We All Need a Little More Sabbath

Some thoughts on that awkward fourth command

Burnout is everywhere. I think that in our post-lockdown world, we all realized just how much we needed some time to refresh. For those of us who had the privilege of staying home during the lockdown, the time we had to spend with our families was priceless. I know that’s true for me and my year as a stay-at-home dad with Cayden. But for those of us who were considered essential workers with nonessential pay, our heartache for Sabbath intensified like never before.

In our culture of hustle, 10x (any ex-Grant Cardone addicts?), and maximum efficiency, observing the Sabbath is not an option. What deals am I missing out on? What emails are going unanswered? What if I miss that big sale?

For business owners, and people in sales (like real estate agents and insurance salesmen), these missed calls and emails are missed money and missed investments. And they actually are. If you miss that call on Saturday because you are out hiking with no service, then that really is money that is going to a competitor.

So in today’s podcast and article, we will be reclaiming the Sabbath by reframing a few objections and trying to change our minds, maybe just by a little bit, on money, efficiency, and what really matters in life.

Sabbath is Not a Burden

I don’t know about you, but when I was growing up, I always looked at the Sabbath day as a burden. Aren’t you glad we don’t have to do that anymore, right? I mean, they couldn’t even pick up sticks on the Sabbath! And so we did things like talk about how every other command of the Ten Commandments is repeated in the New Testament except for the fourth: remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy.

Others talked about how Saturday was changed into Sunday, and so now we follow the Christian Sabbath and worship on the Lord’s Day, the first day of the week. But since blue laws have gone unobserved in most places, most of the people in my generation cannot fathom a time in which Waffle House would ever be closed.

Because of our constant need for financial growth on one end and the constant need for instant gratification on the other, the Sabbath has fallen through the cracks.

Thankfully, people like Abraham Joshua Heschel in his book on the Sabbath, John Mark Comer in his popular Ruthless Elimination of Hurry, and Rob Bell in his audiobook Handling Your Fire emphasize the need for us to return to Sabbath. This diverse group, plus many more authors, pastors, and speakers, have pointed out some of the very things I have about burnout and hustle culture.

Sabbath, then, is far from a burden. In fact, it is a necessity for social justice, personal health, and worship of God.

Observing the Sabbath??

Before we continue, I think it’s important to define my terms. I’m not advocating for a religiously mandated, weekly Sabbath that is observed on Saturday. I’m primarily talking about a frame of mind that shows up in intentional times of rest and disconnection from the world of work, money, phone calls, emails, stocks, appointments, stressful gatherings, etc.

This may be on Saturday for you. Or it could be another day of the week. It may even fit into your particular religious framework by showing up on a specific day like Sunday or Friday. I’m not here to force any specific day or pattern. My job is to show you the importance of Sabbath for yourself and for others and then let you come up with what is best for you.

But if you have trouble starting this sacred habit, then it may be necessary for you to pick a day that you stick by consistently. This means setting boundaries for employees, clients, and even your boss. Treat the day or time as sacred and holy, but don’t stone anybody, please.

Observing the Sabbath as an Act of Love

Observing Sabbath is an act of love that could be classified as social justice. A weekly mandated Sabbath, like what we see in Torah, meant that the shops and fields would be closed for business each week. This meant intentional rest for the managers, employees, slaves, animals, and even the land itself.

Speaking of the land, there were other Sabbaths than just the weekly sabbath. In fact, there were seven, and later even more, times during the year in which one would have guaranteed time to rest and worship God. On top of these annual holidays, there was an additional time of rest for the land every seven years as well as a year every fifty years called the Year of Jubilee in which debts would be forgiven and slaves were released (see Leviticus 23 and 25).

These Sabbaths were times to reflect on the God who frees slaves and who gave the people their land. The land Sabbath, for example, was a time in which everyone, including the foreigners dwelling among the Israelites, could rest and enjoy what the land naturally produced:

You shall not reap the aftergrowth of your harvest or gather the grapes of your unpruned vine: it shall be a year of complete rest for the land. You may eat what the land yields during its Sabbath—you, your male and female slaves, your hired and your bound laborers who live with you, for your livestock also, and for the wild animals in your land all its yield shall be for food. Leviticus 25:5–7

The social justice aspect of the Sabbath really comes out in the minor prophets. To those who wanted to pursue wealth, the Sabbath did seem like a burden. Read this rebuke of some of the merchants in Israel by Amos:

Hear this, you who trample on the needy, and bring to ruin the poor of the land, saying, “When will the new moon be over so that we may sell grain, and the Sabbath, so that we may offer wheat for sale? We will make the ephah smaller and the shekel heavier and practice deceit with false balances, buying the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals and selling the sweepings of the wheat.” Amos 8:4–6

The people who trampled on the needy through their relentless pursuit of fortune wanted to know when they could stop taking mandatory breaks from growing rich. Amos responds,

On that day, says the Lord GOD, I will make the sun go down at noon and darken the earth in broad daylight. I will turn your feasts into mourning and all your songs into lamentation; I will bring sackcloth on all loins and baldness on every head; I will make it like the mourning for an only son and the end of it like a bitter day. Amos 8:9–10

The Sabbath wouldn't end until judgment came. Then there wouldn’t be any buying or selling because they would only feel like mourning.

