We spend a fair amount of time dealing with civil morality and we have to: this is contained in the five later rules: do not perjure yourself, steal, commit adultery, kill and do not covet.
But many, me included forget the Sabbath. And many more do not honour their parents. Moreover, most of our society has decided they have their own gods, thank you very much: they call them self esteem, spirituality, their career. Or indeed shopping: we have fallen to the point that the merchants want to be open every day (and in NZ shops close but three days a year)
Overly restrictive Easter trading laws have driven shoppers online at the expense of stores and Parliament should change the “outdated” law after the election, retailers say.
Retail Association chief executive Mark Johnston said consumers were increasingly shopping online on Good Friday and Easter Sunday when most shops were forced to shut.
According to electronic transactions operator Paymark, Good Friday, Easter Sunday and Anzac Day are three of the four slowest shopping days of the year.
But online spending, both domestically and overseas, rose 17.7 per cent for the two restricted trading days in 2013 compared to the previous year, according to BNZ researcher Marketview, although the amount spent was still less than a regular Friday and Sunday.
The law was outdated, Johnston said, and the association would be asking for the legislation to be amended after this year’s election to keep up with the changing retail landscape. The law did not take into account that people were buying goods from New Zealand stores at Easter anyway.
Well, shopping is not essential, or at least it should not be. One needs to take a day a week off: this is good sense when it comes to training and study. Some jobs, and I have one of them, require that someone is available at all times to deal with emergencies. But shopping? No.
1Then God spoke all these words: 2I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; 3you shall have no other gods before me.
4You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. 5You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, punishing children for the iniquity of parents, to the third and the fourth generation of those who reject me, 6but showing steadfast love to the thousandth generation of those who love me and keep my commandments.
7You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not acquit anyone who misuses his name.
8Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy. 9Six days you shall labor and do all your work. 10But the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God; you shall not do any work – you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. 11For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and consecrated it.
12Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.
13You shall not murder.
14You shall not commit adultery.
15You shall not steal.
16You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
17You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or male or female slave, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.
18When all the people witnessed the thunder and lightning, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking, they were afraid and trembled and stood at a distance, 19and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, or we will die.”20Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid; for God has come only to test you and to put the fear of him upon you so that you do not sin.” 21Then the people stood at a distance, while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was.
And then, let’s considering honouring our parents. This is a command, and it is easy, when you have (as I am blessed with) parents who are worthy of honour. It is a lot harder if you have been alienated from them. At times it is incredibly hard to honour your parents: at times your parents (or inlaws) hate you. But in the end, the truth will out.
And then I received a phone call. It was my father, calling to tell me that my mother’s mother had passed away, and that I should let her know. So much of the pain had seeped away that I felt confident confronting my father, and I asked him why he had done it.
Why did you just turn your back and walk away?
And then the truth came to light. He hadn’t walked away. He certainly had not left us to starve. My mother had filed for an annulment and requested a restraining order, which she was granted. When I finally saw my father again, he had two boxes with him. One was filled with income tax returns showing that he had never missed a child support payment, and court orders preventing him from seeing us based on his violence towards my mother, along with supervised visitations that were all scheduled for when he was overseas, working to meet his child support payments.
The other box contained cards and letters. Birthday cards and so many letters. All returned. By my mother. He never stopped sending them, hoping one of us would one day get the key and fetch the mail, but my mother was always adamant that the mail was her business. It was one of those community mailboxes, where you had to go and fetch your mail, and since I never got any mail, it never occurred to me that there was anything untoward about my mother’s insistence that only she would have access to it.
We spend a lot of time talking about sexual and financial morality. We spend a lot of time talking about the need to honour God, and not have idols. Even when they are beautiful. Particularly when they are beautiful.
We forget that there are two commands about the domestic, and there are reasons for both of them. The Sabbath command is about justice. Everyone has a day off: not just the master. Everyone needs their weekend. [Another reason why I don’t spend all Sunday in Church, and do not schedule much one day in the weekend] That includes time off housework and yardwork.
And we need to honour our parents so that we teach our children to honour us: so that when we are at the end of our days they are around. JB is correct: the truth will out.
Extending this a little, there is an honour, and there are commands, around the domestic. The home is important: one of the things that the Jews have remembered and practiced is the ceremony of the sabbath: with a meal on sundown Friday and then rest and shul on Saturday. That the week ends with a hiatus. For all. For we are not designed to be in the human equivalent of a farrowing cage.
This society we are no neither honours parents, nor the old, nor our need to rest. It has forgotten God. It worships idols made our of our most base desires and delusions. Do not be part of it: be countercultural.
Take a day a week to goof off, and phone your Dad and Mum.
One reason I prefer the Kerk to the Kirk is that the Law is read at the start of every Lord’s Day morning service, as it ought to be. Ignoring the Decalogue is not a problem we have; at least, not as regards our worship services. As for in personal lives, no doubt your mileage may vary, as they say…