Like a boat that would be tossed endlessly and aimlessly and dangerously on the open sea without an anchor, we need to anchor our lives as well. That anchor is devotion to God. God worked for six days during that first “week” then rested on the seventh: “And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done” (Gen. 2:3, NIV). The word holy means “set apart,” or different from ordinary things.
From the law in Exodus we know one reason for this day of devotion is to ensure that we do not get too far away from God’s pattern. If one out of every seven days we are anchored by our focus on Him, we are less likely to drift from Him. On the other hand, if one day each week is not spent in giving Him our attention, we are more likely to put Him further and further away from our thoughts until we do not seriously think of Him at all, and we end up being tossed about on the sea of life only to wind up being smashed and broken on the rocks when a storm hits.
Drop your anchor – keep your focus on Him!
Life on Planet Earth has become a rat race, and a mad scramble to get ahead that is leaving brokenness everywhere. We desperately need a pattern to live by that will enable us to live our lives successfully. Such a pattern already exists; it was set at the dawn of Creation by God Himself. But we are not following the Creator’s directions.
Our twenty-four-hour day is based on the earth’s rotation on its axis. Our twelve-month years are based on the revolution of our planet around the sun. But the only basis for the seven-day week that is used worldwide as a pattern for humanity’s lifestyle is the Creator’s example: “By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work” (Gen. 2:2, NIV). While God’s week included rest on the seventh day, it also involved work for six days straight, giving us a pattern for the discipline of our lives. How close does the pattern of your life follow His?
