The Christian View of Rest

CLASS 4 ISSUES

Study Scripture: Mark 2:18-28, Genesis 2:2-3, Isaiah 58, 66: 15-24,

          Matthew 5:17-20, Exodus 20:8-11.   

Background Scripture: Mark 2:18-28, Genesis 2:2-3, Isaiah 58, 66: 15-24,

                  Matthew 5:17-20, Exodus 20:8-11.   

Lesson 12    May 23, 2026

Key Verse

And he said unto them, The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath:

Therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the Sabbath.

Mark 2:27 – 28

Statement of Belief

We believe that the Sabbath of the Bible, the seventh day of the week, is sacred time, a gift of God to all people, instituted at creation, affirmed in the Ten Commandments and reaffirmed in the teaching and example of Jesus and the apostles.

We believe that the gift of Sabbath rest is an experience of God’s eternal presence with His people.

We believe that in obedience to God and in loving response to His grace in Christ, the Sabbath should be faithfully observed as a day of rest, worship, and celebration.

Genesis 2:2-3; Exodus 16:23-30; Exodus 20:8-11; Matthew 5:17-19; Mark 2:27-28; Luke 4:16 bye; Acts 13:14, 42-44; 16:11-13; 17:2-3; 18:4-11; Ezekiel 20:19-20; Hebrews 4:9-10; John 14:15;

If you wanted to attack the idea that there is a God and that He created the heavens and the earth and all living and inanimate things it is to be expected that you will attack the things that God prizes.

The positions or laws that God prizes are expressed in the Ten Commandments which is regarded as the Constitution written by God and given to the nation of Israel.

Among these doctrines given to the nation is the command on Sabbath observance and worship. This doctrine has been the most disregarded and rejected by that nation and that attitude has been regarded by God as a rejection of His Being and hence his requirements.

Israel was told repeatedly that disobedience on that matter would be responsible for the nation being disciplined by God by way of exile from the Promised Land of Israel.

It is therefore no surprise that the doctrine of the Sabbath has created more controversy than any other. 

There is more fiction and friction surrounding this topic than around any other, despite the fact that the teachings of the Scriptures are quite plain on the subject. 

To understand this strange twist we must look closely at what Sabbath is, what it’s very existence implies, the benefits that it has for man, and the almost universal rejection of people who attempt to take the Sabbath seriously as commanded by God.

Logically, anyone who professes to follow the Bible strictly as their only rule of faith and practice is bound to keep the seventh day as Sabbath.  Baptists, who pride themselves as having the Bible as their only rule of faith, should be Sabbath keepers. 

Before we pride ourselves on what we think about ourselves and our specific congregation, let us be aware that many of us will say one thing about the Sabbath and yet do quite another thing in practice as we serve our own ends.

Having however moved away from strict adherence to the Bible, mainstream Christians cannot appeal to the Word of God to reverse the tremendous decline in the practice of worship on Sundays.  Appealing to Christians to follow a practice that is not  rooted in the Word of God is inevitably doomed to failure. 

Any non-biblically based appeal is a poor reflection on, and really condemns the erring leadership in the churches, who have to resort to theories such as the “one day in seven” theory, the simple “rest-day” theory, the “civil Sabbath” theory, as well as others.  Note that none of these arguments are based at all on the Bible.

It is important to note that any other day of worship apart from the seventh day Sabbath, is based on “Tradition”, and has little justification in the teachings of Christ and the apostles.  This “Tradition” contradicts the Bible when it claims that the seventh day Sabbath has been set aside for Sunday.

The bible is quite specific as to how the Sabbath is to regarded and what can be done and should be done on that Day, and what should not be done on that Day.

As we begin to examine our Study Text and its context we will see the Lord Jesus Christ establishing His authority.

 As Jesus teaches on what the Sabbath is, why it was established, and how the Sabbath is to be regarded we see the Lord Jesus Christ establishing his authority to reveal the facts on all matters. He will therefore tell us He has authority to determine what He can do in several areas we will note:

1. To forgive sins (12:1-12)
2. To call a tax collector and  to eat with sinners and tax collectors (2:13-17)
3.  To permit His disciples not to fast (2:18-22),  and
4.  His authority to heal on the Sabbath (3:1-6).

In exercising His authority Jesus will arouse the antagonism of the scribes and the Pharisees and the Herodians which will eventually lead to His death.

As we study this matter of the Christian view of rest let us look carefully at the kind of people that Jesus interacted with and those that flocked to Jesus. He walked along the shores of Galilee’ Sea and He summoned fishermen who were common labourers, and instead of aiming a little bit higher He chose Levi, a tax collector,  the lowest possible class of person that anyone preaching about the Kingdom of God would want to join him.

This was the territory of Herod Antipas who ruled Galilee to pursue the interests of Rome. Herod thought he was the King of the Jews but in fact he was the lapdog of the Romans. The Jewish tax collectors like Levi were doubly despised for they not only gouged their countrymen but they also collaborated with the enemy helping them to maintain foreign dominance. Nobody who was a good Jew in good standing would want to become a Tax Collector.

When Jesus called Levi He was bringing little credit to Himself and placing His mission at risk to call the common labourers, common sinners and the lesser of the world who everybody thought were too far from God to be brought into the family of God. These people were considered to be outsiders, outside the pale, and so no religious leader would make an effort to accommodate them.

