“Sabbath” – Exodus 20:8-11

How many of you have a “smart phone”? How many of you have a not-so-smart phone? If you have a smart phone, you know that sometimes, for no good reason, they just don’t run right. They start running really slow. It takes forever for an app to come up or a video won’t download. Maybe your email doesn’t update timely or you start missing phone calls. So, what do you do? Do you just keep pressing the button? Maybe screaming at it will help, have you tried that? Maybe a good tap with a hammer will solve the problem.

My iPhone has Siri installed in it. I don’t know how it works but most of the time it can be pretty helpful especially while driving. But sometimes I say, “Hey Siri, call Mama” and Siri says back to me something like, “Calling NASA.” “NASA? No! Not NASA! Call Mama! Can’t you understand plain redneck Texan English?” “This is NASA. How may I direct your call?” “Is my Mama there? No? Then I guess Siri is stupid, huh?” And then I feel bad for calling Siri stupid and that’s when I know it is time for me and Siri and my phone to take a break.

What do you do when that happens? You just turn it off for a few minutes, right? You hit the reset button. You give it a break so it can get back to normal and whatever was bothering it usually just goes away. And what happens if you don’t give it a break; if you don’t let it reset? Does it get better? No. It always just gets worse.

Do you ever wish you had a reset button on you that you could just push and what had been bothering you would just go away? Don’t you wish you could just relax and take your mind off all the craziness of the world and take a break? It seems like God should have programmed us (to use computer language) to need a reset button. You would think He would have provided such a thing, huh?

Well, actually He did. In the Old Testament they called it the Sabbath. In the New Testament they started calling it the Lord’s Day (Rev. 1:10). Our grandparents called it the Holy Lord’s Day. Our parents called it Sunday. Most people today…call it the weekend.

It started at the creation of the world. In Genesis 2:2 it says that God rested from all His work on the 7^th day. Now, God being God, He wasn’t tired. He was modeling for us what we would need to do. That word that we translate “rested” is “shabbat” (shaw-bath) in Hebrew. It means to rest or to cease. It does not mean Saturday or the 7^th day. My concordance tells me that the meaning includes to sit, to stop, to celebrate and a day of worship, rest, refreshment and enjoyment. It’s a reset button.

As a kid, Christianity seemed like a long list of thou-shalt-nots and don’t do this and don’t do that. But as I grew up, I started to realize and I continue to realize that all those commands that God gives are for our benefit. If you have ever had a toddler, you know that they think you as a parent are the worst person in the world because you won’t let them stick that fork in the electrical outlet. You don’t know what you are talking about. That lion at the zoo wants me to go into his cage and you not letting me go is just cruel. But mommy, I want to take my bath tonight in the dishwasher. Why won’t you let me? A sign of maturity is understanding that parents have rules for the good of the child, not because they hate the kid.

We say around here that we don’t have any rules and we don’t. Although some of you seem to want to be the reason that we make some rules but so far, we don’t have any. We don’t care what you wear or what you drive or how you worship. We might eat brownies or ice cream on Sunday mornings sometimes. We don’t have any rules but we do have some commandments. In fact, I think there are like ten of ‘em and they are all found in Exodus chapter 20.

I understand that a few weeks ago in children’s church they were studying the 10 Commandments. Anna asked the kids if following the 10 Commandments would get you to Heaven and they rightfully all said no. Anna said, “Well, what do I have to do to get to Heaven?” and one of the little girls said, “Well, first you gotta die.”

So, there is that. Technically that is correct, I guess, but the 10 Commandments, while not the way to Heaven, are important. They were given to Moses by God Himself on Mount Sinai to give to the Hebrew people after they had escaped from Egyptian captivity. They were given for the benefit of the people, not because God didn’t like them. He loved them and wanted to protect them. He didn’t give them just to be mean or because He didn’t understand their situation. He gave the commandments to protect the ones He loved. We need to remember that.

Let’s read just one of the ten this morning. Skip over to verse 8 and let’s read 8-11. Exodus 20:8-11 says, "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10but the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. 11For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore, the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.”

Now, settle down. It’s okay. I hear you. I hear you screaming at me in your minds and you are screaming that you are not under the Law. You are under grace. The 10 Commandments don’t apply to you. Well, I have just one thing to say to you about that. You are absolutely right. When the children of Israel were going into the Promised Land, God gave them the Law and the 10 Commandments were part of that Law. The Law was part of His covenant relationship with them. 

