[0:00] Good morning. We will be reading from Psalm 92 today. It is good to give thanks to the Lord, to sing praises to your name, O Most High, to declare your steadfast love in the morning and your faithfulness by night, to the music of the lute and the harp, to the melody of the lyre.
[0:31] For you, O Lord, have made me glad by your work, and at the works of your hands I sing for joy. How great are your works, O Lord!
[0:41] Your thoughts are very deep. The stupid man cannot know. The fool cannot understand this, that though the wicked sprout like grass and all the evildoers flourish, they are doomed to destruction forever.
[0:55] But you, O Lord, are on high forever. For behold, your enemies, O Lord, for behold, your enemies shall perish.
[1:06] All evildoers shall be scattered. But you have exalted my horn like that of the wild ox. You have poured over me fresh oil. My eyes have seen the downfall of my enemies.
[1:19] My ears have heard the doom of my evil assailants. The righteous flourish like the palm tree and grow like a cedar in Lebanon.
[1:29] They are planted in the house of the Lord. They flourish in the courts of our God. They still bear fruit in old age. They are ever full of sap and green to declare that the Lord is upright.
[1:43] He is my rock. And there is no unrighteousness in Him. That is the word of the Lord. Amen.
[2:03] It's great to be in the house of the Lord this morning on this frigid day. I think I got frostbite getting from my car to the building.
[2:17] But I've made a swift recovery, as you can tell. And boy, it's just, it's like winter's here. Ohio, you can leave it to Ohio to really not really give us much of a preparation for the cold weather.
[2:32] We were just in our shorts last week, sunbathing in the backyard. And sure enough, we are bundled up in our homes around a fire now. But so is life in Ohio.
[2:46] But it's great to be with you all, regardless of the weather, regardless of the temperature, regardless of the condition of the society all around, regardless of all your to-do lists that you still have waiting for you once you get home, regardless of your lunch plans, regardless of how you have been struggling to even get out of the door today.
[3:12] Today is the Lord's day. And in that, I believe, at the end of our time, we'll be able to understand a lot about what that means.
[3:22] Today's message is one of sort of an intermittent message regarding something that we believe. We call it a statement of faith sort of topical series.
[3:36] We usually find unique times in between our normal expositional series, the verse-by-verse series. And we find ourselves here today looking at this topical message regarding a statement of faith.
[3:55] And this allows us to dive into convictional aspects of our church that otherwise we would not find an opportunity to do so other than maybe hosting a class that maybe 10% of us will probably participate in.
[4:07] So this being a corporate gathering, we find that this actually is something along with baptism and the Lord's Supper, something that we can be observing in things that we believe topically and still be faithful to God's Word and our gathering.
[4:24] But the Lord's day, what in the world is that? I don't know. But we're going to find out today, right?
[4:37] We're all like, hmm, since you asked that, I don't know. I've heard that here and there. But let's find out about what that is today. We have a sermon title today called Rediscovering the Lord's Day.
[4:54] And so while we are generally used to the verse-by-verse exposition of God's Word, I'm just going to put the elephant in the room. This is going to kind of feel academic, all right?
[5:07] But it's okay to feel a little academic once in a while, to learn something, not to just be stirring our emotions and our hearts upon various beauty and elaborate nature of God's grace and everything.
[5:23] You know, there's a time for that, but there's also times to stir our minds, to get our minds busy. Because when we get our minds busy, our hearts are then realigned by what we know rather than what we feel, rather than what we experience.
[5:37] And so it's going to feel a little academic in nature. However, rest assured, it will be beneficial for us. And if you're new to us today, if you're in the first time sitting here like, well, this is great.
[5:49] I heard some good things, some bad things. I've come here to kind of experience, see what sift through the noise. But if you're new and you desire something that's deeply profound to humble your heart and speak life into your surroundings, rest assured, the very nature of this message today will accomplish a humbling end.
[6:13] It will. And if not, there's always next week to give it another try. We will be here, Lord willing, next week and you can try it again. But we will begin the message today to look upon the precepts and the patterns found within God's Word and God's history that He's been writing for the church and even recent culture to answer this very question.
[6:42] What is the Lord's day? In other words, why does the church meet on Sunday?
[6:54] Why? Isn't this some man-made thing? That some guy with a cool robe said, this day in history we will meet on Sunday and therefore we will meet. Follow me, right?
