Deuteronomy 5:12-15 says
We keep the Sabbath to remind us that God brought us out of Egyptian slavery with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm—verse 15
That speaks to me today. 99% or 99.9% of our country works on the Sabbath to catch up what they missed doing the other six days. Isn’t that like slavery? Working seven days a week and never finishing all of the work?
God has saved us from slavery with His mighty hand and outstretched arm. Does the outstretched arm imply more work than had He only used His mighty hand? I believe God can do anything with a word, so I have to believe that outstretched arm is telling us His care, His concern was great when He did save us.
We work seven days a week because we feel we are making a difference?
Or maybe because we fear we aren’t?
Or maybe because our time is short?
I get it, finally.
The work is there from God. He doesn’t need our efforts to do it, but He allows us to partake in His work. But we serve Him, not the work. How easy that is to forget. He has numbered our days. He isn’t an unrealistic manager or job foreman who doesn’t have realistic expectations of what we can accomplish.
He is a loving foreman, overseeing our work to make sure we are assigned the very job best suited for us. Sometime that job is least suited for our current personality and spiritual condition in order to reveal to us a new weakness, to get us to call out to Him.
Other times, we are assigned to the job that is perfectly matched with our soul, our gifts, our values, our goals.
In either case, He doesn’t give us more work than we can accomplish in 8 or 10 hours a day. He knows we need down time, we need money, we need food, we need entertainment and exercise, we need worship, we need time with Him.
I have always been a workaholic, but I guess until today I never noticed how that is so out of balance with my picture of God. My picture of God is that He has it all under control and that He loves me immensely—more than anyone has ever loved me before. So why would I work non-stop doing work He hasn’t asked me to do?
As Solomon said, there is a time for everything. Maybe that should be reworded to say there is time for everything.