GOD-LIFE: SABBATH

Sermon preached by the Rev. Michael Anderson Bullock

[Isaah 58:9b-14; Hebrews 12:18-29; Luke 13:10-17]

She moved slowly, and with visible pain she approached her unofficial “seat” in the congregation.  After almost two decades of such precarious movement, her struggles were not particularly noticed by the other members of the worshipping community.  She and her bent-over state were – for better or for worse – regarded as part of the fabric of the gathered community.  Ironically, her arrival signaled to everyone, including the congregation’s president, that worship could now commence.

That day, outside the synagogue door, in the hub-bub among the gathering of congregants, word had leaked out that a visiting rabbi would teach and preach.  It’s not that the incumbent rabbi was insufficient.  He was quite a dutiful and attentive man, respected and liked; but word was that the visitor came with a bit of a stir about him.  People wagged their heads with some anticipation that this guy was an up-and-comer, not the kind of visiting preacher a small, crossroads village was likely to attract.

Yet, on this particular sabbath day she was unusually delayed in getting to the synagogue.  In fact, by the time she got to the door of the worship space, the visitor had already begun his congregational teaching.  Sheepishly and not wanting to call attention to her tardiness, she unpretentiously shuffled toward her usual seat, when suddenly she heard the preacher call out to her to come to him.  Not waiting for her frail steps to make the trip, the rabbi suddenly raised his hand toward her, and with great authority in his voice virtually shouted: “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.”  And then, amidst the stunned silence of the congregation, he moved toward her and laid his hands on her stooped head, upon which she stood straight up -- healed and free.  Words to God of gratitude and praise flowed with her tears of joy.  After eighteen years of being bent over like an old willow branch, only able to see what was immediately in front of her, she now stood straight and tall.  How could this be?

There was no time to follow the trajectory of her question, as the president of the congregation immediately broke the moment with his indignant anger, which he directed at his guest rabbi with full force.  Quoting the Fourth of the Ten Commandments, the president severely upbraided his young, teaching guest for trampling over the Mosaic Law, the commandment to “keep the sabbath day holy”.[1]  And, of course, in his own way the hosting president was right: Worship was certainly not a matter of an ”Open Mic Night” event.  The sabbath is not only meant for humane rest from the burden of toil; it is ultimately the specifically sacred time to remember God and our life with God.

Such public conflict in the prayer space was unprecedented for the congregation, and the people collectively drew in their breath when the visiting rabbi did not back down but responded with a stinging indictment of his own: “You hypocrites!” he thundered.  “On the sabbath, don’t you untie your cow or donkey from the stall and lead it to water?  Is it not right for me to untie this ‘daughter of Abraham’ and lead her from the stall where the Evil One has tied her these last eighteen years?”[2]

At these words, the congregation, regathering their sensibilities, remarkably stood in their prayer space and applauded wildly, cheering this visiting preacher.  End of story – but not really.

As the one who is primarily responsible for the worship of this parish community, I freely admit to you that I have mixed feelings about this synagogue scene.  What if I had invited a guest to preach here, and he or she went on to do his or her own thing, trampling upon what we have carefully and faithfully cultivated as our guiding worship structure?  At the apparent hijacking of our worship, I most likely wouldn’t stay quiet.  As I trust you know, I feel very strongly that this sacred liturgy is not a matter of an “open mike night” experience, where people can express themselves, or cut their teeth on their public speaking, or – God forbid, demonstrate how smart and wonderful they are.

Yet, having confessed this, after all, there is Jesus, teaching and preaching and demonstrating the power his words through actions that bring God’s life to life.  I get the president’s indignation over being overshadowed by Jesus’ actions, but this is not a competition but a recognition of what it means to experience Emmanuel: God with us.  In this, I think of the reverent space-making that John the Baptist portrays.  At the time when his own disciples begin to compare him to Jesus, quite remarkably the Baptist says, “He must increase but I must decrease.”[3]  In such cases of “God-with-us” insight, all plans and patterns for liturgy and worship must fade in their puniness.

Yes, making room for the Christ of God is the primary purpose of faithful, healthy, Christian worship.  The Lord’s own promise implies as much: that “whenever two or three are gathered in my Name, I am in the midst of them.”[4]  This means that the first characteristic of our worship begins by making room for the Risen One.  Then the second element is to note and take to heart what life with Emmanuel is like.  The final purpose of worship is to bring what we have experienced in worship out into the world through the way we live.

