Sabbath Keeping: Finding Freedom in the Rhythms of Rest

by Lynne M. Baab
2005, InterVarsity Press.

One of my perennial weaknesses is time management, the science of maximizing personal effectiveness (or the art of not doing everything at the last minute). The apex of my time management efforts came in the third grade, when I finished writing a report on tigers two days before the due date. Since then, deadlines have been my constant enemy.

I'm convinced that God is not in the self-help business, because his words for procrastinators are hardly motivational. When I look to the Bible for time management advice, I end up being called a sluggard, inferior to ants. In fact, the Bible does say a lot about how we steward our time. But most of that attention is devoted to one one particular day of the week, the sabbath.

Lynne Baab's recent book, Sabbath Keeping, is a brief and practical introduction to God's gift of weekly rest. After outlining the biblical history of the sabbath, Baab shares why we need to learn to cease from our work and receive rest from the God whose work is finished in Christ:

Without time to stop, we cannot notice God's hand in our lives, practice thankfulness, step outside our culture's values or explore our deepest longings. Without time to rest, we will seriously undermine our ability to experience God's unconditional love and acceptance. The sabbath is a gift whose blessings cannot be found anywhere else (19).

When it comes to using our time well, God is more concerned that we begin with rest than that we master our to-do lists, calendars, and long-term goals. This is good news for a procrastinating, would-be overachiever like me. As I've learned to experience the sabbath, I've begun to understand that my value to God isn't enhanced by my accomplishments, nor diminished by my failures. Now each sabbath rolls around as a celebration that my work is set in the context of God's creative-redemptive work, that my rest is a result of his work being completed, and that my love is merely a response to the God who first loved us. I hope that you, too, will find freedom as you join this celebration.

Download the first chapter of Sabbath Keeping here!