Our Summer Sabbath

May 29, 2005 (Second Sunday after Pentecost -- Proper 4A)

By The Very Rev. Terry White, Dean

- Deuteronomy 11:18-21,26-28
- Psalm 31 or 31:1-5,19-24
- Romans 3:21-25a,28
- Matthew 7:21-27

(From The Lectionary Page)

“At some time or other every aspect of life faces a day of reckoning, a day when we realize that matters have gone in the wrong direction and that measures have to be taken to get them back on track. It can happen with one’s own habits, with the life in an institution, and it can happen with a nation.” (H. O’Driscoll, The Word Today, Year A Vol 3, pp 10-11.)

This conviction that things are wrong and must be corrected is found today in people on both sides of debates concerning the state’s definition of marriage and whether civil unions can carry the same legal privileges as marriage, whether capital punishment is justified in some instances or should never be applied, and whether state and federal spending places money where it is truly most needed and most effective.

“Our first reading comes from the book of Deuteronomy, which means literally The Second Law. This book once played a huge role in the life of the nation of ancient Israel. Hilkiah the high priest found this scroll in the Temple, and showed it to King Josiah. The king read this book and realized to his horror how far the life of the nation had slipped in terms of moral and ethical behavior, and how social justice had fallen far from the nation’s priorities. The king ordered a public reading of this great scroll and commanded all subjects to hear it.

“This passage for today confronted the people of Israel and confronts of us. The words of God are to be
In your heart and soul
On your hand, on your forehead
Taught to your children
Written on your house and your gates

The words of God are to be talked about
at home and when you are away,
When you lie down and when you rise
(Ibid.)

This central theme of this text needs little interpretation. All of God’s people are called upon to make that relationship with God permeate all of life.

Yet the end of this passage is open to interpretation, concerning the blessing and curse. The debate centers on whether God takes an active role in blessing or cursing those who keep the law or break it, or whether the blessing or curse is the natural outcome of keeping or ignoring the law, the natural outcome also being ordained by God. An important question, as the saying goes, for another time.

One difficultly this passage presents to we Anglicans is how little gray area exists. Most of your life and mine is spent in the gray zone, and much of the ministry of the Church is carried out against a backdrop that is rarely clearly right or wrong, sinful or righteous, blessed or cursed. And that is precisely why we need to be regularly confronted with passages such as this one – to remind us of what God has set forth as being sure and certain.

The chaplain in the TV series M*A*S*H, Father John Francis Mulchahy, said that having lived in a war zone, just a few miles from the front, he had seen the ten commandments take quite a beating. I’d like to reflect a moment on one such Word of God that takes quite a beating, the commandment to honor the Sabbath and keep it holy.

Priest and Scholar Barbara Brown Taylor writes in the current edition of the Christian Century:

“Most of us are so sold on speed, so invested in productivity, so convinced that multitasking is the way of life that stopping for one whole day can feel at first like a kind of death. As the adrenaline drains away, you fear that your heart has stopped beating since you cannot hear your pulse pounding in your temples anymore. As you do no work, you wonder if you are running a temperature since being sick is the only way that you ever get out of work. As time billows out in front of you, you have a little panic attack at how much time you are wasting since time is not only money but” [also a measure of worth.]

Here’s the heart of her article: “For reasons like these, plenty of us take an hour here or there and call it Sabbath, which is like driving five miles out of town and calling it Europe. Two hours on a Sunday morning is not enough. We need ten times longer that that to calm down enough to draw a deep breath. We need ten times ten to trust the saving rhythm of Sabbath without worrying that our own ambition will yank the rug of rest out from under us.” Rabbi Michael Lerner says in his book Jewish Renewal that Sabbath is a full 25 hours and once we’ve practiced it weekly for two years minimum, we only then begin to observe the commandment to keep a holy Sabbath. (Sabbath Resistance, pg 35, Christ Century May 31, 2005).

This weekend is for most folks the beginning of celebrating the concept of summer, marking a definite change in life’s patterns. Vacation from school or work is at hand, the longer days allow for more recreational activities, dinner is usually a little later, and allegedly at least, our pace feels different. The word we pronounce “recreation” is in God language pronounced re-creation. To be recreated means more than engaging in our favorite leisure. It means to return to the source, to our Creator.

This Second Sunday after Pentecost is marked by special attention to the centrality of the Eucharist in our lives and in the life of the Church. Just as we were made a new creation in Holy Baptism, so we are re-created at this Holy Table. But we know that this summer season of recreation so often means were are less likely to keep a holy Sabbath and feast on the Bread of Life. And while I have a hard time believing that God smites us when we fail to keep Sabbath, and I know from my own life that life is decidedly less blessed when I see Sabbath as an option. This is not about making sure summer attendance is up at the Cathedral. Taking the Sabbath seriously benefits each of us, and the world.

In our Gospel reading, Jesus sounds like a guest expert on This Old House – he says that the foundation is everything. But more than that, when talking about rain, floods, and winds – he was talking about that which comes naturally. Life naturally assaults our faith: when we are treated unjustly, as illness takes life from us, as we observe how good and innocent people suffer, and when one that we love dies – all of this takes a toll. What is more likely to help us at such times: spending more or less Sabbath time? Not in the Pharisaic and Puritanical sense, but in the holy sense that enables us to cope with floods and winds and move through such times, deeper into the heart of Jesus. God must permeate all of life.

Dear Friends in Christ, may we allow these texts to confront us. There is much in my life and perhaps in yours, much in the life of the Church, and in our several communities, that is in need of correction. Let us see Sabbath as a necessary part of that witness, just as crucial to living out our baptismal covenant as is delivering meals to those shut-in, visiting the sick, and working for justice.

Our servanthood is only effective if we have a firm foundation. In God’s Presence, through Christ revealed in Word and Sacrament, we are recreated. Remember the Sabbath. “Remember what it means to be made in God’s image, and when the Sabbath ends, join God in the work of mending the world.” (Brown Taylor.)