A Time to Be Refreshed

So the sons of Israel shall observe the sabbath, to celebrate the sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant.’ It is a sign between Me and the sons of Israel forever; for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, but on the seventh day He ceased from labor, and was refreshed.
—Exodus 31:16–17

God gave us the Sabbath not only for our physical well-being but also for our emotional well-being. The fact is, in today’s technological world, very few of us suffer from calloused skin or bruised muscles from our work. But the emotional stress associated with the work we do is sometimes more taxing than the physical stress that people endured a hundred years ago.

Many of you know of William Wilberforce. He was a member of the English Parliament. He was a Christian who was largely responsible for the abolition of slavery in Great Britain. William Wilberforce was a tremendously godly man, but he had a problem with ambition. It has been said that ambition would have killed William Wilberforce if it had not been for his observance of the Sabbath. On Sundays Wilberforce refused to work or even think about work. Instead it was a time for rest and for worship. In one of his spiritual journals, Wilberforce wrote, “Blessed be to God for the day of rest and religious occupation wherein earthly things assume their true size and ambition is stunted.”

For six days a week, the things of this world are in our focus and they seem so large, so giant. But on Sundays, we turn away from our everyday concerns and we see things as God sees them. Think about a rubber band. You can stretch that rubber band, but if you keep it stretched too long and too far, eventually it’s going to snap. It’s the same way with us emotionally. There needs to come a time when we relax the tension. That day is the Sabbath.

Here’s another interesting observation about the Sabbath. God, in talking about the Sabbath, said, “It is a sign between Me and the sons of Israel forever; for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, but on the seventh day He ceased from labor, and was refreshed” (Exodus 31:17). Isn’t that a neat thought? God Himself was refreshed on the Sabbath. This tells me that on the Sabbath it’s not enough just to quit working, but we need to do something to refresh ourselves emotionally. Sometime on Sundays you ought to do something you want to do, something that refreshes you emotionally. Maybe read a book, take a nap, go for a walk, or watch a television program or a football game. Do something that refreshes you emotionally. That’s what God says the Sabbath is for. He was refreshed on the Sabbath.

The Sabbath should be something we look forward to. That is God’s wisdom. The Sabbath is a time to refresh ourselves emotionally.

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Today’s devotion is excerpted from “Working Ourselves to Death” by Dr. Robert Jeffress, 2008.
Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1960,1962,1963,1968,1971,1972,1973,1975,1977,1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.