Sabbath R and R
Exodus 20:8-11
Deuteronomy 5:12-15
September 3, 2006
30 years ago, it was not uncommon for me to sit in front of the television on Saturday and Sunday mornings with a big bowl of Lucky Charms cereal watching cartoons. I grew up with the Superfriends, Scooby Doo, Tom and Jerry. In one of the cartoons the two main characters at the beginning of the episode would punch into work with their time cards and at the end they would punch out. And during their work day one of them would try to catch, trap, chase, tackle the other. Using ropes, rocks, bombs, trees, cars, missiles or whatever else he could find he did his best to capture the other. But episode after episode, it never worked. And at the end of their workday these two that had worked so hard would simply grab their lunch pails and punch out and go on as if their day job wouldn’t affect them at all. In fact they would say good-bye to each other in a civil manner, only to pick up their chasing, hitting, trapping duties the next day.
The cartoon portrayed this idyllic situation in a sense where work was work.
Work was what you did from dawn to dusk.
It was something you picked up when you came in the morning and left when you exited the doors.
It was something that had no hold on your mind, heart, once you left the job site. And boy how I wish that were true.
Be honest now-
Raise your hands if you’ve thought about your job while sitting here in this service this morning.
If you thought about what you didn’t finish yet
left undone.
or about what you are facing when you go back.
Raise your hand if you’ve ever stayed after hours to finish a project or go in early to get a jump-start.
Raise your hand if your spouse/your child/ or a friend ever accuse you of being distracted by work, consumed by your job, or totally enmeshed in it?
Work - contrary to what the cartoon portrayed to me as a kid, consumes much of our
mental focus
physical abilities
emotional strength
And so on this Labor Day, I want not to talk about work, each of you know how to do that well. Really well. But instead, I want to talk with you about the boundaries God has given to us regarding work. Guidelines designed to let us "punch out on the work time clock."
Just as God has given us boundaries about the marriage relationship - no extra-marital affairs.
Just as God has given us boundaries about our tongue - be quick to listen and slow to speak.
Just as God has given us boundaries about chasing after, accumulating and putting your trust in wealth - when he said,
"What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul?"
So too has God given us boundaries regarding work. Boundaries meant to keep work in its proper place. Boundaries that are meant for you and me to not become "human doings" but to become the "human beings" that God intended us to be.
The clearest boundary marker or most concise teaching meant to be a guardrail about not allowing work to consume us is found in what we call the 10 Commandments.
The Bible lists these 10 Commandments in two different places. One time in Exodus 20 and a second time in Deuteronomy 5. In each of these lists the commandments/the boundaries are the same. I’ve printed these passages on the back of your bulletin.
In Exodus 20:8 and 9, we read, "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the 7th day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God."
Deuteronomy 5:12 and 13 - uses almost the exact same works. "Observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy, as the Lord your God has commanded you. 6 days you shall labor and do all your work but the 7th day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God."
God’s boundary marker for work is this: work is to be part of our lives, our habit, our routine 6 days a week, but six days a week only. When the 7th day of the week comes - work is not to be part of it.
In a sense - punch in on the time clock on day one and after day 6 punch out. Once day 7 comes around work is not to have its hold on you.
"Yeah - right, Pastor Tim.
That’s easy for you to say. You only work 1 hour a week."
God’s boundary for work is straight forward and clear. Work 6 days but not on the 7th.
For you retired folk - this divine rhythm was part of the culture you grew up in when you were kids.
I heard my grandparents talk about nothing being opened on Sundays, only Churches. And if you weren’t sitting in one, most likely you weren’t at your place of employment but at home or with your family.
But it isn’t this way anymore is it. Some of you have to work 7 days a week. Or your workweek begins and ends not on Monday and Friday but with some other pattern.
Work schedules have changed. Therefore God’s boundary regarding work has been blurred.
Another thing has happened, where before people worked 6 days and were off 1, now a typical schedule is work 5 days and be off two. Some of you work 4-10 hour days and are off for 3. This schedule happened historically when the labor movement was strong. A great idea. But what it has resulted in is not work 5 days/1 day at home/honor the Sabbath on 1 but instead, do what the boss says I have to do for 5 day and then do what I want to do for 2 days. God is left out of the equation, with the result being that God’s boundary marker - work 6 and honor the Sabbath on day 7 is completely disregarded.
I believe there is another element present is our culture that makes honoring this commandment difficult. Many of your neighbors and many of us are over extended by what we own or said more truthfully what owns us.
We have too many possessions to pay off.
We have too many toys to take care of.
Therefore we don’t have time to not work. When we aren’t at work at the job, we have to work taking care of the things that we were hoping would bring us enjoyment. Or we work side jobs to try to make the payments.
I’ve come to believe that the very things that we have, aspire to acquire, create a noose around us and actually keep us from living the life God intended for us.
Some of you have too much land and therefore you have to mow too much.
Some of you have too big of garden
too many 4-wheelers
too many window to clean
too many bathrooms to keep up
too expensive of car.
Cut back. Downsize. Rather than these bringing enjoyment, they end up sucking the life out of you.
As a bill board sign says along route 536 in West Mount Vernon - the most important things aren’t things.
Sabbath is part of God’s answer to this. Honoring and taking a day out of every 6 can help us to be re-oriented away from our consumerative culture and toward our God.
Sabbath was meant to create an order.
a weekly rhythm to your life.
It was to dictate to your boss the hold she could have on you.
It was to create a boundary that we were not meant to cross.
It was meant to be a liberating weekly reality.
Before I get to the practical side of Sabbath keeping, some ideas as to making it a reality, allow me to share with you something I had never seen before in our two texts.
A few minutes ago we read the 2 places in the 10 commandments where God’s boundary for work was listed. They were nearly identical. Yes?
Yes.
But notice that each passage gives a different reason. A differing explanation as to why Sabbath is to be honored. Each reason for Sabbath is significant.
In Exodus 8:11, v. 11 gives us this reason. "For in 6 days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, but he rested on the 7th day." We keep Sabbath because God himself did this. Because God chose to do this himself. Because this was how God designed the created world. Because this was and is God’s design, plan, model and intention. We keep Sabbath. Sabbath was created before sin entered the world. Therefore when we honor it we participate in something that sin hadn’t touched. One that first Sabbath day - God rested. He relaxed.
The created order/God’s work was done. He concluded it. The boundary was set. God modeled this weekly rhythm himself. (See Genesis 1:1-2:3)
This is the most obvious reason for Sabbath keeping. We are to honor Sabbath because Sabbath is rooted in creation. God rested/relaxed.
The second reason, the one given in Deuteronomy 5:15 is this. Honoring Sabbath redeems us, rescues us or releases us from enslavement to work.
Vs. 15 reads, "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."
Just as God redeemed, brought release to his people who were enslaved to Pharaoh - allowing them to live liberated, free, from his demands, so too does honoring a weekly Sabbath remind me that I don’t have to work to keep the world running. It doesn’t all depend on me.
Sabbath reminds me that I am not a machine.
God tells us to honor the Sabbath because he longs for you and me to be able to have an orientation other than being enslaved by the work place and all your possessions.
Our God longs for you to be reminded weekly that He is in control and desires for you to remove yourself from steering your life, your calendar and your schedule. It is a day of reassurance of His sovereignty in all things.
So a second reason we are to honor Sabbath is because Sabbath is rooted in the Exodus - God’s Liberating release of his people from enslavement to work.
God redeemed
rescued
released
Taking/learning to honor a Sabbath day helps us to not be defined
confined
and enslaved to our work.
