SPEAKER_00: My name is Ryan.
SPEAKER_00: I'm one of the pastors here at Impact, and we are going through a series through the book of Exodus.
SPEAKER_00: And today I'm really excited.
SPEAKER_00: I pray it's going to be a timely word because we're going to be talking about what I believe every mom wants more than anything else.
SPEAKER_00: Rest.
SPEAKER_00: Exodus chapter 31.
SPEAKER_00: And we kind of joke about this, but we know moms are just tired.
SPEAKER_00: Really, everybody in this world is tired, but moms, especially so.
SPEAKER_00: Moms, we know you guys spend every day focused on other people, especially the little miniature versions of these people, right?
SPEAKER_00: Nurturing, correcting, feeding, cleaning, just really essentially keeping them alive every day and thriving is a full-time task.
SPEAKER_00: Mothers are multitaskers.
SPEAKER_00: They're master multitaskers, where they're able to do by necessity multiple different things, and it's so incredibly impressive.
SPEAKER_00: And yet we also know that the on the flip side of that, what it means is that your brains never stop.
SPEAKER_00: The mind can never power down because if you power down, little people die.
SPEAKER_00: And so you're constantly thinking about what you should be doing or could be doing and never really able to rest.
SPEAKER_00: There's so much physical activity that goes into motherhood as well.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Lifting, holding, scrubbing, walking, constantly moving.
SPEAKER_00: Moms are never really alone.
SPEAKER_00: Even in the bathroom.
SPEAKER_00: You don't get a break, a little moment to yourself.
SPEAKER_00: You could be sitting in there and there's little fingers under the door.
SPEAKER_00: Did you guys know that the average mother, especially with young children, hears mom of some variation more than 200 times a day?
SPEAKER_00: Mom, mom, mama.
SPEAKER_00: Then they get teenagers.
SPEAKER_00: Bruh, right?
SPEAKER_00: Whatever it is.
SPEAKER_00: You hear it over and over and over again.
SPEAKER_00: Moms, you don't even get the sleep that everybody else does.
SPEAKER_00: And this is scientific, not just because you're stressed out about your kids.
SPEAKER_00: Something happens once you have children where moms don't sleep deeply.
SPEAKER_00: They have been reprogrammed to hear their children crying.
SPEAKER_00: This happens at a chemical level.
SPEAKER_00: Hormones are actually introduced that will wake you up easier and keep you from sleeping as deeply.
SPEAKER_00: There are even neurological structural changes that happen in the amygdala that allow you to wake up in case your child needs you.
SPEAKER_00: That's why you're tired all the time.
SPEAKER_00: Guys don't have that problem.
SPEAKER_00: So, mom, just take it easy when your husband is sleeping peacefully.
SPEAKER_00: It's not because he doesn't care.
SPEAKER_00: It's because his amygdala has not evolved like yours.
SPEAKER_00: And mom's to add everything on top of everything, you have to deal with the constant comparisons, don't you?
SPEAKER_00: The opinions of other people.
SPEAKER_00: How you should do things, how I did things back in my day.
SPEAKER_00: And we constantly see examples on social media and everywhere else that seem like they've got it all together and we're the only ones hanging on by the skin of our teeth, feeling like everything's falling apart and we're failing.
SPEAKER_00: So happy Mother's Day.
SPEAKER_00: You are more loved than you could ever possibly know.
SPEAKER_00: And I know the Lord wants to encourage you guys here today as we talk about rest, something y'all need.
SPEAKER_00: I know that it's not just moms, most of us in here, as we're hurried and hairy, we're incredibly busy, trying to do too much, constantly feeling like we're just exhausted.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: We say things like we're stretched thin, we're stressed out, we're spinning too many plates, and at some point we feel like something's gotta give.
SPEAKER_00: A lot of us feel tired and exhausted because we feel like we don't have enough time.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: We don't have time to do everything we need to do.
SPEAKER_00: So we think we have a time problem.
SPEAKER_00: Can I encourage us, really even challenge us here today to maybe adjust our thinking in that just a little bit?
SPEAKER_00: Here's why.
SPEAKER_00: We think of time, we have to think of it like a resource.
SPEAKER_00: Think of it like money or finances.
SPEAKER_00: And time is really the most valuable resource that you and I have, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00: Because we can't earn more of it.
SPEAKER_00: We can't work hard to get more time.
SPEAKER_00: We have the time God has allotted to each of us, and not a second more.
