Well, good evening again tonight. The text for our worship this evening will be from the Laws of Moses in the Book of Torah in Exodus chapter 20. So please turn a copy of the scripture with me to Exodus chapter 20 verses 8. to 11, Exodus chapter 20. And if you're using the Bible that is under your chair, it will be on page 61, page 61. During this season, we are studying the Ten Commandments. And as we have studied so far, the Ten Commandments is way more than just the most influential legal documents in human history. The backdrop of the Ten Commandments It's God's glorious creations and loving redemption. So when we come to learn and keep the 10 commandments, especially the fourth commandments tonight, we should come with an attitude of, what can I get the most out of it? Instead of, what can I get away with? That's often our attitude with the 10 commandments. And if we have an attitude of what can we get the most out of it with this curious, humble, and grateful attitude, we will find more rest than burden. Let us come rest in the Lord our God by hearing his law from Exodus chapter 20. Verses one to 17, I'll read verses eight to 11 again for our study tonight. And I'll be reading from the English Standard Version. This is the word of God. And God spoke all these words, saying, "'I am the Lord your God who brought you "'out of the land of Egypt, "'out of the house of slavery. "'You shall have no other gods before me. "'You shall not make for yourself a carved image "'or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above "'or that is in the earth beneath "'or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain. Remember, the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labour and do all your work. But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male servant or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God has given you. You shall not murder, You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's. Verses 8 to 11 again. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days you shall labour and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you or your son, or your daughter, or your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock. or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the Word of our God shall stand forever. Amen. Let us come to the Lord and ask Him to illuminate our hearts as we rest in His Word. O Lord our God, we have come to this day that belongs to you, this holy day. And so may your holy word pierce our hearts and bring us rest so that we will clearly hear and obey your words and see the rest that is found in Jesus Christ alone. We pray this in the name of Jesus. Amen. If you look at this first part of the Ten Commandments, you see the first trinity of no. You shall have no. You shall not. You shall not. The first commandment is about the object of our worship. The second commandment is about the manner of our worship. And the third commandment is about the degree or depth of our worship. We should exalt the Lord our God alone by representing Him faithfully in our words and our deeds and in our thoughts. But then after these three no's, these strings of no's, God suddenly shift from the strings of negatives to a positive command. You shall not. You shall have no. You shall not. You shall not then. Remember. Remember. Remember what? It is as if there was something that we have forgotten, or this is something That is easily, that can be easily forgotten. And it is. In the ancient Near East, even today, people follow the stars to order their calendar. A sunrise and a sunset are a day. Months goes by, lunar eclipse. A year, or a solstice, goes by the earth, rotates around the sun, but a week, A Sabbath can only be seen in God's word and order. It's easy to forget because it cannot be seen by the natural eyes. It is a God-centered calendar. However, though we order our lives after the pattern of the sky and the celestial bodies, we don't order our lives after the Lord's pattern. God commanded, remember, because we have forgotten the need to depend on the Lord as the true God and Creator. Our forgetfulness and dismissal of this command has made us more restless. It's such a serious problem that God elaborated this command, making this command the most mentioned command, and arguably the most controversial commandment in the whole scriptures. We somehow want to fight rest. Israel was even condemned to exile because they refused. to rest. I mean, how stupid was that? They were exiled because they wouldn't rest. And yet, it is what we do. We forget, and we're prone to forget our need to depend on God. We have been so devoid of depending on God that we become restless. And we wonder what's wrong with our society. We seem so prosperous in our nation, yet we are so chaotic and restless because the predominant Christian populations in our nations, or even in our church, refuse to commit this whole day to the Lord, refuse to commit to rest and depend on God for just one whole day. This is not the majority of our church. here tonight. In the time of Exodus, the climax of our restlessness, the climax of restlessness is slavery under Pharaoh. And nowadays, it's slavery under the grips of the world. We either let the world enslave us to the point of being unable to trust God and rest in Him for just one day, or the world doesn't give us enough resources or time that we have to take some, if not all, of the Lord's day to work. No wonder Christians today become less and less set apart from the world. Because even Sunday looks just like any other day. So this command, this fourth commandment is the Lord setting the Christians, setting his people apart again. It is reminding us to order our lives by surrendering our work and rest to the Lord alone. We are to surrender our lives. We're to order our lives by surrendering our work and rest to the Lord alone. We're to order our lives by surrendering our work and rest to the Lord alone. And that means we order our lives by celebrating the Lord's salvation, by cultivating the Lord's restoration, and by communicating the Lord's creation. We're to order our lives by surrendering our work and rest to the Lord. That means we celebrate the Lord's salvation, We cultivate the Lord's restoration, and we communicate the Lord's creation. So first, we celebrate the Lord's salvation. Look at the first part. Look at the first part of the fourth commandment, verses eight to 10. