Before I get onto this great subject that I’m learning about in this season (wish I’d known about it 30 years ago!) I have to say a huge thank you to all of you who read my blog last week. “Can I get a lift with you, no, sorry” It had a LOT of readership and I had some great comments, so thanks!

Sabbath v. day off – If you’d have asked me a few months ago whether I took a Sabbath, I would probably have answered, ‘yes’. Since we began in ministry back in 1989, we have always taken a Tuesday off. I don’t know why we took Tuesday, but it’s always worked for us. And, unless there has been an emergency or a meeting we had to attend, we’ve stuck to it – our churches have known it and it’s been great. Then we read ‘the ruthless elimination of hurry’ by John Mark Comer and we realised the huge difference between a day off and a Sabbath!

Before we go to the Sabbath, let me challenge this – over the years, I’ve often asked ministers if they take a day off – so many say, ‘no’ I don’t have the time. I don’t have to say much on this, I’ll just leave it to God and then pose a question and a challenge.

“By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work” Genesis 2:2

Who do you think you are, with allegedly no time to rest, when God rested? If you’re in full time ministry and you don’t take a regular day off, in mine and apparently God’s opinion, you’re doing it wrong. Yolk easy, burden light. This isn’t about an easy life, but we should all be carrying easy yolks. If that’s not your experience, then as the girls in Frozen say, ‘let it (some things) go. We can’t possibly function better than God.

The challenge now, for me, is the Sabbath and what that means.

Here is the first time we hear about the Sabbath:

“Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. ⁹ Six days you shall labor and do all your work, ¹⁰ but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. ¹¹ For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.” Exodus 20:8-11

It’s the longest commandment and the only one with a reason to do it, and that’s because God did it.

When I was a kid, we weren’t allowed to go to the shops on Sundays, I never understood why, it was just that way. Learning about the Sabbath 50 years on, I kinda get it now.

No one was allowed to work for one day a week. I want you to imagine what our world would be like if everyone just stopped! Of course, shops used to be closed on Sundays – no one could shop, no one could shop! The UK stopped and probably had a much more relaxing day than they do now because of that. Sundays don’t work great for Christians of course because of church commitment which I am fully supportive of – don’t be taking a Sabbath on a Sunday! I’m not saying that.

Comer’s great description is this: Sabbath is meant to be a day when you stop and rest. Switch your phone off and do something for 24 hours that is either rest or worship and that fills your joy shelf up! (My paraphrase) If you’re not sure what the difference is between a day off and a Sabbath, let me give you an example that happened to us recently that convinced me of the difference!

We went out in the car to a shopping centre to look for something we needed to buy. On our way there, John was on hold to HMRC – do I need to comment any more on the ‘stress’ that was causing – can you hear the tune they play for 3 hours before they answer the call? You have to work your self up to be ready to make that phone call. As we pulled into the car park, our car decided to break down! Thankfully it was there and not on the roads we’d been driving along. So, that meant another call to the RAC and a 6 hour wait all while sorting out an issue with the tax people! John and I rarely get stressed and we weren’t really stressed during this time because we’ve learned to be a peace, whatever is going on, BUT, this was definitely a day off and NOT a Sabbath.

If we’d taken a proper Sabbath as I’m beginning to learn, we wouldn’t have gone shopping or had the phone on. We’d have stopped for 24 hours and none of the above stress would have happened. Can you see the difference?

A day off is where you go shopping either on line or physically, you deal with the bank, the tax man, amazon, etc…On a Sabbath, you rest or worship. And a Sabbath will look differently for everyone.

Remember,

“Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath” Mark 2:27

So, we’re not going to all do the same like the Israelites did, although Jewish communities today still practice the Sabbath in all the traditional ways and something about that is very attractive in the sense that they are all doing it together as a community, but the flip side is, it can turn into religion rather than relationship with Jesus and something that is done because you have to rather than you want to.

I’m skimming the surface of this great subject but it does seem to be raising its head in a number of different sources, so maybe God is wanting to get our attention. Apparently, something like, the difference between working for 55 hours and 65 hours a week is nothing as far as productivity is concerned, they wield the same results. That’s kind of like the difference between working 6 days a week compared to 7. Maybe God was right? Shocker!

I don’t know what your week looks like, and you might be saying, ‘I don’t have time for a Sabbath’. If that’s true, and I would question it because of God, then take half a Sabbath. Get your kids involved, our daughter and son-in-law are months ahead of us on practicing the Sabbath and they have a 5 and 3 year old and a 5 month old – it’s doable or God wouldn’t have said or done it. Don’t know where to start? switch your phone off for half a day (when was the last time you switched your phone off?) and don’t buy anything! It will set you free. John and I have only done one full Sabbath in the last few weeks but I know we want and need to make it a regular part of our week. I know we will function better because of it.

If you want to understand more I can’t recommend John Mark Comer’s book enough – ‘The Ruthless elimination of Hurry’

Until next time,

D x