Sabbath — Pat Dryburgh

I’m pretty certain that this is something that most in ministry have to wrestle with at some point. I am truly glad that I was able to wrestle this one down early on; otherwise I don’t know how much longer I would’ve been able to go on.

Moses wrote in Exodus 20:8 “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.” Jesus said “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.” What amazes me is that amidst our hurried lives that we live, we don’t notice that God has given us an amazing, holy gift in the form of a day. A day where, as Rob Bell puts it,

Sabbath is taking a day a week to remind myself that I did not make the world and that it will continue to exist without my efforts. Sabbath is a day when my work is done, even if it isn’t. Sabbath is a day when my job is to enjoy. Period. Sabbath is a day when I am fully available to myself and those I love most. Sabbath is a day when I remember when God made the world, he saw that it was good. Sabbath is a day when I produce nothing. Sabbath is a day when I remind myself that I am not a machine. Sabbath is a day when at the end I say, ‘I didn’t do anything today’ and I don’t add ‘And I feel so guilty.

What is truly remarkable to me is how productive I am in a week when I have taken my Sabbath. I am refueled, refilled, remade so that I can be everything God wants me to be through the rest of the week. My mind is more stable, my emotions less controlling. God does some of the most amazing stuff on my Sabbath, which honestly makes me wonder “how could I have missed this the past 22 years of my life?”

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