Keeping the Sabbath Day

Minister:
Date: AM
Text: Psalm 92; Lord's Day 38
Psalters: 225, 140, 380, 350
    1. Our God is a covenant God, Who takes His people into a beautiful restful relationship.
    2. This command is positive, requiring a positive spiritual labor, not in not doing.
  1. The emphasis.
    1. The Sabbath is a positive blessing (not to be a burden), for God blessed the Sabbath (Gen. 2:3).
      1. God?s blessing sets the day apart for sacred use, which separates it from the other six days of labor.
      2. This command gives us our privilege (?may?) more than our obligation (?must?).
    1. Thus the fourth command touches all the days of our week and life.
      1. Then the Sabbath is not an end in itself, but is the means God uses to equip us unto all good works.
      2. Our contact with Christ on the first day of the week has a sanctifying effect on us all the other days.
      3. And the Sabbath day is a picture of Heaven, the eternal Sabbath (Heb. 4:9,11)
    2. The legitimate change in the form of the fourth command does not destroy the principle (confer Heb. 4:9).
  2. The manner of keeping the Sabbath is resting on Christ, our Savior.
    1. ?Sabbath? means ?rest;? the enjoying of an accomplished work (as God did, Gen. 2:2).
      1. Real rest is found in the finished work of Jesus Who labored to bear our guilt and punishment.
      2. There is no rest for the wicked (Isa. 57:20,21) because they never find rest.
    2. This Sabbath rest is the heart of the ministry of the gospel to a restless world and to saints in such a world.
      1. The church proclaims rest to the weary and heavy laden in the way of coming to Him (Matt. 11:28).
      2. The ?schools? refers primarily to the education of men for proclaiming the gospel.
      3. How do we maintain the ministry of the gospel and the schools.
  3. The implications.
    1. Cease from my evil works all the days of my life.
    2. It means that we work for six days, just as our Father works.
    3. Every day we must walk in sanctification.