Sabbath or Service?

This coming week the Gospel will pose a question to us in regard to how we follow Christ. the Apostles come back from healing and casting out evil spirits. They are tired and do not get a chance to even eat due to the masses coming to Jesus. Jesus has them withdraw with him on a boat to re-energize. We see here an image of sabbath - withdrawing from business to be alone with the Lord. But when they reach where they are going the crowds have already arrived there. Jesus has compassion on them and feeds their spiritual hunger by teaching them. So the question is left to us "what is greater, our need for 'balance' in our lives or our baptismal call to do the Lord's work?" the answer has to be that they are both essential and neither one can exclude the other. We have to know our limits. The Lord doesn't call us to push to the point of physical or mental breakdown. Yet we can't let 'balance' be an excuse for laziness either. Our 'ministry' should flow out of that quiet time with the Lord where he refills our cup so that we may share what he has given us with others. Perhaps we sometimes feel we are doing too much because, when it comes to sabbath, we haven't done enough.

Pax!