[7:07] I'm not too sure about that. And so isn't it all man-made? Isn't this like an old covenant sort of topic of Sabbath and all things relating to that?
[7:21] Aren't we freed from all that nonsense of legalism, of pharisaical legalism and all this structure? And we're free in Jesus Christ. We can meet on whatever day we please because we are free.
[7:34] I believe by the end of our time, God's Word will conclude no. And the psalm that we just read this morning was indeed, look at the title at the very top of that psalm.
[7:49] It is a song of the Sabbath. And by the end of our time, I believe we will be convinced that it is a song for today and until the very last day of history, until the Lord's return.
[8:04] And so, I want us to pray as we begin to stir our thoughts and curiosity of this Lord's Day and what this means for us as a church.
[8:16] Let's pray. Father, we give you this time. This has been such a busy last 48 hours in the history of this church.
[8:30] But what a great 48 hours it has been. while this message was planned long ago, I pray that we are coming under your teaching.
[8:48] God, just as you have called me to shepherd this church, allow me to shepherd well and glorify you in so doing. And we pray this in Jesus' name.
[9:00] Amen. Amen. You guys still awake? Good. I want to set up an argument for you.
[9:14] The argument for you today is sort of like teeing this up to begin the conversation. In recent history, what has changed in recent history?
[9:32] My grandmother, just back in the 30s, she would talk about growing up and saying that there has been quite a drastic shift in how society is structured, in how society values certain days of the week.
[9:53] Things have changed drastically. What has changed? Well, back in the 1930s, my grandma would say how stores, all stores would be closed on Sunday.
[10:08] Every store would be closed on Sunday and would consist of waking up, going to Sunday school, then attending service after Sunday school, going home, singing songs with the family in the afternoon around a piano, and then only to study God's Word even further to speak about the sermon and then return back to church later that evening, and then even a youth group meeting that she would attend after church.
[10:45] going into the 1950s, the 70s, we can see that stores began to become open on Sunday, but with a limited supply available.
[11:02] Right? They restricted some products to be sold on Sunday and limiting the amount of shopping that was done. Sort of like, okay, we'll just kind of ease our way in a little bit and see how that goes.
[11:14] Think about it, even the NFL in the 1950s, the board of the NFL said that it was the most ridiculous idea, this is a paraphrase, direct quote, I'm not that good, it would be a ridiculous idea to ever stream, maybe they didn't use stream, broadcast, that was a TV language, it would be ridiculous to broadcast a football game on Sunday because they believed that it would never be watched.
[11:44] that was in 1950. Today, I think many people will think that it's foolish to go to church because it would interrupt their watching.
[12:03] All I'm trying to see today is that something has changed, has it not? According to tradition alone, you can see something that began to occur in the culture has begun to reprioritize the church on Sunday.
[12:22] Slowly and surely, the culture has indeed reprioritized the church on Sunday. This is the story of the Old Testament of the culture invading the convictions of the church and leading them astray.
[12:41] Now, I don't want you to hear that I'm an old grumpy man up here talking about the good old days and everything. I'm not shaming, I'm not guilting us today.
[12:54] It's not my aim. I didn't say in my preparation, in my prayers of this message being delivered, I really want to make them hurt. Right?
[13:05] Not trying to do that at all. Trying to love you. Trying to guide you. All I want us to do today is to think practically about the issue that something has changed.
[13:17] I want us to turn to the Bible to see if this is something even worthy of discussion. Is it just a man-made tradition after all that we can just let the culture have their Sunday and we'll just have a seven-day work week where just every day is like the other?
[13:31] And for an hour and a half we'll give to church. We'll give to the gathering. But I don't want us to miss that conviction. I don't want us to think that we can meet on just any other day.
[13:47] We can just do what we want. I believe that that would miss the conviction. And I am not convinced that we can just do what we want. I believe that after our time we'll realize that this is simply just not the case.
[14:02] That God has given principles from Scripture. He has given patterns through history all of which God dictated for the world to work around the church.
[14:18] Do you hear what I'm trying to say? An imagery of a rock that's fixed in a river that the river just, the river is going to run but God has placed a rock within the path of a river and the water goes around.
[14:32] The rock was fixated by God saying, not this day. The culture can go around but not this day. My role today is to lead us and to guide us.
