SUNDAY /SABBATH

GOD'S GIFT TO YOU John M. Buchanan
Mark 2:23-3:6 Broad Street Presbyterian Church
June 17, 1979 Columbus, Ohio

I remember clearly the time when the closest thing
SS eens

to hell itself was a hot summer Sunday afternoon -
a

particularly if you happened to be a boy of ten. \ The ules

— *

|

were unwritten, but omnipresent nevertheless. | Blessed with

ESS
parents who were more human than pious, I was only partially

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a victim of Saréery a! In my case prohibition

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waiget
seemed to be related to the pala a of a particular activity,
——

for Some Rasen
or the perspiration it generated. | Riding a bicycle was
=e

allowed, playing basketball was not. \ The best Sunday
Pe
appees OT au

activity, of course, was reading. \ Mostly , however, I was a
Ea » neerbel teieciatiae 2

horri - if - observe \ pp t
orrified if somewhat curious r I suppose i

didn't hurt them, but I do recall the ones who remained in

their Sunday clothes throughout the hot afternoon, sitting

on the porch, forbidden to play e=gmme!/I recall the signal
—— RS ee

we had to indicate that their parents had dozed and that
it was safe for me to bring them Tie comics from our Sunday

paper - the only color in their drab Sabbath.

From the time I first thought about it I never could

bring myself to believe that God cared much one way or
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—e

the other about the way his people spent their Sunday
Oe eS SSS

afternoons.\ A Harmless idiosyncracy, it has always seemed.

And yet the topic represents a venerable tradition and, in
sin ine etelieeeeiiaaliieny

a very real sense, it does contain provocation and conflicting
—_ ee eee

expression of religious conviction.

The whole topic is full of both humor and_tragedy.

On March 13, 1842 the first*train ran from Glasgow to

Edinburgh. | me Presbytery of Glasgow/"denounced the running

of Sunday trains as a flagrant violation of the law of God
eee

Elna hia tT Te ee aeommanamabs , 2 grievous outrage

eae —_————

on the religious feelings of the people of Scotland, a
a a aa

powerful temptation to the careless and ing oe eerent -

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caadetenblvempninbinae an eCr eet GE ae and@most’ aan ae
to the quiet of the rural _parishes along the line, by the

introduction into them every_Sabbath of many of the

ace

profligate and dissipated who inhabit the cities of Glasgow

Enis ail

and Edinburgh". | In Edinburgh a delegation of ministers

lined the platform andU'informed the detraining passengers
Yl

that they had bought tickets to hell". ) (Maurice Lindsay,

A Portrait of Glasgow, cited by William Barclay, The Ten

Commandments for Today, p.37-38).

That's the silly part.\ The tragedy is in the report

EI
of Peter MacKenzie regarding an Irish family on the streets
[ee ee “(Gee
of Glasgow, on a snowy night in isa7] "one child out of

seven dead, \the mother herself dying of consumption, yictims

of a church ruling that soup kitchens for the destitute were
a

not to be opened on the Sabbath for fear of offending the

tora." (crbia, p.38).

—

How in the world can Christian people start with

the compassion of Jesus Christ and somehow end up with
——————_-i_2— Ss SE

a child dying of hunger because it happens to be Sunday

seemed to enjoy the company of little children and the

night?) What connection is there between the Lord who
SSS sees:

sad scenario of youngsters sitting in their best clothes,
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grimly sweltering on a hot afternoon?

See

Obviously my conclusion is that there is no connection
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at all.} And yet t#es dynamic¥ontinues to show itself in
ae

lite. The very best intentions, the noblest ideas, seem to
Sere ee

go awry, after they have been institutionalized for very lon a

Li
ing any event, how we got from there to here is a story
ee

worth knowing, I think.

The idea of a Sabbath was purely Jewish \ diameter

The Babylonians devised a seven day week :\ the Romans assigned
Sa Saas feeeerOnetetoes lH sR

each day to a deity :\ the current names of the days come from
A SSS SSE

the names of Scandanavian gods - Wednesday from Woden,

Thursday from Thor, for instance.

The idea of one day out of seven assigned for rest\ the

idea that the pattern is part of the natwyve of things from

eal

the creation itself: the notion that observing a Sabbath is
ie

vital to the health and well-being of the people - that is

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pure Judaism, and ~ I would add - pure genius, \ put over

the centuries, particularly in times of intense piety and
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penitence, the aummlm@et Jews turned their laws inward,
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studying them, interpreting them and inevitably expanding

them.\ Nowhere was that process_so thorough as in the area
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of Sabbath observances,
See ane

Let me illustrate.

———

They Commereed -M forbade work.

Er

\ Ce encoendinat=

But what is work? \ ne expanded law identified thirty-nine
_—

different categories, and each one was subdivided many times.

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One category was carrying a purden.\ But what is a burden?
re, bd

Is a child a burden”), No ~ but if the child has a stone in
—_—ik Ee

his hand he or she is burden 4\ But w at, actly, is the
a burde h exactly, -

definition of a stone?" (See Barclay, p.27).

