Sabbath
Week 01: Preparing for Sabbath
The Sabbath is a gift from God. It’s a day of rest, celebration, and delight. But at its core, it means to cease or to stop. Sabbath is a day, unlike other days. It’s a special day that is set apart and different. On Sabbath, we learn to breathe deeply, to rest, and to enjoy life as a gift from God. On Sabbath we refrain from regular work and activities to focus on enjoying life, the people we love, and God himself. Sabbath should, therefore, feel like a holiday, a festive day, or a day of great delight! That’s because the Sabbath is a gift from a good God.
Sabbath keeping won’t happen by accident, it takes preparation. In fact, God’s people used to have a day called ‘Preparation Day” (Exod. 16:23). It’s mentioned in all four of the gospels (Matt. 27:62; Mk. 15:42; Lk. 23:54; John 19:14, 42). The people of God would take some time on the day before Sabbath to prepare their homes, make plans, prepare dinner, and do the shopping. We do this every time we celebrate a holiday like Christmas. Well, Sabbath should feel a lot like a holiday like Christmas. It should be a day that we look forward to with excitement and joy. But anyone who has done Sabbath well will tell you that it takes a bit of planning and preparation. But it’s worth it!
Practice for this week Take some time to prepare for Sabbath. In the day or hours leading up to it finish your shopping, cleaning, and preparing for a day of delight.
01 – Plan your Sabbath. What do you want Sabbath to look like? Who do you want to spend it with? Plan out what you want to do, what you will eat, and anything you might need to plan beforehand. Maybe you want to go into nature or read a book. Maybe you want to plan a Sabbath dinner with friends. Or maybe you want to take a nap. That’s fine. Take some time to plan that out.
02 – Put distractions away. The word Sabbath means to “cease”. In order to Sabbath well you’ll have to put some things away. The most obvious is any work, email, or distractions that will keep you from resting. Do you need to respond to any text messages or emails before Sabbath? Do you need to finish any projects or tasks? Ironically, resting well can be a lot of work. But it is well worth the effort.
03 – Prepare the details. Do any shopping that you’ll need for Sabbath, clean your place, and put away your phone if you can. Invite friends over for Sabbath dinner or make any plans that need to be made beforehand.
04 - Try to Sabbath. The goal this week is not to knock it out of the park. If you get 24 hours or 24 minutes of sabbath, that's great! The goal this week is just to prepare. In my opinion, this is often where people either succeed or fail at doing Sabbath well.
Begin your Sabbath or Sabbath dinner by lighting a candle and saying this Hebrew prayer of blessing: “Blessed are you, O Lord our God, king of the universe, who has sanctified us by your commandments, and commanded us to kindle the Sabbath lights.” And then with all the chutzpah you can muster get everyone to say “We welcome the God of the Sabbath!”
Recommended Resource: Subversive Sabbath by A J Swoboda