I believe it was John Bright in his History of Israel who said that a major factor in preventing Israel from being absorbed into the various cultures during their exile was their practice of the Sabbath. Once every seven days they pulled out of their culture and reminded themselves who and whose they were. At one level they simply stopped producing and reminded themselves that they were more than what they produced. At another level, through prayers and worship, they reached out to God and reminded themselves that they were part of something larger than themselves. They also reconnected with the fact that though their circumstances seemed bleak, they were a people set aside by God for a special purpose.
I raise all of that because I think their is a lot of evidence that our faith is in danger of being absorbed into our culture. Both in ethics and in practice, it is increasingly difficult to distinguish a Christian from other members of our society. Even our clergy can be seduced into responding to the success models of our culture more than staying in contact with who called them and for what purpose.
Presbyteries could minister to their churches and clergy by occasionally having some Sabbath time that helped people reconnect with their identity as churches and clergy of those churches. That will be our theme for the rest of the week.
