QQ60-62. How is the Sabbath to be sanctified and what is forbidden in the fourth commandment?
A (60). The Sabbath is to be sanctified by a holy resting all that day, even from such worldly employments and recreations as are lawful on other days; and spending the whole time in the public and private exercises of God’s worship, except so much as is to be taken up in the works of necessity and mercy.
A (61). The fourth commandment forbiddeth the omission, or careless performance, of the duties required, and the profaning the day by idleness, or doing that which is in itself sinful, or by unnecessary thoughts, words, or works, about our worldly employments or recreations.
A (62). The reasons annexed to the fourth commandment are, God’s allowing us six days of the week for our own employments, his challenging a special propriety in the seventh, his own example, and his blessing the Sabbath day.
The Puritans called the Lord’s Day the “market day of the soul.” This is one of the main things that got the Puritans such a bad name among the countrymen. But their fellow English citizens began to look at this inside-out and our own contemporaries have far exceed the first modern secularists in viewing this Day as “all fences and no fields.”
In the Sabbath command, we are being commanded to be as happy as human beings possibly can be. Our problem is that we do not believe God about this. This was not simply a Puritan hobbyhorse. Whether they were right about recreation I will leave to others to debate. Sproul, speaking in the line of the Continental Reformed, remarked that, “The distinction in Isaiah 58 is between doing what is pleasing to God and doing what is pleasing to ourselves in opposition to what is pleasing to God.”1 God’s people have always viewed corporate worship as the highlight of their week. This is certainly the experience of most of us when we were brand new believers. But what has changed?
In our outline today, we will look at 1. things to partake, 2. things to forsake, and 3. things that come up.
Things to Partake
The operative phrase here in the answer to Question 60 is a HOLY RESTING. Not any old resting, but a holy or sacred rest. Much could be said about it, but given how we have set the foundation of moral law continuing and the exact day changing, the only unresolved doctrinal question for most will be how this translates into a spiritual exposition of the fourth commandment. It is mistake to think that “spiritual commandment” would have only new creational dimensions and not old creational. The miracles done by Jesus should be a corrective to this. He could restore the man’s hand in a way we cannot, but we can do things that work toward restoration. So we will divide this spiritual keeping of the command into 1. doing good for one’s own soul and for other believers, 2. striving to enter his rest, 3. sanctifying of the Day.
First, there is the doing good. Jesus wrapped up His lesson about the Sabbath in Matthew 12 by saying, “So it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath” (12:12). At first glance this statement looks so uncontroversial as to be nothing to the controversy. Weren’t the Pharisees objecting just because they believed Jesus to be doing bad on the Sabbath? So of course in their minds, they would have held to the good! But actually, no, because in order to do good, one must do.
Second, there is the entering of the gospel rest. Just as “strive to enter his rest” is paradoxical, so is restful working. But so it was on another occasion where Jesus was accused on breaking the Sabbath for healing the invalid at the Pool of Bethesda. “But Jesus answered them, ‘My Father is working until now, and I am working’” (Jn. 5:17). That is interesting.
Both of these involve activity, which to the untrained eye, can look just as much like tiresome work as any other. In speaking of the correct way to interpret the Gospel passages where Jesus was accused of violating the Sabbath, Chantry rightly comments,
“One of the prominent mistakes of the Pharisees was their belief that a day of rest was for the purpose of the fullest possible inactivity and non-exertion … Non-effort has never been the great point of the Sabbath. It is not a day for human dormancy or repose in which you are to become passive. If it were as the Pharisees conceived of it, the best Sabbath-keeper would be the one who assumed the most complete state of inertia!”2
Just think of the priests in the Old Covenant. Did they not work much on the Sabbath? While you are thinking about them, think of a feast. Doesn’t someone have to set the table? And others to cook? There are other logistical matters, such as someone to send out invitations, and so forth. If it is a big feast, there will be many hands on deck. And then there are all the activities in the backyard. Now who would ever confuse such a feast day with a work day? But in fact, many do. What other reason can be given for this but that there is somewhere else such party-poopers would rather be?
