In the fast paced modern era we live in, many struggle to find some quiet time for rest and repose. However, God has always emphasized the need for His people to come away from worldly concerns for a time of reflection and communion with Him. (Gen 3:8-9, Gen2:2-3, Mk 6:31)
We were not designed to operate in a 24/7 working environment. As the Creator and Master Designer of the Universe, God alone knows the optimal conditions in which we should live. Just as you would not subject your car or a piece of expensive machinery to undue stress by using it contrary to the operating instructions (abuse), so you should also take care to heed God’s operating instructions for your own well-being, be it physical, mental, emotional or spiritual.
It is the same Lord who decreed the boundaries of the oceans who also has decreed the boundaries of time and space, giving us six days in which to labour and commanding us to rest on the seventh day to commemorate the great work of Creation that He had accomplished. It is also a time to contemplate the restoration of all things which He has already set in motion by His redeeming death, victorious Resurrection and atoning priestly ministry.
Jesus, when He was on this earth, showed us in what spirit we ought to keep the Sabbath. The Sabbath is God’s gift to man. This is what Jesus meant when He said that the Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. (Mk 2:27) No gift is a burden; hence the Sabbath ought not to be kept in legalistic tradition, but in joyous freedom and should be our delight. (Is 58:13-14) Also notice, He did not say: “The Sabbath was made for Jews…” He said “man”, meaning ALL of mankind, non-Jews included.
Many have neglected the Sabbath or have chosen to replace God’s Holy (sanctified*) Day with a day of their own choosing. At Creation, God rested on the Sabbath (seventh day), setting a pattern for us that was to last for all eternity. If the Sabbath had been changed to Sunday (first day of the week), surely something as important as this would have been an explicit command of Jesus Himself! Yet we see no such command in the entire Canon of Scripture. We see the price of neglect of God’s Sabbath all around us, in the maladies of the depressed and anxious. People are suffering from stress, overwork and depression from their youth. God has given us a command to rest – if He has decreed it, why should we fight it? In God’s Kingdom made new, ALL peoples will celebrate the Sabbath. (Is 66:22-23) Why not embrace and enjoy it now!
* to sanctify = to set apart for holy use
