Series: Big 10
“THE SABBATH PRINCIPLE”
EXODUS 20:8-11
OPEN
We’re moving right along in our series of messages called Big 10 based on the 10 Commandments. Today we’re going to look at the fourth commandment. We’re going to study “The Sabbath Principles.”
Ex. 20:8-11 – 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 male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. 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.
Ironically, this is the longest commandment of any of the Ten Commandments, which may tell us about its importance. I think God knew that perhaps we would overlook this one and so he made it the longest so it would stand out.
The basic message of 4th commandment is that God is the Lord of time. He has authority to tell us how to use it and we must account to him for each moment.
What is the Sabbath? The Sabbath is a day set aside by God for his people. God originally established this day to be observed on the seventh day of the week. For thousands of years, Jewish people have celebrated the Sabbath on what we would call Saturday.
Based on the Creation account in Genesis, the Jewish day was originally from around 6:00 p.m. one day to 6:00 p.m. the next day; so Jewish people still celebrate the Sabbath from 6:00 p.m. Friday to 6:00 p.m. on Saturday. It was a day for God’s people in the Old Testament.
But something happened. Today, many people consider the Sabbath to be the first day of the week – Sunday. Nine of the 10 Commandments are repeated in the New Testament. The only commandment not specifically referenced in the New Testament is this one – the one regarding the Sabbath. How did we get from Sabbath day to the Lord’s Day?
The celebration of deliverance from slavery in Egypt was the high point in the heritage of the Jews. As Christians, the high point of our heritage is the resurrection of Jesus – deliverance from slavery to sin through his death and resurrection.
Jesus came out of the grave on the first day of the week. The church was started on the Day of Pentecost which fell on the first day of the week. The name became known as the Lord’s Day. Rev. 1:10a – On the Lord’s Day I was in the Spirit.
Was this change authorized by God? Some claim no. Jews and Seventh-Day Adventists still practice the Saturday Sabbath. There is no direct New Testament command concerning this matter. However, it is evident from other aspects of biblical teaching as well as apostolic precedent that a change was made.
As you study the New Testament, you find that God’s people under covenant with him through his Son celebrated their day of worship on the first day of the week. Acts 20:7a – On the first day of the week we came together to break bread. 1 Cor. 16:2 – On the first day of every week, each one of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with your income, saving it up, so that when I come no collections will have to be made.
In the early 2nd century AD, Ignatius of Antioch noted that “those who followed ancient customs [that is, the Jews] have come to see a new hope, no longer celebrating the Sabbath but observing the Lord’s Day, the day on which our life sprang up through Christ.”
From the New Testament, we learn that the Saturday Sabbath is no longer binding. Col. 2:16-17 – Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. 17 These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ.
Christ said that he came to fulfill the law. The original Sabbath pointed to the day when Jesus would come and complete God’s instruction in this matter.
Does that mean that the principles of the Sabbath are no longer valid? No! We shouldn’t ignore what God has to say in this matter. His word is for our benefit and our enrichment.
But for some reason we tend to ignore the principles of the Sabbath. Why do we do that?
One reason we ignore this command is because we think that the Sabbath no longer applies to us. We’ve been taught that it’s an Old Testament law that has no relevance today. In fact, out of all the Ten Commandments, this is the one that is the most controversial within the church.
Some people have taught that this is a command that we can safely ignore. But we’ll see in a moment that the principle of the Sabbath is as relevant today as it has ever been.
Another reason that the principle of the Sabbath has been ignored is because this command has been twisted throughout the years. We’ve taken what was meant as a blessing and turned it into a burden.
By the time that Jesus came, rabbis had added hundreds of rules to define what you could or couldn’t do on the Sabbath day. In Mt. 23:4, Jesus said about the Pharisees regarding their view of the Old Testament law, “They tie up heavy, cumbersome loads and put them on other people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them.”
We’ve done the same thing. People have actually preached such legalistic things that you shouldn’t read your newspaper on a Sunday. You shouldn’t watch TV on a Sunday. You certainly shouldn’t play sports on a Sunday. No movies, no parties, no dates. We’ve added all these rules that have turned the Sabbath from a blessing to a burden. That’s not at all what God intended.
How do we as Christians – whose day of worship is the first day of the week, otherwise known as the Lord’s Day – how do we put the principles of the Sabbath into practice in light of the New Testament and honor Jesus Christ as Lord in these things? Some of the principles of the Old Testament Sabbath still apply to us outside the community of faith known as the church. But others apply within the realm of the community of faith known as the church. They’re all practical in our lives. Let’s look at these principles and apply them to our lives here in the 21st century.
REMEMBER
A man goes to see his doctor because he’s having trouble with his memory. The doctor gives him a cursory examination and in frustration says to the patient, “Bill, if I've told you once, I've told you a hundred times, I do not treat amnesia cases!" As human beings, we tend to suffer from a form of amnesia. We’re forgetful people.
One of God’s top 10 things to do in life is to remember something. Humans are prone to forget: to forget who God is, to forget what God has done, to forget why we are here, and forget what gives life meaning.