But after Jesus came, many Jewish Christians wanted to know what role the Law should continue to play in their lives. Were Christians obligated to keep the Law? If not, what was to keep them from living sinfully? The apostle Paul boldly claimed that Christians “are not under law but under grace” (Romans 6:14). But we need to remember that Paul was writing to Jewish Christians. You and I have never been under the law.  No Gentile has ever been under law.  We can’t apply this literally to us.  We can learn from Israel’s history the importance of the Law, but we can’t say that we were under the Law.  That would have fit the Judaizer’s goal - that all Christians be Jewish first and under the Law. (Thanks, Randy)

Paul explained in Galatians 3 that the Law of Moses was a “paidagogos,” which is translated schoolmaster, tutor, or guardian. In the Greco-Roman world, the son of a wealthy man would be cared for by a paidagogos, a slave who was given the responsibility of watching over his master’s son. This guardian would watch over the boy constantly, taking him to school, keeping him out of trouble, guiding him, guarding him, and teaching him. In the life of a young boy, a paidagogos was a good thing. However, when the boy became a man, he no longer needed a paidagogos. He was set free from this tutelage. https://radicallychristian.com/why-christians-are-not-under-law-but-under-grace

Paul said that until Jesus came, “we were held in custody under the law, locked up until the faith that was to come would be revealed. 24So the law was our guardian until Christ came that we might be justified by faith. 25Now that this faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian.” (Galatians 3:23-26) So, basically Jesus brought the Jewish people out from under the Law of Moses and therefore they were not bound by the 10 Commandments and neither are we.

Now…I hear you screaming at me that if we are no longer under the Law, why would I use one of the 10 Commandments as our text for today’s message? Oh, just wait. It gets better. Okay, so we are not bound by the Law but when the teachings of the Law are echoed or also taught in the New Testament then we are under those teachings. If Jesus or Paul or Peter or James or any other biblical author says something is a sin, then that is a word from God who inspired the writing of it and should be taken as such.

When the 10 Commandments say not to murder, that is also taught by Jesus in Matthew 5:21 where He says, “You have heard that it was said to the ancients, ‘Do not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.’ 22But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment.” So, Jesus doubles down on murder and says not only is murder wrong, but anger or hating is the same thing. And all the 10 Commandments are also taught in other places of scripture in the New Testament…except one. Want to guess which one? I told you it would get better.

The only commandment not also taught in the New Testament is the 4^th commandment which is to keep the Sabbath day holy. And…now you are screaming at me again, right? Why would you bring up that one law if we are not under that one law? Well, because it is important and I’ll tell you why. The only part of that commandment that is not backed up in the New Testament is the word “sabbath” which the Hebrews called Saturday.

The New Testament church, the first church there in Jerusalem commemorated the resurrection of Jesus by meeting on Sundays instead of Saturdays to honor the fact that Sunday was the day Jesus was resurrected. And the resurrection of Jesus changed almost everything!

So, with all that being said, nothing about the 4^th commandment changed except the day. We are still to abide by what the commandment says. We are still to keep a day holy because it was taught and modeled by the first church. So, what does it mean to keep the day holy? That’s the million-dollar question and that’s where so many people get confused. Some people take it too far and some don’t take it far enough.

I remember my mother telling me about when she was a little girl and her daddy was a pastor. She said every Sunday the pastor’s family would go eat at somebody’s house, a habit my mother called “horrible.” She said the host family would prepare the whole meal on Saturday and put it on the table and cover it with a tablecloth for the next day because they wanted to keep the Lord’s day holy. She told me that she had a Sunday School teacher that didn’t allow them to use scissors to cut things out because that was considered work to her.

So, where do you draw the line between keeping it holy and being legalistic? Well, let’s talk about holiness first. What does it mean to keep something holy? It means to keep it set apart for God’s work. It means it will be different than all the other days. If you work a job five or six days a week and Sunday is one of them, is Sunday holy? Is it different than the others and set apart for God’s work? No.

What about me? Now you’re screaming at me in your mind that preaching is work and you are right. But is Sunday different than all the other days and set apart for God’s work? Yes, Sunday is way different for me. What about cops and doctors and…okay, let’s talk now about legalism. Think back to my illustration of Jesus teaching about murder in Matthew 5. Jesus made it an issue of the heart. He said that if you hate a man, it is the same as murder and murder is wrong.

Matthew chapter 5 helps us a lot in this regard. In Matthew 5, Jesus is preaching the Sermon on the Mount and He absolutely rocks some peoples’ theology here. This whole sermon is so counter-cultural, so mind-blowing that it says at the end of this sermon in chapter 7 that the crowds were amazed at His teaching because He taught as One who had authority. And in this sermon He addresses quite a few issues.

He starts by saying, “Do not think I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets.  I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.”  And then over and over again, He says, “You have heard it said…” and then He goes on to quote some part of the Law but then He adds a little something to it. He said, yes, murder is wrong but so is hate. He said, yes, adultery is wrong but so is lust. He takes it a step further with divorce and taking vows and getting revenge making all of them about where your heart is, not just the outer action.

