Glorious namesake, amen. You may be seated. Let’s go to our sermon text of Hosea chapter 5. As you know, I preach sections of verses at a time.
They’re called parochipes, an idea or a thought that’s collected there, and I’ll stop and drill in to the text with, I think, I hope, edifying details of doctrine and practice. So here I thought it appropriate in Hosea 5.7 and the corresponding passage in chapter 2, verse 11, to talk about the Lord’s Day. Let’s listen attentively to the Word of God.
Hosea 5.7 and then 2.11. They have dealt treacherously with the Lord, for they have begotten the pagan children. Now a new moon shall devour them and their heritage. Chapter 2, verse 11.
I will also cause all their mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, her sabbaths, all her appointed feasts. Let us pray. As you read here, God, of your warning upon the Old Testament Church, the people of old, how they have abused your worship, the first three commandments, as well as the fourth.
And upon that fourth commandment, God, you tell them that it will be a sad time, that the new moon, which should be a time of celebration, a day of celebration, a holy day, shall devour them instead. And the judgment and the punishment you have upon them, gracious God, because they have abused not only the first three, but also the fourth, as we shall see. Our God and Savior, may this be a warning for ourselves, but also an encouragement to stand fast and firm, that we are doing the right thing in accordance to your Word, to have a day, a day, the Lord’s Day, as it’s called in Revelation.
No other day is called that, because it is indeed set aside as the Resurrection Sunday. Our Lord and Savior, it is a time to especially focus upon you. We’re thankful that we desire to do that, and you have guided it and given us a law to that end.
We pray that we would continue to do thus, not out of pride or arrogance, but because we love you with a love that is born from your Spirit, we pray. Amen. Of the four commandments and the first table of the law, I think the Lord’s Day is the most ignored or misunderstood.
I don’t think it’s always intentional in many regards. It is often thought of as exclusively a Jewish law, in my experience, or others may confess the Lord’s Day on paper, but in practice it means just hollowing out one hour in the morning and leaving the rest of the day to be what they call a family day. To help with this matter, I offer this sermon.
First we will explain the day of rest known as the Sabbath. The word just means rest, to cease from activity. Then we will look at the abuse of it during the time of the Jews as well, and today at the end, and understanding the practical ways in which we can honor the Lord and avoid desecrating it, the Lord’s Day.
What is the Christian Sabbath?
What is the Sabbath is the first point. It is first of all, initially, a creation ordinance. It is a time, one day in seven, in this case, the end of the creation week in which God rested, right? The Lord, we read on the seventh day, rested.
It’s a day of physical as well as spiritual rest, foreshadowing the eternal Sabbath to come in heaven, abiding upon the entire human race like marriage and work. It was made before the fall, and it was set aside and instituted by God himself, by his own divine example in history and in space. We read this in Genesis 2.2, and as I read this text, ask yourself, does God need rest? 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 he had created and made. It’s emphatic. God rested.
He ceased the creation of things in this time and space. Is it rest that God is concerned about, or does he do it all together for your sake, for the sake of humanity, that he show by his divine example this is what you ought to do. Take one day out of seven, here in the Old Testament as you know at the end, Saturday, and rest both body and soul.
Of course, it’s for our sake and not his that this is written, that he who rests in God should be partaker of the future Sabbath. Just as the temple and the sacrifices, as King Solomon reminds us in his prayer, God doesn’t need them. He doesn’t need rest, he doesn’t need a temple, he doesn’t need animals slaughtered on the altar.
They’re there to teach us things, to help us grow as believers, and to point, of course, to Christ and the eternal Sabbath in this case of rest that we have in heaven. Are not God’s blessings a good thing? Should we not pursue what God blesses and what God pursues? He pursued rest. He enacted it.
We are supposed to follow his example. It’s there for our sake, brothers and sisters. That alone is one of the things that convinced me many, many years ago, when I was a younger Christian, of the significance and importance of a day of rest.
God himself did it. It was in the state of innocency. There was no fall.
Satan had to come along and deceive Adam and Eve. And if they needed it before the fall, how much more do we need it after the fall? All fortiori, right? How much more? All the more, because we’re distracted by the things of this world, by the prosperity, especially in the West, that we have, the material prosperity, the goodness that God has given us. And it predates the giving of the Ten Commandments.
