August 19, 2025 • 60 mins
We’re breaking from our usual quick-hit HHP Podcast style to bring you a rich “table talk” conversation with long-time friends Michael & Selah Hirsch — authors of the brand-new book Pressing Pause, all about the beauty and gift of Sabbath.
This isn’t theory. For years, the Hirsch family lived life at full speed — leading organizations, raising four kids, running triathlons, and building businesses. But then God invited them into something they never expected: the rest, rhythm, and joy of Sabbath.
We talk about:
- Their journey from nonstop busyness to Sabbath peace - How our friendship played a role in their discovery - The Jewish roots of Sabbath and the feasts - Why rest can actually transform your Christian faith and family life
Whether you’re curious about Sabbath, hungry for a deeper walk with God, or just need permission to slow down, this episode will inspire and challenge you.
📚 Pressing Pause by Michael & Salah Hirsch – Available now at https://startsabbath.com/
🎙 Subscribe for more Bible, church, and family conversations.
#sabbath #sabbathday #sabbathkeeper #sabbathrest #theway #sabbathtruth #sabbathforchristians #christiansabbath #newbook #sabbathbook
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to the HHP Podcast.
My name is Chris Franke and I am the Senior Pastor of HFF Church in Oklahoma City.
Join me and others from around the country as we talk all things Bible, Church and family.
We may be right, we may be heretical, but that's for you to decide.
Drop a like, a share, a comment, subscribe and let's get to it.
(00:22):
Okay, so we're just going to jump right in and do something completely different today.
If you've ever been a part of the Hopeful Heretic Podcast, our podcasts are under 10 minutes long.
We try to focus on a scriptural nugget, something from a sermon series, maybe something that is considered borderline heretical and mainstream Christianity, whatever it is.
But today we're in, I guess we're just going to call it table talk as we sit at the table here with Michael and Salah Hirsch.
(00:51):
And so full disclosure as we start off today, I've known them for many, many years and we'll get into that story and let them share some of that kind of stuff.
So it's not like I just walked in and had like 30 minutes to kind of read over their book and kind of talk to them.
We have done life with each other and our children for five, six, seven, eight, nine years.
I don't even remember that's how old I am.
(01:12):
And so today the reason why I wanted to do something different, have a video is because
I'm not going to steal all their thunder, but they just wrote a brand new book called Pressing Paws and it is on the Sabbath.
And so I'm very excited as a guy who has kept the Sabbath for, I don't know, about 18, 19 years.
(01:34):
I just think it's more like a hundred.
I know my hair looks like I've been doing it for a hundred years, but I'm excited to be here with you guys.
And so I'm actually going to just start off by just asking you to kind of just tell a little bit about your story.
Tell a little bit about who you are.
You know, don't let me steal the thunder on that and just kind of tell everybody a little bit about yourself.
(01:58):
And we'll kind of then lean into how you how you ended up here in the Sabbath.
Yeah, let's jump in. Let's get started, Chris.
Thank you so much for having Michael and I.
We absolutely love you and your family.
And I'll tell you, you are a critical part of this story and it's been pretty neat because as we look back, looking back,
you always see, I think more clearly the hindsight and the hand of God.
(02:19):
And I feel like we're in a season where we've seen so clearly in now what we didn't see in part in the ways before.
And that's where our journey has led us to this point.
And Michael and I have been married going on now 20 years.
We have four small kids and two puppies and that's another story for another day.
It's important to add that.
But the Lord has brought us to his heart through different stories.
(02:41):
And but but but in this time and in this season, we're focused on marriage.
We're focused on family. We're focused on leaning into hearing his voice and walking in his ways,
which is why we were so surprised that we had never yet discovered the gift of Sabbath and had the invitation for us at the table.
And so just to bring the story to kind of the present time and moment,
(03:02):
here we are living in Oklahoma just around the corner from you guys that we hadn't been made friends just yet.
And that was again part of just the Lord going, hold on.
There's one more piece I've got to bring you bring to you.
And so we've we're in this neighborhood area.
We were doing life. Michael's been leading nonprofits,
organizational executive director for now over 20 years.
(03:25):
And that's brought us to different cities, which is what was kind of our story to Oklahoma and busy from morning till night.
And the parts that were even still in the dark were then on top of all of the leadership.
You have been running Ironman Triathlon for 10 plus years and you'd get up at like 4 a.m.
in the morning, train all the way until like 7 a.m. brush, get the kids breakfast off to school.
(03:48):
I love being a mom to our kids and on the flip side, I'm a business owner.
And so our world, if you want to bring into our world, they're nonstop.
They're on the go. They're loving Jesus, taking care of people, building businesses.
Nonstop. And so for us to press pause for people to know that now it takes kind of a miraculous journey.
(04:09):
So let's bring it to you guys because you were part of that.
So we're living here around the corner and right around the covid season.
We got to meet your family and you walked in and I was like, who is this family?
We've got kids and they've got this beautiful presence of God with them, which instantly connected to us.
But then you had something else.
You began to share with us more of the understanding of the Jewish roots of our faith.
(04:32):
I remember at one point you prayed in Hebrew over a meal and I was like, I don't understand in my natural mind what you're saying.
But my spirit is resonating with us.
And then you began to share with us about Shabbat and Sabbath and more about the feast.
And Michael and I were in a season where we've been following the Lord.
We're in church. We're reading our Bible.
We're talking to our kids about how to walk out their faith with the Lord.
(04:55):
In fact, we tell them go shine like bright lights all the time, you know, but yet there was another piece of the light of the Sabbath table that we had not discovered.
And then I'll never forget one time you invited us to Shabbat at your home and we walked into this presence and we walked into walking with you through the practice of disconnecting from the day.
(05:16):
Which I don't know about anybody else who's listening to this, but that's hard for a person like me to disconnect.
I'm constantly running to do this and things.
But Michael and I walked away from that. I'll never forget you're like, say oh, there's something here.
There is a disconnect from the world and there is a threshold and an entrance into a moment of eternity.
And that began to give us this taste of what is this?
(05:37):
And so, Michael, why don't you jump in now and why don't you share?
Because that then led you to a trip to Israel, which brought even more life and color to the invitation God was bringing to us.
Definitely. And we're so grateful. I mean, we said this to you just before we started and you were one of the, you were the first seed.
You sowed the first seed into our hearts as it relates to Sabbath and to rest.
(05:59):
But then that led to an unexpected email that I deleted.
We thought it was the mail.
I thought it was internet fishing and too good to be true.
Free invitation to come to Israel.
God knows. I'm glad we did.
The second email, I scrolled to the bottom and realized that this is for real, that there's an invitation, a colleague of ours that had visited pre-COVID to Israel and recommended that I go on a pastoral trip.
(06:25):
And so we said yes. And that trip led me to Israel.
And I never forget prior to and I'm sure first timers that have ever gone to Israel have done before.
But you kind of look at the itinerary of what you're going to do and places you're going to see and visit.
And so I had the checklist of the places that I knew that God was going to meet me.
(06:46):
And he did in these places.
And so I was looking forward to be out on the Sea of Galilee and having a time of worship, you know, being in the Garden of Gethsemane and getting an opportunity to pray, visiting, you know, various archeological sites.
Yeah.
I looked over a Friday night Sabbath dinner with an Orthodox Jewish family.
(07:09):
Wasn't at all on my radar.
But what's interesting, though, and I think this is just true to life and I find myself, you know, in this place here and especially in Western culture and the world at the pace and the way that we do life.
Up to that Sabbath dinner on a Friday night, I was really a tourist.
Yeah.
And I was sightseeing the moment that my feet and 24 others of us stepped foot into this family's home shifted from being a tourist and a spectator to participating and engaging.
(07:43):
They're just a special presence of God at the table, at the table where everything just seemed to slow down.
Probably one of the first times over the first maybe seven or eight days of the trip that I didn't even have a desire to even pull out my phone.
I was just in I was just in this moment.
And so fast forwarding a couple of days later is the infamous phone call to say lunch and I'm downloading and I'm unpacking what I had experience.
(08:14):
And I said is on a Wednesday and we're getting ready to fly out and I said, say, look, get ready because I'm going to hit the ground running pretty hot Friday night.
We are going to have our first Sabbath dinner as a family.
And you said, I said, oh, my goodness, just keep it simple.
Like I could hear the excitement and the passionate voice.
(08:34):
And I'm thinking to myself, OK, I resonate with something that you're feeling because I trust you.
But on the flip side, we are so maxed out.
We have no room for anything else.
And I know when you go in, you go in like full right.
And so Iron Man is a staff.
That is what I'm talking about.
So here's the final part of the story.
So he did not keep it simple.
(08:56):
OK, let me tell you that first time we get to the table and like Michael's got all these things he wants to talk about and he wants to share with us the Hebrew prayers and have the elements on the table.
And the kids are just like, mom, what is happening?
And like, I think it was like such a long time later.
Dinner is cold.
We're all kind of going, what is this?
(09:18):
This goes forward.
I don't understand this.
But let me fast forward and then you can share more with people as we get into the book.
But the peace of God met us in that moment.
That's awesome.
Even though we didn't understand it.
And thankfully, he did simplify it because now it is part of our family rhythm.
But I'll say this Friday nights at our table, whether it's a beautiful meal that maybe I found online and we follow a recipe or whether it's leftovers.
(09:43):
And you know, frozen pizza has become our most sacred time of the week because we've learned that the invitation of Sabbath is an invitation to the presence of God.
And in the crazy, nonstop dinging of text messages, emails, kids, mortgages, life, sports practices, you guys live at the ball field.
Yes.
(10:04):
We have found a way to literally carve out a place where the peace of God has filled us.
And also this last part, it has revolutionized our marriage, our family.
It has strengthened our relationship with the Lord from our life to our leadership.
Chris, like the overflow of God's presence has happened in a fresh way that we just never knew existed before.
(10:27):
It was literally the missing part.
Which is, I want to make sure that the audience understands because some people might be watching this podcast or listening to this podcast and they already know you guys and they've interacted because, like you said, you guys have run businesses.
You've pastored. There's a lot of people that you've, you know, one degree, three degrees, you've had some sort of influence in their life.
You know, we coach baseball together.
(10:48):
You know, like there was other areas of life other than just being neighbors or whatever.
But there's going to be some people who are going to watch this, who this is the first time they're being introduced to you guys.
And so I want to highlight a couple of things here.
It's not like you didn't already have a faith in Jesus.
It's not like you didn't already have a church community.
You guys have, for as long as I've known you, you've been plugged into faith community, not only for your family here locally, but then you also work to help other faith communities as well, both in church and extracurricular activities.
(11:22):
And so you already had, from my vantage point on the outside looking in, you already had a great relationship with Jesus.
The Holy Spirit already is dwelling in your family.
I always tell people, look at the fruit. And that's how you know if the Holy Spirit is evident in people's life.
And you can see the fruit in your children. You can see the fruit in, whether it was with LoveWorks or now Kidvation Global or all the other things that you've done.
(11:46):
Iron Man's, I was scrolling my phone the other day and saw pictures of Jude down at Lake Thunderbird when you were doing the Iron Man with Jude, little old baby Jude.
Or, you know, even in COVID when everything locked us down and you're like, hey, look, we need to transform a bedroom into an office because we can't stop.
And so I got to express my brand in your brand in the house.
(12:12):
So for anybody watching, like these people love Jesus.
They went to church. He was a part of everything they did.
And so when you hear the testimony of Michael talking about and Saylo talking about getting introduced to the Sabbath and then going to Israel,
one thing that came and maybe it's a Holy Spirit moment, maybe it's nothing but 24, you know, like the throne room, 24 elders that are there.
(12:36):
And so 24 people come into an Orthodox home to do Shabbat.
All of these things like it's not like somebody who's watching here, you would say like, oh, okay, well, you know, I came into the Sabbath and then I found God.
They had God. God was prevalent in their life.
And so they didn't know they were missing anything.
They didn't know that there was anything more.
(12:58):
It's like, hey, look, we've got a great relationship with the Lord and the Holy Spirit is operating in our midst and in the midst of our family.
And yet, even in that quest of just doing life with God on a regular basis, the Lord found you in a moment where you weren't necessarily expecting it and revealed himself even more.
(13:19):
You kind of mention as like spiritual breadcrumbs in the book of like, you know, if you are looking and you're seeking and you're walking with the Lord, He brings those breadcrumbs to lead you to places.
A lot of times people want that apocalyptic moment where it's like I'm on the road to more and God comes and shuts down 35 and talks.
(13:39):
But a lot of times it is more spiritual breadcrumbs.
And I remember we used to tease you a lot about this because you were always going literally your schedules.
And it wasn't like it was a selfish calendar.
Your calendars were engaged to engage with other people.
And so you were constantly pouring out while also being poured into whether it was with Life.
(14:04):
Church or some of the other areas.
And you would always say, hey, we're going to have to put a pin in that, Chris.
Like we can't talk about it right now. We're on max capacity.
We're going to have to put a pin in it.