SPEAKER_00: And so time is so incredibly important, and we feel like we need more.
SPEAKER_00: We can't get more.
SPEAKER_00: But think of money as that resource, right?
SPEAKER_00: If you came to me and said, Ryan, I'm really struggling right now because you know, we're financially, we're we're in uh having a money, major money problems, and I just I just don't have enough money, we're not getting enough, and I can't pay my mortgage.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, oh my first thing I'm gonna say is that's just terrible.
SPEAKER_00: Like, talk me through this.
SPEAKER_00: Let's let's just talk through.
SPEAKER_00: And you share with me, you know, mortgage$2,500.
SPEAKER_00: Just can't afford to pay it month in, month out.
SPEAKER_00: We just don't have enough.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, all right, well, where's that money going?
SPEAKER_00: How's your budget?
SPEAKER_00: You're like, what budget?
SPEAKER_00: Well, do you have a budget?
SPEAKER_00: Okay, let's let's develop a budget together.
SPEAKER_00: And in that process, we discover that yeah, the mortgage is$2,500, you can't afford to pay it, but you are somehow managing to pay about$1,500 a month to Amazon.
SPEAKER_00: And then there's another maybe$500 a month at Starbucks and some other random coffee places.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe there's, I don't know,$750 to$1,000 a month just on entertainment.
SPEAKER_00: About another$1,250 a month goes just to eating out at different restaurants and your favorite froyo place.
SPEAKER_00: You have three really nice cars, and about$1,500 goes out to make those car payments, and another two to$1,000 to$2,500 just for the gas.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: And we start looking at the actual budget, and what do we discover?
SPEAKER_00: We discover you don't have a money problem, you have a spending problem.
SPEAKER_00: Guys, your budget for time is called your schedule or your calendar.
SPEAKER_00: And some of you need to look at that calendar and how you budget your life and your time to discover you don't have a time problem.
SPEAKER_00: You don't need more of it.
SPEAKER_00: You have a spending of your time problem.
SPEAKER_00: Do you agree with this statement?
SPEAKER_00: We've mentioned this before, but but here's a statement.
SPEAKER_00: God has given you all of the time you need to do everything he calls you to do.
SPEAKER_00: Can I say that again?
SPEAKER_00: God has given you all the time you need to do everything he's called you to do.
SPEAKER_00: Do you agree with that statement?
SPEAKER_00: I certainly hope so.
SPEAKER_00: What kind of cruel, vindictive, right, manipulative God would be up there going, hey, I need you to do all these things, but oh, you don't have time.
SPEAKER_00: No, that's not his heart, not who he is.
SPEAKER_00: He's given us all the time that we need.
SPEAKER_00: So if we agree with that statement, what must we conclude, those of us who say, I don't have time to do everything?
SPEAKER_00: We are busying ourselves with things that he's never called us to.
SPEAKER_00: We're not living with wisdom when it comes to our time.
SPEAKER_00: The apostle Paul writes in Ephesians 5, verse 15, look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise, but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.
SPEAKER_00: Because we need to rediscover and understand what the will of the Lord is for us.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what we're gonna read together here in Exodus chapter 31.
SPEAKER_00: If you were here with us last week, we read through the Ten Commandments, the ten words that God gave to his people, calling them to live a certain way that reflects his character and his created order.
SPEAKER_00: And then in 11 chapters that followed that, what we see are more laws about social governance and society, more laws about worship and how to worship him the right way.
SPEAKER_00: And now we come to the end of that discourse where God is speaking to Mo to His people through Moses.
SPEAKER_00: And on the heels of all of these laws, we see in verse 12, Exodus 31, these words.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord said to Moses, You are to speak to the people of Israel and say, Above all, you shall keep my Sabbaths.
SPEAKER_00: For this is a sign between me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you.
SPEAKER_00: You shall keep the Sabbath, because it is holy for you.
SPEAKER_00: Everyone who profanes it shall be put to death.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever does any work on it, that soul shall be cut off from among his people.
SPEAKER_00: Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day shall be put to death.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore the people of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, observing the Sabbath throughout their generations as a covenant forever.
SPEAKER_00: It is a sign forever between me and the people of Israel, that in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed.
SPEAKER_00: God gives expanded commentary on this fourth command to keep the Sabbath.
SPEAKER_00: Now, Sabbath, the word literally means to stop, to cease to rest, to cease striving or working.
SPEAKER_00: It's like God speaking to his people saying, just stop.
