…And I Will Give You Rest

I don’t think I understand the Sabbath.

“. . . in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day.  Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.”  Therefore God tells us, in Exodus 20:8-11 and Deuteronomy 5:12-15, to remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy:  “Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God.  On it you shall not do any work . . . .”

Because this command is among the Ten Commandments, I assume that it is part of the moral law, as opposed to the ceremonial law, and thus that it continues to be binding on us Christians today, like the commandments not to steal, not to murder, etc.   But what does it mean to obey this commandment?

Christianity is not a legalistic religion, and I feel as if trying to work out a code of specific things I can and can’t do on Sundays would be legalistic.  Jesus deals with questions of Sabbath observance in the parallel passages Matthew 12:1-14, Mark 2:23-3:6, and Luke 6:1-11, and He tells us, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.”  In the Ten Commandments in Deuteronomy, God draws a connection and contrast between the Sabbath and slavery:  “Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the LORD your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm.  Therefore the LORD your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.”  So maybe in the non-legalistic new covenant of Christianity, all I have to do is make sure I’m not a slave to my work, sacrificing all my waking hours to an employer, school, or anything else.  Maybe if I make time in my life (throughout the week) for rest and reflection (including prayer and Bible reading), I’ll be fully obeying the spirit of the law, applying the Sabbath to my particular circumstances in this particular time and place.

On the other hand, maybe Jesus doesn’t give me nearly that much license to define the boundaries of the Sabbath.  In those passages, the only two kinds of “work” being done were (1) Jesus and His disciples were hungry; so they gathered food, and (2) Jesus healed a man.  His discussion of law and mercy, especially in Matthew, suggests that even under the old covenant, in Judaism, it was better for a man to do something admittedly “not lawful”—a violation of the ceremonial law—than to neglect an even more important good, such as eating to survive, or loving one’s neighbor.  If this is how He wants me to understand the Sabbath, not only under the old covenant but also under the new, then I’m not free to work whenever I feel like it, but can make exceptions to the basic rules onlyto the extent that objectively higher priorities override them.

At least, if I assume that I’m in compliance with the law of the Sabbath whenever I feel as if I were, how useful is it as a moral law to shape my life?  If I generally take feeling good about my actions to be a sign that everything is fine, don’t I risk being largely blind to my own pride, for example, or any number of other sins?

Thoughts?

Edit (May 11th, 2010): a couple of further thoughts—

I’ve heard some suggest before, and Rob (godsloveandlaw, below) suggests on his blog, that at least part of what this commandment means for us Christians today is that we ought to go to church every week.  I’m inclined to agree; church certainly seems like a way to “remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy”, and in any case I think all Christians ought to go to church every week, whether that responsibility is found in this commandment or elsewhere.  I don’t mean that I think missing the odd week here and there is a sin, but I think there’s a morally significant difference between (1) sleeping in one Sunday and (2) generally not making a practice of going to church, just as there’s a difference between a couple’s (1) using contraceptives to adjust the number and timing of their children and (2) deciding not to have children at all.

I guess I’m thinking that I won’t consider it necessarily “against my religion” to do work (even paid work, for a job) on a Sunday (although I’ll certainly try to avoid having a work week that extends to Saturdays and Sundays to the extent practicable, whether that’s for religious reasons or other), but I would still like to help other people observe their own Sabbaths.  The “blue laws” that used to guarantee that no one in a given community would have to do certain kinds of work on a Sunday aren’t common these days, at least in the part of the country I’m familiar with (and I think there are good arguments for such laws, even though I’m generally very much for free markets and against government interference), but each of us still has some power to affect the incentives and pressures on others through our own voluntary actions:  I’m going to try (to the extent practicable) not to go to the store on a Sunday, and especially not to go out to eat on a Sunday, any more.  Of course Sunday, being (for most of us) part of the weekend (when we’re not working), is one of the most convenient days for many of us to do our shopping, and to enjoy the occasional relaxing dinner out.  But the other side of that coin is that for us to relax and have those conveniences, other people have to be working those hours (including, sometimes, being pressured to skip church and work instead)—and such work!  Working as a busboy or waiter can be particularly stressful and unpleasant, and I don’t want to inflict that on anyone on what might otherwise be his day of rest.