Which is really just a way of asking what Sunday is for. Consider the NFL. Its ratings are falling and the league invents self-justifying reasons why. Do Colin Kaepernick, et. al. have a significant effect on viewing? Frankly, I doubt it, although some people have tuned out because of them for sure.
I have already explained that the reason ratings are falling is - Peyton Manning is not playing anymore. To elucidate further, I mean that there is no celebrity quarterback in the game now that Peyton retired. Tom Brady? Old and deflated by deflate-gate. Aaron Rodgers? Great quarterback. So what? Colin Kaepernick? Oh, wait, we already talked about him. And he's not a first-tier QB anyway. Games today are simply boring. (Update - In fact, the 10-23 evening game is being called "The Worst Game Ever.")
My 23-year-old daughter told me today that Millennials don't have the inclination to watch football or any other sport for three hours. To which I would add, "Unless their own kids are playing," which clearly none are yet. Millennials are far more likely to be glued to digital heroin than non-interactively observe what;s happening in some distant location.
As I type this, awaiting some time to pass before I must leave for my afternoon work, the Tennessee Titans are losing to the Colts in the second half. The Titans' season is 3-3 as of now. If they lose they return to losing-season status; if they win the gain winning-season status for the first time this year.
Does it make any difference to me which outcome occurs? No. Will my life improve if they go to 4-3? No. Will it be diminished if they to 3-4? No. Is there anyone whom I know who could answer affirmatively to any of those questions? No. So do I care whether they win or lose? Not in the slightest.
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| Yawn. |
Jews honor Friday sundown to Saturday sundown as their Sabbath. Once the sun sets, Sabbath rules kick in and remain in effect for 24 hours. Generally, these are prohibitions of certain activities, mainly those of the workaday week, and their society of source was agricultural, not industrial. The command to honor the Sabbath springs from the Exodus of the children of Israel from Egypt and is found in the Ten Commandments, the heart of the Law of Moses.
Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God; you shall not do any work—you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and consecrated it.Hence, the Sabbath was to be a day set aside with deliberation for purpose of honoring God and the commandments of God in the world.
The first Christians were almost all Jews and they kept the idea of the Sabbath, but not the day of the week. The use of Sunday as the Sabbath by Christians was a very early adoption, done because, of course, it was on a Sunday that Jesus was found to be resurrected from death. But through most of Christian history, the purpose of the Sunday Sabbath mirrored that of the Jewish Sabbath: to be a day distinct from the rest with a deliberate focus on the worship and work of God in the world.
That this orientation has been mostly abandoned in the US today hardly needs be said. And not just by "Nones" or other non-Christians. Probably the majority of American church goers are pretty much done with the Sabbath part of Sundays about noon.
That the ancient Jews often fell short in keeping the Sabbath is evident from reading the Jewish Scriptures (Old Testament). Take, for example, Isaiah 58, in which the prophet decries just going through the motions of faith while expecting the same results:
“Shout it aloud, do not hold back.
Raise your voice like a trumpet.
Declare to my people their rebellion
and to the descendants of Jacob their sins.
2 For day after day they seek me out;
they seem eager to know my ways,
as if they were a nation that does what is right
and has not forsaken the commands of its God.
They ask me for just decisions
and seem eager for God to come near them.
3 ‘Why have we fasted,’ they say,
‘and you have not seen it?
Why have we humbled ourselves,
and you have not noticed?’
“Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please
and exploit all your workers.
4 Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife,
and in striking each other with wicked fists.
You cannot fast as you do today
and expect your voice to be heard on high.
5 Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
only a day for people to humble themselves?
Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed
and for lying in sackcloth and ashes?
Is that what you call a fast,
a day acceptable to the Lord?
6 “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?
7 Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
8 Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness will go before you,
and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard.
9 Then you will call, and the Lord will answer;
you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.
“If you do away with the yoke of oppression,
with the pointing finger and malicious talk,
10 and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,
then your light will rise in the darkness,
and your night will become like the noonday.
11 The Lord will guide you always;
he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land
and will strengthen your frame.
You will be like a well-watered garden,
like a spring whose waters never fail.
12 Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins
and will raise up the age-old foundations;
you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls,
Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.
13 “If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath
and from doing as you please on my holy day,
if you call the Sabbath a delight
and the Lord’s holy day honorable,
and if you honor it by not going your own way
and not doing as you please or speaking idle words,
14 then you will find your joy in the Lord,
and I will cause you to ride in triumph on the heights of the land
and to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob.”
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.There are consequences from not keeping the Sabbath, and there are results if we do. It is results we want, not consequences, yes? "For the mouth of the Lord has spoken."
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