Yesterday, Janet and I celebrated our 49th wedding anniversary. We have known each other for more years than that, more than 63 years total, but we were engaged on Christmas Eve, 1972 and married on August 24, 1973. Janet and I have recalled our past many times and one of the comforting things about knowing someone so long is the fact that we have so many shared memories – we attended the same church as little kids and our folks were best friends.
Janet’s youngest sister, Nancy, and my youngest brother, Ken, were both born in the summer of 1960 so Janet and I have a long history together. We met met in 1959 at Trinity Methodist church at 99th and Winchester on the south side of Chicago.
Our official marital journey started on a Friday night at 7:00 p.m. in the sanctuary of the church we grew up in – the same church that my parents were married in a generation earlier. And the same place where the Open Hearth Room adult Sunday class met each week – the place where our parents first met.
After a wonderful church rehearsal and then dinner at The Barn, a famous restaurant on the south side of Chicago, the weekend of our wedding was a whirlwind of family, fun, thoughts about the future and preparation for my summer semester finals that were happening the following week. So our honeymoon to California was delayed a week until my finals were over.
As we celebrate 49 years of officially being married, I can’t help but be reminded of the ancient rules the Jewish people followed in the Old Testament. You may have heard that every seventh year, the land had to lay fallow, without the planting of crops. Through a series of passages in the Scripture, it is recorded that God promised that after six years of planting and harvesting, the land was to have a year of rest – a Sabbath year. People and their families, as well as their livestock, could eat the produce of the year, but nothing was to be intentionally grown. In fact, when crops were planted in the eighth year, there would still be enough food from the sixth year to feed the country until the next harvest came in.
All this is pretty straightforward, but then God initiated a Year of Jubilee. After seven periods of seven years, the Israelites were to observe a year of Jubilee. This special year, celebrated every 50th year, was kind of a reset for the nation.
All debts were cancelled, land was returned to its original owner and, among other requirements, slaves were set free. It was a time of rest and refrain from work. It was a time to depend on God to provide. And let’s not forget that the 49th year was also a Sabbath year, so the people had to have strong faith to depend on God to provide for several years in a row – if they were obedient to God’s commands!
This was a way to keep the distribution of wealth even among the tribes. A practical example would be that when you paid for a piece of land, you would take into account how many years until the next year of Jubilee. Because the land would return to its original owner at that time. It was a time of equity – people freed from selling themselves into bondage or servitude, as well as several other commandments regarding the year of Jubilee.
We are to still celebrate a Sabbath each week and from personal experience, I can tell you that it makes a difference in our lives. Taken in the context of today, during a Sabbath, God wants us to depend on Him for provision and to rest in His love for us. It’s all about trust. It also seems to me that Janet and I, after 49 years of marriage, should enter a year of Jubilee as well. It should be a year of remembering the past, all that God has provided us with, our family and the trials and tribulations we have suffered, as well as the celebrations and successes we have been blessed with. A year of trust and increased faith – a reset!
So starting today, the beginning of our Jubilee year, I am going to try and depend even more completely on the Lord and spend more time recognizing the things that God wants for us – harmony, equity, rest, worship and community. Our verse for tonight reflects these values.
In the third book of the Pentateuch, written by Moses, God sets forth the rules for the year of Jubilee. Moses tells us the wishes of God in Leviticus 25:8-11, “ ‘Count off seven sabbath years—seven times seven years—so that the seven sabbath years amount to a period of forty-nine years. Then have the trumpet sounded everywhere on the tenth day of the seventh month; on the Day of Atonement sound the trumpet throughout your land. Consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you; each of you is to return to your family property and to your own clan. The fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you…”
I can’t wait to have a year of Jubilee with Janet. My encouragement this evening is that God wants us to celebrate His love for us and increase our trust in Him by relying on divine provision. Certainly, as Janet and I age together, we have increased our trust in the Lord each year. My prayer is that we make the most of this opportunity to honor God. I love you, Janet, and would do it all over again in a heartbeat! It’s been a great 49 years! Now, into our year of Jubilee! Have a great day in the Lord, grace and peace…