Sermon

Exodus 20:8. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work. But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God: in it you shall not do any work, you, nor your son, nor your daughter, your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger that is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.

This commandment was engraved in stone by God's own finger, and it will be our comfort to have it engraved in our hearts.

The Sabbath day is set apart for God's solemn worship, it is God's enclosure, and it must not be alienated to common uses. The Lord has set a preface before this commandment, he has put a reminder to it — Remember, to keep the Sabbath day holy. This word Remember shows that we are apt to forget Sabbath holiness, therefore we need a memorandum to put us in mind of sanctifying this day.

I shall explain the words.

- 1. Here is a solemn command: Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. - 2. Many cogent arguments to induce us to observe the command.

1. In the command, first, the matter of it, namely, the sanctifying of the Sabbath, which Sabbath sanctification consists in two things.

First, in resting from our own works.

Secondly, in a conscientious discharge of our religious duties.

2. The persons to whom the command of sanctifying the Sabbath is given: (1.) either superiors, and they are, first, more private, as parents and masters; or, secondly, more public, as magistrates; or, (2.) inferiors. First, natives, as children and servants — your son and your daughter, your male servant and your female servant. Secondly, foreigners — the stranger that is within your gates.

2. The cogent arguments to obey this command of keeping holy the Sabbath. 1. From the rationality of it — Six days you shall labor, and do all your work: as if God had said, I am not a hard master, I do not begrudge you time to look after your calling, and to get an estate. I have given you six days, six to do all your work in, and have taken but one day for myself: I might have reserved six days for myself, and allowed you but one; but I have given you six days for the works of your calling, and have taken but one day for my own service; therefore it is equal and rational, that you should set this day in a special manner apart for my worship.

2. The second argument is taken from, secondly, the justice of it. The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God: as if God had said, The Sabbath day is my due, I claim a special right in it, and none has any right to lay claim to it. He who robs me of this day, and puts it to common uses, is a sacrilegious person, he steals from the crown of heaven, and I will in no wise hold him guiltless.

3. The third argument for sanctifying the Sabbath is taken from God's own pattern — he rested the seventh day. As if the Lord should say, Will not you follow my pattern? Having finished all my works of creation, I rested the seventh day. So you, having done all your secular work on the six days, should now cease from the labor of your calling, and dedicate the seventh day to the Lord as a day of holy rest.

4. The fourth argument for Sabbath sanctification is taken from the benefit which comes from a religious observation of the Sabbath. The Lord blessed the seventh day and hallowed it: it is not only a day of God's blessing — God did not only appoint the seventh day, but he blessed the seventh day. The Sabbath day is not only a day of honor to God, but a day of blessing to us; it is not only a day in which we give God worship, but a day in which he gives us grace; on this day a blessing drops down from heaven. This is a great argument for keeping the Sabbath day holy: God is not benefited by it, we cannot add one cubit to his essential glory; but we ourselves are advantaged: the Sabbath day religiously observed entails a blessing upon our souls, our estate, our posterity. As the not keeping this day holy brings a curse (Jeremiah 17:27), God curses a man's blessings (Malachi 2:2), and the bread which he eats is poisoned with a curse: so the conscientious observation of the Sabbath brings all manner of blessings with it. These are the arguments to induce Sabbath sanctification. And so I have divided the commandment into its several parts, and explained the sense of it.

The thing I would have you observe is, that this commandment about keeping the Sabbath was not abrogated with the ceremonial law, but it is purely moral, and the observation of the Sabbath is to be continued to the end of the world. Where can we show that God has given us a discharge from keeping one day in seven? So that I say, this fourth commandment is moral, and obliges Christians to the perpetual commemoration and sanctification of the Sabbath.

Question: Why has God appointed a Sabbath?

Answer. 1. In respect of himself: it is requisite that God should reserve one day in seven for his own immediate service, that hereby he might be acknowledged to be the great sovereign Lord, who has power over us both to command worship, and appoint the time when he will be worshipped.

2. In respect of us. The Sabbath day makes for our interest, it promotes holiness in us. The business of the weekday makes us too forgetful of God and our souls; the Sabbath brings God into our remembrance. When the dust of the world falling has clogged the wheels of our affections, so that they would scarcely move toward God, the Sabbath comes and oils the wheels of our affections, and now they move swiftly in religion: therefore God has appointed a Sabbath to ripen our holiness. On this day the thoughts contemplate heaven, the tongue speaks of God, and is as the pen of a ready writer; now the eyes drop tears, now the soul burns in love. When the heart was all week frozen, now on the Sabbath it is melted with the Word. The Sabbath is a friend to religion, it files off the rust of our graces, it is a spiritual jubilee in which the soul is set to converse with its Maker.

I should in the next place show you the manner how we should keep the Sabbath day holy. But before I come to that, I shall propose a great question, namely:

Question: How does it come to pass that we do not keep the seventh day Sabbath, as it was in the original institution, but have changed it to another day?

Ans. The old Seventh-day Sabbath (which was the Jewish Sabbath) is abrogated, and in the room of it, the first day of the week, which is the Christian Sabbath, succeeds. The morality or substance of the Fourth Commandment does not lie in keeping the seventh day precisely, but in keeping one day in seven, which God has appointed.

Qu. But how comes the first day of the week to be substituted in the room of the seventh day?

