Exodus 20, I'll read the fourth commandment, verses eight through 11. Here now, God's holy word. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy? Six days you shall labor, do all your work. The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work, you nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant. nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it." Turn also to Colossians chapter 2. Colossians chapter 2, page 749 in your pew Bible. I'll read two verses So we continue to go through the epistle to, Paul's epistle to the Colossians. We come to these two verses last week, and we're gonna look at them again. Colossians 2, verse 16 and 17. So let no one judge you in food or in drink regarding a festival or a new moon or Sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ. Thus far, the reading of God's holy word. A couple days ago, my wife and I and the kids were in our van and we were driving to the Archer's house for the prayer meeting we had on last Wednesday night. We were excited to be there. We got to meet the Sharptons and they pulled up at the same time we did. I got out of the car and got Benaiah, and my wife got the food, and we were just chatting. The kids ran out and went inside to play, and we were talking with the Sharpens, first time to meet them. And so we went inside, and we were just excited to enjoy fellowship, and we'd probably been there for 10 minutes. The kids, of course, were playing, and I don't know all the details, but I just remember my wife turning to me, kind of flustered, And she says, Thomas is in the car. Thomas had fallen asleep. He does this. It's our fault, of course, as parents. But he fell asleep, and we thought he'd gotten out of the car. And so I stopped my conversation, and I ran out there. And of course, it's dark, and he's alone. And the closer I got to the van, the more and more I could hear his voice. He was crying. And not only was he crying, but he was saying, Daddy, Daddy. And I opened up the side door, and I grabbed him. He had his arms wide open. He was just crying. And I specifically remember saying to him, Thomas, I'm so sorry. I didn't know. I didn't know. Sorry, Thomas. I just didn't know. I felt so bad and the idea is that there are times when all that matters is to simply know that you have a need to do something. Sometimes all that matters is to simply know that you have a need to do something. When it comes to God's Word and the laws of God, something that we need to know, something that we need to grow in our knowledge of Christ is to know what God has commanded us to do. And one of those laws that is often not known by God's people is the fourth commandment. It's the Sabbath. I remember being newly married to my wife having grown up in a reformed church, not knowing about the Sabbath, thought it was a Jewish thing, and we moved to Savannah, Georgia, I was in the army, and my pastor preached on the Sabbath, and I remember just thinking to myself, I didn't know, I thought it was Jewish, I thought it was a ceremony. And perhaps, to some degree, that's your mind, your mindset. The Sabbath may be a little hazy for you, This morning we're going to take a look at the Sabbath and the fact that there is still a Sabbath and on what day we are to observe that. Like I said, we come to Colossians 2, 16 and 17 in our regular preaching of the word. And this is a verse, these verses here, are often used to throw out the Sabbath, more or less, to say something to the effect that Christ has fulfilled the Sabbath. One commentator. a well-known preacher and writer. He says regarding these verses, when Christ came he fulfilled them all, referring to all the days. And then he says we no longer celebrate the Sabbath. Now, this morning, one of the things that you might have in your mind is, well, what does it mean to keep the Sabbath? That's a good question. That's really another question in this whole One other question, perhaps we can look at that in the future. What does it mean to sanctify the Sabbath? We looked at some passages already, and the basic idea is that it's a day to worship God. It's a blessed day, where to that end, God calls us not to work. And it's a whole day. The question, though, this morning is really not how to keep the Sabbath. It's that there is a Sabbath. The first question that we really need to cover I mean, is the Sabbath ceremonial? Is it Jewish? And is it done away with? Or is there still a Sabbath keeping the people of God? And my lesson for you this morning is kind of long, but this is what it is. Not only was the Sabbath not a ceremonial law, but there is still one day in seven to be kept as a holy Sabbath to the Lord, which today, which now is the first day of the week. That's what we see this morning. Not only was the Sabbath not a ceremonial law, but there's still today, one day in seven to be kept as a holy Sabbath to the Lord, which now is the first day of the week. I'm going to bring this lesson to you into three points. If you have the outline in your bulletin, it's a little bit different than what's printed there. I'm first going to cover there is still one day in seven to be kept as a holy Sabbath to the Lord. So let's look at that principle. There's four reasons for why we should understand there's still one day in seven to be kept as a holy Sabbath to the Lord. And the first reason is from its origin. It's from its origin. The Sabbath is a creation ordinance. Genesis chapter two, in the