12 “Observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy, as the LORD your God has commanded you. 13 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 14 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 ox, your donkey or any of your animals, nor the alien within your gates, so that your manservant and maidservant may rest, as you do. 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.
- Deuteronomy 5:12-15, The New International Version, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan
Publishing House) 1984.
Dear Friends in Christ,
This text seems to have a natural connection with this time of year. School is out. The weather is nice. Summer officially arrived this past week. Whether it actually happens or not is another story, but traditionally this is the time of the year when our thoughts turn to slowing things down... taking some time off... perhaps a vacation or at least a diversion from what we do throughout the year. Thoughts of rest.
Throughout the ages people have long understood the need for rest. Human beings are not machines. We need time to recharge, rejuvenate and refresh ourselves. Contrary to putting us behind in our work, taking time for rest often serves to make us more productive and effective in doing whatever it is we normally do.
Taking this observation to a higher level, it is interesting to note that the Gospels often point out for us how Jesus rested. Which only underscores that rest is a good thing. In fact, as our text for this morning points out, it is a Godly thing. Consequently, if there is one central message that comes through loud and clear for us in today’s text, it is this:
GOD WANTS US TO GET OUR REST
As we turn to this portion of God’s Word, let’s first take a look at
1. The history behind our text
and then spend some time talking about
2. The deeper kind of rest God wants us to have
Observe the Sabbath Day by keeping it holy, as the Lord your God has commanded you.
As a complete listing, the Ten Commandments are recorded twice in the Old Testament. We first find them in the Book of Exodus, shortly after God inscribed them on two stone tablets and gave them to Moses on Mount Sinai. The second time was 40 years later when Moses, now at the end of his leadership position, repeats them in his farewell address to the nation of Israel. (The word "Deuteronomy" literally means "repetition of the law." It’s a fitting title, because that’s essentially what Moses did in this book.)
Of the Ten Commandments the one we have before us is, as you may have recognized, the third. It deals with the "Sabbath," which is the Hebrew word for rest. God wanted His people to get their rest – both physically and spiritually. In fact, He demanded that they get their rest by making the breaking of this commandment a capital crime.
There are a number of reasons why God gave His people this command. The first was purely practical. 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, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your ox, your donkey or any of your animals, nor the alien within your gates, so that your manservant and maidservant may rest, as you do.
What this tells us is that God was concerned about the physical well-being of all His people. You may have noted that not only the Israelites, but also their servants, were to rest. One day a week they were to abstain from hard work so they would not be exhausted by constant labor. That was the intent...
However, we learn that in later years the Jewish people interpreted this command too narrowly and grossly misapplied it. Our Gospel lesson for today (Mark 2:23-28) would be such an example. The religious leaders of Jesus’ day had so focused on the letter of the law rather than the spirit behind it that they went to great lengths determining what constituted work. So when the disciples ate some grain they suddenly found themselves accused of breaking the Third Commandment – probably on the grounds that they were harvesting on the Sabbath. Jesus points out that this is hardly what God had in mind...
From the book of Exodus we learn a second reason God had His people keep the Sabbath had to with the fact that He created the world in six days and rested on the seventh. Israel was to observe the same pattern in their lives as God did in Creation. But it was more than mere imitation; this is the day they were told to "keep holy." In other words, they were to set this day apart and make it special. This was the day that was to be devoted to reflecting on God and His Word. This was the time set aside for public worship and praise. They were to rest from the physical so they could concentrate on the spiritual...
We can also speak of a third reason behind this command of God. If the first reason was physical and the second was spiritual, we might call the third reason educational, or perhaps, informational. Although it is not mentioned directly in our text, there is a common higher purpose behind all of the religious ceremonies and customs God instituted for His people, including this one. And that purpose was to point to and educate the people about God’s plan of salvation for all mankind.
What I mean is this: Just as every lamb sacrificed as an offering for sin on Jewish altars pointed to the ultimate sacrifice for sin that was to come, in the same way the rest that Israel found for their bodies pointed to the ultimate rest they would find for their souls in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It was this that Jesus had in mind when He offered the glorious invitation recorded in Matthew 11:28: "Come to me all you are weary and burdened and I will give you rest." Rest, meaning true spiritual rest; rest, meaning the forgiveness of sins and removal of the fear of death – that is the kind of rest Jesus provides. And that’s the deeper kind of rest that served as the underpinning for God’s Third Commandment.
Before we talk more about this deeper kind of rest that God wants us to enjoy, allow me just a couple of final thoughts on the text itself, because the whole idea of the Sabbath can sometimes cause misunderstanding...
