Sabbath Economics March 25, 2007
Exodus 16:1-30
We have been looking at the 4th commandment over the past few weeks: “remember the Sabbath and keep it holy.”
Sabbath Declares God’s Provision
There are two things that happen in the beginning when God provides manna. Some people worry that there will not any manna provided tomorrow, so they hoard it so they can be sure to have some; other people don’t believe God’s command that they should collect double on Friday so that they can keep the Sabbath. Both are out of luck – the hoard goes rotten over night, and the people who do not collect enough for the Sabbath have to go hungry for that day.
When we keep the Sabbath by not working, we are saying that we believe that God is the one who provides our daily bread. Although we may receive a check from our employer, or the government, in the end, it is God who provides for our needs. We can trust him that if we take the day off, as he asks, there will still be food on the table. If our work is unpaid, we can trust that all of the things that we need to accomplish will not go away, that God will provide the time for us, and the resources to accomplish all that is important to him.
In this way, Sabbath keeping is an issue of trust; “do we trust God that there will be manna on the ground tomorrow?” Do we trust him that the manna will not go bad on the eve of our Sabbath? Do we really trust him that he is our provider, or do we need to control the situation to be sure that there is enough?
Some of the Israelites tried to control the situation and it made sure that there was not enough.
Sabbath Declares God’s Abundance
I’ve said before that a friend of mine read a book on personal economics, and one of the principles of the book was, “Live like you have enough.” The writer said that to show yourself that you really have enough, and you don’t need the “more, more, more” that the advertisers say we need, is to give 10% of your income to charity. Sound familiar? God says that we should give 10% of our income to him as well.
Sabbath is much like tithing in this way. It says “I don’t need to keep grasping for more, God has given me enough.
Retailers that didn’t want to open on Sundays a few years ago finally decided that they had to, or else they would lose “market share” to their competitors. There seems to be this theory that there is not enough to go around, so I must work harder to make sure that someone else does not get my share. God’s economics is difference – his economics is not one of “not enough;” It is an economics of abundance where five loaves and two fish are enough to feed 5,000 with 12 baskets left over! His economics are where there is enough food to feed everyone in the world if we just shared it equitably. His economics say that you will be blessed if you trust in him and obey him, not if you work every waking moment, and then some, to get ahead.
Sabbath says to stop grasping for more, and enjoy the abundance that God has given us.
Cheryl Bradbee writes in her Lenten devotional guide: “Sabbath economics are based on God’s promise of abundance for all creation – an abundance that does not require constant gathering. Sabbath-living requires that people put their faith in God, becoming “rich toward God” rather than rich in material treasures.”
Sabbath is a gift for your employees
If we go back to the Ten Commandments, where keeping the Sabbath is number 4, it says, "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.”
The Sabbath is not just for us, it is for the people that we hold sway over as well, not as a burden to place on them, but as a gift for them.
In Isaiah 58, God is responding to the people who had declared a fast inorder to get relief from God. But their fast is a sham, he says to them:
’Why have we fasted,’ they say,
’and you have not seen it?
Why have we humbled ourselves,
and you have not noticed?’
"Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please
and exploit all your workers.
4 Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife,
and in striking each other with wicked fists.
You cannot fast as you do today
and expect your voice to be heard on high.
It appears that they took the day to sit in ashes and cry out, but they made sure that their exploited workers continued their business throughout the day.
Our Sabbath is not a fast, but a feast, (although we do fast from work). We cannot think that God will be impressed with our Sabbath-keeping if we are forcing others to break the Sabbath.
Part of our Sabbath-keeping must be, as far as it is up to us, allowing others to enjoy the gift of Sabbath.
Sabbath is a gift for the poor
Sabbath year harvest
For the Law that God gave in the Old Testament, Sabbath was not just one day a week. It was also the seventh year. Every seventh year, the people were supposed to let the land go fallow – not plant anything on it, and they were not to harvest anything that grew on its own. What they were supposed to do was to allow the landless poor to come and harvest what grew on its own. It was a “get ahead” plan for the poor – they could glean from the fields, and likely sell some of what they gleaned back to the landholders!
Exodus 23:10-12
"For six years you are to sow your fields and harvest the crops, but during the seventh year let the land lie unplowed and unused. Then the poor among your people may get food from it, and the wild animals may eat what they leave. Do the same with your vineyard and your olive grove.
