Welcome to the Sabbath. At an early age growing up in Connecticut, I remember stopping for the Sabbath as a day of rest. It was a day of no school, no chores, and was a happy childhood memory.
As years went by it became a day to spend time alone with God, finding the peace and rest that accompanied it. One of the passages that was a favorite for the day comes from Isaiah, “If you turn back your foot from the Sabbath, from doing your pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight and the holy day of the Lord honorable; if you honor it, not going your own ways, or seeking your own pleasure, or talking idly; then you shall take delight in the Lord, and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth; I will feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.” I found that the Sabbath was more than just a day of no school and no chores, but a day created by God for rest for my spirit, and I found it as I drew near to Him.
Years have passed and after adding a wife, five children (another due in May), and increased work responsibilities, life is busier than it once was, and yet still the Sabbath comes. As a family, we remember the start of the Sabbath day by stopping with a “holy convocation.” This is a special time for all and normally includes prayer, recounting what we are thankful for, reading the Sabbath email or from the Sabbath book, and almost always singing Steal Away and perhaps other Sabbath hymns.
Still, I sometimes feel that stopping is something that Life does not allow. The emphasis here is on the word “feel.” When I started writing this, most of the family had been in bed with the flu or colds, and there seemed to be never-ending work responsibilities. I also realize that Lifefor others has many sorts of busyness: a funeral procession went by our house a little while ago, and you wonder who has passed and what is the story of each person in the cars that passed by. After recently attending the funeral of a young man I worked with, I realize again that the circumstances of life are full of change; they do not stay the same.
But God does. When experiences shout at us in deafening tones that there is no God, and the Sabbath is just another day, we still know what is always true. Though such things vary from year to year and even week to week, the God who instituted the Sabbath remains the same and brings a Sabbath rest without fail.
So even if we don’t remember it, THE SABBATH COMES, gifted to us by a Divine Love that is forever. May you find His rest this day, and always.
