Chapter 2
“Sabbath”
Sabbath. What does that even mean?
The first gift that God gives to humanity after their creation is the gift of Sabbath. What does that even mean? It is here that we come face–to–face with a Bible word—shabbat. In Hebrew, the word simply means “cease, stop, or slow down.” It is connected to another Hebrew word menuha, which simply means “rest.” Both speak to the same reality. Space carved out that is not for work, productivity, accumulation, or control.
I love that word shabbat. Whenever I hear that word shabbat, I can’t help but hear the word beginning with a call for quiet: “shhhhhh.” It is an invitation to the quiet, to the unconquered time of God where he is Lord and we are at rest under his lordship. This command to rest comes almost immediately in the storyline of the Bible in Genesis 1–2. After creating through six days, God looks over all that he has made and called “good” and declares,
By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done. (Gen. 2:2–3)
Notice the two components of this section within the creation narrative. First, notice that God has ordered and structured time itself around a seven–day period. God creates a seven–day week. That is, the framework of seven days is rich with divine intention. Echoing church fathers (like Basil of Caesarea), theologian Colin Gunton argues that the ordering of seven days establishes a distinct relation between the present time and eternity. That is, the seven–day week was created by God to serve as a contrast to the realm of eternity in which God dwells.
As has been said, time is basically God’s way of keeping everything from happening at once. This is why Jewish scholar Abraham Heschel beautifully describes Sabbath as “eternity uttering a day.” Sabbath is a moment of eternal glory momentarily breaking into our finite, present world. The emphasis in Scripture is not on the time of creation, as some so easily assume, but on the creation of time itself. The seven–day week is God’s brilliant creation, what one poet calls “the most brilliant creation of the Hebrew spirit.”
This command is God’s way of keeping human work and human rest in balance. Keep the text in mind—God commands one day of rest and six days of work each week. In that framework, therefore, we must remember that this commandment is both an invitation to rest and an invitation to work. For some, the Sabbath commandment is not an invitation to work less but actually to work more. Sadly, some generations have tended toward workaholism and others toward laziness. Balance is what is needed. Six days of work—one day of rest.
Notice, secondly, that in the rhythm of a seven–day period is a very clear rhythm of rest that is framed by this week. One day in seven is to be given to rest—ceasing, delighting and being with God. Every week, one day is to be set aside for rest. So central to God is the ethical imperative to rest that it is established in Scripture before commands against murder, adultery, divorce, lying, incest, rape, jealousy, and child sacrifice. Why do we Sabbath? Genesis says we Sabbath, first, because God kept a Sabbath and, second, because God built it into the DNA of creation, and it is therefore something creation needs in order to flourish.
While the New Testament continues to teach on the Sabbath, it appears as though Paul frees the new covenant people from a specific day. God never intended what he gave to us as a gift to become a tool of shame or guilt. The Sabbath is for us. We are not for the Sabbath. And in that reality we can experience freedom and joy. Remember Paul’s words: “Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day” (Col. 2:16). Do not be judged, friend. Remember, no one has ever, save Jesus, kept a Sabbath perfectly. There is grace. Endless grace. All we have to do is “make every effort” to enter the Sabbath. The primary idea in the New Testament is not about a specific day but rather if we are beginning to enter into the rest of Christ.
As God invites us to Sabbath, we will be tempted to think that Sabbath cannot “work” for us. “I don’t have time to take a whole day to rest,” people have expressed to me for years. Biblically, however, this is not the case. The biblical story tells us that to rest one day a week is to be truly human, and to not rest is to be inhuman. Humans were made to rest. When we say we don’t have time to rest, we cannot find time for something that has already been found. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer once wrote, with God, an imperative is an indicative.
That is, what God commands us to do tells us something of who God is. God invites us to rest. And God rests. Are we stronger or wiser or better than God? As the creation story reminds us, the need for rest is built into the genetic makeup of the universe, and ignorance of such is like humanity trying to genetically modify the whole universe.
The very good creation of God—the Lord of the universe—has created the week. But as well, God has created a day within that week that is to be a day of rest. How beautiful is that? We literally worship the God who invented the weekend!
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