The words: "On the seventh day God finished His work" seem to be a puzzle. Is it not said: "He rested on the seventh day"? … "What was created on the seventh day? Tranquility, serenity, peace and repose [menuha]."
There is happiness in the love of labor, there is misery in the love of
gain. Many hearts and pitchers are broken at the fountain of profit.
Selling himself into slavery to things, man becomes a utensil that is
broken at the fountain.
He who wants to enter the holiness of the day must first lay down the
profanity of clattering commerce, of being yoked to toil. He must go
away from the screech of dissonant days, from the nervousness and fury
of acquisitiveness and the betrayal in embezzling his own life. He must
say farewell to manual work and learn to understand that the world has
already been created and will survive without the help of man.
These three almost random quotations from Heschel's book The Sabbath, at least partially explain why I'm excited, a wee bit apprehensive, deeply appreciative, and a bit introspective. In a week's time I will be on Sabbatical. And next week I am at the Baptists Doing Theology in Context Consultation – so Sabbath soon.
The first quotation indicates the theological rootedeness of Sabbath in the activity and creativity of God, the balance of work and rest. The word 'menuha' refers to a quality of composed repose, of trustful enjoying of what is and of letting be, and something that is getting harder to find in the high octane, performance driven ways of living that reward productivity, excellence and achievement. Sabbath is one way of demonstrating the counter-achievement – of not exhausting the core and source of our own vitality.
The second quotation is important for those of us who call what we do vocation.Years ago Luther insisted, rightly, that every Christian's vocation is to be conformed to the image of Christ, and serve Christ in the place where God has called us. Now I've always known the work of theological education, just as pastoral ministry, is a non-profit-making activity. But for us purpose-driven* Christians the warning isn't about profit measured in money – it's the insidious equivalent of achievement, results, publicly demonstrated success, which all unnoticed can become a religion of works in which work and results become the criterion of worth. Heschel's image is telling and clear – 'a utensil broken at the fountain' – to lose the capacity to hold the essentials of life. Evangelical activism can too easily become a dependence, the spiritual addiction of doing, that is sustained by an inward restlessness that doesn't know when, or how, to be still. A time of Sabbath enables a recovery of equlibrium, a rediscovery of our own dispensability and also of our dependence – on the grace that neither needs nor demands our works. (*Mischievous question – what would a purpose-driven Sabbatical look like??? Would the book The Purpose-Driven Sabbatical be a good task-oriented, time-limited goal to set while on sabbatical?)
'The betrayal of embezzling our own lives' – the idea that we filch, embezzle, steal, misappropriate, who we are and what we were made for by an overemphasis on our own work isn't new. But Heschel's way of putting it highlights why overwork is theologically suspect – it is to secretly steal what it is not ours to possess. The life God has given is to be lived, not lost in living. And Sabbath as a life principle is simply that, a principle that preserves life. I have a feeling that 'the profanity of clattering commerce' has some application also to the way doing displaces being, so preoccupied with serving God that God himself goes unnoticed – and unloved.
Sabbath is a gift from God. Sabbatical is a gift too – from those who by adding to their own work create space and time. The remarkable group of people who are my colleagues and friends in the Scottish Baptist College, are making such a time of Sabbatical leave possible. I'm well aware of what that will mean in extra work and responsibility for all of them. That's the point of the reference made at the start, of being deeply appreciative as Sabbath time approaches. Their vocational faithfulness, giftedness and work enables Sabbath to happen for me – I receive that as generous gift, and am grateful for the unselfish giving that makes it possible.
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