Remember the Sabbath
We sat atop Pinnacle mountain at 7:02 am in quiet, holy anticipation. The world was dark and still but thirty minutes ago, and over the course of our climb, we watched a glorious unfolding. Colors lightened the black sky. What was previously hidden came into contact with light, taking shape and form. One by one, morning birds awakened the silence with a new song. And in the space of one breath, the burning sun crept up boldly but quietly over their horizon.
A Sunday sunrise.
“There is something about the sunrise,” my friend whispered in a voice that echoed with awe and wonder. “And I don’t even know if I can put words to it.”
“It feels like we are watching something sacred, even participating in it.”
Wide open spaces. The stillness of the morning. The freshness of the air. The being awake while most of the world is still asleep. The beauty of such a brilliant sunrise that happens in silence, unannounced, like a glorious surprise intended just for those who pay attention.
Doing this on a Sunday made it seem extra meaningful. I wondered what the sunrise was like on that one Sunday long ago when the Son of God rose from the dead.
We got to talking about Sundays, which got us talking about Sabbath, which is actually something that I have been thinking about and talking about with a lot of people in a lot of different conversations recently. Funny how the Holy Spirit goes before us and convicts the people of God about the same things sometimes, and we don’t even realize it until we start talking about it.
“Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. It’s the only one of the Ten Commandments that we pretty much disregard these days,” she remarked. “Like all the others still apply to us except that one.”
I had never thought about it like that, but she was right.
We’re not too different from the Israelites, I suppose. The ancient Israelites depended on farming their fields to feed their families. If you did not work, you did not eat. They literally cultivated to survive. To take a day of rest was a significant sacrifice, one that reminded the Israelites very tangibly that their livelihood depended on God and not their own effort.
And so God gave them Sabbath. A day of rest when life was stressful. A day to cease striving in order to cultivate dependance on God. A day to remember who God is and what he has done.
Sabbath is less of a twenty-four hour time period and more of an attitude of the heart - an attitude of peace and trust while at rest. But the heart isn’t naturally inclined to enter that kind of rest, and so the Israelites needed some structured and practical guidelines for one day out of every week to teach them how to trust God in both their working and their resting.
Sabbath is a spiritual state of the heart, but Sabbath regulations helps the heart get there.
The same is true for us.
Sabbath is still all about the state of our hearts before God, but we need literal and practical Sabbath guidelines in order to train our hearts to enter that state of rest and dependance.
Just because we live in a modern culture in a developed country does not mean we are exempt from Sabbath. I wonder if we don’t need it now more than ever. In a society addicted to accomplishment, achievement, work, progress, and forward momentum, we have been victims of a pace that is not spiritually sustainable. Though we don’t live by subsistence farming like the Israelites, we still have things that we feel we must do in order to survive. Sabbath is still a surrender of those activities. Sabbath is an intentional sacrifice of our drive to get things done in order to remember what God has done. Sabbath is a reminder that we can rest from our physical labors because we know he will provide for our needs, and we can rest from our spiritual labors because the cross alone did the necessary work of salvation.
I’ve noticed a chronic problem in my life — spiritual amnesia. Just like the Israelites were so quick to forget what God had done for them and fall into the same old sins, doubts, and complaints, even we as God’s people today are quick to forget him and fall into the same old things that we’ve always struggled with. I wonder: is there a connection? Could our spiritual amnesia be correlated to our failure to practice Sabbath? Could our failure to regularly rest in God and remember him be contributing to those same old sins we can’t seem to beat?
I’m putting it to the test, and I invite you to consider it with me. I am practicing a stricter version of Sabbath than I ever have before, not because it’s a legalistic religious practice, but because the outward practice trains the heart to enter the inner attitude of spiritual rest. God gave us Sabbath for our good; therefore, obedience to this command must reveal some blessings that maybe, just maybe, we’ve missed for far too long. I don’t know about you, but I’m thinking Sabbath is a gift that maybe I have been unintentionally rejecting but am now finally ready to receive.
So what does Sabbath look like? For me it looks like a daily rhythm of rest by starting the morning out in prayer, meditation, and Scripture memorization before I jump into the “work” that needs to be done that day.
It looks like allowing one hour before bed to spend time with the Lord, and I actually have to set an alarm on my phone that rings “Sabbath” to tell me to stop whatever I am doing to meet with God.
It looks like choosing one day of the week (Sunday is my preference but may not be ideal for everyone) to dedicate entirely to rest and remembrance. I intentionally do no work nor tasks - no buying or selling, no washing or cooking, no planning or scheduling, no “catching up” on things, and limited use of technology. I give extra time to personal and corporate worship, study of Scripture, prayer, and then spiritual activities that prompt remembrance of who God is or what he has taught me in certain seasons of my life. I operate at a slower pace, allow plenty of margin instead of rushing from one thing to the next, and make no plans except congregational worship in the morning and then attending small group community in the evening.
I have set these guidelines not like rules to strictly follow, nor as a standard to judge myself or others by, but rather I think of them like healthy habits that are training my forgetful heart to rest and remember in God’s presence.
