I wrote last week about my desire to keep a Christian Sabbath, with the spirit and not the letter of the law. Specifically I wanted to keep the Old Testament injunction “six days shalt thou labor” instead of my usual “six days shalt thou procrastinate,” and avoid the deadly “I’ll get up at the crack of dawn on Sunday and get it all done” mentality, which has been the cause of my being late to church many times, stressed, tired, under the gun, and totally without the ability to enjoy a day of rest and spiritual refreshment. (Just to be clear–this is only about myself and my personal activities. I’m not going to get all worried about whether or not it’s okay to go out to eat, or to stop at the grocery store because I genuinely forgot to buy something, or even to go to a movie. All of those activities do cause other people to work, but they’d be doing it anyway . . . so I think I’ll just concentrate on my side of the street, or the paper, or whatever figure of speech you want to use.)
So, now that I’ve gotten all that out of the way, how did it go? We were having people over for dinner, and I was determined that I was going to follow the checklist of last week’s post. I did get my weekly post for the Cherry Creek Chorale finished, although not actually posted. I kept stopping and starting on housework, especially cleaning up the kitchen. I just wasn’t feeling very energetic, for some reason. It was very, very tempting to to say, ‘Oh well–maybe I’ll get started on Sabbath-like Sundays next week.’ But finally I just pushed myself over the hump. I got the table all set and got out the serving dishes. Jim and Gideon helped do some other things, with Gideon making a batch of cream-cheese brownies. I figured out what needed to be done for food prep in the morning and went to bed with a real feeling of accomplishment.
Sunday I got up and did the following:
- washed the salad greens
- baked the rolls (the flour was ground the night before)
- peeled and sliced the sweet potatoes and pre-cooked them in the microwave
- prepped the pork roast
- cut up and washed the cauliflower
- Got the pork and sweet potatoes into the oven before I left for church
When I got home Gideon and I had a rather frantic half an hour or so getting the last-minute stuff done, but it wasn’t too bad. We had a nice dinner, I put the china and crystal in the sink with hot soapy water, and our guests didn’t leave until well after 4:00. We had a lovely time! And when I was asked if I was up for playing a game I said, “Sure,” which probably shocked my son and brother-in-law. After a couple of games I did go upstairs and work on my chorale music, which I figured was legitimate, and did some kitchen cleanup (with help from the guys). They were doing a Skype game thingy with my sister-in-law, so I was free to watch Masterpiece Mystery. The day ended peacefully and happily.
So, as I said last Monday, how next Sunday goes is largely dependent on what I do today, and tomorrow, and the rest of the week.
What could you do today that would give you a Sabbath rest this coming weekend?