The Hard Work of Resting on the Sabbath
[19] As soon as it began to grow dark at the gates of Jerusalem before the Sabbath, I commanded that the doors should be shut and gave orders that they should not be opened until after the Sabbath. And I stationed some of my servants at the gates, that no load might be brought in on the Sabbath day.
[20] Then the merchants and sellers of all kinds of wares lodged outside Jerusalem once or twice.
[21] But I warned them and said to them, “Why do you lodge outside the wall? If you do so again, I will lay hands on you.” From that time on they did not come on the Sabbath.
[22] Then I commanded the Levites that they should purify themselves and come and guard the gates, to keep the Sabbath day holy. Remember this also in my favor, O my God, and spare me according to the greatness of your steadfast love.
Nehemiah 13:19–22 ESV
After the majority of the Jewish people were hauled off by war or to exile in Babylon, they began to take the Sabbath more serious than ever. After hundreds of years with struggling with idolatry, that never seemed to come up again in the various sins of Israel. They didn’t just get there naturally, though. They had some help from their leaders.
Nehemiah was zealous for the rebuilding of the city of Jerusalem, and then the re-institution of the feasts and the Levitical priesthood. He knew that Israel had been in exile because of their failure to follow the Law – especially in keeping the Sabbath Holy. When the Sabbath began to look like every other day of the week, he knew something serious had to happen. He knew that it wasn’t out of blatant rebellion that the people were buying and selling on the Sabbath day instead of resting so he intervened on the thing that was doing the distracting: the outsiders coming to town.
We are not as zealous for the Sabbath as Nehemiah for many reasons. First and foremost, because Jesus fulfilled the Law, we no longer express our faith by obeying the written law but by being led by the Holy Spirit. I’m not totally sure that the Spirit would lead you to threaten to beat up fish salesmen on a Sunday, but if He did, it wouldn’t be because they were breaking the Sabbath.
The idea that works for us from this, though, is that good rest takes work. He had to go out there ahead of time and close the gates before the merchants showed up. He had to go out there and tell them, “If you do this again, I will lay hands on you!” I don’t think was was planning on praying for them.
And finally, he called on the priests to also take part in keeping the day Holy. This was way too big of a job for Nehemiah himself. If the people were going to recognize the Lord as their provider and get back to resting in Him as the giver of all good things, it was going to take more than Nehemiah.
There is somebody you know that works hard at making a restful day for others (it might even be on a Sunday!).
What if you joined them, planned ahead, and stoked up some zeal for the hard work of rest?
What if we all had a day that we considered the Lord’s purifying power in us, and the joy of spending a whole day out of the week dedicated to Him?
And what if after all the setup was complete, we rested with the prayer Nehemiah prayed, “My God, spare me according to the greatness of your steadfast love. “