The short answer is this: The Jewish people received and accepted the Torah from the Creator. The Torah contains instructions on how to live life. Among these are instructions for Shabbos, with which we can transform an ordinary Saturday into the holy Shabbos, a foretaste of the World to Come.
As I was mulling over how to capture the essence of what Shabbos observance means, I had an insight about something that has bothered me for years. Everyone who has anything to do with קירוב רחוקים/bringing Jews back to Torah observance, will tell you that getting them a taste of Shabbos is key. Anyone with a brain in their head who has truly experienced Shabbos can testify to the veracity of that statement. I have asked the dayan, R' Fuerst, shlita, about having people for a Shabbos meal; his answer never varies, "They come for the entire Shabbos, or they don't come." How can that be? Shouldn't we give them a taste of the beauty of Shabbos?
And yet, I have friends and nearly family members who have attended dozens or more Shabbos s'udos and are no closer to Torah observance than they ever were. I don't mean "on the path to Torah observance, just going slowly." I don't mean, "Not frum yet." I mean even more than not moving closer to Torah observance, they actually feel no connection whatsoever to the Torah and Shabbos. How can that be?
Remember Sin, a woman whose father was Jewish but whose mother was not Jewish that attended a synagogue of the Conservative Jewish Religion (who is not, of course, Jewish; but fancies herself a conservative Jew), introduced in a TftD back in 2016? She also wanted to join us once for the Shabbos evening meal. We made up a time. I made kiddush and motzi upon my return from shul and before Sin arrived with her son and a friend of his. When we started serving the meal, she asked about the ceremony before the meal, which she wanted her (non-Jewish) son and his (also non-Jewish) friend to see. I responded, "It is not a show we put on. It is an important part of how a Jew observes Shabbos." She didn't storm out right away, but found a reason to leave early.
And that's the problem. Those Jews that are invited to drive over on Shabbos, have a beautiful meal, maybe even hear inspiring stories and beautiful melodies... are coming over to observe traditions and ceremonies; traditions and ceremonies of an interesting culture.
Imagine inviting someone to dinner to try BBQ steak for the first time. Each guest is given a steak, sauce, briquettes, lighter fluid, and a hibachi grill. You all BBQ your steaks, and he watches. He has all the ingredients, but he doesn't participate. He doesn't marinate his steak, he doesn't fire up the grill. He has all the ingredients, but he doesn't follow the rules. He walks away as hungry as before.
And that is what the dayan told us. If we invite a non-observant Jew to violate Shabbos to join us for Shabbos, he thinks, "Ah! Just as I thought... Orthodox Jew have to keep Shabbos, not us reform/conservative/reconstructionist/egalitarian/unaffiliated Jews." We haven't brought him closer, we have confirmed his suspicions and closed the door on him.
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For those of you who care, but not enough to paste the text into Google translate, here is how I explained "keeping Shabbos" to a non-Jewish hispanohablante/native Spanish speaker:
La respuesta corta es la siguiente. El pueblo judío recibió y aceptó la Torá del Creador. En la Torá, hay instrucciones sobre cómo vivir la vida. Hay instrucciones sobre el Shabat, con las cuales podemos transformar un sábado común en el Shabat sagrado, una muestra del mundo venidero.
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