What does a day of rest mean for you? Here are some diagnostic questions: How does my day of rest differ from other days? Have I made preparation so that I can devote my time to rest? What do I think when I hear people talk about a “holy rest”? Do I really think such a day of rest is necessary?

We live in an age when the practice of observing the Sabbath has gone the way of the dodo bird.

To a great extent, businesses keep the same hours on Sundays that they do on weekdays. The 24/7 news cycle stops for nothing except breaking news that it hasn’t already worn out. In that context, the non-Christian population knows no weekly cycle of life.

Even in the Christian world, the belief that Sunday is the Christian Sabbath has largely disappeared, with many under the impression that it was solely a Jewish requirement and has been replaced by our spiritual rest in Jesus. Many Christians perceive Sunday as a day on which we devote an hour or so to public worship and then return to our ordinary labors.

I do not have the space here to demonstrate my conviction that Sunday is indeed the Christian Sabbath, and thus a day of holy rest unto God. Instead, I would ask those students not persuaded of that position to act as if it were true—to begin setting apart Sunday as a day of holy rest.

What would it mean to set Sunday apart in this way? It would first mean extending one’s participation in the life of a church beyond an hour in the pew. Find ways to contribute to the Sunday commitments of the church. Attend an evening service if the church has one. Help with Sunday school. Join other Christians in fellowship, in which the focus of conversation is not sports or school but the work of God.

What does a day of rest mean for you? Here are some diagnostic questions: How does my day of rest differ from other days? Have I made preparation so that I can devote my time to rest? What do I think when I hear people talk about a “holy rest”? Do I really think such a day of rest is necessary?

Make Sunday a day of holy rest. Spend extra time in Scripture. Spend extra time in prayer and meditation. Give your life a weekly rhythm, fueled by the day spent apart, a day of spiritual rest, and a day in which the focus is not on this passing world but on that eternal Sabbath yet to come.

If you begin to practice this, I am convinced you will find a change in your life. You will be less hurried, less frazzled, more rested, and more prepared to heartily mean it when you say, “Come quickly, Lord Jesus.”

Dr. Ben Shaw, is a Minister in the Presbyterian Church in America and Professor of Old Testament at Reformation Bible College in Sanford, Fla.