If you haven’t experienced it, you know someone who has: a flight delay. I’m not talking about a flight delayed for an hour or two because of bad weather; I’m talking about a flight that is delayed for eight hours or more because there is no crew available to work the shift. That’s what happened to a grandmother I sat next to on a recent trip. She got up at three in the morning to catch an early flight to see her new grandson but ended up waiting at the airport until evening before her plane finally boarded. The reason for the delay was that the crew scheduled to work her flight had spent much of the previous night waiting for a plane to be fixed so they could fly home. By the time they got in, they had exceeded the maximum hours a flight crew could work in a 24-hour period. By law they had to rest for the day before they could resume work.
If you’ve been caught in that situation, how did you feel? Frustrated, no doubt but hopefully thankful too. It’s not worth insisting on being on time if your pilot is so exhausted from the previous day’s work that he can’t keep his eyes open. Better late than dead! It’s not just the airline industry that has strict labor laws governing how long one can work before they must take a break. Such laws are meant to protect lives.
As we continue our sermon series on the Ten Commandments this morning, we’ll see that the Third Commandment functioned like our labor laws do today. God said: “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates. 11 For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy” (Exodus 20:8-11). As we take a closer look at this commandment we’ll see how it revealed God’s love for his people in Old Testament times and how it continues to safeguard our rest today.
With the Third Commandment God was declaring: “Don’t just do as I say, do as I did!” In six full days, from the workshop of his Word, God fashioned Planet Earth and the solar system in which it spins (Sarah Habben). On day seven he rested from this work of creation though not, of course, from his work of sustaining and preserving what he had made. Now God wanted his people to do the same: work six days and then rest on the seventh. But why was it important that the Israelites follow God’s example in this matter? Because he knows what worry-warts and workaholics people are. With the commanded Sabbath Day rest an Israelite was forced every seven days to renounce his autonomy over his time and affirm God’s dominion over him…no wait, that makes it sound like God was just trying to show his people who was boss. Rather, with the Third Commandment, God wanted his people to see that they had no reason to worry about life because if he could create a universe in six days, he certainly could give his people what they needed to live on an earth that he continued to govern. God proved this point when he provided extra manna on Fridays so the Israelites didn’t have to go out and collect any on Saturdays, the Sabbath Day.
As if that wasn’t enough proof that the Israelites could afford to rest from their work on the Sabbath, Moses added this thought when he repeated the Third Commandment to the second generation of Israelites - the ones who were about to enter into the Promised Land. “Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the LORD your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the LORD your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day” (Deuteronomy 5:15).
Why could the Israelites afford to keep desisting from work one day a week? Because the God who commanded it had not only created them he had saved them. That helps us understand why God was so adamant that this command be obeyed. To ignore it was to say: “God I don’t really trust that you love me and will provide for me. I’ve got to do it myself!” One man who thought this and went out to gather wood on the Sabbath was stoned to death for his sin (Numbers 15:32-36)! Yes, God was serious about this command for he used the Sabbath Day as a weekly object lesson to teach his people that his relationship with them was not based on anything they could do. Rather it was based on what he had done and would do as their Creator and Savior. “Do nothing,” God was announcing, “I made you and I will save you, in time (as in Egypt) and in eternity (through my Son).”
And now we’re getting closer to seeing what the Third Commandment has to do with us. No, we don’t desist from work on the Sabbath Day (Saturdays) do we? Should the church elders line us up and heave stones at us? Listen to what the Apostle Paul wrote to the Colossian Christians: “…do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to… a Sabbath day. 17 These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ” (Colossians 2:16, 17).
The ultimate the purpose of the Sabbath Day was not to give the Old Testament Israelites a break from their work; it was to give them time every week to ponder how their Creator and Savior God would one day give them perfect rest. That perfect rest would come through God’s perfect Son, Jesus who took our sins upon himself, like a father hoisting onto himself his son’s bursting backpack so that the child can run ahead and explore the hiking trail unhindered by backbreaking weight. Since Jesus came to give us real, lasting rest through this forgiveness, there is no need to keep refraining from work on the Sabbath. To do so would be like ignoring the real burger on the plate in front of you and instead chewing on a picture of a burger featured in the restaurant menu!
While we no longer need to physically rest one day a week, there is a continuing need for us to ponder what Jesus has done for us. Listen to what another New Testament writer said about the Sabbath: “There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; 10 for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. 11 Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience” (Hebrews 4:9-11). “Let us make every effort to enter that rest…” Did Martin Luther have in mind that admonition when he wrote the following explanation to the Third Commandment? “We should fear and love God that we do not despise preaching and his Word, but regard it as holy, and gladly hear and learn it.” I don’t know but it certainly helps us understand why Luther would connect “gladly hearing God’s Word” to the Sabbath Day. For it’s through God’s Word that faith in Jesus is created and strengthened. Without that Word we’ll lose faith and therefore be shut out of the eternal rest God has prepared for us.
Already in Bible times the importance of hearing God’s Word was connected to the Sabbath Day. Although the lay people were not to work on the Sabbath, the priests were busy, busier than usual for God had commanded an extra burnt offering on the Sabbath. That’s not quite the same as if I would insist that we sing an extra closing hymn today, but it might have the same effect: get us to slow down and ponder longer what it means that God is our Creator and Savior. By Jesus’ day it was the custom to gather in the synagogue on the Sabbath to hear God’s Word. Jesus honored this custom by not only attending these worship services but also by preaching in them.
So should the Third Commandment simply now read: “Be in church every week”? Well you can come to church every Sunday and still be guilty of despising God’s Word. We, who have grown up with Siskel and Ebert, are tempted to approach every worship service like it’s a movie we’re reviewing. We’re quick to give it the thumbs down if it didn’t make us laugh, feel good, or keep us awake. While your worship leaders may be entertaining at times, we’re not entertainers; we’re caterers: here to feed you God’s Word so that your soul receives the rest it needs.
Ah but it’s still easy to wonder whether faithful worship attendance really does anything. I mean do you remember anything from the Sunday sermon come Monday morning? Not even much sticks in my mind by then and I preached the sermon! So is listening to, or preaching a sermon a waste of time? No. It’s like washing your shirt. The soap and the water may pass right through the shirt so that nothing sticks but it does leave the shirt clean and fresh. Likewise you may not be able to remember much from the Sunday sermon or from your home devotions but whenever God’s Word passes through you to convict you of your sins and to remind you of your forgiveness in Jesus it leaves you clean and fresh, and ready for service (adapted from illustration by William Dallmann). No, I’m not suggesting you just have to show up here to be saved. God’s Word connects us to the eternal rest of heaven only when it is combined with faith. So eagerly hear and study the Word! Reach for the Bible, not the bottle when you need some comfort and encouragement. God, through his Word, will give you the rest you seek.
Although God meant for the Third Commandment to be a blessing to his Old Testament people, they rarely kept it. When they did, it was often out of a sense of duty. It’s easy for us to fall into that same trap and think that we’re just too busy to hear or read God’s Word. But what we’re saying is that we’re too busy for the rest that God wants to give us through his Word. Slow down. Give ear to God’s Word and gladly hear and learn it often. It will lead to an awesome and to an eternal rest. Amen.
Alternate Introduction Idea from Harold Johne:
What did it take for you to be here this morning in this service? Was there something else that you wanted to do, or perhaps needed to do, that you put off in order to come here? If so, that put you in the same quandary as countless Old Testament believers who were actually required to rest from work on one day a week, the Sabbath. What I would like to point out to you this morning is that the Old Testament believer's decision to rest on the Sabbath was an act of faith, just as your being here this morning in this service is an act of faith.
