How does one honor the Sabbath when you’re out of work? How might we read the text, and live it out, considering that we might be reading it from a cultural or economically-biased perspective. Miguel De La Torre, writing in EthicsDaily.com asks, how we might “Honor the Sabbath when you’re out of work?”
Honoring the Sabbath When You’re Out of Work
By Miguel De La Torre in EthicsDaily.com
“Remember to keep the Sabbath day holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. The seventh day is a Sabbath to Yahweh your God, you shall do no work that day” (Exodus 20:8-10).
How many times have you sat during a service only to hear some minister preach on this particular biblical passage? More than likely you heard the good reverend expound the virtues of honoring the commandment by worshipping God on Sunday.
You probably heard a sermon that advocated obeying the commandment so that a day could be carved out of our busy lives to study God’s word and worship God’s holy name. Or maybe the minister’s homily emphasized the importance of spending a day in fellowship with family and fellow believers.
Whatever message you heard, it probably emphasized taking a day off. But such sermons betray the fact that the vast majority of us have been taught to read the biblical text through the eyes of those who are economically privileged.