Lesson 13: Creating and Finding Sabbath –
Finding God in All the Noise
One of the best talks I ever heard was at Muhlenburg College and was given by an Episcopalian bishop. It was entitled something like, “The Future Health of Our Society Will Be Dependent on Observing the Sabbath.” His point was that the only way to cope with the way our technological society controls us is to take time out to critique conventional thinking and ponder what is really important in life.
So what is the essence of the Sabbath law? Well, that depends on the time period. Over the ages, God’s people have observed the Sabbath in many ways, all relative to the demands of time and place. I still feel some guilt when I shop or go to the movies on Sunday, because I was raised in a time when businesses were closed. Some of my friends were not even allowed to play cards or listen to the radio.
Of course, I do not feel too guilty, as it is obvious some have to work in a science-based, technological society if the rest are to re-create. Someone must run the gas stations and power plants; someone must man the television studios and entertainment centers.
Lest we feel this is a compromise, we should remember our biblical forbearers adjusted down the ages. They first called for stopping all agricultural jobs, then all commercial activity, and finally all that could be considered labor. Jesus refused to practice as the authorities of his time asked, and Christians changed the day from Saturday to Sunday.
Those of us who studied Luther’s Small Catechism remember that he forgot about the day all together and highlighted, instead, the edification aspect of the commandment. “We are to fear and love God, so that we do not neglect his Word and the preaching of it; but regard it as holy and gladly hear and learn it.”
All this leaves us asking what kind of observance is appropriate in our time. I think it would include a healthy rhythm between work and meditation. Some of us still use the every seventh day one when we go to church, hear the Word of God, contemplate the meaning of life, check our priorities, and attempt to adjust our lives to the God’s will. This is basic repentance, re-thinking our lives as we listen to God’s Word.
Sharing the Lord’s Supper teaches us to observe the basic rhythm of eating together during the week. We talk with one another at dinner. We share what is important in our lives: discuss who we are, what we believe, and what we intend to do. We listen to the people across the table, valuing them for who they are, rather than what they do.
In a society that places everything in economic terms, the Sabbath reminds us life is far more than making a living. Pastors often report they have never heard a dying person wish they had spent more time at work. They regret they have not observed the most important things of life, those that the Sabbath proclaims.
Modern cognitive scientists agree this is a very healthy life style as they discover meditation and contemplation overcome stress better than drugs. The classic texts in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5 claim it is so important that we should include our sons and daughters, male and female slaves, foreigners, livestock, and even the land in our observance.
Take some time to consider other healthy ways you can observe the Sabbath in our time and place. Share your ideas in the comments section by clicking on “comments” in the byline text at the top of this post.
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While I’m not sure it’s the best way to find God, one way I approach the noise of life is to turn off the radio in my car. In doing so, I’m left with my thoughts and not the constant stimulation of our world. Without television, cell phones, or radio, I’m left to hear the voice in my head, think through issues, pray, set goals, and consider the day/week/year ahead.
As I travel the subway systems of major cities, or spend time in airports, I’m overcome by the numbers of folks who have headsets on, earphones in, or eyes glued on email. It seems to me that people are fearful of their own inner voice– and that all time must be filled with some type of sound or external input. For me, and my wife too, I think– we are grateful for moments of silence when the TV is off and the room falls strangely quiet.
The Sabbbath should be a time of remembrance, renewal, and rededication toward living a Christian life. Fritz mentions past practices that have passed way. Withoout judging their effectiveness or appropriateness, we can say that a Sabbath where a visit to church is an obligation squeezed into an otherwise full schdule for the day is probably not the best plan to meet the golas of the Sabbath.
In the past Heaven and Hell were the carrot and stick to encourage proper behavior among Christians. These seem to be far less effective today. If a company wanted its employees to do their job in a certain way, it could offers bonuses or the threat or dismissal as the carrot and stick. This approach, however, today is primitive. The company instead would hire industrial psychologists to recommend policies that had been validated through behavioral science research.
If the Church wants to be more effective in getting its members to respond positively in their actions to the demands of the Gospel, it needs to take advantage of modern knowledge that was unknown at the time the Bible was written. Reading Bible passages and sermons are fine, but to depend upon them in a modern world as a primary source of eliciting desired behavior is to neglect the knowledge of human behavior gathered in the scientific age.