I do say that this notion of worship doesn’t come naturally for most of us, which is the reason that there is the Law and the Tradition to act as guardrails, so that we don’t careen over the edge of our own agendas and expectations.  And yes, the confrontation between the synagogue president and Jesus is about the relationship between law and life, tradition and exploration, especially between the relationship between God’s Law and God’s Life: The point being that you can (in the abstract) not break the law and still tragically and unnecessarily lack the Life that the Law is meant to shepherd.

All this and more are operating in this electrically charged gospel story, but with all the dramatic action, there is one central item that is easily and unfortunately missed.  So, I close by noting the issue of “sabbath”.

In the Jewish tradition that stems from the Gensis creation story, the seventh day of the week is reserved as the “sabbath”.  For according to the Creation story, God rested on the seventh day, making it a holy day that not only provided humane rest for people from life’s toil but (as I said earlier) it is also a sacred day to remember God and our life with God.[5]  But at its heart what is operating within the notion of “sabbath” is far larger than a set-aside day.  Rather, the experience of “sabbath” is meant to provide God’s faithful people with a taste of what life is like on God’s terms.  And in this aspect of “sabbath” we are immediately and directly connected to the Exodus story, where Israel is delivered from bondage and liberated to be what God called them to be.  This sense of “sabbath” as the time not only to receive respite from the toil and demands of daily life but also (and more significantly) to experience the greater life with God who delivers all of us from bondage.  Amidst all the captivating action in today’s gospel, I think this is what operates at the heart of today’s lesson.

I say this because St. Luke is so precise in noting that Jesus was teaching and preaching in a synagogue on the sabbath.  What transpired on that sabbath occasion that caused the congregation to rise to their feet and cheer was not simply a matter of a healing.  No, what occurred on that sabbath in that synagogue was a demonstration – a demonstration of the God-life breaking in on the people with the message of hope, redemption, and new life.  The bent-over woman quite literally stands for more than her own life.  She is Israel.  She is God’s people.  She is you and me, confronting as her own the gift of deliverance and liberation from all that has her and us bent-over and enslaved.

So, with this interpretation, the implicit question is: In what ways are we in the place of the seriously infirm woman and her need of healing?  What has us bent-over and stooped in our lives, causing us to be imprisoned and unable to have the life we need, the life God intends for us to have, the life God-in-Christ gives?  What holds us in bondage from standing straight and tall, free to move and to be our best selves?

Like the infirm woman in the synagogue, some of us are limited physically.  Our bodies are our instrument on which the music of our lives is played.  When our physical instrument is impeded, our life’s music can easily become distorted.  This is to say that physical health is a precious gift -- one we easily take for granted.

Others of us, which is to say all of us some of the time, suffer emotional and spiritual bondage.  Fear, with its suffocating effects on the soul, cause us to be deformed in our abilities to have a full and fruitful life, to the extent that too many of us adjust to this warped way of being and living.

But like a shard of light in a dark room, the sabbath illuminates what is our true heritage as God’s people.  In Christ, we are delivered – delivered from the bondage of our fearful mistakes and the death of our need to control and invited to receive that resurrected life – the one we have seen and been given in Jesus, who is God’s sabbath in the flesh and in our midst.  Think of spending time hanging out with the one you love.  It is such a gift.  And this is what sabbath involves: The opportunity to spend time with the God we love and who loves us.

But how do we recognize this sabbath life?  What is it like for us?

I think that every time we are grateful, every time we are touched by a sense of thanksgiving, we are in a sabbath moment, a sabbath experience.  As that wonderful Prayer Book prayer of thanksgiving puts it: Grant us an awareness of all your mercies, that with a truly thankful heart we may show forth your praise, not only with our lips but in our lives; by giving up ourselves to your service and walking before you in holiness and righteousness all our days…[6]

In this way sabbath is not just a matter of a day where we clear out our busyness and let God be God, but it is more deeply also an “attitude of gratitude” that is habit forming and by which we joyfully may stand straight and tall.

This the reminder that the Prophet Isaiah speaks to in this morning’s first lesson.  Listen again.

If you refrain from trampling the sabbath, from pursuing your own interests on my holy day; if you call the sabbath a delight and the holy day of the Lord honorable; if you honor it, not going your own ways, serving your own interests, or pursuing your own affairs; then you shall take delight in the Lord , and I will make you ride upon the heights of the earth; I will feed you with the heritage of your ancestor Jacob, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.  Amen.

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[1] Deuteronomy 5:12-15 and the BCP. p. 350

[2] Luke 13:15-16: cf., The Message. 

[3] John 3:30.

[4] Matthew 18:20.

[5] Genesis 2:2-3; Exodus 20:10.

[6] Book of Common Prayer. General Thanksgiving. P. 101.