This is September 28, 2008, the year of our Lord. Zion Baptist Church, we will continue where we left off last Lord's Day concerning God's judgment on America and the reasons for it. Now, we'll start our scripture reading today in Isaiah the 58th chapter. Isaiah 58. Besides all the other sins of idolatry, covetousness, which is idolatry by the way, covetousness is idolatry. One of the Ten Commandments is, Thou shalt not covet. And even in the beginning, God gave us commandments One of those was to keep the Sabbath day, which is the day following six working days. Before we start reading there in Isaiah 58, let's turn back over to Genesis, the second chapter, verse 3. Genesis 2 and 2 and 3. There's a couple of things I want us to see here. Chapter 2 verse 1 says, Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had made, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made. And God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made. Now, one, God didn't rest from all of his work, meaning his providential work. He still had to hold the stars and the heavens up. He still had to put everything in place. The Lord Jesus is continually before the throne making intercession for the saints, and the Son of God, the second person of the Trinity, all the work that they had to do, they continued to do, But he ceased from those labors of making and creating all things. And so we are, in like manner, are to work six days, labor six days, and on the seventh day cease from our labors of those six days. We don't lay down and do nothing. We continue to work, but we work at the things that we're supposed to. One of those is worshiping the Lord, observance of our worship to our God. Jesus said in Mark the 2nd chapter that the Sabbath was made for man. We understand that the Sabbath was made for man to observe the worship of God and to rest from his labors that he labored those six days. Not to lay around and be idle and do nothing. It doesn't mean that. But it does mean to rest from the labors of your providing living for your family. Those six days. Now what day of the week was the seventh day? We have no idea what day of the week, the seventh day, in ancient times fell on. We don't have any idea what day of the week was it, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. We don't know what day of the week it was. All we know was it was following six days of labor, the seventh day was the Sabbath day, the day that was sanctified, meaning set apart, for worship of God and for rest and it was sanctified and it was blessed by God. So we don't know which day of the week that would have been but we do know that the Jews celebrated Saturday, which is the seventh day of the week, of our week, and that's the day that they set aside for the Sabbath day. And, of course, the Christian Sabbath is on the Lord's day, the first day of the week, or the eighth day. Now, mentioning that eighth day, the Bible doesn't say what happened on the eighth day in the beginning, does it? It doesn't mention a thing. about what happened on the 8th day. But it did omit something on the 7th day. Let's look and see what is omitted. In the 5th verse it says, And God called the light day, and the darkness He called night, and the evening and the morning were the first day. And verse 8 says, And God called the firmament heaven, and the evening and the morning were the second day. And verse 13 says, in the evening and the morning were the third day. And verse 19 says, in the evening and the morning were the fourth day. Verse 23, in the evening and the morning were the fifth day. And verse, well, I missed it. From verse 24 on down was the sixth day. Verse 31, And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had made. And God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it. Because in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made. He omitted something in the seventh day, didn't he? And the evening and the morning were the seventh day. Why did he leave that out? Why did he omit putting that after he put it after every day? One through six and the evening and the morning were 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th day, but on the 7th day he didn't say. And the evening and the morning were the 7th day. It was as though as it was meant to be that the 7th day would continue forever. The 7th day observance of worship and rest would continue until the Lord returned. Or so it appears to me. There is no evening and morning where the seventh day and that was the end of the seventh day. It's not there. He omitted that. I believe he omitted that for a very good reason. He didn't omit it for no reason. He omitted it for a purpose. He put it there on the other days. He didn't put it there on the seventh day. Just as everything that's in God's Word is there for a purpose, everything that's not in God's Word is there for a purpose. And this is not there for a purpose. I believe that purpose is that that day was to continue. Now, I know that men take it lightly about the Lord's Day. As you can tell, there's very few here today. And because men think that they can do anything that they please on the Lord's Day, and there's no big deal about it. That this day is no different than any other day. But as we read the Scriptures, let's just turn the page here a little bit. Cain and Abel in chapter 4, and in the process