INTRO
Knowing the physics of flight -- how lift, drag, and thrust work to get a body off the ground -- is not the same as watching the ground drop below you as the clouds surround you.
Knowing what musical modes are and being able to tell someone John Coltrane used these in innovative ways to push free jazz forward is not the same as putting an intuition in your soul into notes in the air for anyone with ears to hear.
Knowing the Queens Gambit or what a force out is in baseball is not the same as besting a worthy opponent in Chess or feeling your legs take you somewhere your conscious mind may not even know you need to go so you can feel the ball hit your glove and throw where you should to get an out for your team.
And knowing that Jesus said do not worry, and love your enemies, is not the same as feeling the lightness of trust take root in your gut or feeling bitterness lose its grip on your chest.
Some things, you have to practice to understand.
So in this series, we hope to help you practice your faith so you can know salvation.
This time we look at what it means to practice rest, and what good resting might produce.
STORY
There is no way to know, precisely, how faithful Jews in Jesus' time practiced the Sabbath. We know general things like they worshipped and rested, and we know some of the things that were considered work and so were excluded from a day of rest. But the Jewish prayer books and liturgies were still being written and arranged and tested and further developed, and we can't determine exactly where in that process the liturgy was when, say, Jesus, Mary and Joseph, or Jesus and his disciples, participated together in Sabbath worship.
But the scholarship on the development of these liturgies does allow us to form some sort of plausible and coherent picture.
So we can imagine that just like our push alerts buzz and inboxes clutter and deadlines and social commitments approach, all while status bars fill and the next episode loads in 3, 2, 1, to clutter our typical Saturday evenings ... We can imagine a typical first century Friday where finances continued to dwindle and fields needed plowing and kids needed dinner and homes needed tidying. But we can also imagine that as their demands swirled with their own momentum and day sank deeper into the evening darkness, observant Jews would resist the urge to do just one or two more productive things, and instead light two candles.
And as the flame of the first began feebly to counter the darkness of the night, they remembered the command from Exodus chapter 20: Remember the Sabbath day, and keep it holy ... You shall not do any work ... For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested on the seventh day.
A central piece of any practice, as we have been using and exploring the term, is the narrative that gives it birth and shapes it as it grows. And where so many of our days off are shaped by the larger narrative of productivity, it is good to begin exploring the practice of Sabbath by noting it's story not the story of technology, entertainment, and consumption, but of Creation.
And in Sabbath's narrative, as told in Genesis 1, there is a consistent -- or perhaps a better word is "faithful" -- there is a faithful rhythm or pulse. The main beats of this rhythm are: time, call, response, consideration, then back to time.
Time: In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth.
Call: God said, "Let there be light."
Response: Light answered, and broke forth from the darkness.
Consideration: God takes it in, savors it, and calls it "good," then God gives more:
Time: There was evening and there was morning, the first day.
At this point in the story, so much still remains undone. There is no sun, no stars. No earth or life. We are far from a complete creation, and, we might not want to let God forget: there is still darkness. If we wait to rest and enjoy what has been done until everything feels done, our story will never lock in with the rhythm of the creation story, and so the story we do live will be shaped by our own power and ability to accomplish, and we will never experience Sabbath.
But in observing Sabbath even in the midst of all that is still waiting to be done, the practice of Sabbath pulls our story into the narrative defined by a God who is purposeful, and powerful, but not in a hurry.
So as this story continues, God gives the infant creation time to just be what it is, and then the rhythm cycles again: time, call, response, consideration, time.
Again and again: time, call, response, consideration, time -- Six times in all. And every time God speaks, creation responds and expands into greater and greater complexity and beauty with life filling the oceans and crawling on the ground and soaring through the air and God takes it in and calls it good and then starts again. Over and over, until God rests on the Seventh Day, creating the Sabbath.
And that rhythm keeps coming, inviting us to dance along whether we are working first century fields or 21st century digital landscapes, whether gathered in ancient synagogues and temples or in contemporary auditoriums and living rooms.
