I. Sabbath

    A. Remember the Sabbath to Keep it Holy

        1. the Genesis account of creation closes with a description of the seventh day of that first historical week, establishing a Sabbath precedent that would apparently not be visited again until the time of Moses (Genesis 1:31-2:3)

        2. commentators believe Moses wrote that account by inspiration of the God who was there, but the concept of a Sabbath does not recur until the giving of the 10 commandments (Exodus 20:8-11)

        3. God explains it further: “It is a sign forever between me and the people of Israel that in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed’” (Exodus 31:17)

            a. the Hebrew carries the connotation of God using the seventh day to catch his breath1 and that distinction is very important to understanding the very purpose of the Sabbath command

            b. “There is no hint that the restrictions were meant to guard against the wrath of a jealous and angry deity. The Sabbath was meant to be a blessing to man and not a burden” (ISBE).2

            b. notably, the covenant that included the Sabbath was made only with the ancient nation of Israel – not the modern, almost secular Israel of today or certainly spiritual Israel, the church of Christ (see also Exodus 31:16)


    B. Sabbath Requirements

        1. remembering the Sabbath meant more than acknowledging at sundown Friday that it was now Saturday and it meant more than just choosing to worship on the last day of the week

        2. remembering the Sabbath to keep it holy meant seeing to a number of religious rituals associated with the covenant and the practice

        3. work was forbidden (Exodus 34:21); so was business (see Nehemiah 10:31)

        4. the Sabbath was a sign of God’s then special relationship with Israel and allowing the practice to die out would have removed that symbolism (Exodus 31:13)

        5. the penalty for a violation of the Sabbath commemoration was capital (Exodus 31:14-15 and Numbers 15:32-36)

        6. remembering the Sabbath required animal sacrifice (Numbers 28:1, 9-10)

        7. after Israel’s fall, Nehemiah worked to reform Israel’s forgotten observance of the Sabbath (Nehemiah 13:15-22)


    C. Perpetuity

        1. the Sabbath was to be part of God’s covenant with Israel forever – a perpetual contract with his people, but does that imply that it is somehow still binding today?

        2. the Aaronic priesthood was likewise described as perpetual, but has been superseded today because the old covenant is done away with

            a. Moses was told to bring Aaron’s “sons also and put coats on them, and anoint them, as you anointed their father, that they may serve me as priests. And their anointing shall admit them to a perpetual priesthood throughout their generations” (Exodus 40:14-15)

            b. today, there is not a single Levitical priest in the entire world and there hasn’t been one for more than 1900 years – if that perpetual covenant stood today, Christ would not be our high priest and we would have no access to Heaven even now (Hebrews 7:11-13, 8:13)

        3. that perpetual covenant, which included the Aaronic priesthood and the Sabbath observance has been annulled because of Israel’s unfaithfulness and a new covenant in Christ has been established

        4. perpetual, in this case, means forever within a context and that forever is over


II. Christian Sabbath?

    A. Jesus Kept The Sabbath

        1. Jesus, unlike all of us, lived his entire life under the Law of Moses, and was therefore, answerable to its Sabbath requirements, which he never broke

        2. fresh from his temptation ordeal in the wilderness, “Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee, and a report about him went out through all the surrounding country. And he taught in their synagogues, being glorified by all. And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day” (Luke 4:14-16)

        3. one commentator reasons, “The humane element in the rest day at the end of every week must have appealed to His sympathetic nature … As an institution for the benefit of toiling men and animals, Jesus held the Sabbath in high regard” (ISBE).3


    B. But Not Human Sabbath Traditions

        1. the Sabbath, however, became a very contentious issue between Jesus and the teachers of Israel, who in their legalistic zeal, had made draconian interpretations of the Law that went far beyond both the purpose and the character of God’s original intent for the Sabbath

            a. the rabbis interpreted the prohibition of Sabbath work to mean that one could not travel on the last day, or at least, he could not go far, so they set a limit of about 1000-1,200 yards (ISBE)4

            b. one could not travel any further from his residence than that distance, unless he knew about the wonderful, hypocritical, unnecessary rabbinical loopholes

                1. “If, for instance, the approach of the Sabbath found one on his journey, the traveler might select some tree or some stone wall at a distance of 2,000 paces and mentally declare this to be his residence for the Sabbath, in which case he was permitted to go the 2,000 paces to the selected tree or wall and also 2,000 paces beyond, but in such a case he must do the work thoroughly and must say: ‘Let my Sabbath residence be at the trunk of that tree.’”5

                2. the phrase “Sabbath’s day journey” is even used by Dr. Luke to describe the distance between Jerusalem and Mount Olivet (see Acts 1:12)

        2. understand that God’s original intent for the Sabbath was to benefit man by giving him a day free from work – a day which no authority could take away – a day very important then to a nation emerging from forced labor in Egypt

