By Barry Casey
Theologian Stanley Hauerwas once said that the test of a church is in the kind of people it produces. Based on that stringent criterion, most churches would fail the test. Hauerwas was not grandstanding nor was he unduly harsh. The churches in Revelation come in for more criticism than he leveled. But, thanks be to God, we are also forgiven, encouraged, and inspired continually to follow Christ more faith- fully and reflect God’s love in the world. Nevertheless, whenever I rev up to criticize the church or Christianity in general, I remember Hauerwas’ warning. The church is what we make of it, but we often fall far short of what it could be.
Some years ago, I decided I needed to get back to basics. I had been raised an Adventist and then had chosen to become one. I had been raised a Christian and then chosen to become one. I had been a teacher of theology, a youth pastor, and had led evangelistic meetings in England, Wales, Canada, and California. But I knew that if I didn’t redefine Adventism for myself, in a form that had feet and could walk, I could no longer remain an Adventist.
Where to begin? I started with the name: Seventh-day Adventist. What could be more basic than that? It became clear to me that the ideas of the Sabbath and the Second Advent contained a complete and profound philosophy of life. The Sabbath and the Second Advent, to follow French Christian existentialist philosopher Gabriel Marcel’s thoughts, are mysteries, not problems. Problems have solutions and are outside us.
Mysteries have depths that can only be plumbed from within. To work with mysteries is to be changed and charged with spiritual energy. So, I want to look more closely at the lovely mystery of the Sabbath—and leave the Second Advent for the future.
I’d like to outline a personal theology of the Sabbath: first, as it relates to hope and suffering, and second, as it bears directly on resistance to evil and the transformation of suffering.
The Sabbath and hope
The Sabbath and hope share several characteristics essential for resistance to evil and the healing of suffering. The Sabbath is a gift from God to humans and thus has an element of grace about it; hope is a need intrinsic to human nature, the satisfaction of which comes most fruitfully from God as a gift of grace.
The Sabbath experience and hope are both future directed and point us beyond ourselves to the transcendent and the eschatological. While it is clear in the Old Testament that the Sabbath looks back to God’s initial creative activity, it is also clear that the Jews were asked to observe the Sabbath because it prefigured the ideal society of the future.1 Further, the weekly Sabbaths pointed forward to the sabbatical year in which fundamental relationships between humans, and between humans and nature, were to be restored. Debts were to be cancelled and the land to lie fallow so the minerals in the earth could be replenished.2 The sabbatical year, in turn, pointed forward to the great Year of Jubilee, the fiftieth year, in which land was to be returned to its original owners, all debts wiped out, and slaves set free. It was this eschatological symbol to which Jesus appealed in his inaugural sermon (Luke 4:18), in which he declared the messianic Sabbath to have begun.
The Sabbath, like hope itself, is an occasion for an opening up to oneself, to others and to God; it is the quintessential experience of communion. As a day of rest (but not inactivity) the Sabbath functions as a time to step back from common pursuits and discover ourselves anew. It opens us to communion with God as we realize we are created in God’s image.
The Sabbath as rest and peace
Both Jewish and Christian observance of the Sabbath is as a day of rest and peace. The Genesis account of creation indicates that the Sabbath is the time when God finished working and “refreshed Himself” (Ex. 31:17, NEB). In this rest God did not simply stop activity but enjoyed the works of His hands. This rest was thus an expression of joy and celebration of that which God had made.
In a similar manner, we are to rest on the Sabbath to allow ourselves perspective on what we are and what we shall become. Against the compulsive fear that we shall suffer if we are not working, the Sabbath is a reassurance that the world will not come to a halt because we do not produce seven days a week.
The Sabbath and creativity
As the Sabbath commemorates God’s creative work, so it may commemorate our own creativity. At the completion of the week, we offer up to God our work in God’s name. We turn these efforts over to God in the hope that sincere works done to restore healing and promote justice will have a liberating effect.
The Sabbath also affirms us as beings created in the image of God, as social beings from the beginning. The Sabbath brings us into a community where we may open up to each other and provide nurture and support in resistance to despair and cynicism.
The Sabbath and liberation
The Sabbath is also the assurance of God’s willingness to infuse present history with the work of liberation. The Sabbath as a sign of God’s activity in history is a call to cooperate with God in liberation to undo the works of evil.
The Sabbath also reminds us of the struggle and conflict in achieving liberation. But as the remembrance of the long- ago deliverance of the Exodus, it becomes the basis of hope in the present. The Sabbath as a symbol of God’s liberating activity is a dangerous memory.
For us, the Sabbath is a symbol of hope over suffering which draws individuals into solidarity. Such a community can become the flashpoint of justice and liberation in its sphere. The Sabbath calls us to trust and to make ourselves available to others in communion and service. As a living memorial to creation, the Sabbath gives us a framework for our identity as humans and calls us to co-creatorship for the works of justice and peace. As a dangerous memory of suffering and hope, the Sabbath calls us to remember our captivity so that we might continue the work of liberation.
But true hope is realistic about evil. The cost of hope, like the cost of discipleship, lies in learning to live with Sabbath as a sign of God’s activity in history is a call to cooperate with God in liberation to undo the works of evil.
The Sabbath also reminds us of the struggle and conflict in achieving liberation. But as the remembrance of the long-ago deliverance of the Exodus, it becomes the basis of hope in the present. The Sabbath as a symbol of God’s liberating activity is a dangerous memory.
For us, the Sabbath is a symbol of hope over suffering which draws individuals into solidarity. Such a community can become the flashpoint of justice and liberation in its sphere. The Sabbath calls us to trust and to make ourselves available to others in communion and service. As a living memorial to creation, the Sabbath gives us a framework for our identity as humans and calls us to co-creatorship for the works of justice and peace. As a dangerous memory of suffering and hope, the Sabbath calls us to remember our captivity so that we might continue the work of liberation.
But true hope is realistic about evil. The cost of hope, like the cost of discipleship, lies in learning to live with ambiguity and with suffering. We do not seek suffering; it comes to us unbidden. And the process of hope confirms the necessity of hope, if for no other reason than hope refuses to admit defeat and thus survives. As long as there is a protest, however faint, against the systems of evil, they are vulnerable.
I believe the Sabbath experience can give people courage and hope. But since there is always a risk to faith in resisting evil and transforming suffering, there is no unequivocal assurance of victory. Yet, the Sabbath is our invitation to hopeful journeying.
–Barry Casey taught religion, philosophy, and communications for 37 years at universities in Maryland and Washington, D.C. He is now retired and writing in Burtonsville, Maryland. More of the author’s writing can be found on his blog, Dante’s Woods. Email him at: [email protected]
References
- Dresner, Samuel H. The Sabbath (New York: The Burning Bush Press, 1970), pp. 63-64. 2. Edwards, Tilden. Sabbath Time: Understanding and Practice for Contemporary Christians (New York: Seabury Press, 1982), p. 13.