And as that call keeps coming, the story of Creation continues to move through history. Twisting and turning as sometimes creation responds with joy and beauty, but sometimes with rebellion and death. So if our ongoing Sabbath practice is connected to this story, and if we are to honor Sabbath even as necessary work screams for our time and effort and victims groan for justice, our Sabbath liturgies should also deal with the painful realities we all face.
Which brings us to the second candle that was part of the Jewish liturgies somewhere around the time of Jesus.
As it added its light to the hours of darkness,
the ancient worshippers would remember the command from Deuteronomy chapter 5: Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy ... you shall not do any work ... remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt.
Remember you were a slave in Egypt, it says. If we are truly practicing Sabbath, we are remembering this story as our own, as a kind of first-hand experience. So we, with those who have known the genuine horrors of literal slavery, along with ancient Hebrews and the first disciples of Jesus, catch flashes of a bush that burns but never turns to ash. Of a river turned to blood and frogs and locust and darkness enveloping a land. Of a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night and a stone that gives water and bread that appears from nowhere.
Sabbath is born from, and pulls us into, a story as complex as our own reality. It contains everything from the glorious harmonies of a world alive with love and creativity to the degradation of oppression and murder and the necessarily terrifying and wondrous work of redemption. Everything from Creation to slavery and Exodus.
Practicing Sabbath rest, therefore, will always involve a certain tension. God's call to rest does come. And our heeding that call requires trusting the character of the One who issues it. And this will always grate against the demands of our world and our own anxieties.
But if we trust enough to shut off the ringing, crimp the flow of endless information, cut the power source to whatever projects the illusion that we are in control of our lives and world or resist the urge to numb it all, and instead respond to the call to rest ... we do so because we were slaves in Egypt. We trust because the God who is powerful enough to bring something out of nothing, was faithful enough to make a way for our salvation, and this God is also a God who rests.
While we may not know exactly how Jesus and the disciples did Sabbath, we do see that genuine Sabbath practice takes a different form from merely unplugging or sinking into doom scrolling or frantically doing only what you enjoy doing for a whole day, because Sabbath is not born from our contemporary stories of entertainment or productivity and consumption.
So in the following conversation Julius and I go deeper into the kinds of Sabbath practices that might conform to this story of Creation and Redemption, and the kinds of good that might result, and make our rest and our work something that contributes to Creation's ever-expanding beauty.
DISCUSSION
Julius: Welcome back to “All Things.” Once again, this is Julius and Wil, and we have been talking this series…
Wilson: Can I say howdy? I've wanted—
Julius: Howdy, of course— I saw it in your face you wanted to say something. [Laughs]
Wilson: I've been thinking about my roots, a lot, re- my origins a lot in this whole talking about practice, and the interconnectedness of like what's internally good in the moment and where it came from and where it's going... And it's just made me kind of think about my grandpa, and so, howdy.
Julius: Howdy.
Wilson: It feels alien to my tongue, even if it's deeply embedded in my soul. So....
Julius: Very deep. So we're already getting into it: talking about origins, narrative culture.
Wilson: Deep, important things. People, everything
Julius: We cannot can not squander these moments.
Wilson: It's fun.
Julius: Um, but we've been talking about practices, um, in this series and today we want to dive into the practice called Sabbath. Which, I mean, if you've been part of or adjacent to the Christian faith for any period of time, that, that word Sabbath, um, is talked about often and, um. I can think back to, especially in my undergrad years in college-- I remember Sabbath became something of a… I don't want to say buzzword. I don't want to cheapen it by saying buzz word, but it was just like a hot topic, especially among a bunch of burnt out college students…. especially around like midway through it, sophomore, junior year, where all of the enchantment of, “Oh, I'm a freshman” and the excitement kind of turns into, “I have so many papers to write...”
Wilson: “I don't even know if I like this anymore!” “I thought I wanted to spend four years studying this.”
Julius: [Laughs] No exactly. But I remember we, at least in my friend group, we hit a point where, um, a lot of my friends who particularly also were involved in like discipleship ministries, a lot of our mentors started talking about the importance of the practice of Sabbath and a lot of like camp speakers that we would talk to would talk about the practice of Sabbath as a really important thing. But I think we all kind of grappled with it so differently.