I am not saying ANYTHING GOES in appropriating a more modern approach. Manipulation is not a Christian virtue. The Christian message can not and should not be made all sweetness and light. Still getting people to live a Christian life is good for them and for others. We should not be bound by the past in seeking this goal.
Often since I read it for a sermon reflection a few years ago, the New English Bible version of Matthew 24:6 pops into my head when I’m thinking about modernity and chaos and the need for quiet and reflection and peace. Jesus says to the disciples, “The time is coming when you will hear the noise of battles near at hand and the news of battles far away; see that you are not alarmed.” This is the verse that we normally see as “wars, and rumors of wars”. The way I read it, he’s telling them not to be distracted or misled or made afraid by the confusing sights and sounds that will swirl around them… “the noise and the news.” Scott said that turning off the radio or the television helps him be centered… to which I say, amen. But it’s more than just that… or rather, it’s a Pandora’s box that can’t be closed at this point. We’ve become conditioned over so many decades to have an immediate emotional reaction to things that we see and hear… but, unlike our ancestors, we don’t just see and hear them directly when they’re happening next to us, or hear about far-away happenings directly from people who were there. We see and hear everything, near and far, through a filter, a funhouse mirror, of anxiety and stress and division and politics and cynicism. Not to sound like a cynic myself. 🙂 Sometimes the filter is external… we watch cable news or listen to talk radio and hear what we want to hear: the “news” pre-cynicized and pre-anxietized for us by a well-paid angry blowhard or snarky cool-kid character. But sometimes it’s internal… we process events or people or the “news” knowing that we have to be skeptical, to look for biases, to agree or disagree, to be alarmed. Even if the TV’s off and the radio’s silent and my homepage isn’t set to the Huffington Post or Fox News… it’s still like that. Not to toot Fritz’s horn, but I’ve been hearing him for decades talk about the Niebuhr idea of the Christian task of “rethinking” ourselves and our lives, and like the noise and the news, that thought has always stuck with me. I think Sabbath, however it looks in practice, NEEDS to be a time to “rethink”… to look at ourselves and our world and most especially the assumptions we make about what is and isn’t important, what is and isn’t what we’re “supposed” to do, what is and isn’t our responsibility, what is and isn’t our concern. We need to rethink how we view the world… we need to do that regularly and repeatedly! We need to rethink the filters and biases and anxieties that drive and define and slant us. We need to step back from ourselves and our alarm and our distraction. I think that kind of Sabbath is desperately needed in individual lives… but I ALSO think that the Christian community should encourage its participants to collectively “rethink” as a regular practice. I am inspired by a man I don’t know very well, but who I grew up in Christian community with… his regular links and thoughts on Facebook reveal a person who, kind of late in life, began to practice a kind of rethinking, and it has changed his worldview, his priorities, and his life in a profoundly positive way. I think that too many of us… just, don’t see the need for that, or think it’ll be too hard, or maybe even see the need but just absolutely don’t want to. I am alarmed, myself, at how the conversation all around in American society seems to have turned sour and angry… not that this is new, but that it’s been going on for so long that it’s starting to seem unfixable. And also that the sourness and anger seems too often focused on demonizing and blaming those who are on the outside, those who are unfamiliar, those who are poor and sick and weak. I am sometimes inspired, and sometimes alarmed… and I always, always, need to rethink. That kind of Sabbath… isn’t on many people’s radar screens, seems like; we’d all rather have our preconceptions reinforced, and I most definitely include myself. But, I think Sabbath that’s about reflecting and rethinking and looking, hard, at our filter, our own personal or communal funhouse mirror… I think it would help us all.
Sorry for being long and rambling. 🙂
I got a lot of personal comments about this lesson, mostly from people claiming they recognized observing the Sabbath is important in their lives. One spoke of needing to find Sabbath periods as part of every day. Others offered a variety of observations, such as spending time in the garden or the outdoors, reading books or walking. A couple spoke of using the Sabbath to visit family. One spoke of time spent with his wife and children as his Sabbath observance. I guess I was impressed first that so many responded to what I thought was a rather ordinary lesson and second that they spoke of wanting to do rather obviously healthy things. Maybe the way to healthy living is not hidden at all. The secret might be simply disciplining ourselves to so follow them.