But for some reason, when Michael had this this Holy Spirit moment in Israel and he contacts you and he says, hey, on top of Iron Man's and on top of running businesses and on top of raising our children in our church communities and our friends and everything else, I want to add something else to our plate.
(14:34):
You know, it had to have been a divine interaction with the Lord because you probably would have immediately from the past been like Michael, we're at full capacity.
We have to put a pin in that, come back and talk about it at some other point.
And now to hear your testimony and to read about some of your testimony and what the Lord revealed to you, you went from putting a pin into saying we're going to take a pause and we're going to press pause on our life.
(14:58):
And so I want to talk a little bit about the book.
A lot of people, you know, they'll come into some revelation of the Lord, you know, it could be the Sabbath.
It could be I need to be more engaged in a church community.
It could be I need to sow into the regular community.
But not a lot of people go out and write their testimony to share that with other people.
(15:19):
And yesterday when we were setting up, I was kind of talking to you about for me personally,
the two things that stand out in the book of Revelation is that we'll overcome the struggles, the trials of this world by the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony.
And so you could have just done that by testifying to your friends or your family of the beauty that you found in the scripture.
(15:41):
But you felt called by the Lord to write a testimony for everybody so that they could hear your testimony.
And there's true power in that.
So tell me a little bit about how we went from, OK, Michael comes back from Israel.
You guys are already stressed out on a calendar.
The first Shabbat is a little rough, a little hectic to now hearing the passion in your voice about sitting at this table with your family and getting to a place where then you decided, hey, we feel called to write about that.
(16:14):
Tell me a little bit about how you came there.
You know, you want me to jump in there?
So I think what's beautiful is that we didn't start off with the, hey, we've got a story to tell because we're living it for a while.
You know, and I feel like that's where I'll give you so much credit.
You have such a steadfastness, Michael.
And after that first Shabbat, I think I still haven't fully tasted in, you know, what the what it was of the invitation because it was a new rhythm.
(16:39):
And so let me just kind of pause there for a moment and acknowledge the fact that there is resistance to new rhythms.
And I'll put both my hands in the air.
And I just I said, you know, are we sure we're doing this?
Are we doing it next week?
Like I didn't understand yet what was new and what was becoming a part of the fabric of our family.
And so for anyone who is going to say, hey, like I do want to learn more.
(17:00):
I want to maybe want to try this.
I think by the time we finish today, I think it might be good for you to say like expect some of that resistance.
Maybe we'll even talk about that more.
Resistance to a rhythm.
Resistance to a rhythm because it was still new to us.
But that newness, we had to push through that.
And so I'm kind of stepping ahead just to acknowledge that upfront because that is something to be aware of.
But we pushed through that resistance and we said, let's do it again.
(17:24):
Come back to the table the next Friday night.
Come back to the table the next Friday night, you know, and we were beginning to say, OK, what is this?
This is new, but the Lord is calling us.
And to your point, nothing has changed in our lives.
We still run 24/7.
We still run organizations and businesses.
We're still a huge part of our church community.
Nothing has changed.
There was just a missing piece and that missing piece was to come back to the table, to come back to the table.
(17:47):
And I'll tell you, I don't have a marker of a timeline, but after a handful of those come back to the tables,
I remember it was, hey, it's Friday.
Shabbat shalom.
Like it was then this excitement.
And so we went from newness to like the beginning of we come, we come to the table, not are we coming to the table,
(18:08):
but we're coming to the table and we begin to shift in ourselves.
And then I'm skipping ahead now, but then it was like, hey, let's invite other people to the table.
And that's where the fruit of peace, especially when we walked through a very challenging season,
probably in our 20 years of marriage, the most challenging season of life, of leadership.
I walked through a heaviest state of ever anxiety and depression that I've ever experienced in my life.
(18:30):
We kept coming and coming to the table and the fruit of all that was peace and the fruit of all that was connection.
And the chaos began to diminish and the Lord's presence began to fill us in places that we were so desperate
and hungry for and the table anchored us.
And so then to the point of where the story was is we began to feel and see all of that and say,
let's bring other people and other families that are in our Christian community,
(18:53):
other families that are our neighbors, other families that are visiting in town.
And more people began to say, okay, what is this thing?
And we said, come join us for Sabbath.
Come be a part of our Shabbat table.
And again, some weeks it was a little nicer or fancier than others, but the presence of God,
the way that we crossed that threshold from ordinary into a place of eternity
(19:14):
where Michael began to lead out and say, let's welcome the presence of God.
Let's signal the Sabbath time.
The way our kids literally soak in the blessing is like has blessed our heart.
And so then some people began to say, hey, I think you need to share this with other couples
and other families who just didn't know this existed.
(19:35):
And I'll say this part here, and then Michael, you kick in your thoughts,
but I was sharing with you, Chris, one of my favorite quotes and brand
when it comes to personal brands is, you're often positioned to help the person you once were.
And that's what this book is.
It's what we needed a few years ago, someone to tell us.
And you know, and that's where God brought us into it.
And we think that there are so many other families that have been at our table
(19:57):
and so many that have not been to our table or to a table yet who need to hear the story
because they're going to see themselves in this picture.
They're going to see themselves as people who are pursuing the heart of God,
who want to leave kingdom, impact and legacy,
who want to raise kids who are next generation of leaders,
but who are probably dangerously low to running on empty.
(20:18):
And so again, I'm skipping around here,
but I'll tell you where the emptiness was creeping up,
the Lord filled it at this table and it has been our joy, hasn't it babe,
to share it with so many others.
And I pray that that's what this story is for those who just we've yet to meet yet.
I think you're getting ready to give a Sabbath altar call.
Come to our table, come to our table.
(20:39):
That's okay. Let's take them out back and get the hose on.
Well, I don't know where anybody sits on sprinkling, but that's the best we got here.
It's okay.
Well, you said it so well, you know, and we've talked about this.
We, you know, we refer to Sabbath as the gift that we had no idea that we needed.
Yeah, but God did.
And then he gave it to us at a time where a few months like down the road,
(21:02):
there was a series of storms that we had no idea that were coming, you know,
that were coming our way, but God was just rooting us and he was grounding us,
you know, giving us an opportunity to really experience that peace,
you know, that transcends all understanding.
And then that gift just for us, it just became undeniable.
I can recall just recalling right now, Nya sitting, our daughter Nya,
(21:23):
just now 12 years old sitting in the chair, I say, "What chair is sitting in?"
And just out of nowhere, she said, "Dad, Mom, like this is how peace is supposed to feel."
And Anker saying to us, "This is what a family is supposed to be like."
And just you're hearing and then you're seeing then an expression then around this table,
just coming out of each of our kids, Tinsley, who would interpret a dance to worship on our Sabbath nights.
(21:50):
And then we would linger.
And linger is a word that I think for 40 plus years of living, I'd use a single time in my life.
I mean, I'm not going to throw you under the bus, but like we coached baseball together and you didn't linger ever.
So you were in and out because there was always something else.
There's always something to do.
And so for you to testify, we began to linger as a family.
(22:14):
You know, that's a huge shift in what the culture was for your family because you are driven people.
And that's not even a bad thing.
You know, laziness in the Bible is a bad thing, but you can't be too driven as well.
And so you started to linger.
The kids start to just embrace this.
(22:36):
So tell me then like, what's your favorite part of the Sabbath?
You go first because I know mine.
If you take mine, you're busted.
No, just kidding.
Since I know what you're going to say here, but I would all of it.
All of it.
Okay.
But if I had to say something like that's not allowed.
(22:56):
It's like asking, so what is your favorite?
Who's your favorite kid?
You know, but what I love, Salah mentioned that on Fridays, and Fridays works and this is,
and we read about this in the book, but Salah works Friday night works for Salah and I.
That just happens to work with our schedule.
Others that we know, they Sabbath on other nights and that's their prerogative.
(23:19):
That's their, we believe that's their choice and that's their freedom.
Friday works for us, but Friday we begin to signal Sabbath.
That's like definitely your favorite part of the signal.
That is a signal Sabbath and Chris, like you've mentioned sports a few times.
A good coach is going to spend some time in preparation and getting ready, whether it's
for a practice or a game, you're going to have your exes and you're going to have your
(23:40):
O's.
You're leading a business and a team.
You're going to have a plan.
Correct.
You're going to have meetings and you're going to have talking points.
Hopefully.
Occasionally you can wing it, but other times you're spending time, the good ones, the good,
the great ones spend time in preparation.
And so we call it then a state of a Sabbath state of mind.
Okay.
And so it doesn't have to be a three hours to get into the Sabbath state of mind.
But five, it could be five or ten minutes.
(24:03):
It could just be spending time with your Bible closed.
It could be opening up your Bible and reading Isaiah 58 and what he speaks about the Sabbath
and making Sabbath a delight.
That leads me to the lighting of the candles.
Okay.
Yeah.
Leads me to lighting of the candles.
And you think about candles, not just in the context of Sabbath, but we use candles and
(24:24):
for some do celebrating birthdays.
Correct.
But it signifies a moment.
It signifies time.
It sets it apart.
And so that was part of us borrowing part of my experience that I had in Israel.
And it was a part that marked that moment.
It is.
To set it apart.
Like you signal it, but then it marks it.
I think that's so good you're saying that.
(24:46):
It really is.
And as our eyes are being open to Sabbath and the scripture was being opened, as we spent,
I would say the first two years after we started practicing Sabbath, reading whatever I can
find on the subject.
Yeah, you love reading books as a whole.
Yes.
Podcasts like this.
And I was seeing scripture that I had read hundreds of times as if I was reading it for
(25:09):
the first time.
Yeah.
And he takes us back.
I could take us back to the garden.
Yeah.
And God's creation account and in Genesis 2, God, when he created day one through day
six, you know, he either called it good or very good and what he created.
But on day seven, he didn't call it very good.
He didn't call day seven good, but he called it holy.
(25:32):
That's good.
The first thing that he called holy was not his human creation, but it was time.
Yes.
So there's just something, you know, we gather for dinners, you know, around this table all
throughout the week, like you guys do, and I'm sure those that are watching and listening.
But there's just something different about the Sabbath.
Yeah.
(25:52):
And when you light those candles and you signify that right here, right now, this time that
– and I'll be honest, like, as hard as we lead and parent and all of those things,
sometimes we can fall into a me mentality.
Yes, we think we're doing it for doing things all for God and advancing His kingdom and mission.
(26:13):
But we believe when we Sabbath that we light those candles and set it apart.
And this, I think, is something that is differentiated in this book.
We don't believe that that time is about me.
Yeah.
That's not Michael time.
It's not Salah time.
It's not my kids' time.
But we're saying, "God, this is your time, and whatever you want to do as we put our
(26:36):
feet," our friends – I love the saying that they say to us, like, "putting your
feet under the table."
So as we gather at this table, we get to put our feet underneath it, and we come just as we are.
Yeah.
Whatever happens to be going on, we bring the high, we bring the low.
You light the candle, and you set it apart, and you just watch God do something.
(27:00):
That's the gift.
So that would be –
Okay, I thought you didn't steal my thunder then, okay, Chris?
My favorite part is hands down.
I love it all, like Michael said, but my favorite part, hands down, is the moment of the blessing.
Okay.
And so what is the blessing?
If someone hasn't read the book or does their Sabbath, okay, so I'm lighting candles,
and I'm saying a blessing, "Hey, just for context, I think our whole Sabbath time
(27:22):
takes on average maybe 15 minutes before we get to dinner."
So what we're talking about is totally feasible for any family, whether you are a single parent,
a larger family around the table, maybe you are a college student, empty nesters.
Just remember, this is exactly for you.
So the blessing, though, is I believe something that will totally impact your heart, because
(27:45):
what Michael does is as we walk through the steps of Sabbath, we take a moment to decompress.
He takes a good maybe 15 minutes.
I take maybe 30 seconds sometimes.
I crash land into Sabbath.
Answer my last email, shift my laptop, we're at the table.
He takes a minute, he gets into his heart.
We come to the table.
We start off with a welcome.
Michael shares a devotional.
(28:06):
We take a moment perhaps to play a worship song, and we light the candles, and we welcome
the presence of God, and then it leads us into the blessing.
And the blessing is where Michael walks around the table.
He actually stands up, and he physically puts his hand on our shoulders, and he starts with me,
and he goes through birth order with our kids, and he shares something that he sees in us.
(28:26):
He saw in us this week.
I love that you make it time-relevant.
So you've really kind of developed what we call in the book like a blessing radar.
Like you're looking kind of then throughout the week, consciously and subconsciously,
because now it's a rhythm, it's a habit, and you're looking for something that you can say,
"Hey, I saw this in you."
And it's not always, you know, "Oh, I saw you do this," or "Accomplish this,"
(28:46):
but this is like the essence of God I see in you.
This is the quality of integrity or the quality of the strength and the uniqueness,
the fingerprint of God that's only in you.
And you take, you know, 10-15 seconds, and you call that out, and you look us in the eyes.
I don't want to take it because it's not just the words, but it's also the body language.
And let me take a moment to help everyone realize too, we're married,
(29:09):
and sometimes we have come to the table, and we are in a marriage moment.