[14:47] That's my job as a shepherd. And so what I want us to do is just not hear things that I'm not saying, not sharpen your swords to just take my head off, not to clench a rock in your hand to stone me after the church service.
[15:00] I want you to understand that I'm truly from the bottom of my heart trying to lead us and guide us in faithfulness to how we ought to gather, how we ought to view Sunday.
[15:13] And so I really want you to know that at the front end that I love you guys so much and I want us to be faithful to God's word and what God has instilled within his church. So please be led today and see the love that I have for you.
[15:30] So the first point section is I want to do two rediscoveries of the biblical Sabbath principles and there's going to be two rediscoveries and then a last recovery that we'll end with in the third point.
[15:49] We cannot ignore how strongly the Bible stresses the Sabbath. You cannot read the Bible within biblical theology and not just isolating things from the other but taking it as a whole and seeing those principles and patterns.
[16:12] You can't read it and sort of just say, well, the Sabbath has nothing to do with us. The most crucial question that we can ask regarding the Sabbath in the Old Testament is where and when did it originate?
[16:30] Where and when did the Sabbath originate? Is it a creational institution or a Mosaic institution? And how you answer that question will actually dictate how we ought to view it today.
[16:44] Let's look at creation in Genesis 2. I'm sorry, I didn't get time to put in my cross references. It's usually my Saturday adventure, but I was handing out turkeys.
[16:57] So, bear with me. I have these bookmarks. I have a couple bookmarks here. If you want to flip with me or write them down and take a look at them later, I want to look at Genesis 2 and there's going to be several references today.
[17:11] Next will be in Exodus. So, Genesis 2, verse 1 through 3, we read that there is a creational institution that was established.
[17:24] And so, chapter 2 says, thus, the heavens and the earth were finished in all the host of them. And on the seventh day, God finished His work that He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work that He had done.
[17:44] So, God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, God rested from all His work that He had done in creation.
[18:01] This model of work and rest is perfectly observed through biblical revelation. You can get months, you can get seasons and years through the stars and the moon and everything like that, but you get days of the week through biblical revelation.
[18:23] That's where we find it. And so, we have a day set out. God finished His work and blessed the seventh day.
[18:35] And while this is not a command, we can't ignore what God did, though. Pre-fall what He did. There was a structure in the nature of God of working and designating a day as set apart, making it holy.
[18:55] As we look throughout the time of the nation of Israel, we reach to Exodus 16. This is a precursor to Mount Sinai, pre-Mosaic institution.
[19:08] Read with me in verse 26 of Exodus, 16. It says, six days you shall gather it, but on the seventh day, which is the Sabbath, there will be none.
[19:23] On the seventh day, some of the people went out to gather, but they found none. That God withheld any sort of work for Israel. They went out to work and they couldn't find anything.
[19:38] God said, no. And this is pre-Mosaic. This is pre-Mosaic. The Sabbath, as it were here, Israel was, in the wilderness, was forbidden to gather manna during the Sabbath.
[19:54] And guess what? They kept the Sabbath even before Sinai. It was a pattern in their life. And look, the Sabbath is a creation ordinance, it's a creation institution.
[20:07] In other words, it's transcendent through all time. We have various creation institutions. We have marriage, that's a creation institution. We have the family, we have male headship in the household, are all pre-fall creation ordinances and institutions for us today.
[20:26] And also, we find within that, there being a day set apart. And if these were all set in place pre-fall, how much more vital, we can apprehend them post-fall, now that things have gotten really complicated with our sin.
[20:45] And God did just that. Three examples here. Mount Sinai comes in Exodus 20. And I'll read it for you, look at it later, because I want you to be convinced and convicted on your own, not by just me blabbering from a pulpit.
[21:00] Test me what I'm saying. Exodus 20, verse 11, for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day.
[21:13] Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. This is the fourth commandment at Mount Sinai. God blessed the Sabbath day.
[21:25] And it's a reiteration of the creational principles found in Genesis 2. He's directly relating it to Genesis 2. And rest, what does rest look like?
[21:37] It doesn't look like taking a nap. I want us to understand that this rest was a cognitive engagement in who God is and all the work that God has done.
[21:51] It's something that our minds are engaged on and we're meditating on. It's not just taking a nap. Though I am a Baptist and I do appreciate my naps on Sunday afternoon, so I am indeed preaching to myself.