So who would bring these people into rest? Would they be eligible for the eternal rest with God?

 Let us consider carefully what we are facing in the Study Lesson. To learn the instructions for us today and what Jesus is teaching there are several implications.

We must consider whether in our days we ever make changes in the Church to reach out and accommodate people who are “real sinners” as well as those people that maybe are in recovery?

Do we adjust our services to provide rest and recreation and exposure on the nights of the week, and do we make an attempt to encourage a new life at specific times and make room for them to come closer to God as we meet on Sabbaths?

Are we interested in continuing to pray and to think about the best way to reach out to folks in those conditions, how to accommodate them, and how to incorporate them into the life of the church?

Note  in the of Mark that Jesus is entering the home of the Tax collectors and sinners who flagrantly disobeyed Jewish law, sharing a meal with them which meant sharing life, trusting and accepting them, aligning Himself with the wrong people.

God has stepped out of heaven and into our world to show us what heaven is like and to show us what the coming new world is like, So He is challenging us to not forsake but enter the world of sinners and the Levi’s for Jesus wants to heal them and restore them to the community of faith, running the risk of associating Himself and His disciples with a disreputable lot of people.

Be careful to note that Jesus does not say that these people with whom He dealt were not a collection of rascals for they were all sinners, all the despised social outcasts. And the scribes and Pharisees would pass by and see Jesus in the midst of them and they became absolutely scandalized and appalled, for Jesus was obviously a friend of these men, not lecturing them, sitting among them and eating and drinking with them.

 Jesus did not disagree with the scribes and Pharisees on their assessments of these “ sinners and tax collectors”. He agreed that they were sick, hurting, and troubled men whose lifestyle had damaged them deeply to the point where they could not see life in the right way and would simply cover up their many evils and the falsehood that they were doing in very many ways.

But Jesus would tell the scribes and Pharisees that He had come to heal and deal with men where they were hurting, where He was needed to help them.

Jesus knew that the sinners and others  who were self-righteous  and self-sufficient felt that they had no need of help from God, but for Jesus these people were more important than those with preconceived notions about people formed without sufficient knowledge of them, resting on mistaken or distorted ideas that they had been taught and with which they grew up.

Accordingly, in our Lesson we will have to deal with the power of tradition (2:18-20). This of course has direct relevance to the issue of the Sabbath for Jesus had to deal with first century Jews to which the Sabbath was not simply a day of rest. The Sabbath was intricately tied to their national identity and their national hopes for God insisted that Israel observe the Sabbath after He had liberated them from Egypt.

So for those in Israel keeping the Sabbath was a badge of Jewishness, for they were people that had been persecuted and killed simply because they had been Jews. For them keeping the Sabbath meant that they were being reminded that they are God’s people when they kept the Sabbath. They remembered the work of God in creating the world and in creating them as a people, taking them out of slavery so that they would anticipate God’s future work in liberating them from the enemies that were all around them.

We should look at how we treat the Sabbath for it is not only a time of rest but it is also a time of remembering that we had been freed and redeemed from slavery.

It is important to understand how people can connect the Sabbath with all kinds of traditions and needs that they have personally and one writer therefore comments in a passage relevant to us for we too have needs and things we prize and hold onto:

“Whether one kept the Sabbath or not—and how one kept it—was no small matter in Jesus’ day. For many, Sabbath practices determined whose side you were on, whether you accepted the Roman occupation or whether you opposed it. For Pharisees, a popular pressure group, keeping the Sabbath according to their rulings was a sign of loyalty—to God, to Israel, and to the national hopes for liberation. They were watchful for the emergence of movements that ignored or trivialized the Sabbath and thereby posed a threat to their hopes for the coming kingdom of God, which for them constituted liberation from Rome”.

Note how easy it is therefore, for the Pharisees and scribes, as well as ourselves to mix up the issue of the Sabbath with all kinds of other concerns, ignoring the fact that the Sabbath was God’s gift to His people so that that they could rest from their work one day a week and remember Him. But the Pharisees had hijacked the Sabbath so that it became for them not so much a day of rest but a badge of national loyalty, so that men and women should serve the Sabbath, which met the Pharisees understanding of it.

 So what Jesus had to make clear to the scribes and Pharisees that

“ The Sabbath was was made for man and not man for the Sabbath”. Therefore anyone that excluded men and women who don’t share their views should not be dehumanized for the Sabbath was made for men and women. The role taught to believers by Jesus is that we have to teach the world about that fact, the importance of what God has instituted for man’s benefit.

It should be stated now, though we will discuss it later, that Roman Catholicism and its predecessor structural perversions has been responsible for many changes in Biblical teachings. 

The Roman Catholic Church encompasses the greater part of western Christianity, and is the culmination of pagan influences, philosophical and political systems and ideas from Greece and Rome and these brought into the Church Sunday observance, Easter, Good Friday, baptismal regeneration, the use of lights in worship, prayers for the dead, sprinkling and pouring in addition to immersion, the worship of the saints, the power of the official religious hierarchy to make or to eliminate established laws and practice, and many other additions.

