Sabbath.

Not a word we hear much in Christianity anymore. I think our lives are so hectic and crazy, we've forgotten that taking a "sabbath" is actually a commandment from God.

"Remember the Sabbath day by keeping 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... for in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth... but he rested on the seventh day." Ex. 20:8-11

I realize that even though we don't use the word "sabbath" often it's not a new concept to us, but most sermons I've heard about Sabbath focus on our need to take a rest. We talk about the importance of re-creating ourselves so we are prepared to do God's work the following week. As though God couldn't continue His work unless we had that rest... But I was struck with another perspective about Sabbath as I've been reading Louie Giglio's book, i am not but i know I AM.

He points out that Adam and Eve were created on the sixth day of creation and then immediately there was rest...

"Adam and Eve were feeling fine. They weren't stressed-out, overwhelmed, road-weary, overworked, vacation-starved, frazzled, worn down, bleary-eyed, over committed, or spent. Why would they possibly need a rest day this early in the game?

But maybe it was God who needed a break. After all, He was the one who had done all the creative work. Maybe He was the one who needed a rest. Right?

Wrong.

God wasn't the slightest bit tired on Day Seven. Making the world wasn't too much for him. In fact, God simply spoke and the world came into being. God felt the same on Day Seven as he had before He invented time and space."

It wasn't because Adam and Eve needed a rest. And it certainly wasn't because He needed a rest. God commanded Sabbath in order to teach us something about Himself... He wanted Adam and Eve to acknowledge and forever remember on each forthcoming Sabbath all the things He created, He put into place and motion, He kept in control, before they even showed up! He wanted Adam and Eve, and us, to know that He had already done it all long before we were there to offer our advice and suggestions or get our hands in it and meddle around.

Because it's so easy for us to think that we're the ones keeping it all together, right? The inability to take a Sabbath rest is really telling God that He is not doing a good enough job. He won't be able to take care of things if you let it go. That we are better than Him at handling things. We put ourselves under the weight of doing it all.

"The weight of trying to make yourself bigger than you are -- of trying to figure out how to run your life on your own, of always trying to determine the outcome, control the relationship, close the deal, run the show, hold it all together, know the future, protect your interests, build your kingdom -- the weight of playing the role of God in your life and the lives of those around you."

(For me, it's constantly wondering if I'm raising my children right or am I doing something that will turn them completely away from God in their adult years.)

"But be encouraged. Today is Sabbath. It may not literally be Sunday, but Sabbath is a state of mind and attitude of the heart. Sabbath happens anywhere and everywhere we let go of the controls and lay the cares of our lives at His feet.

So, where is your future right now? Where is the outcome of your pressing dilemma? Is it in the hands of the businessman on the other side of the conference table? Is it in the hands of the boyfriend or girlfriend or spouse? In the hands of a team of doctors?

Or, is your life, and all that concerns you, in the hands of the God who constructed the universe effortlessly in one week?

If you want more rest and less 'stressed' declare this very moment to be your Sabbath -- the place where you pry your fingers off of the circumstances and people you are trying so desperately to control, the place you discover that life really does work better in His hands instead of yours..."

Happy Sabbath day, everyone!

*all quotations are from Louie Giglio's book i am not but i know I AM unless otherwise stated