[22:09] Exodus 31, it's sort of reiterated again for the people of Israel. In Exodus 31, strong language, mind you. Exodus 31, 12. And it says, and the Lord said to Moses, you are to speak to the people of Israel and say, above all, you shall keep the Sabbath, for this is a sign between me and you throughout all the generations that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you.
[22:39] You shall keep the Sabbath, singular, not plural like the other day, because it is holy for you.
[22:51] Everyone who profanes it shall be put to death. Whoever does any work on it, that soul shall be cut off from among his people. Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord.
[23:11] Whoever does any work on the Sabbath shall be put to death. you can't get more strong language than that. Verse 16, therefore the people of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, observing the Sabbath throughout their generations as a covenant forever.
[23:34] It is a sign forever between you and me, the people of Israel, that in six days the Lord made heaven and earth and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed.
[23:54] A holy day, six days work, seventh day rest. This is a covenant sign between the people of Israel.
[24:06] In other words, it's an ordinance, it's an institution by God similar to that of circumcision, which in the New Testament, the New Covenant is seen through baptism.
[24:18] Or Passover in the Old Covenant being a new covenant, being the Lord's Supper. But then something happens in Deuteronomy.
[24:29] We see Deuteronomy 5, verse 12. And so the people of Israel are told, observed the Sabbath day to keep it holy as the Lord your God commanded you.
[24:41] 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.
[24:52] You or your son or your daughter or your male servant or your female servant, all the servants, or your ox or your donkey, the cats and dogs are included, and any of your livestock and the sojourner who is within your gates, everyone, male servants, female servants, may rest as well as you.
[25:10] Everyone, stop what you're doing and rest. And look, a little spin here. You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm.
[25:27] Therefore, the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day. Another six days work, seventh day rest, like Exodus 20.
[25:39] But God gave Israel something specific here. Remember their exile and redemption. You see, church, mankind resting is intimately connected to God's working.
[25:59] Our rest is intimately connected to God's working. Why? The reasons all the ordinances are even something important in the life of the church because we are forgetful people.
[26:20] We forget so easily, especially when the culture is just getting by on Sunday and inviting the church in to their open stores and their NFL games.
[26:40] God gave mankind something solid. Guess what? They're called the Ten Commandments and spoiler alert, there are ten of them. He gave it to us. Forgetful people.
[26:51] All the Ten Commandments had different aspects and principles. Ceremonial principles, moral principles. And so looking at the ceremonial principles of the Ten Commandments, we're talking about the fourth commandment here.
[27:07] Jesus Christ fulfilled the ceremonial fulfillment of all the Ten Commandments. He fulfilled them, all the ceremonial aspects of them. That it's the blood of Christ, not the blood of goats that atoned.
[27:21] And so we see that there's something that happened, but there's also this aspect that Jesus even himself in the Gospels said that he is what? The Lord of the Sabbath.
[27:38] And so we understand that there should be something that we see regarding the Sabbath. That with Jesus Christ at the cross, it shouldn't just simply indicate that God has just said, yeah, you know what?
[27:51] I think we'll just do away with all that now. You guys can meet whenever it's convenient for you. He did not.
[28:02] Because I believe a moral dimension still remains today that says God's people must meet together to meet the Lord, the principle, moral principle of the Sabbath.
[28:18] Just as there's other morals, like you're not going to kill somebody and murder somebody according to a moral principle of the Ten Commandments. You see, church, since the Sabbath day is rooted not in the Mosaic law and institution, but actually back in Genesis pre-fall into chapter 2, we see that this means that it is for mankind to observe transcendently until Christ returns, until the re-creation.
[28:49] not only that, but as we turn upon the New Testament, some of you are probably like, okay, man, let's get out of the Old Testament. You got it, nailed it, let's move on here.
[29:02] Not only in the Old Testament can we turn to, but we can turn to the New Testament. And the fulfillment that Jesus Christ, being the Lord of the Sabbath, we see this eschatological fulfillment that is to come.
[29:16] the bookends of the Bible actually talk about a day being set apart. Hebrews 4, 7, 3, I think I have it bookmarked here.
[29:29] There we are. Hebrews 4, the second part of 7, verse 7 and to 13, it says, today you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.
[29:41] For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken of another day later on. So then there remains what?
[29:54] A Sabbath rest for the people of God. For whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his.
[30:05] Let us therefore strive to enter that rest so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience. reading on to verse 12.