The earliest Christians were Jews and it never occurred
EEC rw Ld

to them not to observe the Sabbath. \ana yet, from the very

= =,

earliest days Christian people have been drawn to the first
=e ee

with
day of the week, the day of Resurrection, the day ASRS

bnemnaninnes cn a_i

ere
The Lord's pay |r" was their Special day, the day on which
[ore
they gathered te worship. \ey the end of the second century
am F emmnisiami sine octal

Ba endneam reese
assigned to the Sun goud| Trey called it - after Easter -
ba

the idea of a Sabbath had simply disappeared from the
=e.
Christian Church.% Early theologians, in fact, advised

Christians to avoid Sabbath observance. \ The Lord's Day was for
Cael nd

worship - otherwise it was an ordinary day, full of ordinary
se

activity. Like Fs Wonder ‘or Ube- wien Praqers ratte

_— Ware + Wolke % erty.

But when the Roman Emporer Constantine became a Christian,

by edict he made the Lord's Day a kind of noataay. \ror: was
eee, eet / <a errr

Q new clramcat sdec.

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2
cutlawed - only in the cities.| Constantine was not subtie

et

at all.| Christian soldiers were given Sunday oft | Non-
—_— — ‘SpemarpoTTiacamiienrie—

Christian soldiers spent the day parading and memorizing

eo rey

Christian prayers in case they might wish to reconsider.
eo id

Constantine started something which has never stopped.
=e

=

cul
2 ble ow” In 735 a theologian named Alciun came to the radical
eral te manana

Ee
Ne eee conclusion that the Lord's Day was a kind of Sabbath. | Thomas

pm A
Acquinas, in the 13th_century took the idea to its limits

pit” by teaching that the Sabbath is changed into the Lord s Day.
And shortly thereafter the Christian Church had as ma nyjrules
eterno

as the first century Scribes and Pharisees.
—_——

The Reforers tried to reverse the process | both Calvin
ae ae = ER

and Luther disavowed the identification of Sabbath with

Sunday. | But, they failedl In fact, the idea was 2 tavorite “Byer

ators eae abba Wes Madr BOeci A

pastim When they came to power in England under Cromwell

aaa.
William Barclay writes that (They ordered every Maypole in

England cut down , [turned Christ ah@ into a penitential fast
and enacted a series of Saeem.Sunday observance laws including
SET et
some which forbad fall vain and profane walking on the
Lory

ae

Sabbath! Ncbid, 36).

They called their clergy together at Westminster and
Cal Lam miami il

wrote a monumental confession of Reformed Presbyterian Faith.
r See EN

And theyincluded in it their curious and unbiblical obsession
f ‘CERCA oe enisere Sail

with the Sabbath.

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wld eva re Ne m Su WS - attyrnre . Mow

in ¢ he

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pict,

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got

hets Yow Sad Pecawn 2&2 Sanat ~

Lat _ Mneys my sid wie long Pate,

,» let's

go back and see what the book says. foux text this morning

naire . . el

contains - brief vignettes which contrast the behavior
re REAL — Seaman

and teaching of Jesus with the religious law, the Sabbath

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eneiane

law in particular.
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. . ager e
In the first instance Jesus and his disciples —mp
i

caught picking grain from a field which they MER csing.

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The law allowed for sojourners to help themselves when hungry.
i

But it W& the Sabbath. In fact, they homes brokG» four

different Sabbath laws prohibiting, reaping, winnowing

_—eeee—

threshing and preparing a neal.f When the Pharisees accused

wwe

him Jesus refera@ithem to the story in I Samuel 21 about the
TEC

time David, himself, fleeing for hig Jife and desperately

hungry, ate the sacred bread. Scripture, that is to say,

eee,
contains an instance where human need is more important

Feel

than religious rute.| The important point here is what Jesus

said next:{ "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the

eee nel
Sabbath .") That is, the idea of a Sabbath is a good one\\ Tt
eee ‘TREE ORSRCE TE CEE nie”

was intended to make life better and fuller and healthier.

ewemwecerc- ITI

But somehow, things are upside down \ The Sabbath has become
mene

sacred in and of itself. 0 bacrity it Nie deci aa. oud
=e ’ .

‘=o a
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The second incident is poignant. \ rt involves a man
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with a crippled hand.{ It involves a curious Sabbath
Pen el

stipulation that in case of critical illness, steps maypebe
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taken to prevent a person from dying, but not to make him or
a] /—_

her better. | Jesus knew the rules.|JHe also could have met

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the man later out back and healed his hand. fThe account,

however, indicates that he had had enough.) He was looking
——————_——_—

for a test case and this was it. |i full view of everyone
ee a ST

inside the Synagogue on the Sabbath, he healed the man,
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after he had explained in the simplest possible terms that
ar ia ain aa le a el Se

it is always lawful to do good on the Sabbath.

