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"Repair the Breach by Keeping the Sabbath" Isaiah 58:9b-14

by Clancy Nixon

August 26, 2007

Church of the Holy Spirit

Ashburn, Virginia

www.HolySpiritAnglican.org.

William Wilberforce was both a committed evangelical Anglican

and a member of English Parliament at the beginning of the

nineteenth century. As told in the excellent movie Amazing

Grace, Wilberforce's most successful work was to lead a thirty

year legislative battle to end the slave trade in the British Empire.

Early in his career, when his party captured the majority, he faced

a great temptation to join the government as a member of the

Cabinet. This would have meant more power for him; but the

move might have derailed him from his calling. At the end of a

week of fantasizing about the possibilities of a new position,

Wilberforce took extended time that Sunday to reflect on it, and he wrote this in his

diary: "Blessed be to God for the day of rest and religious occupation wherein earthly

things assume their true size. Ambition is stunted." He decided not to pursue the

position. Wilberforce was a true "Repairer of the Breach" of which Isaiah prophesied in

58:12 (NKJV). A "breach" is a break in a wall. A repairer of the breach is one who helps

restore spiritual Jerusalem, whose walls have been broken down, a builder of the

Kingdom of God. Wilberforce began a centuries-long work of repairing a festering gash

between peoples, that of race-based slavery. Thank God that Wilberforce understood true

rest. He had a regular habit of Sabbath rest and reflection each Sunday, what he called a

"cessation of the routines of our times." I'm indebted to Gordon MacDonald and his

book, Ordering Your Private World, for this illustration and for much of the material in

this sermon. (Oliver Nelson Publishers, 1984.)

You and I need rest. We are a busy and tired people. The supporting walls of our

lives are often in a state of disrepair, and we are not attending to them as we ought to be.

Most of us would admit this, yet few of us manage to get

victory over the over-commitment that marks so many of

our lives. To the right is an image I saw this week that I

think captures our obsession with overwork.

This week I managed to rest and reflect more than

I have in a while. I didn't get this extra time because I

worked my spiritual disciplines or because I planned for

it or because of anything I intended. I got more rest this

week because I got sick. I spent six straight hours in bed,

reading a book about Lyme's Disease. Then I reflected

on it and decided on a new action plan for my own treatment. Many of us take little time

to take care of ourselves when our other responsibilities crowd in on us. Do any of you

live in that place? When I do finally get an extended rest, a real Sabbath, often I find that

I needed the rest more than I knew. This week, I decided that I will no longer put off a

needed three day quiet retreat. It's part of my Sabbath rhythm one hour a day; one day a

week; one three-day quiet retreat a year; a three month sabbatical every five years. I

remember a Chinese restaurateur I met some time ago who told us he worked seven days

and nights a week he said, "have to, have to." If we wait until the work is finished

before we rest, many of us will never rest, due to the nature of our work. Repair the

Breach by Keeping the Sabbath.

Why do you and I need rest? Because (1) God designed us to need Sabbath rest.

Open your Bibles to Genesis chapter 2, verse 2, on page 2 of your blue pew Bibles.

Genesis 2:2. Moses writes, "By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been

doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. And God blessed the seventh

day and make it holy...." Exodus 31:17 says, "In six days the Lord made heaven and

earth, but on the seventh day, he ceased from labor, and was refreshed." God was

refreshed! Did God need to rest? No, I think not. Did God choose to rest? Yes. Why?

God made his creation subject to a rhythm of rest and work, so God modeled that rhythm

for us by his own behavior. This rest was not meant to be a luxury; rest is a necessity.

God the designer made us with a need for refreshing Sabbath rest. We ignore that need at

our peril. Two of Wilberforce's colleagues in Parliament took their own lives. Of these

unfortunate men, Wilberforce wrote, "With peaceful Sundays, the strings would never

have snapped as they did from over-tension." If they never lay fallow, the fields of our

lives become unproductive. If we don't stop occasionally to repair the cracks in the

retaining walls of our lives, eventually they break down. We need to repair the breaches

through attentive rest. Repair the Breach by Keeping the Sabbath.