[30:20] You see, for the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart, and no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give an account.
[30:42] This is a book that we'll be entering into through the Advent series, the book of Hebrews, and this is written to Jewish Christians. It indicated that this Sabbath day is imperative to observe because it is indeed a foreshadowing of a promise to come.
[31:02] The Sabbath principle has remained for God's people, old covenant and new covenant. covenant. And looking further to the book end of Scripture, this is the last one, is in Revelation 1.
[31:19] Looking further, we see Revelation 1.10 which is a profound verse where John is in the Spirit on the Lord's day.
[31:33] Being in the Spirit, Revelation 4.2 interprets, the Bible interprets the Bible. That's a pretty cool thing. Revelation 4.2 explains what that means. In the Spirit, he was worshiping on the Lord's day.
[31:47] It's not the day of the Lord, but it's actually a dominical day. It's a Lord's day, not the day of the Lord. And this day is used as like an adjective.
[31:58] I don't want to get this into a Greek lesson, but it's an adjective here. And its only other usage is back in 1 Corinthians chapter 11 regarding the Lord's supper, another ordinance to the church.
[32:13] It's a special day, which naturally refutes any misuse of talking about there being no distinct days in Romans 14 of no special days.
[32:24] Because that wasn't what Paul was saying regarding the days that he was referring to. But we see that something from the bookends of the Bible and through the meat of the text, all in between.
[32:38] There has been a recurring pattern and principle of a Sabbath day. A day remains. And this is good news.
[32:49] Biblically speaking, with the fuller revelation of God's redemptive work in Jesus Christ, let me preach for a moment. It's all been known to us.
[33:03] The gospel has been made known through the Bible, a fuller revelation being God's redemption in Jesus Christ. He made his life known, he made his death known, he made his burial known, he made his resurrection known, and his ascension known.
[33:21] How could we become so lawless to abandon the greatest blessing of rest because of God's work in specifically Jesus Christ?
[33:33] who died upon a cross. Jesus Christ was consumed in the wrath of God. And by every sense of the reality of what occurred, it was God taking his own wrath upon himself.
[33:51] Jesus Christ was consumed in that wrath. And might we allow his work to then consume us, his grace to consume us, to remind us of us to rest in his substitution what he accomplished.
[34:11] Just as God did the work of creation in himself, God also did the work of redemption in himself to justify and redeem us from sin, absorbing the penalty of our sin upon the cross to pay a debt that he did not owe, that we could not pay.
[34:32] This is the good news of the work of the cross. And the world is witnessing the work of God in Jesus Christ. The world has witnessed it. They were bystanders.
[34:42] They saw his life, death, burial, resurrection. They saw all of that. The world saw it. And when the world witnesses a resting church, they ought to see the cross as well.
[34:54] when everyone is huddled around their TV screens out doing XYZ, when they see a gathered church, they see a resting church in the sufficiency of what happened on the cross.
[35:13] Maybe you're not in Christ today, maybe you're not a Christian, and this is starting to make sense. Might today God be calling you to enter into rest, right?
[35:28] Rest from all your continuous labor of trying to make your relationship with God better to maybe make Him think less awful of you because of what you did the night before last night.
[35:42] Might you be realizing that there's no way that you can ever help yourself in persuading God to think more highly of you?
[35:53] There's nothing that we can accomplish to do that work. And we know there is nothing that we can do to mend that relationship but only faith in Jesus Christ that can mend that perfectly.
[36:06] You see, because of the work of God, His people set aside a day dedicated solely to the Lord where they don't work and they worship. It was a solemn rest.
[36:20] It is rooted in creation pre-fall and in anticipation of in recreation post-fall. But we got to argue which day.
[36:34] And so this second section, this is going to be quick, we're on the downhill. The second section is rediscovering apostolic patterns.
[36:46] So we can clearly see that something. We can argue that whatever we thought coming into the church tonight, we can say that there's something to a certain holy day to be observed regarding the Sabbath.
[37:02] But we're all going to probably say, alright, which one? Which one of the seventh days? Well, the apostles observed the Christian Sabbath on the first day of the week.
[37:22] Primarily because of the resurrection of the Lord occurred on the first day of the week. And the apostles, being the foundation of the church, met on the first day of the week.
[37:35] And all the gospels agree of that being the resurrection day in Matthew 28, Mark 16, Luke 24, and John 20, verse 1.
