Last night I continued reading authors on the Sabbath. I finished the evening listening to Tim Keller's sermon on Luke 6. Before that I reviewed Dabney, Hoeksema, and others. My reading confirmed what I wrote years ago; there is little agreement out there not only on how to observe the Sabbath, but why we observe it.
Two things seem clear to me from Scripture. First, it a Sabbath to God (Ex. 20:10). Second, it was made for us (Mark 2:27). It is hard to rest from worldly concerns. It is hard to spend the whole day thinking about God and His love. I guess that shows how out of practice we are and how much we need one day in seven to help us. Most people spend time looking for Sabbath rules. It is much harder to simply experience a Sabbath.
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I just finished a series on the Sabbath at my blog, if anyone's interested.
My argument was that traditional presbyterian sabbatarianism got it wrong, mainly because it was this-worldly.
But what we should be doing is withdrawing from cultural participation on the Lord's Day as a means of subverting our consumer-driven culture, rather than as a means to strengthen it.
JJS
Phenom, you are asking the wrong question. Reread my post. I said that most people ask about rules. The issue is, what is the Sabbath to accomplish. If the Hebrew word means "cease", then what do we cease from? If it has redemptive significance, then how do we appreciate that? Israelites worshipped, and that seems a good thing. The rest of the day seems to be to be focused on stopping the things we do to make it daily in the world. It should be something we look forward to. Sort of like the rest at the end of a long (six day) race.
I increasingly am convinced that the best way to figure out what the church (or the sabbath) is supposed to look like is to not participate in either for a long time.
I'm probably wrong, but I'm very convinced of this at the moment.
"I'm probably wrong, but I'm very convinced of this at the moment."
Brian, did you mean to say this?
Brian, sorry if I missed your humor. I can be slow on the uptake. Age does that.
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