The Gospel and Work: Sabbath

The scripture reading today comes from the book of Exodus and the Gospel of Mark.

Please follow along in your bulletin.

In Exodus we read,

Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.

Six days you shall labor and do all your work,

but the seventh day is a Sabbath of the Lord your God.

In it you shall not do any work,

you or your son or your daughter,

your male or your female servant,

or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you.

For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth,

the sea and all that is in them,

and rested on the seventh day.

Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

In Mark we read,

And it happened that he was passing through the grain fields on the Sabbath,

and his disciples began to make their way along while picking the heads of grains.

The Pharisees were saying to him,

Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?

And he said to them,

Have you never read what David did when he was in need,

and he and his companion became hungry?

How he entered the house of God in a time of Apathah,

the high priest,

and ate the consecrated bread,

which is not lawful for anyone to eat except the priests.

And he also gave it to those who were with him.

Jesus said to them,

The Sabbath was made for man,

and not man for the Sabbath.

So the Son of Man is Lord even over the Sabbath.

Mark 3.

He entered again into the synagogue,

and a man was there whose hand was withered.

They were watching him to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath,

so that they might accuse him.

He said to the man with the withered hand,

Get up and come forward.

And he said to them,

Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath,

to save a life or to kill?

But they kept silent.

After looking around at them with anger,

grieved at their hardness of heart,

he said to the man,

Stretch out your hand.

And he stretched it out,

and his hand was restored.

The Pharisees went out,

and immediately began conspiring with the Herodians against him,

as to how they might destroy him.

This is the reading of the Lord's Word.

I think I'm on.

Okay, good.

Wow.

That was amazing and beautiful.

Thanks, guys, for leading us to worship the Lord this morning.

Let's see who's on vacation already,

and who's preparing to go on vacation,

who's visiting,

because they're on vacation.

If you're here for the first time,

or haven't been back in a while,

my name is Tobin Miller.

I'm one of the pastors here,

and we've been doing a sermon series on the gospel and work.

How does being a Christian,

or how should being a Christian,

affect how we do our work?

What does it look like?

Should we work differently after we come to a relationship with the Lord,

or do we stay the same?

So we've done two sermons so far with some testimonies,

and today's the third.

And just to kind of catch you up to speed,

what we've talked about so far is we've said that in work,

we looked at Genesis and the book of Ephesians,

we've said that we all tend to suffer compartmentalization.

So we've said that we all have this internal mechanism within us

that we compartmentalize our lives.

We have the office,

we have the home,

we have family and friends.

And the problem with that is that often we ask different questions in those compartments.

At home, we might ask or tell our kids,

is that the right thing to do when they beat up their brother or sister?

That never happens in my home, but it could happen in your home.

We ask that question, is that right?

But at work, we might ask the question, is it legal?

In other situations, we might ask other different types of questions.

And the problem is that we become confused,

and we don't know what questions to ask,

and what are the answers that guide our life?

Just recently, a lot of the students in several high schools in Hong Kong

were kicked out because they were smoking marijuana.

And there's a big interview in a newspaper, I think last week,

talking about what the school should have done.

There's several of the schools that are having this trouble.

And as they're interviewing some of the students,

the students had some confusion because their response was,

I don't understand why it's wrong for me to smoke pot here in Hong Kong,

whereas in my home state of California, it's totally legal.

I can do that.

And so there was this confusion of what is right and what is good

and what is should and what is truthful.

And we all struggle with that.

We said that God created us to work, and our work brings glory to God.

We said that work is a noble thing.

No matter how we feel, sometimes we feel like work is just,

I just want to get through this so I can do what I really want to do.

But the scripture says that work is noble, and God created us for this.

We learned that our primary relationship is our relationship with God,

and that relationship with God should govern how we interact

in all the compartments of life, at home, at work, with our family.

That relationship with the Lord guides us, it drives us,

and it anchors us into reality.

We talked about no matter where we work, our ultimate boss is God.

We talked about how sometimes we have this temptation not to come into work

until our boss is there, and I know you never struggle with this,

and not to leave until your boss leaves.

But we talked about how Ephesians said that our ultimate boss is God,

and he sees everything.

He sees the things that we do, and he sees the things that we don't do.

We learned that we're not to worry about our future,

because if God is our ultimate boss, he will take care of us.

We might not receive that pay raise we expect.

We might not receive those promotions, but God sees all, and he takes care of us,

and in the end, as we walk with him, he will watch us and guide us.

We learned that the garden, our world, our workplace is broken

and filled with weeds and thorns and thistles,

and all this comes from a broken relationship between us and our creator.

The Bible calls this sin.

We don't like to talk about sin often, but the Bible talks about it a lot,

and it's something that happens because our relationship with God is broken,

and because of that, our world has fallen.

We talked about in God's kingdom, our work, our calling, our ministry,

are all the same thing.

