Understanding the Sabbath How do Christ-followers learn about the Sabbath today? We rarely talk about it in our churches. Most people disregard it. Most pastors disregard it. We think it’s an Old Testament law that isn’t for us. We’ve heard about those in the Jewish religion who practice a legalistic form of Sabbath keeping and that’s our concept of Sabbath. We don’t understand the Sabbath rest of the New Testament. Actually, keeping a Sabbath day to honor the Lord and for personal rest and renewal is the most repeated command in the Bible. And the New Testament has a lot to contribute to our understanding. I’ve learned about Sabbath primarily from Eugene Peterson. In “Sabbath as Praying and Playing” I share some of his uncommon and refreshing insights on Sabbath, gleaned from the Bible and also many years of practice. For instance he says: The two biblical reasons for sabbath-keeping develop into parallel sabbath activities of praying and playing. The Exodus reason directs us to the contemplation of God, which becomes prayer. The Deuteronomy reason directs us to social leisure, which becomes play. Praying and playing are deeply congruent with each other and have essential inner connections… What is it like to pray? To play? Puritan Sabbaths that eliminated play were a disaster. Secular Sabbaths that eliminate prayer are worse. Sabbath-keeping involves both playing and praying. The activities are alike enough to share the same day and different enough to require each other for a complementary wholeness (Working the Angles, p. 74-75).
Posted on: Sat, 01 Feb 2014 15:40:20 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015