Like, I just also remind you, this is real life.
But you take a moment.
And you come to the table as Cain and Abel.
Tears of joy and other tears.
Yes, yes, yes.
I'm giving you the look.
But we still, but we still keep going.
You still come to the table, and you still put all that aside, that humanity aside.
(29:31):
You look me in the eyes, maybe one of the kids just had a meltdown,
and you call out the God in us.
And here's what makes this special, Chris.
I believe two things.
If anyone's listening who's like me, yes, words of affirmation is one of my love language.
And I just love it.
I soak in it.
But two things have come to our tables.
Number one, the world is full of criticism and negativity.
(29:51):
And I feel like the enemy is out right now through anxiety, through self-doubt,
through imposter syndrome, through comparison, through emotional abuse, verbal abuse.
People have been torn down, I think, by words.
Words hurt and kill and destroy.
And that's why God in the invitation of Sabbath said,
"I am going to restore through the verbal lens, through the verbal power of the mouth,
(30:15):
what I want you to know about your calling in me as your beloved children."
And that telling you is a seed after a seed after a seed of just these beautiful, loving words,
just calling out the goodness in someone when the world has tried to just destroy that in them.
And I'll tell you, that's a testimony for us for a story for another time,
because, Michael, you weren't raised in a household of positive words.
(30:38):
And you were raised in a household where emotional abuse and verbal abuse was present.
And I'll tell you, if it wasn't for God doing the work in your life, saving, salvation,
and if it wasn't for Him curating your heart as a husband and father through Sabbath,
we didn't have that level of positive words.
You weren't negative, you weren't abusive, but you haven't really, I think,
learned to release the goodness that you speak so regularly over me and the kids.
(31:04):
And I'll tell you, Chris, our kids just look up.
In fact, I have pictures of them. I think we put some of them on the website.
Our kids just look up. And I feel like that's the story of God to us in ways, you know what I mean?
Like, they look up and they catch you in the eye,
and they receive every word from their father's heart to them,
which is how I believe they will always look up to hear the voice of the Father in their life.
(31:28):
And I'll tell you, that 10 to 15 seconds, as you go through the room and through the table,
like, everyone's heart receives a gift.
And we carry that in us throughout the week.
And we carry that in us when the enemy says, "But you're not good enough,"
and "You're not beautiful enough," and "Look at everyone who's better."
Or "You're never going to make it." I'll tell you, those words counteract and counterbalance that
(31:49):
because they are the identity of Christ in us through the Father.
That's beautiful. You know, for anybody who knows me,
I come from more of the obligation side of the Sabbath.
You know, my testimony was born again Christian at 13, came into the faith with the Sabbath
and all of those things all at once.
(32:11):
It was just kind of like you, like, shut the laptop, we're going in.
And we went hardcore in, and we approached the Sabbath almost as an obligation of commandment in the Scripture.
And so, it took us a long time.
Whereas it sounds like, you know, you guys were signaling Sabbath,
and you were struggling on some of the first ones, and you were trying to find that rhythm.
(32:32):
Ours really came from self-creation because we didn't come to the table because we were looking to be with God.
We came to the table because we felt like God was telling us, "If you don't come to the table,
you're in trouble." And so, years and years and years later, you know,
I started to recognize how I was projecting an orphan spirit into the nature of God.
(32:54):
And so, what I hear here, even on Salah's testimony of you, is that you grew up in a home
where there was times that things were said that could have led you into an orphan spirit
to even maybe project that onto who God is and His nature.
And you are breaking those generational curses through Sabbath and the blessing.
(33:15):
You're not just coming to the table. You're not just lighting the candles.
You're not just saying, "Baruch atah." You're looking every person in the eye,
and you're speaking as if God the Father was speaking to them.
And so, you're saying, not only through the table, not only through the Sabbath,
are we finding peace and we're finding rest, but you're breaking generational curses in your children
(33:37):
by saying, "I'm going to not pass down an orphan spirit to them because they're going to be able
to see the Father through the lens of a loving Father, not one who is judgmental or condemning
or how dare you not do the Sabbath right or whatever."
And so, I have perused this book multiple times. And one of the things I really love about,
(34:01):
you know, the soul cycle that you have in there is that you help walk people through things that aren't,
"What are you doing on the Sabbath?" Because a lot of where I've come from over 20 years
and the hundreds of thousands of individuals that I've met with, they all want to know
if they're looking at the Sabbath, they want to know, "Well, what am I allowed to do?
What am I not allowed to do?" And so, they approach it as almost as if it is like a job description
(34:24):
or some sort of interaction, transaction with the Lord.
And this book comes at it in a completely different approach. It comes at not, "I have to keep the Sabbath,"
not that the Lord is making me keep the Sabbath, but here is the joy of what we have found
by honoring this time with the Lord. And here are some things that we put into practice
(34:47):
that help you actually experience not only the family, but the Lord.
And so, I really love that this has not come as like the instruction manual on Sabbath.
It's come as testifying of the power of what you found in this day.
And again, reminding the people who are watching, you already had a testimony from my vantage
(35:08):
point on the outside of the Holy Spirit and God being in your life.
So, when you look at, if you're a Christian, a Baptist, a Pentecostal, a Catholic, whatever
denomination, non-denomination you are, you can look at your life and you can say, "I
love Jesus, and I believe Jesus is all over my life." Well, guess what I would tell you?
I would testify that both of them would be in that same state. But you're hearing through
(35:32):
this podcast and through the testimony of this book that there can be more.
You know, kind of that, I'm reminded of if you knock, if you seek, if you ask, you will
find me. If you continue to pursue God, there will be those divine revelations, those spiritual
bread crumbs where He will lead you to the bread of life, where He will lead you with
(35:52):
a little cup of water to not have thirst anymore. And we're seeing that through the testimony
of this book.
And so, for those of you who are interested in Sabbath or, you know, maybe you weren't
interested in Sabbath and somehow some algorithm puts you onto this podcast, you know, I want
you to listen to this, maybe even go back and listen to it with your eyes closed too,
(36:15):
and not get caught into what you hear, you see from a practical of like, "I have to do
this," or, "If I do this, this is going to be great," because you testified as well.
You have to work at the rhythm. You have to find your rhythm, and you testified that everybody's
rhythm is a little bit different. And so, there isn't a one-size-fits-all Jesus model
(36:37):
for the Sabbath. You have to make that because your relationship with God is different. Your
personal relationship is different, yours is different, mine is different, and you found
a way as a corporate unit of a family to find yours. And so, one of the things I've heard
over all the years talking about Sabbath and interaction is, "Well, that's a Jewish thing."
(37:00):
And you kind of testified that, you know, "Hey, we first got introduced to Sabbath because
my family came over here. I don't look Jewish. I'm wearing a Jesus Make Us One t-shirt, you
know, got a man bun, whatever." But then you went to Israel and you had the interaction
with the Orthodox Jews that are there. Just listening to the testimony, take the Sabbath
out of it for a minute. If you didn't call it Sabbath, if you didn't call it Shabbat,
(37:24):
if you called it Monday or you called it Tuesday or whatever, listening to the testimony and
reading some of the testimony right in here, who wouldn't want better marriages, better
families, all of that? So, how do you combat somebody who says, "Hey, look, man, that's
a Jewish thing. Like, you know, we're free from the law." And they immediately kind of
(37:47):
like want to take up arms against it just because it might be culturally or it might
be something different. Even though they've heard so far this unbelievable testimony of
what the Lord has done, and you're not practicing Judaism. You didn't give up Jesus. You didn't
like, you didn't come in here with Zitzio or Akippah or anything like. So, for all of
those non-denominational, Baptist, Pentecostals out there, all those people in America especially,
(38:12):
because our culture is driven on the economics of finances and what can I do with these?
What do you say to them to say like, "Okay, guess what? We found God's economy, Trump's."
What do you say to them? How do they overcome those, you know, like, "I'm not Jewish. This
is a Jewish thing." How do you overcome that?
(38:33):
Yeah, I'll share, if you don't mind, just from a personal side of how I answered that.
And I know that you've got a different answer just with, I think, even greater depth of
understanding. So, for the feelers in the room, I'll say this, I don't believe that
we can all agree that we were not made to run on empty, you know. And I think, you know,
the Lord created where we need sleep at night to renew, that we need the seasons to cycle,
(38:55):
you know, that the summer, fall become the winter, become the spring. I mean, I could
go on and on. Even in the way our calendar runs, like, there are patterns of renewal
and restoration if we look at how we were formed from creation.
That's good.
And I think our culture, especially in Western, and especially if you add to that anyone who
is driven by achievement or productivity, and that signals their worth, which again,
(39:18):
I'll be honest, I'll raise my hand to them, that we feel like we're meant to do it all
on our own. And the Lord has said, "Don't even call...yeah, take away all the names,
take away all the titles, but you will run on...you will run to empty. You will burn
yourself to the ground." And I'll tell you, the statistics on burnout and anxiety, I mean,
our divorce, I mean, it's through the roof because...
(39:39):
Even since 2020, you're COVID, like, just unbelievable.
And we are right there. All three of us at the table are equally in danger of those things
if we do not find our place of renewal. And so we can find it by Netflix and chill. We
can find it through trying to go on vacation or get a pedicure or run out to, you know,
get a drink. I mean, there are all the ways that our society tells us, "Take a break,
(40:02):
find that rest, find that renewal." You know what I mean? But I'll tell you, that is temporary
fixes. And we all know we are more tired the next day, you are hungover, your bank account
is depleted, and everything is still staring you in the face because all you've done is
tried to numb out what was really the deeper place of needing the restoration of the Father.
(40:23):
And so I'll tell you, if someone says, "Is this a Jewish thing?" No, I'd say, "This
is a human thing." This is a place because at the end of the day, I can see my life go
two different directions. And one direction is this far because it's my own striving,
and it's probably going to enter into a lot of broken places. Or it's going to be miles
longer, and I pray legacy miles longer, because I walked in partnership with the Father. And
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I'll tell you, that might still be a little too over someone's head a little bit. So you
jump in here and you share your thoughts. But I'll tell you at the end of the day, right
now, if this at all is resonating to you where you are tired, you are exhausted, you feel
the fraying edges of your marriage, you are short with your kids, you are dealing at night
with racing thoughts, that is telling you your warning lights are going off.
(41:10):
Yeah, you have to press pause.
Your battery is on low because you haven't pressed pause, and all those temporary fixes
aren't going to take you to a greater place. They're only going to ultimately take you
down to zero. The place is at the presence of God, whether it's at a table, whether it's
driving in your car, you know, whether it's out on a walk, whatever your Sabbath looks
like, it's the fact that we have to come to the Father and rest is not weakness. It is
(41:34):
wisdom to live the life we were created to live.
No, that's great. Well, we know we're not going to win over your argument. Yeah, that's
right. You're going to absolutely encounter scripture us, you know, all day long. To that
person, I would love to say, if it was realistic, boy, we would love to have you join us. We
have a seat at the table for you just to experience, to touch and to see. You just alluded to it
(41:59):
and I'll read it. To that person, I would ask four questions, which is ask four questions
from God's Word in the message. And I know I'll probably get, you know, some banter about
using the message translation, but boy, I love those four questions.
Yeah. Are you tired? Are you worn out? Are you burned out on religion or life?
(42:24):
Yes.
Come on, Jesus, here we go. And He says, "Come to me, get away with me and you'll recover
your life and I'll show you how to take a real rest." I'll show you how to take a real
rest. And that's been part of our journey. You know, it's a difference between either
resting from work or working from rest.
(42:44):
Yeah, that's good.
And so, I would encourage anyone to think about those four questions. You know, are
you tired? Are you worn out? Are you burned out on religion? Come to me and I'll show
you how to take a real rest.
And then it doesn't matter, I think, at that point, sometimes, is this a Jewish thing? That's
what I need to live. That's what I need to run the race I'm called to.
(43:07):
I mean, who do you know? I mean, we both, all three of us interact with a lot of people
in a lot of different spheres all the time. Who doesn't check those boxes?
Yeah, that's great.
Literally, who doesn't? You know, black, white, Asian, Hispanic, Judaism, Hinduism, Christianity,
who doesn't in the 21st century, who doesn't check those boxes? I mean, like, you might
(43:31):
say like, "Okay, well, I only checked two of them," but two is a lot.
Two is, yeah.
And so, that's a humanity type of call there to say like, "Hey, everybody checks those
boxes and they need to find a rest." And, you know, your testimony as Jesus' love and
Holy Spirit-filled individuals is, "We even needed a rest."
(43:53):
Absolutely.
And again, testimony is, Jesus was prevalent in your life, and I saw it. And yet, there's
this beautiful kind of breakthrough that you've experienced in this time. And ultimately,
listening to your heart and even in the book, like, why wouldn't you want to share that
with someone?
Yeah.
Why wouldn't you? I mean, like, you know, you've done love works, you've done all these
(44:14):
things for schools and children and all these ministries and companies you've worked with
to help get their message out there. And it's like, in the end, you believe in what you
promote. And so, if you find value and you have found value in something, you want others
to have that same blessing.
