Subversive Sabbath: The Surprising Power of Rest in a Nonstop World

by A.J. Swoboda

emergency or something to which a response can wait. Discerning the difference between a legitimate Sabbath emergency and something that can wait is an art form acquired over time. In my work, two parishioners in a relational spat is not an emergency. An elder needing to talk through a finer point of theology is not an emergency. A conversation about a roommate who needs to do the dishes better is not an emergency. I learned long ago that if I am needed to help resolve everyone else’s “emergency,” then I am discipling people to be more dependent on me than on God and even on each other. Thus, if I am compelled to respond to every pressing need, I am creating a context in which my parishioners have an unhealthy relationship of dependence on me. The result: I start developing an overinflated sense of my importance. The longer I have kept a Sabbath, the more I have found that not answering nonemergency Sabbath issues actually releases people to grow in their dependence on God and on other people in the community. Again, Sabbath is ministry. My Sabbath-keeping helps others learn to minister to one another.