Although the Christian is not required to keep the Sabbath, the Fourth Commandment does reveal our self-centered nature. How often do we wish there were eight days in a week to spend pursuing our own agenda, and rarely set aside one day for God’s?
Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. Exodus 20:8-11
The word Sabbath is derived from the Hebrew verb “to rest or cease from work”. God commands that we remember to set aside one day out of seven to rest and worship God in public and private. God has blessed the Sabbath-day to be set apart for the intentional exercise of our service and duty to God while we rest from our own works. Notice the preface to the Fourth Commandment, “Remember the Sabbath day”. We all have a tendency to not remember the day ordained by the Lord. We instead put other plans before the solemn corporate worship of God the Creator. The charge of keeping the Sabbath is directed to governors of families and other superiors. Also take notice how that is linked with the decrees of the Fifth Commandment.
We should rest from the works of worldly employments and recreations that are on other days lawful. We instead waste the day in idleness and needless works or sordid, worldly gain. We should make it our delight to spend the time in public and private practice of worship of the God of Scripture. We instead fill the time with words and thoughts about our worldly employments and recreations. We should prepare our hearts for the preaching of the Word and the praise of His Name. We instead refrain from any adoration and reverence for the God who is worthy. God has not only appointed the seventh day, He blessed it. God could ask for six days of worship and only give us one day to work. Instead He offers us to follow His pattern as He finished all His work in six days and dedicated the seventh day to holy rest.
The Church, since Christ’s ascension, has no authority to prescribe a Sabbath-day. Israel observed the Sabbath to remember God’s work in Creation and the Exodus. Christians since the 1st century have followed the Apostles practice of observing the first day of the week, known as the Lord’s Day, for the worship of our risen Savior who was raised from the grave on Sunday. The grand reason for changing the Jewish Sabbath to the Lord’s Day is that it puts us in mind of the mystery of our redemption by Christ. The reason why God instituted the old Sabbath was to be a memorial of the creation. Great was the work of creation, but greater was the work of redemption. Great wisdom was seen in making us, but more miraculous wisdom in saving us. Great power was seen in bringing us out of nothing, but greater power in helping us when we were worse than nothing. You can see the Jewish Sabbath as a type or a shadow of what was to come in Christ. Jesus is the fulfillment of the Feasts of the LORD in Leviticus 23:7, 15, 35-36, 39-40. Now we can understand why the Jewish Sabbath is transferred to the Lord’s Day, also known as the Christian Sabbath.
Jesus kept the whole Law (including the Sabbath) to be the perfect sacrifice for us. The Bible makes it clear that the Law has been satisfied in Christ, not in our Sabbath keeping (Galatians 3:10, Hebrews chapter 10).
How often have we considered if we should go to church on Sunday, but we don’t dare question if we should go to work on Monday. The Sabbath-day is a gift to us, not a burden. God will not hold him guiltless who steals His glory and lives for himself. Trust in the ‘Lord of the Sabbath’ (Mark 2:28).
Read these encouraging words from Charles Spurgeon, “I am no preacher of the old legal Sabbath. I am a preacher of the gospel. The Sabbath of the Jew is to him a task; the Lord’s Day of the Christian, the first day of the week, is to him a joy, a day of rest, of peace, and of thanksgiving. And if you Christian men can earnestly drive away all distractions, so that you can really rest today, it will be good for your bodies, good for your souls, good mentally, good spiritually, good temporally, and good eternally.”