Please turn with me in your Bibles to Deuteronomy chapter 5. taking a brief break from our study in the book of Acts to give two weeks' attention to Scripture's teaching on the Lord's Day, Sunday, the Christian Sabbath. And then we'll spend a few weeks in the Old Testament book of Habakkuk. It's one of those short little books in the Old Testament. And there are a number of reasons for this one. It's in the Bible, so it's perfectly good for us to consider these things. Second, I think it can be helpful for us to have a little bit of a mental change of pace. We've had, I think, more than 20 sermons now in Acts, and so just get a little bit of some new territory. And in particular, in these first two sermons, for me anyway, in 2024, for us to orient ourselves around one of the foundation stones of the Christian life, gathering together on the Lord's Day to worship God. Sarah Grafton and I were on vacation the week before last, as you know, and part of what we did while we were gone in the Mississippi Delta was help my in-laws organize and move some of the items in her grandparents' house. They've recently moved to a retirement home in Ridgeland, and there's a house filled with decades and decades worth of things, and we were trying to help organize. And one of the things Sarah Grafton's grandparents did for a number of the items in their house was label them and designate them to be given to specific people. And I could give a whole host of examples of that, including this tie. Sarah Grafton's grandfather, Sonny, loves lions. So they're filled throughout the house, all these figurines of lions, lions that are bookends, decorative lions, porcelain lions, metal lions, bronze lions, silver lions, and on and on. And one of the things Papa did was label some of the lions to give to our boys. And so Camp and Mac and Jack each got a lion. It was for them, designated to be given to them by someone who loves them. God has done that for us. He's done it in a number of ways. But there is something that God has given to us that He says is for us, that was made just for us. My boys, I think, will look on those lions with affection because they were given for them. Jesus says in Mark 2.27 that the Sabbath, the Lord's Day, was made for man. God made something just for you, for people whom He loves. It's true of many things, but Jesus says it's true of Sunday, the Lord's Day. The Bible calls Sunday the Lord's Day in Revelation 1.10. It's the day in which our Lord Jesus rose from the dead. We see in the book of Acts, the church gathering over and again on the first day of the week. That was almost a name for Sunday. We gathered on the first day of the week, Acts 20, verse seven, they gathered on the first day of the week to hear preaching. First Corinthians 16, two, they gathered on the first day of the week to give for the mission of the church. It's the Christian Sabbath where God's people set one day aside in seven to rest for worship. As you're hearing me say this, there might be, I think, among us, three groups of people when I talk about the Lord's Day or the Christian Sabbath. And as a preface, I've belonged to all three of these groups at one part or another of my life. So none of this is said with any judgment and it's said with a great deal of sympathy. I'm now in the first one, but I used to belong to all three of them. First, when I speak about the Lord's Day or the Christian Sabbath, some of you might be convinced you're here and you're saying, well, yes, of course, isn't that obvious? God's people gather on Sunday, we set our work down to take up the things of God, we rest so that we can worship. Of course, that's basic, that's elementary. So you might be in that first group of the convinced. The second group of you might be the concerned. I belong to this group at one point. The Lord's day. What could be more contrary to the grace and freedom of the New Testament than a requirement to observe a particular day of rest. After all, this group would say, and again, I said this once with a great deal of conviction, don't the apostles explicitly forbid setting aside one day in seven? Isn't the Sabbath canceled? I remember hearing about people who observed Sunday as a distinct and separate day and thinking to myself, what could be more legalistic more contrary to the gospel than that. And perhaps you're in that second camp and I belong to that camp for a time. And the third of you might belong to the clueless. What in the world is he talking about? I've never heard about the Sabbath or the Lord's day. What in the world is that? And if that's you, you're in the right place. I spent most of my life in this group. Uh, But whatever group you find yourself in this morning, I hope that you will see from God's word that God calls us in His love to set one day aside each week for His worship to rest in Him. And I have one very particular goal for this week and for next week, and that's for each of you as individuals and for us together as a church more and more to love the Lord's day. I want you, and I say this without any rose-colored glasses, to look forward to Sunday the way an eight-year-old boy looks forward to a birthday party. The chief of days, to love the Lord's day. And so I want you to do that. What I want to do, I struggle to limit myself in a sermon like this because it's a topic for which I have great passion. My aim today is to lay just one brick, just one reason why you should cherish Sundays. And that is because it is a day of rest. A day of rest. And so all I want to do this morning is to show you from Scripture that