Holy Day or Holiday? (Part 1 of 4)

The fourth of the Ten Commandments is the one that calls us to remember the Sabbath day and to keep it holy. But here in the 21st century, does that still make sense?

Is this ancient law still relevant in our culture? Today on Truth for Life, Alistair Begg explores the clear and specific instruction God has given us to set apart one day from all the rest. I invite you to take your Bibles, and we'll turn to Exodus. And there in Exodus chapter 20, we read in verse 8 and following the words of the fourth commandment, Remember the sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but 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 manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates. For 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. Shall we bow in a moment of prayer?

Our gracious God and Father, this commandment, perhaps more than any other, is militated against both outside the church and inside the church. And if we're going to come to terms with it, if we're going to bow beneath the weight of its instruction, we're going to need the enabling power of the Holy Spirit to convince us of the truth of the Word of God. And so we ask for that today. Nothing more than that, and nothing less than that, so that we may be renewed in our inner being regarding the truth of Holy Scripture. And we pray in Jesus' name, asking this.

Amen. A number of people have spoken to me concerning the impact of these Ten Commandments as we have begun to study them together. One gentleman announced at the conclusion of last Sunday morning that he was, as he put it, zero for three. And as you know, we had only done three to that point. His honesty extended to the fact that he went on to say that, having read ahead, he felt that the best he might hope for was one out of nine.

He made contact with me later in the day to say that after some further study, his revised estimate was that he was going to be zero for ten. Now, those observations are as helpful as they are honest. Because there isn't one of us here this morning that is going to be able to stand up and say that we have kept any of the first three commandments perfectly. We haven't loved God exclusively, we haven't worshiped God correctly, we haven't been free of the misuse of his name, and now as we come to the fourth commandment, we've got a sneaking suspicion that we're going to have to bow beneath the weight of this one and acknowledge that we are guilty and that we are lawbreakers. Now, that ought not to be of a concern to us, insofar as that is the purpose of the law or one of the purposes of the law. If we could have kept all the commandments perfectly, then God would have accepted us.

But we can't, and therefore he doesn't. We're guilty, we've broken God's law, and it is by means of the law that we're made conscious of our sin. If we simply compare ourselves with other people, we may say, Well, I'm a little better than this individual, I'm not as good as that one, but on a kind of sliding scale, I'm really not that bad, and if God grades on the curve, then presumably I'm really okay. But when we stand against a perfect law of holiness and place our lives in the reflection of this, we realize that we're guilty. Now, the whole of the Bible makes clear just why this is. And if you turn for a moment this morning by way of introduction to Romans chapter 3, I need to say this, and there is a sense in which I might realistically have this as the recurring introduction to all of our studies in each of the commandments, because it is equally apropos every time we turn to another one. Romans chapter 3, and in verse 19. When Paul is writing, he's already pointed out from the Old Testament that there is no one who does good, not even one.

People don't like to hear that. And then he says in verse 19, "'Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, the purpose being so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law, rather through the law we become conscious of sin.'"

Now, just hold it there for a moment. What Paul is saying is this, that the law of God, summarized in the Decalogue, in the Ten Commandments, is given to us as a mirror in which we see a reflection of ourselves, and when we see ourselves, we realize that we are lawbreakers, that we are guilty before a holy God. We also realize that we cannot keep this law with any sense of perfection, and therefore that the law, the Ten Commandments, cannot be for us a ladder up which we climb to acceptance with God.

And if there is to be acceptance with God, then we know that it must come by some other route. That's verse 21. But now, says Paul, a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known to which the law and the prophets testify.

In other words, he says, what I'm about to tell you is not new. The whole of the Old Testament, in the law and in the prophets, they're pointing forward to this solution to the problem. Verse 22, this righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. That is the appeal of the gospel. That is the opportunity of the good news.

That is the expansiveness of the offer. That there is a possibility of being put in a right standing with a holy God, I who am guilty and a lawbreaker, and the way in which that divine transaction takes place is through faith in Jesus Christ, and it comes to all who believe, who entrust themselves exclusively and wholly into the care of the provision that God has made for us in Christ. For, he says, there's no difference. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. So then we see that the law confronts us with our guilt. It sends us to Christ to find forgiveness and freedom. The freedom is not a freedom to do what we want, but rather to do what we should.

What should we do? How may we know what we ought to do? Well, that is summarized for us here in the Decalogue, in the Ten Commandments. Here are the guidelines for freedom. Here is how children are to live with their parents.

Here is how husbands are to live with their wives. Here is the sanctity of human property. Here is the sanctity of work. Here is the sanctity of life.

Here is all that God intends in this great summary statement, providing for as the nature of genuine freedom. So the believer, then, keeps the law of God, not believing that by keeping it we gain acceptance or approval with God, but rather we keep God's law as a declaration of our grateful response to his life. Until we understand that, then we haven't really understood enough to proceed with the study of the Ten Commandments.