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. "'Six days you shall labour and do all your works, "'but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. "'On it you shall not do any work.'" There are mainly four commands here in this one big commandment. Remember? Keep it holy, shall labour, shall not work. So it seems like a lot, but these four hangs on this one phrase, a Sabbath to the Lord your God. How did these people under Mount Sinai get to enter the day that belongs to the true God alone, with God using his personal name, Lord your God. As I have mentioned and emphasized again and again, don't forget about salvation by grace alone first. Verses one and two, the gospel according to Moses. I am the Lord. This only happens because I am the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. They get to enter this day that belong to the Lord, their God, The Lord their God brought them out of slavery and make them his people. But what slavery were they dealing with? One thing you would notice about this Ten Commandments so far is that they hadn't really had to do anything yet. Even though it's a command, they haven't had to do anything yet. Just take a quick glance in the first four commands here. In Egypt, they were enslaved to serve multiple gods. So forget about resting, because you have to serve so many gods. And God came along with one command, just one God. He didn't even use the word serve. Forget about multiple gods, you only have one God. Well, that makes their job a lot easier now. And because there were multiple gods, they had to make tons of idols. So definitely forget about resting. By the way, they weren't working either. Making and serving idols is not working. It's sinning. Every sin is idolatrous. And that's why any sin, any violation of the Ten Commandments is a violation of the Fourth Commandment, because this commandment also says, you shall work for six days, not sin in one of those days. The Israelites have been enslaved to sin, making and serving idols. And God came along with a second commitment and said, stop that, don't even bother with making idols. What a relief. And also all the gods in Egypt has specific characteristic that the people need to carry. Ra, the sun, or the eye of Horus, And God said in the third commandment, just use my name faithfully, name. I have an object to carry, it's word. Use my name faithfully. And last, the fourth, the climax of it all. For 400 plus years, the Israelites toiled in suffering. As I mentioned, they weren't working, they were sitting. They were just doing stuff that would never bring them rest. and that will never bring them profits. And they were toiling and suffering, and if they rest, the toiling triples. Now, imagine if you were one of the Israelites, and God saved you from years of toiling, and then He said, remember, you get a weekly vacation, there will be a call of celebration. People will be praising, rejoicing, gathering, and feasting with the saviors and with all those whom the saviors have saved because God has delivered His people and separated them from their oppressors. And today, there's a greater call for celebration. In Jesus Christ, He has done what the Sabbath couldn't. He has separated us from the stings of death and delivered us from the penalty of sin. We're no longer slaves in Christ, yet many of us here live as if we are not, live as if we have not received a greater salvation. Acting like slaves, we still show the final identity in worldly pursuits. enslaving ourselves in worldly pursuits. I need more money. I need more training. I need better grades. And I ask, who is your Redeemer? Take just one day off in trusting God and rest in your Savior. I've seen many families that will replace this day of rest, this day of salvation, with more practices, with more competitions, with more games, with more schools. Certainly, the future of our children is important. But who is their true God and Savior? And these parents wonder why their kids leave the faith after they graduate. They can't even keep, gratefully keep one whole day for the Lord. Why would they lay their whole life before the Lord? During the week, our days are already devoid of studying the scriptures, praying, confessing our faith and sin, resting, worshiping, and fellowshipping. Because these six days, these weekdays, these days are filled with ordinary and worldly work. So don't fill the Lord's day with more ordinary and worldly works. Celebrate this day. It's a day of salvation. And while celebrating, I would also like to advise our parents here. Don't scream at your children all the way to church. Make this day restful and enjoyable. Yes, you may all be late to church, but your God who saves you loves you. Make this day enjoyable. And you kids have been yelled at the whole week already, this week. Make it exciting. care for their souls with truth and grace. Don't let sin, especially anger, enter this day of rest. Be excited to celebrate the day of salvation with the Lord and all His saints. We are to order our lives by surrendering our work and rest to the Lord, our God alone. And that means we celebrate the Lord's salvation. Second, we We cultivate the Lord's restoration. We cultivate the Lord's restoration. I'll continue to finish verse 10 with me here. On it, you shall not do any work. You, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. After God delivered Israelites, he began to restore them from the identity of slavery by just showing up for them every single day. Before this chapter, before this fourth commandment, in Exodus chapter 16, the Lord blessed his people with bread from heaven. He even doubled the portion on the sixth day so that they can rest on the seventh day. And the Israelites, what did they do? They still went out and gathered, and they found nothing. We will not rest. We will not cease to work unless the Lord commanded us to stop. We need to stop to cultivate God's restorative blessings. Israel will need to stop and