"The biblical revelation is about awakening, not accomplishing. It is a realization, and not any kind of performance principle whatsoever."   (Richard Rohr, Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality)   There may not be anything more difficult for people today than to adjust ourselves to the truth of this statement by Richard Rohr.   This difficulty seems to be part of living in U. S. society.   Biblical scholar Walter Brueggemann says that we try to do more and more in an effort to be adequate.   That's what it takes and it feels like a treadmill.   In such a world, faith and church are often one more item to schedule and one more bill to pay.   Experiences, including religious ones, become commodities to be bought and sold.   He suggests that American society knows very little about Sabbath.

The fourth commandment is to remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy.   In the Deuteronomy version of the Ten Commandments, we are observe the Sabbath and keep it holy because we were "slaves in the land of Egypt."   Brueggemann points out that Sabbath is a way of living that affirms God's kingdom of abundance.   It is a time to refrain from the process of making a living to remember that we all come before God as equals.   It is a time to let go of striving for adequacy through our labor and embrace the fundamental reality that we are created acceptable to God - who we are and as we are.

Sabbath is basic to the journey of faith, but it is in significant tension with our current societal culture.   The pain we feel is the result of our wanting to live in both worlds - to have it both ways.   The message of our culture is that we need to strive and labor in order to escape the specter of scarcity and be adequate.   That message does not coexist peacefully with God's abundance - that we are fully and completely acceptable, adequate, and wonderful.

Ultimately, faith invites us to embrace an attitude of abundance.   The challenge we face is to change our perspective and see the rest of life through the lens of faith and abundance.   The question for churches may be this:   how to invest ourselves in spiritual formation without just adding one more thing.   Can we approach biblical abundance as not another commodity?

My questions at this point are more compelling than my answers.   I still try to have it both ways - to appease the demands of the culture by trying to achieve adequacy while also satisfying the perceived demands of the church to be more like Jesus.   Once in a great while, I think I am almost good enough to pull it off.   That achievement allows me to live the lie a little longer.  

The invitation of faith is to let go an attitude of scarcity and embrace an attitude of abundance.   Curiously, I find that the scarcity is really hard to leave.   It is addictive.   Ironically, the only way I usually make such a challenging change in my life is when the pain of trying to have it both ways gets acute enough.   Maybe that is the function of stress, pain, and even burnout for us - making it painful enough?   If so, then perhaps change is coming soon.   This is the issue of our lives.   This is the challenge for our journey now and faith holds the key.

Thanks for continuing to bless me as we journey together.
    
Jack Price

FYI - Jack has published several articles at: http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Jack_F_Price

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