It has, for some reason, recently been a thread of thought for me wondering about the implications of some of God’s commandments, and how they would apply to a newly forming civilization in ancient days. Everything in our age is so established, that it’s interesting to me to think about the requirements necessary to properly keep some of them.
Today I was thinking of one of the Ten Commandments, specifically, to keep the sabbath day holy (Exodus 20:8). It occurred to me that in order to keep this one, that a society-civilization would have to have some kind of a calendar system in order to keep it. And with that, I started thinking of some of the principles related to that. For instance, I believe that it could imply a sense of order in our own lives and houses. How can you keep the Sabbath if you aren’t prepared for it, or even know when it is?
I don’t really have much more to comment on the matter, since that was really my only thoughts so far. On a personal matter, though, I find it easier to “keep” the sabbath if I look at it from a certain perspective. Growing up, I always had a pessimistic approach of it, where I basically considered it a day of all the things I couldn’t go and do — shopping, sports, whatever. But now, I try to look at as a sabbatical, which oddly enough, has a more effective approach linguistically for me.
I believe that the Lord considers it a day of rest, and that’s what I tell myself to do on Sundays: give it a rest. If I wanna go play on the computer or spend time on video games (which I don’t really consider all that bad, but wouldn’t really say it’s all that great either), I tell myself to just give it a rest for one day.
The other week I was sick for a few days, and was stuck at home doing pretty much nothing. I decided to stay completely off the computer while I was at home resting, because I know that sitting myself hunched over a terminal all day long isn’t really gonna help me get better much quickly. What ended up being just a few days with a cough and some body pains, actually turned into an incredibly positive experience because I got to give the normal day-to-day routine of my life a rest, a real sabbatical, and it gave me some serious insight into my daily habits. I had not only the time, but the peace of mind to read, to think about things, to write down my thoughts, and worship. I was a little sad to have to go back to the daily grind.
Anyway, that’s all. 🙂