there is a day of rest, and then that it is, secondly, a day of rest. That God in His kindness has given you Sundays to rest. That's it. That's the one brick that I want to lay. Well, let's pray, and then we'll read from God's Word. Our Father in Heaven, We pray that You would teach us. We pray that You would correct us. We pray, Lord, that You would cause us not only to understand Your Word, but to delight in what it says. Father, to drink deeply from the wells of blessing that You intend for us on the first day of the week. Lord, help me to be clear and simple. Help us to understand and obey. And Father, not only that, give our hearts more and more of that rest that you intend for us to enjoy. We ask in Jesus' name, amen. Let's hear the word of God, Deuteronomy 5, verses 12 to 15. This is the word of God. Observe the Sabbath day to keep it holy as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days shall you labor 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 ox or your donkey, or any of your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates, that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you. You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day. The Lord's Day is a day of rest. I want you to see first that there is a day of rest, and second, that it is a day of rest. So first, there is a day of rest. We see that very clearly here in Deuteronomy's account of the Ten Commandments. God commanded, and notice that word in verse 12, He commanded His Old Testament people, Israel, to keep the Sabbath day holy. In the Old Testament, that was the seventh day. They were to set that day aside, the last day of the week, for rest so that they would gather for the worship of God. And notice in verse 12, it wasn't something that they had invented, a mere social consensus, but something that the Lord your God commanded you. That command included, in verse 13, a call to work six days. That for God's Old Testament people, they were to work Sunday through Friday. Six days shall you labor and do all your work. But then the seventh day was to be a day of rest. Six days of labor and one day of rest. We see that in verse 14. The seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work. They were to work six days and rest one, looking forward throughout their week to that day of rest that God had given. So he commanded his Old Testament people, Israel, to observe this day of rest. But this command did not begin with God's Old Testament people, Israel, in the time of Moses. It stretched even further back. Moses, the Lord rather, makes this clear in the Exodus version of the Ten Commandments, in Exodus 20, where God tells Moses, remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Why, boys and girls, for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them, and he rested the seventh day. That this call to set aside one day each week began not just with Moses at Mount Sinai, but all the way back in creation. patterned after God's work, creating all things by the Word of His power in six days, and resting on the seventh. We see the climax, in some ways, of creation in Genesis 2, after God had made everything, before man fell into sin. We see in Genesis two, one through three, thus the heavens and the earth were finished and all the host of them. And on the seventh day, God finished his work that he had done. And he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy because he rested on it. God rested from all his work that he had done in creation. So it goes back all the way to creation. I ought to tell you, God has something for you that is for rest, holiness, and blessing. Does that sound like something positive and very good or something negative and dark and cold? I think the former. So he commanded his people, Israel, to keep the seventh day holy, but that goes all the way back to creation. It's a creation ordinance. But it doesn't just stop in the Old Testament. It not only goes back to creation, it also goes forward into the New Testament. In Luke 6, verse 5, Jesus says, I, the Son of Man, am the Lord of the Sabbath. I don't think Jesus intended to cancel the day if he called himself the Lord of it. There are certainly many changes from the Old Testament observance of this one day and seven to the new. Jesus purified the day. You remember how the Pharisees had added man-made restrictions to the Sabbath day and Jesus exploded them. He was walking in a field with his disciples. He plucked grain, rubbed them between his fingers. And there were people who wanted to condemn him for rubbing grain between his fingers on the Sabbath day. And Jesus said, even David ate the bread in a time of necessity from the tabernacle. There are all sorts of ordinary things that you need to do like eat. Drive your car and take care of your children and on and on you go on Sundays or in his case Saturday He also said it's a day for mercy you remember boys and girls how there was a man with a withered hand and The Pharisees were very concerned. What is Jesus going to do? It's the Sabbath He told the man stretch out your hand because the Sabbath is a day for doing good and So Jesus purified the day by exploding all of these man-made rules and regulations that the Pharisees had added and God had not commanded in any way. Not only that, Jesus removes all of the aspects of the day that were unique to Moses and Israel. We don't offer the sacrifices that were offered on the Sabbath day. We don't go through the types of rituals of worship that the Old Covenant had on the Sabbath day. The same condemnation that's given to