Exodus 16.22, you read about that. They knew, the reaffirmed by Christ. Matthew 12.8, for the Son of Man is the Lord even of the Sabbath.
He is a God and master of it. Matthew 24.20, we read, but pray ye that your flight be not in winter, neither on the Sabbath day, he says. And that was in the New Testament era.
Now before I go into further depth, of course, and explain that there’s still 1 in 7 ratio. It’s just now it’s changed to Sunday, the first day of the week, and not Saturday. There’s still rest.
It’s still the same thing before the fall. But now something cosmic has happened, which of course is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. I want to talk about what is required in the fourth commandment.
What is required? What should we do? What does it mean, then, in having this commandment of God for us? The fourth commandment requires the keeping holy to God such set times as he has appointed his Word expressly, one whole day in seven, to be holy Sabbath to himself, the confession tells us. Citing, of course, the Bible itself. God did not rest for part of the day, but the day itself, one day in seven.
And we should follow that pattern as well, that we should worship on that day in particular. We should focus more on God and then the rest, because you’re doing two things here on the Lord’s Day. You’re ceasing from labors, if you’re able, from your job.
And we are, many of us, blessed in this nation and in our congregation to be able to do that. We can have the weekend off, typically, and even Sundays off, so that we can be with our family, but more importantly, with the saints and in worshiping of the Lord our God above. And so we can do these things and focus upon him.
So rest and worship of God. And of course, works of mercy and necessity as well are there, because, as I remind you, the Sabbath was made for man, not man, for the Sabbath, Jesus tells us. That it was conformed to our limited and our weaknesses here.
And some examples here of works of mercy and necessity. Of course, if you have to work, you’ve got to put food on the table, and the boss won’t give you this day off, and you’ve tried, then you’ve got to work, and the churches are going to have a coming after you or whatever. But prayerfully, you don’t have to go through that.
But there are other acts of mercy and acts of necessity. Some clear, obvious ones, not listed here. This is from William Gouge.
If you remember, I went through William Gouge on the Christian family through his book on this matter. And he talks about the Sabbath day as well as the Lord’s Day. When I say Sabbath from here on out, I mean the Christian Sabbath or the Lord’s Day.
I don’t mean the Jewish one anymore, okay? For clarity’s sake. He has a commentary on the book of Hebrews, and the book of Hebrews talks about, in chapter 4 of the Lord’s Day, he says, Acts of mercy and necessity include instructing the ignorant, establishing the weak, comforting troubled souls, informing such as are in error, reproving sinners, and edifying them as well. Of course, food and sleep and the like you need.
That’s part of that too. It’s not in his list here. At least I don’t have it in my notes.
So, such a description here, as well as other things he talks about, shows us that the Puritans were not as strict, at least in my caricature, in my head growing up as a Christian, as we may have thought. There are many things that we can deal with and talk about to instruct the ignorant, to help them in various and sundry things. Not only in the first table of the law, but the second table of the law.
Like sanctification, not only with respect to worshiping God, but sanctification in everyday life. People have questions. What do I do about these sociopolitical issues, perhaps? And that comes up and can be talked about within proper bounds, I believe.
To resolve doubts, he talks about if we have questions of how to apply God’s law and issues of life, and how I should say yes to this or no to that in things at work or in my neighborhood. To comfort souls, counseling sessions and the like, to instruct them and to encourage them with the Word of God and the truth of his Word. And, of course, I submit to you that one of the pressing things, not as needful or merciful, is talking about various and sundry things of everyday life.
Of common things that we typically talk about the rest of the week, like sports. What is forbidden? The fourth commandment forbids the omission or careless performance of the duties required. You’re not doing what you should do.
Worship God and honor Him. Focus upon Him. Now we’re finite, of course, so we can’t do that continuously throughout the entirety of the day.
We know this. And so we take a rest, we go home, relax a little bit, we eat, we may read a little bit of Bible commentary, sing some Psalms. Not doing these things as we require.
And profaning the day by idleness, or doing that which in itself is sinful, or by unnecessary thoughts, words, and works about our worldly employments or recreations. Because we have a lot of things we can be worried about, concerned about. We’ve got work tomorrow, we have work yesterday, could be work at home, work on the job site.
That’s true. We should try to the best of our ability. We’re gonna be limited, I know.
Put that stuff, put it aside. Don’t do dwelling on these things. I’ll give you some examples, but I don’t want you dwelling on them.
