I think this idea has been lodged in my brain since last Thursday. That’s the day I went to the fair so I could see all the hard work our youth had been doing. I was proud as a peacock. Everything from zucchini pickles to a photo essay about farm life, cereal bars and biscuits to hogs, chickens, and goats. 4-H is a marvelous endeavor, helping all sorts of youth learn to love and tend creation. These youth can feed themselves and others, and they can work hard with gardens and livestock.

What stuck in my mind particularly was the care for animals. This is something God calls us to, in ways that might surprise us. In Leviticus 25, in a parallel to the commandment to work for six days and on the seventh to remember the Sabbath, rest, and keep it holy, God says the following:

The Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying: Speak to the people of Israel and say to them: When you enter the land that I am giving you, the land shall observe a sabbath for the Lord. Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard, and gather in their yield; but in the seventh year there shall be a sabbath of complete rest for the land, a sabbath for the Lord: you shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard. You shall not reap the aftergrowth of your harvest or gather the grapes of your unpruned vine: it shall be a year of complete rest for the land. You may eat what the land yields during its sabbath—you, your male and female slaves, your hired and your bound laborers who live with you; for your livestock also, and for the wild animals in your land all its yield shall be for food. (Leviticus 25:1-7)

God calls us to a balance in life, a balance of hard work and rest. This balance is important for all creation, land and animals included. Whatever the land yields – without any planting or cultivation – that’s what is to be eaten by everyone and everything, even wild animals.

The Sabbath is a strange thing because it is both a command and a gift. In the New Testament Jesus tells us that Sabbath was made for human beings, not human beings for the Sabbath. In other words, the command is a gift, something tricky for us to understand. But consider this: if God came to you and knocked on your door, called you by name and said “My beloved one, it is time for you to take some rest,” how would that feel? Imagine the presence of God over every farm, every person, every city, calling out the same command and gift: “rest, my beloved ones.” Soil would rest, horses pulling carriages would rest, soldiers would rest, people struggling with burdens of all sorts in their lives and hearts would rest, oxen pulling plows would rest, children would rest.

God honors and delights in the labor of our youth and the labor of their animals. God also calls us all to a Sabbath of rest in which we are gracious enough to accept God’s provision for us.

It is my prayer for you that you will turn to God and accept the rest that God offers, knowing that it is what God desires for you. For God loves you.

Blessings to you all,

Michelle

~ by feast4thought on July 19, 2010.

Posted in Monday Morning Meditation