In relation to the tragic events recently dominating the news,
the Ten Commandments have, in one way or another,
been much on people's minds these past few weeks.
True, our attention has mostly been called to just four of the Ten.
Relating to events of terrorism + counter-terrorism around the globe,
we've thought of the 6th commandment: "You shall not murder,"
and the 3rd: "You shall not make wrongful use of the name of God,"
the latter ruling out acts of violence done in the name of God,
such as those committed by a number of terrorist groups.
And relating to events in the life of President Clinton,
we've thought of both the 7th: "You shall not commit adultery".
and the 9th: "You shall not give false testimony ''
But this morning, rather than registering my opinion about
how one or another of these four commandments applies
to persons who are far removed from us,
I want to reflect on how another one of the commandments
applies to our lives.
For, of the Ten Commandments,
it is neither the one about using God's name falsely,
nor the one about murder,
nor the one about adultery,
nor the one about false witness
that is the commandment
most widely violated by Christians today.
And whereas Christians who commit murder
or the wrongful use of God's name or adultery or false witness
usually feel at least some pang of conscience,
most Christians who violate this other commandment
feel not the slightest twinge of remorse.
The commandment to which I refer is the 4th:
"Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy ''
And in preaching this morning's sermon on the 4th commandment,
I confess that I'm preaching as much to myself as to anyone else.
For "Hi! I'm Byron, and I'm a workaholic.
The term '7-24,'
7 days a week, 24 hours a day,
could have been created with me in mind."
I haven't always been that way. When I was growing up,
my parents firmly taught that Sunday was the Christian sabbath,
and they strictly enforced Sunday as my day of rest,
my day for Sunday School, Church, and family.
Some of that I saw as good:
a wonderful family dinner, no school work, no chores.
Some of that I saw as bad:
no movies, no partying, no hanging out with friends.
The biggest blowup I ever had with my parents
had to do with their policies about Sunday observance.
I was graduating from 8th grade in my local public elementary school.
In those days 8th grade graduation was a big deal.
w e had one rich kid in our very small class of thirteen.
Her name was Jacqueline Alt,
and her parents offered to take every student in the class
to celebrate our graduation at the swankiest hotel in Chicago.
There we'd eat Sunday lunch and see the holiday ice show.
But my parents wouldn't let me go because it was Sunday.
I was the only kid in the class who couldn't go.
Even my friend who was Salvation Army and
whose family was far more conservative than mine
was allowed to go.
But not me.
It took four years to get my revenge on my parents,
but when I went away to college I chucked sabbath observance.
Oh, I wasn't all that bad, mind you!
I still went to church on Sunday morning, but
I spent the rest of the day doing sinful things like homework,
and I've been a proud "7-24 workaholic" ever since'
Then along came my reflections on this morning's scripture lessons
about the meaning and purpose of the sabbath,
and I've concluded that it's important for me and for others
to at least take the 4th commandment seriously enough
to wrestle with it and to think it through again.
For this commandment seems to have something to say
to the many in our culture for whom work has become a captivity,
a captivity that numbs our feelings,
inhibits our development of relationships with others,
endangers our health, and cripples our spirituality.
Workers in every segment of the economy seem to be putting in
significantly more hours than did those same workers a decade ago.
And it seems high time for us to rediscover the biblical view
that the failure to set appropriate limits on work
is captivity to sill!
My first up-close and personal encounter
with a Jew who took sabbath-observance seriously
came during my Ph.D. studies.
Zvi somehow managed to get all A's
even though he worked only six days a week,
and I had a number of long conversations with him
about the role sabbath played in his life.
It was Zvi who first pointed out to me that the two versions of
the Ten Commandments, in Exodus and Deuteronomy,
give different reasons for observing the 4th commandment.
Exodus tells us to desist from work and rest every 7th day
because God, the Creator of the universe, rested on the 7th Day
and thereby created tranquility, serenity, peace, and repose
as something good offered to every being.
Deuteronomy tells us to observe a sabbath rest
so that we might remember that God, who redeems and liberates
people from captivity, is gracious and kind and that
God calls us to observe not only the form of the sabbath
but also the moral purpose of the sabbath,
which is to use our liberated energies
to extend a grace and kindness like God's own to
those who continue in need or remain captive.
By reading Exodus and Deuteronomy together we learn that:
"The God who spills out galaxies without end
and assigns the cells of all creatures their unending tasks
is the God of divine [compassion]
who commands human transformation of the world
in accord with the canons of [rest + ] righteousness."