We ask sometimes, what is your ministry at work?

And some people will say, well, I lead a Bible study, or I pray for people,

or I lead people, or I listen to them, or I talk to them.

But the scripture says that our work is our primary ministry,

and everything that we do in our work reflects on God and glorifies him.

Sometimes, if you're honest, we tend to separate.

This is the secular, and this is the sacred,

and we live in the secular Monday through Saturday,

and we live in the sacred on Sunday.

But the Bible says that everything is sacred,

and that God is with us at all times,

and he's guiding us.

And the last thing that we learn is the only way that we can fix the brokenness,

the only way that we can come out of the thorns and the thistles,

the only way that we can deal with the weeds in our life and in our workplaces

by fixing our relationship with our creator, God.

No matter what we try, no matter how we fix things or try to do things,

and there's books and books and books written on it,

that nothing's going to happen until we fix our relationship with God.

It was 1972.

I don't know how many people weren't alive then.

But in 1972, my family was moving from Trenton, New Jersey,

McGuire Air Force Base, to Montgomery, Alabama,

Maxwell Air Force Base, where my dad was going to attend a war college there.

We didn't know anything about the South.

We had all these questions because we watched Huckleberry Finn,

and we wondered if people actually wore shoes in the South.

And I'm here to tell you that in 1972, about half did and half didn't.

Okay?

It's true.

And we got there, and it was a very interesting experience for us

because my family were not churchgoers.

And I remember the first Sunday, we woke up, and we slept in as we always did,

and we said, let's go get something to eat.

And we started driving around town,

and all the restaurants were closed.

I mean, everything was closed.

The only thing that had cars parked outside of it was churches.

And we didn't go to church.

We just wanted food.

And so we drove it around, and we drove around,

and we ended up coming home because we couldn't find a place

that was open for us to eat.

It's called the Blue Laws in the South.

And some of them still exist, like selling alcohol on certain days

or things like that.

But there were these ideas that we want to keep this thing holy and sacred.

And we didn't know that because we weren't churchgoers.

We didn't know what holy or sacred or church was all about.

We just knew that we couldn't eat dinner that night

because everything was shut down.

It was crazy.

I remember asking a friend of mine, his dad later, his name was Andy.

I said, what's going on here?

And his reply is, and you can't repeat this

because back then I was called Toby instead of Tobin.

He said, Toby, people are just too busy in Montgomery.

People need to learn how to rest.

People need perspective.

And I've thought about that a lot.

People need to learn how to rest.

People need perspective.

We're going to look at a passage today.

It's in the Gospel of Mark, but it's actually in Luke and Matthew also.

And it's a story of Jesus coming against the religious leaders,

and he's going to talk to them about rest.

He's going to talk to them about work.

He's going to talk to them about perspective.

In the Jewish culture, it's called the Sabbath.

I know it's something alien to us in Hong Kong

because we pride ourselves in busyness and working hard.

I was talking to a guy this week, and he says,

what are we going to preach on this Sunday?

I'm like, we're going to preach on rest.

He's like, ha, ha, ha, good luck with that.

I was like, yeah, you're right.

And I struggle with even sharing this

because I realize that often I'm a much better communicator of it

than a practicer of it, especially as a pastor.

Because what I found out is pastors become very, very busy,

especially on Sabbaths.

People are very busy, and they need to rest.

They need perspective.

What do you think about that?

I've thought about that some, and I realize that in my own life,

and this is a sermon towards Tobin,

so if you hear me say we or us, it's actually me.

It seems like we just get busier and busier in Hong Kong.

Life is busier and busier,

and I challenge you this week to ask somebody how they're doing

and write out how many times they don't say I'm busy.

And I challenge you this week, if someone asks you,

how are you doing?

Not to say in some form or fashion that you're busy,

but it just seems like we're busy, busy, busy,

and we all need rest, and we all need perspective.

And it seems like technology hasn't helped at all.

I got this new, I got my Apple smartphone,

and I felt like it's going to help me slow down.

It's going to help me get perspective.

It's going to help me organize my life,

and it hasn't helped at all.

I mean, I'm on the date night, Thursday night,

and guys, this is not a good thing to do, okay?

Christina and I are talking.

I'm trying to pay attention to her.

We're focusing.

We're having this talking about feelings and emotion.

She's using her 20,000 words for the day,

and I'm trying to use my 500 words for the day.

And she mentions something that strikes this spark in my head,

and I go, oh, yeah, I forgot all about that.

And I pull out my phone, and I start to do a text message.

And she goes, what are you doing?

And I'm like, I thought maybe the kids called.

And I wanted to check and see if they called.

I lied as a pastor.

But I realized that my life is getting busier and busier,

and that we're all getting busier and busier,

and we're chasing after the wind.

