NRS Luke 13
10 Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath. 11 And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and was quite unable to stand up straight. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, "Woman, you are set free from your ailment." 13 When he laid his hands on her, immediately she stood up straight and began praising God. 14 But the leader of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had cured on the sabbath, kept saying to the crowd, "There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day." 15 But the Lord answered him and said, "You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger, and lead it away to give it water? 16 And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the sabbath day?" 17 When he said this, all his opponents were put to shame; and the entire crowd was rejoicing at all the wonderful things that he was doing.

The peace of God, which passes all human understanding, keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of God; for the sake of Jesus the Messiah. Amen.

God wants you to have a day off. Seriously. One day out of every seven God wants you to have 24 hours in which you are free to do absolutely nothing. Take a long nap and go for a leisurely walk. Float on an inner tube and stare at the clouds. Kick your feet up and watch a dumb movie. God wants you to have a day off.

That's not a day to catch up on the stuff you didn't get done on the previous six. It's not a day to prepare for the coming six. It's not a day to do the bills, clean the house, wash the car, run the clothes, do your homework, finish the book report, or exhaust yourself having fun. It's a day to rest. It's a day free of obligations. It's a day to rejoice in the reign of God come to earth in Jesus.

This is how Jesus interpreted the Sabbath. Contrary to his opponents, Jesus did not explain the Sabbath in lists of do's and don'ts. Unlike the Pharisees, Jesus didn't prescribe how far you could walk or what you could lift on the Sabbath. For Jesus, the Sabbath was all about freedom, God's freedom. When Jesus healed the woman all bent over and stooped from what Luke calls a "spirit of weakness," Jesus was exercising God's compassion to free this woman so that she, too, may enter into and enjoy the peace of God's Sabbath.

Jesus' understanding of the Sabbath differed radically from the religious authorities of his day, but what Jesus did not do was to abolish the Sabbath. Jesus did not scratch the Third Commandment. Jesus did not say, "Oh, do whatever you want to do whenever you want to do it." In Jesus' teaching, we keep the Sabbath not to earn points with God, but as a concrete way of trusting God. In keeping the Sabbath, in taking that day to do nothing, we are trusting that God really does rule, that our lives are really, truly, and safely in God's hands, that creation in all its goodness does not finally depend upon us and our strivings. The whole world is not resting on our shoulders, but we are, in fact, resting in the good and gracious will of God.

As I think today's Gospel makes clear, Jesus allowed tremendous latitude in how, where, and when we keep the Sabbath. In his letter to the Romans (14: 5,6), Paul assumes that Christians are free to observe any day of their choosing as a Sabbath to the Lord. In the pagan culture of his time, Paul recognized that not everyone would have the social or economic freedom to observe the same day of rest and worship. But what Paul also understood was that, in Jesus, God's Sabbath peace had broken into this world in a way that allowed believers to begin each week, not with work and responsibility, but with rest and refreshment in the Kingdom Jesus has brought to earth.

I think one of the great tragedies of my generation has been the eclipse and virtual loss of the Sabbath. When I was a kid, I remember watching "The Jetsons." (Remember?...) In that cartoon future, work would be just a matter of pushing a few buttons and putting your feet up on a desk. We'd fly around in hover craft while robots did our housework, cooked our food, and walked our dog. And with everything automated, we'd have just tons and tons of free time to polish our nails, eat bon-bons, and take exotic vacations.

I suppose in some ways that future has come to pass. We now have gadgets and gizmos that would make even the Jetsons green with envy. Thanks to automation, both at work and at home, we have, praise God, been relieved of untold drudgery that bent the backs and broke the spirits of earlier generations. But for all those time-saving devices, do we really have any more time? It seems like so much of our technology has not really resulted in more time for us to rest and relax, but more time for us to work harder and take on new responsibilities. And sometimes it seems like we're less the masters of our technology, and more its slaves. How many of you have to carry cell phones and pagers from work? How many of you have to take shifts at being on 24-hour call? How many of you sometimes have to go weeks, maybe months, without a full day off? And how many days do you come home from work so stressed and burned out that the only thing you can do is crash in front of the TV set? The line between home and work has become so blurred that we often don't know whether we're coming or going. Sad but true, the most common complaint I hear from people is that they're exhausted and overcommitted and have way too much to do with far too little time in which to do it. So much for the Jetsons!

God wants you to have a day off, and me, too. You know, I'm preaching not only to you but to myself as well. Even on vacation, Carolyn will sometimes look at me and say, "Can't you just sit still? Why do you always have to be doing something?" That's a good question, and yes, my hyper-ness may have something to do with our time and culture and technology, but it also has a lot to do with me and my insecurities. I believe in God's grace, sealed in the blood of Jesus, but like you, there's also a part of me that doubts that grace; that tells me I have to prove and justify myself; and that if I let up for just a moment, much less a day, then everything is going to come crashing down. How arrogant! And how foolish!

God wants us to have a day off. God wants us to have a taste of the Kingdom right here and right now, and not just sometime in the future or when we die. God wants us to have a day when we let go to let God be God, our God, as revealed in the great compassion and tender mercies of Jesus Christ. Of course, there's a big difference between having that day and taking that day. To take the day that God has given us requires discipline. It means resisting the pressures that come both from within and without ourselves to stay busy, don't rest, don't trust, and for God's sake, don't let anyone catch you doing nothing. It means turning off the cell phone and getting off the clock to listen for God's voice and dwell in God's eternity, if for but a moment. It demands planning and it requires leadership. Especially in families, keeping the Sabbath means that we all have to pitch in and support one another so that we can all have at least that one day to bask in the glory of God's all-sufficient grace.

It's not easy, but it's not optional, either.

In the Name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.