to take the full good of all the ordered resting times: to wit, the
Sundays. I wish all tired people did but know the infinite rest there
is in fencing off the six days from the seventh. In anchoring the
business ships of your daily life as the Saturday draws to its close,
leaving them to ride peacefully upon the flow or the ebb until Monday
morning comes again. O the delight, the lull, of feeling: "No need to
settle this question--no need to think of this piece of work--for a
whole long, sweet thirty-six hours!" Why do you take Sunday papers, to
keep your nerves astir with business on the Lord's own day of rest?
Why do you add up and consult and consider in the pauses of the sermon,
or make opportunity for a business whisper in the porch, and on the way
home? Why do you let the perplexities of servants, of means, of plans,
ruffle your spirits on the one great day of freedom? Do not you know
that even a debtor may walk abroad on Sunday, with no fear of a prison;
and house doors may stand open, and no sheriff can enter. Shall it be
worse with your mind than with your body?
"Sleep, sleep to-day, tormenting cares,
Of earth and folly born,"--
It is the high court of the Prince of Peace.
"Rest on Sunday!"--I hear some earnest worker cry. "Why Sunday is the
hardest of all the week!"
Yes, in a way that is true, for workers in the Lord's work. Yet as far
as possible do not make it so. Do not imagine that you have the whole
world on your shoulders: do not try to have. Do not lift up a burden
you can by no means bear. The messengers came back to the Lord with
their reports,--so you.
"Lord, they will not hear--"
"Lord, it is done."--
Work with your whole heart and strength; but then take work and class,
and lay them at the Lord's feet; and with them the tired worker too.
So doing your work peacefully. And if Monday morning finds you tired,
it will find you also rested. The air of the world will have cleared
somewhat, giving a nearer view of "the city"; its mountains will have
sunk down well nigh out of sight, before the everlasting hills to which
you may lift up your eyes for help. And labour and care and profit and
loss will cease to be a tangle when stamped with this order:
"Occupy till I come."
But for you who are _not_ workers (the why and wherefore are for
yourselves to say) do you too make the Sabbath a day of rest. Yet do
not let your Sunday rest run into Sunday dissipation by trying to hear
all the good sermons at once. Choose (and abide by) some true church
so near that no street car shall be run for you, and yet--if
possible--far enough off to give you a freshening walk as you go and
come. Neither take out your carriage, "that thine ox and thine ass may
rest." [18] Of course I speak only of places where it is possible to
walk to church.
Get up early enough to have no hurry and no "late." Have a simple
church dress that will need no fussing; have a simple breakfast,
without "hot cakes," and a cold dinner, "that thy man servant and thy
maid servant may rest as well as thou." [19]
I know it is charged upon the men of the family that they will never
"stand" a cold dinner. But I have catered for just such many times,
and I know they will. Only be you careful on Saturday, to provide a
dainty repast that is _fit_ to eat cold--and then see. You will find
those very grumblers charmed with their dinner, and praising it before
any other in the week. You can always grace your cold dishes with hot
coffee and baked potatoes.
O the rest, the "recreation" of such a day! With all earth's turmoil
pushed aside, and Christ himself the one invited guest. Unless indeed
some needy friend, who can have no "Sunday" elsewhere. People talk in
these days with horror of the old Puritan sabbath. But even if
everything be true that they tell of it, I would rather spend Sunday
with blinds shut and pictures turned to the wall, than in the full
week-day glare which fills some houses. And if you want refreshment
from your play-times in the week, if you want heart and mind and face
to keep fresh, begin the week with the Lord's day kept wholly to the
Lord.
"Verily, my sabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you
throughout your generations." [20]
A sabbath, a rest. Rest of mind which lingering in bed will not give;
rest of body which feasting could only hinder; a rest of heart by
dwelling all day in the deep shadow of the Lord's presence. So
beginning the week, this promise shall be upon you as each day rolls on,
"My presence shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest." [21]
"And in all things that I have said unto you be circumspect; and make
no mention of the name of other gods, neither let it be heard out of
thy mouth." [22]
[1] John x. 5.
[2] John vi. 35.
[3] Job xvii. 9.
[4] Ps. lxxxiv. 7.
[5] Isa. xl. 31.
[6] Neh. viii. 10.
[7] Ps. xcii. 12.
[8] Jer. xxxi. 12.
[9] Ps. xcii. 14.
[10] Hosea xiv. 5.
[11] Heb. vii. 16.
[12] Phil. iv. 18.
[13] Mark vi. 31.
[14] Isa. xxviii. 12.
[15] Ps. lxxxvii. 7.
[16] Isa. lvii. 20.
[17] Job vi. 6.
[18] Ex. xxii 12.
[19] Deut. v. 14.
[20] Ex. xxxi. 13.
[21] Ex. xiii. 14.
[22] Ex. xxiii. 13.