Third, there is the sanctifying of the Day. Specifically, what about the WHOLE DAY dimension? In defense of this view, the Puritan George Swinnock wrote, “Reader, as thy duty is to rest the whole day from wickedness and worldly work, so also to employ the whole day in God’s worship, be either praying, or reading, or hearing, or singing, or meditating, or discoursing with others about the works or word of God. Be always taken up either with public, private, or secret duties.”3 The best Puritans were actually practical realists about this. They sought to steer a course between antinomian Sabbath-hating and legalistic Sabbath-binding. Diversity of practice was to be expected because if the Sabbath was made for man, then its graces were made to fit the molds of every specific man, woman, and child. So Beeke and Jones summarize and quote Owen to this effect,
“On the day of worship, Owen divides duties up into public and private, with the former taking precedence over the latter. Private duties, which must be done before or after public worship, include the exercises of ‘prayer, reading the Scripture, meditation, family instructions from the advantage of the public ordinances … to be recommended unto everyone’s conscience, ability, and opportunity, as they shall find strength and assistance for them.”4
It will sometimes be asked: Is it a sin to attend only the evening service? We cannot say that this is the case from Scripture. The same logic that is implied by the Westminster Standards about the Sabbath, namely, works of necessity and mercy, can apply to which service (AM or PM) one attends. Suppose, for example, that a church necessarily can only meet in the evening. Ultimately, we cannot prescribe for another conscience where God has not been explicit in his word. But so long as one is honoring the Lord and longs to be with his saints, worshiping and participating in the means of grace to the fullest, this is the spirit of the law.
Things to Forsake
Just as with the positive, so with the negative, we must recognize the difference between the substance of righteousness (its spiritual essence) in a command versus its circumstantial application and enforcement. Remembering that Old Covenant Israel was a typological people, the ways that the Day was lived out and the ways of enforcing it can be different. So with the case in Numbers 15, of the man bundling sticks was not meant to be a permanent model for what not to do and what to do to someone if they did. An illustration given by Chantry in his book on the Sabbath may be helpful. He was explaining what Paul was getting at in Galatians 3 and 4 regarding Israel of old being as a child under a schoolmaster. He said this,
“When a small child lacks all of the information needed for his own safety and lacks the insight to grasp information even when it is given to him, how do we guide him? We do it by repetition of strict outward limits and by threats of painful punishment! If you were the parent of a toddler and you lived near a lake, you would have to be concerned lest he drown. Therefore, you would constantly remind him not to go beyond the treeline unless attended by parents. Not only would you say, ‘Don’t go into the water.’ You would have to be more strict to be safe. ‘Do not go onto the beach or the dock without mother and father,’ you would say. If at any time and for any reason he put one foot on the dock or the beach, immediate punishment would result — he would get a spanking. You are preserving his life. This is exactly what God did with the Jews under Moses.”5
It is instructive that it is at the tail end of that section of Galatians 3 and 4, namely 4:10-11, where Paul applies the principle to what? “You observe days and months and seasons and years! I am afraid I may have labored over you in vain” (v. 10). It may be that the main thing to forsake about the Sabbath is the Old Covenant observance of “the Day.” Naturally that isn’t going to settle all of the debates about how to spend the Lord’s Day. But many would say that it is a clue that the “all day” dimension is all receiving of grace with the saints, and not walking on eggshells.
There is the OMISSION AND CARELESS PERFORMANCE of Question 61. Let me put it in these terms. I have been asked a few times, “Is my failure to read the Bible daily a sin?” and I ask them, “Well, do you believe Jesus’ words in Matthew 4:4, that ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word from the mouth of God’ or the Psalmist who said, ‘I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you’ (119:11). Do you believe such words?” “Oh, certainly,” they reply. Then there you have it. You know that you do wrong against your body to starve it, right? Now by way of application, if the Lord’s Day is drinking out of a firehose what you’ve already acknowledged to be true of the Dixie Cups of your devotional time, then what follows? To plug up any of that firehose is bad for your soul and the souls of others.