There are several commonly accepted ideas about the Sabbath which are totally false, and clearly without biblical support, but nevertheless are repeated over and over again.  Several of these false ideas are listed by one writer:

1. The early New Testament Christians began worshipping on the first day of the week instead of the seventh day Sabbath.
2. The Sabbath was a Jewish institution which originated with Moses.
3. The Sabbath of the Old Testament was a day of legalistic restrictions, a burden and yoke for the Israelites.
4. Roman Catholic and other theologians rely primarily on the Bible for justification for observing Sunday as a holy day.

To be able to refute these false ideas we should now therefore look at what the Sabbath is all about and who established it.

By doing so the Lesson Study will examine the Christian view of “Rest” which is taught by Scripture. This view is in the teaching of Jesus and the Apostles.

 

THE ORIGINS OF THE SABBATH

The word ‘ Sabbath’ comes from a verb meaning “to cease, to abstain, to desist from, to terminate, to be at an end”.  It also has another meaning of “to be inactive, to rest”.

The Bible tells us that after God created the heavens and the earth, He then created man on the sixth day.  When God “finished” this great, powerful, marvelous, beautiful, and unparalleled creative work, He chose to cease, to rest, to step back, and to delight in what He had created.

He then chose to create the Sabbath, blessing it, sanctifying it, and making it the Holy Seventh Day.  Note that in Genesis the day is called the “seventh day”, a terminology which links the creation with the “rest” that God had done.

Clearly, God did not rest because He was tired.  God is spirit, and not flesh, yet He chose to ‘rest’, and to bless this particular “seventh day”.  At its creation therefore, there was no link with any “Jewish” institution or people, because of course none of these existed at that time.

The hallowing and blessing of the “seventh day” carries with it the idea of  ‘separateness’.  God separated the seventh day from the rest of creation in a special act, notwithstanding the declared fact in Genesis 1: 31, that the creation was “good”.

Here we must stress therefore, that it was nothing but the favor and grace of God that leads God to declare that the ‘seventh day’ was holy and blessed. 

God Himself set an example and rested, a very deliberate act.  The Sabbath is therefore based on God’s “rest”, and common sense should tell us that nothing in this universe will ever or can ever supplant or set aside this tremendous display of grace, power, and gracious example.

The “seventh day”, as a blessed and holy day, created by God Himself, over at least two thousand years before the birth of Moses, was made for man.

In Mark 2: 27 Jesus had to rebuke the Pharisees, and to remind them that “the Sabbath was made for man”.

Note that the Sabbath was made for man, not just for Israel.  It was made for man thousands of years before Moses.  Man was not created just to serve the day, but the day was created to benefit man. In Exodus 20: 8-11, the ‘ rest’ and ‘ holiness’ connected with the ‘seventh day’, makes it clear that for man there is an issue of obedience.  Man was to do what God commanded, that is, rest and worship, for that would benefit man.  Man should therefore not shy away from doing what is for his personal materialistic benefit, for in addition this shows his obedience to God.

The question of obedience and rest on the ‘seventh day’ is therefore a moral matter. The necessity to obey was built into the foundations at the time of creation.

The ‘seventh day’ Sabbath has universal application and perpetual repercussions for all creation.  It was created in “time”, and reflects the fact that “time” is a creation of God.  Man is a creature of time, and God has made one particular ‘time’ stand out to remind man that he is a creature of time, created by God, the only one who holds the breath or the ‘ time’ of man in His hands.

Playing around with the Sabbath is therefore a very serious matter.  In the Book of Isaiah, Chapter 66, verse 23 to 24, the scene is set when Christ returns to the earth in judgment. He judges and disciplines the disobedient and unfaithful, and declares plainly that from “seventh day” to “seventh day” all flesh must and would come to worship before Him. 

To make men to understand how serious He is, He will have them see the corpses of those who have transgressed against Him.  See verse 24. 

ORIGINS OF THE SABBATH IN SECULAR HISTORY

The scholars have always argued over whether the Sabbath was observed during the time from Adam to Moses.  This argument is heightened by the fact that there is no specific or direct reference to Noah, Abraham, Joseph, or the other Patriarchs keeping the Sabbath.  We know however that in Genesis 26: 5 God described Abraham as a man who obeyed him, and who kept his requirements (or his charge), his Commandments, his statutes, and his laws.  Abraham certainly knew about many of God’s rules. It would appear then that the Patriarchs knew about God’s rather detailed wishes and desires.  They knew that many sins such as adultery (see the case of Joseph), and stealing (see the case of Jacob in Genesis 31) was wrong. Abraham even tithed, even though the bible did not teach about the necessity for this practice.

There are five schools of thought, which teach that mankind had some concept of the Sabbath well before Moses. We can list these schools as the Babylonian, the Lunar, the Kenite, the socioeconomic, and the calendrical. We will look at three of these views.

The Babylonian school hold that the “sapattu” was a Babylonian “taboo sabbath” day, which also was adopted by the Caananites, the Hebrews and other peoples of the Near East.  One writer states

“This day was designated specifically as the “day of quieting the heart”.  The precise meeting of this expression is uncertain, but at least the concept of relaxation is implicit therein.  Furthermore, the seventh, 14th, 21st, and 28th days of certain months, and not  improbably of every month, and likewise the 19th day-that is, the 49th, the seven times seventh, day from the first day of the preceding month-were regarded as “evil days”.

