Jesus said, “If you do not fast as regards the world, you will not find the kingdom. If you do not observe the Sabbath as a Sabbath, you will not see the father.“
Here the Lord speaks of fasting with regard to the world—a fast, not starvation. You are in the material world and the Lord intends you to enjoy life to the fullest possible extent. This life, indeed, is a most precious gift, and the whole of life is sacred. Yet the sacredness of life is only manifest in a more complete way when you are Spirit-connected. Unless there are times that your attention is turned inward instead of outward, it is difficult, if not impossible, to know yourself and to maintain a Spirit-connection. Thus the Lord calls you to withdraw yourself from mundane activities at certain times so that you might entertain the supramundane dimensions of life and establish a Spirit-connection. The holy Shabbat is the central focus of those times one is to cease from mundane activities in order to seek the Spirit and Truth that is within and beyond.
Shabbat, itself, is a holy continuum of spiritual practice and spiritual living. It is a day of repose and joy, a day of celebration and worship of the Divine Life in Spirit and Truth. On this day, the elect dedicate themselves to holy discourse, study and contemplation of the Holy Scriptures, and esoteric wisdom, prayer, meditation, and sacred ceremony. Shabbat is a fasting from the hyperactivity of the world to entertain a communion in the Spirit of God. One leaves the ways of mortal human society to engage in the enlightened society of the angels and the elect, thus restoring one’s soul.
When considering the nature of the holy Shabbat, our teachers tell us that it is the space and time we make in our lives for the Lord and the holy Shekinah. The Lord says to us, “If you do not honor the Shabbat, you will not see God.“ Stated simply, if you do not make sufficient space and time to meet with God, then you will not “see“ or meet with God. Likewise, if all of your time and energy is invested only in mundane and worldly matters, you will have neither the time nor energy to find the kingdom of heaven. Here, in essence, the Master is speaking a basic truth. If you do not make the time-space-energy to seek the kingdom of heaven or to enter into a direct experience of God, you won’t be able to find or enter into the kingdom of heaven, nor will you directly experience the presence of God.
Now the Lord does not tell you what to do with this holy day (“holiday“) or how to celebrate it. While a tzaddik may guide you to a certain extent in how to keep the Shabbat, as will the spiritual community of which one is a member, ultimately you are called to follow the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and to act as a co-creator of this day of divine revelation.
Why is the Shabbat called a “Day of Divine Revelation“? Because it is the fruition of Creation, and Creation itself is the self-expression and revelation of God. When St. Paul was taken up into the third heaven and secrets of the angelic world were revealed to him, the masters teach that it happened on the holy Shabbat. Likewise, St. John received the Book of Revelation on the Lord’s day, when he was in the Spirit. With everything to be done in the process of daily living and all of the distractions of the world, if you do not make space and time for the Spirit, when shall you be taken up in the Spirit of the Lord to be shown hidden and secret things? As one sage has said, “If not now, when?“