creation of the world, God established three ordinances, marriage, work, and the Sabbath. Genesis 2, I'll read three verses to you. Verse 1, Thus the heavens and the earth and all the host of them were finished. On the seventh day God ended his work which he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it he rested from all his work which God had created and made. Turn over in your Bible to Exodus 16 if you like. We see in Exodus 16 Moses with Israel and they have not arrived to Mount Sinai. They have not received the law, the Mosaic law. In Exodus 16 there is a Sabbath. Verse 22, so it was on the sixth day that they gathered twice as much bread, two omers for each one. And all the rulers of the congregation came and told Moses, And he said to them, this is what the Lord has said, tomorrow is a Sabbath rest, a holy Sabbath to the Lord. And then on verse 29, he says, for the Lord has given you the Sabbath. See, the Sabbath is something before Moses. Even in Exodus 20, the passage I read to you, God's people at that time were called to remember the Sabbath. They had already been given, they were called to remember it. And the basis for that, verse 11 of Exodus 20, was not something peculiar to Israel as those under Moses as their mediator of that covenant, that administration of the covenant of grace, but the reason is rooted in creation. Verse 11, four, why are we to keep the Sabbath? Four, in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth and the sea, et cetera. Now, in Mark chapter two, Jesus says something very interesting, and I remind you that this message is heavy on the head, heavy on doctrine, because sometimes all that matters is to know that we have a need to do something. Mark chapter 2 verse 27 Jesus is discussing the Sabbath with the Pharisees who did not rightly understand the Sabbath. We shouldn't take the Pharisees as knowing rightly what it meant. Jesus says in verse 27 of Mark 2, He said to them, the Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath. This is creation language. The Sabbath was made not for Israel, not for Moses, for all man is to be a blessing to them for rest." So we see here first that the Sabbath is a creation ordinance. Now the other reason why there's still a Sabbath is from Old Testament prophecy. The prophets prophesied of our day, the New Testament time, that there would be a Sabbath. We see that in Isaiah 56, which is page 471 in your Pew Bible. Isaiah 56, Isaiah is speaking of the New Testament time period because he's talking about the reality that foreigners and eunuchs, people who are ceremonially restricted from the temple, they're actually gonna be in a temple. They're actually gonna be worshiping, like we are. We are in a sense in a temple, even now by the spirit, and we're all foreigners. So I was talking about the New Testament time period and notice a few things about this. Isaiah 56 verse 1, I'll read a few verses. Thus says the Lord, keep justice and do righteousness for my salvation is about to come, my righteousness to be revealed. Blessed is the man who does this and son of man who lays hold on it, who keeps from defiling the Sabbath, keeps his hand from doing any evil. Verse 3 there's a reference to Farner as well as a eunuch. Verse 4 there's a reference to a eunuch who keeps my Sabbath. You'll notice Verse six, he says, also the sons of the foreigner who join themselves to the Lord to serve him, to love the name of the Lord, to be his servants, everyone who keeps from defiling the Sabbath and holds fast my covenant, even them I will bring to my holy mountain and make them joyful in my house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be accepted on my altar, for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations. So we see how the prophets foretold, they forecasted that the Sabbath would be kept in the New Testament. But thirdly, and the last reason I'll give for my first point, is that the New Testament directly commands Sabbath-keeping. The New Testament directly commands Sabbath-keeping. Hebrews chapter four, that's page 761 in your pew Bible. Hebrews chapter four, we'll look at One verse, verse nine. Now, before I look at Hebrews 4, verse nine, I wanna say something that's very important. And that is this, is that we don't need the New Testament to repeat a command from the Old in order to keep it. It's a result of faulty theology that's very prevalent. The idea, one very famous man said, the New Testament never commands Christians to observe the Sabbath. And I'm gonna explain how that's not the case, but we don't need it in the first place. I want you to think about that for a moment, very important. That idea is faulty. Think about it for a moment, I'm not trying to Be vulgar for vulgar's sake, but there's a lot of laws that are not repeated in the New Testament. Marriage laws, incest, not repeated in the New Testament. Think about the commandment to not make an image of God. That commandment, that specific statute, is not repeated in the New Testament. Think about the laws and the statutes governing marriage and parenting. Now, any book that's worth its salt on parenting or marriage is gonna be loaded with quotations from the book of Proverbs. See, we bring things over from the Old Testament unless they've been abrogated, cut off, which is, by and large, the judicial laws and the ceremonial laws. But we do have a New Testament command. And it's Hebrews 4, verse 9. I'll start in verse 8. The