In our day and age, it is hard to find rest. We are always connected and that has changed our hearts. We often feel important and needed when we can’t turn off our Blackberries, and can’t stop working. That’s today’s reality.
In a different way, it was hard to find rest in Jesus’ day. It was simply hard work to survive, eat and sleep in shelter. But the Jewish people had one major distinctive, the day of rest God gave at creation, and that they had been instructed to preserve.
But over time, a religious codification of law had been built onto God’s plan for Sabbath rest at creation. We see it in a story of some Pharisees, or religious legalists, and their conflict with Jesus here:
On a Sabbath, while he was going through the grainfields, his disciples plucked and ate some heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands. But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath?” And Jesus answered them, “Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him: how he entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those with him?” And he said to them, “The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.” (Luke 6:1-5 ESV)
Here we can see how the Pharisees had made even a day of rest into hard work. The Sabbath, even as it’s observed today, can become a strange mixture of freedom and peaceful rest, and concern and anxiety for legal compliance.
For example, I have a friend who lived in Israel for a short time, who would tell stories of a mad rush to get enough food before sunset on Friday when the Sabbath began. Then she’d take long walks to visit with a friend…all to avoid operating a car. What’s more work – walking or driving?
Or at Toronto’s Mount Sinai hospital there is a Sabbath elevator that stops at every floor on Saturdays, so no buttons need to be pressed. You can see how carefully work has been defined – button pushing is too much, but walking is okay.
The proper way to take Sabbath rest is still debated today – including debates on how strictly Christians should apply the Old Testament laws about Sabbath as a day of worship and rest. There is a clue here in the passage we’re exploring this week, where the Pharisees are confronting Jesus about his disciples eating on what was supposed to be a day of rest. They are plucking grain left for poor travellers like themselves, and rubbing it between their hands to make it edible, which was one of 39 types of work forbidden by the teachers of the law.
Note how Jesus responsds. He doesn’t laugh it off as an old throwback idea. No, he takes it somewhere different, he seems to say rest is vitally important, and that it is what he’s all about. He says he’s the Lord of the Sabbath. We saw in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus’ intention is not to throw away the law, nor to adopt the Pharisees’ interpretation of it wholesale, but rather to fulfill its original purpose. He reveals the point of the whole law to be…himself!
Question: What was your experience of weekends growing up? Was either day set aside as a day of rest?
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If there is one thing we’ve seen from this week’s exploration of how following Jesus “resets” our views of sex and marriage, it is that we have a choice. Like the Corinthians, we have the physical abilities, biological urge, and even the legal right to engage in whatever sexual activities we can dream up…with very few exceptions, and sometimes even without immediate consequences. In our society today, no one can really stop you – you essentially have the right to do what you want.
But Paul was writing to the Corinthian Christians, those who have chosen to follow Jesus and allow him to “reset” their entire lives. They have intentionally chosen to live in God’s kingdom and enjoy its rights, rather than the kingdom of this world and its rights. He wants them and us to see that although we can do almost anything legally in this world, it doesn’t mean we should. It may be lawful in our world, but it isn’t good for us in God’s kingdom. Unlimited sexuality may satisfy a biological urge, but we are more than bodies, we are made in the image of God. We are made for much more than what the Corinthians, or many of us, are settling for while separated from God.
But for now, here are some good questions for us all to consider – if you have commited to this journey, or are willing to give it a try – you will have to leave some rights behind, in order to gain all that God offers his children. What is it for you, that you will grieve leaving behind? Or if you’ve been practicing the kingdom for a time, what old way of life do you keep returning to, try as you may? As Paul puts it, what do you need to flee from, in order to be fully free to experience the fullness of life as God intended it? Yes, flee. The false god of sex outside God’s “containers” can get such a hold on us, we actually have to run away from it, as we run towards Jesus. Some baggage can’t come with us, but must be fled.
Chances are there is a sexual dimension to all our brokenness, where we fall short of God’s real plans for us and our lives. The solution is not to try harder, be better, etc. but to flee – to leave this world with its rights that may be legal in our society but are ultimately destructive in God’s. Christians set out on a journey with Jesus to the kingdom of God…where we put him at the center of our lives, and start practicing, over time and effort and failure, listening to his guidance in scripture and allowing him to reshape us into what he created us to be in the first place, both our bodies and souls. To do that, you have to flee something, but God promises the destination, even the journey, are far better than we could ever imagine.
Challenge: Consider, and discuss with your spouse if married, or a loved one, what sexual brokenness you’ll need to “flee” in order to travel together towards God’s kingdom.
When our computers get bogged down and unmanageable, we know to hit a reset button to simply start over. Wouldn't a reset button be great in life? We know it would be complicated, with all our responsibilities and routines to consider, but imagine the freedom and refreshment of a new start in life! What would you do differently? What would you pay more attention to, and what would you ignore? How would you avoid getting bogged down and broken again?
The great news is, in coming to earth as Jesus Christ, God has begun to "reset" our universe, our world, and even us. We're invited to start over with him, in what he calls his kingdom. We're invited to start a new life with a clean slate.
What gets wiped clean, and lived differently, when God resets our lives? We'll explore how God resets these key areas of our lives:
Reset: Goals
Reset: Time
Reset: Money
Reset: Work
Reset: Body & Food
Reset: Sex & Marriage
Reset: Family
Reset: Compassion
Reset: Nature
Reset: Society
Reset: Death
Join us for the next several weeks, and invite God to reset your life.
