Sabbath Quotes

“Hope is not mere optimism; rather, it is moving forward in anticipation of redemption in spite of the improbability of rescue.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“We live in a day when our sense are so dull that we need extreme sports, bingeing, or dangerous pastimes to give us a sense we are alive. We crave reality — both pain and pleasure — so much that many young people cut themselves, saying, 'I just wanted to feel something.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“We are not to work on the Sabbath because it takes us out of the play of joy. It is as bizarre as making love to your spouse, but getting out of bed during the process to cut your lawn or wash dishes. Such an offense would do far more than spoil the mood; it would be a direct assault on the integrity of joy, announcing that a mundane chore is more pleasurable than sexual joy with your spouse.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“It is not presumptuous to ask, 'What is it that you see in me that brings you delight?”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“Speed is the ultimate defense, the antidote to stopping and really looking. If we really saw what we were doing and who we had become, we feel we might not survive the stopping and the accompanying self-appraisal. So we don't stop, and the faster we go, the harder it becomes to stop.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“The only parameter that is to guide our Sabbath is delight. Will this be merely a break or a joy? Will this lead my heart to wonder or routine? Will I be more grateful or just happy that I got something done?”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“Abundance is not about possession; it is utterly, completely, and solely about gratitude.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“We will never know Sabbath delight unless God delivers us from drowning in the noise and grime of our soiled days.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“We are to free the slaves because we were once slaves. Sabbath is a remembrance of the stale bondage of Egypt and the fresh air of our new garden given to us because of the faithfulness of God's covenantal love, not due to our capacity to make God happy. Yet God is more than happy with us — he adores us and lavishes us with freedom and joy.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“A gift that has the power to change us awakens a part of the soul. But we cannot receive the gift until we can meet it as an equal. We therefore submit ourselves to the labor of becoming like the gift. Giving a return gift is the final act in the labor of gratitude, and it is also, therefore, the true acceptance of the original gift.' There is a burden of gratitude that, if it is not returned, will crush our spirits or splinter them. But we don't give to get rid of the burden; we must become like the gift in order to give it in its fullness.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“Time has become a precious commodity and the ultimate scarcity for millions of Americans. A 1996 Wall Street Journal survey found 40% of Americans saying that lack of time was a bigger problem for them than lack of money.”6”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath: The Ancient Practices

“Delight doesn’t require a journey thousands of miles away to taste the presence of God, but it does require a separation from the mundane, an intentional choice to enter joy and follow God as he celebrates the glory of his creation and his faithfulness to keep his covenant to redeem the captives.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath: The Ancient Practices

“Heschel offers this befuddling language to put us right side up. He writes, Time, that which is beyond and independent of space, is everlasting; it is the world of space which is perishing. Things perish within time; time itself does not change. We should not speak of the flow or passage of time but of the flow or passage of space through time. It is not time that dies; it is the human body which dies in time. Temporality is an attribute of the world of space, of things of space. Time which is beyond space is beyond the division in past, present, and future.8”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath: The Ancient Practices

“Many people experience time as an unruly mess that is often out of control. We need time, as if God has not allotted to us all that we are meant to have. We make time, as if we had the power to create it. We steal time, as if we could add more to our lives. We spend and use time, as if it really were a commodity.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath: The Ancient Practices

“The Sabbath is the day that holds together the beginning of time and the end; it is the intersection of the past and future that opens a window into eternity each week.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath: The Ancient Practices

“Awe takes our breath away, and a moment of wonder returns us to the childlike sensation of being small in the face of something—Someone—bigger. Awe is humbling. The absence of humility is a mark of decadence and narcissism”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath: The Ancient Practices

“Many who take the Sabbath seriously and intentionally ruin it with legislation and worrisome fences that protect the Sabbath but destroy its delight. For many Sabbath keepers, it is a day of duty, diligence, and spiritual focus that eschews play and pleasure for Bible reading, prayer, naps, and tedious religious services that seem designed to suck the air out of the soul. If that is keeping the Sabbath holy, then it is better to break it.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath: The Ancient Practices

“We enter delight only as we gaze equally and simultaneously at creation and redemption, in spite of the darkness that surrounds us and constantly clamors to be truer than God.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath: The Ancient Practices

“It is stunning to look at the power of contempt. From one disdainful student I am contemplating retirement. The fact that I could be so ill affected indicates that I am wickedly disturbed and ought not to be in the classroom. Then the fact that I’d think about quitting at all proves I am a quitter and ought to quit. It is an endless sequencing of convoluted logic and the violence of contempt. And it is magnified by the delight of evil that it has far more power to move the soul than the apparently far lesser power of kindness.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath: The Ancient Practices

“Time, that which is beyond and independent of space, is everlasting; it is the world of space which is perishing. Things perish within time; time itself does not change. We should not speak of the flow or passage of time but of the flow or passage of space through time. It is not time that dies; it is the human body which dies in time. Temporality is an attribute of the world of space, of things of space. Time which is beyond space is beyond the division in past, present, and future.8 If Heschel is correct, time doesn’t have to be redeemed or used or stolen or made or spent; instead, we are called to submit to time as the medium in which we live.9 Time is simply to be breathed like air.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath: The Ancient Practices

“Action is never enough if defined as eradicating the problem. Action is always enough if it is faithful to the call of the moment.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“It is not wrong to petition God on the Sabbath, but the heart of the Sabbath is to delight in all he has given us, rather than to ask for what has not yet been fulfilled. Prayer on the Sabbath might well fit into the categories of praise or invitation.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“Joy must be chosen, but the deeper conundrum is that it can't be controlled or cajoled as to when it will come or how long it will stay.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“The Sabbath is a party, and what is a good party without a drinking song? Almost all the early John Wesley hymns were sung to what at the time was wild pub music.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“What might it look like if we lived as if we will not be endlessly divided from those who have brought us harm and whom we have failed as well?”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“To enter the realm of play, we must give ourselves to something or someone and turn away from all else. It is both a pledge and a betrayal.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“Jesus, the fullness of God and man, is the full perfection of humanity, and he calls us to a humanity that is full and alive, without flaw or fault.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath

“The Sabbath is not a vacation; it is a grateful celebration. Who are you celebrating? To whom do you owe your life, your current taste of re-creation? Who marked you with kindness that has enabled you to offer care in return? Who has scarred you with heartache that has enabled you to enter the wounds of others with grace? We are called to bless those who love us and those who love to do us harm.”
― Dan B. Allender, Sabbath