SPEAKER_00: That's what the Sabbath command is, the fourth command or word.
SPEAKER_00: Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy.
SPEAKER_00: And so the last day of the week, this Sabbath day, all of Israel stopped working.
SPEAKER_00: Everything shut down.
SPEAKER_00: It was like Chick-fil-A on a Sunday, man.
SPEAKER_00: No one is working or setting their hands to any task.
SPEAKER_00: You notice this phrase that God actually speaks at the beginning here of Exodus 31, where he says, Above all you shall keep my Sabbaths.
SPEAKER_00: Above all, it means most importantly.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Eleven chapters of laws that govern the Jewish people, how they're to live, and call them to worship certain ways, and all these different, these different religious things that God gave to them, saying, This is how you are to live.
SPEAKER_00: And then on the heels of it at the end, he says, But most importantly, keep my Sabbaths.
SPEAKER_00: That's a day for me.
SPEAKER_00: Remember the Sabbath.
SPEAKER_00: Because we don't have a time problem, as we discussed.
SPEAKER_00: We do have a spending of time problem, and we have an obedience problem.
SPEAKER_00: We don't do what God calls us to do.
SPEAKER_00: We don't prioritize rest.
SPEAKER_00: I think a lot of us suffer from a self-delusion where we have an inflated sense of self-worth.
SPEAKER_00: And a lot of us we run ourselves ragged, we never take time off because we have convinced ourselves we can't.
SPEAKER_00: We can't rest because if we stop and rest, the world's gonna fall apart.
SPEAKER_00: And God needs to remind us through Sabbath rest, you're just not that important.
SPEAKER_00: You're definitely not as important as you think you are.
SPEAKER_00: This is one of the reasons I find so much rest when I go to the beach, and I can just sit on the shoreline and I can watch the sunset and I can hear the waves just crashing over, and maybe it's not the beach.
SPEAKER_00: I can go to a water any waterfall anywhere where there's this rushing sound of the water, the crashing of the waves.
SPEAKER_00: I look out at the expanse, the vastness of the ocean, see how huge it is.
SPEAKER_00: And it's God in those moments speaking to me, saying, Ryan, you are so small.
SPEAKER_00: And all the things you're stressed out about because you and you alone can do these things, you're not that important.
SPEAKER_00: I love you, but you're not as important as you think you are.
SPEAKER_00: And I find so much peace in that reminder as I rest that God's got it, not me.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us need that reminder, and Sabbath is how we experience that.
SPEAKER_00: Sabbath laws were eventually over the years and even centuries twisted by many of God's people.
SPEAKER_00: They became burdensome, they became really stressful to keep.
SPEAKER_00: And it was originally intended in a good way.
SPEAKER_00: They wanted to make sure that they didn't violate the Sabbath, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because we saw the consequences of doing so.
SPEAKER_00: And so to make sure they didn't break Sabbath and accidentally do work, they established rule after rule prohibiting different forms of physical activity that could be constituted as work.
SPEAKER_00: And so they said, you can't smooth anything out, you know, like we would do as a leather worker.
SPEAKER_00: We can't do that.
SPEAKER_00: We can't, you know, hammer anything into a shape like metal workers, you know, we can't carve things or cut things because that's what woodworkers do.
SPEAKER_00: And so we can't sweep or clean because that's labor as well of cleaning.
SPEAKER_00: And so we would have all these different forms of activity that were restricted.
SPEAKER_00: And then people began to ask, well, well, does this considered smoothing?
SPEAKER_00: And so then the rabbis would get together and they'd have all these sub-rules under the main rule and category of work, saying these are the subcategories of work you have to avoid, otherwise, you're breaking Sabbath, which is why most of the time they don't even brush their teeth, because technically you're smoothing toothpaste over your teeth.
SPEAKER_00: So we just have some rank breath people on the Sabbath, and it became this cumbersome burden.
SPEAKER_00: Instead of the blessing, it was meant to be for the people of God.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus points this out, Mark chapter 2, verse 23.
SPEAKER_00: We read this one Sabbath, he, Jesus, was going through the grain fields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain.
SPEAKER_00: The Pharisees were saying to him, Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: So plucking was a form of work or labor that was prohibited by the Jewish rabbis saying, No, that constitutes work.
SPEAKER_00: You can't pluck.
SPEAKER_00: Some bushy eyebrows probably up in that place, too.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, I stand corrected.
SPEAKER_00: My wife corrected me a long time ago.
