Sabbath
Catch your breath and step into God’s time - Sabbath. In place of 24/7 work, availability, and productivity, we practice a rhythm of work and rest. We set aside one full 24 hour period for rest and worship, to pray and play.
“In our own contemporary context of the rat race of anxiety, the celebration of Sabbath is an act of both resistance and alternative. It is resistance because it is a visible insistence that our lived are not defined by production and commodity goods.”
— Walter Brueggemann
Living into Sabbath
The practice of Sabbath is a gift from God to you, a 24-hour period without the burden of “have-to’s.” The biblical practice of Sabbath nudges us towards a holy good-for-nothingness in which all we do is enjoy life. The Sabbath restores in us a playfulness, a delighting in things. It cultivates a holy awe and wonder for life and living. Sabbath is meant to help us simply BE God's creatures, a day to delight in life, to be frittered away with God, beautifully wasted in prayer and play (but never a time to be killed).
One of the fine writers on Sabbath is the Jewish scholar/Rabbi Abraham Heschel who emphasizes the importance Scripture gives to time over place. He writes:
The Bible is more concerned with time than with space. It sees the world in the dimension of time. It pays more attention to generations, to events, than to countries, to things; it is more concerned with history than with geography. To understand the teaching of the Bible, one must accept the premise that time has a meaning for life which is at least equal to that of space; that time has a significance and sovereignty of its own.
The illusion of our clocks and watches is to convince us that all time is equal, every day is a unit of 24 hours. But there is a created rhythm to life of work and rest, and Sabbath trains us to live within this rhythm.
Eugene Peterson wisely notes the social nature of Sabbath-keeping. Peterson observes, “I don’t think you can keep the Sabbath by yourselves ... it’s a social thing. It requires a lot of relationship, a lot of help ... There’s just too much going to distract you. The most important thing we did in keeping a Sabbath is getting help.”
We need that help because we are shaped to be always-on, busy, 24/7 people, constantly pressed for time. We need the encouragement of our Habitus Community to practice Sabbath. There’s a wonderful example of this in the theatre district of New York City where a Jewish theatre troupe called 24/6 was formed for Sabbath-observant Jews. Members in 24/6 are not required to rehearse or perform on Friday nights or Saturday afternoons, freed up to pursue their faith convictions and their vocations.
We want to be equally serious in our commitment to Sabbath keeping, to seek out faithful responses to the contemporary challenges we face in resisting the idol of busyness, productivity and performance.
Looking for ideas for your Sabbath practice - click here for an idea resource to inspire your practice of rest, worship and delight
Video resources
Two video resources on Sabbath: one a conversation hosted by Regent College about how Sabbath is not just a rest from your workweek but a reorientation of your life; the second an overview of Sabbath in the bible.
A conversation between Prof. Bruce Hindmarsh, author/blogger Ann Voskamp, Pastor and educator Mark Buchanan, and Paige Gutacker on Sabbath.
This Bible Project video gives an excellent overview of God’s idea of Sabbath and why Jesus adopted this idea as a major part of his own mission to bring God's Kingdom to earth.
