1. Read Genesis 2.1-3. Why does God bless the 7th day? What does God cease from doing? What’s your immediate reaction to Sabbath?
2. How have you seen Sabbath been religiously abused? What kind of Sabbath is God inviting us into?
3. What is your primary motive when you invite people to follow Jesus? In what ways do you “teach them everything I have commanded”? Matthew 28.20.
4. When reading the 10 commandments how often do you bypass the command of honoring the Sabbath? Are certain commands more important to God, or less important? How important is the Sabbath to God? How important is it to you?
5. In what ways did God provide and protect the Israelites on the Sabbath? What can we learn from this example?
6. Read and reflect on the following statements regarding Sabbath. Which do you resonate with most? Why? John Ortberg, “For many of us the great danger is not that we will renounce our faith. It is that we will become so distracted and rushed and preoccupied that we will settle for a mediocre version of it. We will just skim our lives instead of actually living them.” The Life You’ve Always Wanted
Carl Jung said, “Hurry is not of the devil, hurry is the devil.”
Wayne Muller writes a lot about Sabbath.
He says, “We are blessed with inner rhythms that tell us where we are, and where we are going. No matter, then, our fifty and sixty-hour work weeks, the refusing to stop for lunch, the bypassing sleep and working deep into the darkness. If we stop, if we return to rest, our natural state reassess itself. Our natural wisdom and balance come to our aid, and we find our way to what is good, necessary and true.” Sabbath
7. What are some of the Biblical promises associated with honoring the Sabbath?
8. How did the Israelites put themselves in God’s Great Story? When you read Scripture how do you see your story in the context of His Story? Give a recent example.
9. What would it look like for you to practice Sabbath? What would it feel like or sound like or not sound like if you set one day aside a week to rest and remember?
10. How do you see Sabbath as a way of life vs. an Old Testament teaching?
11. How could you incorporate Thanksgiving with honoring the Sabbath?
12. Read Jesus’ invitation to come and rest in Matthew 11.28-30 (MSG). How can you move toward this rest and rhythm as livable reality?