What is most important to understand is that the Sabbath requirements were only for God’s Old Testament people. Therefore, according to the outward, literal sense, this command does not apply to us as New Testament Christians. As mentioned just a moment ago, the Sabbath was one of those customs and ordinances that pointed the way to Christ – and are no longer necessary since He has come. The Apostle Paul, for example, refers to the Sabbath in a list of things he defines as "a shadow of things that were to come." Once those things came – and this has to do with the coming of the Savior – they were no longer necessary.
However, the main principle behind this commandment is still binding today. And that is this: God wants us to spend time with Him and His Word and find in Him true, refreshing spiritual rest. Let’s talk about this now. What is the rest that God wants us to have?
To put it in a single statement, God wants us to have rest from doubt. And first and foremost, doubt about where we are going to be when we die.
Jesus Christ erased all doubt about our eternal whereabouts by His trip to Calvary. We know where we are going. The believer does not refer to heaven as a place we hope to go in the sense that maybe we’ll make it, maybe we won’t. Sinners though we be, heaven is ours because the sins that would bar us from heaven have been removed. We are redeemed, restored, forgiven. We are heaven bound; not because of what we do for God, but because of what God has done for us in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And that provides us with tremendous spiritual rest...
There is a striking illustration of this kind of rest in the book Pilgrim’s Progress. The main character, Christian, is making his pilgrimage from the terrestrial city (earth) to the celestial city (heaven). At the beginning of his journey he carries on his back a huge knapsack, which represents the reality and burden of his sin. He is hunched over because of its weight. Then someone directs him to a hill where he sees three crosses. He is told to take his burden there. As he walks to the center cross and gets near it, something amazing happens. The knapsack falls off his back, rolls down the hill and is eventually swallowed up by an empty tomb.
That illustrates pretty well the true spiritual rest that is ours, doesn’t it? In the bare cross and empty tomb of Jesus Christ we find our forgiveness; our rest.
Now let me give you an example of how this plays itself out in real life. I recall some conversations I had with a man who was near death, and he knew it. We talked about important and essential spiritual matters; how Jesus had prepared a place for Him in heaven and that sooner probably than later he would be with the Savior he had known all his life. Although there was a procedure open to him that may have extended his life for a short time at best, he chose to simply place himself in the hands of the Lord who had never left him or forsaken him before and let his future be God’s decision.
In the course of one of those conversations he told me about a relative of his who found himself in the same kind of situation. However, his reaction to adversity was decidedly different. This relative, you see, was an atheist. When he learned that he was seriously ill, panic and fear set in. He went from specialist to specialist looking for a cure and, finding none, subjected himself to any kind of offbeat and experimental process that promised to buy him any time...
Two men facing the same adversity, buy two vastly different responses. One was at rest, one was in turmoil. The difference? Jesus Christ. He is the one who sets our hearts at peace. He is the one who gives us rest from doubt about where we will spend our eternity... God wants us to get that kind of rest.
What other kinds of doubt does God want us to take a rest from? Let’s move from the eternal to the present. God wants us to take a rest from doubting our life is going like it is supposed to...
All of us at some time or another had or have an idea of how we’d like our life to go. In the business world and in all kinds of personal management literature, people are urged to plan their career path and identify their goals. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
However, the visions we have for how our lives are to unfold are almost always idealistic. Seldom do we insert into the picture things like tragedy, or unexpected illness, or the premature loss of a loved one, or financial worries, or family difficulties, or marriage problems, or employment concerns, or unmet expectations.
But on this side of heaven, those things happen. Sometimes we bring these things on ourselves; other times they simply seem to appear like uninvited guests. Regardless of the cause, when they do come into our life there is the temptation to doubt God’s love for us or His providence or His power or His concern for us. There is a temptation to doubt whether God really is in control.
God wants us to take a rest from that kind of doubt. And the place to go, once again, is the cross of Christ. The Apostle Paul put it this way: "He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all – how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?" And the implied answer, of course, is that God will give us all things. He who has taken care of our greatest need – the forgiveness of sins – will take care of every other need as well. So we can rest.
We’ll end this morning with the same observation made at the beginning: the Third Commandment is appropriate subject matter to contemplate as we officially begin the summer... As we go about the physical rest that summer affords us, may it be that we will also be reminded of the greater spiritual rest that has been provided for us by a loving God.
Then we will rest in peace – now and forever. And every day will be a Sabbath. Amen.