Living on Sabbath Time: Day 1/31

Greetings my fellow PEPpers and Sabbath keepers!

Well, here we go on another new journey.  Eugene Peterson translates Proverbs 11:24 “The world of the generous gets larger and larger; the world of the stingy gets smaller and smaller.”

One of the things you are going to discover as you dare to stop doing things and start giving away time to God this month is that you are going to have more time than you had before.  Mark Buchanan in his book, “The Rest of God: Restoring Your Soul by Restoring Sabbath,” writes, “Generous people generate things.”

If you will be willing during this Sabbath month to “spend time” instead of managing time you are going to have time – the time of your life.  For example, God challenged the Jewish nation and each extended family to make provisions for every young couple to have a year off from work and military service simply to enjoy life together as newlyweds (Deut. 24:5).  Can you imagine
the health and happiness of a nation that would be willing to do that?  That nation would be a nation of strong healthy marriages that would produce strong healthy families that would produce strong healthy citizens, soldiers and workers.

In other words, God was telling the nation of Israel that if they would be willing to allow young couples to spend time on each other instead of having to manage every minute to maximize production and profit that in the long run they and the nation would be richer and better for it.  But it has never been done.  The nation, no family and no man could dare to release the time and resources to allow for God’s principles to work.  They couldn’t trust God enough to find rest.  They couldn’t trust God enough to give up control of their calendars for our calendars represent our time and our time represents our life and at the end of
the day that is the real issue of Sabbath – can I surrender my life to God?

So on this first day of our Sabbath month I challenge you to take a step of faith.  Somehow and in some way make a “Sabbath
decision” every day this month.  What does that mean?  Only time will tell, but I do know that God will be pleased with every baby step of faith that you take in trying to figure that out.  So, get ready for the time of your life as you experience the pleasure and joy of living on “Sabbath time.”

Resting in Him,

david l. kemp