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Today, when weather permitting, is when we would celebrate River Sunday, a Sunday about rest and relaxation with our fellow siblings in Christ at this church.
Those are the things we most associate with the Sabbath: Rest, Relaxation, the absence of work. But that is not all that the Sabbath is about, as Jesus shows us in Luke this morning.
If rest was all the Sabbath was about, then Jesus would not have cured this woman or upset the leader of the synagogue. The Sabbath is not just what we get out of it. To say that would be to follow what I like to call the entertainment model of worship. This is the model where our worship is simply about what we get from it and nothing more.
The Sabbath is not even about what we give on this day. If so, all Jesus, the woman, and everyone else would have been doing is praising God, nothing more. There is praise in this reading, but not before Jesus performs his healing.
What the Sabbath is really about is both what we give to God and what we receive. Jesus makes it clear from His chastising the leader of the synagogue that what is involved in this healing is the work of God. First of all, the recipient of the healing is a "daughter of Abraham", and thus part of God's chosen people. Second, Jesus says she has been bound by Satan. The only one who can unbind the works of the evil one is God Alone.
God isn't just working on the Sabbath, God is interacting with us as human beings. God is building a relationship with us, and we in turn are building our relationship with God as well.
Building relationship is what the Sabbath is all about. That is why we worship in the way that we do. We hear what God has to say to us. We receive the gift of God's Word, and then we respond to it, like the woman, with praise and thanksgiving.
Even the Eucharist shows this back and forth with the Lord in worship. We offer gifts up to God, and we in turn receive the gift of the Holy Spirit making Jesus present for us "in the breaking of the bread."
This is why regular Sunday attendance is so vital to each and every one of us. It is a weekly reminder to us build up our relationship with God. It is the weekly act to build that relationship as well. We need Sunday because it brings us closer to God.
We rest on Sunday not just because we need rest, although we do. We don't need it just because we cannot continue our work without a break, which many of us know is also true. We rest on Sunday so that we can have a time to be with God. We set aside this time as a Holy thing so that we can build our relationship up with God.
I hope you enjoy this time of rest and relaxation together on Sunday. I also hope you will continue to come and rest with us each and every Sunday because we need this time to build our relationship with God. Ultimately, my hope is that this and every Sunday will be a day that you can become closer to God, that you can listen to God, and that you can grow in love and relationship with our Lord.