author of Hebrews, he writes, for if Joshua had given them rest, they would not afterward have spoken of another day. So there's another day he's gonna be speaking about. Verse nine, there remains therefore a rest for the people of God. Now the discussion here is that the word rest in verse nine means the keeping of the Sabbath. That's what it means. The King James Marginal Translation says that. Now the idea is that this word in the Greek, which is sabbatismos, is different than all the other words in this chapter that are translated rest. It's a different word, sabbatismos. In a couple of examples from the Old Testament, this is how it's used in the Old Testament. Take Leviticus 23, 32 as just one example. Now I read that passage to you. Listen to the verse again. It shall be to you a Sabbath of solemn rest, and you shall afflict your souls on the ninth day of the month at evening. From evening to evening, you shall celebrate your Sabbath. You shall sabbatismos. You shall celebrate your Sabbath. That's the idea. So it's not just a rest, or even a quote-unquote vague Sabbath rest, but a keeping of the Sabbath. And that's the basic crux of the point. There remains therefore a keeping of the Sabbath for the people of God. So, the first idea is that there still is one day in seven to be kept as a Sabbath. But because this issue is largely misunderstood, and in some cases outright rejected, we need to look at it a little closer. We need to look at it a little closer. And one of the main reasons for rejecting the Sabbath is to say that it was a ceremonial law. And I want you to think about that for a moment. Now, we've talked about it a little bit already. The idea is that it's a creation ordinance, so it continues. It's not based on Moses' law. Well, let's go to Colossians 2 verse 16. And this is where many people will say that the Sabbath was ceremonial and therefore the fourth commandment, all that it represents, is done away with. Colossians 2 verse 16. So I want you to see, secondly, that the Sabbath was not a ceremonial law. Again, Colossians 2.16 says, so let no one judge you in food or in drink regarding a festival or a new moon or Sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substances of Christ. We need to look at this verse and the way in which Paul would have intended us to look at it. That's one of the principles of interpreting our Bible. We need to become, in a sense, more Jewish. If I was to tell you that maybe during the fellowship time after the service that my wife and I and the kids, we're gonna go to L.A. We're going to enjoy the sights. You would assume that I meant that we were going to go to Los Angeles. But if I was to go on vacation, and I was in Birmingham, Alabama, and this actually happened, and I was to tell my mother that we're going to get in the car and we're going to go to LA. She would immediately think that we were going to go to Lower Alabama, south of Montgomery. It's called Lower Alabama. That's what people call it around there. And we need to realize that Paul is from Alabama. That's my illustration. Now, let me back that up a little bit. In the Old Testament, there are five places where this phrase actually comes up, set feasts, New Moons and Sabbaths. Five places, and I can give those to you. We'll look at two of them. 2 Chronicles 31.3, 2 Chronicles 2.4, 2 Chronicles 8.13, and the other three. Let me read to you two of them. 1 Chronicles 23.31, David is establishing as a prophet, like Moses, establishing worship legislation. And the priests were to do something at every presentation of a burnt offering to the Lord, on the Sabbaths, on the new moons, and on the set feasts. And of course the Greek, Old Testament, same words, same exact words. Nehemiah 10, 32 through 33. When God's people were performing worship, they came back from exile. Here's what they did. Also we made ordinances for ourselves to exact from ourselves yearly one third of a shekel for the service of the house of our God for the showbread, for the regular grain offering, for the regular burn offering, of the Sabbaths, the new moons, and the set feasts. This is a reference to the ceremonial law. What's done away with, what you are no longer required to observe, are the ceremonial Sabbaths of the Old Testament. And that would make a lot of sense. been listening to me preach this book, you'll notice that just like in Galatia, Paul has a concern for the Christians in Colossians, they don't become too Jewish. Circumcision has been replaced by baptism. The basic principles of the world that he references in verse 8, this is the ceremonial law. There's two other places, and I'll touch briefly, where people go to to say that the Sabbath has been fulfilled in Christ, and it's been fulfilled in the sense that it's done away with. That's Romans 14. I'll read verses five and six. Perhaps you've heard these verses. These verses are very important, and they have a lot of application for us in regards to Christian liberty. I'm gonna speak to you on them just in regard of this issue. Romans 14, verses five and six. One person esteems one day above another. Another esteems every day alike. Let each be fully convinced in his own mind. He who observes the day, observes it to the Lord. And he who does not observe the day to the Lord, he does not observe it. He who eats, eats to the Lord. For he gives God thanks. And he who does not eat to the Lord, he does not eat and gives God thanks. Just two