Last week an expert on Womans Hour was asked how parents could help teens cope with the psychological pressures of study and exams. Her top recommendation was always having at least one day a week free of any study or exam work, and instead just being together and doing enjoyable things. She said this helps the brain process what teenagers have taken in the rest of the week, so it is actually beneficial academically as well as being good for wider well-being.
She talked about this as if it was a new idea of which the benefits were only now being appreciated but the Bible teaches that this has been part of God's guidance to mankind since the dawn of time. The command to keep one day in seven holy, by resting from work, demonstrates perhaps more vividly than any other command how the service of God and the wellbeing of human beings are inextricably intertwinned. It is the Evil One who insinuates that God's commands are burdensome, and designed to serve some divine self-interest at the expense of our own.
The command to observe the Sabbath is not only contained in the rules and regulation of Leviticus but is so foundational to a life of holiness that it stands alongside the most fundamental moral principles in the Decalogue or Ten Commandments. We should therefore take extreme caution before discarding the observation of the Sabbath along with aspects of the ceremonial law as some people are wont to do. As Jesus said, the Sabbath was made for man and for his spiritual, physical and mental good. I can testify that this principle has proved good in personal experience, right through from my earliest exams at school to high-pressure postgraduate medical qualifications.
'Test me in this' says the LORD Almighty 'and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it' Mal 3:10
