just take enough manna in the morning for your day. Not too much. More will come tomorrow (16:4).
God institutes the daily rhythm of just enough work. Don’t worry about tomorrow, tomorrow has enough worry for itself (Matthew 6:34).
2. On the 6th day take 2x as much so on the 7th day you can rest (16:5, 23).
God institutes the weekly rhythm of just enough work. Surrender your week’s efforts to me and let me worry about the 7th day. You rest.

This was a check up for me, asking me the hard question, do I trust God enough to stop when I’ve done enough (daily and weekly). This last year this question came up in various forms for our church: are we doing enough or too much, are we trusting God with our efforts, are we just pursuing an idea or a God-given conviction, and are planning according to our size and resources.

For my own check up it was the whole Sabbath command that got me thinking? It was to be a “holy Sabbath to the Lord” (16:23). The command to rest on the Sabbath was GOD-WARD.

See, sometimes Sabbath can be reduced to vacation. The root of vacation is to vacate or escape. Sabbath doesn’t sound like that at all. It’s rest without the desperate need to get out of town. It’s a holy rest.

Have you ever felt like your vacation left you more restless than restful?

9 years ago I was on a beach in Cuba striking up a conversation with an English chap (I think they’re chaps in England?) and asked him how he was doing. He guy told me that he was – or what I thought sounded like – naked (or knackered). After the shock, or wonder if he was hitting on me beside the pool, I asked him to clarify. He told me that he meant fatigued. But how someone could someone be fatigued on a beach in Cuba?

However, after meeting many people who vacation many times per year yet still feel anxious and restless, I’ve realized that true rest – or restoration – doesn’t just come from vacation, but from a genuine pause that is God-ward.

So, how can you make your rest – Sabbath – God-ward? Here’s some ideas:

FULLY PARTICIPATE in your church community’s weekly gathering. Approaching worship, prayer, the scriptures – and not least important, communion with people – with the right motives will help point you God-ward on the Sabbath.

GET AWAY often – somewhere, sometime – with your journal, Bible, and God.
It was during my vacation that I rediscovered this. (Sadly, I find myself rediscovering this too often) I was less than 2 weeks into my vacation when I realized I was still a little restless. I reflected on the time spent, and realized most was filled with home renovations, trips, and lots of activities. I followed the longing my soul seamed to be whispering and got alone for some SPR (scripture, prayer, reflection). It was refreshing and restful.

SLOW DOWN enough to see the activity of God.
Do something, or nothing at all, to help you slow down enough to see what you normally can’t see. Gardening, walks, writing, painting, sipping your favorite drink in a good space, whatever. Anything that helps you rest, not just vacate, and in the process notice what God is up to.

Lastly, ask yourself: what fuels me God-ward and than be intentional about including that during Sabbath. Mark Buchanan says it’s usually anything you don’t have to do. Normally the things you have to do are about securing something to provide for your life.

Getting back to Exodus 16, there’s one key element that made the difference for Israel in the desert. TRUST. By learning to trust in God they were able to trust that rest wasn’t hurting their lives but helping it. TRUST in God believes that while you rest God won’t let things fall apart. While you’ve done enough for today, tomorrow will have more to do. That God will guide you and provide for you as you work faithfully when needed AND trust joyfully when you rest.

Exodus 16 makes sure we know that Israel’s trust and attention to rhythm paid off. We’re told that “the people rested on the seventh day” (16:30). I.E. they were restored. At the start of a new uncharted journey, no promises of security, the risk of desert travel – they found rest in the on and in the Sabbath. We’re also told that for the next 40 years manna was waiting for them every morning except the 7th day. But they made it, following they’re daily and weekly rhythms, finding rest as they made the Sabbath God-ward.

If you need a vacation, please, take one – we all need it. However, if you’re looking for rest it will only come when you put your trust in God and the rhythms he’s wired us to live within.