Wednesday, June 1, 2016

Today’s Reading  |  Leviticus 25:1–17
The Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying: Speak to the people of Israel and say to them: When you enter the land that I am giving you, the land shall observe a sabbath for the Lord. Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard, and gather in their yield; but in the seventh year there shall be a sabbath of complete rest for the land, a sabbath for the Lord: you shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard. You shall not reap the aftergrowth of your harvest or gather the grapes of your unpruned vine: it shall be a year of complete rest for the land. You may eat what the land yields during its sabbath—you, your male and female slaves, your hired and your bound laborers who live with you; for your livestock also, and for the wild animals in your land all its yield shall be for food.

You shall count off seven weeks of years, seven times seven years, so that the period of seven weeks of years gives forty-nine years. Then you shall have the trumpet sounded loud; on the tenth day of the seventh month—on the day of atonement—you shall have the trumpet sounded throughout all your land. And you shall hallow the fiftieth year and you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you: you shall return, every one of you, to your property and every one of you to your family. That fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you: you shall not sow, or reap the aftergrowth, or harvest the unpruned vines. For it is a jubilee; it shall be holy to you: you shall eat only what the field itself produces. In this year of jubilee you shall return, every one of you, to your property. When you make a sale to your neighbor or buy from your neighbor, you shall not cheat one another. When you buy from your neighbor, you shall pay only for the number of years since the jubilee; the seller shall charge you only for the remaining crop years. If the years are more, you shall increase the price, and if the years are fewer, you shall diminish the price; for it is a certain number of harvests that are being sold to you. You shall not cheat one another, but you shall fear your God; for I am the Lord your God. (NRSV)

Reflection
Seventh day. Seventh year. Seven times seven years.

This passage reminds us how important time is in our Judeo-Christian tradition.

“Time is money.” “Don’t waste your time.” “I can’t lose time by doing that.”

Our Western culture values time, too, but in a very different way. (I’m indebted to George Lakoff and Mark Johnson’s Metaphors We Live By for powerfully pointing this out to me long ago.)

In our very modern, very Western culture, time is a commodity: something to be invested well and managed carefully. We should profit from our use of time.

Leviticus, and similar passages in Exodus, help us balance our approach. Time is a gift. Time is holy. What we have received as a gift, we should tend gratefully and lovingly. What we have received as a gift, we can share generously and joyfully.

It’s not that we need to reject either view; rather it’s helpful to let them inform each other. The ancient scripture has its own wisdom that sounds pretty contemporary. We work better when we take time to rest. Work endeavors fare better when everyone is treated fairly. Land produces better when it’s given time to lie fallow.

As we begin meteorological summer today, let us rejoice in the cycle of time: another season, unique and extraordinary, to enjoy and celebrate. In cherishing it, wantonly wasting some on what helps us rest and helps us grow, we can offer it back to the God who invites us into time and will one day call us out of it into eternity.

Prayer
God of moments and days, weeks and years, thank you for your gift of time. We are grateful for your sabbath mandate and call to jubilee. Help us to take these as seriously as we do our work. May all of what we do and are be a pleasing gift to you. We ask this in the name of our brother Jesus. Amen.

Written by Susan Quaintance, Program Coordinator, Center for Life and Learning

Reflection and Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church

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