remember God's blessing. And as they remember, they also expand this blessing. So you see this command, and it shifts to loving your neighbors. The force, if you understand how The outline of this law is that the first four is about loving God, and the last six is about loving your neighbors. But in the fourth commandment, you begin to see the shift from loving God to loving your neighbors. In the gates of the saved, no one should do any work, not even the livestock. If you have any doubt, Whether John there should work, just look at the little puppy. That puppy can't even work. The saved ought to extend rest to others. They either let others rest or help others rest. In a sense, helping others to rest is not an ordinary worldly work. It's an extraordinary and godly works of bringing God's rest. And that is lawful. That is what we call the extraordinary work of necessity. There are works of necessity that relates to preserving rest. Someone, I mean, Someone had to keep the gates up to keep the family and sojourners to rest in there. As Jesus taught, the Sabbath was made for men, not men for the Sabbath. For example, it is lawful for security or law enforcement to protect rest, because crimes doesn't take a break. Or for ministers to bring others to remember the Lord, the true rest. on the Lord's day. Now, if everyone is not working, what are they doing? Nothing? No. The Bible gives no space for laziness. Rather, they're gathering. None of them are working, they're gathering. God saved his people to be with them. And we gather to worship because that's where the Lord attends. This day is not just a holiday, it is the holy day of the Lord. So how do we cultivate this day of restoration? First, You need to stop and remember. Don't even think about possibly being behind on your work. Remember that your Savior will take care of you. I begin to practice that towards the end of my college years. At first, it was hard. There would be a paper due on Monday, or a final comes around on Monday. But thankfully, I had a professor. He would not give any assignments or any tests on a Monday, because he was a student before. He knew that he would do it all the day before. He knew that's what we would do, so he wouldn't assign it. So we won't do any work for his class. So I begin to practice on every other class. At first, it was hard. But I actually truly begin to rest, because I already committed, I'm not going to think about it. I'm not going to study, so I'm not going to think about it. I actually rested. Yes, I have a book to read. A 500 book to read in seminary that is due on Monday, I didn't know about it. Boy, I passed and I'm now here. And I did put down zero percent. And the Lord is gracious. He'll get you through it. Repent of your sin, repent of your laziness, and he'll get you through it. Cast your burden onto the Lord. And second, join his people. As you rest and you join his people, don't be self-reliant, picking just any day for yourself and for your own pleasure, and think that that's keeping this command. The Lord saved his people from slavery, and it was slavery that was keeping the people apart. Now come and gather, because you're saved to gather. Third, this is with common sense, to be able to gather and worship and rest well, you need sleep. Getting better at resting comes with getting better at planning. That's why you will never see our church gather at three or four o'clock in the morning because you need to sleep. Yes, Logan could preach longer, but no one would show up. On the other hand, that also means that you shouldn't be staying up all night either. So you can prepare yourself to rest. With that in mind, fourth, we strive. not just the day before, but the whole week before. Rest from your sin, strive to stop sinning, and prepare yourself during the whole week so that you can get better and enjoying the Lord more and more on this day. And last, we help others. to experience rest. The Israelites, they were sojourners. That means wherever they travel, that gate of rest goes with them. Wherever you go, you ought to be bringing rest to other people, not having them to work for you, not paying them for service. Instead of going to restaurants after worships, or going to watch a game after worship, be hospitable. Invite others over. Feed them. Or bring food to the shut-ins who desperately need your company. A lot of them haven't seen their children and their grandchildren. They'd love to see your family to eat with them. On that day, visit them. If you're an employer, close it. Shut it down. This is the day of the Lord. Invite your employees to enjoy. The day that God restores his people. Remember in Exodus what Pharaoh said. He says, keep the Israelites working so they pay no attention to the truth. Is that what you want to become if you're an employer? And just look at what happened to Pharaoh and his family at the 10th plague. How God severely judged Pharaoh for that. You do not want that kind of judgment. Bring people, bring your employees to hear God's word. and observe this glorious Lord's Day. We are to order our lives by surrendering our works and rest to the Lord. That means we celebrate the Lord's salvation, we cultivate the Lord's restoration, and last, we communicate. the Lord's creation. We communicate the Lord's creation. We last look at God communicating to us the reason for this command in verse 11. Look at verse 11 with me. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore, The Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. This commandment begins with remember, because it was pointing to Israel, it was pointing to Israelites to look back, not just look back to Exodus 16, or look back to the whole event in Exodus. No, he was pointing them to look back to the very beginning. And it turns out the fourth commandment wasn't made for the Israelites, it wasn't made for the Christians, it was made for everyone, all men. It's a creational order. In six days, the Lord brought all things into existence and order. And He rested on the seventh day by blessing it and making it holy. That means God separated that day from the ordinary and the worldly to the extraordinary and the godly. It's sad that Many people in our generation, or today, have FOMO. They have the fear of missing out. So they will choose this day of gathering with the Lord and skip on it. They'll choose to skip on this day. No, this is the day. This is the one day that you should be afraid of missing out because it's the most blessed day. It's the day the divine has specially blessed. And this is the day you should be afraid of missing out on. This is the best day. I get excited to come and celebrate every day for it. And it's the best day because when God gave Israel this command and pointed them to the creation, He was bringing them back to Eden, to the time when the Lord and true rest was there. He was making them into His image again, to reflect His pattern. We work. because God worked. You see? This is what the image of God does. We reflect his pattern, and we rest because he rested. Entering this day of rest communicates new creational glory. However, the sad reality is that we, is that while is that we never enter into that rest because of sin. The whole creation was put into exile because sin separated man from God. While God rested, no one did. And that's why Israel had to keep to keep repeating this pattern and all of us have to keep repeating this pattern all of us have to keep toiling hoping to reach that seventh day of rest only to have it slip away from us the next day the eighth day or the first day of the week And we will just keep going back and forth in this cycle until the day we die. And death is not rest. People say rest in peace, but the reality is there is no rest in death. So how can this cycle be stopped? The only way this cycle can be stopped, the only hope, is if God step out of His rest and conquer our death. And by His grace, He did. In Jesus Christ, the Lord our God came and took on flesh. And on that mournful eighth day, the first day of the week, 2,000 years ago, Jesus rose from the dead. And after that resurrection, especially after the Pentecost, the apostles begin to hold worship and fellowship on Sunday. As B.B. Warfield wonderfully put it, Christ took the Sabbath into the grave with Him and brought the Lord's day out of the grave with Him on the resurrection morning. In Jesus Christ, we no longer work for six days and wait for the day of rest to come. No, we have entered into eternal rest through Jesus Christ. In Him, you have eternal life. You have it now. So you have entered into eternal rest through Jesus Christ. That means you begin the day of rest on the first day of the week. And when Monday rolls around, that does not mean that you're stepping out of rest. That means that you're taking Jesus's great commission and expand that rest in the name of God to the ends of the earth. Because Jesus has conquered death, he has begun a new creation, and he's putting all things under his feet. Now, some people would argue that, well then that means that this commandment is no longer applicable to us because every day is the Lord's day. And we don't need to bother with Sunday anymore, or even the Sabbath. Because every day is the Lord's day. That is not realistic. Because that can only be a reality when the Lord returns. To say that every day is the Lord's day is to say that no day is the Lord's day. People who treat the Lord's day like that eventually just become worldly. We cannot have the day of rest to be every day until the new heaven and the new earth. And to do that is to have an over-realized eschatology. No, before Jesus returns, we faithfully and humbly observe the Lord's day as He ordained, and let that day set us apart as we enter the world. with the hope of rest. So how do we communicate the new creational rest as found in Jesus Christ alone? We put our faith in Christ by going to Christ and meet Him there on Sunday, the whole day. And we also reign, rule with Christ Jesus did extraordinary and godly works to make all things new. It wasn't just a work of necessity, but also the work of charity that is lawful. Jesus healed. He fed. He visited. He forgave. And ultimately, he was sacrificial. So it's not just lawful, but encouraged that we follow Jesus' pattern. We follow his works of making all things new. Let us sacrificially, humbly bring rest by healing the sick, feeding the poor, protecting the weak, visiting the troubled, inviting the rejected, and forgiving the unforgiven. We are to order our lives by surrendering our work and rest to the Lord our God alone. That means we celebrate the Lord's salvation, we cultivate the Lord's restoration, and we communicate the Lord's new creation. Now I'm not saying this is easy. Like every other command, this is hard to keep. And I break it every single day. Our sin render us useless and restless. So how then can we keep this commandment? If we're breaking it all the time, how can we keep it? We repent. We turn to the Lord of the Sabbath, Jesus Christ. Are you looking to, are you looking for rest? Are you restless? Is your sin weighing you down? Then find rest in Jesus Christ, turn to Him, and all who labor and are heavy laden. And He will give you rest. Take His yoke upon you and learn from Him. For He is gentle and lowly in heart. And you will find rest for your souls. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Let us pray. O Lord our God, as we come before you, we humbly submit to you and confess our sin to you. For we, as your people, have grossly violated this commandment every single day. You told us that we shall work for six days, yet we sin in those days. We are unfaithful in those days, in our laziness, in our lies, in our idolatry. And on the day that you call us to rest in you and keep it holy, we make it into a day that is for ourself, not a Sabbath to the Lord our God. And we make it a day of more labor. So Lord, forgive us and restore the joy of our salvation that we will celebrate and enjoy this day. And we'll enjoy so much that we'll want to bring it to others. Help us to rest, to turn to You. And that we can more and more depend on You and trust in You and expand our rest to the ends of the earth. And we pray, oh Lord, that You will come quickly, come bring the consummation of Sabbath with the new heaven and new earth. Pray this in Jesus' name, amen. Let us respond to God's call.