Genesis 2:3 (NRSV) Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.
Matthew 11:28-30 (NASB) 28"Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. 29"Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. 30 "For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."
“Rest” literally means to cease or to put a stop to, to be at ease. But the literal definition only hints at the meaning. It is in seeing the way the word is used throughout Scripture that we see what “rest” means and what is promised. Rest is what the people of Israel were promised in the Promised Land, but the history of Israel is anything but a life of ease. Rest is also what Jesus promised those who turned to Him. Again, something more than ease is meant.
Sabbath rest is not about merely stopping work, but stopping to remember. To remember God’s sovereignty over our lives, to remember God’s calling us away from the destructive bent in human life, to remember God’s promise to us, and to remember that this is God’s will for all people. Work is good. The world, as God created it, is good. But if that is all we are surviving on it is like cotton candy to the digestive system. It gives a momentary lift, but does not nourish, does not last, does not satisfy, and simply leaves us thirsting for something else.
That is what Genesis claims. We will never find the good life if we seek it only in wealth, health, religion, relationship, or anything else the world may offer. Those who find the good life seem to have one thing in common. They do not find the good life in the circumstances of their life. All of that may have a place, but not a priority. The priority has something to do with God. Their faith is the foundational fact of their life.
Sabbath rest means that we are to remember that our life is not about what we are about for six days of the week, but rather what we are about on the seventh day, the Sabbath, when we recall what God has done for us and what we do in gratitude and commitment to God. The Good Life is this truth that we need regularly to remember and to receive, for the Good Life is ultimately not something we can work to achieve. It can be received only in gratitude and lived out in faithfulness. As one Rabbi has said it, “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS.”
From a sermon preached by Henry Dobbs Pope January 26, 1992
© Rhonda Hinkle Mitchell Broyles
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