So let me summarize it again. Until the law of God confronts us with our sin and our need of a Savior, in whom we then trust, any explanation of the Ten Commandments will fall deaf upon our ears. Because the Ten Commandments are not a way to gain acceptance with God, but they are the guidelines for free living, lived out by those who through faith have believed in the provision of Christ.

Okay? So this morning, when we proclaim the law, we are inevitably categorized. We are all lawbreakers. We are either those who have broken the law, have come to Christ for salvation, and trust in that alone, or we continue as unbelievers. And if, having come to Christ for salvation, we then are those who are saying, Teach me from the Word what the parameters of freedom really are. And so we discovered in the First Commandment that it had to do with the exclusive worship of God. In the Second Commandment, that it was important for us to worship the correct God correctly. In the Third Commandment last time, that we are not to misuse the name of God. And now, this morning, in the Fourth Commandment, we discover that there is an abiding significance to a day that is holy to the Lord. Now, there are two things that mitigate against any good understanding of this commandment, and they are these. On the one hand, an almost complete lack of conviction about any notion of the abiding significance of the Fourth Commandment. And we'll address that in a moment. And on the other hand, almost total confusion concerning the nature, not only of all the Ten Commandments, but peculiarly, of this one day.

Now, we can highlight this in a number of ways. Let me do so by quoting from the Civil War. General Jackson is a legend in American history. Any of you who have read of Jackson will know that he was a man of extreme principle and character. At the very heart of this was his conviction of faith in Jesus Christ. And his extreme, rigorous character attached itself also to the observance of the Sabbath. And writing in his biography, his widow says, "...certainly he was not less scrupulous in obeying the divine command to remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy than he was in any other rule of his life. Since the Creator had set apart this day for his own and commanded it to be kept holy, he believed that it was wrong for him to desecrate it by worldly pleasure, idleness, or secular employment as to break any other commandment of the Decalogue. Sunday was his busiest day of the week, as he always attended church twice a day and taught in two Sabbath schools.

He refrained as much as possible from all worldly conversation. And in his family, if secular topics were introduced, he would say with a kindly smile, We will talk about that tomorrow. He never traveled on Sunday, never took his mail from the post office, nor permitted a letter of his own to travel on that day—always before posting it, calculating the time it required to reach his destination. One so strict in his own Sabbath observance naturally believed that it was wrong for the government to carry the mail on Sunday. Any organization which exacted secular labor of its employees on the Lord's Day was, in his opinion, a violator of God's law. And so his life was marked by a rigorous obedience to the law of God.

Now, loved ones, here's the question. Is this quote from Jackson an anachronism? In other words, if Jackson was right, where does that leave us? Because if we're right, most of us, he was wrong.

But one thing is for sure. We're not both right. So we need to go to our Bibles, then, and determine who approximates to the instruction of God's Word closely. Is it us in our libertine rejection of the Lord's Day? Or is it Jackson, in his rigorous obedience of it?

That kind of sets the context. You're gonna have to think with me. I feel the alien nature of this commandment so strongly that it couldn't be graphically portrayed any more than if I were to come up here wearing the funniest suit you ever saw, and you could say, Oh, I understand why he's saying that, because he's the fellow that wears that funny suit.

He has a lot of quirks to him. But, loved ones, we've got to get to grips with what the Bible states. There's so much material we can't cover it in one sermon. So tonight we'll come to many of the questions that most of you are hoping we'll address right now.

We're not gonna get to them. The reason we're not is because unless we understand the foundational element of this, those other questions about which we debate so strongly are, frankly, just an irrelevancy. Okay? So there are three points that we're going to address. Number one, we're going to consider the principle as it's stated. Secondly, we're going to look at the practice as it is observed.

And then we're going to finally come—and that will be this evening—to the practice applied. Okay? So, sorry, the principle stated, the pattern observed, and the practice applied.

Okay? The principle stated is summarized clearly in this first sentence of Exodus 20. All of the rest of it is an application or an amplification of this straightforward command—namely, remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.

Now, there's nothing particularly difficult about that. It's very clear. What it actually means demands our attention, but the clarity with which it is stated is obvious, as with the others. You shall do this, you shall not do that.

It is clear even a child can understand it. God is concerned about the sanctity of one day in seven. So it is absolutely vital that we come to understand that there is no convincing reason to believe, as some have taught and continue to teach, that the fourth commandment is in a different category from the other nine.

If you've been around church life long enough, you may well have imbibed the notion that we have nine commandments, and then we have one that is kind of maybe in and maybe out. Interestingly enough, the maybe out factor has a direct correlation with the prevailing impact of the surrounding culture. There was no maybe out in the mind of Stonewall Jackson. There was no maybe out in the minds of our forefathers in this country.

And one of the things I always do when I travel this country and I'm with older pastors, I always ask them, Tell me about the Lord's day when you were a young man. And they describe a day that is very, very different from today. Now, there's a reason for that, loved ones, and we need to find out what it is.

