The Lost Art of "Sunday"

"I am so stressed out." "I can't get my life together." "I am always tired." "Help!"

As a pastor, I hear these complaints often. There is usually no easy answer. But--here's my first question: "What do you do with your Sundays?" Better yet, "What do your Sundays do with you?"

We are all made to need rhythmic rest. According to the Scriptures, this need is woven into the fabric of who we are--in past creation, in present command, and in future consummation.

Consider the word, "Sabbath." What does it mean? It means cease, stop, rest, take a break, observe.

Eugene Peterson writes, “Sabbath is a deliberate act of interference, an interruption or our work each week, a decree of no-work so that we are able to notice, attend, listen, [and] assimilate” the “comprehensive and majestic work of god.” It “erects a weekly bastion against the commodifiction of time, of reducing time to money, reducing time to what we can get out it, against leaving no time for God or beauty or anything that cannot be used or purchased” (Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places).

There it is. Who wouldn't want that?

Rest and worship this Sunday.