What is the Sabbath?
The Sabbath was instituted by God. If you go back to Genesis 2:3, the Bible says that God rested. The word is “Shabbat.” He sabbathed on the seventh day after creating the world in 6 days. And the Lord blessed that day. Then, when he gave the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20, the Lord said, “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.” (Ex 20:8, NKJV) He then defined what that meant. He said, work six days, and then when you get to the seventh day, Saturday, don’t work on that day. In other words, whatever it is that you do for work, to earn a living, when you come to the seventh day, don’t do that thing.
The Sabbath was a day for ceasing. That’s what the word means: “to cease.” The Sabbath was a day to cease that work, to rest, seek restoration, and to worship. But through the years, the Jewish rabbis, especially the Pharisees, had turned the Sabbath into something that was ridiculous and difficult. They messed up something good by layering law after law and rule after rule and regulation after regulation on top of what God had said about the Sabbath day. They added all these rules to the point that the people of God didn’t look forward to the Sabbath day because they had to be nervous the whole time, thinking, am I doing something wrong? Am I breaking one of these hundreds of rules?
Some of the things that the Pharisees said you could not do on the Sabbath: you could not eat an egg that was laid on the sabbath day because it represented work on the part of the chicken. You could not take a bath on the sabbath day because the water might slosh onto the floor, and that meant you’d be cleaning the floor. That’s work. So that was prohibited. You couldn’t look into a mirror on the sabbath day because you might see a grey hair and be tempted to pull it out. That would be work, and that was forbidden. If you became sick on the Sabbath day, you could be treated only enough to keep you alive. They could not treat you enough to make you better because that would be healing, which is work. You couldn’t tie or untie a knot on the Sabbath day. You could not cook on the Sabbath day… and the list went on and on. It became a burden that people couldn’t bear.
But when Jesus came to be the Lord of the Sabbath (Matthew 12:8), He redefined what the Sabbath was. Since Jesus came, the Sabbath is no longer a rigid 24-hour period of rest from our work with a bunch of rules attached to it. Now, the Sabbath is about trusting that Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath and that in Him, we can enter into a constant, never-ending spiritual rest because He’s done all the work for us to be saved when He went to the cross and died for our sins. There’s nothing left to do to work for our salvation. Now we can enter into rest.
Now, the question about the Sabbath is not WHEN; it’s WHO. The Sabbath is a Who. Our Sabbath is the Lord Jesus and the work that He completed for us when He went to the cross.
**Excerpt taken from a sermon by Pastor Dan Spencer entitled “A Man in The Synagogue” on February 11, 2024. You can watch the full sermon here by clicking the link or watching the video below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSjxvuLgc6c
The Sabbath was a day for ceasing. That’s what the word means: “to cease.” The Sabbath was a day to cease that work, to rest, seek restoration, and to worship. But through the years, the Jewish rabbis, especially the Pharisees, had turned the Sabbath into something that was ridiculous and difficult. They messed up something good by layering law after law and rule after rule and regulation after regulation on top of what God had said about the Sabbath day. They added all these rules to the point that the people of God didn’t look forward to the Sabbath day because they had to be nervous the whole time, thinking, am I doing something wrong? Am I breaking one of these hundreds of rules?
Some of the things that the Pharisees said you could not do on the Sabbath: you could not eat an egg that was laid on the sabbath day because it represented work on the part of the chicken. You could not take a bath on the sabbath day because the water might slosh onto the floor, and that meant you’d be cleaning the floor. That’s work. So that was prohibited. You couldn’t look into a mirror on the sabbath day because you might see a grey hair and be tempted to pull it out. That would be work, and that was forbidden. If you became sick on the Sabbath day, you could be treated only enough to keep you alive. They could not treat you enough to make you better because that would be healing, which is work. You couldn’t tie or untie a knot on the Sabbath day. You could not cook on the Sabbath day… and the list went on and on. It became a burden that people couldn’t bear.
But when Jesus came to be the Lord of the Sabbath (Matthew 12:8), He redefined what the Sabbath was. Since Jesus came, the Sabbath is no longer a rigid 24-hour period of rest from our work with a bunch of rules attached to it. Now, the Sabbath is about trusting that Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath and that in Him, we can enter into a constant, never-ending spiritual rest because He’s done all the work for us to be saved when He went to the cross and died for our sins. There’s nothing left to do to work for our salvation. Now we can enter into rest.
Now, the question about the Sabbath is not WHEN; it’s WHO. The Sabbath is a Who. Our Sabbath is the Lord Jesus and the work that He completed for us when He went to the cross.
**Excerpt taken from a sermon by Pastor Dan Spencer entitled “A Man in The Synagogue” on February 11, 2024. You can watch the full sermon here by clicking the link or watching the video below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSjxvuLgc6c