Nourishment for our Soul
So often, AFTER we have put away our electronic devices for the evening, the screen lights up, forcing us (through habit) to reach AGAIN for our phone, tablet, or laptop. We have been conditioned to think we need to read, see, listen, and respond whenever that dark screen lights up and catches our attention. The physicians study and write how this obsession is not healthy. The eye doctors who study our eyes each year look deeply into our corneas and see the damage the constant usage has caused on our eyes.
Now, do not get me wrong because if you are just like me, then our electronic devices are never far from our person. We carry them in the vehicle with us, carry them in our pockets, purses, and backpacks. When we forget them, we go back to retrieve them. They are forever with us on our person.
The LORD knows us so well, for HE created us, thought of us, fashioned us, and desires that we come to know HIM as LORD of our lives. The CREATOR knew we would need rest; HE even demonstrated when this rest should occur during a week’s work.
“Thus the heavens and the earth were completed, and all their hosts.
(Genesis 2: 1-3 NASB)
By the seventh day God completed His work which He had done,
and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done.
Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it,
because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made.”
- God completed His work.
- God rested from His work.
- God blessed this day of rest.
God knew we would not stop working or not know we need rest, so He demonstrated this practice for us to learn from His example.
How are we doing with God’s teaching? Well, I struggle to keep this commandment. Yes, that’s correct—God gave us a law of rest—because He loves us and knows us, realizing how the keeping of His law will bring conviction to us when we fail to keep the commandment. God’s law reveals our sinful self, reminding us how we need a Savior. God knows how we can become addicted to so many things because He created us, so He made the Way to save us from our own human nature.
“The Pharisees were saying to Him,
(The Gospel According to Mark 2: 24-26 NASB)
“Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?
And He said to them,
“Have you never read what David did when he was in need and he and his companions became hungry;
how he entered the house of God in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the consecrated bread, which is not lawful for anyone to eat except the priests, and he also gave it to those who were with him?”
We need to nourish our soul. We need a time of rest, a time set apart (sanctified) from our life-work. We need a day to walk, to hike, to nap, to share meals with those we love, to read, and to break away from the daily grind of the work-week.
We need a Sabbath-Rest, & the Lord Jesus Christ tells us why this time of rest is so crucial.
“Jesus said to them,
(The Gospel According to Mark 2: 27-28 NASB)
“The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.
So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”
- May we be faithful to keep the LORD’S commandment.
- May we be faithful to set aside a time for rest each week.
- May we be creative in how this looks in our lives.
- May we share time with the family of God, worshipping our Lord Jesus, thankful for His salvation.
- May we be thankful for this gift of God—a Sabbath rest.
- May we receive God’s gift, created by Holy God, for each one of us.