Importance of the Sabbath: Rest, Worship, and Spiritual Observance.

[Hobie]

Here is an interesting perspective on the Sabbath... 'People of faith regard the Sabbath not just as a day of rest, but also of worship; for so it was designed by Almighty God. But people, being perverse and wayward, has ever sought, and indeed have succeeded, in violating the principle of the Sabbath...

Employers used to work their laborer's from daylight until sunset in ancient times, and allow no breaks except when dark set in; and then laborer's could recuperate until the next day. To ensure that laborer's worked all hours possible, employers plunged the world into ugly times; the world experiencing slavery, colonialism, serfdom, debt bondage, forced marriages, child soldiers and similar abuses; all with the objective of merciless human exploitation....

God told Israel, “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.” (Exodus 20:8) This was not just a Jewish thing, confined to Jews, it was to be so for strangers in Israel as well: “But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates.” (Exodus 20:10)...

When God created the world He did not give names to the days, He gave each day a number. The world was created in 6 days and God rested on the 7th day (Genesis 1:31-2:2). This seven-day period is called a week which means simply a space of seven days.'

 

[Hobie]

It gets the Sabbath correct but then wanders on into the problems and excuses created by another day...

'No one has ever been able to establish if what we call the first day is actually what God called the first day.

There is probably a big difference between what is accepted, and what is real, for a number of reasons:

1. No one has been able to trace the days back to the beginning of creation
2. During the dispensations of innocence and human government Sabbaths were not observed, and no documentary evidence exist that they were even known.
3. Some old civilizations worked to an 8-day week
4. There have been numerous changes in the week cycles, and days have been added, and subtracted, to calendars over time
5. Many countries in the world accept Monday as the 1st day of the week and reflect that on their calendars; whilst others accept Sunday.

It cannot be known, with certainty, that the day on which you worship, whatever you choose to call it, corresponds to the day you think it is as originally numbered by God.'.

So what is the true importance of the Sabbath...

 

[Hobie]

The importance of the Sabbath is a day made by God for man at Creations to cease from work to 'Shabat' or to rest and this gives man the time to commune with God, through worship, spiritual observance, etc.. and develop a one on one personal relationship with Him.

Gods ordained day of rest has existed since Creation where it was made for man as Christ proclaimed, “And he said unto them, The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath:" (Mark 2:27). This took place in the beginning of Genesis where after six days of Creation, God rested: “Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done” (Genesis 2:3).

This period of time on the seventh day is first thing that is sanctified in the Bible, and in declaring the seventh day holy, God made this time sacred. This is why later in the two tables of stone given to Moses, the Fourth Commandment says to "remember" the day of the Sabbath and to "keep" it holy, as it was something that was already made and was already holy.

 

[mailmandan]

People of faith understand that our "sabbatismos" rest is found in Christ in contrast with keeping the weekly sabbath day under the law.

Hebrews 4:9 - So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. (NASB) Notice that the Greek word "sabbatismos" here is used nowhere else in the Bible.

W. E. Vine, Greek Dictionary points out:

Sabbath rest (4520) (sabbatismos from sabbatízo = keep the Sabbath) literally means a keeping of a sabbath or a keeping of days of rest. It is used in this passage not in the literal sense (meaning to keep a specific day, the "Sabbath" day) but to describe a period of rest for God’s people which is modeled after and is a fulfillment of the traditional Sabbath.

SABBATISMOS a Sabbath-keeping, is used in Heb. 4:9, R.V., "a Sabbath rest," A.V. marg., "a keeping of a Sabbath" (akin to sabbatizoµ, to keep the Sabbath, used, e.g., in Ex. 16:30, not in the N.T.); here the Sabbath-keeping is the perpetual Sabbath rest to be enjoyed uninterruptedly by believers in their fellowship with the Father and the Son, in contrast to the weekly Sabbath under the Law.

Because this Sabbath rest is the rest of God Himself, its full fruition is yet future, though believers now enter into it. In whatever way they enter into divine “rest,” that which they enjoy is involved in an indissoluble relation with God. (Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words)

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Colossians 2:16 - Therefore no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day— things which are a mere shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ.

 

[Johann]

People of faith understand that our "sabbatismos" rest is found in Christ in contrast with keeping the weekly sabbath day under the law.

Hebrews 4:9 - So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. (NASB) Notice that the Greek word "sabbatismos" here is used nowhere else in the Bible.

W. E. Vine, Greek Dictionary points out:

Sabbath rest (4520) (sabbatismos from sabbatízo = keep the Sabbath) literally means a keeping of a sabbath or a keeping of days of rest. It is used in this passage not in the literal sense (meaning to keep a specific day, the "Sabbath" day) but to describe a period of rest for God’s people which is modeled after and is a fulfillment of the traditional Sabbath.

SABBATISMOS a Sabbath-keeping, is used in Heb. 4:9, R.V., "a Sabbath rest," A.V. marg., "a keeping of a Sabbath" (akin to sabbatizoµ, to keep the Sabbath, used, e.g., in Ex. 16:30, not in the N.T.); here the Sabbath-keeping is the perpetual Sabbath rest to be enjoyed uninterruptedly by believers in their fellowship with the Father and the Son, in contrast to the weekly Sabbath under the Law.

Because this Sabbath rest is the rest of God Himself, its full fruition is yet future, though believers now enter into it. In whatever way they enter into divine “rest,” that which they enjoy is involved in an indissoluble relation with God. (Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words)

SermonIndex.net Audio Sermons - Sermon Index

Colossians 2:16 - Therefore no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day— things which are a mere shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ.