Exodus 23:10-19

Exodus chapter 23 and verse 10.

Verse 6.

Verse 7.

So here we see that every seventh year was to be what was called a Sabbath year for the Jewish people.

And that meant that there was no planting or no reaping during that entire year.

And three reasons are given for this in the text.

The first one is that the land may rest.

Now today in our culture we have modern techniques in farming that help to replenish the soil, that help to kill insects that may have gotten there in the previous seasons, but in ancient days they didn't have those things.

And so when you think about that, a theological reason and the theological reason would be having a reverence for the land that God has given but also a practical reason because during that year when the land is resting the larva of insects that might destroy crops are dying off and also the land is able to build within itself its own sort of fertilizer through compost and decay and things like that.

So that was the first reason for the Sabbath that's given.

And then the second reason for a Sabbath year was that the poor may eat.

Now, what does that mean? Well, there would be crops that would grow in those fields even though nothing was planted.

If you garden like we do, and I'm sure a lot of y'all do, you know that.

You've seen that probably at your own house.

At our house, sometimes we have what we call volunteer plants.

Have you ever seen a volunteer plant? They come from seeds that are left in the dirt from the previous season.

And it's nothing for us to go out there and say, where in the world did this tomato plant come from? We didn't plant this thing.

Or where did this pepper plant come from? We didn't plant this thing.

And so these volunteer crops, they would prop up during the Sabbath year.

But when they did, you weren't to go harvest them, the landowner, that is.

You were to leave those things out there and they were to be available to the poor.

Now that doesn't mean that the landowner and his family couldn't eat from those crops because when you read Leviticus chapter 25 verses 6 and 7, it says they can.

But what the owner of the land could not do was go out and harvest all of those volunteer crops.

He couldn't because he didn't put the work in it.

He didn't go out there and plant it.

He didn't go out there and weed it or anything like that.

These things just popped up out there.

So it means that the owner of that land could not harvest the crop during the Sabbath year, could not store the crop during the Sabbath year, could not sell the crop during the Sabbath year.

And the primary purpose of the crop on that Sabbath year was to have a place where poor people who didn't have land could go out there and they could pick grain.

They could pick food, and they could take it back to their house, and they could eat it.

You say, well, what about the landowners? Well, again, the landowners could.

They could just only go out there and get enough for their meals.

But remember, the landowners were normally more wealthy people, so they would have food that was stored back.

They would have food that they had put in the barn for the previous years.

So that's the second reason that's given for the Sabbath year there.

And the third reason is given here in the text that the beast of the field may eat.

And so some of these volunteer crops that would pop up would then be given to the farm animals so that the farm animals didn't starve.

Again, it's an important thing to think about when you realize that there was no welfare system.

There wasn't a welfare system like our government has today for poor people.

And this was God's way.

This is God's way of taking care of people.

And as well, also giving people an entire year, not from working completely, but an entire year from not working in those fields.

Now God promised the people in Leviticus 25-21 that He would give the people such a blessing in the sixth year.

that the abundance would ensure that they did not starve in the seventh year.

And so when you think about it from that perspective, the Sabbath year then required a measure of faith.

Would they trust God or not? God said in that sixth year, I'll give you enough.

And during that seventh year, you won't have to worry about it.

You'll have plenty of food.

But they've got to trust God.

So again, there has to be a measure of faith.

Would they rely on their own works going out there and, you know, planting and harvesting? Or would they simply rely on the promise of God? God said if we would let the land rest on the seventh year, On the sixth year, he'd bless us and he'd take care of us.