Religion - The Sabbath

I am going to attempt to do a post each Thursday that relates to the youth group lesson the night before. We are "reading the red", the words of Jesus, and are currently cruising through Matthew. Of note, as Pastor Jay related recently in a sermon, the first person to print a copy of the Bible with the words of Jesus in red did so to remind himself of the blood shed by Jesus. We finished chapter 11 and began chapter 12 last night.

Jesus discusses the Sabbath at the beginning of chapter 12. The Pharisees were seeking to catch Him in an act that broke their laws and were carefully watching His actions on the Sabbath. Knowing their hearts, Jesus put things in perspective, telling them that it was good to do good things on the Sabbath. The Sabbath was a day to honor God, not to follow some set of strict guidelines. He told a story of a sheep falling into a pit and asked who among them would not save it even on the Sabbath. He then healed the withered hand of a man, an action the Pharisees considered sinful and illegal.

We take this story and others like it and get from it that good deeds are good deeds, no matter which day of the week that they occur on, that the Sabbath is not restricted to rest, a day where one can do nothing, and rightly so. However, as I thought about this after class, I wondered if we have taken this too far, if we have used these words of Jesus as an excuse to circumvent the will of God. The Sabbath was set aside to be a day of rest, but, perhaps more importantly, it was set aside as a day to focus on God. The two reasons are actually very strongly linked. Is it not much easier to focus on God when you are at rest, when you are not filling your day with errands and chores and your own fun activities? There needs to be time with God and it should be all through the week, but one day a week, God asks us to put away the daily obligations that we must fulfill throughout our lives and focus on Him. Do we?

This is particularly tough for me to write about because I am as guilty as anyone. I give the morning to God, but the afternoon and evening are mine, no different from any other day. Granted, I don't work and I do usually take it easy, but the thought I mostly have is that this is my time. I do have an excuse with two young boys running around the house like whirling tornados; it is not exactly the environment for quiet time and rest. Still, it was no different for me before I had kids, so using that excuse would be a delusion.

There seems to be a fine line to walk here. God doesn't want us to obsess with rules to the extent where we miss the point of the rule. However, I do believe that our worship day is a special day for God and we should treat it as such. Jesus debunked the idea that we are forbidden from action on the Sabbath, but I see nothing where Jesus discounts the importance of the Sabbath. We should put God first every day of the week, but we are human and our lives are busy and we generally fail miserably in that regard. He asks that on one day of the week we make a conscious effort to focus on Him and give our activities, whatever they may be, to Him. Do we? If I answered honestly, I would have to answer no.