I got a paint job. Our house is gonna be painted. And I could be worried about them getting there and getting it cleaned up and washed down ahead of time.
That they’re preparing the house for the paint, and that it’s gonna rain tomorrow, and so they may not come tomorrow. Do we have our schedule? Can we work it out? No. I don’t want to put all that stuff aside.
It’s distracting. On the Lord’s day, it’s His day, not my day. My day is Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.
Not exclusively. I’m gonna point this out, because again, you still have family time. You still, that is, you go home.
I’m not going to your family. You’re not listening to sermons all day long. You’re not super holy because you’re doing that.
You’re not less holy because you’re not. We get this from Isaiah 58 13. We get this, at least my presentation here, and my reading of the text.
We read it carefully here. This is a famous passage in Isaiah 58 13 through 14, which is used in the Confession, and it’s a prophecy. So this is another text that changed my mind about the Lord’s Day, although I practiced the Lord’s Day as a non-reformed man.
I was a Baptist. I was a charismatic. You all know this, but we took Sunday seriously.
It’s a cultural thing, I’m sure, at the time, in the 70s and 80s, although as I’ve grown up, I realized it really was dying off. Even then, my family was probably just strange. And so I grew up that way.
I went to worship morning and evening. I went to Sunday school class. We went to worship Thursday, but especially on Sunday.
I didn’t know why. I had no roots in it. I couldn’t argue why from the Word of God.
This is one of them. It’s a prophecy of the New Testament era, Isaiah 58. And what does he talk about in this prophecy? But the Sabbath, a day of rest.
As we know, of course, it’s the Lord’s Day, Sunday. If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight, a holy of the Lord, honorable, and shall honor him, not doing thy own ways, nor finding thy own pleasure, nor seeking thine own words, then thou shalt delight thyself in the Lord, and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father. For the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.
That’s pretty lofty urging and blessings for honoring God’s day. And you pay close attention to the strong language here. It says, nor speaking thine own words, nor finding thine own pleasure, I submit to you that he’s not saying you can only quote Bible verses.
Right? You can’t eat anything that you enjoy on Sunday, because that would be having something pleasurable. No, clearly here in the strong language, as we see in the book of Hosea and elsewhere, he’s saying you guys have so ruined the Lord’s day, that you’re focused on the pleasures, you’re focused on your own desires all the time. Again, it’s just one day, apparently, maybe for an hour, they do their offerings and sacrifices in the temple, and the rest of the day is family day.
It’s goof-off day. It’s sports day. In America, it certainly is sports day.
That’s what he’s pushing back against. And one way you push back against that in regular human language is what? You use strong absolutist language, don’t you? He’s not saying you can’t enjoy dessert on Sunday. You can’t use your own words.
It’s not his point. It’s to show them shame and to urge them to flee such a profligate, hedonistic lifestyle that they were doing. And of course in Hosea, here, they were participating in false worship, and glorying in Baal, and Asheroth, and others, claiming that perhaps she’s the wife, Asheroth is feminine, the wife of Jehovah, as we saw in the historical records in archaeology last week, there in chapter 5. It’s quite astounding.
They found it there, in Canaan. They dug it up. That’s what they were believing.
They’re clearly abusing the new moon in chapter 2, the feast, the Sabbath, and her appointed feasts. That is God’s feast. They made them their own instead of God’s.
So the Holy Day is a day of convocation in the Old Testament, twice a day, morning and evening, with doubling of the sacrifices compared to other Holy Days, for example. As a side note, in the Old Testament, how they practice these things. Let’s get to the second point.
When is the Christian Sabbath?
When is the Sabbath? The Old Testament, there, right in Genesis 2. It’s the end of the creation week. God rested, show by divine example. I’m gonna rest, you better rest, because I don’t need it, you need it.
The six-in-one pattern. The law does not say the last day. Fisher’s commentary, a lot of commentaries came out in the 1500s, 1600s, birthed out of the Reformation.
It seemed like every pastor wrote his own commentary, his own, excuse me, catechism. This is his catechism, Fisher’s catechism. In the beginning of the commandment, it is not said, remember the seventh day, namely in order from creation, seventh, V-E-N-F-T-H, but remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, the day of rest.