And we all, we all knew as something to be valued. We felt it like deeply in our exhausted undergrad bones that Sabbath is something like good news. But as, as for actually practicing it, I think we were all kind of messily fumbling about what things brought us actual rest versus what things were just like temporary shutdowns that would make maybe make us more stressed when we come back into like our normal rhythms.
So. Just to kick it off. What can you say about like what it looks like to practice Sabbath and Sabbath as a, as a means of true rest, rather than just, um— that maybe just tuning out and watching Netflix for five hours isn't always necessarily the most Sabbath-like restful thing?
Wilson: And that's it. I think that would be it in a nutshell, the distinction is Sabbath is about rest, and rest is not numbing. Rest is, is a practice. Rest is a concrete way of thinking, feeling and acting that allows us to tap into, and as Christians, tap into the creative source of all things, I mean the, the life, the rejuvenation that comes from communion with God.
The one who creates and sustains everything that's rest and that's very different than numbing or pausing. Um, and could did pull in here kind of as, uh… evidence for this case or… allies in our argument, a lot of the studies carried out in many fields about the effects of things like excessive screen use, uh, binge watching shows that, that really, like, what it does is distract and numb.
And, and your body holds this stuff. I mean, there's a, there's a book now— that I highly recommend, we’ll make a note to put this in the show notes— called the “Body Keeps the Score” and, and that is true of big traumas, but it's also true of like, I guess the daily paper cuts wounds right throughout the week.
Those things add up and your body holds it. And what, something like bingeing and scrolling does is distract the conscious part of your mind from what's happening, but it doesn't actually deal with the exhaustion and the pain.
Julius: Hmm.
Wilson: So it numbs it and your body holds that stuff. And so really it'll feel, I mean, it's, it's not wrong.
And it's a very gray, I mean, the problem isn't that this isn't true. It's that it’s a difficult truth… is, is what that sort of like day off. That's just, you know how I mean, I, I keep calling it numbing or distraction— you put it unplugging or it's something that shutting down, right. That is really like, I have this massive wound.
I mean, and it's getting serious. Like it's getting infected bleed out. It's the difference between actually dealing with the wound and popping some meds that'll make you not feel the pain while the infection continues to spread and while you continue to bleed out your, your life's energy, um. And so the difference there is, is not just the certain things that will, that will cover over or distract us from the pain.
But actually some of the things leading to true rest might be a journey through and into. And so like alluding back to some of the practice, the concrete practices that we talked about in the intro to this episode, looking to the scriptural stories and the liturgies and the habits that arose around, you know, through that, that progression, that movement from, you know, the Exodus to Jesus and his disciples and what Sabbath looked like— all of it was intentional.
Every, you know, from the lighting of the candles to the way they prepped the things, to what the, you know, the, the discussions, the readings, the thought— all of it was intentionally geared, not just to distract us for a little while so we can get back after it come Monday morning, but to take us through whatever it is, we've got to get through, to commune with the God whose life whose power who's creative.
Uh, energy is always greater than whatever forces of death we've been wandering through all week.
Julius: Yeah.
Julius: I think that makes me think of, I listened to a podcast a couple months ago that Bernay brown was talking about, um, trauma, but even just like emotions in general, how emotions are something that, um, have like a beginning, middle and end that you kind of have to, you have to feel your way through the entire journey of the emotion.
Um, and I guess when you just kind of numb, like whatever traumas, have stress responses happening in your body and in your nervous system, like you're actually kind of pausing this. I mean, Right.
now I kind of see it as a progress bar because my CPU is running super hot right now and I can hear the fan, but it's kinda just like.
Um, that program is still needs to run its course, like it's not, but just pausing it doesn't finish it. You're just kind of delaying it. And so I've found that there are moments where I'm like scrolling. An hour deep into tick Docker. And like, I can, I can feel myself running away from the, like from the stress response, but I haven't allowed myself to feel through it, to like, to kind of, um, allow that emotion to pass.
