Did you realize that God is very serious about you taking a day off? He knows you need the rest. He knows you need to pump the brakes of your busy life. And a big part of getting this rest is resting in Him. That’s why He created the Sabbath. He’s so serious about the Sabbath that He put it in His Top Ten. So when Nehemiah returns to Jerusalem and finds the people ignoring God’s divinely decreed day off, he hits the roof (Neh 13:15-22). What should be a day kick back and focus on the LORD is a day devoted to looking for bargains. Jerusalem’s gates are open and the city is open for business. But the governor shuts the gates and shuts it all down. This isn’t about rule-keeping but about remembering just how much God faithfully loves His people. He loves you so much that He gives you a day off.
The scene is Jerusalem. The time is somewhere around 430-420 BC. God has worked to bring home about 60,000 of His chosen people in three waves. First under Zerubbabel (Ez 2:1-2). The second under Ezra the scribe (Ez 7:6). The third under a cupbearer-turned-governor named Nehemiah (Neh 1:11-2:11). Nehemiah serves God and His people for a dozen years in Jerusalem (Neh 5:14). His supervision of the city walls reconstruction project is at the top of his resume (Neh 1:3; 6:15). At the end of his 12-year leave of absence, Nehemiah heads back home to his job as the royal wine steward under the king of Persia (Neh 13:6). But he makes a return trip to the Promised Land to check up on things.
Nehemiah quickly discovers the situation in the city is falling apart. One of the priests has turned over one of the temple storage units to one of Jewish enemies as his deluxe apartment in the sky (Neh 13:4-7). The angry governor personally kicks Tobiah’s stuff to the curb (Neh 13:8). Because there’s no room to store their food supplies, the Levites and singers leave the temple and head home to get a second job (Neh 13:10). Nehemiah appoints new supervisors over the storerooms and restocks the pantry (Neh 13:11-14).
After all the the chaos at the temple, you can bet Nehemiah was looking forward to kicking back on the Sabbath and setting his heart on the goodness of God. But as the sun goes down Friday night, he notices vendors setting up. “In those days I saw in Judah people treading winepresses on the Sabbath, and bringing in heaps of grain and loading them on donkeys, and also wine, grapes, figs, and all kinds of loads, which they brought into Jerusalem on the Sabbath day” (v15). Just when God’s people should be winding down, business starts picking up.
Nehemiah is serious about the Sabbath because God is serious about the Sabbath. He uses the word describing this weekly day off (Heb. shabbat) 10 times in verses 15-21. This holy day goes back to Creation week when God wrapped up His six-day work week to enjoy His supernatural handiwork. “So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all His work that He had done in creation” (Gen 2:3). It’s not like our Creator needed the time off. He certainly wasn’t tired. But He gives a pattern to follow. God takes the day off to rest. We’re to take day off to rest.
Fast forward from Creation week to the Exodus. For 400 years, the Egyptians made sure that the Jews never got a day off. Seven days a week, the Israelites went to work as slaves. Generation after generation of God’s people knew nothing of a day off. Ever. Once Yahweh springs the Hebrews from captivity in Egypt, He graciously gives them Saturday off every week. It’s a key part of the Big Ten chiseled in stone for Moses on Mount Sinai (Ex 20:8-11). Just as God took the day off at the end of Creation, He gives His people a day off each week after working 400 years without one.
He declares each Sabbath Saturday to be holy. The best way to understand this is that is should look VERY different from the other six days of the work week. We’re to rest from our work. We’re to rest in Him. God loads the Bible encouragement to find our rest in Him and Him alone (Ex 33:14; Ps 4:8; Ps 23; Ps 37:7). Jesus makes it clear that we can experience a level of relaxation in Him that can’t be found anywhere else. “Come to Me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy, and My burden is light” (Mt 11:28-30).
Back in Jerusalem, Nehemiah warns the sellers to back off (v15). He also gets in the grill of the movers and shakers of Jewish society, “the nobles of Judah” (v17). They had better realize that they are trashing their God-given day off. “What is this evil thing that you are doing, profaning the Sabbath day?” (v17). He uses the Hebrew verb chalal, which means to pollute, defile, desecrate, or dishonor. What should be a wonderful and restful day set aside for setting our hearts on God and His goodness has become a clogged toilet of selfish consumption and consumerism. For Pete’s sake, they had already made a covenant promise not to be Sabbath breakers with local vendors (Neh 10:31). The governor reminds folks that this is exactly one of the reasons God sent them into Babylonian exile in the first place (v18; (Jer 17:19-23, 27).
Things come to a head one Friday night at sunset. Since the Sabbath officially starts when the sun goes down on Friday (Lev 23:32), Nehemiah gives the order to shut the city gates to keep out all the Gentile vendors from setting up shop (v19). And nobody gets in until sunset Saturday. The next thing you know, sellers start lining up and camping out just outside the walls (v20). At this point, the governor has had enough and makes it clear that this stops right here, right now. “Why do you lodge outside the wall? If you do so again, I will lay hands on you” (v21). Just in case you’re wondering, Nehemiah is not offering to pray over these merchants. He warns them that he will personally kick some booty if they don’t pack up their junk and hit the road. He’s more than happy to engage in a little Sabbath sundown showdown. In the words of the great prophet and theologian Elton John, Saturday’s alright for fighting. Message delivered loud and clear. These local vendors wanted no piece of that action. This was not a problem any longer.
The crisis ends with Nehemiah telling the Levites to guard the gates and keep the Sabbath (v22). Once things settle down, the governor prays to the One who loves His people so much that He provides this day of rest. “Remember this also in my favor, O God, and spare me according to the greatness of Your steadfast love” (v22). At the end of each of his specific reforms here in chapter 13, Nehemiah humbles himself before God (Neh 13:14, 22, 29). Here he sets his focus on the LORD’s loyal and long-lasting goodness toward His people. This is the awesome Hebew term chesed. It describes God’s faithful, lovingkindness, and unfailing love. It’s the active and never-failing love connected with God’s covenant promise to His people. This love is based on God’s faithfulness not our obedience. His undeserved goodness. The term we see in the New Testament for this very same idea is grace. Tullian Tchividjian likes to call it God’s descending, one-way love. We worship God not because we’re good but because He is. Nehemiah prays to the ever-loving, ever-faithful God who’s behind everything that’s happened in the resettlement and rebuilding of Jerusalem.
You might get the idea that Nehemiah is some sort of religious fanatic and bully when it comes to keeping the Sabbath. But this is NOT about following the rules. This is about knowing that God wants His best for us. He made us and knows we need rest. He made us for a deep relationship with Him. Observing the Sabbath is a huge part of that. A little more than 400 years later, Jesus would make it clear that God created the Sabbath for man, not the other way around (Mk 2:27). He tells the religious police that they are totally missing the point if they think rule-keeping on the Sabbath and temple worship is the big idea. “I tell you, something greater than the temple is here…For the Son of Man is the Lord of the Sabbath” (Mt 12:6, 8). What’s even better, there’s an ultimate Sabbath in our future (Heb 4:9-11).
God loves you so much that He gives you a day off. He loves you so much that He wants you to spend that day off with Him.
No comments:
Post a Comment