Absolutely.
So, it doesn't matter whether you're Jewish or not. We see in Jesus' interaction in the
(44:38):
Gospels, almost everybody He interacted with was an Israelite or a Hebrew at some point.
Obviously, we see the Pharisees and the Sadducees in that. But there was that group of people
that He ministered to who weren't religious leadership. They were just trying to get by.
They were trying to go to work. They were trying to raise their kids. They were trying
to make sure that the floor was swept, all those types of things. And He constantly shows
(45:01):
us, especially in the Gospel of Matthew, the concept of the table and coming to the feast
and to the banquet with Him and being a part of those things. And that signifies freedom.
And so, if you take the Sabbath away and you take the Jewish nature, the Hebrew nature,
whatever it is, it's like, don't you want to come to the Lord's table? Don't you want
to find freedom with Him? Don't you want to overcome those four check boxes that are so
(45:26):
simple but almost all humanity falls into that? I mean, if you don't, I guess we can
pray for you. But why wouldn't you want that?
And so, okay, so there is a specific quote in here, and I know we're running short on
time and we could literally do this for days that are out there. But I want to actually
(45:47):
read something. It's from the portion of the book on the person you're becoming in transformation
at the table, because we talked a little bit about your transformation to get you to the
table, to get you to the Sabbath. But then you actually go into more details and different
nuances of that. And I want to read a quote out of here, because I love that you guys
(46:10):
didn't focus on it just being about the Sabbath. It was, what could we glean from the Sabbath
and our experience with the Lord to focus on, are we being the greatest co-heirs of creation
with the Creator we can be? And you say, "The transformation goes far beyond a single evening
each week." And that's kind of an answer to the Jewish nature. It's like, "Oh, well, you
know, I can't keep a Shabbat on Friday night to Saturday like the Jews, or I don't even
(46:33):
want to look like them." I mean, there is people in the world that have that issue.
But you say, "The transformation goes far beyond a single evening each week." We no
longer feel the need to chase rest through social media, kind of ironically, because this
will be on social media, movies or getaways. We still love to do all those things, but
(46:55):
we don't need them because we found renewal in our new weekly rhythm. So, you now find
yourself leading the week through the renewal of the weekly rhythm rather than trying to
figure out how to fit a Sabbath into what was the rhythm before. So, there's actually
been a total transformation.
(47:16):
That's the revelation to us.
That's awesome.
Well, and I'll say that because I feel like I feel guilty stopping. I feel guilty resting.
I know that's something we've even wrestled with in our marriage. Say, "Sala, sit down,
slow down, stop trying to fold laundry while we're having this conversation," or "Stop
trying to answer this email and just, you know, the spaghetti is burning on the stove."
Or you know what I mean? It's like, but rest feels hard and rest feels guilty. And if this
(47:39):
conversation only stood at, "Hey, we need to press pause and find rest," I think that
would be one layer, but it wouldn't have revealed what ultimately was the transformation
point of our lives, which is realizing what we've been starting to talk on. So, just
we're circling back here is going, that's actually where we come to our filling up.
(47:59):
And I'll tell you, I have come to our table more times than I can count with tears in
my eyes with the weight of heaviness on my shoulders. I'll tell you, it is like sliding
into home base. You're playing baseball. I feel like I have slid in here sometimes and
our kids are like, "Mom, are you okay?" And now they know I'm releasing sometimes. I think
sometimes all that we need is...
(48:21):
Like crawling in, crawling into the door.
...getting to the table, like doing my game. Sometimes it's with fun and joy and people,
and other times it is with just raw humanity, okay? Because to the point when we press pause
and we truly find rest comes then the lifting up. And I think that that's what you're saying
there, Chris, and that's the part where I feel like the Lord has shown us this is not
(48:42):
just a law to abide by, even though it is a commandment, it is the gift. And the gift
then is then comes the filling up of a discovering delight and taking a moment to then let go
of all that and say, "The most beautiful things are what matter here." You know, it's not
the balance in my bank account, it's not in the, you know, what somebody else has or whatever,
(49:04):
but it's in realizing delight is found in the richness of relationship. And that filling
up begins to bubble and bubble and bubble, and then it hits this point where it is then
the awareness of God and the purposes of life. And I will tell you, we walk out of that time
and we walk in just more creative and more inspired, or maybe it's not that. Maybe it's
(49:25):
the fact that I just needed to release a heaviness to the Lord. Maybe it's I just needed to bring
calm for a minute, the kids can all say "Amen" to that in the background. But what you're
saying there is that it's one thing to say, "You're exhausted, you need to find rest."
It's further into what Michael shared, and it's dealing into the worn out and into the
burnout and maybe into a misunderstanding of who Jesus is. Because at the end of the day,
(49:47):
He is not a dictator, He is a Father. And I don't know what Father you were raised with,
and all of ours here at this table were very different, and none of them were perfect.
But I will tell you this, He is the perfect good Father. And I think so many people haven't
seen the goodness of God. And I'll tell you, we have walked out of every single time, whether
it's been out of places of great joy and victories, out of places of deep valleys and pain. We've
(50:11):
walked into places where it's the goodness of God. And I'll tell you, that's where you
go from rest being a part of walking into goodness. What would you say?
No, I love everything that you said. You're dabbing into that we could be another hour
because you're touching on the Sabbath Soul Cycle.
Well, maybe this is the second part of another book in the future, like, you know, here, the
whole series. And I think I know another place that we could do a podcast.
(50:35):
Ah, yes.
Yes, the beach.
Yes. I mean, you guys are going to be like right down the street from my Sabbath.
Not like that's a God wink or anything.
Spiritual bed crumbs all the way to death.
No, I echo everything that you said. And just how good is God, you know, just to think,
you know, like we pay attention to our phones on low battery or a light on our dashboard
(50:59):
in our car that God from the beginning, He gave us 52 times, 52 days out of the year
to experience. We're just scratching. You know, we're just scratching the surface of
His goodness.
Yep. 52 times out of the year, He gives us an opportunity to be able to be able to reset
and be able to rest and find delight in Him. And then what I love what you're just saying
(51:22):
too is in that fourth part, which we haven't talked about yet is that activating purpose.
And I'll never forget sitting around this table after the blessing. And I blessed, you
know, Salah and the kids, and we're getting ready to transition. And then our Sabbath
consists of at that point, usually we will have communion and we'll break the rest.
And we're getting ready to do that. And I feel a small hand on my shoulder.
(51:47):
And you're dribbled to say.
And that small hand on my shoulder was one of our kiddos that wanted to bless dad. And
so powerful just to think, because that's the, we call it the overflow. You know, where
is all this going? Right? Where does all this go? And for us, that's it. And that's the
(52:08):
overflow then. It's the Sabbath that really serves as the launch pad, you know, into the
rest of the week. And sometimes I think we err when we talk about Sabbath, we talk a
lot about resting, we even talk about pausing. And we know that God did that. He set the
pattern for us in the very beginning. But let's not forget, God loves work. He gave
(52:29):
Adam a job to do.
Correct.
He wanted them to multiply. He does. He wants you to multiply. You got animals to name.
And so please, I hope, I'm glad this came out because work's important to God.
And advancing His kingdom. But again, it's the work that's coming out of the rest. And
(52:51):
then it's the work that's coming out of our identity and the work that's coming out of
our alignment.
Ask yourself this, are you running in your striving? Or are you running out of place
of sacred rest with God? And I think that right there, you know, and some people still
need to dive into that deeper. But I think if you ask yourself at the end of the day,
God is powering me. You know, it's the jet engine into my life here. That's going to
(53:15):
help you start to realize, okay, there might be a piece that's missing. And I believe it's
found in Sabbath.
I think that's really good. And I think, you know, looking at the parable of the wineskin,
and, you know, it says John came. I personally believe John was one who came with the spirit
of Elijah to testify before Jesus came. And you talk about we were pouring out, pouring
(53:36):
out, pouring out, but nothing was pouring in. And what do you lead with? And then how
do you even activate a purpose at that point in time? Because you're almost just activating
obligation, obligation to a job, to a mortgage, whatever it might be. And a lot of that is
dictated by peer pressure in the world. And so, you found a place and you're helping
(53:56):
people through this book, find a place to activate a countercultural rebellion.
Yeah, that's a whole chapter in the book.
Yes.
That's a whole chapter.
And I think ultimately, you have to pour out so that then Jesus can pour in so you can
continue to be activated to pour into others. And I think that's beautiful. And we're going
to have to wrap up today, not only for their schedule, but for the fact that you guys are
(54:20):
probably, you know, doing something else, unless it's your Sabbath day. But I do want
to leave us with this because even down to the nuances of, you know, we live in a culture
that is very much social media driven, it's TikTok driven, it's short. People like to
joke that humanity has the attention span of a goldfish. And so, we are a kind of a
(54:45):
one-liner society. We lock on to doctrines and theologies and sayings and all those kind
of things. But even on the cover of this book, I want to tell you why I believe this book
can drastically impact your life more than just teaching you about the Sabbath or why
the Sabbath is good or why the Sabbath isn't. It is finding rest in a restless world. Everybody,
(55:10):
if you're being honest, if your spouse is in the car with you, she's being honest for
you, all of us have a restless nature. We all long, creation as a whole, the trees,
they're restless. They want creation to come back to the perfection of the garden, kind
of how you nuanced that earlier in there. And so, how do we get away from the restlessness
(55:32):
of this world and actually find rest? Well, you have to press pause and then the Lord
works it out. They didn't come to this table today and tell you that, you know, the first
Sabbath that they got together, they had it all figured out. I can testify over 20 years.
I still don't think I have it figured out. But we keep accepting the invitation for going
to the regulation and expecting that if we meet with our Father at His table, and we
(55:57):
do our roles as fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters in Christ, they fellowship Him
with other people, that God will take care of the rest. He can activate that purpose
and He can shift everything. That might also mean that He shifts your life in a way that
you had no expectation. Maybe you didn't even want it. But I can promise you, when you find
(56:19):
rest in God, when you press pause on your life, He's going to activate you. And at some point
of time, we'll have to get another podcast, maybe on the beach, because there is an activation
that came from this and a whole other testimony for you guys to give. But for everybody who's
watched this or listened to this, so tell them where they can go get more information
from you guys.
(56:40):
Well, we'd love for you to get the book. It's available on Amazon now, so it's pressing
pause. Grab the book, grab a few copies, share it with other people. I love you. But when
we find something we love, we are nuts for sharing it with other people. And so share
this with other people. On the flip side, join Michael and I. Connect with us at StartSabbath.com.
That's where you can get more resources, more parts about our story. We've created what's
(57:04):
called the Press Pause Challenge. It's a free challenge to take. And I don't know about
you, but sometimes I need someone to like walk with me for a little bit. I mean, I'm
a visual person too. So like, don't let me read the directions on the game. Just play
the game with me a little bit and I'll pick it up as I go. This is us being able to walk
with you as you learn. Okay, let me take a moment. Let me like signal this. Let me prepare
(57:24):
myself for resistance as I put this on my calendar. What do I need to kind of have at
my table or how do I walk through this? It's only 15 minutes. I can do that, but show me
the way to go. And so you can sign up for the Press Pause Challenge and we're going
to be able to walk with you. And then on the flip side too, in the book and on the website,
we've got a great way for you to share your table with us. And so get the phone number,
(57:48):
get our email addresses. We always tell everyone like, kind of take like a selfie of your Sabbath
table, send it over, be a part of the community. We've got resources, we've got more even things
coming, but it's a way for us to walk with you into accepting the yes to this invitation.
In fact, that's all you need to say today.
Yeah, you're not alone.
Just say, just start, just say yes to God and to saying, "I'm going to make room for
(58:13):
Sabbath."
That's right.
It can be an evening, it can be an hour between shifts at the hospital, it could be a moment
on an airplane. If you already have a flight booked and you've got to jump into a meeting,
it could be taking a whole part of an afternoon on a weekend. God will meet you in whatever
time you make. What were you about to say?
I was waiting to get a pause.
Take a pause. Seriously, stop the pause and get back to what that is.
(58:38):
It could be a single candle, it could be no candles, it could be fine china that you set
aside, it could be a paper plate, but just start.
Yeah, that's the most important. Just say yes.
Sabbath.com.
Start Sabbath.com. That's it.
Awesome. Well, I can attest to some of the most wonderful individuals that I've ever
met and I know that making adjustments in your life can be hard, especially if you feel like
(59:04):
you're doing it alone. Even though we've testified that we all keep the Sabbath and we all find
beauty in the Sabbath, if there isn't somebody in your local area that you're already doing
with, you will feel alone if you're trying to just do it on your own.