When the children of Israel stood ready to enter into the Promised Land, Moses gave a repeat of the 10 Commandments to firmly anchor these principles in the minds of God’s people.
Deut, 5:15 – 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.
One of the main purposes of the Sabbath is for God’s people to remember the mighty works of God on their behalf. It’s extremely important for us to be reminded of the greatness and goodness of God.
The Old Testament people of God had established means of remembrance called feasts. The feast of the Passover, the feast, of Tabernacles, The feast of the New Year and the Day of Atonement were all days for God’s people to remember how God worked in their midst.
How often do I take time to remember what God has done for me? Do I think about his blessings in my life? Do I remember his gift of love by coming to earth as Jesus and dying for my sins? Do I remember the hope that I have because of Christ’s resurrection? Do I remember all that he has done to show his grace and mercy to me?
As the New Testament people of God, we’ve been given a memorial feast. It’s called the Lord’s Supper or Communion. Christ himself gave us this memorial.
In the 12th chapter of 1 Corinthians, Paul summarizes Jesus’ instructions to his followers on the night before he went to the cross. 1 Cor. 11;23-26 – For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me.” 25 In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.” 26 For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
The Sabbath principle to remember is deeper than just recognition that we forgot something. Forgetfulness can be frustrating but most of the time, we simply remember something trivial. The “remember” here is to take something that is from the past so that it could be living in the present and live on in the future. It’s not just a mental remembrance; it’s celebrating and modeling of that which has gone before us so that the practice of remembrance would continue into the future.
REST
There are two important things that we’re taught in this commandment. The first thing is that God designed each person to be involved in some sort of lasting labor. The ratio he gives here is 6 days of work, one day of rest.
And as Christians we each should be diligently involved in some type of legitimate work. It may be as a source of income and it may be as a volunteer. We should be delighted to have an opportunity to work and we should see work as a gift from God.
God created us to work. In fact, the first command God gave man in the Bible was to work. Genesis 2:15 says that God put Adam, “in the Garden of Eden” and commanded him to “work it and take care of it.”
The second thing that we learn is that there is to be a day of rest. The word sabbath is a translation of the Hebrew word shabbos. It means to cease, desist, or rest.
The idea of sabbath is rooted in the beginning of our universe when God created everything. Gen. 2:2-3 – By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. 3 Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.
God didn’t do that because he was tired. He did it so that we would understand that we need rest. God’s instruction here is clear. One day out of seven, we have to say, “Time out.” There is a Genesis rhythm to Creation. God made it so that everything needed a rest.
God made this world so that even dirt needs to rest. People who are big time gardeners don’t plant the same crop in the same place every year. Like a good farmer, they rotate their crops. Why? Because one crop will take certain nutrients out of the soil but not replace them. The principle of rotating crops is to plant a crop in the place of the one from the year before because it gives back the nutrients that were depleted the year before.
The fact of the matter is that you’re better than dirt. If dirt needs to rest, how much more do you need to rest?
Our bodies need a break. Your body was not designed to be driven and pressed seven days a week. Statistics now show that when we work excessively without breaks, our bodies begin to suffer with symptoms like high blood pressure or even premature heart attacks. One doctor discovered that more oxygen is lost in a day’s work than is recovered in the night’s sleep. The body needs one day off a week to restore the proper amount of oxygen to the system to begin a new week’s work.
Your body needs a rest. You can get away with it for a while. But your body needs one day in seven that’s free from stress.
Does our rest day have to fall on the weekend? No. When you study the church in the New Testament, you find that Sunday was actually a work day for the early Christians. They either met early in the morning and then went to work or they met later in the evening after work to join together in celebration of the Lord’s Day.
It’s important to find a suitable day of rest. It doesn’t necessarily have to be Saturday or Sunday. Just about anyone in professional ministry would find it very hard to find much rest on Sundays.
We should find sufficient rest in every day and seek out one day of rest during the week. Working yourself ragged six days a week and then falling asleep in church on Sunday does not fulfill the prescription for rest.
Ps. 23:1-3 – The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing. 2 He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, 3 he refreshes my soul. He guides me along the right paths for his name’s sake.
David says that God MAKES me lie down. Notice that “he makes me lie down” comes before” he refreshes my soul.”
Leonard Sweet says “It’s not so much that we ‘keep the Sabbath’ as that the Sabbath keeps us – keeps us whole, keeps us sane, keeps us spiritually alive. Genuine Sabbath-keeping is not a series of “you shall nots” but a string of celebrations. Its goal is not to shut you off from the realities of life, but to open you up to living.”
REFLECT
When God finished creating Adam it was on the evening of the sixth day of creation. The first full day of Adam’s life was the seventh day of creation. It was the day that God stopped to rest and reflect upon his creation. Undoubtedly it was a day that Adam spent considerable time reflecting upon God’s purpose for his life in the scheme of creation. One important act of worship is to reflect on God’s grace and ponder it’s implications in our lives.
