From August 3-7, 2026, the Presbyterian Outlook staff will step away from our daily work to observe a week of Sabbath.
Our worship resources will remain available on our website, carefully edited, designed and scheduled in advance. But you will not receive our regular emails that week, and anything appearing on our social media channels will have been prepared ahead of time.
As a small, interconnected staff, we regularly cover for one another’s vacations, illnesses and personal needs. But when the whole staff steps away together, no one is left carrying the work. A shared Sabbath allows all of us to stop.
Lately, I have come to understand Sabbath as more than the cessation of work. Sabbath also creates space for curiosity, delight and imagination.
In Play: How It Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul, Stuart Brown writes: “If we stop playing, we share the fate of all animals that grow out of play. Our behavior becomes fixed. We are not interested in new and different things. We find fewer opportunities to take pleasure in the world around us.”
Brown’s words resonate with me personally. I do not want my behavior or my thinking to become fixed. I want to continue growing and developing as a human being and as a disciple of Jesus Christ. I want to remain curious about God, my neighbors and the world around me. I want to keep discovering new reasons to rejoice.
Sabbath invites us into that same holy delight: to notice what is beautiful, receive what is pleasurable and remember that life is a gift rather than an assignment.
Play helps me do that.
For me, play includes reading novels simply because I love them. It includes scribbling random thoughts and musings in a notebook without worrying whether they will become anything “useful.” Play is taking a long walk with my dog, Max, and letting him decide which path smells most interesting. It is sitting with my husband on our screened-in porch, talking about our work, our children and the lives we are building together.
Play takes many shapes. It may be active or quiet, solitary or shared. What makes it play is not the activity itself but the freedom, pleasure and openness we bring to it. Play does not have to accomplish anything. Its delight is enough.
This is part of the gift of Sabbath. Sabbath releases us, however briefly, from the need to justify every hour by what we produce. It reminds us that our worth does not depend on our usefulness. We are God’s beloved children before we write the article, answer the email, preach the sermon, balance the budget or solve the problem.
God’s rest in Genesis is not an exhausted collapse after a grueling week. God pauses to behold creation and call it good. Sabbath invites us into that same holy delight: to notice what is beautiful, receive what is pleasurable and remember that life is a gift rather than an assignment.
Play is also important for an organization and communities of faith.
The word “creative” is baked into the Outlook’s new mission and vision statements on purpose. We seek to publish honest, creative and justice-centered content. We want to be nimble enough to respond to the church’s changing needs and faithful enough to recognize change as an opportunity to try something new.
That kind of creativity requires room to play.
This does not mean we are unserious about our ministry. Independent journalism demands rigor. Publishing demands discipline. Serving the church requires accountability and care. But seriousness need not become rigidity. An organization that never pauses to wonder, experiment or delight in possibility can easily become fixed — repeating familiar patterns simply because they are familiar.
Play loosens our grip on “the way we have always done it.” It gives us permission to ask unexpected questions, follow interesting ideas and imagine possibilities that cannot emerge when every moment is governed by a deadline.
From August 3-7, I invite you to practice sabbath and play alongside us. Read something that has nothing to do with your work. Take the long way home. Draw badly. Sing loudly. Follow a child’s curiosity or a dog’s nose. Sit with someone you love and let the conversation wander.
Do something that does not need to become anything else. Then notice what opens within you.
