Most people get Sunday off from work.
At one place I worked, we were paid double if we worked in Sundays.
Pastors, of course, have the opposite. We only work on Sundays.
For one hour.
Let’s go to God in prayer.
God of wisdom, may the words that I speak, and the ways they are received by each of our hearts and minds, to help us to continue to grow into the people, and the church, that you have dreamed us to be.
Amen.
Most Christians honor Sunday as the day of the week when Jesus rose. Some still honor Saturday as the seventh day. But how did we get to a seven day week to begin with?
Many will point to Genesis 2:
Thus the heavens and the earth were finished and all their multitude. 2 On the sixth day God finished the work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all the work that he had done. 3 So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all the work that he had done in creation.
Genesis 2:1-3, NRSVue
Some anthropologists think the week came from the month: The moon works on roughly 29 ½ day cycles. If we instead think of it as 28 days, that time can be divided into quarters. And a quarter of 28 is seven.
However the seven day week was determined, there is an idea that the seventh day is special.
In Exodus 20, beginning with verse 8, one set of the Ten Commandments indicates how human beings should observe the Sabbath:
8 “Remember the Sabbath day and keep 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; you shall not do any work—you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. 11 For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and consecrated it.
Exodus 20:8-11, NRSVue
Leviticus 23:3 reinforces this idea:
3 “Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of complete rest, a holy convocation; you shall do no work: it is a Sabbath to the Lord throughout your settlements.
Leviticus 23:3. NRSVue
And Deuteronomy 5 reiterates this:
12 “ ‘Observe the Sabbath day and keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. 13 Six days you shall labor and do all your work. 14 But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God; you shall not do any work—you, or your son or your daughter, or your male or female slave, or your ox or your donkey, or any of your livestock, or the resident alien in your towns, so that your male and female slave may rest as well as you. 15 Remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm; therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day.
Deuteronomy 5:12-15, NRSVue
So this is the culture in which this morning’s scripture were written: The seventh day of the week is a blessed time when no one should do any work, not people – including resident aliens – or even livestock.
And the reading from Isaiah talks about not trampling on the Sabbath.
So our reading from Luke has the leader of the synagogue trying to enforce this rule.
“There are six days on which work ought to be done;
come on those days and be cured and not on the Sabbath day.”
Luke 13:14b, NRSVue
That’s attention to the letter of the law.
But our reading from Isaiah also says to
remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil,
and offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted
Isaiah 58:9b – 10, NRSVue
So should we refrain from any kind of work on the seventh day?
Today, even very conservative observant Jews will drive their sick child to the hospital on a Saturday.
As we read in Mark chapter 2, verse 27:
27 Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for humankind and not humankind for the Sabbath, 28 so the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.”
Mark 2:27
So the Sabbath is created for humans: for rest, of for contemplation of God and God’s creation.
In Judaism, the day begins at sunset. Beginning a day at sunrise or sunset is fairly easy, even on cloudy days. We know when the sky gets light or dark.
High Noon would be a good reference if we could always see the sun. Midnight is pretty difficult to determine without the technology of mechanical or electronic clocks.
So the Jewish Sabbath day begins at sunset on the day we call Friday, and continues until sunset in the day we call Saturday.
I don’t think we really know which current day of the week is the Sabbath. Over millennia, people may have lost count. But I think the idea of a Sabbath is more important than which day it is: a day for rest and contemplation.
I personally try to keep a Friday sunset to Saturday sunset sabbath because, between my two jobs, I work Sunday morning through Friday noon .
Your sabbath may be different.
There is a culture of “grinding”: working hard every day of the week. But even our fitness devices tell us to rest and recover between times of exercise. So we should definitely take a day to rest each week.
But what if there’s someone in need? Can we just turn them away because it’s our sabbath? If it’s a life or death emergency, of course we should help. But we can also help feed people on our sabbath, help in the healing of people on our sabbath. We should not turn away from compassion just because of the day of the week.
So my challenge to each of us this week is to identify 24 consecutive hours each week that we can set aside for rest and for contemplation.
Remember that we can still be compassionate even on our sabbath.
Amen.
* Scripture quotations marked NRSVue are taken from the New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. https://www.friendshippress.org/pages/about-the-nrsvue
* Scripture quotations marked KJV are taken from the King James version of the Bible.
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