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The Fourth Commandment – The Sabbath
There is no confusion in the first three Commandments.
God declares who He is and that He expects us to honor Him and only Him.
There is no other God.
We are not to make any kind of image to worship.
He tells us that even His Name is Holy.
The Fourth Commandment is one that many people are confused about.
Of all God’s commands, this one has caused the most controversy within the organized Church. All of us want to obey God’s every command.
Let’s read what God says in Exodus 20:8-11 NKJV, “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. 11 For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it. God rested on the seventh day.
God was concerned about His people.
They had been in Egypt for 430 years, about 400 as slaves without days of rest. As slaves they did what they were told to do, when they were told to do it. Their lives were totally structured by their owners.
Our Heavenly Father put structure and self-discipline back into their lives with the Ten Commandments. In the Fourth Commandment, God points out to them that in six days, He created everything, and then He rested. Likewise, He gave us the Sabbath as a day of rest.
God gave us an example of how we should live our lives. It does not tell us that He was tired from all that He did. It tells us that He rested and He blessed the Sabbath day.
Whether God was tired is not the issue. He knew that we would get tired in our daily lives and would need rest. Many of us don’t know when to stop and rest. If we have employees, some of us might tend not to give them time off. Having created us, God knew that we would need rest from our labors.
In Jewish society, they took what God said and expanded. You were not to work, do chores, or even take part in stressful activities. They understood that God gave the Sabbath to allow us to recuperate mentally and physically.
God wanted us to set aside a time to worship.
The first three commandments tell us that we are to worship only the God who created us, that we are not to build anything to represent Him and worship it. Even His Name is to be considered Holy and used only with reverence.
His Fourth Commandment tells us that we should set aside a day to rest our bodies and minds. God knew that we needed free time to worship Him and be with our families. He made it clear that no one was to work; not wives, servants, or visitors.
Scripture says, “The LORD blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.” That means that He made it a Holy Day for the Israelites. They took this simple commandment and added many restrictions, which made it a burden instead of a blessing.
God wanted His people to take rest and worship seriously.
He established the Sabbath for Israel. He did not institute the Sabbath for Himself, but for man. Jesus confirms this in Mark 2:27 NKJV, “And He said to them, ‘The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.”
Our Father knows our needs today as He did when He gave the Ten Commandments to Israel.
So, what day is the Sabbath?
There is no question that the Sabbath was what we call Saturday. The Jewish people celebrate the Sabbath as the period from sunset on Friday evening to just after nightfall on Saturday. It usually works out to be about 25 hours. During these hours, they have many rules in addition to what God commanded.
It is worth noting that nine of the Ten Commandments are reinforced in the New Testament, but the Sabbath is not. While at the same time, there are narratives related to their not understanding the Sabbath.
This brings us to why Christians replaced the Sabbath with Sunday.
First, Jesus was obedient in all that God required of Him while He walked this earth. He was a Jew and lived under God’s Law. Jesus clearly states He did not come to change the Law. He came to fulfil it. He said in Matthew 5:17 NKJV, “Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill.”
Jesus lived His life in obedience to God’s Law as given to the Jewish Nation. He explained it, but did not change it. He and His disciples treated the Sabbath as holy.
On the Sunday that He arose, we find Jesus’ followers together behind locked doors. They were afraid; they had seen Jesus beaten, killed, and sealed in a tomb.
THEY HAD FOUND THAT TOMB EMPTY!
JESUS WAS NOT THERE!
NOTHING WILL EVER BE THE SAME!
The Apostle John tells us in John 20:19 NKJV says, 19 Then, the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst, and said to them, ‘Peace be with you.”
THEY SEE JESUS FOR THEMSELVES!
HE IS ALIVE!!
Nothing will ever be the same again. It was the most incredible Sunday in the history of Creation.
God made all things new in His Son! How do we react to this world shaking, world changing event?
This one event will mold all days to come.
THE CHURCH
Jesus would spend another 40 days on earth. Hundreds of people saw Him and knew that despite crucifixion, and his death and buriel, He was Alive!
In your Bible study you may have missed this, but Luke opens the book of Acts with this statement, The former account I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, 2 until the day in which He was taken up, after He through the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the apostles whom He had chosen, 3 to whom He also presented Himself alive after His suffering by many infallible proofs, being seen by them during forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. Acts 1:1-3 NKJV
At the end of these forty days, Jesus appeared to them one more time when they were all together and told them that they would be His witnesses to all the world.