SPEAKER_00: We don't pluck eyebrows, we tweeze eyebrows, we pluck chickens, right?
SPEAKER_00: Major difference.
SPEAKER_00: What was the response of Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: Verse 27.
SPEAKER_00: He said to them, The Sabbath was made for men, not man for the Sabbath.
SPEAKER_00: So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus brings these religious leaders back to the heart.
SPEAKER_00: And please understand, everything we're going to be talking about today as we unpack God's word about Sabbath and rest is not a call to go back to some legalistic keeping of a particular day that we deem Sabbath day.
SPEAKER_00: And if we do anything but just sit and stare at the wall, we're violating God's Sabbath.
SPEAKER_00: That's not the heart.
SPEAKER_00: The heart of everything we're going to be discussing today is to get back to the spirit of Sabbath, that it was made for man, that God gave Sabbath and rest as a gift to be enjoyed, not just employed, but enjoyed by his people.
SPEAKER_00: We need the Sabbath rest.
SPEAKER_00: We see its importance even in the consequences.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you guys caught that, but whoever does any work on the Sabbath day shall be put to death.
SPEAKER_00: Can you imagine living by that rule today?
SPEAKER_00: If you break the Sabbath and you work on a day you shouldn't be working, we will make sure you rest in peace forever.
SPEAKER_00: Truth be told, guys, we don't even need someone to kill us if we break Sabbath.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us are working ourselves to death, aren't we?
SPEAKER_00: Grinding each and every day.
SPEAKER_00: The stress we're feeling, even physically.
SPEAKER_00: Physically, it manifests into health issues and problems, anxiety, depression, all of these things because we never stop.
SPEAKER_00: We just keep going and going and going because we can't stop and we still need, and the mindset just continues to go.
SPEAKER_00: And we are literally working ourselves into the grave.
SPEAKER_00: The second consequence is that they were to be cut off from the society, the people of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: And again, we do this to ourselves with our work and busyness.
SPEAKER_00: It's not just our vitality and our health, it's our relationships.
SPEAKER_00: Guys, how are your relationships today?
SPEAKER_00: Are they as healthy as they should be?
SPEAKER_00: I don't know why we think we're gonna have healthy relationships when we never have time to engage that relationship in a healthy way.
SPEAKER_00: Because even when we're there, we're not really there.
SPEAKER_00: We're somewhere else here, or we're passed out on the couch over there.
SPEAKER_00: So when we should be engaging in relationship and conversation and being able to know others that we love and care about, we're just too distracted, too exhausted to be able to do so.
SPEAKER_00: And those in our lives that should be getting the very best versions of us get the very worst.
SPEAKER_00: Because we get home and we got nothing left in the tank.
SPEAKER_00: I think about early in my marriage and family, where I was working very hard, trying to get certain ministry things established and putting in probably, not probably, putting in too much time, thinking it's all up to me and it's all on me.
SPEAKER_00: And I was finishing up my graduate school and we kept having kids.
SPEAKER_00: We tried to figure out what caused that, you know.
SPEAKER_00: But they're little babies and they're in that high demand season of life, and we were tired.
SPEAKER_00: Tracy and I, we described it as feeling toxic.
SPEAKER_00: You guys ever felt that before?
SPEAKER_00: Where it wasn't like we we just were mad at each other, we just hated everyone.
SPEAKER_00: It was our baseline.
SPEAKER_00: We were just always grumpy and angry and just needed to sleep.
SPEAKER_00: That's how we felt.
SPEAKER_00: No rest for the weary.
SPEAKER_00: And our relationship started to suffer.
SPEAKER_00: We started feeling distance even grow between us.
SPEAKER_00: And I was so thankful we were able to go and see a counselor.
SPEAKER_00: And this counselor sat down and heard some of the situation, and he quietly walks up to the whiteboard and he goes, Ryan, give me some roles that are in your life.
SPEAKER_00: What roles do you play in your life?
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, Well, I'm a pastor, okay.
SPEAKER_00: What else?
SPEAKER_00: How about personally?
SPEAKER_00: Well, I'm a husband, all right.
SPEAKER_00: I'm a father, great.
SPEAKER_00: And you know, how about a child of God?
SPEAKER_00: Yes, I'm a child of a son of God as well, a child of God, yes, definitely.
SPEAKER_00: He writes all these up on the board.
SPEAKER_00: Friend, okay, great.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, now do me a favor, rank these in order of biblical priority.
SPEAKER_00: Rank these in order of priority.