And guys, that is not a good thing to do on your date night, okay?

And single guys, if you're dating a girl, put up your phone.

Don't take it with you.

Just please don't do that.

I was meeting with a friend this Friday.

He's from another country, and we're talking about life.

And I asked him how he was doing.

He was in just for a couple days, and he said,

things are crazy, and they're busy.

And I think I'm going to get laid off at the end of this year

because there's another massive round of layoffs coming in my industry.

And I looked at him, and we started praying and talking about it.

He goes, but you know, I don't know if that's a bad thing or a good thing

because my family has been complaining about how busy I am,

and I'm not spending enough time with them.

But then if I don't get laid off, other people are going to get laid off,

and then I'm going to have to do their job also,

so I'm going to even be busier.

So maybe it's a good thing that I get laid off

because I'm just too busy.

And you know, the Bible talks about that a lot.

In the very beginning in your bulletin, we look at it in Exodus.

It actually comes from Genesis.

And it says in the very beginning that God creates everything.

He creates everything in six days.

And on this seventh day, he says this will be a day of rest.

He establishes this work rhythm.

Six days of work, one day of rest.

It's called the Sabbath.

It actually means to cease in Hebrew.

It means to stop, to do nothing, to relax.

And I thought about that passage because God's created it.

That God finishes his creation, and God is God.

He's not tired.

He doesn't need to rest.

He doesn't need to recharge his iPhone or his batteries.

But for some reason in the Scripture,

he lays down this day of rest for you and I as his creation.

And he says, this is the day I want you to relax.

This is the day I want you to recharge.

This is the day that I've made just for you to enjoy me.

This is the day I want you to have perspective.

We read a little later on in Exodus passage,

and it was printed for you in a bulletin,

that God actually takes his Sabbath day,

and he makes it a law.

It's this gift that he gives to us.

And it's not a gift that's supposed to be burdensome.

It's this gift that's supposed to give us freedom,

to give us a chance to relax,

to give us a chance to break.

It's a gift to help us biologically and psychologically

and spiritually to rest.

And so he puts it in his word,

and the Jewish nation took this idea of Sabbath,

and they ran with it.

It was a huge part of the Jewish culture.

I mean, if you go to Israel today,

on Friday night at 6 o'clock, everything shuts down.

And Saturday night at 6 o'clock, everything opens up again.

And they prided themselves in the Sabbath,

because for them, it was a covenant relationship

between them and the creator of all things.

The Jewish writers, from that time on,

took this idea of Sabbath,

and they started to write and to organize

and to build upon it,

to where it came to a place

where the Sabbath was the most important thing

in a Jewish culture.

It was a thing that separated them

apart from all the other nations in the world.

No other nation had a day of rest.

It was totally alien and totally strange,

just like a person driving from New Jersey

down to Alabama

and experiencing a closed-out place.

That would have been strange to them,

and that was something that the Jewish people

prided themselves in,

because it meant they had a relationship.

It meant that they had perspective with God.

In Deuteronomy, we read later on

that God actually says for the people

in Deuteronomy 5,

and I think it's printed in your bulletin,

He says,

I want you to practice this Sabbath

because you need to remember

that at one time you were a slave,

and slaves got no rest.

But as the people of God,

I've given you a day of rest.

Slaves have no rest,

but the people of God

have a rest.

They have a perspective.

One Jewish writer said it like this,

and I thought this was encapsulated at all.

He said that in the Sabbath,

our greatest needs

of rest,

identity,

self-worth,

worship,

security,

are perfectly met.

In the Sabbath,

our greatest needs,

our greatest needs of man,

rest,

identity,

self-worth,

worship,

and security

are perfectly met.

But by the time of Jesus' day,

they had taken this Sabbath,

which was just this law,

and they had added,

and added,

and added,

and added,

and added hundreds and hundreds

of rules and regulations

and things that should be good,

and they divided work

up into 39 different categories.

So when Jesus came on the scene,

it wasn't just a day of rest,

but it was a day

that you had to do,

do,

do,

do,

do,

do,

do,

or you weren't actually resting.

Some of the rules were like this.

On the Sabbath,

you cannot walk more than 3,000 feet.

On the Sabbath,

you cannot carry an object

with any weight.

Actually,

the weight was this.

This is a pine cone

I picked up from the Garden of Gethsemane

when we were on our Israel trip.

And this is the size of the weight

that you could carry on the Sabbath.

That was it.

Now,

if you were walking with somebody

and you got past your regulated time

that you could walk,

you could hand this off to them,

and then they could carry it,

and then they could hand it off to you.

Now,

you didn't have to do it backwards

like in rugby,

but you had to hand it off

after a certain period of time.

No one got that right.

Rugby,

you run forwards,

you pass backwards.

Anyway,

I'll try it later.

Anyway,

but this was the weight

that you could carry.

