Sabbath Rest

For the last several months, we've been making a point of taking one day a week to spend time together as a family and enjoy a brief vacation from our regular work and tasks. We catch up on some sleep, read books, watch something worthwhile, play a game with the kids, and enjoy each other's company without the distraction of normal household duties. This takes some discipline, of course. It means that I need to have the house relatively tidy and the laundry done (and put away) by the night before. It means planning simple meals ahead of time or picking up some food so I don't spend the day in the kitchen (or at the store). But it's been worth the harder work and planning to have a day when I can lay all those normal cares aside and rest my mind and body in preparation for another week of busyness and work.

However, I've noticed something else that has cropped up with the Sabbath resting, too--something not so helpful. I've begun to catch myself putting my reliance on getting that day off, putting my trust in the chariot of extra sleep and the horses of relaxation. "I can get through this coming week," I think, "if I can just have this one day of peace and quiet."

But the fact remains that--try as hard as anyone might--normal life is no great respecter of Sabbaths, especially if there are kids around to enjoy them with you. Just the other week, after a pleasant full night of sleep and the expectation of a lovely day of R&R, Nathan had to run out briefly to help a friend. No sooner was he out the door when my dreams of refreshment were rudely dashed by The Great Diaper Explosion, which cruelly combined itself with a clogged drain and the previous night's bed-wetting accident (not mine) to create a Sabbath morning of laundry piles and shower scrubbing (and all this while pancakes were burning and children were screaming about all the upheaval). Yes, all-in-all a very restful Sabbath morning! Just what the doctor ordered....

And actually, probably just what the doctor really did order, because in all the chaos, I found myself getting angry at the circumstances, moping in self-pity ("Great! Now I'm going to head into this week more exhausted than I came out of the last one!") and suddenly realizing how misplaced my hope is. I put my trust in physical rest, and think I can't go on unless I have it. But Jesus didn't come to give us a weekly day of peace and quiet, all trial-free and up to our hopeful expectations. He didn't come to give us a nice little break from normal life. He came to BE our Sabbath rest, at all times, in all circumstances, on the best most restful of days and the worst most fatiguing of days. My hope is not to be in having some great respite from chaos and busyness on an assigned (by me) day each week. My hope is to be in the never-failing, daily-giving, unending Sabbath rest of Christ's work on my behalf.

It's the finished work of Christ that he gives to me as my own record of perfection so that my soul can find rest in a holy God's presence, free from endless striving after perfection and super-productivity. It's not about a day of physical rest, helpful and wise as that may be. In fact, having a certain day set aside as a Sabbath is teaching me how fleeting and uncertain our earthly rest really can be, and how important it is that my hope is not in anything this earthly life can provide.

The Sabbath keeps me humble because it just proves again and again, week after week, how much I am not in control of my day, how much I desperately need the true refreshment that only the Spirit can give, how reliant I am on sleep and rest, and yet how little my hope can be in those earthly blessings.

And times of bodily rest and refreshment are certainly a blessing, something to plan for and to be thankful for. But whether I get some relaxation once in a while or whether I spend my planned rest time cleaning up waste, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his. (Heb. 4:9,10)

"Come to me, all you who labour and are heavily burdened. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and lowly in heart and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light." (Matthew 11:28-30)