[37:46] And as we, verse 1 and then verse 19 in John. And as we explore throughout the New Testament, we see that it is recorded that the church did something unique on the first day of the week.
[38:02] In John 20, in Acts 2, in Acts 20, in 1 Corinthians 16, there was something special that occurred and every author indicated which day it was.
[38:16] We should see that. And while it doesn't explicitly support in and of itself a Sabbath, it does indicate a pattern with that first day of the week. And throughout the church writings of the early church, the first century church fathers, we might think of even into the Middle Ages of Thomas Aquinas, who had said that the tradition of the church meeting on Sunday, was because the apostles did that.
[38:44] They patterned that in their lives. So in their teaching and practice, they did that all throughout the first century church. And even the disciples of the apostles wrote.
[38:57] The apostles' disciples, think about that. Students of the apostles carried that tradition in their writings. It's not found, it wasn't canonized, but their writings still exist, just like journals exist in our day today.
[39:11] It was apostolic practice, church. And where apostolic practice is observed, it then becomes a precept of life because of the authority of the apostles in the life of the church.
[39:26] So what day was it for them? It was the first day of the week, Sunday, a day of celebration of Jesus Christ conquering death and fulfillment of the Old Testament, ceremonial aspects and precepts and principles of the seventh day Sabbath in Judaism.
[39:47] Jesus Christ fulfilled it and it's even written by the disciples of the apostles. They did it because they wanted to make a clear distinction away from Judaism into Christianity to say, we're not even going to, we could meet on Saturday but we're going to actually meet on Sunday because that Saturday is filled with all sorts of other things.
[40:09] And so we see that apostolic pattern and precept that Sunday is the day. A Christian Sabbath if you want to do play on words.
[40:21] A set aside day is holy. not just an hour. Not an option but an imperative that we ought to see the culture at war with.
[40:44] Christ. This pattern and precept carried throughout several periods of life through the Middle Ages even to the Reformation and the 16th through the 19th century and even into today.
[41:00] And we can argue about Calvin's thoughts on Sunday worship but there was a lot unique going on in the culture within the Pope instituting days and things like that but Calvin was in church on Sunday.
[41:15] Okay? And even to take it a step further Calvin was not an apostle. He was just a flawed man just like all of us. And so we turn to a London Baptist confession of faith 1689 that takes us back regarding this day.
[41:35] It states this gets into our statement of faith of us as a church Steel Valley Church Exodus 20 it refers to. It is the law law of nature that in general a portion of time specified by God should be set apart for the worship of God.
[41:52] So by his word in a positive moral and perpetual commandment that obligates everyone in every age he has specifically appointed one day in seven for a Sabbath to be kept holy to him.
[42:09] And then referring to 1 Corinthians 16 Acts 20 and Revelation 1 from the beginning of the world to the resurrection of Christ the appointed day was the last day of the week after the resurrection of Christ.
[42:26] I'll repeat that after the resurrection of Christ it was changed to the first day of the week which is called the Lord's Day. London Baptist Confession 16 and 89 also continues that says the Sabbath day referring to Isaiah 58 and Nehemiah 13.
[42:46] The Sabbath day is kept holy to the Lord when people have first prepared their hearts appropriately and arranged their everyday affairs in advance. Then they observe a holy rest all day from their own works.
[43:05] Words and thoughts about their secular employment and recreation. If things need to get done in the week you get as much done by Saturday.
[43:16] Sunday you rest. Matthew 12 it refers to not only that but they also fill the whole time with public and private acts of worship and the duties of necessity and mercy.
[43:35] Now time is not going to allow us. we're nearly reaching lunch and here I am talking about Sabbath rest and the culture has capitalized upon my stomach to make me hungry knowing that lunch is coming.
[43:46] Time is not going to allow us to go into the depths of history, the depths of confessions and catechisms and councils like the Synod of Dort.
[43:58] But I'm sure that all of you are upset about that. That man, you know, I was really waiting for those catechisms, Brent. I really wanted to stay here until 3 o'clock this afternoon.
[44:09] Let's practice what you're preaching, right? You could throw that on me. But I am praying that the Holy Spirit is stirring within each and every one of us a conviction that I believe the church today has lost.
[44:26] Christ. And so as I'm sort of wrapping things up, we had two points of rediscovery.