And in the back of my head, I can tell that my brain is still like, “You're still stressed!”
Wilson: Okay.
Julius: Um, and, and so there have been moments where, um… like three hours of binge watching YouTube, um, will leave me still tired afterwards— especially and then like my eyes get tired too, I get eye strain a lot, but th but versus just like 10 minutes of paying attention to my breathing and doing like a Headspace meditation, or some kind of like mindfulness exercise that those 10 minutes are infinitely more restful than the three hours that I've been doom-scrolling.
Wilson: Doom scrolling— I haven't heard that, but I like it. It seems true.
Julius: Yeah.
Wilson: So I guess I can also speak. Uh, I guess from the end of the mentor or the guide that kind of talks about this and requires it. Um, and I've seen it especially this last year. Now what I'm about to say first, this is not like betraying any one student's trust because this is not any one student.
This is like 70% of all my students and every one of my Christian tradition classes. Um, but especially in the last year, Um, I'm the one that requires them as part of this class to practice Sabbath and to reflect on it. And, and this is, this is, again, it's always true, but especially this last year with, with COVID and because of how much of our life even more so got pushed on to screens in this last year.
And we were, you know, for so many people really locked down in their house and everything is happening through some sort of virtual means. When I, when I say, as part of this class, you're going to be required to participate in Sabbath, which is not just taking a day off. Here's some guides for what it is to participate in Sabbath and reflect on it.
It's amazing how many of these reflections start off with an honest confession that I, I honestly, I, I really appreciate, you know, I tell them over and over. I appreciate the honesty and the authenticity don't feel like you just have to say, what would I want to hear? Really reflect and tell me truthfully about it's amazing.
How many of those honest introductions begin with in such a busy season in such a crazy year? I was truthfully angry at being required to take a day off in the middle of this busy schedule in this semester.
Julius: Yeah.
Wilson: And I felt like going into it, it was going to compound my stress because this is, you know, Sunday is the day I chose to do it, to kind of stick with the tradition.
And Sunday is typically the day that I catch up on this and I get a jumpstart on this sort of homework. So I thought it was going to make it more and more stressful and I was angry, but after having done it, practice it a couple of times and it will get to more certain, probably some more. As having this, not just be a don't do anything day, but intentionally participate in these kinds of things that direct your mind and your heart to God, the creator and the sustainer.
I was surprised and had this counterintuitive reaction to see that what I thought was going to make my week way more stressful actually made it a lot more restful, gave me more sense of like centerdness and agency, gave me clarity on my priorities for the week. And so I felt like it didn't just rejuvenate me, but it, it reframed the way I engaged and thought about the whole rest of the day.
Julius: I think that there's. Really profound that's revealed in what you just talked about with your students. The responses of that. So many, and I, I F I felt that as a college student, and even now, honestly, like there are moments where it, sometimes our gut risks bonds is it would stress me out more to take a break or like to rest, um, I think that really says something about the kind of culture that we're situated in and how disordered it is, um, that I think, um, so as we're, as we start to kind of transition this conversation into like internal goods, Right.
We've been looking at all of these things through the lens of practice, one of the internal goods that I, that I. That comes to mind that I can name is that it's an opportunity for us to embody and participate a way of life that runs counter to this capitalistic hyper productivity culture. And that looking back at its roots, um, I remember studying about this for a sermon, but like really being.
Moved by the fact that the practice was Sabbath was introduced to the people of Israel, like as a kind of response after they came out of like out of Egypt where they were enslaved and the narrative that they were formed in was like our only like our, our very existence. Is to build up the empire is to lay bricks, to build these buildings and to like, to make of the empire greater that like that is, that was the tell us that they were inscribed in was that we exist only to make these structures and to, um, Yeah. To, to work And to, to be at the whims of, um, the enslavers. And so when, when they are taken out of that and as a people, God introduces this practice of Sabbath, that there's something really forming about that, of like you are no longer in that, like, environment. This is not the true narrative of the world.
