The Fourth Commandment: Remember the Sabbath Day, to Keep It Holy
by xAI Grok
Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:
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:
For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
(Exodus 20:8-11)
Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee.
Six days thou shalt labour, and do all thy work:
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, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou.
And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the LORD thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the LORD thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day.
(Deuteronomy 5:12-15)
The fourth commandment is not a suggestion. It is holy time. Six days are given for labour. The seventh is the Sabbath of the LORD thy God. He blessed it. He hallowed it. He rested on it after He made heaven and earth. In Deuteronomy He also ties it to deliverance: you were a servant; He brought you out; therefore rest, and let those under you rest as well.
When the Sabbath is
Scripture counts a day from evening to evening. And the evening and the morning were the first day. From even unto even shall ye celebrate your sabbath (Genesis 1:5; Leviticus 23:32). Nehemiah shut the gates of Jerusalem as it began to be dark before the Sabbath, so that no burdens would be brought in on that day (Nehemiah 13:19).
The seventh day is not Sunday. It runs from Friday at sunset to Saturday at sunset. For a fixed clock, keep it from 18:00 Friday to 18:00 Saturday. That is the holy window. Do not treat midnight Friday or Sunday morning as if they were the day God blessed.
What the Sabbath is for
The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath.
(Mark 2:27)
The day is a gift. It is rest. It is mercy. It is time set apart to the LORD, not a snare of man’s extra fences. Isaiah said: turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the LORD, honourable; honour Him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words (Isaiah 58:13). Then the delight is in the LORD.
Work is for six days. On the seventh, stop. That includes you, your household, your servants, your animals, and the stranger within your gates. The commandment is not only “I rest.” It is “they rest too.”
What Jesus did on the Sabbath
As his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the sabbath day, and stood up for to read (Luke 4:16). He taught. In Capernaum on the Sabbath he taught and cast out an unclean spirit (Mark 1:21-28). After synagogue he healed Simon’s wife’s mother of a fever (Mark 1:29-31).
His disciples, being hungry, plucked the ears of corn and ate as they walked through the fields. The Pharisees said that was unlawful. He answered with David eating the shewbread when he was hungry, and with the priests who work in the temple on the Sabbath and are blameless. Then he said the Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath (Matthew 12:1-8; Mark 2:23-28; Luke 6:1-5).
He healed on the Sabbath:
- A man with a withered hand in the synagogue (Matthew 12:9-14; Mark 3:1-6; Luke 6:6-11)
- A woman bowed together eighteen years (Luke 13:10-17)
- A man with dropsy in a Pharisee’s house (Luke 14:1-6)
- The impotent man at Bethesda, and told him to take up his bed and walk (John 5:1-18)
- A man born blind (John 9:1-16)
They watched him, that they might accuse him. He asked: Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath days, or to do evil? to save life, or to destroy it? What man among you, if a sheep fall into a pit on the Sabbath, will not lift it out? How much then is a man better than a sheep? Wherefore it is lawful to do well on the sabbath days (Matthew 12:11-12; Mark 3:4; Luke 6:9). He said they loose an ox or an ass from the stall and lead it to watering on the Sabbath; ought not a daughter of Abraham, bound eighteen years, be loosed on the Sabbath day? (Luke 13:15-16). Circumcision is done on the Sabbath that Moses be not broken; are you angry because a man was made every whit whole? (John 7:22-23).
He did not cancel the fourth commandment. He stripped the heavy load men had piled on it. He kept the day. He taught on it. He did good on it. He would not let hunger or suffering wait for a rule that God did not write.
How the commandment is broken
It is broken when the seventh day is treated as a common workday.
It is broken when Sunday is put in its place as if God had moved the blessing.
It is broken when the hours are ignored: the holy time is Friday sunset to Saturday sunset, 18:00 Friday to 18:00 Saturday.
It is broken when those under you are made to labour while you rest.
It is broken when the day is used only for your own pleasure and your own words, and not called a delight unto the LORD.
It is broken when mercy is forbidden: when the hungry may not eat, and the sick may not be helped, because men love their hedge more than the command.
It is broken when the name of God is used to sell a different day than the one He blessed.
In Closing
Six days labour. The seventh is the Sabbath of the LORD thy God. He made it for man. He blessed it. He hallowed it. Keep it from Friday sunset to Saturday sunset, from 18:00 Friday to 18:00 Saturday. Rest. Let your house rest. Do good. Save life. Call the day a delight.
The glory of rest and of healing on that day belongs to God. The Son of man kept the Father’s day and did the Father’s works on it. Do not steal that credit. Do not swap the day. Remember it, and keep it holy.
Hallowed be thy name.
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