SPEAKER_00: Guys, I was a pastor, I knew this one, right?
SPEAKER_00: So, oh, that's easy, right?
SPEAKER_00: Child of God, number one.
SPEAKER_00: Number two, husband.
SPEAKER_00: Three, father.
SPEAKER_00: Four, maybe pastor slash friend.
SPEAKER_00: We'll give it a tie.
SPEAKER_00: And I felt very good about my list.
SPEAKER_00: And he kind of looked at me, said, Hey, this is good, this is solid.
SPEAKER_00: Then he looks at Tracy.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Um, Tracy, can you now do me a favor?
SPEAKER_00: And will you re-rank these based on order of what you see Ryan live out?
SPEAKER_00: Suddenly I had to go to the bathroom real bad.
SPEAKER_00: But I couldn't leave and still say face.
SPEAKER_00: So I had to just sit there and take it like a man.
SPEAKER_00: And she re-ranks him, and it went, Pastor.
SPEAKER_00: Father.
SPEAKER_00: Husband.
SPEAKER_00: Friend.
SPEAKER_00: Child of God, and she said, That's up to me.
SPEAKER_00: She re-ranked him, and he rewrites it down, and he looks over at the board, and then he looks at me.
SPEAKER_00: And then he looks back at the board and he looks at me.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, Okay, so just make sure I'm clear here, Ryan.
SPEAKER_00: You expected God to bless this?
SPEAKER_00: What a moment for me to come to that realization.
SPEAKER_00: I had a priority problem.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't have a time problem.
SPEAKER_00: I had an obedience problem.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't have a time problem.
SPEAKER_00: I had a spending of my time problem.
SPEAKER_00: I had an inflated sense of self-worth.
SPEAKER_00: That I was more important than I actually was.
SPEAKER_00: And what does scripture tell us?
SPEAKER_00: Let no one think of himself more highly than he ought.
SPEAKER_00: And I needed to be brought back to a place of right priority.
SPEAKER_00: God tells his people that this Sabbath is going to be a sign forever between him and his people.
SPEAKER_00: The word for sign here, it doesn't mean like a sign and wonder, you know, like a miracle.
SPEAKER_00: It means a marked characteristic of a person or a group of people, something that sets them apart.
SPEAKER_00: And it fits right into what he also said, right?
SPEAKER_00: That the Sabbath was something where that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you.
SPEAKER_00: So he gives Sabbath to his people to mark them so that they can know God has sanctified them.
SPEAKER_00: This word for sanctify means to set apart, to set apart for his purposes.
SPEAKER_00: As this is what Sabbath and rest is meant to do to set us apart as different from everybody else in this world.
SPEAKER_00: Everyone in this world is so busy and worried and stressed out.
SPEAKER_00: They're trying to keep up.
SPEAKER_00: The relentless demands of everyday life keep up with the Joneses.
SPEAKER_00: And the Sabbath is a bold declaration that we don't really give a rip about the Joneses.
SPEAKER_00: Let the Joneses do what the Joneses are gonna do.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna do what God has called us to do because we're his people.
SPEAKER_00: It reminds us we are no longer slaves, that we are sons and daughters of the king.
SPEAKER_00: Sabbath isn't just rest.
SPEAKER_00: Sabbath is the resistance.
SPEAKER_00: It is how we boldly and stubbornly rebel against the rat race of this world.
SPEAKER_00: The hedonic treadmill we talked about last week, right?
SPEAKER_00: Where we're just on this constant treadmill of chasing happiness and chasing everything this world has to offer.
SPEAKER_00: Sabbath is where we emphatically declare no, I'm not a slave to this world.
SPEAKER_00: I will not serve the gods of this world.
SPEAKER_00: I am a child of the true and living God.
SPEAKER_00: He is my provider, he is the one who cares for me.
SPEAKER_00: And if he created everything in six days and rested on the seventh, who do I think I am?
SPEAKER_00: I'm resting as well.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna rest with him and trust his provision in my life.
SPEAKER_00: Deuteronomy chapter 5.
SPEAKER_00: I want to skip down to verse 15 of Deuteronomy 5 here.
SPEAKER_00: It's Moses recapping this Sabbath command to the people of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: And he gives this reason, right?
SPEAKER_00: God's speaking through Moses.
SPEAKER_00: Here's why you keep the Sabbath.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 15, you shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt.
SPEAKER_00: And the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because you're not slaves anymore.
SPEAKER_00: You're children of God.