Start Sabbath.com is a resource for you to understand that they don't want you to just
buy the book. They want to actually walk with you. The testimony is one that builds with
(59:28):
the testimonies of others. And just like this might have filled you up today and you might
be super excited and you might have already said yes, you might have already gone to Start
Sabbath.com and signed up for the challenge. But in the end, you sharing that information
and sharing your testimony with the Hirsch family is a way to also bless them with your
(59:48):
testimony and blessing others as well. Because in the end, that's the currency of the Kingdom
of God. You are the currency of the Kingdom of God. They are the currency of the Kingdom
of God. So you're not alone. Go to StartSabbath.com and join this revolution that's happening
right now to push back against being tired and burnt out.
(01:00:10):
Yeah.
Michael, Salah, I don't say this to everybody that I talk to, but I love you guys and we
always have. You guys just, you radiate Christ. And so, I look forward to hearing all the
testimonies that come out of this revelation of the Holy Spirit. And we'll see you next
time.
Welcome to the HHP Podcast.
My name is Chris Franke and I am the Senior Pastor of HFF Church in Oklahoma City.
Join me and others from around the country as we talk all things Bible, Church and family.
We may be right, we may be heretical, but that's for you to decide.
Drop a like, a share, a comment, subscribe and let's get to it.
(00:22):
Okay, so we're just going to jump right in and do something completely different today.
If you've ever been a part of the Hopeful Heretic Podcast, our podcasts are under 10 minutes long.
We try to focus on a scriptural nugget, something from a sermon series, maybe something that is considered borderline heretical and mainstream Christianity, whatever it is.
But today we're in, I guess we're just going to call it table talk as we sit at the table here with Michael and Salah Hirsch.
(00:51):
And so full disclosure as we start off today, I've known them for many, many years and we'll get into that story and let them share some of that kind of stuff.
So it's not like I just walked in and had like 30 minutes to kind of read over their book and kind of talk to them.
We have done life with each other and our children for five, six, seven, eight, nine years.
I don't even remember that's how old I am.
(01:12):
And so today the reason why I wanted to do something different, have a video is because
I'm not going to steal all their thunder, but they just wrote a brand new book called Pressing Paws and it is on the Sabbath.
And so I'm very excited as a guy who has kept the Sabbath for, I don't know, about 18, 19 years.
(01:34):
I just think it's more like a hundred.
I know my hair looks like I've been doing it for a hundred years, but I'm excited to be here with you guys.
And so I'm actually going to just start off by just asking you to kind of just tell a little bit about your story.
Tell a little bit about who you are.
You know, don't let me steal the thunder on that and just kind of tell everybody a little bit about yourself.
(01:58):
And we'll kind of then lean into how you how you ended up here in the Sabbath.
Yeah, let's jump in. Let's get started, Chris.
Thank you so much for having Michael and I.
We absolutely love you and your family.
And I'll tell you, you are a critical part of this story and it's been pretty neat because as we look back, looking back,
you always see, I think more clearly the hindsight and the hand of God.
(02:19):
And I feel like we're in a season where we've seen so clearly in now what we didn't see in part in the ways before.
And that's where our journey has led us to this point.
And Michael and I have been married going on now 20 years.
We have four small kids and two puppies and that's another story for another day.
It's important to add that.
But the Lord has brought us to his heart through different stories.
(02:41):
And but but but in this time and in this season, we're focused on marriage.
We're focused on family. We're focused on leaning into hearing his voice and walking in his ways,
which is why we were so surprised that we had never yet discovered the gift of Sabbath and had the invitation for us at the table.
And so just to bring the story to kind of the present time and moment,
(03:02):
here we are living in Oklahoma just around the corner from you guys that we hadn't been made friends just yet.
And that was again part of just the Lord going, hold on.
There's one more piece I've got to bring you bring to you.
And so we've we're in this neighborhood area.
We were doing life. Michael's been leading nonprofits,
organizational executive director for now over 20 years.
(03:25):
And that's brought us to different cities, which is what was kind of our story to Oklahoma and busy from morning till night.
And the parts that were even still in the dark were then on top of all of the leadership.
You have been running Ironman Triathlon for 10 plus years and you'd get up at like 4 a.m.
in the morning, train all the way until like 7 a.m. brush, get the kids breakfast off to school.
(03:48):
I love being a mom to our kids and on the flip side, I'm a business owner.
And so our world, if you want to bring into our world, they're nonstop.
They're on the go. They're loving Jesus, taking care of people, building businesses.
Nonstop. And so for us to press pause for people to know that now it takes kind of a miraculous journey.
(04:09):
So let's bring it to you guys because you were part of that.
So we're living here around the corner and right around the covid season.
We got to meet your family and you walked in and I was like, who is this family?
We've got kids and they've got this beautiful presence of God with them, which instantly connected to us.
But then you had something else.
You began to share with us more of the understanding of the Jewish roots of our faith.
(04:32):
I remember at one point you prayed in Hebrew over a meal and I was like, I don't understand in my natural mind what you're saying.
But my spirit is resonating with us.
And then you began to share with us about Shabbat and Sabbath and more about the feast.
And Michael and I were in a season where we've been following the Lord.
We're in church. We're reading our Bible.
We're talking to our kids about how to walk out their faith with the Lord.
(04:55):
In fact, we tell them go shine like bright lights all the time, you know, but yet there was another piece of the light of the Sabbath table that we had not discovered.
And then I'll never forget one time you invited us to Shabbat at your home and we walked into this presence and we walked into walking with you through the practice of disconnecting from the day.
(05:16):
Which I don't know about anybody else who's listening to this, but that's hard for a person like me to disconnect.
I'm constantly running to do this and things.
But Michael and I walked away from that. I'll never forget you're like, say oh, there's something here.
There is a disconnect from the world and there is a threshold and an entrance into a moment of eternity.
And that began to give us this taste of what is this?
(05:37):
And so, Michael, why don't you jump in now and why don't you share?
Because that then led you to a trip to Israel, which brought even more life and color to the invitation God was bringing to us.
Definitely. And we're so grateful. I mean, we said this to you just before we started and you were one of the, you were the first seed.
You sowed the first seed into our hearts as it relates to Sabbath and to rest.
(05:59):
But then that led to an unexpected email that I deleted.
We thought it was the mail.
I thought it was internet fishing and too good to be true.
Free invitation to come to Israel.
God knows. I'm glad we did.
The second email, I scrolled to the bottom and realized that this is for real, that there's an invitation, a colleague of ours that had visited pre-COVID to Israel and recommended that I go on a pastoral trip.
(06:25):
And so we said yes. And that trip led me to Israel.
And I never forget prior to and I'm sure first timers that have ever gone to Israel have done before.
But you kind of look at the itinerary of what you're going to do and places you're going to see and visit.
And so I had the checklist of the places that I knew that God was going to meet me.
(06:46):
And he did in these places.
And so I was looking forward to be out on the Sea of Galilee and having a time of worship, you know, being in the Garden of Gethsemane and getting an opportunity to pray, visiting, you know, various archeological sites.
Yeah.
I looked over a Friday night Sabbath dinner with an Orthodox Jewish family.
(07:09):
Wasn't at all on my radar.
But what's interesting, though, and I think this is just true to life and I find myself, you know, in this place here and especially in Western culture and the world at the pace and the way that we do life.
Up to that Sabbath dinner on a Friday night, I was really a tourist.
Yeah.
And I was sightseeing the moment that my feet and 24 others of us stepped foot into this family's home shifted from being a tourist and a spectator to participating and engaging.
(07:43):
They're just a special presence of God at the table, at the table where everything just seemed to slow down.
Probably one of the first times over the first maybe seven or eight days of the trip that I didn't even have a desire to even pull out my phone.
I was just in I was just in this moment.
And so fast forwarding a couple of days later is the infamous phone call to say lunch and I'm downloading and I'm unpacking what I had experience.
(08:14):
And I said is on a Wednesday and we're getting ready to fly out and I said, say, look, get ready because I'm going to hit the ground running pretty hot Friday night.
We are going to have our first Sabbath dinner as a family.
And you said, I said, oh, my goodness, just keep it simple.
Like I could hear the excitement and the passionate voice.
(08:34):
And I'm thinking to myself, OK, I resonate with something that you're feeling because I trust you.
But on the flip side, we are so maxed out.
We have no room for anything else.
And I know when you go in, you go in like full right.
And so Iron Man is a staff.
That is what I'm talking about.
So here's the final part of the story.
So he did not keep it simple.
(08:56):
OK, let me tell you that first time we get to the table and like Michael's got all these things he wants to talk about and he wants to share with us the Hebrew prayers and have the elements on the table.
And the kids are just like, mom, what is happening?
And like, I think it was like such a long time later.
Dinner is cold.
We're all kind of going, what is this?
(09:18):
This goes forward.
I don't understand this.
But let me fast forward and then you can share more with people as we get into the book.
But the peace of God met us in that moment.
That's awesome.
Even though we didn't understand it.
And thankfully, he did simplify it because now it is part of our family rhythm.
But I'll say this Friday nights at our table, whether it's a beautiful meal that maybe I found online and we follow a recipe or whether it's leftovers.
(09:43):
And you know, frozen pizza has become our most sacred time of the week because we've learned that the invitation of Sabbath is an invitation to the presence of God.
And in the crazy, nonstop dinging of text messages, emails, kids, mortgages, life, sports practices, you guys live at the ball field.
Yes.
(10:04):
We have found a way to literally carve out a place where the peace of God has filled us.
And also this last part, it has revolutionized our marriage, our family.
It has strengthened our relationship with the Lord from our life to our leadership.
Chris, like the overflow of God's presence has happened in a fresh way that we just never knew existed before.
(10:27):
It was literally the missing part.
Which is, I want to make sure that the audience understands because some people might be watching this podcast or listening to this podcast and they already know you guys and they've interacted because, like you said, you guys have run businesses.
You've pastored. There's a lot of people that you've, you know, one degree, three degrees, you've had some sort of influence in their life.
You know, we coach baseball together.
(10:48):
You know, like there was other areas of life other than just being neighbors or whatever.
But there's going to be some people who are going to watch this, who this is the first time they're being introduced to you guys.
And so I want to highlight a couple of things here.
It's not like you didn't already have a faith in Jesus.
It's not like you didn't already have a church community.
You guys have, for as long as I've known you, you've been plugged into faith community, not only for your family here locally, but then you also work to help other faith communities as well, both in church and extracurricular activities.
(11:22):
And so you already had, from my vantage point on the outside looking in, you already had a great relationship with Jesus.
The Holy Spirit already is dwelling in your family.
I always tell people, look at the fruit. And that's how you know if the Holy Spirit is evident in people's life.
And you can see the fruit in your children. You can see the fruit in, whether it was with LoveWorks or now Kidvation Global or all the other things that you've done.
(11:46):
Iron Man's, I was scrolling my phone the other day and saw pictures of Jude down at Lake Thunderbird when you were doing the Iron Man with Jude, little old baby Jude.
Or, you know, even in COVID when everything locked us down and you're like, hey, look, we need to transform a bedroom into an office because we can't stop.
And so I got to express my brand in your brand in the house.
(12:12):
So for anybody watching, like these people love Jesus.
They went to church. He was a part of everything they did.
And so when you hear the testimony of Michael talking about and Saylo talking about getting introduced to the Sabbath and then going to Israel,
one thing that came and maybe it's a Holy Spirit moment, maybe it's nothing but 24, you know, like the throne room, 24 elders that are there.
(12:36):
And so 24 people come into an Orthodox home to do Shabbat.
All of these things like it's not like somebody who's watching here, you would say like, oh, okay, well, you know, I came into the Sabbath and then I found God.
They had God. God was prevalent in their life.
And so they didn't know they were missing anything.
They didn't know that there was anything more.
(12:58):
It's like, hey, look, we've got a great relationship with the Lord and the Holy Spirit is operating in our midst and in the midst of our family.
And yet, even in that quest of just doing life with God on a regular basis, the Lord found you in a moment where you weren't necessarily expecting it and revealed himself even more.
(13:19):
You kind of mention as like spiritual breadcrumbs in the book of like, you know, if you are looking and you're seeking and you're walking with the Lord, He brings those breadcrumbs to lead you to places.
A lot of times people want that apocalyptic moment where it's like I'm on the road to more and God comes and shuts down 35 and talks.
(13:39):
But a lot of times it is more spiritual breadcrumbs.
And I remember we used to tease you a lot about this because you were always going literally your schedules.
And it wasn't like it was a selfish calendar.
Your calendars were engaged to engage with other people.
And so you were constantly pouring out while also being poured into whether it was with Life.
(14:04):
Church or some of the other areas.
And you would always say, hey, we're going to have to put a pin in that, Chris.
Like we can't talk about it right now. We're on max capacity.
We're going to have to put a pin in it.
But for some reason, when Michael had this this Holy Spirit moment in Israel and he contacts you and he says, hey, on top of Iron Man's and on top of running businesses and on top of raising our children in our church communities and our friends and everything else, I want to add something else to our plate.
(14:34):
You know, it had to have been a divine interaction with the Lord because you probably would have immediately from the past been like Michael, we're at full capacity.
We have to put a pin in that, come back and talk about it at some other point.
And now to hear your testimony and to read about some of your testimony and what the Lord revealed to you, you went from putting a pin into saying we're going to take a pause and we're going to press pause on our life.