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It is so very easy to be critical and so very difficult
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for us to comprehend the serigqusness with which a devout

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Jew took Sabbath observance » aard the ways in which the

, dynamic exists in our own lives.\ Langdon Gilkey, University
‘Glomee

of Chicago theologian, commenting on the human prospect wrote

a paragraph I recall every time I find myself sitting in a
Sn ge 7j_SeSee

meeting and pondering the fact that what we are talking
_..... ee

about has absolutely nothing to do with the stated purposes

Qmeee- —U lO Se

of the group that is meeting. \ Gilkey wrote:{ "As every

advanced technological society has discovered human beings

are not so much the masters as the servants of the organizations
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(eater

they have created, servants in the pre cise sense that they
‘(ine

~
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find themselves caught and rendered inwardly hopeless within

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the system insofar as they participate in it at a.)

{Reaping the Whirlwind, p.12).

The passage in Mark, I conclude, is not just about some
enemas comer

illy religious rules. | It is about an almost demonic human
gilly
Se aa Fe ead

tendency to create institutions to serve humanity ,

kK Ao sgerd Wore Da Walobed~ MW Yralivekes
Mew Quis vs Gor,
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w

{=

enero
yen grope
& wi

yyerdd °

to invest more importance in the institution than the
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purpose it is supposed to be servitl. sometimes to baptize
eS eT ES

the institution with sanctity and fall down to worship it.
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Thomas Jefferson apparently believed that the only way
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for a nation state to perpetuate its creative vigor was to
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have an occasional revolution, and to rid itself of the dead
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weight of the structure and _pureaucracies it had

accumulated. \ Dangerous words, those \_ And yet recent history
_—_ ass
=

is the story of Presidential despair over the simple

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inability of anyone b-. significantly budge the bureaucracy
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of government .\ It is not, by the way, confined to

the Federal level .\ me dynamic is alive and well -
SS.

——
in your local P.T.A., which group I abandoned \in @nother
——_ as ‘. =

hasten to add,)

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city I when I discovered\its chief purpose
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was to earn money to send delegates to a jon to learn
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how to make money so that next year's delegates could go
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to the convention.

I think Christians - in the mold of Jesus himself,
Sa ae aS

t to be the very ones who ask the embarassing, obnoxious
ad —oem —
questions ===—siemmtoabede think we s hould have learned
ea SSE aa SE Say
by now that there is not a human institutiog anywhere, of
Saas

any size, that will not become a self-perpetuating bureaucracy
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straying from its intent, if someone doesn't ask the questions:

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I believe that is true of governments, prisons, police,
ES — Ss ===

welfare departments, hospitals, universities, courts, armies,
eq aT ae SE

~9-

navies, service clubs and Little League Baseball teams.

I believe Christians ought to be the very ones who drag
Samar sen pada ddan

their feet,\¥call for a point of order, \tapie the motion, or
=

at least guffaw whenever any institute’ begins to call itself
ai renner

sacred.\ That, we should know by now, is the firgi step

Dal
toward idolatry and disaster.\ Christians ,in the mold of
weer, EN: ne

Jesus, should know by now that the only thing sacred in this

=a
universe is God himself and the people in whom he has planted
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his image Causes, governments, laws, organizations, churches,
ame 0 Ghee — aeltneeR

are not sacred:4in this life only people are.
— errr

al

Christian men and women, in the moid, of Jesus ought
derecseriee a /
to know that their religion is a remembering and a celebrating

and a practicing of love, love Jiyed out : in the

worta:\that their religion has stopped being Christian

when it may be described as a list of prohibitions.
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And if we can assimilate and live that, we need and
rE neem

deserve a Sabet .\\ In its proper and original perspective
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Bid
it is a rich part of our heritage) It intended to k p life

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in tocus:\ to avoid the idolatry of too much work \ to season
Lede ll
Labor with leisure. \rt speaks to an urgent pod very

contemporary needwenamely, the need for unstructured and

empty time in our Lives: \tne need for solitude and quigt:

b af i ther * the critical
the nee or parents and children. to be toge her, e er

~ 10 =

need for husbands and wives,
==

pont for the sake of their

relationship to stop doing and start being.
a) ——

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Without legalism, I am convinced that we need a
SaaS

aes
renewed idea of Sabbath:\ that even though God may not be
Saar ey

TATE ou Sky

offended because the stores are open, our person’ health
Sarr, eae SD Le!

and well being - in which He "Bavitally interested — are

=e ray

better served making more creative use of that time .That's

the point realty \ Sabbath was a gift of God.4{ Sunday can
Sem ST Sa

and should be the same:\a precious gift of a day which He wants us tc
T dwt ew sent)
enjoy. bows be
a som ; sr 6a.
W old hymn out of another era entirely, says it

bid we woul
eloquently, and with a delightful Sunday eccentricity... de “a

This is the day of rest: —lv (clover
Our failing strength renew:

oun weary brain and troubled breast,

She Thou thy freshening dew.

Amen.

Help us, this day, our Father, to relax more: to slow our pace,
to live each moment for its own sake. Help us, this day,

our Father, tc do those important things we have been too

busy to do all week. God, our Father, this is the day you
have made. We rejoice in it. We are glad for it. Give us

grace to enjoy it.
Amen.