A very Puritanical question to ask is whether it is a sin to watch or play sports on that day. Even Sam Harris posed this as a problem for Christianity: to handle the unclean “pigskin” of a Sunday, a “two-for-one” problem as Harris saw it. And what about playing video games? The more temporally-minded an activity is, the more it may tend not to contribute to that rest (regardless of what our present views on them are), so that is something to keep in mind. But it would certainly be going beyond any clear commands of Scripture to say that such games absolutely cannot fit into that. Such things are in view in the expression of Isaiah 58, “seeking your own pleasure, or talking idly” (v. 13).
As much as possible, even such things as sports and video games can be redeemed to be means by which we can 1. fellowship with other believers and 2. evangelize those who are not. If we cannot conceive of bringing in such treasure to the kingdom, then it may be well to ask whether we are wiser than God, kinder than God, and frankly whether we understand joy and rest more than God himself who designed them both for our highest good.
Implicit in not employing the sojourner (or alien) in labor, for many of the Reformed, has been the abstaining from any purchases, including meals at restaurants, that would further the violation of this commandment for others. The reason that the same would not apply to church or family meals is because all of the food is purchased beforehand. But it should be pointed out that there is a diversity of opinion on the details of this. But the theological argument on both sides has to do again with the natural (moral) and positive (ceremonial) law dimensions. Those who would restrict any such purchases reason that since this is moral law, we cause even the unbelieving employers and employees to sin and so sin ourselves. Those who argue that it is permissible will have to argue that this aspect pertained to some form of ceremonial or civil law. One interesting passage in this regard is Nehemiah 13.
“Tyrians also, who lived in the city, brought in fish and all kinds of goods and sold them on the Sabbath to the people of Judah, in Jerusalem itself! Then I confronted the nobles of Judah and said to them, ‘What is this evil thing that you are doing, profaning the Sabbath day? Did not your fathers act in this way, and did not our God bring all this disaster on us and on this city? Now you are bringing more wrath on Israel by profaning the Sabbath’ … But I warned them and said to them, ‘Why do you lodge outside the wall? If you do so again, I will lay hands on you.’ From that time on they did not come on the Sabbath” (vv. 16-18, 21).
On the one hand, these were foreigners to the covenant who would be guilty. On the other hand, it is still the Old Covenant people.
We mentioned that to keep something holy means to sanctify it, or treat it special. Its boundaries must be protected. So how we obey the “six day” part of the commandment will have some influence on how we do the seventh. Countless practical examples could be thought of—e.g. going to bed at a reasonable time the night before, not leaving for Sunday chores such as shopping, and instructing the children on the importance of fellowship with our brothers and sisters in Christ on that day. So we often forsake things that are not evil in and of themselves, but things that can clearly become enemies of the best.
Things that Come Up
Objection 1. “I literally cannot get off work on Sunday, or at least I am frequently called to duty! And what if things come up of grave seriousness: an illness, an injury, or simply seeing someone else in need that needs my necessary attention. Isn’t that more like Jesus?”
Reply Obj. 1. Actually, yes. And the Reformed tradition built into their confessional language what are called “works of necessity” and “works of mercy.” The expression also appears in the Westminster Confession of Faith, XXI.8. Again, what is the principle? It is that the Sabbath is made “for man, not man for the Sabbath” (Mk. 2:27).
A WORK OF NECESSITY occurs when one is employed in some service where they are often on call on Sundays — e. g. military service, health care, shipping, etc. But whatever other arguments can be made for this, our goal should be to move toward no longer being dependent on such employment if it is at all possible. Other jobs can be justified as well for those with low incomes and who honestly need to make ends meet, if they can only do so in this way. But again, there should be a strategy that forms the straightest line to getting back on the playing field of the new creation.
Specific questions about. For example: Would someone violate the Sabbath for working Sundays during the busy season (If he tries to go to church at night)? The Scriptures do not apply that level of specificity to this command. We cannot speak directly for God, as only He knows the heart of the person (e.g. whether they truly desire to be in church or not; whether they will take steps in the future to account for as much of the busyness in some alternative way or not), but He also has grace for us in such seasons.
