Today is the last Sunday of this cycle for early morning church. It is a mission service: the regular service at 10 am continues during the year, but the early service happens during the school term. In part this is because many things happen on a Sunday, including sport, and having church early means people can get to obligations at 10 am. We went walking in the hills instead, then travelled to an artisanal cheese maker (that works on the grounds of Cherry Farm, an old psychiatric hospital), and then had lunch.

This is what I call a relaxing morning. Church, a walk, food: the reward for a week. But it depends on somebody working on Sunday: the people in the cafe, for instance. I’m reminded of a conversation I have had twice this week, telling people to take a day off a week and recover.

But that is not something that we should be over legalistic about. There are somethings that the Sabbath does not prevent, such as saving life, or freeing people from bondage.

A Woman with a Disabling Spirit

Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. And behold, there was a woman who had had a disabling spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not fully straighten herself. When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said to her, “Woman, you are freed from your disability.” And he laid his hands on her, and immediately she was made straight, and she glorified God. But the ruler of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, said to the people, “There are six days in which work ought to be done. Come on those days and be healed, and not on the Sabbath day.” Then the Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger and lead it away to water it? And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day?” As he said these things, all his adversaries were put to shame, and all the people rejoiced at all the glorious things that were done by him.

(Luke 13:10-17 ESV)

We all need days off. We all need times of rest. We need recovery. One should not train every day unless one courts injury: I am in the process of trying to restart running and am going to use the Jeff Galloway walk/run system because if I just begin I will injure myself (and it has cost me a lot of money and effort to get rid of the last injury in part: but at a huge cost in cardiovascular fitness. And this programme mandates one day of rest, and three days of cross training.

In the same manner, it is important to have a day when I am not looking at Archie. Six days is enough. But sometimes things happen on your day off, and you should deal with them. People still need to be fed. The Sabbath should be a rest, not a burden.

And all too often, in some form of hyperspiritual competition, we spend all day at Church stressed out and trying to act pretty. This is foolish. None of us are that righteous, and none of this is restful. Church is more like 12 step: it is a place where we encourage each other to be faithful and do good. [Historically it is the other way around: 12 step was based on Christianity, but kept the form, removing the power].

Part of Sunday is goofing off. Down time. And if that means I’m playing cards, or the kids are playing computer games today, it does not matter.

For tomorrow we work, and tomorrow will come soon enough. Use your sabbath — which for many who have public ministries, is not Sunday — to recover.

You will not find that rest in legalisms. You will find it in obeying the principles of limiting the hours of effort, and allowing recovery. You need to build this in, to schedule it: for longer hours lead to fatigue, and that leads to errors.