of time, verse 3 chapter 4, and in the process of time it came to pass that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground and offering unto the Lord. How did he know to do that? And let's change the words here a little bit. In the English translation, in the King James translation, it says, and in the process of time. But that literally means at the end of day. at the end of days, and at the end of days it came to pass that came brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the Lord." That's what that actually says. In the process of time, it's actually saying, at the end of days. What does he mean, at the end of days? Now, I could just tell you that this is what I think, This is a good example where you can learn that scripture interprets scripture. Now, I love to read after John Deal, I read some after Matthew Henry, I read some after Matthew Poole, I read some after some other folks, but The only way to know is to compare Scripture to Scripture. And when I preach something and it sounds new to you, you are to search the Scriptures to see if those things are true. You don't take the preacher's word for it because the preacher will lead you astray. Especially if he's not studying the Scriptures himself, he's just listening to somebody else. There's only one place where that word's used again, here in the first parts of these scriptures in Genesis, about the end, and it's in Genesis 2, 3, where we just read, "...and on the seventh day God ended His work which He had made, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made." God ended His work. And if you're going to compare Scripture to Scripture, you've got to compare the right time with the right time. And here God ended something, and here He says in verse 3, "...and in the process of time, or at the end of days." At the end of what days? The six days of labor. At the end of the six days of labor came brought forth of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the Lord. And Abel, he also brought of the firstling of his flock, and of the fat thereof. And the Lord had respect to Abel in his offering, but unto Cain in his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance failed. And the Lord said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth, and why is thy countenance fallen? If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? And if thou doest not well, send life at the door, and unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him. They both knew that at the end of the six days of labor that there was an observance of worship to their Creator or God. Even Cain, who was not the chosen, who was not the seed, the spiritual seed of God that would carry on the lineage for the Messiah to come. Didn't matter, did it? He was the creature of God. He was made by God to serve God and to worship God. Whether he was born again doesn't play into the picture. What does play into the picture is that the righteous have always been persecuted by the unrighteous, and here's a perfect example of it. Abel was righteous in what he did because he did it by faith. You can read that in Hebrews 11. By faith, Abel offered a more perfect sacrifice than Cain. Because Cain didn't bring his in faith. How come? He didn't have any faith. How come he didn't have any faith? Because that's a gift of the Spirit of God. God didn't give him any. But that didn't change the requirement for him to bring his offering, did it? He just got mad because God accepted Abel's and he didn't his. But he shouldn't have gotten mad. He didn't bring it because he didn't want to, or he didn't bring it in faith because he didn't want to bring it in faith. He didn't want to bring it at all. But he knew better. He was taught to do that. God put it in him to do that. And all through the Scriptures you can see where God requires men... Let's turn over to... Let's see where we're going here. There's other places in Genesis that you can see the Sabbath is not mentioned until Exodus, the 20th chapter. But we know in Exodus, the 20th chapter, the Sabbath is mentioned as being from the beginning. We read that, I believe, last Lord's Day or the one before that. In Exodus 20, he says, "...six days shall thy labor and do all thy work." 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, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy strangers within thy gates. 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. It didn't say he blessed the Sabbath day here in Exodus 20, does it? It says he blessed the Sabbath day, which happened to be the seventh day, but he blessed the Sabbath. What was the Sabbath? It was the day after the six days of labor that was set aside to worship God, and it says he blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it. It means he made it a holy day. Okay? Now, before that. Let's back up a little bit. And let's find here in the wilderness about the manna. Well, I thought it was in there. Because I wanted to read to you about where they were picking up manna on the sixth day. They picked up twice as much manna on the sixth day. because the seventh day they were to do no work. Therefore, not only did they pick up twice as much manna, if they picked up more than they needed any of the other days, it would spoil. But on the sixth day, they picked up twice as much because they couldn't pick up any on the