Sabbath breakers in the Old Testament is now pronounced in the New Testament on God's people. And that's why you see, for example, in Romans 14.5, Paul warning against those who try to count the Old Testament Sabbath as a special unique day. Or in Galatians 4.10, or Colossians 2.16, everything that was unique to Israel and Moses, Jesus has removed. He's changed the day. From the day of the completion of creation, the seventh day, to the day of completion of salvation, the first day, the day of Jesus' resurrection from the dead. So the now God's people don't work looking forward to rest, God's people work having begun with rest, the rest of Jesus' victory over death. He's changed the name of the day. In the New Testament, the day is called the Lord's day, a day about Jesus Christ. And it is the only New Testament holiday commanded to be observed in the church. Sometimes it's easier to hear these things in January than it is in December. Well, it's certainly profitable for us to reflect on Jesus' death, resurrection, birth. There's no scriptural command to observe Easter or Christmas, and certainly no scriptural command to observe Lent or Advent. But there is a scriptural command to gather together on the day of Christ's resurrection, the Lord's day, and worship Him. There's a great deal of change. There's also continuity. The moral principle that began at creation before the fall that God's people set aside one day in seven continues. That we rest from our work to worship God. That's exactly what we see in the New Testament. On the day when Jesus was raised from the dead. What do we find the disciples doing in John 20, 19? We find them gathered together. In Acts 20, verse 7, what does the early apostolic church do on Sunday, on the first day of the week? They gather to hear the teaching of the apostles. Interestingly, in Acts 20, verse 7, they're gathered together in the evening. They gather together to give. 1 Corinthians 16, 2. To set aside some of what God had given them to bless the church, their own congregation, and the mission of the church beyond their walls. So while there's a great deal of change from the Old Testament to the New, there's also a great deal of continuity. This principle that one day in seven is to be set aside for God's worship so that we may rest. There is a day of rest. Now, before we move on to emphasizing the rest of the rest, I want us to ask a question as we think about this scriptural obligation to set aside one day in seven for the Lord. And that's this. Have you reckoned with God's commandment to set aside one day for his worship? This commandment has not been canceled. It's not a mere past tradition, a factor of the way life used to be in the 1950s when all the shops were closed. It's not a mere aspiration. It would be really nice if we could do that. Imagine if you applied that logic to any of the other nine commands. I often meet with couples for premarital counseling. Suppose I was meeting with them and speaking to them about the seventh commandment. And I said to them, the seventh commandment, you shall not commit adultery. That is a really good mark to aim at, something to which you should aspire. Don't get too worried if you can't actually achieve it. Sure, there's all sorts of concerns, other lusts and attractions to grab your eyes and your affection. So you should aspire to the seventh commandment in your marriage, but don't get too worked up if you can't keep it. Have any of you entered into a marriage with that stated purpose? And yet I think so often that's how we approach the fourth commandment. This would be a great idea if only it were possible. But have you reckoned with Scripture's teaching that God commands you to set one day aside for rest. That's what His Word says, that this is a command of the Lord to rest for worship, that Christ, who is Lord of time and salvation, calls this day mine. I want you to think about that. It's the way you plan your week, and the way you spend your time, and especially how you spend this day. Does the fourth commandment hold sway over your decisions? And if it doesn't, praise God in His word, He calls us to repent, and promises forgiveness, and help to walk in new obedience. So there is a day of rest. But second, I want you to see that it is a day of rest. I must say, I have such a burden when I preach to you about the Sabbath day, for you to see it as something positive. Something that you hunger for and long for, not a list of dark don'ts. Yes, there are don'ts. Just like in your marriage, when you marry someone, you say no to a whole host of other people because you say yes to someone you love. And the same thing in the Lord's day, we say no to some things so we can say yes to the best thing. Boys and girls, if you're out on the playground and you have two hands full of those ubiquitous pebbles that find their way into our washing machines and our dryers and our floors, everywhere they go, if you have two hands, boys and girls, filled with pebbles, and I want to bring you a Hershey's candy bar that's this big, have you ever seen those, boys and girls? What do you have to do to take hold of the candy bar? You've got to put down the pebbles. It's the same thing on the Lord's day. We set some things down, even good things, so that we can take up the best thing. And here, God tells us we take up rest. Rest. Rest. How many of God's people need rest? Our text in Deuteronomy tells us that the Lord's day is intended to be a day of rest for your body. Verses 13 and 14. We give ourselves to work six days of the week. But in our case, the