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During this message today, we’ll be looking at and singing the hymn, “Earth and All Stars” (#558 in your green hymnal, Lutheran Book of Worship). Now, I haven’t asked a congregation to sing this hymn in a number of years. There’s a reason for that.

I was a new pastor in my first congregation over on the other coast. I picked this hymn because I thought it reflected both the scriptures and my message for that day. After the service, one of the members came up to me with his worship book opened to the hymn. “Pastor,” he said, “with all the great hymns and great music, tell me why we had to sing a piece of schlock like this!”

I’m pretty poor at replying immediately, especially to someone offering what I consider negative criticism, so I don’t remember how I answered. Later, I told the senior pastor about it: why I’d picked the hymn, what the fellow said, how I felt. I guess I was looking for a bit of sympathy. “Well, Greg,” he answered, “I’m sorry…but it is schlock!” So, I can certainly sympathize with those of you who have ever had someone criticize one your old favorites.

I may be a bit nervous, then, asking you all to sing this, but I noticed in our records that, before I came on board, you have sung this hymn a few times in the past decade. That makes me a little braver.

We’ll be looking at this hymn as a frame for today’s sermon because, even if it were schlock, then it’s schlock that’s based on the Holy Scriptures, and it expresses what I want to say this morning about the Sabbath. Beyond that, it expresses great and eternal truths about God the Creator, about the continued incarnation of Jesus Christ in the world, and, I think, it is “schlock” that sings about the final hope and destination of all of creation!

Before we sing it, let’s look at the scripture on which it’s based. If you look on page 262 in the front part of the hymnal, in the Psalms section, you’ll find Psalm 98. It starts out: “Sing to the Lord a new song for he has done marvelous things.”

I honestly believe that these things: art, music and dance are more than aesthetically pleasing. These things worship God. These glorify God. (Notice, I am not saying that all art, music and dance worship God.) But we worshippers are—more than invited to art, singing and dance—we are commanded to do them. Read through the Psalms; it doesn’t say, “Come, ye of perfect pitch and melodious voice, and sing.” It is a general command: “All y’all, sing!” That may mean that some of us need a broader interpretation or a different understanding of what singing can sound like…or, if singing necessarily sounds at all!

To see what I mean, look at Psalm 98. Let’s start at verse five. I’ll sing the odd verses and have you all join me on the even verses. While we sing, though, pay attention to those who are commanded to join our song.

5.   Shout with joy to the Lord all you lands;

Lift up your voice, rejoice, and sing.

Sing to the Lord with the harp,

With the harp and the voice of song.

With trumpets and the sound of the horn

Shout with joy before the king, the Lord.

Let the sea make a noise and all that is in it,

The lands and those who dwell therein.

Let the rivers clap their hands

And let the hills ring out with joy before the Lord when he comes to judge the earth.

In righteousness shall he judge the world

And all the peoples with equity.

Okay, who is commanded to join our song? Right, everyone and everything; all people and instruments and creation are commanded to lift up their songs!

Now, let’s look at the hymn, “Earth and All Stars!” In the first stanza, these are to join the song: earth, stars and the planets. In another hymn, this is called the “music of the spheres.”[1] Victory and army are commanded to sing to the Lord. Then it finishes with a refrain from the first verse of Psalm 98: “He has done marvelous things. I, too, will praise him with a new song.”

The second stanza calls on the weather, plants, dry leaves and all of creation to sing. Let’s join them and sing the third stanza:

Trumpet and pipes! Loud clashing cymbals!

Sing to the Lord a new song!

Harp, lute and lyre! Loud humming cellos!

Sing to the Lord a new song!

            He has done marvelous things.

            I too will praise him with a new song!

So, all music and instruments are commanded to join the song.

Fine, beautiful. But what does all this have to do with our gospel lesson, or with this sermon that I’ve titled, “Sabbath, Unshackled”? Let’s find out by turning to our gospel lesson…

St. Luke often connected Jesus’ work and ministry to the Sabbath. Today’s healing happened, not only on the Sabbath, but also right in the middle of a synagogue! His healings often lead to a public controversy with religious leaders.

Here at the center of our lesson was this woman, already brought low, bound by a spirit. Literally, the Greek Bible said it was a “spirit against her strength.” She was already doubled over, but still the leader heaped all the more shame on top of her. “Day of all days, why does she come to be healed on the Sabbath?” I want you to notice that the woman never asked to be healed, and nobody asked for her. Jesus called her out…on this day of all days!

(In the next chapter of Luke, chapter fourteen, something very similar happened. Jesus healed a man with dropsy, and there he was even more obvious about this point. Before he called to the man, Jesus asked, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?” Then, Jesus answered his own question by calling the man up and healing him before the whole crowd.)

The religious leader of today’s gospel lesson was addressing Jesus, well actually, he was trying to make a point before the crowd, and asking, “Why sully yourself, us, and this Sabbath that is supposed to be devoted to worship of God, by calling up, touching and healing this invalid, this in-VAL-id woman?”

In another place Jesus once said, “People are not made for Sabbath, but Sabbath is made for God’s people.” In other words, the Sabbath is given to us as gift. We were never meant to be gifts to the Sabbath, enslaved or oppressed by it…given to us! Jesus’ answer to this religious leader and elsewhere, showed that Sabbath is “kept holy,” not by its proper and pure rites, but by the “kind of people” observing it, their hearts for God and his people.