These things rise in my heart as I watch the sun rise over the Arkansas River Valley. And as the sun takes the earth by the edges, I know that something new is rising in me, too.
A Sunday sunrise.
“There is something about the sunrise,” my friend whispered in a voice that echoed with awe and wonder. “And I don’t even know if I can put words to it.”
“It feels like we are watching something sacred, even participating in it.”
Wide open spaces. The stillness of the morning. The freshness of the air. The being awake while most of the world is still asleep. The beauty of such a brilliant sunrise that happens in silence, unannounced, like a glorious surprise intended just for those who pay attention.
Doing this on a Sunday made it seem extra meaningful. I wondered what the sunrise was like on that one Sunday long ago when the Son of God rose from the dead.
We got to talking about Sundays, which got us talking about Sabbath, which is actually something that I have been thinking about and talking about with a lot of people in a lot of different conversations recently. Funny how the Holy Spirit goes before us and convicts the people of God about the same things sometimes, and we don’t even realize it until we start talking about it.
“Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. It’s the only one of the Ten Commandments that we pretty much disregard these days,” she remarked. “Like all the others still apply to us except that one.”
I had never thought about it like that, but she was right.
We’re not too different from the Israelites, I suppose. The ancient Israelites depended on farming their fields to feed their families. If you did not work, you did not eat. They literally cultivated to survive. To take a day of rest was a significant sacrifice, one that reminded the Israelites very tangibly that their livelihood depended on God and not their own effort.
And so God gave them Sabbath. A day of rest when life was stressful. A day to cease striving in order to cultivate dependance on God. A day to remember who God is and what he has done.
Sabbath is less of a twenty-four hour time period and more of an attitude of the heart - an attitude of peace and trust while at rest. But the heart isn’t naturally inclined to enter that kind of rest, and so the Israelites needed some structured and practical guidelines for one day out of every week to teach them how to trust God in both their working and their resting.
Sabbath is a spiritual state of the heart, but Sabbath regulations helps the heart get there.
The same is true for us.
Sabbath is still all about the state of our hearts before God, but we need literal and practical Sabbath guidelines in order to train our hearts to enter that state of rest and dependance.
Just because we live in a modern culture in a developed country does not mean we are exempt from Sabbath. I wonder if we don’t need it now more than ever. In a society addicted to accomplishment, achievement, work, progress, and forward momentum, we have been victims of a pace that is not spiritually sustainable. Though we don’t live by subsistence farming like the Israelites, we still have things that we feel we must do in order to survive. Sabbath is still a surrender of those activities. Sabbath is an intentional sacrifice of our drive to get things done in order to remember what God has done. Sabbath is a reminder that we can rest from our physical labors because we know he will provide for our needs, and we can rest from our spiritual labors because the cross alone did the necessary work of salvation.
I’ve noticed a chronic problem in my life — spiritual amnesia. Just like the Israelites were so quick to forget what God had done for them and fall into the same old sins, doubts, and complaints, even we as God’s people today are quick to forget him and fall into the same old things that we’ve always struggled with. I wonder: is there a connection? Could our spiritual amnesia be correlated to our failure to practice Sabbath? Could our failure to regularly rest in God and remember him be contributing to those same old sins we can’t seem to beat?
I’m putting it to the test, and I invite you to consider it with me. I am practicing a stricter version of Sabbath than I ever have before, not because it’s a legalistic religious practice, but because the outward practice trains the heart to enter the inner attitude of spiritual rest. God gave us Sabbath for our good; therefore, obedience to this command must reveal some blessings that maybe, just maybe, we’ve missed for far too long. I don’t know about you, but I’m thinking Sabbath is a gift that maybe I have been unintentionally rejecting but am now finally ready to receive.
So what does Sabbath look like? For me it looks like a daily rhythm of rest by starting the morning out in prayer, meditation, and Scripture memorization before I jump into the “work” that needs to be done that day.
It looks like allowing one hour before bed to spend time with the Lord, and I actually have to set an alarm on my phone that rings “Sabbath” to tell me to stop whatever I am doing to meet with God.
It looks like choosing one day of the week (Sunday is my preference but may not be ideal for everyone) to dedicate entirely to rest and remembrance. I intentionally do no work nor tasks - no buying or selling, no washing or cooking, no planning or scheduling, no “catching up” on things, and limited use of technology. I give extra time to personal and corporate worship, study of Scripture, prayer, and then spiritual activities that prompt remembrance of who God is or what he has taught me in certain seasons of my life. I operate at a slower pace, allow plenty of margin instead of rushing from one thing to the next, and make no plans except congregational worship in the morning and then attending small group community in the evening.
I have set these guidelines not like rules to strictly follow, nor as a standard to judge myself or others by, but rather I think of them like healthy habits that are training my forgetful heart to rest and remember in God’s presence.
These things rise in my heart as I watch the sun rise over the Arkansas River Valley. And as the sun takes the earth by the edges, I know that something new is rising in me, too.
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