brief comments about this passage. The first is that it's pretty basic. Sabbath isn't mentioned here. It just needs to be stated. He doesn't mention the Sabbath. The second thing to note is the context here is that there are Jewish Christians and there's Gentile Christians in Rome. And some of the Jewish Christians have not fully realized all the implications of the gospel, and they are still observing these feasts that pointed them to Jesus, in memory of Jesus, and they're celebrating Jesus in that way. And you'll recall from other passages of scripture, there was a time, a transition time, that the apostles allowed the Jews to do this type of thing. And this is the idea. Paul's saying, they observe it to the Lord, let him be. You're not Gentile Christians required to observe them. Now Galatians 4, we'll just finish with a reference to Galatians 4 again. Another place that people go and they'll say, look, We're no longer required to keep one day in seven holy to the Lord. And I'll read Galatians 4, 10 and 11. I'll just make a brief comment about it. And again, I realize this sermon is very heavy in the head, but sometimes it just matters to simply know that you need to do something. Galatians 4, verse 10, you observe days and months and seasons and years. I'm afraid for you, thus I have labored for you in vain. One of the reasons why we read Leviticus 23, and it took me probably eight minutes, was because there we see the days and the months. And there's other places where the seasons and years kind of come in. But we see the liturgical calendar, the ecclesiastical calendar of the Old Testament. It's one of the reasons why you need to keep reading the Old Testament, even though Leviticus may not have a lot of direct application for you, it helps you understand the New Testament. That's what Paul is referencing here. Again, there's no reference to the fourth commandment, Sabbath. You're being Jewish, you're observing the ceremonial law, all these days and months and seasons. And that's one of the reasons why we read Leviticus 23. It wasn't just to see how important the Sabbath was and that Sabbath breakers were severely punished. It's a big deal. The Sabbath was a big deal in the Old Testament. It was also just to see this days and months idea So the Sabbath was not a ceremonial law. There were ceremonial Sabbaths that have been done away with, but the fourth commandment, the obligation to keep one day in seven is moral. As our confession states, it's ongoing. It's always been and always will be until Christ returns. Now, I wanna make one last comment. One last comment. My last point is, all this discussion going on and on about the Sabbath begs the question, well, when is the Sabbath? The Jews, if you noticed in the reading, they kept the Sabbath on Saturday. And this is Sunday. This is the first day of the week. When are we to observe a Sabbath? And what I want you to see in this third point is God has not given us a yearly Sabbath. He has not given us a monthly Sabbath. He's given us one holy day and it is a weekly Sabbath. Now, John 20 is a good place to go for this. There's two lines of thought. So again, the third point here, is that that day now is the first day of the week. We know that for two reasons. We know it by example, and we know it by direct reference. John 20, verse one. Now the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb early. although it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb. And all the way through verse 20, you have the fact that Christ rose again on the first day of the week. Notice verse 19, John 20. Christ has risen, he's appeared to Mary Magdalene, talked with her. John 20, verse 19, then, the same day at evening being the first day of the week, When the doors were shut, where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst and said to them, peace be with you. What's going on the first day of the week? The disciples are gathered, and the idea is that they're gathered to worship. They're afraid of the Jews. They shut the door, and Jesus appears. He meets with them. What happens to God's people when they gather under the authority of the elders, and there's a call to worship? By His Spirit, Jesus is with us. In verse 26 of John 20, the same thing happens. After eight days, The disciples were again inside. Eight days is a Jewish idiom. It's a funny way of saying the first day of the week. I could go on and on about examples. Okay, Acts 20 verse seven. God's people are with Paul on the first day of the week. 1 Corinthians 16 verses 1 and 2, God's people are gathered on the first day of the week. Revelations 1 verse 10, this became the example, the custom to keep a Sabbath on the first day of the week that John in Revelations 1.10 said, I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day. First day of the week is properly called, especially for Christians, the Lord's Day. There's also a command. There's a New Testament command, or at least a reference to observing the Sabbath, the Christian Sabbath, the Lord's Day on the first day of the week. That's Hebrews 4 again. I want you to turn back there. Hebrews 4, that's page 761 in your Pew Bible. This time we're gonna be looking at verse 10. Verse 10 gives us the basis for the Sabbath keeping in verse nine. Okay, so again, verse nine says, there remains therefore a rest for the people of God, for he who has entered his rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from his. Now