Just so, in the end of this commandment, the words are not, the Lord bless the seventh day, 1-2-3-4-5-6-7, but the Lord bless the Sabbath day, the day of rest, the cessation from ordinary, everyday labors that you do throughout the week, and hallowed it. There are hints of this change in the day, but the same ratio in the Old Testament. Again, Isaiah 66, 23, and it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, all flesh will come to worship me, says the Lord.
Nobody except, I suppose, dispensationalists, who believe that the Old Testament will be, and the whole sacrificial system will be reenacted in Jerusalem in the thousand year reign, takes this text to mean, oh, we’re supposed to have a new moon celebration, just like the Sabbaths, so the new moon’s another holy day besides one and seven. But he’s using the language, Isaiah’s, of the New Testament era, explaining these days of festivals and holy days, you’re still going to have them in the future, but not those specifically, as we know. They’re all done away with, but one day, one day only, the point being, there will be a time of celebrating God, he’s using the language they understood, which is all these feast days, to express the greatest feast day, which is the resurrection of our Lord and Savior, brothers and sisters, that’s this day, every Sunday is Resurrection Sunday.
The reasons given to, appended to, the fourth commandment, maybe you never noticed this before, so in Exodus, is one reason, in Deuteronomy, chapter 5, is another reason, and Exodus, the reason is because God rested, in Deuteronomy. It’s because God redeemed you out of Egypt, so things have changed, redemptive history has progressed, the eighth day passages as well, circumcision and the feast of the, of the tabernacle, on the first day, there shall be a Sabbath rest, on the eighth day, a Sabbath rest as well, Leviticus 23, 39, foreshadowing the New Testament era, the first day of the week would be the eighth day. Obviously, there’s no eighth, there’s seventh, you start over again. New Testament reality, Christ’s redemption, and he redeemed us from sin, ushering in a new age, and a new creation, as the reason was given for the Sabbath, was God created all things, and he rested, and isn’t that good enough for you? And then again, well, God redeemed you, from Egypt, he delivered this entire nation, this is a good reason why you should holler a whole day for him, because he protected your family, and your future generations.
And so all the more, the Christ has come in the flesh, brothers and sisters, in the New Testament era, it did not raise up on Saturday, but on Sunday, there’s a new heaven, a new earth, that we were ushered into, it’s still six and one ratio, but now it’s shifted by one day. The church celebrates, and understands, and acknowledges, in Revelation 1 10, a thing, or a day, called the Lord’s Day, not Lord’s Day plural, but singular. And how can it be his day, unless there’s something holy, and special about that day. Just the name itself, tells you something is going on here, something significant, and what day would be a Lord’s Day, in the New Testament, the day he rose from the dead, because we don’t know his birthday, isn’t that interesting. God told us nothing about when he was born specifically, we’re just guessing somewhere around maybe December, and there’s still a debate about that, but we know that was Sunday, he rose from the dead, because that’s what he wants us to focus on.
In terms of Holy Day, Hebrews 4 9, there’s this passage I alluded to earlier, about rest, there remains therefore, a rest, for the people of God, for he who has entered his rest, has himself also ceased from his works, as God did from his, so he’s making this parallel, the spiritual parallel, from the physical creation of the world, where God rested, right, air quotes it, like he’s exhausted, to the spiritual rest we have in Christ Jesus, that we don’t save ourselves from our works, by our works, how obedient we are, so he’s pulling off the idea of physical labor and spiritual labor, physical work, spiritual works, moral works, more precisely, how obedient you are, the reality of the rest was offered in the Old Testament, Hebrews 4 1, the reality of the rest is offered today, that is, they too could have had that rest, that’s what happens at the end of chapter 3, but they went in the desert, and many of them did not mix their life with faith, but unbelief, and they died in the desert. They could have had that reality in the Old Testament, and many of them did, of course, those who were saved.
We have the reality as well today, but it’s all tied to the great cosmic change between the Old Testament and the New Testament, no more Jewishness, no more new moons, no more multiple holy days, but just the one singular that predates those holy days, plural, was the singular day, the creation rest day, continued now, but now shifted by one day, because the great work that Christ came, when he came in the flesh, God as man, it made a great significant change, and one of those is so great, it changed time itself, split between BC and AD, and also through the week, rest one day, is now shifted to Sunday, the beginning of the week, the eighth day, and what’s interesting in Hebrews 4.9, as a side note, there remains therefore a rest, the word is Sabbath, right out of the Greek, you can get the word Sabbath pretty much out of that word, but it’s a unique word, as only Paul likes to use unique words, there in that text, which seems to hint at, I would argue, but that would be another sermon.