Like you are not, um, Your existence is not to satisfy the needs of your enslavers anymore. Like it is to participate in the rhythms of what God has created. And like in the, in the very story that they follow this God who has created the universe rests. And so they are being reformed and inscribed into a different narrative that is resistance to this culture that is hyper.
Like productive, capitalistic, Imperial. Like your only value is in your ability to work and build up like our empire
Wilson: And that, um, I think that gives us opportunity to talk about something we've introduced earlier in this series where there's a lot of this in, in the, under, like the, the heading of habits. Right. In contemporaries, uh, like in a lot of contemporary circles, people are awakening to like the, the wisdom that's there and habits and how much good can be brought from it, but why it's so important to keep it, uh, situated in the narrative that it belongs.
Um, and how that, that story, that narrative shapes so much about like what we are able to receive and recognize as the goods that are true to what the thing is, you know, rather than something that we would twist it and manipulate it for. And the final ends on that. So flushing that out. Um, we can say that there are a lot of people now in the, like the business, the productivity world that are coming to realize, Hey, um, you know what, a lot of people's productivity and energy over time drops.
And so there there's studies that show, Hey, if we consistently require people to work more than 50 hours a week, right. So like sure. Maybe in one week with a burst, if they worked 50, 60 hours, a lot more gets done than would get done in a typical 40 hour work week. Right. And they're certain, but they're starting to see though, if we consistently.
Require that over the course of a year, the total productivity drops because people are working at a much depleted state, right. If they're, if they're healthy and rested, their capacities are this right. But when they're not regularly rested, they're over. Instead of functioning at like 9100% of their potential, they're consistently functioning.
I like, you know, 50%, 60% of their potential. And so over the course of a year or two on that kind of timeline, their overall productivity greatly drops. So because of that, you know, now you have businesses in schools where, you know, some people call it a white space or the need to work in throughout the day.
You know, little breaks and then throughout the week breaks and to have healthy start and stop times, right. To let people's bodies work. The thing there is, uh, there are certain things that do overlap with this, and there is a certain wisdom, but what I think what you said that like generated the opportunity in my mind to point out though, is look at the difference in the story and the starting point, right?
The starting point of that awareness is embedded in the story of production. Oh, look, shoot. We're all about productivity. We assume that that's the good that we're after. Like that's our goal. And look, when we do this, we're not being as productive as we can. So then they come in and they pull that, but it's directed towards a totally different goal or end and the danger there.
Is just like on a personal level when we can get really, really good at getting what we want, but we're not good at desiring good things together. And then we can end up fighting over, you know, the goods fighting over the results. Right. And that can lead to interpersonal conflict or conflict within groups or tribes.
Right. So on this level, though, when we, when we're thinking about. Like, what is this all about? This can lead us to a place where we actually get better and more efficient at destroying things.
Julius: Okay.
Wilson: Right. If we're about producing as much as we possibly can, we don't then see this embedded in a story that pays attention to like the effects on other things and the interrelatedness of, of all of creation.
And so we can just get better and better. I mean, I mean, to take a concrete example, cutting down trees. Right. Oh, our loggers. Aren't getting enough regular rest. And so throughout the course of a year, they're not cutting as many. Right. And so let's give them this time off. And so now a productivity, as far as just how many trees we cut down increases.
And now we get better and better at outrunning. The planet's ability to, to refresh this resource that we need, or, you know, we get better and better at digging up and burning all the fossil fuels. Right. And so the difference here, that's the story of creation is, look, this all begins with God creating.
Not just to make a bunch of stuff. I mean, if anyone could be hyper-productive God could, God could waste us in a competition for productivity. I mean, especially looking at the imagery, God just speaks. So all God's got to do is talk faster, right? Creation happens with, with words. And so God could just rattle a couple of compound sentences and have the whole thing done in a moment.
But instead God speaks slowly and
Julius: Hmm.
Wilson: time each day to consider and to call it good to appreciate and to notice, and then to call it something else. That is organic to that grows out of what's been done before and then consider, right. And so there's rest and consideration each day, and then there's a day of rest at the end that, that culminates the whole thing.