seventh day, and it didn't spoil. So there was a miracle here. Not only did God give them more than they needed on the sixth day, so that they could not do their manual labor on the seventh day, but He caused it not to spoil also. So that's a perfect example of how the Sabbath day, the day of rest, the day that God hallowed, is set aside for His worship and for a day of rest. It's a holy day. That's why stores used to not open. That's why they ought not to open today. That's why you and I ought not to patronize those stores on the Sabbath day because we're encouraging them to open by doing business with them. It's a holy day. And it's not just a holy day for religious people or for Christian people or for church-going people. It's a holy day for all of God's creation. And because we refuse to obey God's holy day and keep His holy day holy, He's going to destroy this land in Isaiah the 58th chapter. Now, Isaiah criticizes hypocritical fastings of the Jews. They fail to give their tithes on the Sabbath as they're supposed to. That's what we read beginning at verse 1. It says, "...cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and show my people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins." I will urge you, Christian people, who hear the Word and hear the Scriptures, to cry out in the marketplaces and in the streets and places that you go, and show the United States, show America their transgression and their sins. You may say, and this is the thinking of some people, well, they have a right not to hear what I think. They may have a right, but you have an obligation to tell them why it is that God's judgment on this nation is about to be poured out. They may have a right not to hear it, but you have an obligation and a responsibility from God to tell them, if you don't repent, God's about to destroy you. You better get back in church on the Lord's day. You better keep, I don't care if you claim to be a believer or not, you better get in the house of God on the Lord's day. You better close your stores down. Better keep the Sabbath day holy. It's not just all about the Sabbath day, but let me tell you something, even Adam, even Adam in his state of innocency was required to work six days and on the seventh day worship God. Because the Bible, God told Adam, He said, I'm going to put you in the garden, you'll tend it, and you'll keep it. Why was it important for Adam to have to work? Because when he wasn't working and when his wife wasn't working, what happened? Here comes old serpent. When there was leisure time and they weren't worshipping God on the Sabbath day, what was they doing? Listening to the devil. And he convinced them that what God said was a lie. And what he was telling them was the truth. Now, when you don't work six days a week, and you don't go to church on the Sabbath day and keep that day holy, and close down your stores and stuff, you've got plenty of time to listen to the devil and let him convince you that what God says is a lie! Don't be stupid, people! Repent! And if you'll start to preach this to people now, everywhere you go, you say, but preacher, we're just a few. There wasn't but just a few with Jesus either. You remember what the angel said to Sarah? Is there anything too hard for the Lord? Come on. He's God. You do what you're supposed to do. You let Him worry about doing what He's supposed to do. He'll take care of His end. You take care of what you're supposed to do. Let me take care of what I'm supposed to do. Preach the gospel. You go out and tell people, if you don't repent and return the Sabbath to the Lord, He's going to bring judgment upon you. You tell them now. You see it starting to happen already. People are already getting scared and worried. Oh, they're shaking. Their knees are knocking together. They don't know in the morning what's going to happen on Wall Street. And they're worried. I hope they don't bail them out. I pray they don't bail them out, and I pray it drops down to less than 7,000. You'll see people jumping out of buildings if it does. They'll kill themselves if the stock market crashes. It's not going to affect poor folks like me too well today. It'll be hard for me to get gas, and I hope I got some seed saved from last year's planting, but we'll make it. But oh, what a time to preach to people. I told you God said, repent. You can read it from the Old Testament from the beginning to the end. It's happened over and over again. This is not anything new coming about. God's wrath is going to be poured out upon this country if we don't repent. So tell them now. He says, cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet. I don't care if they want to hear it or not. What they want doesn't matter. I have to listen to that boom, boom, bam, bam, boom, boom, boom. Every time I pull up to the service station. Yet they seek me daily, and delight to know my ways, as a nation that did righteousness, and pursued not the ordinances of their God. They ask of me the ordinances of justice. They take delight in approaching to God. Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? Wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast you find pleasure, and exact all your labors." What's he telling them there? He said, they wanted to know what I required of them and I told them. And then when they started to do what I required of them, then they started to say, well, what's the use in doing it if you're not going to pay any attention to us, God? It doesn't matter whether he's paying attention or not. It's like I told Brother Randy yesterday, it doesn't matter whether you understand what the Word of God says or not, just do it. You'll come to understand it later if God's willing. People tell you when they read the Word of God, well, I just don't understand it. I don't care if you don't understand it. Just do it. You can understand it later. Just be obedient. Do you believe it's the Word of God? Then read it and do it. We'll worry about the understanding later. If you'll do it long enough, you'll start to understand it. And what were they doing? Behold, in the day of your fast you find pleasure in exact all your labors. Behold, you fast for strife and debate and to smite with the fist of wickedness. You shall not fast as you do this day to make your voice to be heard on high. Your reason for fasting is wrong, he says. And your days in which you're fasting, you're finding pleasure. That's the wrong purpose of the fast. The fast is when you throw sackcloth and ashes up in the air because of sorrow and mourning. It's not a day to find pleasure. And the Lord's Day is not a day to find your pleasure and to do what you want to do. The Lord's Day is the day to worship Him and to rest from your labors. It is such a fast, is it such a fast that I have chosen, a day for a man to afflict his soul? Is it to bow down your head as a bulrush and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Wilt thou call this a fast and an acceptable day to the Lord? Is not this the fast that I have chosen, to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, that ye may break every yoke?" He said, that's the fast that I've called. You can do without food and throw dust in the air and sit in a corner and say, oh, it's me all you want to, but until you start to do what I've commanded you to do. And what was that? to loose the bands of wickedness. The bands of wickedness is disobeying the Word of God. And he said, keep the Sabbath day holy. And he says, cry out into the streets, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet and show my people their transgression and their sin. Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him, and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh? Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thy help shall spring forth speedily, and thy righteousness shall go before thee, and the glory of the Lord shall be thy reward. Then shalt thou call, and the Lord shall answer. Thou shalt cry, and he shall say, Here am I. And if thou wait from the midst of thee to yoke, and putting forth the finger, and speaking vanity, and if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul, then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness as the noon day. He says, You want to see? You want to be able to see and understand the Word of God? Then do the Word of God. Isn't that what he's saying? That's what he's saying when I read that. That's what he's saying when I read that. He's saying, you're blind and you don't like the dark? Then do what I said, do. And I'll make your days shine. He said, I'll open up the light to you. I'll let you see. And when you cry, I'll answer. When you pray, I'll hear. But what do we always say? What does it always come back to? Obedience! It's always about obedience. Obey the Word of God. And the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make fat thy bones. And thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not, that they shall be of thee And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places, and thou shalt rise up into the foundations of many generations, and thou shalt be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of paths to dwell in, if thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath." My goodness, imagine that. I don't care where you go. Last week we went to Isaiah the 29th chapter. No, we went to Ezekiel the 20th chapter last week. And we saw the same thing there. We went to Jeremiah the 25th chapter and we saw where they were going to go into captivity for 70 years because they went 140 years without keeping the sabbatical year. And they kept breaking the Sabbath. And it's always the same. God told Abraham, your people are going to have to stay down in Egypt for 400 years until the sin of the Amorites is fulfilled. And He told Jonah, go preach to the Ninevites. Their sin has come before me. And I'm not having any more. Tell them to repent or else. Of course, he went the other direction. He's wanting God to hell firing brimstone on them, you know. He was wanting them to pull a Sodom and Gomorrah on the Ninevites. They were enemies of Israel. But he didn't. He went and preached to them. How many was it that went and preached to the Ninevites? One. Not a multitude. One. We're few. Yes, we are. But start crying out in the streets and let the Lord do His work. Verse 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, honorable, and shalt honor him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words, 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." Do what I said do! And I'll show you some lights! That's what he's saying. He's saying do. You don't have to understand what I'm telling you to do. Just do