You couldn't toss something

into the air

and catch it with the other hand.

That was work.

That was a bad thing.

You couldn't do that.

You couldn't light a fire

or you couldn't put out a fire.

Two trips ago,

my birthday was on the Israel trip,

and Christina was trying

to throw a party for me

and had this beautiful cake

and all these candles,

and we were going to have this party.

We'd have an early party

because everybody was going to go out,

but it was on the Sabbath,

and the guy says,

here's your cake,

here's your candles,

but you can't light it.

I go,

what?

He goes,

you can't light it

because that's work.

Well,

how are we going to do

a birthday cake

without lighting?

He goes,

what?

601.

601,

you can light it

because at 601,

the work can be happening

because the Sabbath is over.

So my birthday party

started at 601,

May 14th,

four years ago,

but you couldn't do

any work on that.

A woman

could not look in a mirror

because she might see

a gray hair

and be tempted

to pull it out.

That would be work.

Now,

I know that wouldn't happen

to any of the women

in our church

because there are no gray hair,

it's just frosted hair,

but you could not do that.

You could not open a can

except for a Diet Coke can

because a Diet Coke can

was seen as holy

and righteous and good.

So that was the only,

I'm teasing,

okay,

but that was the only can

you could open.

In fact,

he says that you couldn't

even heal people

if someone was sick

and they were beat up,

you could keep them alive,

but you couldn't

heal them at all.

And so these Jewish writers

put all these clarifications

and they took this idea

of a Sabbath,

which was this amazing blessing.

It was a day to rest

and get perspective

and they added

all of these things on it

and they basically

turned this day

of a blessing

into a day

of a curse.

And so on Jesus' day,

there was all these rules

that you had to do

and what their faith became

was a religion

based on works.

You had to do these things

to feel secure.

You had to do these things

to get your identity.

You had to do these things

to get your self-worth.

All these things

that the Sabbath

was supposed to give us

just as we rested

and reflected on God,

now they said

that was not enough.

You had to do,

you had to do,

you had to do,

you had to perform,

you had to be better

than everybody else,

you had to be better

than those people around you,

you had to keep the law

more perfectly,

and if you did that,

God would be pleased.

Does that sound good?

So you know

what's gonna happen

because Jesus

is gonna come in here

and Jesus is gonna say

to them what he sees

right away,

he says you guys

are adding all these rules

and laws on all these people

but the problem is

you don't even do them

for yourself.

You just make them do them

but you don't take them

on yourself

and so Jesus comes

with his disciples

and they go after him

in this series of passages

and they try to change him,

they try to take grace

in the gospel

and turn it into works

and you know

what's gonna happen.

It's not gonna be good.

You know,

one of the neat things

about this sermon series

as we've been talking

is that we've been able

to have businessmen

come up and share

some of their journeys

and stories

and so I've asked Simon Wong

to come up.

Simon, where are you?

You're hiding.

Simon almost ran away today

because he came up

and we said,

we're gonna do the interview

and I said, yeah

and he goes,

did you get my questions?

I said, no

and he said,

are the same questions

you're gonna ask me?

I said, I forgot

what those questions were

and we're just gonna go by ear

and so he's pretty nervous here

so Simon,

thank you for coming up

and you know,

Simon, one of the things,

Simon's in our community group

his wife Sherman

helps do the youth ministry,

children's ministry

and I just appreciate your,

I just appreciate your transparency

and your honesty, right?

And as you walk,

it's been neat to see that

and so is it cracking

or you don't have to,

you can do it if you want.

I'll be like Oprah

but I'll stand up

because I'm the skinny Oprah.

Okay,

so Simon,

maybe you just share

with us a little bit

about just your story,

where you're at

in this journey

of work and experiences.

Just a little bit background,

my name is Simon,

I work in IT industry

long times ago,

around 20 years ago.

At that time,

you know,

computer technology,

there's no,

so everything is in English,

right?

You are not able

to see the internet page

in Chinese,

in Japanese,

in all these

other different languages.

So,

so I work in the Silicon Valley

to actually,

to,

to build technology

to represent those languages.

So right now,

you are seeing smartphone,

you are seeing the internet

with those languages.

I'm so proud

to be part of that,

right?

So,

and,

no.

So as Bernard said,

three,

three weeks ago,

you kind of took the garden,

and you took all the loose pieces,

and you're trying to

interconnect and telecommunicate

throughout the garden,

right?

And so now you're,

he set up the framework,

and now you're giving us

the language to do that in,

right?

Yes.

Okay, okay, okay.

So,

in 2004,

I think

God has put in my,

in my heart

a burden

to work with people

rather than technology.

So I start to

think about,

you know,

how are we going to

witness to Christ

in work?

How are we going to

deal with people?

And then,

I decided to come back

to Hong Kong

to work on a

totally different career,

which is,

a lot of people

don't like it,

is sales.