Wilson: And so our practices here, this is circling back around. What we're looking for as the internal good for Sabbath is not just to let us get back into it. So we get all our homework done so that we accomplish this and we get the right. Yeah. That's twisting the practice towards an external good. Bring it back home.
Hopefully like at a deeper level, the point here, the practice is to commune with God so that what we do could be better out of an appreciation of what is there. We've taken time to think and to consider. And now our next move comes from not just what's our strategic plan, but I've noticed this about God's world, about our connectedness, about.
About people. And now what's the thing that, that the beauty and the appreciation would move me to add. Now that I have this energy and I have this inspiration that comes from this, what's the next thing that I could do to contribute to this overall flourishing, to lead, you know, from, from the, the origin of God's creation.
Julius: Hmm.
Wilson: Where God does this to express God's goodness and beauty and care to lead to a greater awareness and participation in like that. Goodness, instead of just what we can accomplish welcome, like, uh, now I'm thinking to kind of wrap this segment up. Um, when, when we talk about, when you talked about, uh, the, the institution of Sabbath, On the tail end of the Hebrew people's freedom from their enslavement in Egypt, where there, it was about look at the glory of this empire.
Look at our pyramids, right? And so make more bricks, make more bricks. Hey, guess what? We've outrun the land's ability to make straw. You no longer have straw for your bricks. What Pharaoh does is double the requirement
Julius: yeah.
Wilson: do it without the straw you're at out,
Julius: right.
Wilson: Instead of it being the, like how much can we to, to build, to show the glory of God, zero in this empire, in the pyramids and the buildings and the cities, instead of it being that what, uh, Irenaeus Leone says is the glory of God.
The glory of God is a human being fully alive.
Julius: Hmm. Hmm.
Wilson: right, we take our time to see like, what is the, and this story about like, God, God's the one that plants the garden and puts us in that garden to work it. And in doing that, that we reflect God's care and goodness for the world. How does, how does this practice of Sabbath reorient us towards that place?
Where beyond the forces of consumption and death, uh, what the, what the rest and the rejuvenation leads to as us coming back more alive
Julius: Hmm.
Wilson: and that a liveliness being intricately, the goodness of that, the internal good being. Intricately inseparably connected to us using our energy, our strength, and our power to a greater flourishing, not just to dominate and build bigger buildings and larger empires.
Julius: So where my mind goes Right.
now. Is thinking about what it takes to actually practice Sabbath is from my experience. And this is reflected in, um, the law too. Like the guidelines, like there are strict guidelines, um, pertaining to Sabbath in the old Testament. And I like, I know even just from like small.
Um, like first, not second firsthand experience, but like, I, I know a couple of friends who are like, who practiced Judaism and that there's a certain amount of like work that has to be done in order to practice Sabbath that there's like prep work that needs to be done. And.
Bringing that into the conversation of like what virtues are needed in order to practice Sabbath. I think that there is a certain amount of like discipline and attention, and I guess like ordering that needs to be done in order to like create room for rest. And so I think about that on like an individual level of like, like on a very practical level, um, Don't quote me on this, but, um, I think, I think one of the old Testament guidelines is that like, you can't like.
Travel a certain amount. You can't like purchase things. You can't like cook things. I don't think even like that's considered work on the Sabbath. And so the part of the prep work is like making sure that your food is gathered and like, like prepped for the next day or like that you, you take care of all your errands, but like the day before, so you don't have to go out and walk and like purchase and do all of that stuff.
And it, it feels kind of similar to, um, I know my girlfriend, Sam, like she, uh, she, she, one of the things that brings her rest or like one of the things that she can't feel at rest until like her room is clean or organized. And I feel the same way of like, if my bed's not made, like I can't feel at rest yet, you know?
And that there's a certain kind of, um, If Sabbath is making room for rest, like you have to make your room, you have to reorder it in order to feel at rest. And that takes a certain amount of discipline. It takes a certain amount of attention. It takes like preparation and intentionality in order to practice Sabbath.