Upon these days the physician, the oracular priest, and above all, the king, might not function in any official or professional capacity whatsoever.  While there is no definite evidence that these successive seventh days were identical with the “sabattu”, it is a reasonable inference that such was actually the case.  On the basis of this evidence certain scholars have maintained that the biblical Sabbath was of a Babylonian origin.”

Certainly, some of the restrictions on the Babylonian king, who as a representative of the gods was forbidden to do certain things lest he arouse their anger, seems to resemble several biblical laws concerning the Sabbath.  This would on the surface suggest a possible relationship between the two.

The Babylonian king was forbidden to eat meat roasted on coals, or any food touched by fire.  This was similar to the Exodus 35: 3 command with respect to cooking.  The king was forbidden to ride in his chariot, change his clothes, or discuss affairs of state, similar to the Exodus 16: 29 command.

The Babylonian priests were not to consult the oracles, and physicians were not treat the sick.  The ‘seven times seven’ or 19th day of the month when it fell, was also significant for all Babylonian officials.

For Babylon these were ‘evil days’ or ‘ unlucky days’ based on superstitious fear, with the restrictions meant to appease the angry gods. 

The above is certainly different in terms of ‘rest’, ‘blessing’, and ‘ holiness’ than what the Bible speaks about.  But it seems apparent that this is just the result of the corruption and perversion caused by disobedience and sin.  When the nations before Abraham fell into gross sin and idolatry, it was to be expected that their knowledge of the true meaning of the Sabbath among other things would become perverted.  Exactly the same thing happened in Israel, forcing the prophets to continually rail against the corruption and neglect of the Sabbath in that country.

Another school regards the Sabbath as originating in a distinctively agricultural and primitive calendar.  This calendar was based upon and recorded the successive stages into planting, ripening, harvesting, and use of the annual crop.  It is believed that this was the original calendar, and that the Babylonian ‘sapattu’ and the Canaanite and Semitic institutions came from it.

This calendar had a week of seven days as its basic unit of reckoning time. Its secondary time unit was the period of 50 days, that it, consisting of seven weeks, that is, the seven times seven days plus 1 additional day, which stood outside the week and which was known and celebrated as a festival of conclusions or termination.

This school make great attempts to explain the Feasts of Israel, the Sabbatical year, and the year Jubilee by this alleged so-called basic agricultural calendar. But this is only a theory attempting to harmonize or find a common cause for similar cultural and economic  practices. It is only conjecture.

With respect to the Lunar theory, it is speculated that the Hebrew word for Sabbath originally referred to the day of the full moon.  Jewish tradition has always interpreted the phrase “the morrow after the Sabbath”, as in Leviticus 23:11,15, to mean not the first day of the week, but the morrow after the first day of the Passover, which always falls on a day of the full moon.

In this biblical phrase, the word for Sabbath (Shabbat) always means “the day of the full moon”.  This is clearly a very ancient meaning of the word (Shabbat) but where the word is used in any other place, it always refers to the 7th day of the week.

The Bible however frequently links the new moon and the Sabbath, mentioning the new moon first. See 2 Kings 4:23, Amos 8: 4-5, Isaiah 1: 13.  Some therefore hold that there was a time when the Sabbath referred to the day of the full moon, a very important religious festival.

This however only suggests that the word Sabbath (Shabbat) at an earlier period, had a different or additional meaning, and that the word could refer to the day of the full moon.  The word, by the time of the Exodus, was also used to refer to the weekly seventh day Sabbath.  This 7th day Sabbath, was regarded as of superior sanctity, and worshipped on more often, that all the other festival or Feast days, which were also called Sabbaths. 

Note that these other “Sabbaths” were also holy days and rest days, but they were never treated as the seventh day Sabbath, for this seventh day Sabbath had always been based on the ‘rest’ of God and was never based on the Lunar day. 

 

THE TRUE OLD TESTAMENT SABBATH

In the light of the teaching of the Bible, and paying due regard to the distortions in the ancient secular world, we can now look at what the Sabbath was intended to be.

The Sabbath was always to be a day of joy and to be a day of rest.  The time of the first seventh day celebrations by Adam and Eve must have been one of Utopian delight. Adam and Eve were perfect, fully aware of each other, and aware of the presence and warmth of God’s love and affection.

Indeed, it has been pointed out that Adam and Eve rested with God, on the first day of their existence, even though they had not experienced a week of labour.

Resting therefore is not simply ceasing from labour. The Sabbath pleasure is not just resting from work, there is more to it.

When sin came, the Sabbath also came to be a day of freedom from the drudgery of hard toil and labor. Remember that because of sin, work was now a painful experience for results would only come by the sweat of the brow, and the earth would yield its substance reluctantly.

Isaiah 58: 13-14 speaks of the Sabbath as a day of joy and delight, not a day of burden and oppression.

For the children of Israel who had been released from slavery, this would be a special blessing, for they would on the Sabbath remember that their horrible burdens had been lifted by God.

Psalm 92, a Psalm of the Sabbath, gives us a good insight into what the Sabbath should be, what we should be thinking of, how we should be regarding God, and what we should be doing at that time.