Michael Moriarty makes this comment regarding the subject at hand.
I wonder if the Sabbath isn’t the day when you and I get to stop and remind ourselves…
of who God is,
of the terrible price he paid to buy us back from Satan’s kingdom,
of what he has promised to do in us and through us,
of what he to accomplish in our hearts and lives
and
of the place he is preparing for us, when all of our frantic scurrying across the face of this
tiny planet will only be the dimmest of memories .. and we will be caught up in him
alone.
REJOICE
Worship, not rest, seems to be the focus of the early church. While we are no longer bound to a ritualistic observance of the Sabbath on Saturday, I think it’s still important that we participate with other believers in fellowship and worship on the Lord’s Day in corporate worship. The New Testament bears out that thinking.
But this thinking is at odds with the thinking of those who live around us. When Bill Gates was asked why he didn’t believe in God, his answer included this statement: “Just in allocation of time resources, religion is not very efficient. There’s a lot more I could be doing on a Sunday morning.”
Seven out of 10 people who live around us said the same thing today. “I’m not going to waste my time going to church today. I’ve got better things to do with my time.” There is more to the Sabbath than the absence of work; there is also the presence of worship.
If all you’re doing is taking a day off, then you’re not keeping this commandment. If you say, “Alright, I’ll take a day off. I’ll go camping, hiking, fishing, golfing, etc., you haven’t kept this commandment.
Ex. 20:9 says that it is “a sabbath to the Lord your God.” The Lord’s Day is not my day. It’s God’s day. People will recharge their mind and recharge their body but fail to recharge their spirit.
Some people give the excuse, “The only time I’ve got with my family is on Sunday.” If that’s the case, then you’ve got 2 problems. 1. Your priorities are out of order. 2. If your family is only important to you one day out of the week, you don’t think very much of your family.
When you get up on Sunday morning and say, “I’m going to God’s house, I am going to study God’s word, I am going to fellowship with God’s people, I’m going to show my neighbors, I’m going to show my community that God has priority in my life,” you’re doing something important. You’re declaring that you have control over your work instead of your work having control over you because God is in control of your life.
RELATE
Spend some time building and enhancing your relationships with others as well as God. It’s important for your health and the health of relationships to spend time with others. Spend time with your wife. Spend time with your family. Spend time with your friends. You will be recharged in ways you had forgotten are possible.
One important way to establish and experience this part of the Sabbath principle in your life is to spend time with the people of God – the church of Christ; his Body on this earth.
Failure to meet with God’s people on the Lord’s Day is not a new phenomenon. It existed in the early church as well. The writer of the book of Hebrews addressed this very topic.
Heb. 10:23-25 – Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. 24 And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, 25 not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.
Notice Scripture points out here that regular fellowship with other Christians is a mark of our faithfulness to Christ. Being faithful is holding unswervingly to the hope we profess. The Hebrew writer points out God’s faithfulness to us. Because God is faithful, we should be faithful.
Now, I realize there may be some exceptions to this standard. You might work a job where you have to be gone from the fellowship of the saints. If it’s part of your regular work schedule, it’s really not your fault. After all, God has said that we are to occupy ourselves in work.
In actuality, the fault falls on the local church because they don’t provide a time of worship and fellowship that would meet your need – be it earlier on Sunday morning or later on /Sunday evening. But don’t think the principle of Sabbath rest and worship doesn’t apply to you. We need to work together on a solution.
The gathering of God’s saints for worship and fellowship is not something just for me. It’s also for you. I’m not to be here just for my benefit. I’m also to be here for your benefit. The passage says that we’re to “spur one another on to lover and good deeds” and to “encourage one another.”
Did you ever think that you’re absence from makes others miss out on a blessing? When people aren’t faithful to the fellowship, it becomes discouraging to those who are.
Before there was electricity, people carried candles into the pews. If you didn’t come, your pew was dark; the more dark pews, the more discouraging for others. But if everybody was there the church was filled with light.
CLOSE
Our identity isn’t in a day. It’s in Jesus Christ. We celebrate and worship him together on the Lord’s Day. But the day has no significance without him. Our lives have no significance without him. Because Christ is our Savior and Redeemer, we have something to make that day and every day of our lives significant.
The book of Hebrews was written to encourage Jewish Christians. Because of persecution, some were turning back to their old ways. The writer of Hebrews specifically ties the symbolism of God’s deliverance of the children of Israel to the work of Christ and his Gospel. The entrance into to the Promised Land was seen as entering into God’s rest. Entrance into the kingdom of God through his Son is also entering into God’s rest.
Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath. In Mk. 2:28, Jesus told the Pharisees – “So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.” So the Lord of the Sabbath graciously offers us the opportunity to rest in him. Jesus says in Mt. 11:28 – “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.
When you walk through a cemetery, sometimes you’ll see on grave marker the letters RIP – rest in peace. You’ll never have rest or peace in your life until you come to know Christ as Savior and Lord.
(based on materials by James Merritt, Michael Moriarty, Jack Cottrell, and Mark Driscoll)