SPEAKER_00: Sabbath is our declaration of freedom, that this world with all of its demands will not be master over us.
SPEAKER_00: That everybody else's opinion will not be master over us.
SPEAKER_00: That the clock will not be a master over us like it is for so many of us today.
SPEAKER_00: Y'all realize, right, that the clock is a relatively modern invention in the history of the world.
SPEAKER_00: Not until around the 1300s did the mechanized clock develop.
SPEAKER_00: Around the same time, there was the whole concept of seconds and minutes and hours.
SPEAKER_00: But this is a construct that man created.
SPEAKER_00: Time used to be measured very differently.
SPEAKER_00: Time has always been, we've always lived on this chronological timeline of the space-time continuum, right?
SPEAKER_00: We've always been a part of that.
SPEAKER_00: But the way we measure it has not always looked this way.
SPEAKER_00: You know, the whole phrase, like, oh, okay, it's nine o'clock.
SPEAKER_00: Do you ever think about what a clock means?
SPEAKER_00: It's not like nine, oh, a clock.
SPEAKER_00: It's a clock.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, with an apostrophe, meaning abbreviated form of nine of the clock, meaning nine according to this clock device, not a sundial or some other form of time.
SPEAKER_00: Time used to be measured by moments and events.
SPEAKER_00: What time is church?
SPEAKER_00: It's church time.
SPEAKER_00: Well, what time are we worshiping?
SPEAKER_00: We're worshiping at the time of worship.
SPEAKER_00: And we would gather together and it would be worship time.
SPEAKER_00: You know when that time would end?
SPEAKER_00: When it ended.
SPEAKER_00: People used to measure time even by the natural phenomena of the day, the sun that would rise, the sun that would set.
SPEAKER_00: This is what would determine what a day was and concept of time, the different times of day and the cool breeze of the morning.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: All these different things that they would say, okay, this is how we progress or measure, evaluate time of day.
SPEAKER_00: But then we as man decided we want to master time.
SPEAKER_00: And so we created not just that system, but the clock to measure it.
SPEAKER_00: And in our efforts to master time, we tragically and inadvertently became slaves to it.
SPEAKER_00: We're now governed by this clock.
SPEAKER_00: Guys, true freedom, remember, as we've discussed before, isn't just being able to do anything and everything, is being able not to do these things.
SPEAKER_00: True freedom is being able to say no.
SPEAKER_00: Do you feel freedom to say no to things in your life so that you can Sabbath rest with the Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Slaves are never off the clock.
SPEAKER_00: They're always on, always needing to rest or to work.
SPEAKER_00: They don't get time to rest.
SPEAKER_00: Only those who are truly free can enjoy the blessing of rest.
SPEAKER_00: And so if you're here today and all you're doing is thinking about everything you still need to do and why you can't rest, you're demonstrating to yourself just how much of a slave you are, and the slave mindset and mentality.
SPEAKER_00: Here in Exodus 31, God shares with his people another reason, Sabbath rest is something he calls them to.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Because in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, this is the model that God gives to us.
SPEAKER_00: In six days, the Lord made the heaven and the earth.
SPEAKER_00: And this is what we try to do.
SPEAKER_00: We don't try to make it, but we try to move it.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna move heaven and earth by our effort and our work and what we're doing each and every day.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna fulfill these responsibilities and achieve these tasks and knock these to-dos out.
SPEAKER_00: Because at the end of the day, we want to go to sleep, knowing and feeling like we were productive.
SPEAKER_00: And you know the Sabbath isn't just a call to cease from activity, it is a call to cease from productivity.
SPEAKER_00: A call to say, you don't need to produce anything today.
SPEAKER_00: You let God reproduce and renew in you what needs to be renewed.
SPEAKER_00: You cease, stop, and just refresh as God Himself did.
SPEAKER_00: Again, it's being free from the slave mindset and mentality because slaves, their worth and their value is determined almost exclusively by what they're able to produce.
SPEAKER_00: As today, expectations of productivity are greater than ever before.
SPEAKER_00: I hope you realize that.
SPEAKER_00: I know technology and stuff was supposed to make life easier, but really it made certain tasks easier, but not life.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, it made life exponentially more complex in many ways.
SPEAKER_00: I had a friend from high school who just shot a link into a group text with some of us that graduated together, mid-90s, and he had digitized a bunch of old VHS tapes from our high school days.
