update april 17th 2018 ~ by leilani
Today is the 3rd day of the 2nd week of seven weeks. Today is the 10th day of the counting of fifty days from the day of the waving of the Omer on the morrow after the Sabbath.
UPDATE April 14th 2015
In 2012 I said that I was “almost” able to escape for the Sabbath. I had only been trying for a couple years then, now I have noticed that there seems to be ups and downs. Sometimes I find it is hard to draw away from the world, whether physically or mentally, sometimes it is hard to turn it off.
I feel like one thing has led to another in my life lately, and I don’t mean things are going bad and I can’t forget my troubles, things are really pretty good, But I just feel like I am trying each week to find the peace that I used to have, it was so awesome, and I miss it.
P.S. I saw the picture I attached to this Sabbath story, it reminds me of a “cowboy church” maybe if we could find a group of folks to spend the day with. . . .
Original Post April 17th 2012
24 Abib 1313 BC
According to Jewish tradition, two days after the Israelites crossed the Red Sea they arrived in Marah. There they received several commandments; one of them was to observe the Sabbath. The first Sabbath was observed on the 24th of Abib.
And they went three days in the wilderness and found no water.
Now when they came to Marah, they could not drink the waters of Marah, for they were bitter. Therefore the name of it was called Marah.
And the people complained against Moses, saying, “What shall we drink?”
So he cried out to the Lord, and the Lord showed him a tree. When he cast it into the waters, the waters were made sweet. There He made a statute and an ordinance for them. And there He tested them, and said, “If you diligently heed the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians. For I am the Lord who heals you.”
Then they came to Elim, where there were twelve wells of water and seventy palm trees; so they camped there by the waters. Exo 15
The Sabbath
Six days a week we wrestle with the world, wringing profit from the earth; on the Sabbath we especially care for the seed of eternity planted in the soul. The world has our hands, but our soul belongs to Someone Else. Six days a week we seek to dominate the world, on the seventh day we try to dominate the self.
The Sabbath, thus, is more than an armistice, more than an interlude; it is a profound conscious harmony of man and the world, a sympathy for all things and a participation in the spirit that unites what is below and what is above. – Abraham Joshua Heschel
It has taken me a couple of years but I am almost able now to turn off my six day “wrestle with the world” and really enjoy the gift that God meant the Sabbath to be.
I am finding that the Sabbath is a gift that gets better every week it is received, opened and savored!