And we need to determine whether it's actually progress or regression. Well, you see, there are people who say that the fourth commandment has things that attach to it, regulations, mosaic factors that are such, that we don't do those things anymore, and therefore, because we don't do those things anymore, we no longer need to be governed by this commandment. But, loved ones, this is just silly talk. For example, we recognize that there are mosaic attachments to all of the commandments, not least of all to the fourth. Now, in the fourth commandment, you weren't allowed to light fires on the Sabbath day.

That was a peculiar ceremonial attachment to it. If you broke the fourth commandment, the punishment was stoning. So people say, Hey, we light fires, and we don't stone people, and therefore, we don't get into this fourth commandment stuff, therefore, we don't have a fourth commandment.

No. Because if you think it out, there were ceremonial attachments to all the other commandments. Take the fifth commandment.

Honor your father and mother that your days may be long upon the land. Is that an abiding command? Is that regularly accepted within the church?

Yes. Everybody upholds that one. But the fact of the matter is that if a young man cursed his father or his mother, the punishment was stoning. The seventh commandment, Thou shalt not commit adultery. Do we give credence to that? Do we uphold that? Yes, we do. And what happened to an adulterer or an adulteress?

They were stoned. Now, we no longer stone people, because those are the ceremonial accretions that were part and parcel of the Old Testament context. But the fact that we no longer entertain that which surrounded the command in no way negates the command. It doesn't for adultery. It doesn't for honoring your father and mother. So the question is, loved ones, why in the world should it for the fourth commandment?

And I put it to you that the reason that it does for the fourth commandment is because we don't like the implications of the fourth commandment. It cuts across our lives. It cuts across what we've become used to. It cuts across our desires for acquisitiveness. It cuts across our commitment to leisure. It cuts across the God that we've made of family living. And frankly, we are glad to set it apart as a different kind of command. Now, the question that you must answer for yourself is, is there any abiding biblical validity for making that kind of distinction?

Now, we're going to go on and follow this through, and you must think along with me. Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. In other words, sanctify the day. The phrase here means two things. It means, first of all, remember the Sabbath day by setting it apart. That's what it means to keep it holy. It means to set it apart.

Well, in what way is the day set apart? Well, weren't there seven days in the week that God made? Yes. Did he just call one holy? Yes. Was there to be one that had a peculiar, holy, sanctified dimension to it?

Yes. So in what way was it set apart? Well, it was set apart from all the other days. It was a different day from every other day that God had created. And he sanctioned this by his own example, as we will see. Now, the immediate reaction to that on the part of some is to say, But you don't understand, or maybe not so forcibly, but to say, Well, what about the fact that every day is the Lord's day?

Well, there's a sense in which that's true. We ought to serve the Lord every day, and we ought to serve the Lord every moment of every day. And the way in which we do our work ought to be a service to the Lord. But the fact is, loved ones, that even when we acknowledge that, it in no way sets aside the distinctive element of this fourth commandment, isolating this one day in seven and possessing it with a distinction which God has ordained. John Murray, the late John Murray, professor at Westminster Theological Seminary, says, To obliterate the difference between one day and the other six. To obliterate the difference may appear pious, but it is piosity, not piety. It is not piety to be wiser than God.

It is impiety of the darkest hue. The Sabbath day is different from every other day, and to obliterate this distinction in thought or practice is to destroy what is the essence of the institution. The recognition of the distinction of the day is indispensable to its observance. So that unless you and I be convinced that God has distinguished this day for all of time, and that because he has distinguished it in this way, we must live within the framework of what he has laid down, then any attempts at keeping the Sabbath day will simply be as a result either of legalistic externalism, or as a result of a kind of time-honored tradition, or as a result of the reinforcement of what has become customary for us.

Okay? You're listening to Truth for Life, Alistair Begg, sharing with us part one of a message on the fourth commandment, and Alistair will have more for us on this topic tomorrow. There is no question that this series on the Ten Commandments has a lot to look at.

It's one thing to memorize God's laws, but how do we fully grasp their relevance to our lives right now? The Pathway to Freedom study guide is a great way to help you personalize this study. The guide has 12 chapters that correspond with each of Alistair's 12 messages in this series. There are also key scriptures from Alistair's teaching and questions related to the main ideas of the message. The study guide is great for you to work through on your own.

It's perfect for a small group discussion as well. You can purchase it online at truthforlife.org slash store, or you can download a copy for free. While you're on our website, be sure to look for Alistair's book titled Pathway to Freedom, How God's Laws Guide Our Lives. This book is an additional way for you to deepen your understanding of the Ten Commandments, and you can request your copy when you give to Truth for Life online at truthforlife.org slash donate, or you can call 888-588-7884. I'm Bob Lapine. God has set apart one day from all the rest, and tomorrow we'll learn why that day matters. Be sure to join us then. The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life, where the Learning is for Living.