By sundown on the sixth day, God has completed His work.  Like an artist surveying a masterpiece, He steps back and declares that it is very good.  Good work is satisfying, and God enjoys His work.  But work must stop in order to have Sabbath.

Both in the Garden and at the Cross, God completes His work on Friday.  From the Garden, He pronounces it completed and then enters into Sabbath rest.  From the Cross He pronounces that “It is finished” and enters into Sabbath rest.  On both occasions He has brought life to humanity.  In the Garden He created life with His breath, and on the Cross He redeemed life with His blood.  In both cases the universe needed to stop and spend time absorbing God’s love.  In short, they needed Sabbath rest.

Rest is the first of the primary colors of love that God embedded in the Sabbath.  The most common meaning of the Hebrew word for rest is “to cease” or “stop.”  On the first Sabbath God rested from His work—He stopped.  Stopping has no real value in and of itself.  In fact, it can be detrimental; leading to boredom and the idea that holiness is best experienced in isolation from the world.  The value of stopping is to put an end to one activity to focus on something else.  In the case of Sabbath, God stopped creating to focus on His creatures.

God gave us a perfect example of how to practice rest.  He stopped everything else and spent a full day getting to know Adam and Eve.  The first Sabbath must have been filled with unforgettable memories.

By Des Cummings, PhD

Author of Original Love

To purchase Original Love or other Healthy 100 Resources, visit FloridaHospitalPublishing.com