Sabbath

So there I was sitting in bed this sunday morning trying to work out in what order to complete my lengthy list of tasks when I was reminded of two passages I'd looked at this week.

Poet, Kathleen Jamie's book Findings was a gift (in many ways) and is the most incredible book. It makes you feel as though you walk around with your eyes closed and only ever see a fraction of what the world has to offer, let alone find any meaning or purpose in it. It's like she holds a perfectly focused pair of binoculars up to life.

In one chapter, on a visit to Stornoway, she muses about the Sabbath...

A friend said to me - we were talking about our stage in life, when we
suddenly discover we are the grown-ups, with children and parents,
even grand-parents to tend to, not to mention pupils, patients, or
clients or employers - that we spend so much time dealing with it all
that there is scarsely time to feel. I walked up the silent road
wondering is I couldn't reconcile myself again to the idea of the
Sabbath, to the day of dreary silence and mutton broth I'd known as
a child, if we couldn't close the shops and still the traffic and institute a
modern, churchless day of contemplation and rest; and if it wouldn't
help us all.

And in The Godbearing Life the authors pose that we would do well to remember the Sabbath and that the question is 'how' not 'should' we find these spaces in ways appropriate to our time and context.

Godbearers intentionally interupt the scedule with time for
reflection, renewal, and prayer in order to refresh their souls
and reorient themselves Godward .... Sabbath means quit. Stop.
Take a break. Cool it. The word itself has nothing devout or holy
in it. It is a word about time, denoting our nonuse of it; what we
usually call 'wasting time'....As urgently and pasionately as Jesus
preached and lived the kingdom of God, scripture suggests he
honoured the spirit of the sabbath ... often we read about him
going to a quiet place to pray, claiming mini sabbaths along the
arduous road he travelled.

For the authors 'sabbaths' can come in many forms and at many times and have more to do with rythmn breaking and God facing than one day set aside (and definitely not one day set aside for legalities). They are not only silent and still, they include games, noise and fun, above all they are sacred spaces amongst the hustle and bustle of life. Spaces that can 'help frame ordinary places and times and transform them' to refresh our souls.