Ans. Not by ecclesiastical authority. The Church (says Mr. Perkins) has no power to ordain a Sabbath. But,

1. The change of the Sabbath from the last day of the week to the first was by Christ's own appointment. Christ is Lord of the Sabbath (Mark 2:28). And who shall appoint a day, but he who is Lord of it? He made this day (Psalm 118:24): "This is the day which the Lord has made." Arnobius and the current of expositors understand it of our Christian Sabbath, and it is called the Lord's Day (Revelation 1:10). As it is called the Lord's Supper, because of the Lord's instituting the bread and wine, and setting it apart from a common use to a more special and sacred use: so it is called the Lord's Day, because of the Lord's instituting it, and setting it apart from common days to his special worship and service. Christ arose on the first day of the week out of the grave, and appeared twice on this day to his disciples (John 20:19, 26), which was to intimate to the disciples (says Austin and Athanasius) that he transferred the Jewish Sabbath to the Lord's Day.

2. The keeping of the first day (which is the Lord's Day) was the practice of the Apostles (1 Corinthians 16:2; Acts 20:7). On the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached to them. Here was both preaching and breaking of bread on this day. Austin, and Innocentius, and Isidore, make the keeping of our Gospel-Sabbath to be an apostolical sanction, and affirm that by virtue of the Apostles' practice, this Lord's Day is to be set apart for divine worship. What the Apostles did, they did it by divine authority, for they were inspired by the Holy Ghost.

3. Besides, the primitive Church had the Lord's Day, which we now celebrate, in high estimation. It was a great badge of their religion to observe this day. Ignatius the most ancient father, who lived in the time of St. John the Apostle, has these words: "Let every one that loves Christ, keep holy the first day of the week, the Lord's Day." This day has been observed by the Church of Christ above sixteen hundred years, as learned Bucer notes. Thus you see how the Seventh-day Sabbath comes to be changed to the First-day Sabbath.

Now there is a grand reason for changing of the Jewish Sabbath to the Lord's Day, because this puts us in mind of the mystery of our redemption by Christ. The reason why God did institute the old Sabbath was, because God would have it kept as a memorial of the creation: but the Lord has now brought the first day of the week in the room of it, in memory of a more glorious work than creation, and that is redemption.

Great was the work of creation, but greater was the work of redemption. As it was said (Haggai 2:9), "The glory of the second temple was greater than the glory of the first temple": so the glory of the redemption was greater than the glory of the creation. Great wisdom was seen in the curious making us, but more miraculous wisdom in saving us. Great power was seen in bringing us out of nothing, but greater power in helping us when we were worse than nothing. It cost more to redeem us than to create us. In the creation there was but speaking a word (Psalm 148:5). In the redeeming us there was shedding of blood (1 Peter 1:18-19). The creation was the work of God's fingers (Psalm 8:3). Redemption was the work of his arm (Luke 1:5). In the creation God gave us ourselves, in the redemption he gave us himself: by creation we have a life in Adam, by redemption we have a life in Christ (Colossians 3:3). By creation we had a right to an earthly paradise, by redemption we have a title to a heavenly kingdom. So that well might Christ change the seventh day of the week into the first, because this day puts us in mind of our redemption, which is a more glorious work than the creation.

Use: The use I shall make is, that we should have this Christian Sabbath we now celebrate in high veneration. The Jews called the Sabbath, Desiderium Dierum, the desire of days, and the queen of days. It is a day of sweet rest. This day we must call a delight, the holy of the Lord, honorable (Isaiah 58:13). Metal that has the King's stamp upon it is honorable, and of great value. God has set his royal stamp upon the Sabbath: It is the Sabbath of the Lord, this makes it honorable. This day we should look upon as the best day in the week. What the phoenix is among the birds, what the sun is among the planets, that the Lord's Day is among other days. This is the day which the Lord has made (Psalm 118:24). God has made all the days, but he has blessed this. As Jacob got the blessing from his brother, so the Sabbath has got the blessing from all the other days in the week. The Sabbath is a day in which we converse in a special manner with God. The Jews called the Sabbath, Dies Lucis, a day of light; on this day the Sun of Righteousness shines upon the soul. The Sabbath is the market-day of the soul, the cream of time; this is the day of Christ's rising out of the grave, and the Holy Ghost's descending upon the earth. This day is perfumed with the sweet odor of prayer, which goes up to heaven as incense. This day the manna falls, that angels' food; this is the soul's festival day; on this day all the graces act their part: the other days of the week are most employed about earth, this day about heaven: then you gather straw, now pearl. Now Christ takes the soul up into the mount, and gives it transfiguring sights of glory. Now Christ leads his spouse into the wine-cellar, and displays the banner of his love; now he gives her his spiced wine, and the juice of the pomegranate (Song of Solomon 8:2). The Lord does usually reveal himself more to the soul on this day. The Apostle John was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day (Revelation 1:10). He was carried up in divine raptures towards heaven. This day a Christian is in the altitudes, he walks with God, and takes as it were a turn with him in heaven (1 John 1:3). On this day holy affections are quickened: the stock of grace is improved, corruptions are weakened. On this day Satan falls like lightning before the majesty of the Word. Christ wrought most of his miracles upon the Sabbath: So he does now. The dead soul is raised; the heart of stone is made flesh. How should this day be highly esteemed, and had in reverence! This day is more precious than rubies, God has anointed this day with the oil of gladness above its fellows. On the Sabbath we are doing angels' work, our tongues are tuned to God's praises. This Sabbath on earth is a shadow and type of that glorious rest and eternal Sabbath we hope for in heaven, when God shall be the temple, and the Lamb shall be the light of it (Revelation 21:22-23).