Remember the Sabbath to Keep Us Humble

The Hebrews had been enslaved in Egypt for generations when Yahweh liberated them to be his people. He gave them the Ten Commandments to reveal more of his character and orient his people to their newfound freedom. Right after the commands to worship God alone, not make idols, and not take God’s name in vain, we arrive at one of the more puzzling commands for our twenty-first-century ears:

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 to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and 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. (Ex. 20:8–11)

This command comes on the heels of three vertical commands focused on the people’s relationship with God. After this, the attention shifts to the people’s horizontal relationships with others and the world around them. The Sabbath command serves as a hinge between the vertical and horizontal orientations.

The Hebrew word for Sabbath comes from a root that means “to cease.” On the Sabbath, God’s people were to cease all work to experience rest. This follows the pattern of creation in Genesis where God rested on the seventh day. But it didn’t just govern the behavior of the individual—it extended to the whole community. No one had the right to make others work on the Sabbath.

Imagine what it was like for these recently enslaved people to receive the command to remember the Sabbath. They were given one whole day each week to rest and enjoy their God. What an adjustment for a community that had no concept of “vacation time!” Who were the Israelites if they weren’t working?

The idea of Sabbath is almost as shocking in our hyper-productive American culture. When I introduce the concept to the college students I work with, they typically respond that resting one day each week seems foolish. While we rest, someone else might get ahead. I can relate.

For a long time, I dreaded the Sabbath. As a recovering workaholic, a full day of rest feels a bit like dying. When accomplishments and productivity fuel your self-worth, being still is a terrifying assault on your identity. And that’s kind of the point.

With all our technological innovations it’s easy to buy into the lie that we are in control. While agrarian societies were aware of their dependence on the weather and the whims of planet Earth, we can change entire organizations with an e-mail.

The Sabbath flies in the face of our hustle culture. It exposes the lie that anything can be accomplished if one works hard enough. It acknowledges our human dependence on God to meet our needs. It also declares to those in power that their underlings don’t belong to them.

I’m not suggesting there’s no correlation between hard work and results. The book of Proverbs is full of affirmations of hard work. Take Proverbs 14:23: “In all toil there is profit, but mere talk tends only to poverty.” While the biblical proverbs are more principles than promises, the point remains. Work existed before the fall and is part of how we image God in the world.

And yet, there is deeper wisdom at work, as recounted in Psalm 127:1–2: “Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain. It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep.”

While God honors our hard work, none of it means anything apart from him. No amount of hard work can outrun the underlying truth that God alone brings the transformation we long to see through our labor. Driving others to overwork for us will not yield good fruit.

This is where Sabbath rest comes in. Observing the Sabbath reminds us that God does not need us to accomplish his work. We are not quite so important to his kingdom coming as we’re told at well-meaning Christian conferences. Quite simply, he is God, and we are not.

The Sabbath doesn’t just remind us that we can’t change the world; it also reminds us that we can’t change ourselves. Consider God’s words in Exodus 31:13: “Above all you shall keep my Sabbaths, for this is a sign between me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I, the LORD, sanctify you.”

Did you catch the “above all?” God knows we need the Sabbath because it affirms that he is the one who sanctifies us. We can’t consecrate ourselves to be his covenant people—only God can do that. On the Sabbath we remember that any growth that we’ve seen in our own lives is a gracious gift from God.

The Sabbath isn’t just a break from our work; it’s meant to reorient our relationship with our work. Ultimately, it teaches us that the fruit of our labor is in the hands of God— which are far more trustworthy than our own. It’s an invitation to surrender our pride, which tells us that our provision is solely dependent on us. If that’s the case, rest is simply a distraction we can’t afford. But Sabbath calls us to repent of our pride and enjoy the fruits of humility.

No wonder the prophet pairs these together in Isaiah 30:15: “In returning and rest you shall be saved.” Our salvation flows out of rest because it doesn’t come from us. We cry out to God in repentance because he alone can rescue us from sin and evil and death.

God loves to transform through the work of his people. Paul admonishes us not to grow weary in doing good as we  participate in his kingdom work (Gal. 6:9). But only work marked with humility will keep in step with the redemptive power of God’s Spirit. The Sabbath is an opportunity for us to cultivate this humility. We remember the Sabbath, for it keeps us humble.