verse 10 needs to be properly understood. In the New King James, in most translations, take an interpretation. And they don't capitalize he in the beginning of verse 10. And what they're suggesting is that it's the Christian who enters into his rest, just as God did from his when he ceased working, creating the world at the end of six days. But it's very appropriate and proper for us to realize that Jesus is in view here. On the first day of the week, when he rose again from the dead, he completed the work of recreation, redemption. And what day was that? First day of the week. For he who has entered his rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from his. And it's very proper for us to look at it this way for two reasons. The first reason, and probably the most significant reason, is that it's inappropriate, it's improper for us to compare our tainted, imperfect works here on Earth with the perfect work of God in creation. And that's the comparison. Now what would be a very appropriate comparison? The work of Christ, when he worked salvation for us, recreation. That's a proper comparison. And then the other reason is essentially that The author of Hebrews is talking about how good and how much better Jesus is. The whole letter implies Jesus. It would be natural for him to just bring up Jesus with a pronoun and not a name. So the Sabbath today is, the Christian Sabbath is on the Lord's Day. And this is my lesson for you. I wanna, again, my lesson is not only was the Sabbath not a ceremonial law, but there is still one day in seven to be kept as a holy Sabbath to the Lord, which today is the first day of the week. And I've said all of that because it's so important. to, at times, to simply know that you have a need to do something. As I close here, I really just want to ask you one question related, maybe a couple side questions. Do you know that you have a need to keep the Lord's Day holy? Do you know that? I'm not going to go on on what it means to keep the Sabbath day holy. You may have questions, legitimate questions. What does this mean? Can I do this or can I not do that? Perhaps we can look at that in the future a little bit more, the biblical principles governing that. But I want to ask you, has this fallen off your radar? I know your radar. I know that you want to follow the Lord and you don't like your sin. You pray to the Lord, help me to use my mouth better, help me to honor my parents better, et cetera. Do you think much about this commandment? I want you to think about it. Is the fourth commandment something that you're willing to look into, to study, to learn and to grow on? Perhaps we can do that in the future. Perhaps you can ask me questions. We might have some literature on the literature table in the coming weeks that you can look at. I want you to think about also what we've talked about just in the reading. It's very clear that a proper, any basic understanding of Sabbath is it's a day of worship. Work is forbidden and it's a whole day. I wanna ask you, do you struggle with this? Perhaps you need to change something in your life. Are you willing to do that? God's calling you. A lot of what I've said, He's calling you to have faith in Him. I know what it's like to be sitting in a sanctuary, hearing a sermon, and being like, oh, this is gonna change my life. I'm gonna have to change a few things. What God is calling you to do is He's calling you to trust Him. God, He's wiser. He's wiser than me, and He's wiser than you, and He knows how you ought to spend your time. The Sabbath day is a day dedicated specifically to the Lord. And I wanna also ask you this question. If the Sabbath is on the table, and if the Sabbath is a whole day, Does that mean that you have an obligation to spend the whole day, not just the morning? What do you do in the evenings on the Sabbath day? If you don't make it your custom to come to the evening service, is it because you're sick? Is it because you're not physically able? Maybe. Maybe you can't drive at night, maybe you live far away. But if it's not one of those reasons, what are you doing? on the Sabbath evening. Do you not know that God beckons you, that God has blessed this day, that he calls you to come and hear him, hear him through the preached word, that you may grow, that you may learn about him? My beloved congregation, I love every single one of you very much. And I want you to think about the fact But there remains a keeping of the Sabbath for the people of God. I want you to know that. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we come to you this morning. We come to you in the name of your son, the Lord Jesus Christ. We are so thankful that when we fail to keep your commandments, when we fail to keep your commandments mostly or even partially, whether it be the Sabbath day, whether it be another commandment, we are so thankful that you have forgiven us of all of our sins, not on account of our good works, but on account of Christ's works. Father, we rejoice in knowing that you forgive us of all of our sins. Father, we also rejoice knowing that you are wise and that your law is now the rule of our life, that by your Spirit we can grow more and more in keeping it. Father, we ask that you would give us a willingness to grow in our knowledge of your law, that you would give us faith to, when we hear it, to follow it, We ask that you would do this for our own good and for your glory. For we ask in Jesus's name, amen.