(14:58):
And so I want to talk a little bit about the book.
A lot of people, you know, they'll come into some revelation of the Lord, you know, it could be the Sabbath.
It could be I need to be more engaged in a church community.
It could be I need to sow into the regular community.
But not a lot of people go out and write their testimony to share that with other people.
(15:19):
And yesterday when we were setting up, I was kind of talking to you about for me personally,
the two things that stand out in the book of Revelation is that we'll overcome the struggles, the trials of this world by the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony.
And so you could have just done that by testifying to your friends or your family of the beauty that you found in the scripture.
(15:41):
But you felt called by the Lord to write a testimony for everybody so that they could hear your testimony.
And there's true power in that.
So tell me a little bit about how we went from, OK, Michael comes back from Israel.
You guys are already stressed out on a calendar.
The first Shabbat is a little rough, a little hectic to now hearing the passion in your voice about sitting at this table with your family and getting to a place where then you decided, hey, we feel called to write about that.
(16:14):
Tell me a little bit about how you came there.
You know, you want me to jump in there?
So I think what's beautiful is that we didn't start off with the, hey, we've got a story to tell because we're living it for a while.
You know, and I feel like that's where I'll give you so much credit.
You have such a steadfastness, Michael.
And after that first Shabbat, I think I still haven't fully tasted in, you know, what the what it was of the invitation because it was a new rhythm.
(16:39):
And so let me just kind of pause there for a moment and acknowledge the fact that there is resistance to new rhythms.
And I'll put both my hands in the air.
And I just I said, you know, are we sure we're doing this?
Are we doing it next week?
Like I didn't understand yet what was new and what was becoming a part of the fabric of our family.
And so for anyone who is going to say, hey, like I do want to learn more.
(17:00):
I want to maybe want to try this.
I think by the time we finish today, I think it might be good for you to say like expect some of that resistance.
Maybe we'll even talk about that more.
Resistance to a rhythm.
Resistance to a rhythm because it was still new to us.
But that newness, we had to push through that.
And so I'm kind of stepping ahead just to acknowledge that upfront because that is something to be aware of.
But we pushed through that resistance and we said, let's do it again.
(17:24):
Come back to the table the next Friday night.
Come back to the table the next Friday night, you know, and we were beginning to say, OK, what is this?
This is new, but the Lord is calling us.
And to your point, nothing has changed in our lives.
We still run 24/7.
We still run organizations and businesses.
We're still a huge part of our church community.
Nothing has changed.
There was just a missing piece and that missing piece was to come back to the table, to come back to the table.
(17:47):
And I'll tell you, I don't have a marker of a timeline, but after a handful of those come back to the tables,
I remember it was, hey, it's Friday.
Shabbat shalom.
Like it was then this excitement.
And so we went from newness to like the beginning of we come, we come to the table, not are we coming to the table,
(18:08):
but we're coming to the table and we begin to shift in ourselves.
And then I'm skipping ahead now, but then it was like, hey, let's invite other people to the table.
And that's where the fruit of peace, especially when we walked through a very challenging season,
probably in our 20 years of marriage, the most challenging season of life, of leadership.
I walked through a heaviest state of ever anxiety and depression that I've ever experienced in my life.
(18:30):
We kept coming and coming to the table and the fruit of all that was peace and the fruit of all that was connection.
And the chaos began to diminish and the Lord's presence began to fill us in places that we were so desperate
and hungry for and the table anchored us.
And so then to the point of where the story was is we began to feel and see all of that and say,
let's bring other people and other families that are in our Christian community,
(18:53):
other families that are our neighbors, other families that are visiting in town.
And more people began to say, okay, what is this thing?
And we said, come join us for Sabbath.
Come be a part of our Shabbat table.
And again, some weeks it was a little nicer or fancier than others, but the presence of God,
the way that we crossed that threshold from ordinary into a place of eternity
(19:14):
where Michael began to lead out and say, let's welcome the presence of God.
Let's signal the Sabbath time.
The way our kids literally soak in the blessing is like has blessed our heart.
And so then some people began to say, hey, I think you need to share this with other couples
and other families who just didn't know this existed.
(19:35):
And I'll say this part here, and then Michael, you kick in your thoughts,
but I was sharing with you, Chris, one of my favorite quotes and brand
when it comes to personal brands is, you're often positioned to help the person you once were.
And that's what this book is.
It's what we needed a few years ago, someone to tell us.
And you know, and that's where God brought us into it.
And we think that there are so many other families that have been at our table
(19:57):
and so many that have not been to our table or to a table yet who need to hear the story
because they're going to see themselves in this picture.
They're going to see themselves as people who are pursuing the heart of God,
who want to leave kingdom, impact and legacy,
who want to raise kids who are next generation of leaders,
but who are probably dangerously low to running on empty.
(20:18):
And so again, I'm skipping around here,
but I'll tell you where the emptiness was creeping up,
the Lord filled it at this table and it has been our joy, hasn't it babe,
to share it with so many others.
And I pray that that's what this story is for those who just we've yet to meet yet.
I think you're getting ready to give a Sabbath altar call.
Come to our table, come to our table.
(20:39):
That's okay. Let's take them out back and get the hose on.
Well, I don't know where anybody sits on sprinkling, but that's the best we got here.
It's okay.
Well, you said it so well, you know, and we've talked about this.
We, you know, we refer to Sabbath as the gift that we had no idea that we needed.
Yeah, but God did.
And then he gave it to us at a time where a few months like down the road,
(21:02):
there was a series of storms that we had no idea that were coming, you know,
that were coming our way, but God was just rooting us and he was grounding us,
you know, giving us an opportunity to really experience that peace,
you know, that transcends all understanding.
And then that gift just for us, it just became undeniable.
I can recall just recalling right now, Nya sitting, our daughter Nya,
(21:23):
just now 12 years old sitting in the chair, I say, "What chair is sitting in?"
And just out of nowhere, she said, "Dad, Mom, like this is how peace is supposed to feel."
And Anker saying to us, "This is what a family is supposed to be like."
And just you're hearing and then you're seeing then an expression then around this table,
just coming out of each of our kids, Tinsley, who would interpret a dance to worship on our Sabbath nights.
(21:50):
And then we would linger.
And linger is a word that I think for 40 plus years of living, I'd use a single time in my life.
I mean, I'm not going to throw you under the bus, but like we coached baseball together and you didn't linger ever.
So you were in and out because there was always something else.
There's always something to do.
And so for you to testify, we began to linger as a family.
(22:14):
You know, that's a huge shift in what the culture was for your family because you are driven people.
And that's not even a bad thing.
You know, laziness in the Bible is a bad thing, but you can't be too driven as well.
And so you started to linger.
The kids start to just embrace this.
(22:36):
So tell me then like, what's your favorite part of the Sabbath?
You go first because I know mine.
If you take mine, you're busted.
No, just kidding.
Since I know what you're going to say here, but I would all of it.
All of it.
Okay.
But if I had to say something like that's not allowed.
(22:56):
It's like asking, so what is your favorite?
Who's your favorite kid?
You know, but what I love, Salah mentioned that on Fridays, and Fridays works and this is,
and we read about this in the book, but Salah works Friday night works for Salah and I.
That just happens to work with our schedule.
Others that we know, they Sabbath on other nights and that's their prerogative.
(23:19):
That's their, we believe that's their choice and that's their freedom.
Friday works for us, but Friday we begin to signal Sabbath.
That's like definitely your favorite part of the signal.
That is a signal Sabbath and Chris, like you've mentioned sports a few times.
A good coach is going to spend some time in preparation and getting ready, whether it's
for a practice or a game, you're going to have your exes and you're going to have your
(23:40):
O's.
You're leading a business and a team.
You're going to have a plan.
Correct.
You're going to have meetings and you're going to have talking points.
Hopefully.
Occasionally you can wing it, but other times you're spending time, the good ones, the good,
the great ones spend time in preparation.
And so we call it then a state of a Sabbath state of mind.
Okay.
And so it doesn't have to be a three hours to get into the Sabbath state of mind.
But five, it could be five or ten minutes.
(24:03):
It could just be spending time with your Bible closed.
It could be opening up your Bible and reading Isaiah 58 and what he speaks about the Sabbath
and making Sabbath a delight.
That leads me to the lighting of the candles.
Okay.
Yeah.
Leads me to lighting of the candles.
And you think about candles, not just in the context of Sabbath, but we use candles and
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for some do celebrating birthdays.
Correct.
But it signifies a moment.
It signifies time.
It sets it apart.
And so that was part of us borrowing part of my experience that I had in Israel.
And it was a part that marked that moment.
It is.
To set it apart.
Like you signal it, but then it marks it.
I think that's so good you're saying that.
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It really is.
And as our eyes are being open to Sabbath and the scripture was being opened, as we spent,
I would say the first two years after we started practicing Sabbath, reading whatever I can
find on the subject.
Yeah, you love reading books as a whole.
Yes.
Podcasts like this.
And I was seeing scripture that I had read hundreds of times as if I was reading it for
(25:09):
the first time.
Yeah.
And he takes us back.
I could take us back to the garden.
Yeah.
And God's creation account and in Genesis 2, God, when he created day one through day
six, you know, he either called it good or very good and what he created.
But on day seven, he didn't call it very good.
He didn't call day seven good, but he called it holy.
(25:32):
That's good.
The first thing that he called holy was not his human creation, but it was time.
Yes.
So there's just something, you know, we gather for dinners, you know, around this table all
throughout the week, like you guys do, and I'm sure those that are watching and listening.
But there's just something different about the Sabbath.
Yeah.
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And when you light those candles and you signify that right here, right now, this time that
– and I'll be honest, like, as hard as we lead and parent and all of those things,
sometimes we can fall into a me mentality.
Yes, we think we're doing it for doing things all for God and advancing His kingdom and mission.
(26:13):
But we believe when we Sabbath that we light those candles and set it apart.
And this, I think, is something that is differentiated in this book.
We don't believe that that time is about me.
Yeah.
That's not Michael time.
It's not Salah time.
It's not my kids' time.
But we're saying, "God, this is your time, and whatever you want to do as we put our
(26:36):
feet," our friends – I love the saying that they say to us, like, "putting your
feet under the table."
So as we gather at this table, we get to put our feet underneath it, and we come just as we are.
Yeah.
Whatever happens to be going on, we bring the high, we bring the low.
You light the candle, and you set it apart, and you just watch God do something.
(27:00):
That's the gift.
So that would be –
Okay, I thought you didn't steal my thunder then, okay, Chris?
My favorite part is hands down.
I love it all, like Michael said, but my favorite part, hands down, is the moment of the blessing.
Okay.
And so what is the blessing?
If someone hasn't read the book or does their Sabbath, okay, so I'm lighting candles,
and I'm saying a blessing, "Hey, just for context, I think our whole Sabbath time
(27:22):
takes on average maybe 15 minutes before we get to dinner."
So what we're talking about is totally feasible for any family, whether you are a single parent,
a larger family around the table, maybe you are a college student, empty nesters.
Just remember, this is exactly for you.
So the blessing, though, is I believe something that will totally impact your heart, because
(27:45):
what Michael does is as we walk through the steps of Sabbath, we take a moment to decompress.
He takes a good maybe 15 minutes.
I take maybe 30 seconds sometimes.
I crash land into Sabbath.
Answer my last email, shift my laptop, we're at the table.
He takes a minute, he gets into his heart.
We come to the table.
We start off with a welcome.
Michael shares a devotional.
(28:06):
We take a moment perhaps to play a worship song, and we light the candles, and we welcome
the presence of God, and then it leads us into the blessing.
And the blessing is where Michael walks around the table.
He actually stands up, and he physically puts his hand on our shoulders, and he starts with me,
and he goes through birth order with our kids, and he shares something that he sees in us.
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He saw in us this week.
I love that you make it time-relevant.
So you've really kind of developed what we call in the book like a blessing radar.
Like you're looking kind of then throughout the week, consciously and subconsciously,
because now it's a rhythm, it's a habit, and you're looking for something that you can say,
"Hey, I saw this in you."
And it's not always, you know, "Oh, I saw you do this," or "Accomplish this,"
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but this is like the essence of God I see in you.
This is the quality of integrity or the quality of the strength and the uniqueness,
the fingerprint of God that's only in you.
And you take, you know, 10-15 seconds, and you call that out, and you look us in the eyes.
I don't want to take it because it's not just the words, but it's also the body language.
And let me take a moment to help everyone realize too, we're married,
(29:09):
and sometimes we have come to the table, and we are in a marriage moment.
Like, I just also remind you, this is real life.
But you take a moment.
And you come to the table as Cain and Abel.
Tears of joy and other tears.
Yes, yes, yes.
I'm giving you the look.
But we still, but we still keep going.
You still come to the table, and you still put all that aside, that humanity aside.
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You look me in the eyes, maybe one of the kids just had a meltdown,
and you call out the God in us.
And here's what makes this special, Chris.
I believe two things.
If anyone's listening who's like me, yes, words of affirmation is one of my love language.