The restrictions like staying at home (Exodus 16:29), lighting fires (Exodus 35:3), picking up sticks (Numbers 15:32), bearing burdens (Jeremiah 17:19-27), were intended to ensure that the people did not do difficult home or commercial activities, but rather ensured that they were free to rejoice and rest on the Sabbath.

The temptations to work and be burdened by routine physical activities were too much for Israel, and they often desecrated the Sabbath, doing what was not beneficial for them.

Note that many of the restrictions that Jews later adopted were not from the Bible, but came from the many interpretations of the Law by Rabbis who wanted to preserve the sanctity of the Sabbath. In doing so, they did create many difficulties for the people, and in addition, they also came up with compromises which voided some aspects of the biblical commands.

One writer notes how the Jewish leaders went too far and distorted God’s intention for Sabbath worship. He states:

“Two entire treatises of the Talmud deal with how the Sabbath was to be kept. Thirty-nine types of work were not to be done on the Sabbath. For example, writing more than one letter was prohibited. Tying certain type of knots was prohibited, but others were permitted. A Levite in the Temple could retie a broken string on a musical instrument, but he could not put on a new one. Practicing medicine was not allowed- unless life was endangered. Hence, a man with a toothache could rinse his mouth with vinegar on the Sabbath- as long as he swallowed it (that was eating); but he could not rinse his mouth and then spit out the vinegar (that was practicing medicine).

Travel on the Sabbath was limited to a specific distance from one’s domicile. However, if one wanted to go further on the Sabbath, he could legally extend his domicile by placing some of his belongings at a distant point; then he could begin counting his Sabbath’s journey from that distant point…..

No wonder Jesus called the Pharisees and the Scribes a bunch of self-righteous hypocrites (Mark 7:9-13).”

Note the danger of not closely following the Bible. Some disregard the Bible and desecrate the Sabbath, while others overdo the rules, create their own rules, and offend God.

It is to be noted that the Jewish celebration of the Sabbath, was never and is not now bleak and joyless. It is a day when special food is prepared, specially prepared clothes are made ready and used, and intellectual and religious activities pursuits followed.

The Sabbath then is a time for communion with God, thinking about him, for it is his Sabbath.

It is also a time for remembering the Covenant with God, for God had regarded the Sabbath as a sign of the Covenant He had established with Israel. See Exodus 31:13-17.

The Sabbath was therefore important to Israel, for it symbolized their unique role among the nations.

Ezekiel 20:12-20 emphasized the important of the Sabbath for Israel for the prophet stressed that God had linked this to Israel’s election.

Worship of God, and remembering the relationship with God was therefore of utmost importance. The Sabbath reminded Israel of God’s presence, and His loyalty to them.

The Sabbath therefore does many things. It is a time for worship and praise and remembering God in a special way, in spirit and truth. It is a time for our gratitude to flow out to God for what He has done.

When Israel forgot that, the Sabbath stood as a witness against her, this disobedience among the Covenant people was never treated as a simple matter by God. The Sabbath can thus never be treated as something to be ritually observed. It must be observed with all its meaning and purpose in full view.

God has always given the Sabbath prominence in his dealing with his people. Observing the Sabbath is clearly an integral part of God’s will for all men.

Israel is an example for us all. They received the Ten Commandments, which were written with the finger of God Himself. He spoke it with His own voice, and the people heard the voice of God. When the people of Israel desecrated the Sabbath, they were sent into exile. We need nothing else to understand the importance of the Sabbath to God.

We must render due and appropriate service to God on the Sabbath.

We must also render due and appropriate service to others on the Sabbath. This is a day that we should remember those around us, the manservant and the maidservant, the cattle and animals, and the stranger within our gates.

See Exodus 20:10; 23:12; Deuteronomy 5:14. We must also do “good” on the Sabbath . See Exodus 20, Matthew 12:7-12, Mark 3:4, Luke 13:12.

All of us must ensure that the Sabbath is a delight. We should use it to reach out to others. We must not follow inhumane, burdensome traditions. Jesus insisted that we observe the Sabbath as he intended it to be observed.

We must remind ourselves continually that the Sabbath is special. It tells us:

1. That we belong to God, and are God’s people,
2. That we are closely bound to anyone who belongs to God.
3. It reminds us often of our responsibility toward God, our Creator and Lord.
4. It reminds us of our responsibility to others around us, as well as to the people of God.
5. It assures us that we are in the covenant, and that God will always save and sustain us.
6. That God knows what is best for us, and that His plans for us are always good.
7. It is an integral part of God’s plan to keep us healthy, mentally, physically and spiritually. It is the best stress reliever known, if properly observed.
8. There is joy in serving God. We are reminded of this when we eat what we have prepared or what we have been given by others who see our need. We must remember to share in our blessings.
9. That there is an eternity coming, when we will enjoy fully the “rest” with God.

Jesus and the Apostles are our guide as to how we should observe the Sabbath. They did not follow the distorted Pharisaical approach. Believers must focus on keeping the explicit intent of the Sabbath, devoting their time to God and their fellows, avoiding work, and the idle pleasures of life, and commune instead with God. With that, we must make the Sabbath a delight, and not a dread, being careful to be reverent, since we are on God’s day of special communion.

The general rule is to center everything you do on God. Act as if you truly are the Priest of God and his Christ, and his Ambassador on this planet.

