ALIVE: Chapter 184, it’s Sabbath

Genesis 2:1-3. Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all their multitude. And on the seventh day God finished the work that He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all the work that He had done. So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all the work that he had done in creation.

Exodus 19:20-21. When the Lord descended upon Mount Sinai, to the top of the mountain, the Lord summoned Moses to the top of the mountain and Moses went up. Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go down and warn the people not to break through to look; otherwise many of them will perish.”

Exodus 20:1-3 Then God spoke all these words: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, you shall have no other gods before Me.”

Exodus 20:8-11. “Remember the sabbath day, and 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; you shall not do any work - you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested on the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the seventh day and consecrated it.”

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Jesus’s work was finished on the sixth day when Hades was emptied, as was God’s work finished on the sixth day when Adam and Eve were made. God the Father rested, and God the Son rested. God rested. He rested after He delivered the prisoners of Hades, a feat equal to releasing His chosen people from Egypt. Egypt, where they went to find freedom from famine and ended up in slavery for over 400 years. Fleeing to Egypt turned out to be a terrible disappointment. As when God created mankind. Like corruption. Like illness. Like failure. Like war. However, in the long run, God is far sighted. He uses evil like a dark color on an artist’s palette, to teach, to test, to mold, using it for the formation of His ultimate great design. There is a place and time for Paradise, a perfect holy beautiful pure world and this earth is not it. It’s the first phase.

All the followers of Jesus rested. All the haters of Jesus rested. The Pharisees rested as did the chief priests. Levi rested and Judah rested. It was a sacred day. An invisible chasm between the old covenant and the new, deeper than the Grand Canyon was temporarily filled with rest on this unique day among the billions of years since the first day. In God’s mind this Sabbath was a replica of the very first unique holy hallowed Sabbath, when He sat back pleased with His Creation, calling it good and especially mankind calling it very good. That first Sabbath like this one began at sunset, as did the last two days of creation  (after the sun was created on the 4th day). It wasn’t sleep. It was rest. Wakeful, alert, conscious rest. Holy rest.

Jesus rested somewhere.

On the first day of Creation, God said, “Light be.” And a bright light appeared out of what had been only darkness and void. His only begotten Son is called Light of Light, true God of True God, begotten, not made. And on this particular 6th day, the day that marked the completion of creation, the Son of God was hung to die on the Cross and darkness covered the earth. The entire earth, an eclipse of the sun sat in darkness. This overlay reveals something very important to see.

The old covenants had been fulfilled. The first with Noah that he would be fruitful and multiply to repopulate the earth. An addendum of this covenant being that there would never again be a flood that would destroy the whole earth. The sign of the rainbow is a sign of that covenant between the earth and God and Noah.

The second covenant was with Abraham and his offspring, that they would inherent the land, and become a numerous nation. The sign of this covenant is circumcision of the males. This covenant was confirmed with Abraham’s sons, Isaac and Jacob and is repeated to this day. Isaac who was nearly sacrificed by his father, ended up living for 180 years, and Jacob’s 12 sons kicked off the making of that promised nation.

The newest covenant of God invited all nations and peoples of the earth into the fold of God’s chosen people, each living person is called to be as faithful as Noah and Abraham. Humans, the crown of His creation, are free to drawn near to Him to be considered for entry in the Book of Life. Israel went to sleep after the Passover Seder that followed the most intense day, the Crucifixion of the Son of God.

The Lord God was pleased. It was truly finished. Seeds for populating a new earth and a new heaven were planted in rich fertile soil.

The moon washed over them like a halo in the dark starry sky. This would be the very last night of the dying old world from the moment of the curse, through millennia of destructive conflicts, wars, pain, tortures without a path out. Death was met at the end of every road. But from the sixth day, eve of Passover, there was no Hades to fall into, there was only judgment.

Israel, Jacob’s tribes of sons who birthed the nation, woke up with the sunrise to continue to enjoy their Sabbath of Passover rest. This day of rest was packed full of contemplation of the crucifixion for some, of the first Passover for others, of frenetic worldly thoughts for others. The fast of matzoh wouldn’t allow the people of God to forget the rushed flight out of there. The first born in their homes fasted from everything on the first day. The people poured into their synagogues all over Jerusalem and all over Israel from Galilee to Judea to pray. For the next 7 days the chosen people of God are steeped into a timeless space. An inner vacation from the world around them. Even Pontus Pilate and his soldiers respected the holy days.

The chosen people of God prayed, and tried their best to please, but weakness usually overwhelmed their own wills. In foreign lands it was worse, they knew not of God, the Creator. Humans created gods out of clay, or wood, or metal. They worshipped them. The Greeks and Romans, and more advanced civilizations  created them out of their imaginations, Zeus, Hercules, Aphrodite, Athena. No matter what they did, how they thought, no matter how rich or poor they became, death was the end. A pile of carcasses buried or burned after fewer than an hundred years of being human with all its emotions and intelligence.

It had been a hallowed night, followed by familiar sunshine and more rest. The Sabbath, a day set aside to worship God who created this magnificent world, for those few who recognized Him and knew about it.

On this bright day of Passover rest, although thousands had flocked to see and hear the teacher, healer, and miraculous Son of Man, very few on planet earth knew that Jesus even existed, and they wouldn’t know for centuries. The rising sun shines on a slice of the rotating earth at a time. A night, the beginning of a day, evolved into centuries. Like an oak tree seed buried deep within rich soil grows into a mighty oak that sees generations of men come and go, and never dies, enduring fierce weather, but it is stronger than the weather, and granted to withstand everything as a testimony to design and providence.

No one could know the power hidden in the rest on that one and only Passover Sabbath day when crucified Jesus rested somewhere.

By the end of the Sabbath, at sunset which began the first day of the week, the Jews were ready to sleep again, enveloped in peace and rest, that night was without feast and without famine. Their souls were full.