And I just love it.
I soak in it.
But two things have come to our tables.
Number one, the world is full of criticism and negativity.
(29:51):
And I feel like the enemy is out right now through anxiety, through self-doubt,
through imposter syndrome, through comparison, through emotional abuse, verbal abuse.
People have been torn down, I think, by words.
Words hurt and kill and destroy.
And that's why God in the invitation of Sabbath said,
"I am going to restore through the verbal lens, through the verbal power of the mouth,
(30:15):
what I want you to know about your calling in me as your beloved children."
And that telling you is a seed after a seed after a seed of just these beautiful, loving words,
just calling out the goodness in someone when the world has tried to just destroy that in them.
And I'll tell you, that's a testimony for us for a story for another time,
because, Michael, you weren't raised in a household of positive words.
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And you were raised in a household where emotional abuse and verbal abuse was present.
And I'll tell you, if it wasn't for God doing the work in your life, saving, salvation,
and if it wasn't for Him curating your heart as a husband and father through Sabbath,
we didn't have that level of positive words.
You weren't negative, you weren't abusive, but you haven't really, I think,
learned to release the goodness that you speak so regularly over me and the kids.
(31:04):
And I'll tell you, Chris, our kids just look up.
In fact, I have pictures of them. I think we put some of them on the website.
Our kids just look up. And I feel like that's the story of God to us in ways, you know what I mean?
Like, they look up and they catch you in the eye,
and they receive every word from their father's heart to them,
which is how I believe they will always look up to hear the voice of the Father in their life.
(31:28):
And I'll tell you, that 10 to 15 seconds, as you go through the room and through the table,
like, everyone's heart receives a gift.
And we carry that in us throughout the week.
And we carry that in us when the enemy says, "But you're not good enough,"
and "You're not beautiful enough," and "Look at everyone who's better."
Or "You're never going to make it." I'll tell you, those words counteract and counterbalance that
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because they are the identity of Christ in us through the Father.
That's beautiful. You know, for anybody who knows me,
I come from more of the obligation side of the Sabbath.
You know, my testimony was born again Christian at 13, came into the faith with the Sabbath
and all of those things all at once.
(32:11):
It was just kind of like you, like, shut the laptop, we're going in.
And we went hardcore in, and we approached the Sabbath almost as an obligation of commandment in the Scripture.
And so, it took us a long time.
Whereas it sounds like, you know, you guys were signaling Sabbath,
and you were struggling on some of the first ones, and you were trying to find that rhythm.
(32:32):
Ours really came from self-creation because we didn't come to the table because we were looking to be with God.
We came to the table because we felt like God was telling us, "If you don't come to the table,
you're in trouble." And so, years and years and years later, you know,
I started to recognize how I was projecting an orphan spirit into the nature of God.
(32:54):
And so, what I hear here, even on Salah's testimony of you, is that you grew up in a home
where there was times that things were said that could have led you into an orphan spirit
to even maybe project that onto who God is and His nature.
And you are breaking those generational curses through Sabbath and the blessing.
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You're not just coming to the table. You're not just lighting the candles.
You're not just saying, "Baruch atah." You're looking every person in the eye,
and you're speaking as if God the Father was speaking to them.
And so, you're saying, not only through the table, not only through the Sabbath,
are we finding peace and we're finding rest, but you're breaking generational curses in your children
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by saying, "I'm going to not pass down an orphan spirit to them because they're going to be able
to see the Father through the lens of a loving Father, not one who is judgmental or condemning
or how dare you not do the Sabbath right or whatever."
And so, I have perused this book multiple times. And one of the things I really love about,
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you know, the soul cycle that you have in there is that you help walk people through things that aren't,
"What are you doing on the Sabbath?" Because a lot of where I've come from over 20 years
and the hundreds of thousands of individuals that I've met with, they all want to know
if they're looking at the Sabbath, they want to know, "Well, what am I allowed to do?
What am I not allowed to do?" And so, they approach it as almost as if it is like a job description
(34:24):
or some sort of interaction, transaction with the Lord.
And this book comes at it in a completely different approach. It comes at not, "I have to keep the Sabbath,"
not that the Lord is making me keep the Sabbath, but here is the joy of what we have found
by honoring this time with the Lord. And here are some things that we put into practice
(34:47):
that help you actually experience not only the family, but the Lord.
And so, I really love that this has not come as like the instruction manual on Sabbath.
It's come as testifying of the power of what you found in this day.
And again, reminding the people who are watching, you already had a testimony from my vantage
(35:08):
point on the outside of the Holy Spirit and God being in your life.
So, when you look at, if you're a Christian, a Baptist, a Pentecostal, a Catholic, whatever
denomination, non-denomination you are, you can look at your life and you can say, "I
love Jesus, and I believe Jesus is all over my life." Well, guess what I would tell you?
I would testify that both of them would be in that same state. But you're hearing through
(35:32):
this podcast and through the testimony of this book that there can be more.
You know, kind of that, I'm reminded of if you knock, if you seek, if you ask, you will
find me. If you continue to pursue God, there will be those divine revelations, those spiritual
bread crumbs where He will lead you to the bread of life, where He will lead you with
(35:52):
a little cup of water to not have thirst anymore. And we're seeing that through the testimony
of this book.
And so, for those of you who are interested in Sabbath or, you know, maybe you weren't
interested in Sabbath and somehow some algorithm puts you onto this podcast, you know, I want
you to listen to this, maybe even go back and listen to it with your eyes closed too,
(36:15):
and not get caught into what you hear, you see from a practical of like, "I have to do
this," or, "If I do this, this is going to be great," because you testified as well.
You have to work at the rhythm. You have to find your rhythm, and you testified that everybody's
rhythm is a little bit different. And so, there isn't a one-size-fits-all Jesus model
(36:37):
for the Sabbath. You have to make that because your relationship with God is different. Your
personal relationship is different, yours is different, mine is different, and you found
a way as a corporate unit of a family to find yours. And so, one of the things I've heard
over all the years talking about Sabbath and interaction is, "Well, that's a Jewish thing."
(37:00):
And you kind of testified that, you know, "Hey, we first got introduced to Sabbath because
my family came over here. I don't look Jewish. I'm wearing a Jesus Make Us One t-shirt, you
know, got a man bun, whatever." But then you went to Israel and you had the interaction
with the Orthodox Jews that are there. Just listening to the testimony, take the Sabbath
out of it for a minute. If you didn't call it Sabbath, if you didn't call it Shabbat,
(37:24):
if you called it Monday or you called it Tuesday or whatever, listening to the testimony and
reading some of the testimony right in here, who wouldn't want better marriages, better
families, all of that? So, how do you combat somebody who says, "Hey, look, man, that's
a Jewish thing. Like, you know, we're free from the law." And they immediately kind of
(37:47):
like want to take up arms against it just because it might be culturally or it might
be something different. Even though they've heard so far this unbelievable testimony of
what the Lord has done, and you're not practicing Judaism. You didn't give up Jesus. You didn't
like, you didn't come in here with Zitzio or Akippah or anything like. So, for all of
those non-denominational, Baptist, Pentecostals out there, all those people in America especially,
(38:12):
because our culture is driven on the economics of finances and what can I do with these?
What do you say to them to say like, "Okay, guess what? We found God's economy, Trump's."
What do you say to them? How do they overcome those, you know, like, "I'm not Jewish. This
is a Jewish thing." How do you overcome that?
(38:33):
Yeah, I'll share, if you don't mind, just from a personal side of how I answered that.
And I know that you've got a different answer just with, I think, even greater depth of
understanding. So, for the feelers in the room, I'll say this, I don't believe that
we can all agree that we were not made to run on empty, you know. And I think, you know,
the Lord created where we need sleep at night to renew, that we need the seasons to cycle,
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you know, that the summer, fall become the winter, become the spring. I mean, I could
go on and on. Even in the way our calendar runs, like, there are patterns of renewal
and restoration if we look at how we were formed from creation.
That's good.
And I think our culture, especially in Western, and especially if you add to that anyone who
is driven by achievement or productivity, and that signals their worth, which again,
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I'll be honest, I'll raise my hand to them, that we feel like we're meant to do it all
on our own. And the Lord has said, "Don't even call...yeah, take away all the names,
take away all the titles, but you will run on...you will run to empty. You will burn
yourself to the ground." And I'll tell you, the statistics on burnout and anxiety, I mean,
our divorce, I mean, it's through the roof because...
(39:39):
Even since 2020, you're COVID, like, just unbelievable.
And we are right there. All three of us at the table are equally in danger of those things
if we do not find our place of renewal. And so we can find it by Netflix and chill. We
can find it through trying to go on vacation or get a pedicure or run out to, you know,
get a drink. I mean, there are all the ways that our society tells us, "Take a break,
(40:02):
find that rest, find that renewal." You know what I mean? But I'll tell you, that is temporary
fixes. And we all know we are more tired the next day, you are hungover, your bank account
is depleted, and everything is still staring you in the face because all you've done is
tried to numb out what was really the deeper place of needing the restoration of the Father.
(40:23):
And so I'll tell you, if someone says, "Is this a Jewish thing?" No, I'd say, "This
is a human thing." This is a place because at the end of the day, I can see my life go
two different directions. And one direction is this far because it's my own striving,
and it's probably going to enter into a lot of broken places. Or it's going to be miles
longer, and I pray legacy miles longer, because I walked in partnership with the Father. And
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I'll tell you, that might still be a little too over someone's head a little bit. So you
jump in here and you share your thoughts. But I'll tell you at the end of the day, right
now, if this at all is resonating to you where you are tired, you are exhausted, you feel
the fraying edges of your marriage, you are short with your kids, you are dealing at night
with racing thoughts, that is telling you your warning lights are going off.
(41:10):
Yeah, you have to press pause.
Your battery is on low because you haven't pressed pause, and all those temporary fixes
aren't going to take you to a greater place. They're only going to ultimately take you
down to zero. The place is at the presence of God, whether it's at a table, whether it's
driving in your car, you know, whether it's out on a walk, whatever your Sabbath looks
like, it's the fact that we have to come to the Father and rest is not weakness. It is
(41:34):
wisdom to live the life we were created to live.
No, that's great. Well, we know we're not going to win over your argument. Yeah, that's
right. You're going to absolutely encounter scripture us, you know, all day long. To that
person, I would love to say, if it was realistic, boy, we would love to have you join us. We
have a seat at the table for you just to experience, to touch and to see. You just alluded to it
(41:59):
and I'll read it. To that person, I would ask four questions, which is ask four questions
from God's Word in the message. And I know I'll probably get, you know, some banter about
using the message translation, but boy, I love those four questions.
Yeah. Are you tired? Are you worn out? Are you burned out on religion or life?
(42:24):
Yes.
Come on, Jesus, here we go. And He says, "Come to me, get away with me and you'll recover
your life and I'll show you how to take a real rest." I'll show you how to take a real
rest. And that's been part of our journey. You know, it's a difference between either
resting from work or working from rest.
(42:44):
Yeah, that's good.
And so, I would encourage anyone to think about those four questions. You know, are
you tired? Are you worn out? Are you burned out on religion? Come to me and I'll show
you how to take a real rest.
And then it doesn't matter, I think, at that point, sometimes, is this a Jewish thing? That's
what I need to live. That's what I need to run the race I'm called to.
(43:07):
I mean, who do you know? I mean, we both, all three of us interact with a lot of people
in a lot of different spheres all the time. Who doesn't check those boxes?
Yeah, that's great.
Literally, who doesn't? You know, black, white, Asian, Hispanic, Judaism, Hinduism, Christianity,
who doesn't in the 21st century, who doesn't check those boxes? I mean, like, you might
(43:31):
say like, "Okay, well, I only checked two of them," but two is a lot.
Two is, yeah.
And so, that's a humanity type of call there to say like, "Hey, everybody checks those
boxes and they need to find a rest." And, you know, your testimony as Jesus' love and
Holy Spirit-filled individuals is, "We even needed a rest."
(43:53):
Absolutely.
And again, testimony is, Jesus was prevalent in your life, and I saw it. And yet, there's
this beautiful kind of breakthrough that you've experienced in this time. And ultimately,
listening to your heart and even in the book, like, why wouldn't you want to share that
with someone?
Yeah.
Why wouldn't you? I mean, like, you know, you've done love works, you've done all these
(44:14):
things for schools and children and all these ministries and companies you've worked with
to help get their message out there. And it's like, in the end, you believe in what you
promote. And so, if you find value and you have found value in something, you want others
to have that same blessing.
Absolutely.
So, it doesn't matter whether you're Jewish or not. We see in Jesus' interaction in the
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Gospels, almost everybody He interacted with was an Israelite or a Hebrew at some point.
Obviously, we see the Pharisees and the Sadducees in that. But there was that group of people
that He ministered to who weren't religious leadership. They were just trying to get by.
They were trying to go to work. They were trying to raise their kids. They were trying
to make sure that the floor was swept, all those types of things. And He constantly shows
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us, especially in the Gospel of Matthew, the concept of the table and coming to the feast
and to the banquet with Him and being a part of those things. And that signifies freedom.