That he’s saying there’s still some kind of sign of a future rest, because the Old Testament, they had that rest, that is, they could be born again, and have the Holy Spirit, have justification, sanctification, just like we did, so what’s the difference? Well, part of the difference is Christ came, the day changed, the day’s still the same, because their day still pointed to Christ’s time, but beyond Christ’s time, to heaven, ours is Christ’s time, but also still points to heaven, that still needs a pointing to heaven, there’s still a rest, we still haven’t fully entered in, just like they still haven’t fully entered in, there’s still a parallel, as what I think Paul is saying in Hebrews 4.9.
Why The Christian Sabbath?
Why the Sabbath? I already gave you some reasons, more precisely, right, because God said it, God rested, God gave reasons for it, but here, general considerations, it is necessary to spend some time in our life to focus upon the creator of heaven and earth, because there’s lots of things going on right now that distract us, and we’re reminded of this in the confession of faith, which tells us that we know from the light of nature that we should send some time aside for God, just some time.
Do any Christians who don’t believe in the Lord’s day, one question you can ask them, if they’re predisposed to have a little conversation with you, you think one hour a week is sufficient to honor God? Now it’s a minimal argument, the maximal, of course, is no more than seven, you’re not more holy because you spend five days, we’re monks, that’s what the Roman Catholic Church is, you’re really holy because you’re always honoring God, every day is a holy day for you, no, we don’t believe that, but there’s at least a minimal, just one hour a week, we believe it should be a day. What are the reasons annexed to the fourth commandment? Question 62 of the Shorter Catechism. The reasons annexed to the fourth commandment are God’s allowing us six days a week for our own employments, he’s like, I gave you all this, I could have taken it all from you, because I’m God, but I’m giving you six out of seven days.
His challenging a special propriety on the seventh, his own example, and his blessing of the Sabbath day, as I read in Isaiah 58 and elsewhere, because we are finite, we can only work so much, take care of our family for so long, focus on any one given thing at a time, and God knows this, and so he says, well, I’m gonna give you some time, that’s Sunday, where you can focus on me, although you still have a little focus on food and sleep and your family, that’s true, that can’t be undone.
You’re not less holy, because you may have some emergencies at home, you have family issues and whatnot, don’t feel guilty about that. Oh, I forgot to prepare some food for today, well, that’s fine, it’s not the end of the world, and one way that we help with that, I think, is by giving you morning and evening worship, so that you can put on my calendar, here it is, and I can, by the help of the church, focus on God, because it’s his day. Even on Sunday, we’re finite, as I said, and so this things that we’ve talked about, and some ideas I have here with respect to the Lord’s day, not ideas as I just made up, but part of the tradition of our understanding how to practice it and the like, I’m not trying to be judgmental, because there are some differences, and we do have some disagreements, even within the Reformed tradition as such, but the differences aren’t as great as you think they are.
The more I’ve read of some of the English, and the Scottish, and the Dutch tradition on these matters, there’s a lot of similarity. They’re just like, well, yeah, of course you’re going to have a day off, you got to have time to worship the Lord, and focus upon him, and hear his word, and participate in the sacraments, to have fellowship with the saints, and spend time with the saints. Now, back then, of course, the advantage they had is they all lived in small little towns.
Geneva, our brothers and sisters, had about 12,000 people. That was it. They knew everybody’s business.
We don’t have that anymore, so we have to make a double effort to have fellowship with the saints, because we live so far apart. So, the rest that we are called to, is quite interesting. I used this example before, and though we don’t talk about it as much, I remember growing up, and it was a big movement.
I guess it came out of the 60s and 70s. I don’t know the history of it, of the green movement, right? We got to be eco-sensitive, and be caring of this world, and this creation, and there’s some truth to that. And, of course, they abused it, I think, historically.
But, Mother Earth being green, preserving the environment, and the like, what do they tell you to do? Buy electric this, turn off the lights, don’t run everything so long, control your water consumption. You know where I’m going with this, don’t you? If you turn everything off on Sunday, that is, why are we going to work? Why is everything open on Sunday? Why are the malls open, and businesses? Turn it all off. Well, there’s your green problem solved.
One day out of seven, you have a great dip in power consumption, and use of things of this world. I don’t have a problem with that. Maybe that’s the way we can sell it to our society.