it. Then I'll show you some light. Then I'll open up your minds and let you see. Then I'll be a delight unto you. Now for you and I, it is a delight to come to the house of the Lord, and to sing psalms and hymns, and to worship Him, and to have fellowship with the brethren, and to pray, and to come to church. It's just a delight. David said, I was glad when they said unto me, let us go to the house of the Lord. But to the heathen, it's a chore. But he's telling the heathens. Do what I said, do! And I'll make it a delight unto you. The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the... Not man, but the Sabbath. The Sabbath was made for man to observe the worship of his Creator, God, and to rest from the six days of labor. I'm telling you, if we want this nation to be repaired, if we want to see things happen again, we need to see six days of labor returned and one day of worshiping God. Let men become moral men, men of character. Do away with the sodomites and the opening of the stores on the Lord's day. Return to the Sabbath. There's always been a great revival when men get hungry and they start hurting. Always. You can read all through the Old Testament Scriptures, as we're doing on Sunday night, by the way. And we will have a test, I understand, tonight about the Ten Commandments. One way or another, I'm going to get flogged out there on the oak trees. So prepare yourself for a test on the Ten Commandments tonight. If we want this nation to be repaired, And we want this nation to turn back to God, then the Bible says that judgment starts where? In the house of the Lord. Until you and I start doing what He said to do. Why do you think God said we're a peculiar people? We're supposed to be peculiar. People are supposed to look at us strange. We're not supposed to go to the store on the Lord's Day. For me to be seen at Walmart on the Lord's Day ought to be a shame and a disgrace. Why? Because it's the Lord's Day. It's not my day of pleasure. It's not grocery shopping day for gleeing. It's the Lord's Day. Our holy day, he says, read that one more time. I know my time's up. If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day. Let's see, is there any big words in there? Pleasure, that's not a big word. Sabbath is a day of rest. Nothing hard to understand there. We don't have to get out to 1868. You know what I mean. Dictionary there, "...from doing thy pleasure on my holy day, and called the Sabbath a delight, the holy day of the Lord." You see, the Sabbath was made... God blessed the Sabbath. It's a blessing for His people. It's not a burden. It was not made to be a burden for anybody. It's become a burden. Now y'all know how much I detest and hate the Christ Mass. You know that. But there was a time when I was a boy, in my parents' stupidity and ignorance, that we celebrated the Christ Mass and it was a wonderful time for us. We didn't get anything. You know, if me and my brother got a basketball and a basketball goal, it was hallelujah, praise the Lord, look what we got. And we'd get a candy cane and a sack full of apples and orange and maybe a piece or two of gum in there and it was a wonderful time. Didn't take it long to become a burden, did it? It's a burden to everybody now. It ought to be a burden because it's a pagan holiday. It's a worship of the devil. Saint Nick and every other ungodly thing that there is. But besides the point, this is a holy day, he says. And call the Sabbath a delight. The holy of the Lord. Honorable. and shall honor Him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words. This is the Lord's day, He says. Treat it that way. So when you and I in the Lord's house start doing God's Word, then we'll have an effect on those people around us. Yeah, they'll look at us like we're crazy, and they'll say, yeah, same way they do about the Christ Mass, as, ah, you know, that's being silly now. No it's not! It's being scriptural. You tell me why this nation's in the shape it's in. You tell me why the sodomites run in the streets. Openly! You tell me why they put Brokeback Mountain on the television and bring it into your home. You tell me why every time you pull up to a service station you hear the African boom boom boom boom boom boom. The beat of the devil, I call it. It's because we have not done what God said we here, you and I, have not done what God said to do. But if we will keep the Sabbath day, the reason it was so important for Adam to keep it, and he was an innocent man with no sin, but he had to work. and he had to keep Sabbath day. Surely fallen man like you and I, if Adam our father in his innocent state had to work six days and the Sabbath day he rested and worshipped God, surely that observance for fallen, depraved posterity of Adam is much more important for us that we keep the Sabbath day holy. I know it's not easy. Change is never easy. We've done a lot of changing here at Zion. I've done a lot of changing. And we've done a lot of changing at Zion. One, we've emptied the church. That wasn't hard to do. But changing ourselves to do what God said to do. And I told you several years ago we were going to start doing what the word of God says to do. And it never ends, does it? We just keep finding things that the Word of God says that we're supposed to do that we've never heard of before. But it's here. And it's for us. We'll stop there for today.