THE TEXT

JESUS, REST, WORK, AND THE SABBATH

The Context of this Study is important. Jesus had been teaching in Capernaum and many had jammed into the house where Jesus was teaching.  Some men tried to carry a paralyzed man for healing but to get to Jesus they had to break up the roof and lower their friend into the meeting. Jesus saw their faith and  knowing the real needs of the man, told the paralytic that his sins were forgiven. The scribes who were present correctly stated that only God could forgive but they erred by refusing to see that Jesus was God the Son and hence had the authority to forgive sins. Jesus knew what they were reasoning and so He pointed out that real forgiveness and the power to heal are impossible for a mere man, but for God it’s easy. The scribes should have understood that Jesus who had the power to heal the man’s disease also would have the authority to forgive his sins. The only issue was that forgiveness is invisible but when the man was healed they could see in front of them the healing from the authority of Jesus. The man of course was healed at Jesus’ command and he got up and took up his bed  and walked a healed man.

The authority of Jesus was again demonstrated when Jesus saw Levi, renamed Matthew, sitting at the Tax office. This man was a collector of taxes and therefore regarded as an outcast from society, thus excommunicated from the synagogue, disqualified for being a judge or a witness. Jesus’ love was evident and Levi responded to Jesus’ invitation to leave what he was doing and follow Him.

Later Jesus attended a dinner at Levi’s house and Jesus’ presence and sharing a meal with Tax collectors and sinners brought the objection from the Pharisees that Jesus’ keeping company with sinners meant He could not be a man of God.

The clash between the prejudices of the scribes and Pharisees was now reaching a boiling point for this group felt that Jesus should not be eating and drinking with sinners and tax collectors rather than fasting and praying with righteous people.

Clearly in verse 17 Jesus is telling  the Pharisees that it is impossible for self- righteous and people who thought they were spiritually self-sufficient to repent for they would be thinking that they had everything together spiritually. But Jesus was pointing out that the tax collectors and sinners were more aware of their needs and thus were open to the truth.

Verse 18. Notice the kind of people that Jesus was now dealing with. It seems that this was a fasting day and so the scribes and Pharisees came to Jesus raising a controversy about fasting and the Sabbath. They asked Jesus why He and His disciples did not fast since the day disciples of John and the Pharisees fasted.

We note that this issue of fasting is very important but in the Bible fasting had been set in the law of Moses for a certain time. There were many feast days but only on one day a year fasting was required. That fasting day was the Day of Atonement which the Jews call Yom Kippur. This was a 24 hour period of fasting.

In contrast, every other holy day in Israel was regarded as a time to celebrate but the Bible says that this annual fast symbolized humility before God, a personal sacrifice before God, and a grieving over sin. The Day of Atonement really looked at forgiveness of sins and for the people on that day fasting showed their desire to look at their lives and repent.

John the Baptist had been preaching a gospel of repentance and so he would be emphasizing to his disciples that they should fast

In addition the strange behavior of these Pharisees must be noted for  the Pharisees hated John the Baptist and were quite thrilled when he was arrested by Herod and thrown in prison and executed later on. At that time the disciples of John the Baptist had a reason to be mourning for they were still loyal to John even though he was at that time in prison.

The fact was the Pharisees did nothing to lobby Herod from executing John the Baptist. But now they came to Jesus asking Him why He and His disciples did not fast like the disciples of John the Baptist and the Pharisees. This was clearly carnal religiosity on their part that required fasting.

What shocked the Pharisees was that was that despite the hostility of the religious authorities and Herod the disciples of Jesus were cheerful and happy and so the Pharisees felt that they had no right but to be solemn and do what they regarded as necessary for serious religious activity.

For them the disciples of Jesus and Jesus Himself should pray more, fast more, and memorize more Scriptures as they interpreted them, have more respect for established religious traditions, and be more sensitive to John who was now in prison because of his faith..

These scribes and Pharisees did not seem to understand that eating has its time and place in the life of Jews. It also has its time and place in the life of Christians and so there should be a balance in the Christian life.  The Pharisees and scribes appeared to believe that even though the Day of Atonement is the only fast day in the law, fasting was the best way to call  God’s attention  to their piety, and in addition to that to call attention from men. They would put sackcloth on themselves, rub ashes on their face, suck in their cheeks and look gaunt and suffering to attract attention from the people of the nation to how pious and righteous they were.

These kinds of questions  to Jesus obviously come from people who were on the other side, away from God.

Verses 19-21.   Jesus answered the Pharisees by telling them that they misunderstood what was happening at the presence of the Messiah for with His presence it was not a tme of a funeral but instead it was like a time of a wedding. The bridegroom was there and at a wedding nobody fasted but would be rejoicing, laughing. glad, and in a festive mood.

The day however would come when the disciples of Jesus would have to fast for  the bridegroom would not be with them all the time.

 Verses 21-22. Note the fact that Jesus was pointing the Pharisees to the new relationship that would happen or come into vogue now that He had come from heaven to earth. When Jesus came there would be new activity and a new expression of life.  This would not be the solemn, ceremonial, ritualistic services and worship, and silence before the Lord God Almighty.

The new relationship He had brought would be one of vitality and warm intimacy, for the presence of the bridegroom Himself would bring joy, gladness and celebration.

