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When I was in high school I was involved in a very large youth group comprised of students all over Jacksonville. This meant that the typical youth group trips and missions trips were a 5 charter bus affair. I understand that with students there is something to be said to having “buy-in” to these types of events. You want the students who come to be engaged in the programming. However, the way of securing that buy-in was by “qualifying.” How did you qualify to go on the winter youth trip? Attend Sunday school Attend Sunday evening training union Attend Sunday evening choir practice Attend Wednesday church services and sing in the choir Attend Saturday services that included students traveling to different neighborhoods to administer faith surveys Complete a daily quiet time book, and turn it in to ensure that each space had a handwritten reflection.
Not only was attendance required, but timeliness was measured as well, and excused absences were hard to come by. There are a lot of things I am thankful for about my church upbringing. However, the notion of qualifying is one that I am still unlearning in my faith journey. So many of our faith heroes in the Bible are unqualified or even unsuitable for their calls, and we are reminded over and over that humans aren’t great at judging qualifications, since God alone can see the heart. Sabbath as resistance means that we aren’t trying to measure up or qualify. The act of stopping is an act of finding our security in God to be unearned. In fact, in the Torah, there are a few ways to understand how the people of God are qualified. There are even warnings on who to exclude because of a wary history as a people with a shared trauma. So, when the people of God are being gathered again after the Babylonian diaspora, the only qualification from the law that God gives to gathering insiders is Sabbath. For the foreigner and the eunuch it isn’t what is done, but what isn’t done. This feels like such a welcoming God that invites people into a space of rest and healing. Sabbath to me reminds me that my sacred worth isn’t something I need to qualify for. The more I can accept this message the more I can see myself as God sees me and offer a more inclusive love to others based on their own unearned sacred worth. Rev. Haley Eccles
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