first day of the week, the Lord's day is a day of rest. A day when we allow our bodies to rest from the work and the labor that God has called us to the rest of the week. To set that aside, to take that burden off of our back at God's instruction. And to rest. To let our minds rest. Our bodies rest to set aside the normal work of life. This is especially important for students. I say this as a word of personal testimony and giving thanks to God. I don't know how I would have made it through graduate school if I did study on Sundays. I was so thankful every week to know that I couldn't pick up a book about 19th century Mississippi history on the Lord's day. But even if I had to stay up late on Saturday or get up early on Monday, there's a day when God said, David, that's not a book you need to pick up today. And I know many other students, you might think it's impossible. I have to work on Sunday. You don't. I can give you many examples of that because God loves you and wants you to rest. And he doesn't just call you to let your body rest from your physical, from your normal six week work, but also to allow others to rest. We see that in verse 14. God is explicit here. It's not just you that needs to rest. Now in this agrarian economy, we have rest for donkeys, we have rest for oxen, we have rest for livestock. But not only that, notice in verse 14, rest for servants. God says, I don't just want you to rest. I want the people that you depend on throughout the week to rest too. While most of us don't have servants who live with us or who are regular parts of our life, there are all sorts of people out and about at stores and restaurants and things like this who work for us throughout the week. And we want them to rest. God says, let them rest. Let them rest. If they're to be here, we can't expect them to be there. And we need to let them rest on the Lord's day by leaving those types of buying and selling and so on for the other six days of the week, preparing ourselves beforehand. We have six days to take care of that kind of transacting. And that's a day to let others rest too. So rest for your body. The second rest for your soul, rest for your soul. I wonder how many Christians there are who feel like they're on a constant hamster wheel, perhaps waiting for some vacation or some big thing out into the future. Vacations are a wonderful gift from God, but whose regular life is a life of constant strain until some release. Perhaps it's self-medication with alcohol. Or perhaps it's just going and going and going and going and going until collapse. When God made us to have a day off one day a week. That's how He made us. Rest for your soul. I want you to see here in this rest for your soul, five different ways that God gives rest to our souls on Sunday. First, Sunday is a day of rest from guilt. Jesus was raised from the dead on the first day of the week. And Paul, in Romans 4.25, says that Jesus was raised for our justification. That is, Sunday is the weekly reminder that Jesus has paid for all your sins. Sunday is God's weekly reminder that your debt has been canceled. That there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because He died and rose from the dead. And God has so structured the Christian life, that He doesn't want you to get more than six days away from a whole day of resting in the knowledge that your sins are forgiven. How many go about their lives plagued and weighed down by the guilt of sin, and God in His love wants you to be just a few days away from the proclamation that you are free in Christ from your sins. Free from guilt because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. That's the rest that the Lord's day proclaims to you. Second, freedom from ignorance. In Acts 20 verse seven, the apostle Paul was preaching. This is an interesting story because someone ends up falling asleep during the sermon, falling out of a window. Um, and uh, thankfully that at least the second half, uh, hasn't happened here. We don't want anybody falling. But on the Lord's day, the church gathered to hear God's Word. Hasn't it been your experience? It's been mine when we gather together in Sunday school or for worship. One of the elders teaches from Scripture and there's light that you didn't have before. Or a piece of information from Scripture that helps you to face something that perplexed you. It's a day filled with God's Word so that we might have rest in our souls from the ignorance of unbelief. Rest for your soul from guilt. Rest for your soul from ignorance. Rest from your soul from the things of this world. Now I'm not, this is not a sort of Pollyanna view here. I have four children. I understand how challenging it is to get everybody dressed and out the door and ready to go and then back again in the evening and all of these different things. I get that, right? Where's the shoe? Didn't you have that sweater on? Why is there a stain on that shirt? Are we going to make it on time? So I'm not unrealistic about that. But in Hebrews 4 verse 9, the author of the Hebrews tells us that we're still waiting for the rest of heaven, the final and full rest that we'll enjoy in the presence of Jesus Christ. But the Lord's day is a day when we get to taste that rest. When we get to sit and let our hearts marinate in the presence of Jesus Christ and in the promise of heaven. rest from guilt, rest from ignorance, rest from the things of this earth, and rest from isolation and discouragement. I want you to turn with me to Hebrews 10. Hebrews 10, verses 24 and 25. Why should you love the Lord's day? It's a day of