And so, if you take the Sabbath away and you take the Jewish nature, the Hebrew nature,
whatever it is, it's like, don't you want to come to the Lord's table? Don't you want
to find freedom with Him? Don't you want to overcome those four check boxes that are so
(45:26):
simple but almost all humanity falls into that? I mean, if you don't, I guess we can
pray for you. But why wouldn't you want that?
And so, okay, so there is a specific quote in here, and I know we're running short on
time and we could literally do this for days that are out there. But I want to actually
(45:47):
read something. It's from the portion of the book on the person you're becoming in transformation
at the table, because we talked a little bit about your transformation to get you to the
table, to get you to the Sabbath. But then you actually go into more details and different
nuances of that. And I want to read a quote out of here, because I love that you guys
(46:10):
didn't focus on it just being about the Sabbath. It was, what could we glean from the Sabbath
and our experience with the Lord to focus on, are we being the greatest co-heirs of creation
with the Creator we can be? And you say, "The transformation goes far beyond a single evening
each week." And that's kind of an answer to the Jewish nature. It's like, "Oh, well, you
know, I can't keep a Shabbat on Friday night to Saturday like the Jews, or I don't even
(46:33):
want to look like them." I mean, there is people in the world that have that issue.
But you say, "The transformation goes far beyond a single evening each week." We no
longer feel the need to chase rest through social media, kind of ironically, because this
will be on social media, movies or getaways. We still love to do all those things, but
(46:55):
we don't need them because we found renewal in our new weekly rhythm. So, you now find
yourself leading the week through the renewal of the weekly rhythm rather than trying to
figure out how to fit a Sabbath into what was the rhythm before. So, there's actually
been a total transformation.
(47:16):
That's the revelation to us.
That's awesome.
Well, and I'll say that because I feel like I feel guilty stopping. I feel guilty resting.
I know that's something we've even wrestled with in our marriage. Say, "Sala, sit down,
slow down, stop trying to fold laundry while we're having this conversation," or "Stop
trying to answer this email and just, you know, the spaghetti is burning on the stove."
Or you know what I mean? It's like, but rest feels hard and rest feels guilty. And if this
(47:39):
conversation only stood at, "Hey, we need to press pause and find rest," I think that
would be one layer, but it wouldn't have revealed what ultimately was the transformation
point of our lives, which is realizing what we've been starting to talk on. So, just
we're circling back here is going, that's actually where we come to our filling up.
(47:59):
And I'll tell you, I have come to our table more times than I can count with tears in
my eyes with the weight of heaviness on my shoulders. I'll tell you, it is like sliding
into home base. You're playing baseball. I feel like I have slid in here sometimes and
our kids are like, "Mom, are you okay?" And now they know I'm releasing sometimes. I think
sometimes all that we need is...
(48:21):
Like crawling in, crawling into the door.
...getting to the table, like doing my game. Sometimes it's with fun and joy and people,
and other times it is with just raw humanity, okay? Because to the point when we press pause
and we truly find rest comes then the lifting up. And I think that that's what you're saying
there, Chris, and that's the part where I feel like the Lord has shown us this is not
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just a law to abide by, even though it is a commandment, it is the gift. And the gift
then is then comes the filling up of a discovering delight and taking a moment to then let go
of all that and say, "The most beautiful things are what matter here." You know, it's not
the balance in my bank account, it's not in the, you know, what somebody else has or whatever,
(49:04):
but it's in realizing delight is found in the richness of relationship. And that filling
up begins to bubble and bubble and bubble, and then it hits this point where it is then
the awareness of God and the purposes of life. And I will tell you, we walk out of that time
and we walk in just more creative and more inspired, or maybe it's not that. Maybe it's
(49:25):
the fact that I just needed to release a heaviness to the Lord. Maybe it's I just needed to bring
calm for a minute, the kids can all say "Amen" to that in the background. But what you're
saying there is that it's one thing to say, "You're exhausted, you need to find rest."
It's further into what Michael shared, and it's dealing into the worn out and into the
burnout and maybe into a misunderstanding of who Jesus is. Because at the end of the day,
(49:47):
He is not a dictator, He is a Father. And I don't know what Father you were raised with,
and all of ours here at this table were very different, and none of them were perfect.
But I will tell you this, He is the perfect good Father. And I think so many people haven't
seen the goodness of God. And I'll tell you, we have walked out of every single time, whether
it's been out of places of great joy and victories, out of places of deep valleys and pain. We've
(50:11):
walked into places where it's the goodness of God. And I'll tell you, that's where you
go from rest being a part of walking into goodness. What would you say?
No, I love everything that you said. You're dabbing into that we could be another hour
because you're touching on the Sabbath Soul Cycle.
Well, maybe this is the second part of another book in the future, like, you know, here, the
whole series. And I think I know another place that we could do a podcast.
(50:35):
Ah, yes.
Yes, the beach.
Yes. I mean, you guys are going to be like right down the street from my Sabbath.
Not like that's a God wink or anything.
Spiritual bed crumbs all the way to death.
No, I echo everything that you said. And just how good is God, you know, just to think,
you know, like we pay attention to our phones on low battery or a light on our dashboard
(50:59):
in our car that God from the beginning, He gave us 52 times, 52 days out of the year
to experience. We're just scratching. You know, we're just scratching the surface of
His goodness.
Yep. 52 times out of the year, He gives us an opportunity to be able to be able to reset
and be able to rest and find delight in Him. And then what I love what you're just saying
(51:22):
too is in that fourth part, which we haven't talked about yet is that activating purpose.
And I'll never forget sitting around this table after the blessing. And I blessed, you
know, Salah and the kids, and we're getting ready to transition. And then our Sabbath
consists of at that point, usually we will have communion and we'll break the rest.
And we're getting ready to do that. And I feel a small hand on my shoulder.
(51:47):
And you're dribbled to say.
And that small hand on my shoulder was one of our kiddos that wanted to bless dad. And
so powerful just to think, because that's the, we call it the overflow. You know, where
is all this going? Right? Where does all this go? And for us, that's it. And that's the
(52:08):
overflow then. It's the Sabbath that really serves as the launch pad, you know, into the
rest of the week. And sometimes I think we err when we talk about Sabbath, we talk a
lot about resting, we even talk about pausing. And we know that God did that. He set the
pattern for us in the very beginning. But let's not forget, God loves work. He gave
(52:29):
Adam a job to do.
Correct.
He wanted them to multiply. He does. He wants you to multiply. You got animals to name.
And so please, I hope, I'm glad this came out because work's important to God.
And advancing His kingdom. But again, it's the work that's coming out of the rest. And
(52:51):
then it's the work that's coming out of our identity and the work that's coming out of
our alignment.
Ask yourself this, are you running in your striving? Or are you running out of place
of sacred rest with God? And I think that right there, you know, and some people still
need to dive into that deeper. But I think if you ask yourself at the end of the day,
God is powering me. You know, it's the jet engine into my life here. That's going to
(53:15):
help you start to realize, okay, there might be a piece that's missing. And I believe it's
found in Sabbath.
I think that's really good. And I think, you know, looking at the parable of the wineskin,
and, you know, it says John came. I personally believe John was one who came with the spirit
of Elijah to testify before Jesus came. And you talk about we were pouring out, pouring
(53:36):
out, pouring out, but nothing was pouring in. And what do you lead with? And then how
do you even activate a purpose at that point in time? Because you're almost just activating
obligation, obligation to a job, to a mortgage, whatever it might be. And a lot of that is
dictated by peer pressure in the world. And so, you found a place and you're helping
(53:56):
people through this book, find a place to activate a countercultural rebellion.
Yeah, that's a whole chapter in the book.
Yes.
That's a whole chapter.
And I think ultimately, you have to pour out so that then Jesus can pour in so you can
continue to be activated to pour into others. And I think that's beautiful. And we're going
to have to wrap up today, not only for their schedule, but for the fact that you guys are
(54:20):
probably, you know, doing something else, unless it's your Sabbath day. But I do want
to leave us with this because even down to the nuances of, you know, we live in a culture
that is very much social media driven, it's TikTok driven, it's short. People like to
joke that humanity has the attention span of a goldfish. And so, we are a kind of a
(54:45):
one-liner society. We lock on to doctrines and theologies and sayings and all those kind
of things. But even on the cover of this book, I want to tell you why I believe this book
can drastically impact your life more than just teaching you about the Sabbath or why
the Sabbath is good or why the Sabbath isn't. It is finding rest in a restless world. Everybody,
(55:10):
if you're being honest, if your spouse is in the car with you, she's being honest for
you, all of us have a restless nature. We all long, creation as a whole, the trees,
they're restless. They want creation to come back to the perfection of the garden, kind
of how you nuanced that earlier in there. And so, how do we get away from the restlessness
(55:32):
of this world and actually find rest? Well, you have to press pause and then the Lord
works it out. They didn't come to this table today and tell you that, you know, the first
Sabbath that they got together, they had it all figured out. I can testify over 20 years.
I still don't think I have it figured out. But we keep accepting the invitation for going
to the regulation and expecting that if we meet with our Father at His table, and we
(55:57):
do our roles as fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters in Christ, they fellowship Him
with other people, that God will take care of the rest. He can activate that purpose
and He can shift everything. That might also mean that He shifts your life in a way that
you had no expectation. Maybe you didn't even want it. But I can promise you, when you find
(56:19):
rest in God, when you press pause on your life, He's going to activate you. And at some point
of time, we'll have to get another podcast, maybe on the beach, because there is an activation
that came from this and a whole other testimony for you guys to give. But for everybody who's
watched this or listened to this, so tell them where they can go get more information
from you guys.
(56:40):
Well, we'd love for you to get the book. It's available on Amazon now, so it's pressing
pause. Grab the book, grab a few copies, share it with other people. I love you. But when
we find something we love, we are nuts for sharing it with other people. And so share
this with other people. On the flip side, join Michael and I. Connect with us at StartSabbath.com.
That's where you can get more resources, more parts about our story. We've created what's
(57:04):
called the Press Pause Challenge. It's a free challenge to take. And I don't know about
you, but sometimes I need someone to like walk with me for a little bit. I mean, I'm
a visual person too. So like, don't let me read the directions on the game. Just play
the game with me a little bit and I'll pick it up as I go. This is us being able to walk
with you as you learn. Okay, let me take a moment. Let me like signal this. Let me prepare
(57:24):
myself for resistance as I put this on my calendar. What do I need to kind of have at
my table or how do I walk through this? It's only 15 minutes. I can do that, but show me
the way to go. And so you can sign up for the Press Pause Challenge and we're going
to be able to walk with you. And then on the flip side too, in the book and on the website,
we've got a great way for you to share your table with us. And so get the phone number,
(57:48):
get our email addresses. We always tell everyone like, kind of take like a selfie of your Sabbath
table, send it over, be a part of the community. We've got resources, we've got more even things
coming, but it's a way for us to walk with you into accepting the yes to this invitation.
In fact, that's all you need to say today.
Yeah, you're not alone.
Just say, just start, just say yes to God and to saying, "I'm going to make room for
(58:13):
Sabbath."
That's right.
It can be an evening, it can be an hour between shifts at the hospital, it could be a moment
on an airplane. If you already have a flight booked and you've got to jump into a meeting,
it could be taking a whole part of an afternoon on a weekend. God will meet you in whatever
time you make. What were you about to say?
I was waiting to get a pause.
Take a pause. Seriously, stop the pause and get back to what that is.
(58:38):
It could be a single candle, it could be no candles, it could be fine china that you set
aside, it could be a paper plate, but just start.
Yeah, that's the most important. Just say yes.
Sabbath.com.
Start Sabbath.com. That's it.
Awesome. Well, I can attest to some of the most wonderful individuals that I've ever
met and I know that making adjustments in your life can be hard, especially if you feel like
(59:04):
you're doing it alone. Even though we've testified that we all keep the Sabbath and we all find
beauty in the Sabbath, if there isn't somebody in your local area that you're already doing
with, you will feel alone if you're trying to just do it on your own.
Start Sabbath.com is a resource for you to understand that they don't want you to just
buy the book. They want to actually walk with you. The testimony is one that builds with
(59:28):
the testimonies of others. And just like this might have filled you up today and you might
be super excited and you might have already said yes, you might have already gone to Start
Sabbath.com and signed up for the challenge. But in the end, you sharing that information
and sharing your testimony with the Hirsch family is a way to also bless them with your
(59:48):
testimony and blessing others as well. Because in the end, that's the currency of the Kingdom
of God. You are the currency of the Kingdom of God. They are the currency of the Kingdom
of God. So you're not alone. Go to StartSabbath.com and join this revolution that's happening
right now to push back against being tired and burnt out.
(01:00:10):
Yeah.
Michael, Salah, I don't say this to everybody that I talk to, but I love you guys and we
always have. You guys just, you radiate Christ. And so, I look forward to hearing all the
testimonies that come out of this revelation of the Holy Spirit. And we'll see you next
time.
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