A WORK OF MERCY is something like helping an elderly person with their groceries, or even saving an animal from pain. We get a clue from the man with the withered hand (cf. Mk. 3:1-6). Jesus healed him in the face of those looking on in judgment. How dare he violate the Sabbath! Easy for them to say! They each had two hands that worked perfectly well the rest of the week. For them church was a chance to show off their “morality.” For this man, church was like one of the sanctuary cities of old. He was fleeing for refuge in Jesus from the fiery darts of the enemy that screams to him “Guilty!” “Unqualified!” “Failure!” For the weak, a full and open church is the family they never had, and its King offers not only pardon for sin but protection from Pharaoh who would pursue him all the way into the Promised Land if he could. So yes, those two things, but you will find that the Sabbath is no enemy to necessity and mercy, but rather a life-giving fountain.
APPLICATION
Use 1. EVANGELICAL USE. We mentioned Heidelberg Q.103, but we didn’t cover how it ended: “In the second place, that all the days of my life I rest from my evil works, allow the Lord to work in me by His Spirit, and thus begin in this life the everlasting Sabbath.” We saw this in the Hebrews 4 text and then especially in the words of Jesus in Matthew 11. What does Jesus mostly demand of us here? It is in the form of a free invitation:
“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Mat. 11:28-30).
The great thing about this “market day of the soul” is this. It is the Gospel in the Sabbath. Jesus already sanctified the day for you, because six days he did all your work. He became a man, born under law, and earned your rest and mine.
Use 2. CIVIL USE. There is proven wisdom in the moral law. There is first of all psychological wisdom in it. You may not have noticed—especially if you are young and you think this is normal life—but there is a pandemic of loneliness and depression that really began even before lockdowns two years ago. It is a result of technology that cages growing children in from human interaction that was normal for developing humans for millennia. As The Lord’s Day assembly grows into more fellowship opportunities, we have a ready-made, God-ordained reintroduction to friendship and … And even those who claim to need no relationship are fooling themselves.
Secondly, there is a sociological wisdom in it. There are alternative fellowships with alternative causes and rallies. American civic religion has substituted football stadiums for the cathedral. It has substituted fast-food windows for tables in a fellowship hall.
Use 3. DIRECTIVE USE. What do you to if you are just getting started, or your church is just getting started? The fellowship meal is an obvious place to begin. A church needs more than fellowship, but if it doesn’t at least have that much, there will be other problems.
One thing I would urge is to not pit one good thing against another good thing. In my own church planting exprience, I ran into a colossal misunderstanding that either led to legalism or was itself the result of a more general legalism. Once a church gets big enough to host more events especially for those who aren’t in the busy family season—youth, college age, singles, empty-nesters, retired—many of whom are in a “make or break” moment spiritually and who just need that one life raft of the Friday morning prayer meeting, the Sunday afternoon fellowship meal, the weeknight homegroup, the homeschooling co-op, or the morning class.
But those at the core of the church, whose schedules were already filled up put up the STOP sign because it was “too much” for them. And what I want to plea with the local church where I’m at, before we get to that point (Lord willing)—Not everybody is everybody else! How is that for human interaction 101! So let’s avoid two opposite ditches in the road ahead: 1. You are not bound to exhaust yourself in someone else’s increased joy. 2. Please, don’t bind others from moving forward because you insist on binding yourself. So I’ll put it in one other way: Don’t confuse one person’s exhaustion with another person’s expansion.
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1. Sproul, “Defining the Debate.”
2. Chantry, Call the Sabbath a Delight, 46-47.
3. George Swinnock, quoted in Beeke & Jones, A Puritan Theology, 661.
4. Beeke & Jones, A Puritan Theology, 662; cf. Owen, Day of Sacred Rest, in Works, 19:460.
5. Chantry, Call the Sabbath a Delight, 67-68.