So I transform myself

from an engineer

to a sales,

selling big software

to company

like AT&T.

But now we should

sit down

and talk about business.

And,

basically,

trying to enable,

you know,

IT infrastructure

for mobile phone,

smartphone,

right,

your iPhone apps,

things like that.

It's very interesting.

But a sales career

is very different

from an engineering career.

So,

God taught me

a lot of things

during that journey.

I think God

is still teaching me

right now.

Yeah.

So you're married

and you have two kiddos,

right,

and they're here.

So as you've

been on this journey

and changing

from career to career

and jobs

and things like that,

what would you say

as we talk about

the brokenness

and the thorns

and the thistles

and just

we live in a cursed

work environment

and everything else

and we're here

to redeem that,

what would you say,

how has that affected you?

Right now,

I manage a team

of around

40 people,

30 people.

So I talk

to a lot of people,

a lot of our colleagues,

a lot of our business partners,

a lot of our customers.

My view on the brokenness

is that everybody thinks

that they are not

paid as they should

or they should be paid.

They're always looking

higher than what

they are.

So this is generally

across the board,

right.

So I think

this is kind of

the brokenness

that I'm part of.

I'm also looking

myself as higher

than what I am

and I'm also

trying to ask

for the salary,

the promotion

that I think

I deserve.

So that is

the brokenness

that I'm seeing.

That's good.

That's good.

So in the midst

of that brokenness,

would you ever say

or how would you say

you are tempted

to compartmentalize

and live by

different sets of rules

in different areas?

Has that been a struggle

for you in that sense?

Of course.

So I think

a few years back,

just a short story,

I don't want to make it

a sermon.

You're probably

better than I am

so that's okay.

They're not going

to remember

anything I said,

they're going to

remember everything

you said

so it's okay.

So I don't know

if you ever

pay for a promotion

or a salary increment.

Have you ever

paid?

Okay,

so I'm not alone.

So four years ago

I actually feel

that in two years

I was not paid

as I should be paid.

I'm not recognized

as a person

in the organization

based on the contribution

that I have.

So I'm sure

that a lot of people

actually think that way.

So I go to the Lord,

I decided that I set aside

a date of fasting prayer

to pray for promotion.

We're going to have

a special class on that

right after this,

okay?

So it's, yeah.

This is not biblical,

right?

But it was my theology

at that time.

So I sit down

and start the fasting day

and the first thing

I bow down and pray

and God is telling me

that you are praying

the wrong thing.

Right?

You are praying

for your glory.

You are praying

for your approval

in your work.

You are praying

for basically

your identity

with your peer groups.

So that fasting prayer

of promotion

become a prayer

of repentance.

so that is

a very good exercise

because it geared

myself toward

a working attitude

to serve God

rather than serve myself.

And this is not

a head knowledge.

I have been,

had that knowledge

for a long, long time

that I need to serve God

in the working place.

But having a head knowledge

and actually doing it

is very different.

That's what I'm trying

to share.

So I think

in that instance

I never pray for any,

I don't feel like

I want to pray

for a promotion anymore.

Because God has changed

my heart

that I should pray

for the things

that He cares.

So I'm just going

to break some confidence

but in our community group

we pray a lot about,

if you're not in a community group

you need to get in a community group

because for us

it's where

life on life happenings

and just people talking

and getting to know

in a lot.

So we've been praying

in your community group

about a month ago, right?

You had this

really difficult situation

coming up

where you were going

to have to let off people.

And your company

basically said

cut off 30% of everybody.

And we prayed for that

for like at least a month

and we've talked

and the guys got together

and talked.

And can you just share

what that looked like

for you as you were praying

as a follower of Christ

in the workplace?

And I think I appreciate

one of the sacrifices

you were willing to make

if you want to share that

what you said

because I've never heard

anybody else say that before.

I think it was,

to me it was just an example

of God working in your heart.

So as I said

I manage a group

of 30 people

and I was asked

to lay off 30%

of my workforce

maybe two to three months ago

because the business

is not doing good

and we need to downsize.

So first time

I heard about this

30%

I don't know how

I can do this.

I look at all the peoples

that are reporting to me

and they have families

they have mortgages

across Asia Pacific

in different countries

with different cultures.

Different people look

at these things differently.

So I think

the pressure on me

is that

how are we going

to do this?

How are we going

to execute this?

Another complexity

is that the headquarter

actually assigned

executive management

team

or executive

to actually come

and monitor us

as part of the restructure.

So I was being asked

to identify

who are being redundant

and being let go

will be let go

and basically

I have a very burdened heart

and I share with Tobin

community groups

Chris

we pray about that

and graciously

God give me a peace

that I have never

experienced before

so I have the peace

that I can handle

these things.