And so in order to practice Sabbath and engage in it like fully that like you really do have to make a point out of, of it. Like you have to prioritize it. You have to prioritize clearing out the space in order to do it. And then, um, one of the, but then as we were talking about like how Sabbath is like subversive and a resistance to our like capitalistic hyper productivity, culture and narrative, I started to wonder what it would look like for us as a church to do that community.
Right. Because the biggest thing that kept on popping up in my head that I started to really like get angry at and start to limit was the fact that like it's so like the concept of Sabbath is so subversive because we live in a world where like capitalism and big business makes it such that like working.
Literally like they can't afford to rest. Like there are so many, like, there've been so many strikes this year of workers that are like, I like it's COVID timeframe now. And I cannot afford to take a sick day and how our structures are built in such a way that does like allow people to like, to practically.
Like take a day off and to take a break. Like it's, it's, it's similar to what you're talking about in that narrative of enslavement where like, Israel is like, we're out of straw, but you have to, you have to produce twice as much bricks that like the way that our structures are set. Makes it like impossible to rest.
And so I wonder if part of the, the making room, like, what would it look like for the church to take care of our own in such a way that like the person who is afraid to take a day off, even if they're sick, because they literally cannot afford to miss like a paycheck? Like what would it look like for the church to make room for that So, that that person can have rest.
Wilson: So, I mean, that's a big question and. You know, in the, in the time that we have left and to keep it kind of focused for the listener we'll do through. And I think this is what you were intending through the lens of the virtues required. Um, and so I will, I think that's a great way to do it actually. Cause, cause thinking about the virtues that are required, according to different stories and goals, Will help us see how subversive Sabbath is, and then help us think about all right, what does it look like to cultivate those virtues as a church that would lead to genuine Sabbath and rest flourishing in the kingdom?
And so I'll point out that Sabbath has been subversive for millennia, right? So even well beyond the advent of modern capitalism, And socialism. So we could just kind of blanket well beyond the advent of modern and contemporary economic and political systems. Sabbath has been subversive and Sabbath will be subversive anytime we practice it.
Well, it will subvert any human system that directs the goals and the aims away from God. Uh, W in, in kind of our, and, and we talk because it's what we've experienced most in a, in an out of control capitalist system. Right. Um, the virtue there is, uh, uh, I don't quite have a word yet, but have a word picture.
And so maybe that'll lead to naming it, naming the virtue in a word, but it's that like, Hey, Don't ask questions that are above your pay grade and just keep pouring your energy into it. Like that's the virtue when it's directed towards a Finch efficiency and consumption, you know, just product or just a profit, right?
So you're, you're not even middleman. Head down, keep working and you're hourly. And these are the hours that we say is required. And, you know, these are the hours I have to put in this something I felt as an hourly employee, even in this last year of COVID like, these are the hours I have to put in to, you know, to get paid the amount that will allow me to make rent and buy the groceries and all I can.
And when I add up those hours and compare that to the actual number of hours in a week, And then trying to balance that with the hours, my kids want to jump on the trampoline or to go to the beach, you
Julius: Right, right.
Wilson: and then my wife wants it. Right. So the virtue there would be kind of a, it would involve a lack of 40.
And discernment and just a willingness to, um, to just to keep pouring your effort into what we require that you pour your effort
Julius: Right, right.
Wilson: and the virtue that Sabbath requires. Cause you've talked about the FA is, is exactly that sort of, it's not just long suffering, right? That's going to be part of life in this fallen world.
That's that sort of resilience and long suffering, but Sabbath also compliments. Buttresses that with discretion and foresight, that allows us to think to not just keep our head down and go, but to look up at out and think about where are we going and how do we do this? Well. Um, and I think that's, it's more of it's and along with both of those, right, the long suffering, but also the discretion, the foresight, and there's a kind of prudence.
There is also the cultivation of the virtue of being able to, to notice, uh, Well, again, the, the interrelatedness of everything. And so what does it take to really seek the good of everything to not just produce this product, to not just meet my hours so I can pay the bills, but to be able to name and plan for even planning our energy and our time for that larger.
