CREC Sermon- Reformed 4- Sabbath Rest

CREC 8 R4- Sabbatarian Rest

December 10, 2017

Lynchburg, Virginia

EXHORDIUM

Sabbatarian, Rest, Hospitality, Manners

         We continue our sermons on the CREC, the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches. My goal in these sermons has been two things. First, to give a survey of the things we believe and how we practice them. Second, to create appreciation and excitement for who we are as a denomination and as a church as we seek to honor Christ, grow His kingdom, and serve one another here at Providence Church. I pray the Lord will use these sermons to that end.

Today we are on Reformed, R4, Sabbath Rest. In today’s sermon, I want to focus on the Lord’s Day. In our church, as in most CREC churches, the Lord’s Day is a central part of the character and culture of the church.

         On the Lord’s Day, we do all of those practices that we hold in high esteem in our churches. We Worship, We renew Covenant, We partake of the Sacraments, We read and hear the Word of God, We serve and love one another, We enjoy Christian fellowship, We rest. We recreate. We learn to set aside our particular desires for the sake of Christ and His people.

         In order to do this well, we need to grow as a Community. We need to understand what we believe and how to practice those beliefs in such a way as to honor our Lord and His people.

If, for us, the Lord’s Day means being together, then we need to learn how to do that, as well. This means that we must be slow to anger, quick to forgive, diligent in our manners and in teaching manners to children. We must be disciplined, diligent and persevering.

Resting is extremely hard work. I am glad we are working on it.

As I mentioned in a previous sermon on the Sabbath, the Sabbath can be hard work. Because of this, some of you have grown weary of the Sabbath. Instead of a delight, the Sabbath has become a trial. What are we to make of this? How do we change it?

One obvious way is to make sure you rest on the Lord’s Day. But what does that rest look like? Does it look like sleeping in, being late for church, or missing church? Does it look like isolating yourself from others? Does it look like neglecting the gathering of the saints, as is the habit of some?

How do you make sure you rest on the Sabbath? We may need to ask where rest comes from. If you are a blue collar worker and spend a tremendous amount of energy with your body, one obvious way for rest is to sit down, to lie down and sleep. You need time for your body to regenerate. Many of our jobs are more white collar, sitting in front of a computer typing. Rest from that work might mean getting out and doing some manual labor.

So, rest is relative to some degree. One part of rest the Bible is clear about is rest from your monetary making occupation. Rest from those works and desires that motivate you the rest of the week. Bible rest means rest from your striving after wind. It means honoring the Lord and His people. That may still be work but it is rest from your typical striving. This gives your mind and body a break.

That sort of rest is particularly difficult for women. Many of our women spend their weeks cooking, cleaning the house, serving their husbands and children. And then Sunday is simply more of the same and sometimes with the expectation that even more people are added into the mayhem. A woman might then see the Sabbath as the opposite of rest.

So, you might need to be creative about how to make Sunday different than all your other days of striving. In our home, especially when the children were small, we might Saturday a bigger work day. We tried to get things in order on Saturday so there was not so much work on Sunday. Katie had to work hard and being content with a messier house on Sunday. It makes more work for Monday. But you ladies are going to work just as hard on Monday anyway, so let Sunday take a rest.

Also, you might want to change up Sunday duties. You husbands and some of the kids take over some of mom’s duties on Sunday. Try to create an environment where she really can rest, even in the chaos.

Is. 58:13   If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words:

Delight- Take exquisite delight, luxurious. Is the Lord’s Day a luxury?

        

With a Promise

¹⁴ Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.

With a promise- Ride upon the high places of the Earth. Be well fed. Are you on the low places? Is your soul not well fed? Perhaps the culprit is that the Lord’s Day is not a delight? Perhaps you have despised this day with your attitudes or actions?

A Christian Sabbath

         Maybe I have got ahead of myself a bit? Suppose you say that the Bible does not require a Christian Sabbath?

         Let us read first of all the Bible’s requirement of the Old Testament Sabbath. This is from the Ten Commandments.

        

What the Sabbath is:

Exodus 20:8-11 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. ⁹ Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: ¹⁰ But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: ¹¹ For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.

It would be particularly odd, don’t you think, if the only commandment that is not current in the New Testament is the Fourth?

Wherein is the Moral Summarily Comprehended?

The Ten Commandments

1.    Thou shalt have no other gods before Me.

2.    Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image.

3.    Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.

4.    Remember the Sabbath Day, to keep it holy.

5.    Honor thy father and thy mother.

6.    Thou shalt not kill.

7.    Thou shalt not commit adultery.

8.    Thou shalt not steal.

9.    Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.

10.Thou shalt not covet.

But some men insist that the Law of the Sabbath is no longer valid for Christians.