Jesus therefore gave these two simple illustrations to bring the point to these Pharisees that with His presence joy and celebration were normal. So note what Jesus said  to them for this has a direct relevance to the life of people in the church who should not have dull worship, morbid expressions on their faces, unexciting and totally predictable worship which is shallow and repetitive and which turns off people.:

“Jesus said to them, “While the bridegroom is with them, the attendants of the bridegroom cannot fast, can they? So long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. But the days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day”.

Note that John the Baptist understood this kind of teaching for in John 3:28-30 John told his disciples:

“You yourselves are my witnesses, that I said, “ I am not the Christ”, but, “ I have been sent ahead of him”. He who has the bride is the bridegroom; but the friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom’s voice. So this joy of mine has been made full., he must increase but I must decrease”.

Obviously then, believers must understand the nature of the new relationship with Jesus. If you have the bridegroom with you through the work of the Holy Spirit you will always have joy unspeakable in your hearts. Your worship will reflect this joy and gladness despite the problems which you might be experiencing.

Jesus then gave a very vivid illustration of what is happening when He came and what His coming meant. Jesus said::

“No one sews a piece of unshrunk wool on an old garment; if he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made.

And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; if he does, the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is lost; and so are the skins; but new wine is for fresh skins”.

Clearly then if you have any relationship with Christ there will be a fresh relationship and a fresh and new expression. You will not be able to behave the way you formerly behaved and follow the old habits and the old forms for they will not work. The new form and the new expression is too powerful and it will destroy those old forms and ways of behavior that you had.

Note also Jesus is telling you that if there is a new wine in you there will be a strong reaction for the joy that you feel will be strong and you will need fresh controls. You therefore have to be led by the Holy Spirit so that you can express the joy and gladness that you have in you because of your new relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ.

It would be good if you can find new biblically acceptable ways to express this new relationship instead of going back to the old ways.

Verses 23-24.  Here we now have a new incident which deals with the problem of rules. Jesus and His disciples are going through grain fields and what happens brings Him into direct confrontation and controversy with these Pharisees.

It was the Sabbath day and what the disciples were doing would be perfectly proper during the week for they were not stealing with the farmers as they went through the grain fields. The law said that any person in the nation of Israel when they were going through the grain fields as long as they did not put a sickle or a scythe to the grain, since they were passing strangers who were hungry, they could take out a few heads of grain in their hands and eat the wheat.

So the problem on this occasion was the Sabbath for the Pharisees and scribes had developed 1001 restrictions for Sabbath  activity.

Remember that the Sabbath was originally given to restore man and give him rest and recreation and of course joy. But the Pharisees had surrounded the Sabbath with so many interpretations that they had created terrible burdens for the people to bear. For example they said that if you would spit on the ground and made mud that was mortar, and therefore you were working on the Sabbath. That’s the kind of the many restrictions the Pharisees had come up with and so they considered that it was wrong to rub a few heads of grain on the Sabbath day even though you were hungry because that was working on the Sabbath.

“The Mishnah, a compilation of commentary on the Old Testament written by different rabbis and scribes between 200 B.C. and about 200 A.D. has 36 pages on keeping the Sabbath and one writer records one short paragraph entitled, “The Main Classes of Work Forbidden on the Sabbath”. It states:

“The main classes of work are forty save one: Sowing,  plowing, reaping, binding sheaves, threshing, winnowing, cleansing crops, grinding, sifting, kneading, baking, Shearing wool, washing or beating or dyeing it, spinning, weaving.  Making two loops, weaving two threads, separating two threads, tying a knot, loosening a knot, sewing two stitches, tearing in order to sew two stitches. Hunting a gazelle, slaughtering or flaying or salting it or curing its skin, scraping it or cutting it up.

 Writing two letters, erasing in order to write two letters, building, pulling down, putting out a fire, lighting a fire, striking with a hammer, and taking out aught from one domain into another (, carrying something, say, from inside your house to outside).” (P 106).

“Each of these 49 classes of work has a section where it is expanded and explained point by point. According to the rabbis, Jesus and his disciples are guilty of at least 4 of these 39 classes of work:, ripping, threshing, winnowing and the food preparation”.

It is easy to see that none of these commentaries by the rabbis have any biblical authority behind them for it is only human tradition worked out over the many centuries. The people writing this commentary might have been pious and they might have had sincere motives and they might wanted to protect the law and control behavior that was not religious on the part of people that were trying to keep the law. But these rules were simply intended so that the people wouldn’t have time to think about it.

This was legalism pure and simple which thinks that by doing legalism you can protect and defend the law. But remember that the problem is that all of this is extra-biblical.

Verses 25-28.  The Pharisees attacked Jesus by asking Him what He and His disciples did by taking the ears of corn on the Sabbath and eating it, for that was not lawful on the Sabbath. The disciples picking the ears of corn while they walked through the grain field and rubbing it with their hands and eating it was for the Pharisees a violation of their Sabbath principles. That was forbidden work/

Jesus obviously sarcastically asked the Pharisees whether they had read the story in the Bible about David and the showbread which of course they had read for it was in 1 Samuel 21. This passage told the story of David running from the army of Saul and he was in a situation where there was no food available and so David went to the Tabernacle and got 12 freshly baked loaves from the Tabernacle even though the law of God had stipulated that for ceremonial worship life this should not be eaten except by the priests. We read about this rule in Exodus 29:32-33. And in Leviticus 24:5,8-9:

“Then you shall take fine flour and bake 12 cakes with it… every Sabbath day he shall set it in order before the Lord continually.. it shall be for Aaron and his sons,; and they shall eat it in a holy place for it is most holy to him from the LORD’s  offering by fire, this portion forever”.