        3. God’s intent was not to make a rule so narrow that man would suffer irreparable harm in the process of its observance – that the hungry must wait to eat or the injured must wait for care (Luke 13:10-17)

            a. Jesus did not violate the Law of Moses or its Sabbath component, because its spirit would never forbid helping such a victim of disease at any time

            b. the Pharisees, scribes and other rulers had long ago forgotten the spirit of God’s law – to benefit mankind – and observed the Sabbath without compassion or sympathy

            c. “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel” (Matthew 23:23-24)!

            d. Jesus could have spent the Sabbath from sundown to sundown, healing every sick person in Galilee until his muscles ached, sweat poured from his body and his eyes drooped and he would not have violated his Father’s will

        4. this is the common misinterpretation of the Sabbath that survives today – that the Sabbath was a harsh regulation; it was not, it was a benevolent one


    C. Sabbath For Man, Not Man For Sabbath

        1. Jesus used the Sabbath issue and the rabbinical misinterpretation to expose the hypocrisy of Israel’s teachers and to invite the common people to repentance and reformation, hinting at an even better covenant yet to come (Matthew 12:1-8)

            a. it might seem amazing, but the Pharisees saw no difference between what the disciples were doing that day and a man taking servants and scythes into his field to harvest the grain into bushels for market

            b. their interpretation of the Sabbath code meant that God wanted man hungry on the last day, but that was not so

                1. Jesus exposed their hypocrisy by reminding them that their hero, David, when on the run and hungry, had entered the house of God and eaten the Show Bread, which only the priests were to eat

                2. the priests themselves labor on the Sabbath in the execution of their duties but are held guiltless

            c. as Lord of the Sabbath, Jesus could interpret its purpose and its execution and his disciples were not in the wrong at all, for the spirit of the Sabbath and every command of God is a matter of mercy and not mind-numbed compliance with excessively strict interpretations

            d. Jesus had exposed their blindness to the actual intent of the Sabbath – to bring rest and ensure the welfare of God’s people, not to enforce misery upon them for just a little longer

        2. it seems he went straight from the fields to the synagogue to press his point further (Matthew 12:9-14)

            a. they could never deny that they would lift an animal they valued out of a ditch where it would suffer and might die before sundown

            b. at the same time, however, their legalistic interpretation of the Sabbath would not allow them to lift a finger to help a human being in much worse condition

            c. Jesus violated only the rabbis’ traditions that had become an unwelcome hedge around the merciful law of God – he fully and faithfully carried out God’s purpose for the day

        3. the Sabbath was made for man – for his benefit and welfare; man was not made for the Sabbath


    D. The Lord’s Day

        1. the Sabbath, however, is part of the Law of Moses which Jesus fulfilled and annulled at the cross (Ephesians 2:14-16)

        2. early Jewish Christians continued to meet at the synagogue on the last day of the week, often to find attentive audiences for the gospel

        3. the Sabbath, however, was never enjoined upon anyone coming into the church from outside Israel, nor was it binding at all anymore (Colossians 2:13-17)

        4. the first day of the week, probably as a result of the resurrection and Pentecost arrival of the Holy Spirit falling on that day, gradually became the day of the week on which the early church assembled for worship and fellowship

            a. “On the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul talked with them, intending to depart on the next day, and he prolonged his speech until midnight” (Acts 20:7).

            b. this day, however, was never designated as anything approaching a “Christian Sabbath,” with borrowed rules and interpretations from the original

                1. the Lord’s Day, as it came to be known, must be an occasion for assembly and worship, but not with the kind of attitude that crippled the thinking of the Pharisees and turned their day into an exercise in asceticism and indifference to human needs and suffering

                2. we must be careful not to impose by way of opinion or personal fiat the same kind of regulatory attitude upon the glorious day of resurrection


Conclusion

We can no longer observe the Sabbath, because it is no longer holy to God. Neither is the Lord’s Day a Christian Sabbath, but we must recognize that both were created for man’s benefit, not his harm.


Questions For Review

  1. 1.What happened on the first seventh day of the week? How was it remembered?

  2. 2.What was the Sabbath intended to be when instituted?

  3. 3.What specifically was involved in “remembering the Sabbath to keep it holy”?

  4. 4.If the Sabbath was part of a perpetual covenant, what is its status today?

  5. 5.What is proved by the fact that Jesus kept the Sabbath?

  6. 6.How did human Sabbath interpretations interfere with God’s will?

  7. 7.How is the Lord’s Day similar to and different from the Sabbath?

© 2009, Jeff S. Smith. Outlines and recordings may be used for teaching programs, individual study and review, but are copyrighted and may not be republished, especially for profit, without the author's express consent. Click here to email the author.