Westminster Confession of Faith

         Of Religious Worship and the Sabbath Day Chapter 21

VII. As it is the law of nature, that, in general, a due proportion of time be set apart for the worship of God; so, in His Word, by a positive, moral, and perpetual commandment binding all men in all ages, He has particularly appointed one day in seven, for a Sabbath, to be kept holy unto him:[34] which, from the beginning of the world to the resurrection of Christ, was the last day of the week: and, from the resurrection of Christ, was changed into the first day of the week,[35] which, in Scripture, is called the Lord's Day,[36] and is to be continued to the end of the world, as the Christian Sabbath.[37]

VIII. This Sabbath is to be kept holy unto the Lord when men, after a due preparing of their hearts, and ordering of their common affairs beforehand, do not only observe an holy rest all the day from their own works, words, and thoughts about their worldly employments and recreations,[38] but also are taken up the whole time in the public and private exercises of His worship, and in the duties of necessity and mercy.[39]

What is Our Observance?

Sabbatarian- WCF- We agree but we might want to recreate. We are not uptight about buying gas, eating at a restaurant or stopping at the grocery store on the way home from church to pick up an extra dish for our expected guests.

But what about our full shopping day at Walmart or Kroger? What about missing church for competitive sports? What about attending entertainments? Do we let these things crowd out worship and rest? Then we are not Remembering the Sabbath Day, to keep it holy.

        

The Lord’s Day Not the Sabbath- I had a friend, an episcopal pastor, who took issue with our Presbyterian insistence that the Lord’s Day is the Sabbath. I am not sure how he thought we practiced the Sabbath. Maybe he thought we were Jewish step counters. I don’t know. But it was his view that the Sabbath, as such, was an Old Testament observance and did not transfer into the New Testament. He did not agree that the Lord’s Day was the Christian Sabbath, as our Confession puts it.

         So, instead of arguing with him about the seemingly disputable doctrine, I asked him how he and his church practiced The Lord’s Day. He said they went to church, religiously. He thought people should do that. He said they spend the rest of the day in rest and fellowship. To which, I said, that is exactly what we do. I am glad we agree! He was actually a bit taken aback and did not have much of a response.

         Is the Sabbath a delight? I hope so. The Lord meant it to be, even if we just call it the Lord’s Day.

What Other Parts of the Moral Law Should be a Delight?

         What about worshipping the one true God? What about seeking God in Spirit and in truth? What about wearing the Lord’s name in a worthy manner? What about honoring your father and mother? What about seeking the welfare of others? What about being sexually pure and being faithful to your spouse? What about being content with your own stuff? What about telling the truth? What about learning to contentment in all things?

Are these delights? I hope so. The things I just mentioned are nine of the ten commandments. We clearly see how the Lord requires all of them of us in the Old and in the New Testaments. We are do them out of a love for Him, delighting in His rules and ordinances. Then why, would we leave one out?

Is it not a delight to have a day off, to rest, to worship, to learn to love God and my neighbor? Yes, it is and that is one of our central duties that we need to learn to see as a fundamental privilege.

I hope you see His law that way, as a delight, and if not, then you have missed the spirit of the law for the letter and you need a new heart.

I would categorize our church as Sabbatarian, But one of the definitions of Sabbatarian is a strict observance of the Lord’s Day as Sabbath. Well, we have a religious observance. We do it religiously, every Sunday. But strict? Not so sure on that one.

Our observance of the Lord’s Day is not an cermudgeonly seriousness. It is a joyful celebratoriousness. It is a gift to us from God so let’s have a party.

EXHORTATION

Is this a list of things we should do?

This is one of the real difficulties for pastors. We are always preaching and teaching the Bible. It has some rules and we want you to do them. Go to church. Pay your tithe. Show hospitality. Talk this way, not that way. There are things you must do if you are a Christian.

So, is the Christian faith about a list of things you should do? Is it? Some of you may answer yes. But it is not and if you think the answer is yes, then my temptation to frustration has doubled. The pastor preaches these things, your parents teach you these things, not so you can get the list memorized and checked off. We do not want you to do a list of things. We want you to BE a certain kind of person. But we cannot make you BE that. The BEING part has to be done by the Lord and we must be content to wait upon Him.

The Lord does use means to accomplish this grace of conversion. He uses preaching, teaching, prayer, parents and even your own failures at doing the list.

What kind of person are you? What is coming out of your heart? Is it joy? Is it delight in the things of the Lord? If not, then you do not need a longer list, including the list that says, add delight to the list. No, what you need is a heart that delights in the Lord and His good gifts. I wish I could give you such a heart but I cannot.

I pray that the Lord would do so. That you would be humble and receive it so that you can delight in Him, His people and His day.