I'm not saying

that the issue

was resolved

I'm just saying

that God is with me.

So all along

the process

I think

the challenge

that I see

at one moment

moment is that

when we actually

identify the list

of candidates

to be let go

one of them

actually is myself.

So I find that

I am part of the redundancy

if I'm true to myself

because this executive

is coming

to take my place.

So in that context

I struggle

right?

Evil force

human nature

is asking me

okay you can

take one

as a scapegoat

put it into

the candidate list

and you can free

and you have the job

you know

you're okay.

So I think

I quickly realized

that this is not

a good thing to do.

I quickly realized

that this is not

the thing

that I can

glorify God

actually

it's disgrace

because I

use the authority

that God has given me

to do it

to my benefit

which is not

it's not a justice

it's not a justice

that God wants

to do

at the working place.

So in the end

I just very open

to give the list

to my boss

with my name on it

saying that

okay this is

if you want to do it

this is the list

including myself

and I was a little bit

very

a little bit excited

actually

because I went down

to the HR department

and asked for

what kind of package

I get

and because I worked

in the company

for 17 years

and the HR

is telling me

that you get

one month of salary

out of each year

of service

so I have 17 month

salaries

and I have

big Sabbath

so I was

a little bit excited

and then later

they told me

that there's a cap

of three month salary

so if you work

for his company

you work for three months

and quit

right

so

so I hope

that this is a

protect environment

that when I share things

don't really

you know

tell other people

probably

so this is company policy

so in the end

a miracle happen

is that the executive

which the headquarters

sent

eventually

he doesn't want

to join us

so my boss

is basically

okay

so if this guy

is not joining us

so you will be

resuming your normal duty

as a head of organization

that was the outcome

okay

a physical outcome

but the actual

spiritual outcome

I see

is that

my boss

is looking at me

very differently

right now

he's here

how do I manage

a guy who

doesn't care

to lose their job

right

so he

I think he's starting

not know how

to manage me

because

you know

if you

you can manage

people

you can

you know

give them a salary

and they

they work hard

but if you are

you don't care

about your job

your boss

don't know

how to manage you

so I think

I think

this is a weird thing

but I think

you know

Christian in the working place

sometimes is weird

and I think

it's a

it's a

it's a

glory to God

good

that's great

yeah

we're talking about

the Sabbath today

and just what it means

to rest

would you want to share

anything that God's been

teaching you in this

in your life

would just

besides getting 17 months

Sabbath free

things like that

there's something

as you look at your work

how have you struggled

with being balanced

in keeping perspective

in your management

I think it's a very good

lesson learned for me

so I'm a work

you know

I work

long hours

and also

I care about how

my boss look at me

I care about how

people look at me

and God has

been changing me

step by step

right

I'm not saying that

I

I have done my work

I have

finished my duty

it's not that

it's a journey

that God has

really

coming to start

with me

so I think

in the past

when I

you know

you use

iPhone

you can set up

SMS alert

when you receive

an email

whose address

is your boss's address

so this is called

VIP list

so I set up

a VIP list

so every time

my boss

send me an email

I get an SMS

notification

so that I can

immediately respond

so that you know

I really perform

but in the end

when I get to

a Sabbath day

or a day of rest

I get a lot

of this SMS

so even if I

go out with my kids

and you know

in a park

or whatever

I tend to

go back to my iPhone

and read my email

and try to do things

that is not a good practice

so I think

especially on date night

exactly

so I think

the

so

I try to stop that

and I try to

really trust the Lord

that even if

I'm not taking care

of those things

God will take care

of them

I need to put

that trust

human nature

is telling me

that I need to

handle all these things

but you know

heavenly thoughts

is giving me

the fact that

I need to rest

and really

you know

enjoy that

Sabbath day

together with

God and my family

I appreciate

when you

Simon and Sherman

just joined our group

recently

and one of the first

things he came in

was he just said

wow I got so many

things going on

in my life

I really need

a group of men

around me

to pray with me

and that I can

speak to

and bounce things off

to make sure

I'm not sounding

that I'm not losing

perspective

so I really appreciate

his urgency

in that

and I think

that that's

an encouragement

I think

I want to give

to all the men

and women

that we need

to have people

around us

where we

don't lose

perspective

if we're by

ourselves

in that sense

I want to pray

for you

and Sherman

and their

two kiddos

and just thank you

so much

Father thank you

for Simon

and I pray

for him

Lord

I pray

that you

would be

upon him

that he

would continue

to work

in a manner

that is

showing everyone

the primary

relationship

he has

is his

relationship

with you

I pray

for perspective

and wisdom

as he walks

with you

and leads

others

pray for perspective

and wisdom

and mercy

as he walks

with his wife

and kids

and leads them

in the midst

of all this

Lord

we are so thankful

that you don't

give up on us

that you continue

to pursue us

and even when

we make mistakes

your mercy

and your grace

just