"Six days do your work, but on the seventh day do not work, so that your ox and your donkey may rest and the slave born in your household, and the foreigner among you as well, may be refreshed.
Actually, every year, the people were commanded not to harvest their fields right to the edges, not to shake all the olives from the trees, not to pick the grape vines clean, and if you accidentally left a sheaf of wheat out in the field, you were not supposed to go back and get it. You were to let the landless poor come behind you and glean what they could from your harvest so that they too could enjoy God’s bounty.
Part of observing the Sabbath is entering into this kind of economy where there is meaningful and paying work even for the poor.
My friend Rick Tobias, upon reflecting on the practice of gleaning figured that modern day gleaning could be saving unskilled jobs for the people who need them. This might mean keeping middleclass teenagers from the part-time Mc-jobs so that the people who need them to put food on the table could have them. It definitely means using real cashiers rather than a machine so that that low-skill job is kept for a human.
It definitely means keeping the work that you would normally do on the Sabbath for someone who needs the job.
One day a week is 14% of the week, if we all took a Sabbath, and the work of that day still had to get done, we could wipe out unemployment! (I know it’s more complicated than that, but it’s a beginning.)
As Sabbath is a declaration of God’s abundance, it also tells us that there is enough work to go around.
For the Christians who observe Sabbath on Sunday, it is a feast day, celebrating the Resurrection every week. That tells us that it is not necessarily a day for solemn reflection, but a day for eating with your family and friends and enjoying each other’s company in God’s presence.
Jesus says when you have a feast, be sure to invite the poor and destitute so they can celebrate too. (Luke 14:12-14)
Sabbath is a gift for the indebted and oppressed (Leviticus 25)
The year after the seventh Sabbath year was called the year of jubilee. If you remember your times tables, seven sevens are 49, so the year of Jubilee was the 50th year.
In the year of Jubilee, all debts were forgiven; any land that was sold because of poverty was returned to its family of origin. That way if Granddad was a bad businessman, or lazy or a drunkard, or if some calamity befell the family, the family was not regulated to be landless for the rest of history. The land would be returned to the family and they would once again have the means of production.
The Jubilee year was also a year to set people free who had become so destitute that they had to sell themselves as slaves. If you sold yourself, it was only until the Jubilee year, and then you were free.
Jesus and Jubilee – Luke 4 – year of the Lord’s favor
Jesus takes God’s economic policy and applies it spiritually – as we are slaves to sin and self, Jesus has declared the year of Jubilee and set us free! This does not negate God’s economic desires, but only expands the picture – that we would not be enslaved to anything or anyone
You might not have thought of it before, but keeping the Sabbath also means being concerned with equitable distribution of the means of production, and also being concerned with the freedom of slaves.
A good way to keep Sabbath today would be to see Amazing Grace, and then find out what you can do to see modern slaves set free.
Sabbath keeping starts with resting one day a week, but it is much bigger than that. It is about having a Sabbath attitude, and understanding God’s Sabbath economy, and economy where he is the provider, and he provides in abundance, an economy where everyone is involved in meaningful ways and where everyone is able to enjoy God’s rest without oppression.
Lets return to Isaiah 58 to hear God’s promise.
5 Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
only a day for people to humble themselves?
Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed
and for lying in sackcloth and ashes?
Is that what you call a fast,
a day acceptable to the LORD?
6 "Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?
7 Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
8 Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness will go before you,
and the glory of the LORD will be your rear guard.
9 Then you will call, and the LORD will answer;
you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.
"If you do away with the yoke of oppression,
with the pointing finger and malicious talk,
10 and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,
then your light will rise in the darkness,
and your night will become like the noonday.
11 The LORD will guide you always;
he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land
and will strengthen your frame.
You will be like a well-watered garden,
like a spring whose waters never fail.
12 Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins
and will raise up the age-old foundations;
you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls,
Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.
13 "If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath
and from doing as you please on my holy day,
if you call the Sabbath a delight
and the LORD’s holy day honorable,
and if you honor it by not going your own way
and not doing as you please or speaking idle words,
14 then you will find your joy in the LORD,
and I will cause you to ride in triumph on the heights of the land
and to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob."
For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.