(Larry Rasmussen, p. 21)
But going back to my graduate school friend Zvi,
it was also he who taught me the meaning of the Jewish greeting,
"Shabbat shalom!"
Many Christians of the Upper West Side speak enough Hebrew
to know that the literal meaning of this phrase is "sabbath peace!"
Still, Hebrew "shalom" conveys much more than English "peace."
"Shalom" connotes a state of wholeness that is
a total well-being of body and soul,
a well-being that comes from living in the image of God.
"To say 'Shabbat Shalom' is to wish someone
the wholeness that comes from ceasing to be the fragmented selves
we often are during the rest of the week.
To greet someone with the words 'Shabbat Shalom' is to say,
'may this be a day of wholeness and holiness for you."'
(Donna Berman, p. 37)
My graduate school friend Zvi also taught me the Jewish tradition
that everyone who observes sabbath gains for the day
"a second soul," a kind of spiritual supplement we are granted
to help us to experience fully God's good company
as, throughout the day, we rest deeply in God. and draw
deeply on God's reservoirs of creative and moral power.
Today, some 30+ years after those conversations with Zvi, + some 40
years of having tried it "my way, , , originating in childish rebellion
against my parent's legalistic views of sabbath observance,
I am at last prepared to begin to take the 4th commandment seriously
and to allow myself to experience the joy of rest
and the joy of the quiet, sustained praise of God.
I am at last prepared to believe that how we spend our weekends
plays a determining role in the physical and spiritual health
both of ourselves and of our community.
I am at last prepared to agree that:
"When work + the countless demands of daily life fill all our hours;
when our minds are preoccupied by relentless demands and
distractions,
it is not surprising that we fail to apprehend
the holy [that is] in our midst." (Martha J. Horne, p. 22)
I am at last prepared to acknowledge that
when the Creator has offered us the freedom to rest,
we refuse this gift at our own peril.
I am at last prepared to step off the treadmill
and to begin developing for myself a theology of rest.
Rabbi Donna Berman has said that:
'' As peace is not merely the absence of war,
so, too, rest is not merely the absence of work.
Rest is replenishment of body and soul." (p. 37)
And so we hear in the Gospel of Luke, that one sabbath day, while
Jesus was teaching in a synagogue, he spied a crippled woman,
a woman whose body had been bent double for nearly 18 years.
Like her ancestors in Moses' time who had been slaves in Egypt,
"she was unable to walk straight and tall."
But "That Sabbath was [for her] a day of deliverance
from all that dehumanized her." (Kendra Haloviak, p. 41)
The woman made no approach to Jesus,
she made no request of him,
she revealed no faith in him.
Yet Jesus, in a spontaneous act of compassion,
fulfilled the purpose of sabbath that God
proclaims in the Book of Deuteronomy.
Jesus liberated her from her physical captivity
and replenished her in both body and soul,
offering her shabbat shalom.
God created the sabbath that all might be replenished in body + soul,
and, for us Christians, keeping the sabbath means following Jesus
not only by opening ourselves
to receiving God's gift of rest, renewal, and wholeness
but also by joining with God in sharing with others the
fruit of God's creative + moral purpose for the sabbath,
sharing with others shabbat shalom..
To keep the sabbath and to offer its fruit to others is to honor God
first by enjoying the gift God created on the 7th Day, the gift of rest,
and then by helping to maintain the beauty of all God's creation,
and finally by acting with Christ-like compassion
toward those who are in any way captive or in need.
Over the weeks and months ahead, I hope that we as a community
will turn our minds and hearts to discussing + exploring together
how we can creatively overcome our workaholic tendencies
and how we can recapture in our lives
the beauty and positive value of the 4th commandment.
To begin that process, I invite you to join me for a cup of coffee
and for an informal discussion of how we can establish in our lives
a more healthful and Christian rhythm of work and rest,
of how we can make our weekends more creative and liberating.
And I invite you to join me for that informal discussion beginning
three weeks from today, on Sunday, September 13th, at 9:30 am,
in the Session Room on the 3rd Floor.
Let's get going on this so that we, as individuals and as a community,
may begin to "dance to the rhythm of God,"
so that we, as individuals and as a community, may begin
to "experience the creative [and moral] strength of Sabbath rest"
of sabbath wholeness, shabbat shalom.
(B. Michael Watson, p. 27)
Let us pray.
O God, you have offered us the gift of sabbath rest, wholeness,
and well-being, shabbat shalom.
Help us to change our values and priorities and to answer
positively y our call to accept y our gift.
In Jesus's name, we pray. Amen.
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