you're the God

of second chances

and third chances

and we come before you

and we just

celebrate all you've done

and this dear man

and his family

and we pray

that blessing

for all of us

and we pray

these things

in your son

Jesus name

Amen

Thank you

Thank you

So if I ask you

to come up here

I promise you

I'll follow the script

next time

okay

so I'm not gonna

hey you know

as we look at the passage

here

Jesus comes

and he has this

massive collision

with men

who've lost perspective

on rest

and God

and work

in Mark 2

the story goes

in 23

that he's walking

through the greenfield

with his disciples

it's on the Sabbath

and his disciples

are basically

walking through the edges

because all the roads

would be on the edges

of the field

and on the edges

of the field

there was a rule

it's called a gleaning law

that you wouldn't

cut down the grain

but you would leave it

for the poor people

or for the travelers

and so the disciples

are walking

through these fields

on the edge

and they grab some grain

like this

and they rub it

in their hands

and they blow it

to get rid of the husk

which you do

if you're out on the farm

and then they start

to eat it

and immediately

when the Pharisees

see this

they say look

verse 24

what you are doing

is not lawful

on the Sabbath

if you do some study

and reading

you're going to realize

that it is lawful

and you can do it

but the Pharisees

had taken the Sabbath

and added all these rules

that made it

not lawful

and it's interesting

how Jesus answers them

he doesn't say

come on guys

you don't know

what you're doing

you don't know

what you're talking about

but he just takes them

right to scripture

and he says to them

have you never read

so whenever Jesus says

have you never read

to you

you know immediately

what it's going to mean

is he's going to take you

to the word

and say let's do

some Bible study here

have you never read

what David did

King David

when he was in need

with his companions

they became hungry

they entered the house

of God

in the time of Abathar

the high priest

and in the house of God

there were 12 loaves of bread

that were baked every Sabbath

and they were laid

before the altar

they were the show bread

they were only for

the priest to eat

supposedly

and David came in

and he was hungry

and he went to the high priest

and said my men need food

and we're on a mission

from God

God is annoying me

and we're doing

what God has called us to do

and the high priest

gives them the show bread

and they eat it

and they're filled

and so Jesus says

have you not read

this is what King David did

and how the priest

and gave it to them

and they were also with him

and then Jesus says

in verse 27

the Sabbath was made for man

and not man

for the Sabbath

what he's telling the Pharisees

and what he's telling us

is that God didn't create

you and me

so that we could serve

our Sundays

or whatever our Sabbath is

but he created

that Sunday

that day of rest

to serve us

to come alongside of us

to give us rest

and relaxation

and restitution

that God's laws

were meant to be

a blessing

to all of us

they were never meant

to put us into bondage

but what you see

really quickly

is when people

step into religion

they take God's

good and perfect law

and they add things

onto it

and there's this expectation

and the law

then becomes

not a good thing

but it becomes

a bad thing

it doesn't become

a gift

it becomes

a curse

and you've had that

happen in your life

before haven't you

someone asks you

and they're going to

give you something

and you're like

well if I take this

what am I going to have to do

to receive this

I'm going to have to go down

I'm going to have to

do this and this and this

I'm going to have to register

I'm going to have to fill out

all these paperwork

I'm going to get this gift

and it's not going to be

really what I expected

and it's going to end up

being more work

than I thought it would be

maybe I'm the only one

who's had that experience

but it seems like it happens

a lot in Hong Kong

when they want to give you things

I just don't even want

to take things

because there's always

something I have to fill out

and it's something

I have to do

and that's the way it was

in Jesus' day

with the Sabbath

it was meant to just be

given to people

as a gift

and to relax

and to observe

and to remember

what God has done

and to worship Him

and to know that

they're not slaves

but it became something

that they had to take

and they had to do for

so the average person

had to work harder

on the Sabbath

than they had to do

on any day of the week

and Jesus says

that the Sabbath

was not made

man was not made

to serve the Sabbath

but the Sabbath

was made to serve man

and verse 28

he says

so the Son of Man

is Lord

even over the Sabbath

what he's basically saying

is hey I'm God

and I created these things

and I know

and I don't want to go on to it

because we're going to get

back to that later on

but the minute

he said that

the Pharisees were not happy

Mark 3 goes on

and it says

on another Sabbath

he entered into a synagogue

and there was a man

there was a withered hand

and I have a lot of questions

like why was he there

what happened

most people think

it was a setup

most people think

the Pharisees heard

what Jesus said

at the beginning

and they said

okay let's test him

let's see if he really cares

about people more than himself

let's see if he really cares

about people more than the Sabbath

let's see if he's going to do

what he says he's going to do

and so they're waiting for them

and they put this man

with a withered hand in there

and verse 2

they're watching him

it's this keen

intense eagle eye look

everybody's watching

