Sunday August 21st, 2022 Worship

What do you think about when you hear Sabbath? Do you hear a time of rest? A time to spend with family? A day of living life radically different than you live it the other 6 days of the week? When I think about Sabbath, I think about one of my Orthodox Jewish friend’s traditions, where he doesn’t eat any meals prepared with heat, he doesn’t carry anything (including his keys, wallet, or phone), and he doesn’t personally turn on any electricity. I learned about his practices when we were at a conference together in college, because as sundown approached on Friday night, he started handing around the items in his pockets so that we could carry them for him. I didn’t realize until then, either, how much electricity we use on a daily basis. Staying in a hotel is really nice, until he couldn’t take the elevator, so we climbed the 14 flights of stairs in solidarity with him! And, since he was staying alone, he didn’t outright ask us to turn on the room/bathroom lights for him, but he started hinting at it saying things like, “you know, it’s really hard to go to the bathroom in the dark…” I came to have a deep appreciation for him and his Sabbath practices. It was a radical change from how we live every day. I think that there is something that we can learn from this idea of Sabbath being about more than just resting. And, I think that is what Jesus and Isaiah are both nudging us toward today as well.
“You hypocrites!” (Luke 13: 15). Jesus does not hold anything back in his critique of the synagogue authorities when they tried to condemn him for healing the woman on the Sabbath in today’s Gospel. The head of the synagogue saying, ‘There are six days for working. Come on those days to be healed, not on the Sabbath’ (Luke 13: 14b). But, how can this woman rest when she has been bent over from disease, and likely pain, for the past 18 years? As someone who has experience with chronic pain, I know how exhausting some days of just existing can be. This woman has not really rested in the past 18 years. This sounds like just another experience where the pain of women is dismissed. This is, unfortunately, not just an issue of Jesus’ time, but of our time too. I don’t want to demonize the authorities of the synagogue for their devotion to keeping the Sabbath, because it can be a beautiful practice, yet sometimes our practices unintentionally cause harm to others. Life is a lot more nuanced than we would like it to be sometimes, yet, Jesus simply sees the woman in pain and heals her. He connects Sabbath with justice.
The connection of Sabbath to justice is also prominent in the reading from Isaiah for today. Coming from 3rd Isaiah, when the community is divided against one another as the Israelites who were exiled in Babylon return home, the prophet directs the Israelites to care of the neighbor and to making the Sabbath about God’s will, and not simply about human will. I love the way that the Inclusive Bible translates verse 12 this week: “You will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, and Restorer of Ruined Neighborhoods” (Luke 13: 12). There is a footnote attached to this that says: “To be called a repairer of broken walls and a restorer of ruined neighborhoods…is to be dedicated to reclaiming a community’s safety and dignity from those who would steal and destroy it.” That is absolutely beautiful imagery, desperately needed in the time of conflict and division during the time of Isaiah, and something that our broken and divided world needs to hear today too. What does it look like to reclaim a community’s safety and dignity?
The reading from Isaiah continues on about what it means to honor the Sabbath and not trample it, including “not pursing your own ways, seeking your own pleasure, or speaking with your own words” (Isaiah 58: 13). If these things, coupled with reclaiming safety and dignity for our community are what Sabbath means, then Jesus is honoring the Sabbath when he heals the woman. If we work on the Sabbath, it is for the sake of the community, not for the sake of our own gain. It is focused on caring for all of God’s creation so that collectively we move toward a Sabbath practice when all are able to receive the rest God has gifted to us. Jesus could have told the woman that she had to wait until the next day, but how is that loving? The woman needed healing that day, not in 3-5 business days when it was appropriate. Jesus shows us that it is always appropriate to work toward restoring the safety and dignity of those around him.
We too are given a connection between Sabbath and justice when we are charged with the baptismal promise “to strive for justice and peace in all the earth.” Our promise in baptism is about more than just going to church and reading Scripture, things that orient us to God, but also extend us outward toward our neighbors. Isaiah today says: “If you give yourself to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your shadows will become like noon” (Isaiah 58: 10). Upon hearing this, I can’t help but think about our baptisms, when we are given candles and pray that our lights may shine forth before others. These are not just words that we say at baptism and confirmation, but they really are about the ways we orient ourselves to the community around us.
I think about this too in our ministry here, especially our Food Pantry. One of the things that I love about it is that it is available to people whenever they need food, it isn’t only open for an hour or two, and people don’t have to stand in line, but they are able to come receive the food they need when they need it. I know that it has become harder to afford the cost of stocking the food pantry, but I have seen firsthand what it means to members of our community, especially the guys who come to visit and get lunch on an almost daily basis. We did not decide which hours worked best for us, but focused on when our neighbors need access to food, and that includes stocking and giving away food on the Sabbath. Yet, it is the holy work that God is directing us toward. Sabbath orients us toward justice and toward our community; it orients us away from just ourselves.
As I think back about my Jewish friend and his Sabbath practices, I have so much respect for the way that he values his practices, even when, to those who don’t practice in this way, they might look like burdens. They are absolutely beautiful, and I admire them deeply, yet they are not our practices. And, that is okay. I don’t think that God expects all of us to have the exact same practices, which is part of what Jesus is doing today when he does the unexpected on the Sabbath. Yet, I do think that we are welcomed into honoring how others practice the Sabbath. For some of you, your Sabbath practices might include time with family and friends, or it may include time curled up with a book, or out on a walk, and still, some of you might not be able to practice the Sabbath in the ways that you would wish at this time. There is not just one way to have a Sabbath practice. Yet, no matter your Sabbath practice, I invite you to think of it as a gift from God instead of just another command to follow. It is an invitation to live life in a radically different way than the hustle and drive of our so-called work weeks, which includes resting. It is one of the ways that God cares for us too. After all, God shows us that rest is necessary and sacred too.