rest for your soul, rest from isolation and discouragement. Hebrews 10, 24 and 25. Let us consider how to stir one another up. to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another. And all the more as you see the day drawing near." Why did God give us Sundays to rest? So that you could be encouraged. Notice how the author of Hebrews in these two verses connects gathering together on the one hand and encouraging one another on the other. Why do we get together? so that you can help each other. And I think you can give many testimonies to that, as can I, in the moments before and after the worship service, as we're walking to our cars, as we're visiting in the grass out in front, when a Christian promises to pray for you, or says she will check in during the week, or gives you a word of encouragement that reminds you you're not running the race alone. And God has given us the Lord's day to break us out of isolation and discouragement in the Christian life so that we may encourage one another. Rest from discouragement. And then fifth and finally, rest from fear. Rest from fear. There are two places in the New Testament that make this point so beautifully. One is John 20, 19 and 20. On the evening of the first resurrection day in Luke 20, verses 19 and 20, John tells us this, on the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked, where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, peace be with you. When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples were glad. when they saw the Lord. There are all sorts of reasons to be afraid in this life. There are many scary things in the world that are legitimately scary. And the disciples had all sorts of reasons to be afraid here. They didn't know what had happened to Jesus. The Jews who had killed their Messiah surely would come after them next. And Jesus comes to them in that room, in their fear, and he says to them, peace. And then what does He do? It's extraordinary. He does exactly what He does to us in the preaching of the Gospel and the Lord's Supper. He comes to His people who have all sorts of reasons to be afraid, and He looks at them and He says to them, look at My hands. Look at My side. I died for you, and I'm alive. And then in Revelation 1, one of my favorite verses in the whole Bible, The great apostle John had a vision. Listen, boys and girls, to the way John describes what he saw of the Lord Jesus. Walking amidst the lamb stands, one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and a golden sash around his chest, the hairs of his head like white wool, like snow, his eyes like a flame of fire, his feet like burnished bronze refined in a furnace, his voice like the roar of many waters, and his face shining like the sun in full strength. And John, godly John, who had laid his head on Jesus' breast, who had seen the miracles, who had met with the risen Christ. John the apostle, when he saw the vision of the glorious Savior, fell down on his face as though dead. And what did Jesus say to him? John tells us, Jesus came to me and put his right hand, the same hand that holds the seven stars. And he came to me and he put his hand on me. And he said, don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. All sorts of reasons to be afraid. John was exiled on the Isle of Patmos. The church was being persecuted. He fought against temptation within and opposition without. And Jesus says, remember, with everything that's going on in your life, that I hold the keys of death and hell, and I am for you. It's a day of rest from fear, a day of rest for your soul, a day of rest for your body. So I wanna conclude by saying, quoting, paraphrasing what the prophet Malachi said in Malachi 3, verse 10. Malachi wasn't talking about the Sabbath, he was talking about giving, tithing, But as Malachi called the people of God to give to the work of the church in the Old Testament, God said to them, put me to the test. Put me to the test. This is what God says to you. Put me to the test. See if I will do what I say. And I want to say that to you this morning, as we begin a new year together, hear the Lord say to you, put me to the test. If you set the Lord's day apart, see, if God will give you more rest. Come to Sunday school. Come to morning worship. Come to evening worship. Check on one another on the Lord's Day. Receive and give. Hospitality. Set the day apart. And hear God say to you, test Me in this, and see if you do as I have commanded, whether I will give what I have promised, And that might mean some hard decisions. Saying no to some things and yes to some others. Coming out again in the evening or changing the habits that you have week by week. But God made this day for you to bless you and to give you rest. It's a day named by the Lord. The Lord's Day. And it's a day filled with the Lord. You remember what Jesus said in Matthew 11, verse 28? Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. And isn't it fitting that a day whose name is the Lord is a day of rest? Let us pray. Oh God, we pray that you would help us by your grace, not for self-righteousness, not for pride, but that you would help us for our own good and for your glory to honor this Lord's day. And Lord, we pray that you would fill our lives with that spiritual rest. We know the final rest will only be in heaven. And yet, oh God, we pray that your people would know you more and more to be the lifter of their head, the bearer of their burdens. the one who says, come unto me and cast your cares at my feet. Oh God, even today, give us a taste of that rest, in Jesus' name, amen.