The “kind of people” that keep Sabbath is not about their “moral purity.” Far more important, (beyond doctrinal, ethical, political, sexual, or physical purity) are the inspiration, and displays—what we call the fruits—of our compassion. When we ignore, ridicule, dismiss or avoid the people around us, their shackles or needs; when we seek to press them down with societal… or even Biblical… shame and guilt; or when we attempt to “humbly” and quietly hide our own sinfulness under the guise of our “Sunday best,” (especially when compared to “this woman,” or “them”) …in all of these cases, we show that our own hearts remain firmly bound.

Then, no matter how “pure” we can make our lives look, we are the more guilty and unrighteous. If we are not extending active care or compassion to the “weaker,” “different,” or even the distasteful and annoying person, then it seems that we have not heard or believed the extent and effectiveness of God’s acceptance and forgiveness when proclaimed.

It is arrogant and hypocritical for us to judge, qualify or stand in the way of anyone’s release. That is God’s job. Our job is to proclaim it!

This was not, after all, just a lowly crippled woman. Jesus called her a daughter of Abraham. She was not in-VAL-id. She was a holy child of the promise …as significant and dignified as everyone around her was. And she was made dignified, not by her actions, not by her purity. These things she didn’t have. But she did have the promise, and the forgiveness, and the claim of God on her, and on her soul.

And if the message of Sabbath is peace and release to the captives, if that is God’s work, then there is no better reason or day to proclaim and act out release or acceptance, and no better time than right now, and every chance we get!

And finally, we Christians might do well to occasionally take a humble step backward and realize that we do not gather on the Sabbath described in the Ten Commandments. There is no place in the New Testament where Sabbath is specifically redefined as Sunday.

We celebrate the day after Sabbath. Early on it was called the “Day of the Lord’s Resurrection.” Sabbath is the last day of the week. Sunday is the new day; God lives on both ends! One of my seminary professors calls Sunday the “eighth day” and the “day beyond the week.”

It ought to be clear to us, then, that our Christian “Sabbath” is not bound to a day of the week. It goes beyond the week. Sabbath is unshackled!

(Otherwise, the Seventh-Day Adventists might be right, at least on this one point, and the rest of us have been disobeying that commandment for centuries! Maybe we should repent and change? At least then we’d have a good reason for lying around all day Saturday!) But I don’t think so. Instead, we are Sabbath people. We embrace Sabbath’s eternal peace and release for ourselves, and we proclaim it to others, however and whenever we can.

Sabbath means peace. For us, it is the peace of Christ. We carry peace around with us, we carry Sabbath in and with us, because Christ was victorious over death, and he gave it to us. We, and all creation, can now know our destiny. And it lies in a new creation. With Christ’s resurrection and our salvation, the Sabbath song erupted from Saturday into the whole week, and can sing through any given moment, and through anything we might say or do.

Here are all the new songs of Sabbath: the simplest, kind or small gesture you might do today, or the quick prayer you send up to God on Wednesday. It might be doing your work, with the best of intentions on Thursday, actually caring for your customer, or enjoying a picnic, and squinting into the sun on Friday. It could be caring for your family by hammering a nail, or changing a diaper on Sunday. Maybe the new song sounds like caring for others while applying a paintbrush to new siding. Christians, in your hands all of these things can sing a new song. The voice of Sabbath erupted from Saturday and can now be seen and heard in everything!

Let’s sing together stanza four of “Earth and All Stars!”

Engines and steel! Loud pounding hammers!

Sing to the Lord a new song!

Limestone and beams! Loud building workers!

Sing to the Lord a new song!

            He has done marvelous things.

                  I too will praise him with a new song!

Herbert Brokering did his graduate studies in several Lutheran seminaries before earning a degree in child psychology. He went on to more religious studies at both American and German universities. He worked with the National Lutheran Church for Christian education, and also with the Lutheran World Federation and the World Council of Churches, and he served over a decade as a church pastor.

Herbert Brokering also wrote this hymn that we are singing. He wrote it for the 90^th anniversary of St. Olaf College in 1964. Writing in the spirit of the 98^th Psalm, he said that he “tried to gather into a hymn of praise the many facets of life which come together in the life of community. So there are the references to building, nature, learning, family, war, festivity.”

Look at stanza five. All these are commanded to sing: classrooms, labs, boiling test tubes, athletes, band, and cheering crowds. “I tell you, if these were silent, then even the stones would cry out,” because without God, without Christ, without his victory, salvation and our destiny there would be nothing. So, of course, all of creation must bow before its Creator! All of creation will sing.

All creation will be confronted by and realize the enormity of God. But the unbelievable grace is that God stoops to embrace us. This is the God who could shake Mt. Sinai to pieces, but chooses, instead, to lift us to Mt. Zion and embrace us. Realizing this, everything must sing in worship. If not now, then ultimately, all knees will bow.

Let’s sing together the last stanza.

Knowledge and truth! Loud sounding wisdom!

Sing to the Lord a new song!

Daughter and son! Loud praying members!

Sing to the Lord a new song!

            He has done marvelous things.

                  I too will praise him with a new song!

This is the new choir and harmony of Sabbath that sings any and every day of the week. And when we turn away from our own whining, when we stop distracting ourselves with the faults, and distastefulness, and gossip about others… when, instead, we look out there and see all the children of Abraham, of the promise, when we see a dignity—not their own—but Christ’s dignity, then, in them, we will find the heart of God.

This is how we truly honor the Sabbath, and keep it holy, with the center of compassion, first shown to us by God, and now extended to others through us. Without that center, everything else is false and hypocritical. But with that center, everyone and everything can sing a new song. Daughters doubled over, sons with dropsy, stand up in Christian dignity, and let us sing in all that we do! We sing, because we know that God has brought us up to Mt. Zion! Amen.

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[1] “This Is My Father’s World, / And to my list’ning ears/ All nature sings, and round me rings/ The music of the spheres…”