seekeroftruth
Well-Known Member
Exodus 23:10 “For six years you are to sow your fields and harvest the crops, 11 but during the seventh year let the land lie unplowed and unused. Then the poor among your people may get food from it, and the wild animals may eat what is left. Do the same with your vineyard and your olive grove.
12 “Six days do your work, but on the seventh day do not work, so that your ox and your donkey may rest, and so that the slave born in your household and the foreigner living among you may be refreshed.
13 “Be careful to do everything I have said to you. Do not invoke the names of other gods; do not let them be heard on your lips.
12 “Six days do your work, but on the seventh day do not work, so that your ox and your donkey may rest, and so that the slave born in your household and the foreigner living among you may be refreshed.
13 “Be careful to do everything I have said to you. Do not invoke the names of other gods; do not let them be heard on your lips.
Remember, this is the law given by God to Moses up on Mount Sinai during the same visit as the Ten Commandments.
These comment are from GodVine.
This is the first mention of the Sabbatical year; the law for it is given at length in Leviticus 25:2. Both the Sabbatical year and the weekly Sabbath are here spoken of exclusively in their relation to the poor, as bearing testimony to the equality of the people in their covenant with Yahweh. In the first of these institutions, the proprietor of the soil gave up his rights for the year to the whole community of living creatures, not excepting the beasts: in the latter, the master gave up his claim for the day to the services of his servants and cattle.
As, every seventh day was a Sabbath day, so every seventh year was to be a Sabbath year. The reasons for this ordinance Calmet gives thus:
"1. To maintain as far as possible an equality of condition among the people, in setting the slaves at liberty, and in permitting all, as children of one family, to have the free and indiscriminate use of whatever the earth produced.
"2. To inspire the people with sentiments of humanity, by making it their duty to give rest, and proper and sufficient nourishment, to the poor, the slave, and the stranger, and even to the cattle.
"3. To accustom the people to submit to and depend on the Divine providence, and expect their support from that in the seventh year, by an extraordinary provision on the sixth.
"4. To detach their affections from earthly and perishable things, and to make them disinterested and heavenly-minded.
"5. To show them God's dominion over the country, and that He, not they, was lord of the soil and that they held it merely from his bounty."
"2. To inspire the people with sentiments of humanity, by making it their duty to give rest, and proper and sufficient nourishment, to the poor, the slave, and the stranger, and even to the cattle.
"3. To accustom the people to submit to and depend on the Divine providence, and expect their support from that in the seventh year, by an extraordinary provision on the sixth.
"4. To detach their affections from earthly and perishable things, and to make them disinterested and heavenly-minded.
"5. To show them God's dominion over the country, and that He, not they, was lord of the soil and that they held it merely from his bounty."
Though they were thus bound to keep the sabbatical year, yet they must not neglect the seventh day's rest or weekly Sabbath; for that was of perpetual obligation, and was paramount to all others. That the sanctification of the Sabbath was of great consequence in the sight of God, we may learn from the various repetitions of this law; and we may observe that it has still for its object, not only the benefit of the soul, but the health and comfort of the body also. Doth God care for oxen? Yes; and he mentions them with tenderness, that thine ox and thine ass may rest. How criminal to employ the laboring cattle on the Sabbath, as well as upon the other days of the week! More cattle are destroyed in England than in any other part of the world, in proportion, by excessive and continued labor. The noble horse in general has no Sabbath! Does God look on this with an indifferent eye? Surely he does not. "England," said a foreigner, "is the paradise of women, the purgatory of servants, and the hell of horses.
We are in danger of missing our way on the right hand and on the left, and it is at our peril if we do, therefore we have need to look about us. A man may ruin himself through mere carelessness, but he cannot save himself without great care and circumspection; particularly since idolatry was a sin they were much addicted to, and would be greatly tempted to, they must endeavour to blot out the remembrance of the gods of the heathen, and must disuse all their superstitious forms of speech, and never mention them but with detestation. In Christian schools and academies (for it is in vain to think of re - forming the play - houses) it were to be wished that the names and stories of the heathen deities or demons rather were not so commonly and familiarly used.
I've taken a temporary job this year. I did this because I got bored with retirement. People around me just don't understand the concept. I hardly understand it myself, truthfully. Money isn't important to me. Oh I don't have a lot of money. As a matter of fact, I live quite frugally because I know I'm just on the fringes of poverty income.... but I don't need to make more.... I'm happy where I am. I could have more hours and I've been offered full time jobs for twice the money a half hour away, but I don't need it. People don't need more money.... we're told we do.... just like we're told that twinkies are good for us.... lol.... We need more God.