Good. Because if we're really practicing Sabbath, what we're doing again, circling back, we're not just numbing. What we're doing is community. With a transcendent truth and the truth, the truth, that's bigger than just my need to take a break and bigger than my need to be distracted from this or that is that all of creation needs rest.
Julius: Yeah.
Wilson: It all comes from a place where, I mean, it starts with God even taking time to appreciate. To let, to let that be good enough for now and now the next day when the time is right now, the next step. And then to give that some time, let it settle in. It's appreciate. And now the next step, you know, and just like you see this in farming, this soil needs to live, follow, and that's part of the old Testament law that it's not just a farming law.
It's not just an aggregate, uh, agriculture law. It's not just about productivity. It's deeply tied to. Like the Sabbath laws, let rest, let this soil replenish itself and then it will be able to provide for you. And so it's that. So sure. Work hard when it's time to work hard, but also take time to reflect and appreciate and have some foresight so that we can consistently shape our systems and our structures and our habits in a way that everything.
Gets the rest that it needs so that everything can continue to dry its life. And it's sourced from the only place that that can really come. And that's God.
MEDITATION
The ideal definition of a Sabbath is pretty straightforward - it is a day, traditionally marked from Sundown to Sundown - dedicated to worship and rest. And beyond simply generating a desire in you to practice Sabbath, we would also like to offer some practical help in doing so.
But we realize everyone's lives are shaped by different circumstances. So while it is possible for all of us to share the goal of getting to a place where we can take a whole day each week to rest in God's provision, we are not all starting at the same point, and so that goal will be easier to realize for some of us than it will be for others.
So rather than burden some with unrealistic expectations (because that is the kind of thing Jesus got on religious leaders for doing), I'd like to invite everyone to consider what day could, somewhere down the road, become a day of rest for you.
Now name only 1 thing that currently intrudes on that day and keeps it from being restful.
What would it involve to move that thing to a different day of the week? Or to remove it from the picture altogether?
And remember, practices are communal, so who could you ask to help you with this?
Now, we said the Sabbath is a subversive practice. And because it moves against the current of so many of our larger cultural practices and expectations, like swimming out against crashing waves, getting into a rhythm of Sabbath is not easy.
So many of us are already exhausted from keeping up with the current, the thought of turning and swimming against it might feel like too much. It might even provoke some anger.
And that's okay - just take a minute to really think about the practical implications you'd face if you attempted to make Sabbath a practice, and honestly acknowledge whatever emotional responses you have ...
And now let's close by spending some time meditating on what power and help really makes it possible for us to swim against the flow of consumption and efficiency and find rest in the flow of divine grace. What reason do we have for hoping that we might become the kinds of people who can embody trust in God's care even as expectations pile up and threats to our wellbeing lurk.
And for the source of this hope, let's look again to the source of the Sabbath.
The birth of sabbath comes at the culmination of the creation story in Genesis 2, where it says, quote, "On the seventh day, God rested and finished his work."
Hear that attentively.
"On the seventh day, God rested, and so finished God's work." Notice, at the beginning of the day God spent in rest, things were not complete. It seems one last thing needed to be created to finish the cosmos.
And God accomplished this not by the typical rhythm of call, response, consideration and time, not by speaking, but by resting. But what could God possibly create by resting?
Rest.
On the seventh day God rested, and so made rest.
Just like God's creativity makes our creativity possible, like God's energy enables our work, and God's love funds our love, God's resting makes our rest possible.
And there is an unspoken call here. By inviting us into this rest, God makes a way for the agents God works through to bring God's harmony and beauty to the entire creation to become like the Creator.
When we participate in God's rest, it re-creates in us an intuition and desire for God. An openness to mysteries too great to understand. A state of preparedness for the unexpected. A patience that allows us to wait long enough to discern what God is doing so we can join that rather than take off and implement what makes sense to us.
Sabbath is a creative force. It is different than not doing something. Sabbath rest shapes reality to reflect the peace and beauty of God's own life. If that is not an accomplishment, I do not know what is.