March 18, 2025

GOD’S WORD FOR TODAY:

“This is what the LORD says:

‘Maintain justice and do what is right, for My salvation is coming soon and My righteousness will be revealed. Blessed is the one who does this, and the generation that follows who holds it fast, who keeps the Sabbath without profaning it and keeps their hand from doing any evil.’” (Isaiah 56.1-2)

REFLECTION ON GOD’S WORD FOR TODAY:

What a difference a day makes; twenty-four little hours. (The opening line of Dinah Washington’s famous song.) From sundown to sun-up, in the Creation story there was an entire day. Let’s stop for a moment and review that very first day. The story opens with something similar to Snoopy’s novels, “One dark and stormy night.” The whirling vortices of disassociated matter moving chaotically in what could only be considered mass confusion. There was no sense of order, purpose, meaning nor significance. We could easily say “it just was.” Then God! God stepped into the nightmare that was reality before His presence became present, before Immanuel was imminent. With God came reason, meaning, purpose, function, collaboration, cooperation and synergy. With the power of the Holy Spirit God found the parenthetical light switch and flipped it. He did more than flip a switch. God made an assignment and put darkness into place within the boundaries of His light. We know it was God’s light because God assigned a title to it. That title was “good.” Good in the God book of terms is defined as “that which accomplishes that for which it was intended.” Isn’t it interesting that we assign all kinds of things to the darkness? We fear those things “which go bump in the night.” We fear what’s around the corner even in the daylight hours because our eyes cannot see around it and in the dark recesses of our mind, we imagine there is danger. We continue to battle such chaotic fears, anxieties, paranoias with the singular intent of bringing life back into order and peace. What we truly desire is a light that will consume the darkness and drive the dark of doubt away (see “Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee” for the full lyrics.) It should be no surprise that for the Hebrews, their “day” started in the evening and ended with the light of day settling back into darkness. I pray we can hear that when the night is visited again it is with the blessing of God called “good.” The night is not something to be feared but welcomed. It is not wonder why Satan loves to lurk in the darkness and true to drive away the light of reason and faith. Now, in this day and age, Satan no longer hides in the shadows and recesses of life nor in the hearts and minds of humanity. Satan dances around in the light not because he does not fear God but because humanity no longer embraces the “good” of God. Sadly, it didn’t take long for Satan to bring that reality into being. What took God seven days to bring to life, Satan undid in one day, twenty-four little hours and not even that many. For Adam and Eve, Satan invoked the dark of doubt and the presence of fear by simply questioning God’s word.

Following the word given to Isaiah, found in the introduction of chapter 56, I believe that we can easily consider the very function of our lives as they are meant to exist in the presence of God. It was when Adam and Eve were invited to think that the eighth day was distinct and undefined. The very concept that God no longer was at work in creation being creative is suggested in the introduction of “the Sabbath day.” In the Ten Commandments, the design of righteous living, we are told to “Honor the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.” (Exodus 20.8-11) The priestly voice rehearse this commandment to maintain an order over life which actually served and serves them first. It would not be long after that the “legalists” would take hold of the commandment and make demands of the people by it. The sanctity of that one day was cultivated as a means of domination by rulers (political and spiritual) over the people to serve them as if they were “a god.” The lack of sanctity which was cultivated by them for that day then infested the rest of the week and returned them to darkness. Yet, as we listen to God’s call upon His people, there is always the reminder to “honor the Sabbath and keep it holy.” The centrality of that commandment was actually a lynchpin argument which the Scribes, Pharisees and loyalists to the High Priest used against Jesus. In Luke 6.5 (see Matthew 12, Mark 2, John 5), Jesus assigns Himself the title “Lord of the Sabbath.” From the “human” perspective, the term lord meant ruler over people. It was the person who defined what the people should believe and do. And Jesus did this, but it was in contradistinction to what the leadership of the day defined it as. It was their interpretation of God’s Word that ruled unchallenged until Jesus came as “Lord of the Sabbath.” He not only defined it but put into practice the “good” interpretation of “keeping the Sabbath.“

How did Jesus “keep” the Sabbath? He kept in alive every day. He set aside time to worship and pray personally. He discipled those who had chosen to follow Him with demonstrations of His Father’s word in action. He taught them the applied meanings of the word bringing it alive in the world around them. He did nothing that was not ordained nor given to Him by God. He was “Lord of the Sabbath” by mastering it. Remember He taught the disciples that the Sabbath was made for people and not the other way around. Sabbath was a discipline itself of heart, mind, body and soul. Intentionally practiced one day a week, twenty-four little hours. Practiced intentionally the other six days of the week as a service unto the Lord. Taking one day to be reminded of all that God had done and six days to demonstrate how God was at work in them and through them. This was the call to Israel, and all exiles- foreign and domestic, Jew and Gentile, slave and free, male and female, young and old. This was what God was ordaining for them as He spoke to Isaiah who himself then was a servant of the Lord who worshipped Him in spirit and in truth. Brought together into one lifestyle bonded into a life of righteousness: maintain justice, keep the Sabbath and abstain from evil (serving one’s self before all others.) Remembering that chiastic structure of Jewish teaching, we see the central focus rise up again: Keep The Sabbath; not for a day but for always.

TODAY’S PRAYER IN RESPONSE TO GOD’S WORD:

Father, in these days we are finding the need to believe even more than ever before. We all have known trouble, some in greater ways than others, but You are offering us the assurance that we will not be consumed by it forever. Regardless of the “time” we are in and the “time” we have been given, we ask for Your Holy Spirit which Jesus asked You to share with us, to lead and guide and direct us in the paths we should go. Teach us what we still need to learn. Empower us to put that learning into action. Bless our actions not as a works righteousness which we know is folly but righteous works which declare Your glory and further witness the truth that can set all who believe free from death. So may we live by the name of Jesus our Christ. AMEN.