What is Sabbath rest? There is a radical difference between Sabbath rest as

depicted in the Bible and the leisure and entertainment that we often fill our time with

when we are not working. Isaiah 58:12c and 13 says, "You shall be called a repairer of

the breach... if you refrain from trampling on the Sabbath, from pursuing your own

interests on my holy day..." the NKJV translates `pursuing your own interests' as,

"finding your own pleasure..." Whatever honoring the Sabbath means, this passage

makes it clear that it's not about doing whatever you want on Sunday because you don't

have to show up to work until Monday! For Christians, whose Sabbath from apostolic

times has been Sunday, not Saturday, the day you do just what you want is Saturday.

Sunday is the Lord's Day. It's part of the moral law that Christians are to honor; it's the

Fifth Commandment! Verse 14: Sabbath is a day "you shall delight yourself in the

LORD." I truly believe that's where our greatest delight is to be found. Nothing and no

one can compare to Almighty God! He is more beautiful that Angelina Jolie or Brad Pitt.

He is more powerful than Alexander Putin or Ray Lewis or Clinton Portis, and God never

has bad knees!

I can imagine the howls of protest now. "Pastor, do you mean to tell me that God

would be upset with me if I don't give my whole Sunday over to Bible Study and

prayer?" I didn't say that. But maybe God has a better plan for you. Let me ask you this:

Have you asked God how He wants you to spend your Sabbath? I'm talking about the

refreshing rest that restores your soul. TV rarely restores my soul - only when I'm

watching good movies like Amazing Grace.

Take the time to invite another family or a single person to Sunday lunch or

dinner. You don't have to make a big deal of it it can be very humble, or you can go

out. Take some time with your friends and family to reflect aloud on the sermon or to

share what God has been doing in your life lately. I love hearing these kinds of stories!

Mark your calendars - In just two weeks, on September 9, we're having a parish pot-trust

picnic after church at Trailside park. Sabbath rest can include the game, the chips and the

beer if you don't cloister yourself in your family room while you watch alone. Two years

ago, the Butt family hosted a series of Sunday open lunches at their home. We'd eat

together, have great conversation, eventually many went downstairs to watch football.

Redskins football became a community fellowship event. I'm praying for someone else

to take on that ministry this fall maybe two or three families could rotate it. Football is

fine - just don't let it interfere with your time of reflection on your spiritual journey.

Gordon MacDonald says that (2) true Sabbath rest begins in reflection, just as

God reflected at the end of his six days of work in Creation. Genesis 1:31 says, "And

God saw everything that he had made, and indeed it was very good." So the Sabbath is

"first and foremost to cause us to interpret our work, to press meaning into it, to make

sure we know to whom it is properly dedicated." Now that we are Christ followers, it's

not enough to simply have experiences; we are called to reflect on them. How do we do

that?

(3) Sabbath rest includes corporate worship with your local church. Jesus our

Lord and example joined corporate worship every Sabbath day. Luke 4:16 says, "...as

was his custom, [Jesus] entered the Synagogue on the Sabbath." Let Sunday worship be

a non-negotiable for you and your family, as long as your children are under your roof.

(4) Sabbath rest includes quiet reflection on your own spiritual journey.

Sunday is not the day to catch up on your work, run errands, and end the day exhausted.

If that is how your Sunday looks, it's time to reflect on it. Jewish women who honor the

Sabbath cook ahead of time, so that they can truly rest. You can rest in many ways.

Some people take a nap to catch up on sleep; some of you should! For some of you,

getting more sleep is the most spiritual thing you can do. Some take individual time for

prayer or journaling; some take walks with their mate or a good friend; others exercise.

Everyone should take some time every week to evaluate and reflect on your walk with

the Lord. It's good to ask these questions both in solitude as well as in the company of

people who know you. You can ask yourself questions like this: What is God showing

me this week? Am I in a stagnant place? Have cracks formed in my supporting walls? If

so, where? Has Sabbath become for me a day where I seek my own pleasure? Am I

fulfilling my life's mission? If I'm to be a repairer of the breach in the community,

which wall am I called to repair?

God desires the best for you. There is no need to be legalistic about your Sabbath.

Jesus tells us that the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. (Mark 2:27)

The Sabbath is a day to help each other in the community. On the Sabbath, Jesus healed

the woman who needed deliverance from bondage

to a crippling spirit. Here at Church of the Holy

Spirit, we need help setting up and tearing down. If

you do those things, you are not pursuing your own

interests, you are pursuing delight in the Lord.

Gods' promise in Isaiah is that if you do

these things, you will be a Repairer of the breach,

one who restores God's kingdom on earth. Do your

part; Repair the Breach by Keeping the Sabbath.

Amen.