For the Jewish people, there is a day called Sabbath that is central to their existence as a people.
It comes from the Hebrew word shabbat which means "to cease" or "to rest" and the first place we find this word used is in the creation poem of Genesis. The poem is the depiction of these different movements of how God creates the world and each has a different emphasis and image. So there are six of these movements rooted in God establishing the basis of all that exists, but then we get this seventh movement where God doesn't make anything. God doesn't even do anything. He just shabbats. At the culmination of the creation of the world we are given this picture that the essence of the world has something to do with shabbat.
That shabbat has been instilled into creation.
Which is why, for the Jewish people, the Sabbath is so sacred. It is why their lives find culmination in this day of rest.
Because it deals with the very substance of the world and how it is made.
What we see is that there is a way God creates the world to be and central to that way is the very thing God exhibits at the climax of it all.
That God rests. That God ceases to produce. That God stops and is simply present.
This poem shows us that God created the world to move in a particular way and part of that movement is what God exhibits at the climax of it all.
Resting.
Not producing.
Stopping and being present.
Apparently, this is the way the world is supposed to work.
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Later in the story, the Jewish people have begun to establish their community in the world by attempting to live in the very way of God; they are trying to live in a world that God created and intended. And throughout their journey, we find God communicating to them what this looks like. And, one concept that God keeps bringing up as the Way people are supposed to be living is the Sabbath.
In Exodus 35, God even says this:
In Exodus 35, God even says this:
For six days, work is to be done, but the seventh day
will be your holy day, a day of Sabbath rest to Adonai.
Whoever does any work on it is to be put to death.
Whoever does any work is to be put to death?
I get that the Sabbath is important and all, but death? That's a little extreme isn't it?
In the Hebrew language, there are several words that translate as "death" in English and they all capture something a little different about what they imply. For example, there is the word mavet which can mean either the end of life sort of death or it can mean death by violence. Or there is the word hagar which implies the act of killing, of causing death.
In Exodus 35, there is a different word used. It is the word mut and it literally means "premature death". But when the ancient rabbis would talk about this word they explained it as "the kind of death you do to yourself."
Mut is the kind of death you do to yourself.
Which has some big implications about what is being said for the Sabbath.
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You live six days. You work. You produce. You go. You do things. You try to survive in the world.
But then, after six of those days, there is a day when you don't.
There is a day where you just are.
A day of rest.
It is the same pattern that God showed us in how God created the world. Six and then stop. Apparently, God is trying to emphasize that this is simply how the world works. It is a rhythm built into the very fabric of creation.
Because we see it all over the place. The processes of plants. The patterns of water. The ebb and flow of the life of animals. Apparently, the earth has this understanding that life is done with specific rhythms.
Which is the same reason you go to bed at night.
We have this inherent understanding that our lives are built on rhythm. The seasons and holidays and festivals. The rhythm of the sun and the moon and its subsequent cycles. The rhythm of eating and drinking and typically doing so around the various circadian rhythms that are natural to our being.
It is almost as if you could say that rhythm is simply how the world is meant to work.
And just as if you hear a percussionist in the marching band hit the bass drum on the wrong beat, we know when we are out of rhythm, too.
When I was in college I knew this guy who had developed a sleeping disorder where you stop breathing in the middle of the night, often without knowing it that comes from a mixture of weight gain and high stress levels. He was only a freshman yet he was trying to obtain a degree while still holding down his full time job that he had been doing since he was a in high school. Which meant he was taking eighteen credit hours a week while working forty. On top of that, he was also a community leader for a couple of non-profit organizations in our town leaving him with multiple meetings a week and, overall, very few moments in a day to just be human. So he ate a lot of fast food, often late at night, built up high levels of stress from all of his deadlines and his massive workload, and he had gained about seventy pounds in less than a year. It was a life of being busy and going and it really wasn't much of a life. And, in return, not only was he never present with you and always tired and worn down, his unhealthy patterns left him with the wonder if he was going to stop breathing in the middle of the night. He wasn't living by any rhythm whatsoever and it was becoming increasingly obvious.
Mut.
It is a life off rhythm. And when it happens, it is essentially the same thing as killing yourself.
Because it isn't what we are created for.
Just as we have rhythms of sleeping and eating, we have the natural rhythm of Sabbath engrained into our bones and when we ignore it, we are ignoring the very essence of what it means to be human. We are ignoring the very rhythm our bodies and our minds are created for.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
Six.
Shabbat.
Apparently, this is how we are designed to live. This is how God created the world to function.
And when we ignore it, we are killing ourselves.
The guy I knew in college, every time I saw him, he always had this huge bag that he carried around that he kept all of his stuff in. It was his way of making sure he was able to frantically scurry about everyday and still have all of his papers and notebooks and information.
His bag was the metaphor for the rhythm-less world he was creating every single day.
Which means you could even say that his bag was the very symbol of his mut.
That his bag was kind of like a coffin.
How many of us are so busy striving to do more and produce more and get the most out of every day that we have completely got off rhythm with the very thing that is built into our existence? How many of us have no sense of stopping, where the embodiment of 'six and one, six and one, six and one, six and one' is simply foreign to the lifestyle that we are hoping to pursue? If we are honest, many of us live a life that wants nothing to do with rhythm of Sabbath we were created for.
For many of us, the things that we do are more like a coffin than a job or a hobby or a commitment. Because, essentially, These different things that come to define us are actually killing us. They are taking us out of the pattern we were meant to exist in and, just as if you don't sleep or eat, eventually it will take its toll.
Which is why God makes the point that if you don't keep the Sabbath, you will be put to death.
Except no one is going to have to kill you.
Because you are already killing yourself.
My hope is that we are able to start having a day that is different than the other six.
That we may start living by the rhythms of our substance and of our soul.
And that your bag doesn't consequentially become a coffin.