He doesn’t mention in this sermon anything about the Sabbath but how do you think He would have handled it? Do you think Jesus would have said, “You have heard it said to keep the Sabbath holy but I tell you, eh, it’s not that big a deal”? “You have heard it said to keep the Sabbath holy but I tell you if you have to go to work then go ahead. No big deal. If you really want to go do something else then okay. If your favorite episode of Gunsmoke is on, then I’ll make an exception.” Does that sound like how Jesus would have preached?

Look, we don’t know exactly what Jesus would have said because it is not recorded and when you start asking, “But what about this case or this issue?” then you start sliding toward legalism and you miss the point. The point is the Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath as Jesus said in Mark 2:27. The point is that God designed us to need a day of rest. For some people that work in a cubicle and read all week, rest may mean you work in the garden. If you work in the garden all week as part of your job, then maybe you need to go sit in a cubicle and read as part of your Sabbath day rest.

The real question is, are you keeping that day holy? Are you keeping it separate from the others as a day of rest? Remember what I said earlier. It is to be a day to sit, to stop, to celebrate and a day of worship, rest, refreshment and enjoyment. It’s a reset button. We actually hit the reset button every day, don’t we, when we go to sleep? Every day we have to take a few hours to unwind and sometimes we even take a nap during the day. That’s a good day, isn’t it?  Then every week we take a one full day to unwind. And if we don’t then bad things start to happen. We are not able to use our gifts to their full potential.

Then on top of that, we sometimes get to go on vacation. That’s always fun. But the problem with vacations is so many times we come home from vacation needing a vacation because we are exhausted from the vacation. Vacations away from work are good and healthy but our bodies, our minds and our spirits are designed to need rest and refreshment and if we don’t get that then none of that works right.

How many of you have ever had a conversation with Linda Pierot? What is the hardest part about having a conversation with her? Is it because she is so mean? Is it because you know she is going to scream and cuss at you and call you names? Hardly. The hardest thing about having a conversation with sweet Linda is hearing her. She is so soft-spoken. She is definitely made in the image of God because God also speaks in a still, small voice and every day we need to put ourselves in position to hear Him. Just like having a conversation with Linda would be difficult in a busy factory with lots of background noise, having a conversation with and hearing from God is hard when we are busy so we need to put ourselves in position to hear from Him. We need to do that every day but that’s a big part of what the Sabbath rest is for.

Every day we need to take some time to hear God. Every week we need to spend some extra time and every so often we need even more than that. I have felt for a while that is where I am. I want more. I need to hear from God better and deeper. I need to rest my body, my mind and my spirit and hear what God wants to tell me and so I’m going to put myself in that position to hear Him better.

A couple of months ago, I asked the church Leadership Team if I could take a short sabbatical. Next year will be ten years I have pastored and I just want to know where God wants our church to go spiritually in the coming years. I am not burned out. I don’t need a vacation. I’m not spiritually frazzled or out of God’s will necessarily. I just need to put myself in position to hear God speak to me better. So, I’m going to take a sabbatical for most of August.

After much prayer, I have four men lined up to preach and teach for four Sundays starting August 2. I’m going to go to different churches those four Sundays. I don’t want to miss out on my Sabbath rest during my sabbatical. And I have lots of things that I hope to accomplish during that time. I want to read. I want to write. I want to rearrange that sock drawer finally. But my main goal is just to get myself in position to hear from God in a way I never have.

I want to sit, stop and celebrate for an extended time, not just one day. I want to worship and rest and be refreshed and come back excited about what God has told me and I’m not needing to be heard. I just want to hear Him. We all need that every day. We do it for a little longer on Sundays and sometimes we need an even longer period of time to just be still and know He is God.

This world has gone absolutely crazy. The global church is full of false teachers and wolves that want to come in and tear the church apart. We are watching so many prophecies come true in our lifetime and I expect Jesus to come back any minute now. But if He waits, I want to make sure our church is doing what we are supposed to be doing, going where we are supposed to go and saying what we are supposed to say.

What about you? Are you doing what God wants for you in your life? Are you being obedient to what He wants you to do? He has rules for us because He loves us and wants to protect us. Do you even know Him? Do you have a personal relationship with God through His Son Jesus? All you have to do is believe that Jesus died for your sins on the cross to pay the debt the Father said was due for our disobedience. Ask Him today to forgive you and He will. He will come into your life and change you. Then you can enter into His rest forever as a co-heir with Jesus to all the good things God has in store for us in Heaven. Do it right now while there is still time. Let’s pray.