Then, just before He ascended, Jesus told them to wait.
At this point, they had seen Him several times over forty days. Why did Jesus tell them to wait?
What was going to change that would now make God’s timing right for them to proclaim the message of salvation? Let’s remember that Jesus had told them in Matthew 28:19-20 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen.
The answer is in Luke 24:49 NKJV, where Jesus says, “ Behold, I send the Promise of My Father upon you; but tarry in the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high.” Just as the Prophet Joel said in Joel 2:28 about 800 years before.
They needed the power of the Holy Spirit working within them to do the job they were called to do.
God chose Pentecost Sunday.
It was not man’s idea to change from the Sabbath to Sunday.
God chose to pour out His Holy Spirit on His followers on Pentecost Sunday.
Pentecost was (and still is) a Jewish festival. Pentecost means 50, and it always comes 50 days after Passover. It is known to the Jews as Shavuot, which is the Feast of Weeks.
However, Pentecost Sunday has a whole new meaning to Christians. It was the Sunday that God poured out His Holy Spirit upon those who believed in Jesus as the Son of God and trusted in Him for their salvation. From that day to the present, men and women have been coming together on Sunday to worship God and His Son, Jesus Christ.
All evidence points to Sunday becoming the Christian Sabbath.
There are several reasons for this assumption.
First, since Pentecost, the Apostles and early Church writers refer to gathering on the First day of the week and only refer to the Sabbath when they go there to preach to the Jews.
Second, the New Testament writers refer to the other nine commandments in their teaching, but not the Fourth.
Third, throughout the history of the Church until today, Sunday has replaced Saturday as the Day of Worship. The early church did not mention it; they just gathered on the first day of the week from this time on.
Finally, we are defined as the Temple of God, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 NKJV. Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? 20 For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.
God dwells in us once we have accepted Jesus and been buried with Him in baptism. With the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, every day should be considered Holy. We worship God in spirit and in truth every day of our lives. Following Him is the response to His Holy Spirit within us.
Does this excuse us from attending Church services?
NOT AT ALL! Church services are very important to us.
Paul says in Hebrews 10:24-25 NKJV, And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, 25 not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.
God first ordained the Sabbath because He knew that we needed a special day to worship Him and to encourage each other. The early Church did not give up having a special day for worship. It is important for our spiritual welfare that we exhort one another and gathering on Sunday gives us the time.
Sunday, like the Sabbath, was a time for giving and worship.
First, we see in 1 Corinthians 16:2 where the Apostle tells us, “On the first day of the week, let each one of you lay something aside, storing up as he may prosper, that there be no collections when I come.” The New Testament does not tell us how much to give. However, most Christians believe that the tithe of the Old Testament, or ten percent, is the place to start our giving. Everything we have comes from God and belongs to Him. He guides us with His Holy Spirit to give as He leads.
Second, we see the early Church gathered for what we call the Lord’s Supper or communion. One example of this is in Acts 20:7 NKJV, “On the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul, ready to depart the next day, spoke to them and continued his message until midnight.”
It is clear to me that we are no longer under the Law of the Sabbath.
We are clearly required, by example, to set a day aside to rest and worship God.
Every day is a gift from God and is a day of worship.
We should never let a day pass without giving thanks to God for all He has done and is doing for us.
Finally, although we see the early Church and the Apostles meeting on the first day of the week, there were probably Jewish Christians who still worshiped on the Sabbath, maybe as well as Sunday. So Paul points out that we should not judge others about their days of worship.
In the 14th Chapter of Romans, Paul tells us not to argue or judge other people about their convictions on various topics. One of those topics is about putting one day above another. He says in Romans 14:5-6a NKJV, “One person esteems one day above another; another esteems every day alike. Let each be fully convinced in his own mind. He who observes the day, observes it to the Lord; and he who does not observe the day, to the Lord he does not observe it.”
NOTE: “Let each be fully convinced in his own mind.” We must do as God leads us, not as someone tells us they believe.
The point is that we are commanded to worship and rest by God.
Each one us us is responsible to seek to worship God with our complete surrender to His will in our lives. It is not our responsibility to judge others as they seek to be as faithful as they can be to God.
God set one day apart and we should also. Remember that God wants the best for us and He understands our weakness.
Click the following links to continue your study of all the Commandments, The First Commandment – No Other God!, The Second Commandment – No Idols, The Third Commandment -The Lord’s Name, The Fourth Commandment – The Sabbath,