SPEAKER_00: And so he sent us the YouTube link, and we're watching this just cracking up, going, This is hilarious to see.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm watching it with my kids, and the thing that struck me, those of us who were there in the video, you know, 94, 95, or on our senior trip and these things, the thing that struck me was how strange it was that all of us were there, just interacting, hanging out, not a single smartphone in sight.
SPEAKER_00: They didn't exist yet.
SPEAKER_00: So we didn't have them, and so we're just there hanging out, being together.
SPEAKER_00: No smartphones, no devices.
SPEAKER_00: I think back to those teenage years and days where when I would leave home, you couldn't get a hold of me.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody would even know where I was.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you could leave a vet a message on my my message machine, I'd rewind it.
SPEAKER_00: And I might listen to it.
SPEAKER_00: I honestly think when people left messages back in the 90s, they didn't really expect people to return them.
SPEAKER_00: We kind of just have this expectation of, oh, I missed them, I'll try again and hopefully they'll pick up.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe I'll run into them.
SPEAKER_00: But today, expectations are a little different, aren't they?
SPEAKER_00: Today I am expected to be accessible and available at all times because I'm trackable at all times, because I have access with me always.
SPEAKER_00: And it's the same at home, it's the same at work.
SPEAKER_00: We are we have these expectations of us that we never used to have.
SPEAKER_00: Because things are easier because of technology.
SPEAKER_00: Not too long ago, I thought I heard rain outside.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, is it raining outside?
SPEAKER_00: And I looked at my my kids, I was like, is it raining?
SPEAKER_00: And they got their phone and they opened their weather app.
SPEAKER_00: Like, no, it's not raining.
SPEAKER_00: Like, oh, that's nice.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, when my dad asked me that when I was a kid, I had to like stand up, walk all the way across the living room, go to the slider door.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it might be locked, I'd have to like unlock it, slide the slider door open, walk all the way outside, go back inside, shut the door.
SPEAKER_00: No, it's not raining, and be like, okay, thank you.
SPEAKER_00: Life without apps.
SPEAKER_00: How did we ever survive?
SPEAKER_00: It took more time to do these things.
SPEAKER_00: So today, so much more is expected of us.
SPEAKER_00: It's not that technology has brought simplicity or made things easier so we can take life easier.
SPEAKER_00: It just means we're expected to do more than ever before.
SPEAKER_00: The world says that our worth and value is determined by what and how much we produce.
SPEAKER_00: But God says, no, your worth and your value is found in relationship with me.
SPEAKER_00: Your worth and value is that you bear my image, that I have made you fearfully and wonderfully and uniquely, that I have plan and purpose for your life, that I sent my son to die for you, to forgive your sin and bring you back into my family because of your worth and value that I have placed in you.
SPEAKER_00: That's where it's found in him.
SPEAKER_00: Not in what we do or what we think we achieve.
SPEAKER_00: Let me bring it home with this.
SPEAKER_00: Because we read that God in six days created everything, and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed.
SPEAKER_00: What a beautiful phrase this is in the Hebrew.
SPEAKER_00: This word refreshed, it's where we get the word to breathe or to respire.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, after making everything, God caught his breath.
SPEAKER_00: Now we think of that and go, wait a second, how does that make any sense?
SPEAKER_00: He's the all-powerful, omnipotent creator of everything.
SPEAKER_00: And we read in scripture, God does not grow weary or tired like we do.
SPEAKER_00: So what do you mean, God caught his breath?
SPEAKER_00: The imagery draws us back to Genesis 2, because it begs the question: if God, after creating all things, caught his breath, where did his breath go?
SPEAKER_00: Genesis 2, verse 7.
SPEAKER_00: On day six of creation, the last day of creation and God's productivity, he created man.
SPEAKER_00: And we read this: then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.
SPEAKER_00: You see the imagery?
SPEAKER_00: That God, after creating all things, culminating in the pinnacle of his creation, his image bearers, you and me.
SPEAKER_00: On that seventh day, he rested and was refreshed.
SPEAKER_00: He respirated, he caught his breath, the breath that he gave to give life to his image bearer.
SPEAKER_00: He brought back to himself.
SPEAKER_00: And so God rested in relationship with that image bearer.
SPEAKER_00: In the same way, guys, rest for your soul will never be found.
SPEAKER_00: No matter how many days off you may take, saying, I just want a date of myself and just watch all my shows.
SPEAKER_00: It's not gonna do it.
SPEAKER_00: You're not gonna leave that day going, ah, it is well with my soul.
SPEAKER_00: For your soul to be refreshed requires resting, not just ceasing from activity, but resting in relationship with your creator and your recreator.
