Yesterday we explored a story about Jesus and his followers eating grain in the fields on a Saturday, a day of rest, and getting in trouble from the religious authorities. In his response, Jesus referred to one of the great heroes of the Jewish faith, David, who ate holy bread in the temple when he was starving. He mentions the story, and lets the religious authorities do what they do best – argue about God while God is standing right there. He asks them why David got away with eating holy bread, since David was never condemned for eating it.
This story illustrates Jesus’ approach to two kinds of law. There is God’s law given at creation about the Sabbath: rest on the seventh day…period. That stands, and that’s actually what Jesus is about – giving us eternal rest, even today. But there is also the ritual/Sabbath/ceremonial law that is built on top of the basic commandment at creation. Think of it like scaffolding around a structure to help build it – it can be very helpful in following God’s law. But we don’t want to let it obscure God’s original purpose and law. This scaffolding is a reality of our sin or rebellion from God. Our hearts don’t naturally follow God’s law anymore, and so we need these additional structures. But, don’t forget they are provisional…until something comes along and makes them obsolete
Then Jesus comes along and says, “I am Lord of the Sabbath.”
He claims to be God, and gives an invitation to find rest in him, and to stop wrestling with sin and other sinful realities around us, to stop wrestling with ourselves, and just rest in him as he fights those battles.
Claims like this got him in trouble with the Pharisees and Scribes, and eventually their urging that he be killed. But in doing, they made him Lord of the Sabbath…exactly what he’d said.
On the cross, he is restless for us – huge work. He takes on the restlessness of our sin and because of that, we can rest, not on our work overcoming sin and brokenness in our lives, but on his work.
We see him showing that the day of rest, the Sabbath, isn’t the point, just as the temple bread wasn’t the point. God is the point. Resting in God is the point. We’ll see how tomorrow.
Question: Why do you think Jesus’ claims were so offensive to the religious legalists?
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Hi. Welcome to Redeem the Commute. I’m Ryan, your host for the daily challenges. We’re in the middle of a series right now called Reset, where we look at how following Jesus resets our thinking about various topics in life. This week we’re thinking about how Jesus resets our view of nature.
The daily challenges are meant to help us explore what it means to follow Jesus, even in the midst of a busy commuting lifestyle. We have a rhythm that we follow each week to help us explore our topic. We introduce the idea on Monday, then Tuesday’s we study it in the Bible. Wednesday’s we try to let the Bible’s teaching sink in, and change and transform our thinking. Thursday’s we try to act out what we’ve been learning. Friday’s a day for prayer and reflection, and then Saturday’s a day for rest.
Sunday is a day for community, because even when we are scattered and busy, it is important that we come together as one community to explore Jesus and what it means to follow him in one place. That’s why this Fall we’re planning to launch a new worshiping community in Ajax called Redeemer Church. Stay tuned for more information.
When I say that following Jesus resets our view of nature, you may wonder where I’m going with this. Am I going to say that following Jesus means we don’t need to worry about the environment? That we’re all going to fly away to Heaven someday, so it doesn’t matter what happens here, this is just kind of a disposable world? Well, that’s actually not consistent with Christian belief, and we’re going to explore this week how Christian belief resets our view of nature in a new and unexpected way perhaps.
I’m standing here in the beauty of nature. This is a place where a lot of people have moments where they feel particularly in awe of God. A lot of people say things like, “Oh, I don’t need to go to church. I can just worship God in nature.” There’s a lot of truth to that. We can worship God in nature. Nature is a place where we can really appreciate God’s handiwork as a creator. Where we can really see God as an artist.
I think there’s more to worshiping God than that. Of course, that’s the importance of Christian community that we’re going to be trying to live out when we come together as Redeemer Church. That doesn’t diminish the importance of those God moments that we can have in nature.
A few years ago, one of my favorite parts of my job was that I got to go on a hiking trip every year to the Adirondack Mountains with the counselors in training from a local summer camp. It was the highlight of my year because it was just something I love to do in the first place. The Adirondack’s are one of my favorite places in the world, just all sorts of mountains. It’s like a playground if you’re into hiking and rock climbing.
We’d go there and we’d spend about three days. One day just kind of hiking in, and then two days where we’d do a big hike. The first year that we went, I had to think long and hard about how this was going to be more than just a physical exercise. How would we make this trip, since it was a church camp, how would we help this help us to open our eyes to how God had created the world around us, and how God was a part of our lives, including when we go on a hike like this?
I found the Psalms of Ascent. They are some of the Psalms that you could find in the Bible, and there were particular ones that were known to be the Psalms that people said, or sang, as they climbed the mountain to the temple in Jerusalem. If they were headed to the temple, they were headed there to worship. What we did, is on our mountain climbing trip, as we hiked, we said these Psalms of Ascent. There were some of them that we just kind of timed out. Every time we took a break, we read one together and prayed.
There were other times that I had a Psalms of Ascent ready in case we needed one. For example, somebody eventually did turn their ankle a little bit and got hurt. We had a Psalms of Ascent ready for that, that talked about God keeping us safe and helping us stay protected, and even talked about our ankles not being turned, so it was perfect for that.
We were able to bring together our faith in the God who creates, with our enjoyment of what he’d created. We were able to make our hiking and climbing experience a spiritual experience. When we finally got to the top of the mountain, we stopped and we had Communion.
We had, “a mountaintop experience,” is what people call them. One of those moments that I’ll never forget, and I know that the teenagers and the supervisors who were hiking with us will never forget it either. It was just incredible to have that moment of Communion with one another and with God, when it felt like there was nothing else to distract us, nothing else to separate us from God, but simply some air.
That was my experience with God in nature. You can learn a lot from an experience like that. One base thing that I remember is recognizing that God hasn’t abandoned nature. God created something beautiful and said it was good, and it’s still good, and there’s still a lot of beauty in it. We don’t want to forget that as we try to figure out how to live in this world using the resources we’ve been given wisely.
Well, we’re going to explore this topic a lot more this week, but I’ve got a question for you to think about, and I hope you’ll discuss it with other people you know, from the train, bus, or from work, or from home, wherever you connect with people.
Question: Have you ever had a God moment in nature? A moment when nature pointed you to God and what God had done? Maybe share it with that person who you’re discussing our daily challenges with. What was it like? What did you learn? How did it change you?
Well, have a great discussion. I’ll see you tomorrow as we study in the Bible the connection between God and nature. Bye for now.
When our computers get bogged down and unmanageable, we know to hit a reset button to simply start over. Wouldn't a reset button be great in life? We know it would be complicated, with all our responsibilities and routines to consider, but imagine the freedom and refreshment of a new start in life! What would you do differently? What would you pay more attention to, and what would you ignore? How would you avoid getting bogged down and broken again?
The great news is, in coming to earth as Jesus Christ, God has begun to "reset" our universe, our world, and even us. We're invited to start over with him, in what he calls his kingdom. We're invited to start a new life with a clean slate.
What gets wiped clean, and lived differently, when God resets our lives? We'll explore how God resets these key areas of our lives:
Reset: Goals
Reset: Time
Reset: Money
Reset: Work
Reset: Body & Food
Reset: Sex & Marriage
Reset: Family
Reset: Compassion
Reset: Nature
Reset: Society
Reset: Death
Join us for the next several weeks, and invite God to reset your life.
