"Lord, they will not hear—"
"Lord, it is done."—
Work with your whole heart and strength; but then take work and class, and lay them at the Lord's feet; and with them the tired worker too. So doing your work peacefully. And if Monday morning finds you tired, it will find you also rested. The air of the world will have cleared somewhat, giving a nearer view of "the city"; its mountains will have sunk down well nigh out of sight, before the everlasting hills to which you may lift up your eyes for help. And labour and care and profit and loss will cease to be a tangle when stamped with this order:
"Occupy till I come."
But for you who are not workers (the why and wherefore are for yourselves to say) do you too make the Sabbath a day of rest. Yet do not let your Sunday rest run into Sunday dissipation by trying to hear all the good sermons at once. Choose (and abide by) some true church so near that no street car shall be run for you, and yet—if possible—far enough off to give you a freshening walk as you go and come. Neither take out your carriage, "that thine ox and thine ass may rest." [18] Of course I speak only of places where it is possible to walk to church.
Get up early enough to have no hurry and no "late." Have a simple church dress that will need no fussing; have a simple breakfast, without "hot cakes," and a cold dinner, "that thy man servant and thy maid servant may rest as well as thou." [19]
I know it is charged upon the men of the family that they will never "stand" a cold dinner. But I have catered for just such many times, and I know they will. Only be you careful on Saturday, to provide a dainty repast that is fit to eat cold—and then see. You will find those very grumblers charmed with their dinner, and praising it before any other in the week. You can always grace your cold dishes with hot coffee and baked potatoes.
O the rest, the "recreation" of such a day! With all earth's turmoil pushed aside, and Christ himself the one invited guest. Unless indeed some needy friend, who can have no "Sunday" elsewhere. People talk in these days with horror of the old Puritan sabbath. But even if everything be true that they tell of it, I would rather spend Sunday with blinds shut and pictures turned to the wall, than in the full week-day glare which fills some houses. And if you want refreshment from your play-times in the week, if you want heart and mind and face to keep fresh, begin the week with the Lord's day kept wholly to the Lord.
"Verily, my sabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations." [20]
A sabbath, a rest. Rest of mind which lingering in bed will not give; rest of body which feasting could only hinder; a rest of heart by dwelling all day in the deep shadow of the Lord's presence. So beginning the week, this promise shall be upon you as each day rolls on,