The fourth commandment reads, depending on the version ( NKJV )'Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy',: the NIV ( New International Version ) reads 'Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy', the NASB ( New American Standard Bible ) and ESV ( English Stand Version ) read exactly the same as the NKJV, and YLT ( Young's Literal Translation ) gives us pretty the same reading, 'Remember the Sabbath-day to sanctify it'. Most versions that I've seen say basically the same thing, although using slightly different wording, but still bringing across the idea that God wanted ( wants ) His people to 'keep' His 'Sabbath', and 'sanctify' it.
I'm sure that many here have heard of the recent ( within the past 5-10 years ) 'The Ten Commandments: Twice Removed', and maybe even read it, and, while you may agree or disagree with the presuppositions in this book; this topic has become a more prevalent topic for discussion in the modern church. I recently had a conversation with a brother on this topic ( among others ), and one question that kept popping up was, 'where in the New Testament does it say ( and my brother will be sure to 'correct' me if I got the phrasing wrong ) that we can ignore the fourth commandment?' Well; being as 'hindsight is 20/20', I should have said that it's not just one place that says this, in fact I'd be hard-pressed to 'nail it down': this 'notion' or doctrine ( it's not just me ) can be gathered from the whole of Scripture, in covenantal term. If you've read any of my other articles; you probably noticed, and possibly even agree with me, that Paul's words, in II Corinthians 15:46 are, I believe, indicative of a biblical principal, true throughout the Scriptures, that the Old Covenant ( under the Law ) was chockful of physical types, of which Christ, in some way, was and is, the greater, spiritual Anti-type. The apostle Paul said, in a discussion of the 'change' that they would undergo, 'However, the spiritual is not first, but the natural, and afterward the spiritual', telling them, in not so many words, and as a disciple of his ( ? ) would write later, 'For if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second', and then, quoting from the prophet Jeremiah, 'Behold, the days are coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah—not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them,a]">[a] says the LORD. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more' ( Jeremiah 31:31-34 ) This 'New' Covenant would not be as the 'Old' was, written on physical tablets of stone, in nice 'block' letters; but this time, God would 'write' it on their 'hearts', in a spiritual way ( John 3:1-21 ), searing it into their consciences, if you will, that they might not be able to just throw it away ( unless they got rid of their conscience, which some have tried to do ) but would be a constant 'burning' to them, just in case they attempted to forget His Law!
Back to the particular question of the 'Sabbath' now; what is, or was, the sabbath? According to Genesis 2:2 & 3, 'And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made', and, later in Exodus 20;10, 'the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD your God'and that in that Sabbath, they were to do no work, at the risk of being cut off from God's people. In Hebrews 4:10, the writer states that 'he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His', which should tell us plainly ( or maybe not so plainly ) that this 'rest' that the writer spoke of was a spiritual rest ( in Christ ), and having entered His rest, we have ceased from ( trusting in ) our works, and are resting in His. Some may object to this 'line' of reasoning because the passage, from a 'woodenly literal' reading, seems to say that it is only when we have died and entered what most refer to as 'our eternal rest' in 'Heaven' that we very literally cease to work, but I believe that the context, not only of the surrounding passage, but Scripture as a whole, says otherwise!
So why do we say, ''Christ is our 'Sabbath'"? According to the Merriam-Webster On-line Dictionary, the word 'sabbath', from the Hebrew 'shabbāth', simply means 'rest': that we rest in Christ ( spiritually ) is a fact that no Christian in his ( or her ) right mind would deny, or try to repudiate ( okay; that was a little strong maybe, but I'm not apologizing! ), but many Christians, and I'm not condemning them for this, believe that we must still keep that physical sabbath, on the first day of the week, rather than on the seventh, as God commanded His Old Covenant 'children. I readily acknowledge, by the way, that the early Christians met on the first day of the week ( Acts 20:7 ), arguably in recognition of the fact that Christ rose from the grave in the early morning hours of this day, which we ironically call 'Sunday', originally named after the pagan worship of the sun. According to the Encyclopedia Mythica, 'The name comes from the Latin dies solis, meaning "sun's day": the name of a pagan Roman holiday. It is also called Dominica (Latin), the Day of God. The Romance languages, languages derived from the ancient Latin language (such as French, Spanish, and Italian), retain the root.' I myself assemble with a certain local church on the first day of the week to worship God and to fellowship together; I do not have a problem with this, though I believe that it tends to detract from everyday worship, but it is traditional ( 'everybody's doing it.........) and I see no harm in, this case anyway, 'when in Rome.................'!
Back to our topic, and finally; given the irrefutable fact that we rest in Christ, together with our reference in the book of Hebrews; it should be a plainly ascertainable clue that Christ IS our Sabbath, the spiritual Anti-type of His Father's physical command to His typical Old Covenant 'children! I realize that all may not recognize this fact, and although I believe this to be so ( Amen? ); again, I want to make clear that I do not condemn them for it, though they may condemn, or accuse me! By writing these words; I am not trying to alienate myself from orthodox and mainstream Christianity; nor do I wish to make enemies of any part of the Body of Christ: I am merely responding to question that a dear brother posed. I pray that these words will be read in that Light, and that they may be both instructive and edifying!
In His service, and for His Kingdom,
Charles Haddon Shank
( hey 'Man'; I hope this satisfies you question! )
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