On Keeping the Sabbath

I tend to shy away from anything that might awaken the latent legalist inside me, but my church’s recent focus on Sabbath has me curious, if slightly wary.

My first week of intentional Sabbath was a success. Part of the challenge was to get 8–9 hours of sleep for seven nights in a row. No problem. I just set aside the demands of a family of six, my World Lit students, the graduation ceremony I’m supposed to be planning, my part-time job at church, and my other part-time job as a writer.

On Day 1, after three nights of sleep deprivation, I overslept and arrived an hour late for church, skidding into the parking lot just before the Scripture reader and pastor, and long after the rest of the production team. The extra hour helped me get 7 hours of sleep, which is pretty close to 8, so I counted it as the first full night.

On my actual Sabbath, which for me is Monday since Sunday is a workday, I slept in and then took a walk in the sunshine while listening to a Christian podcast (if a podcast can, in fact, be Christian). I didn’t touch the compelling novel I was reading because it was the Sabbath, and that’s the book I read all the other days and the one that is, in fact, the main reason for my not getting eight hours of sleep a night. (Sometimes I need a little distance from the books I love most.)

Later I sat in the backyard, sang worship songs, and listened to the birds tweeting and squirrels chittering. I answered the Sabbath questions in our Bible study but was dismayed to realize that the longer I sat there, the less happy I felt. What were these worrisome thoughts niggling at me? I journaled, probed, prayed, and then distracted myself by playing with the dog. One can only endure so much navel-gazing…

On my second Sabbath, I spent the day contemplating a screen-free Sabbath while writing an Instagram post about it.

The third week, my clumsy attempts to apply the Sabbath teaching yielded to the not-so-gentle pressure of my calendar. I had, months before, scheduled two of my teens to get their wisdom teeth out early that day. This made for, at times, an entertaining Sabbath as I watched them surface from anesthesia. My normally melancholy son was delighted with everything—the dental technician, me, the warm blanket they gave him, the news that his brother was getting his teeth extracted in the next room. All of it was cause for great joy, and he bestowed a beaming smile on everyone who entered.

Oh, and did I mention my college-age son was home for spring break? And we were hosting extended family? After procuring the requisite painkillers and four kinds of applesauce, I drove my patients home and spent the rest of the day running back and forth to the freezer, switching out ice packs. I logged 9000 steps between the family room and kitchen and got 19 stand hours. A productive Sabbath if there ever was one.

The most unexpected Sabbath was the fourth week, when I went to an arts conference, nervous because I didn’t know anyone except the friend I went with and because a not-so-small part of me is still in middle school. I sat down next to a writer who was kind and welcoming, which gave me the courage to go on, only to be confronted by the astonishing thought that the Holy Spirit is evident in the Narnia books, just as the Father and Son are. A passage from The Silver Chair brought God close with subtle beauty and grace and nary a hint of preachiness.

But when I attended the Goodness Tea Party (which I had signed up for purely because of the name), I was undone. Unknown but gifted writers shared original poems and did what all great writers do—somehow find words for the deep things of the heart.

If I were further along in my Sabbath journey, I might relay the lessons learned and look ahead to the transformation God is performing in me. But my one small takeaway is this: Sabbath is not only a day; it’s a state of heart, and when my heart is intimately connected to my Creator, I am most at rest. Sometimes we go looking for Sabbath, and sometimes it finds us.