SPEAKER_00: It is a time and a day that you set aside for relationship with family and with Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Rest is only found in him.
SPEAKER_00: It's not a coincidence that day seven of man, day seven of God and his creation was day one of man.
SPEAKER_00: He was created on day six, but the first full day he lived on this earth that God made was day seven.
SPEAKER_00: And so God rested on day seven.
SPEAKER_00: Man's first full day on earth was spent in relational rest with his Maker.
SPEAKER_00: Guys, we need it.
SPEAKER_00: This is not an optional thing.
SPEAKER_00: And so it's about being intentional to be with Jesus, to draw closer to him.
SPEAKER_00: This is why Jesus said Matthew 11, verse 28, Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
SPEAKER_00: Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
SPEAKER_00: For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.
SPEAKER_00: You may think you need rest for your mind, rest for your body.
SPEAKER_00: The deepest need is rest for your soul.
SPEAKER_00: And it's only found in coming to Jesus, the one who gives you rest from your bondage to sin, from your slavery to religious performance and keeping the law and trying to earn God's favor.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus alone brings you freedom from earning the acceptance and approval of everybody else around you.
SPEAKER_00: And he alone gives us rest from this mindset where we can't stop thinking that if I stop working, I'll stop being worth anything.
SPEAKER_00: Only Jesus sets us free from it.
SPEAKER_00: So, moms and everybody else here today, keep the Sabbath.
SPEAKER_00: Remember it as holy to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: It's his day.
SPEAKER_00: Not legalistically and all stressed out.
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: Let it be the blessing for you and your family it was meant to be.
SPEAKER_00: And keeping it is an active word, by the way.
SPEAKER_00: You notice he didn't say, hey, if you find some time, just chill out for a little bit.
SPEAKER_00: Keep the Sabbath, remember it because we tend to forget.
SPEAKER_00: It means carving that day out to be with him, to be with family.
SPEAKER_00: Shut off your phones, lock them away in a safe if you need to.
SPEAKER_00: Be together, read together, pray together, play together.
SPEAKER_00: Have dinner around your family dining table.
SPEAKER_00: Sleep in.
SPEAKER_00: Don't come to the 740.
SPEAKER_00: Enjoy your coffee.
SPEAKER_00: Go on a walk.
SPEAKER_00: Be together with your family.
SPEAKER_00: It is gonna feel so awkward and so weird.
SPEAKER_00: Until it doesn't.
SPEAKER_00: And until it becomes the breath that you've needed for years and years and years.
SPEAKER_00: I'd like to close us in prayer today, but I'd also like to close us in prayer specifically for our moms.
SPEAKER_00: Can we do that?
SPEAKER_00: Let's stand together.
SPEAKER_00: And if you're here with your wife, the mother of your children, if you're here with your mom, if you would just put a hand on their shoulder and let's pray for them.
SPEAKER_00: If you're not here with your mom, just find a mom.
SPEAKER_00: I kid, don't do that.
SPEAKER_00: That would be really weird.
SPEAKER_00: But let's pray for our moms today.
SPEAKER_00: Lord Jesus, thank you.
SPEAKER_00: God, thank you for bringing us rest.
SPEAKER_00: As your word says in Hebrews, that there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God.
SPEAKER_00: It is possible.
SPEAKER_00: Or we're not that important.
SPEAKER_00: We just need to reprioritize and re-budget.
SPEAKER_00: And God, I pray that we will do that today.
SPEAKER_00: May that be maybe a gift for many of us to our moms.
SPEAKER_00: Well, for every mother here, I just pray that your spirit will just fill them right now in this moment.
SPEAKER_00: Renew them with the strength that only comes from you.
SPEAKER_00: May they mount up with wings as eagles so they can walk and not grow weary and run and not faint.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, I pray you free them from this mindset that they're not enough, not doing enough, not working enough, that they're failing.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, set them free.
SPEAKER_00: Show them their worth and value in you.
SPEAKER_00: And Lord, may their hearts be filled with joy at the privilege of being a steward of these children that you've given to them.
SPEAKER_00: Whatever season of life they may be in.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, I pray they leave here encouraged and renewed and ready to rest with their family, to enjoy the fruit of the family that they have been such a part of cultivating and growing.
SPEAKER_00: Bless them, Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for them.
SPEAKER_00: And Lord, we thank you for the gift of Sabbath.
SPEAKER_00: May we open that gift and cherish it in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.