[44:37] I'd like us to recover Sabbath principles and patterns today. It should trouble our consciences how far we have strayed.
[44:51] It should trouble our consciences of how far we've strayed from the 1930s. Many might state that, well, you know, Brent, I mean, it's good in philosophy, it's good in thought, but it's just impossible to completely set aside an entire day.
[45:16] And I understand that. Rome wasn't built in a day. I believe the Lord's Day can't be recovered in a day. But many might say that Sunday is just so busy because there's so much to do.
[45:29] It was a crazy work week, a lot of overtime, even on Saturday, and your toilets, I mean, the pipes are exposed. You have nowhere to do your stuff.
[45:41] You know, I got to do something. Now, you know, there's within reason to do that. but we are unable, we're unable to commit to the Lord Sunday, a day of worship, for various reasons.
[46:05] We could probably lay them all out. I'll probably talk to you after a service about that as well. But might I propose something. something. I don't want us to forget how we got to this problem.
[46:21] Because could it be that our toiling today, our last minute, our whole mindset of Sunday needing to be utilized for something tangible in this life, could our toil today be directly due to the ground that the church has allowed the culture to claim.
[46:45] That the culture has efficiently shifted the rock out of their way. Church, it's happening. Just a mere half decade ago, it was unheard of to have high school or middle school, any sporting event that kids are involved in schools to happen on Sunday.
[47:11] Ten years ago, five years ago, it was unheard of to have sports activities in high school, middle school, anything on Sunday. Now the culture expects it.
[47:24] This slow chipping away of the culture through recreation and employment will achieve its ends of causing the world to leave no time for God.
[47:35] God's love. It must stir up our boldness as a church to stand against it. In fact, we have become so used to the cultural influence on us that we have allowed ourselves to dismiss the apostolically observed day on account of house projects, on account of exhaustion, and even fear of illness like COVID going around.
[48:03] like I said, I'm not trying to guilt, I'm not trying to shame, I'm trying to love, I'm trying to lead. You see, church Sunday is the Lord's day, whether you like it or not.
[48:18] Not the Lord's hour. Not the Lord's hour and a half on Sunday morning that you barely got to. From sun up to sun down is the Lord's day.
[48:33] A beautiful day. This is a gift. Can you imagine? No work and worship. That is like music to my ears.
[48:48] Isn't it? Where we turn in our attention upon God alone. So this should look like, if you could imagine, just the beauty of this organized thought.
[49:04] Sunday morning, gathering with the church, leading into an afternoon of reflections to carry home with your family. And might I be so bold to turn the lights back on to the church Sunday evening.
[49:21] There's too many churches that have their lights out on Sunday evening. day. This day is to be kept to the end of the age as the Christian Sabbath.
[49:35] And since the observance of the last day of the week has been abolished, this day is a song that we ought to sing as well on our Sunday, Lord's Day, Sabbath, as we realign our lives to God's ordering.
[49:51] Want to see the beauty of it? revisit Psalm 92 and see how that psalm takes us away from the wickedness of the world and into the worship of God.
[50:02] This is the Lord's Day, the song of the Sabbath. So let me finish with just two more minutes. Lord's Day is Sunday.
[50:15] Lord's Day is Sunday. It's a day instituted by God at creation. It's a day ceremonial, fulfilled in Jesus Christ.
[50:25] It's a day morally and apostolically transcendent for all time. It's a day to set apart for recharging. It's a day to turn off the lies of the world.
[50:39] It's a day to reflect our attention upon the truth of heaven. It's a day to hear God remind us of His salvation.
[50:50] It's a day that the world who's ignoring God may see a church found in His salvation. Most of all, it's a day that is a gift of God.
[51:06] Not a duty, but a delight. May our conviction begin, church. may it begin to be rediscovered and recovered at Steel Valley Church regarding what we do with Sunday as a church.
[51:28] The world can have the other six days. I don't care what you do on the other six days. God does. there are standards and principles that we ought to obey in a certain lifestyle we ought to apprehend for people to see Christ in us.
[51:47] But as far as the Lord's Day, Sunday, the world can have all the six, but Sunday is the Lord's. So in the coming year, I hope that through prayer, through fasting as a church, we can consider as all of this as we reflect, and I pray that God does refine our church culture to stand against the secular culture in the years waiting ahead.
[52:14] So let's pray as we begin to see that rediscovery in the life of our church.