Observing the Sabbath as Self Care

Observing Sabbath is also a form of self care. When Israel was in bondage in Egypt, they were forced to build storage cities for Pharaoh. As he got more and more rich, they became more and more oppressed. His anxiety, which came from his worldview dominated by scarcity, led him to exert more and more pressure on the people.

Sabbath is a way to break the habit of working until one is burned out.

In Israel, every person was to rest on the Sabbath, not just the rich and not just those who were free:

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. Exodus 20:10

This pattern of Sabbath, Moses goes on to tell the people, comes from creation itself. God worked for six days and rested the seventh, so why shouldn’t we?

Sabbath is all around us in creation. As we go through the seasons, we witness death and resurrection, fall and spring. Squirrels work to store their nuts for the winter before resting. And bears hibernate. Cats take their naps, and the rains come and go.

And all living things inhale and exhale. We trade our carbon dioxide for the plants’ oxygen. Breathe in and breathe out. We can only hold our breath for so long before needing to exhale or inhale. So why do we think we can live by working 24/7, always on call, always busy?

Sabbath is like inhaling. We must recharge in order to survive, but unfortunately we live in a world of constant contact. We must always be ready to answer texts and calls. We must always be ready to take an order or talk to a client or fill out paperwork.

But even Jesus needed Sabbath, and Jesus didn’t find his Sabbath in the temple or in the synagogue; instead, he retreated to the deserted places found in gardens, on mountaintops, or by the sea to rest and pray.

Are we better than Jesus? Do we have more energy and willpower than the Messiah?

Observing the Sabbath as Worship

Sabbath is also a time to worship God. Yes, we get together on Sundays and worship in our house churches and congregations, but we also worship daily. Paul told the Thessalonians to pray without ceasing. He told the Colossians that whatever they did in word or deed was to be done as if it was for God. He told the Romans that their lives were holy sacrifices and spiritual services of worship.

Those quiet times of Sabbath that we take throughout the week are times we get to spend alone with God. We may pray audibly or silently. We may mediate. We may go on a mindful hike or spend time near (or on) the water. But regardless of what we do, we should treat these moments as sacred and holy.

These moments that are holy remind us of something important: everything is spiritual. Sabbath ought to show up in every aspect of our lives from how we carry ourselves to how we move about to how we open doors. There’s no need to rush through life because all things belong to us, as Paul told the Corinthians.

This kind of mindfulness is a reflection of our total dependence upon God, something I’ll write more on below.

Reframing a Few Objections

There are a few objections to Sabbath that I’ve had in the past, so I want to share how I have reframed them in hopes that you can learn what I think I am learning.

Scarcity

The first major objection is scarcity. If we don’t work one day of the week (and that includes answering emails, texts, and calls), then won’t we miss out on potential sales, clients, customers, etc.? You can fill in the blanks here, but, “With the _______ the way that it is, what if __________?”

With the economy, job market, inflation, stock market, etc., etc.

The basic fear is that we need to get all we can get whenever we can get it because the possibility of total economic collapse is always on the horizon, and there won’t be enough to go around.

In other words, food, money, clothing, water, and shelter are all scarce. It’s every man for himself. If you’re not first, you’re last. It’s a dog-eat-dog world.

The Bible actually addresses this objection in a couple of different ways. Scarcity fueled the anxiety and, therefore, the brutality of pharaoh. And so when Moses brings his people out of Egypt and instructs them to observe the Sabbath, including the Sabbath year, he offers this bit of comfort:

Should you ask, ‘What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we may not sow or gather in our crop?’ I will order my blessing for you in the sixth year, so that it will yield a crop for three years. When you sow in the eighth year, you will be eating from the old crop; until the ninth year, when its produce comes in, you shall eat the old. The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine; with me you are but aliens and tenants. Leviticus 25:20–23

Jesus also addresses the fear of scarcity in his sermon on the mount. After depicting a kind of kingdom that doesn’t win food and resources through violence, Jesus answers the unspoken objection, “But if we don’t wage war against Rome, how will our families eat? What will we wear?”