And, of course, it’s a better thing that they know that they’re supposed to honor God. But, sure, we can have a green day. Green day is the Lord’s day.
It’s a picture of eternal rest, Hebrews 4, 9, and 9. There remains, therefore, a rest for the people of God. For he who has entered his rest has himself ceased from his works as God did from his. Let us, therefore, be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience.
The abuse of the fourth commandment, I think you already have an understanding of this if you’ve seen things in your life, maybe grown up in a Christian church for a long time. In Hosea, it’s not clear, but I think there’s some evidence here of something going on here. Verse 11 of chapter 2 lists holy days.
I will also cause your mirth to cease. God’s feast days, new moons, and sabbaths. But what do we read here in the description of verse 11 of chapter 2? Her feast days, her new moons, her sabbaths, all her appointed feasts, because they’ve taken them over for their own selfish gain.
They’ve taken God’s sabbath days, God’s worship, God’s new moons, and turned it into worship of Baal, Astaroth, and their own gluttony, right? They’re drunk. They’re temple prostitutes. So, basically, God’s saying, now it’s all yours, man.
You’ve destroyed it. You’ve ruined the things that I’ve given you because it was also his temple and his altars that they’ve turned and twisted to wicked practices. So, they’ve become his own thing.
They’ve turned God’s worship and God’s day to their own day and their own worship. The punishment, of course, is God takes away the good time. These things are supposed to be a blessing for us, and it becomes a curse for them.
Ashes in their mouth, and as we know, ultimately, they’re invaded by Assyria. I will cause her mirth to cease and her feast days and the like. And then in 5-7, the new moon shall devour them and their heritage.
What they thought was a good thing ends up being a curse upon them. The modern abuse today, I think we’ve seen, unfortunately, nearby in our church here, our church building in our neighborhood, where Sunday is just entertainment day, apparently. It’s movie day.
They’ve been advertising that for a long time now. Omission of the Lord’s Day, outright denial, doesn’t happen often, but I’ve seen it. So, they end up believing in 9 commandments, not 10.
They may or may not have a worship service on Sunday because it turns into family day. Changing the Lord’s Day, that happens today as well. Maybe you’ve not thought about that, but there are churches that they started, I don’t know, maybe 10 years ago, I started seeing advertisement for it, where they’re like, we’re going to worship and honor God Saturday night.
What? Are you Jewish? I don’t understand. Are you Seventh Day Adventists? That’s what this building is. They’re confused.
No, because apparently Sunday is family day, right? They just do whatever they want. They’re not honoring God’s day. They’re abusing it, making it their own day, their own feast, their own new moon, right? It’s not as bad thing to be the God.
They’re not drunk. I don’t believe they’re going to be drunk, but it’s the same kind of thing. They shouldn’t be doing that.
It’s worse in some ways because they’re basically saying we’re going to make our own holy day. The Roman Catholic Church does that. They have a lot of them.
Special days they honor to God. We talked about that when I went through Sunday school class on worship of God, that we can’t just make anything we want and say this honors the Lord in a special way like the Roman Catholic Church does. Given what He has done for our soul, brothers and sisters, He only requires one day in seven, a day in which we take a reasonable effort not to go to extremes, to put aside distractions, avoid work if possible, and be with the saints, especially be with God, to focus upon Him.
He is center in our thoughts in formal public worship. That’s one reason why we have it, to honor His name publicly, but also to focus especially upon Him. And it should not be a burden.
Rather, it’s a day of rest for both body and soul. So let’s approach this day of the Lord with a renewed interest in honoring Him and thanking Him for the work of Christ Jesus. Let us pray.
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we praise you, God, and we thank you that most of us and many of us, I believe, as I know, had grown up and have some experience and understanding of a day of rest. And that we make reasonable efforts, Lord God Almighty, so that we can have this time together as the people of God. And between this morning and evening to spend time with the family, to speak of things of the Word of God or going over the sermon and the like, whatever these things that we need to do, God, that we can rest and not be distracted by the things of this world throughout the week and have worry and the like.
Help us, we pray, to this end, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, that we would not turn it into a day of grudging obedience, but of joyful praise that you have loved us with an everlasting love and you’ve only asked for one day in seven, God Almighty. Help us, we pray, to continue to love you and honor you. By the blood of Christ we pray, amen.