Leviticus 25: 1-7, “And the LORD spake unto Moses in mount Sinai, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a sabbath unto the LORD. Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and gather in the fruit thereof; But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land, a sabbath for the LORD: thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard. That which groweth of its own accord of thy harvest thou shalt not reap, neither gather the grapes of thy vine undressed: for it is a year of rest unto the land. And the sabbath of the land shall be meat for you; for thee, and for thy servant, and for thy maid, and for thy hired servant, and for thy stranger that sojourneth with thee, And for thy cattle, and for the beast that are in thy land, shall all the increase thereof be meat.”
When the Lord created the heavens and the earth He established a pattern that would cover all creation. He rested on the seventh day because the work was finished. When Adam sinned he was cursed but even the earth was cursed (Gen 3: 17-19, “And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.”) Even the ground suffers from the pain of the curse and needs to have a rest from this struggle. In order to preserve the ground and allow it to produce food in the long term, the Lord established a pattern where the earth could rest every seventh year. We may ask why the earth had to wait for six years before it could rest in the seventh while man was able to wait for six days and rest on the seventh. This is because the earth produces its fruit in the long term taking whole seasons to be fruitful. So that the earth can be productive before it has a chance to rest it was only allowed to rest in the seventh year. However, the earth would be extra productive in the sixth year because the people needed to eat every day and could not do without food for more than a year while the earth was having a rest.
(The view expressed in this blog are my own and should not be taken as inspired in any way.)
No comments:
Post a Comment