to see what he's going to do

is he going to heal this man

on this day of rest

this day that is not supposed

to do anything

with all these rules

so they might accuse him

he realizes that

in verse 3

and he calls the man

with a withered hand

and he says come forward

and basically he's coming forward

in the midst of everybody

so he's the center of attention

and Jesus asked a question

that could only have one answer

if you knew God's word

only one answer

the answer is yes

but the Pharisees

had taken the yes

and put all these qualifications

and clarifications

and it became a no

and he says in verse 4

is it lawful to do good

or to do harm on the Sabbath

to save life

or to kill it

and everybody knew

that if you're on the Sabbath

and your cow fell in a hole

you pulled your cow out

and if something else happened

and someone was hurt

you were supposed to help them

but the religious people

of Jesus' day

had changed this good thing

into a curse

and so we're told

that immediately after he asked it

they kept silent

they couldn't say anything

verse 5

after looking around at them

in anger

and it's this incredibly

deep righteous anger

but at the same time

you have anger

and you have compassion

he's grieved

so he feels anger

and upset

how they've taken something amazing

like the Sabbath

it was meant to be a gift

but they've turned it

into a curse

and instead of freeing people

it's putting people in bondage

instead of giving people perspective

it's made people lose

perspective

it's made people lose

God

and so Jesus is angry with them

and he's grieved

at the hardness of their heart

and so he calls the man forward

and he says

stretch out your hand

and he stretched it out

and his hand was restored

did Jesus do any work?

no

he didn't touch them

he didn't do anything

according to the Torah

or the laws

that would say

he did something bad

the man's hand was healed

as he stretched out

but in verse 6

we see that the Pharisees

when they saw this

in Matthew

in Luke

it says they were furious

they were angry

they were overwhelmed

they were spitting

fire and venom

and they conspired

with their enemies

the Herodians

it was so bad

that the Pharisees

who were the law keepers

and Herodians

who were in the government officials

who were just

the non-believers

the licentious people

the people who were

doing whatever they wanted to do

they were mostly Romans

and Greeks

it was so bad

and Jesus offended them so much

that they got together

to figure out

how they might destroy Jesus

they realized

that in Christ's teaching

and in grace

and mercy

that their self-righteousness

was going to be destroyed

and their way of life

was going to be destroyed

their religion

was going to be destroyed

the moment people saw

grace

in the gospel

and that happens

in our lives

doesn't it?

you see people

who live religious lives

and you look at them

and you go

wow I'm so tired

I can't even

I can't even think about

being that type of person

but then you see a person

who understands the gospel

and they understand grace

and God's love

and this free gift

and their life is

sweet

their life is freeing

their life is good

so what do we do

with all these stories?

I mean I've been thinking

about these for a while

what do we do with work

and what do we do with rest

and what do we do

with perspective

and what do we do

with healing

and what do we do

with the grain fields

and what do we do

with all these laws?

some people would say

that these rules

and these laws

and this text

they don't apply to us anymore

because we're Christians

and we have mercy

and we have grace

we don't need to observe

the Sabbath

we don't need to do it

we can move on

and live our lives

the way we want to

but I don't know

I mean it seems to me

that Jesus did it

the perfect man

the perfect God

he observed the Sabbath

and I don't think

that we've changed

so much as

people did in Jesus' day

I mean biologically

we're the same

psychologically

the same

sociologically

we're the same

we still struggle

with these things

in our life

we still struggle

with balance

and legalism

we still struggle

with work and rest

we still struggle

with grace

we still struggle

with religion

and not religion

or the gospel

I'm fearful to say

this is what we need to do

because you need to go

before the Lord

and ask him

what am I doing here

am I having perspective

have I lost perspective

how do I keep perspective

in my time with you

but these are some of the things

that I've personally

found in my life

as I struggle

with these passages

these are some

Sabbath questions

I ask myself

and I want to share them

with you really quickly

the first question

I have to ask myself

is where am I getting

my identity

and my security

where am I getting

my identity

and my security from

is it from

is it from my work

is it because

I do a good sermon

and everybody comes up

and pats me on the back

so that's a great sermon

because things are getting good

and people are growing

and people are coming

and people are coming

and oh Lord

is that where

I'm getting my identity

is that where

I'm feeling secure

I mean you can transpose

that to your work

where do you get

your identity

on Monday

and where does your security

come from

where am I looking

for my self worth

and meaning

and purpose

and where am I finding it

I mean if I don't focus

on the Sabbath

and creation

and God giving us

these things

in a life cycle

and he's given it to us

to bless us

and he's given it to us

to free us from bondage

if I'm not focusing

on the Sabbath

that answers all those questions

about me

and who I am

then where am I

answering those questions

where am I getting

the meaning of life

questions answered

where am I getting