When Jesus related this story about David and what he did with the Holy Shewbread from the Tabernacle, Jesus was pointing out that in making themselves authorities over the Sabbath they were ignoring the needs of people. They were totally ignoring the spirit of the law by stressing the words of the law ignoring that the Sabbath was God’s gift to man and the right to save life would be fine. The law should be interpreted in that fashion to make it a positive thing which honoured both the letter of the law and the spirit of the law.

It is therefore possible that one can take positions and practices which seem to be conforming in the form that one presents but what at the same time is non-biblical in substance. It is possible to honor the letter of the law while at the same time violating the spirit of the law. If one stresses the letter of the law past what God intended there will always be loopholes in the letter that allows a person to violate the spirit of the law.

The Pharisees were doing that. Sometimes we come up with positions and practices in the same way forcing others to adopt our views, and if they don’t we dismiss them as being unenlightened.

But we also is clear that in most cases the Scripture is quite precise in what it says and what it means and more often than not we have no good biblical case to come up with rules that contradict other instructions from god in Scripture.

In every case we must remember that we must look in Scripture for the Lord Jesus Christ and what He is and what He does and what He wants. We must never fail to recognize the Lord of the Scriptures for the Scriptures are testifying about the Lord Jesus Christ according to John 5:39 to 40.

We must be careful to understand that a church or believers may disregard Jesus because they start to honor Him in ways not approved in Scripture. They might feel they are correct in doing what they feel is right but in no way we can honour Jesus in a way to contradict Scripture.

The Spirit does not really support the attempts by many to introduce traditions into the church which overrule the plain words of Scripture.

The sad fact to note is that the Pharisees will question Jesus about the lawfulness of Sabbath activity but they see no advantage in pressing their argument for they aren’t interested in debating Jesus only in gathering evidence that they can use against Him.

We read that after this Jesus is angry with them because they had rendered themselves insensitive to human suffering and oblivious to the in-breaking of the kingdom of God.

Their hearts were hardened and so they were opposed to the teaching of Jesus, and His sensitivity to the needs of people. This was because of their hardened heart.

Jesus was the greatest of Jews, and scrupulously upheld the Law, showing what the Law was intended to be  a blessing to man.

Jesus denounced the traditions of the Scribes and Pharisees when these traditions clashed with and voided the Scriptures. He always showed the positive intent of the Sabbath, as in Mark 2:27-28, where He showed that it was lawful to do good on the Sabbath. See also Luke 13:15-15 and Matthew 12:10.

Note how Jesus, in the John 5:1-18 scene acted. He healed the man at the pool of Bethesda. Jesus’ action did not indicate He wanted to change the Sabbath, but showed the spiritual, moral and humanitarian qualities in the Sabbath.

In John 7, Jesus again showed His overriding regard for the spiritual welfare of men. The Sabbath was no hindrance to His acts of mercy and kindness.

In John 9, Jesus again healed another man, this time the man who was born blind. He did this despite the fact that He knew His enemies would use His action to accuse Him.

We also know that Jesus was never accused of breaking the Sabbath, except for doing acts of mercy and kindness, and showing that man could bring joy and peace to meet his needs on the Sabbath.

CONCLUSION

The Scriptures are very clear in advising us what the rest of God or the resting in God is all about.  God gave us the example of resting in Him in Genesis.  Resting in God requires that a person, a believer, ceases from work and focuses on God and His nature and the redemption that He has brought.  God graciously gave us a gift, and it is made for the benefit of man.

 In the rests in God there is restorative power. Under the arms of God there is solace and serenity despite the many storms of life. In Exodus 33: 14 God reiterates to Israel:

“My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest”.

 And in a well known passage found in Psalm 23:2-3

“He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul. He guides me along the right paths for his name’s sake”.

Isaiah 40:31  and the words which tell us to have hope and trust in the Lord for He renews our strength and empowers us to rise above all the circumstances we face. We read:

“But those who hope in the LORD  will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint”.

 And the Messiah Himself gives you that direct invitation of comfort, refreshment, and nourishing:

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light”.

The book of Hebrews in Chapter 4:9-11 point us to our position in the family of God and our exalted future:

“There  remains, then, a Sabbath rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from their works, just as God did from his.

 Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will perish by following their example of disobedience”.

So note carefully that the Scripture speaks of a Sabbath rest available to the people of God, a rest so that we will not strive and engage in Self-effort; we will be like God who rested on the 7^th day of creation. So let us surrender to God and trust in His finished work so that we can say as Psalm 62:1

“Truly my soul finds rest in God; my salvation comes from him”.

 We know from God’s promise repeated in Lamentations 3::22-23 that it is because of God’s love that we are not consumed.

We know that God’s compassions never fail. We know that God’s compassions are new every morning. We know that God’s faithfulness is great.

We can cast our cares on the Lord and He will sustain us for He will never let the righteous be shaken.  (Psalm 55: 22).