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by worrying can add a single hour to your span of life? And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ For it is the gentiles who seek all these things, and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. “So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today. Matthew 6:25–34

The fear of scarcity, then, comes from a belief that there isn’t enough to go around. It comes from the view that God created a world where not everyone can have food and the resources they need to survive. This worldview causes people to hoard money and resources. CEOs get million dollar salary increases while their employees are barely getting by on a poverty wage.

If people would embrace the Sabbath and all of its implications, the world would be a better place. James warns,

Listen! The wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. You have lived on the earth in luxury and in pleasure; you have nourished your hearts in a day of slaughter. James 5:4–5

I Don’t Have Time

Related to the idea of scarcity is the common excuse, “I don’t have time for Sabbath.” But if you’re tempted to make that excuse, take some time to consider how you generally spend your days. If you were to add up all of the little breaks during your day to send a snapchat or check social media, is there potentially an entire day of rest waiting for you after you balance the books?

Or maybe you can’t find a whole day.

But could you find 40 minutes each day?

20 minutes of mediation or quiet time in the morning and in the evening add up to over four and a half hours. Could you knock out your Sunday meal prep in that amount of time? Or could you do your chores within four hours on Saturday?

Whatever you might be doing on your off days that is necessary, like housework, could be made up for by spending a little time each day during the week.

But let’s challenge this whole idea of not having enough time.

The truth is you can’t afford to not take time off for Sabbath.

In other words, Sabbath should be at the top of our priorities, not something we do if we happen to have the time. With that mindset, you’ll never have the time.

There’s an old story about a man who procrastinated chopping wood for the winter. When he grabbed his axe, he noticed it was a bit dull, but he didn’t think he would have time to sharpen it and fell the amount of trees necessary for a safe and cozy winter.

So he chopped away, but even though he got to work sooner, he wasn't able to finish the job. Had he taken time to sharpen the axe, he would have been much more efficient and could have gotten enough wood.

We must sharpen the axe.

Jesus said,

“Come to me, all you who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” Matthew 11:28–30

Even though he said this, we add on so many burdens that aren’t necessary to have life to the fullest. We have to learn to embrace this rest that is available to us, and this means following in Jesus’s footsteps into the deserted places, the mountaintops, and beside the sea. It means sharing a meal with your friends and worshipping together.

If Jesus needed prayer in a garden to face the cross, why do we think we can get by without these quiet moments?

The Sabbath was Nailed to the Cross

One last objection may be that the Sabbath, along with the Law, was nailed to the cross.

Again, I’m not talking about a rule you must keep every week on a specific day to be right with God. Of course, I don’t think that was the point of the original Sabbath commands anyways.

Paul said, “Some judge one day to be better than another, while others judge all days to be alike. Let all be fully convinced in their own minds” (Romans 14:5). So while I personally worship on Sunday, along with most of the Christian world, I don’t even think that Sunday is the “Christian Sabbath.”

My point is that Sabbath is necessary for you to truly live. This can be a specific day, or it can be time you take off once a month. It could even be quiet time each day.

Whatever that looks like for you, prioritize Sabbath and make time for everything else. Spend time with your family or friends. Find a hobby like hiking or kayaking to replace doom scrolling social media, not that social media is inherently bad. If you can make time for silent meditation, that’s great, but if you’re like me and have two toddlers, then your Sabbath time might look a little different.

Here’s a little extra for you. In the Church of Christ, we have generally assumed that the Law was nailed to the cross because of passages like Colossians 2:14 in the KJV:

Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross; Colossians 2:14

The problem with this is that the Jewish believers were still zealous for the Law in Acts 21:20. Paul himself “observed and guarded the Law” (Acts 21:24). Instead of reading the “handwriting of ordinances that was against us…” as the Law, check out these translations:

erasing the record that stood against us with its legal demands. He set this aside, nailing it to the cross. Colossians 2:14, NRSVue

having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Colossians 2:14, NASB95

by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. Colossians 2:14, ESV

The Law wasn’t nailed to the cross. Instead, it was our “record of debt” or our IOU. In other words, it was our sins that were nailed to the cross. Jesus was a Jew. Paul, Peter, and James were Jews. They kept the Law, worshipped in the synagogues, and celebrated the feast days in Jerusalem. While the Gentile converts had a different relationship to the Law, the Jewish believers were still zealous for the Old Covenant, albeit in a transformed way.

The Sabbath wasn’t nailed to the cross, but the Sabbath was fulfilled in Jesus. In him we have ultimate rest, but some of us need to get out of our own way! I know this because I have a hard time of getting out of my own way too.

Let’s reclaim the Sabbath, not as a Hebrews 10:25 style ordinance, but as a life-giving rhythm which sustains us and empowers us to be the people God has called us to be: mindful, generous, humble, trusting, and loving.