“Remember the Sabbath”
Deuteronomy 5:12

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Pastor Kevin Vogts
Trinity Lutheran Church
Paola, Kansas
Fifth Sunday after Pentecost—June 27, 2021

In the Name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

My grandmother embroidered a set of dishtowels for each of her grandchildren.  My set has pictures of little Dutch girls doing the weekly household chores. Monday is wash day; Tuesday is for ironing; Wednesday is for gardening; Thursday is for shopping; Friday is cleaning day; and Saturday is for baking.

My mother tells me that when she was a little girl, most housewives actually followed that same weekly routine; in fact, when my mother was first married, she herself faithfully followed this traditional weekly cycle of household chores. But, today, that kind of fixed, old-fashioned, weekly routine is a relic, a thing of the past, an obsolete tradition that has no place in our modern world.

The question is: What about Sunday?  My Sunday dishtowel shows the little Dutch girl in her Sunday best, on her way to Sunday School and church.  Is that an old-fashioned weekly routine that is also becoming a thing of the past?  Like the household schedule of washing on Monday, ironing on Tuesday, gardening on Wednesday, shopping on Thursday, cleaning on Friday, and baking on Saturday, is going to church on Sunday a relic of the past, an obsolete tradition that has no place in our modern world?

Our text is from today’s Old Testament Reading in the fifth chapter of Deuteronomy, words many of us know from memory, the Third Commandment: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.”

The word “Sabbath” means “to rest,” and in the Old Testament the Sabbath was a day to rest and remember.  God commanded that the Sabbath day was to be a day of rest because the Israelites had been slaves in Egypt, and slaves do not get a day of rest.  This day of rest each week was a constant reminder to them that the Lord had set them free from slavery and brought them out of Egypt.  As our Old Testament Reading says, “Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the Lord your God brought you out of there . . . Therefore the Lord your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.”  A day to rest and remember.

The Old Testament Sabbath was on Saturday, the last day of the week, because on the last day of the creation week God himself had rested from his labors, as Genesis says: “On the seventh day God had finished the work he had done, so on the seventh day he rested.”  So, the Saturday Sabbath was also a reminder to the Israelites that in six days the Lord had created the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day he rested.

However, this commandment to observe Saturday as the Sabbath, and the Sabbath as a complete day of rest, no longer applies to us.  That aspect of the Third Commandment was given only for God’s people in the Old Testament.  Since the coming of Christ we are no longer required to observe the ceremonies and regulations of the Old Testament; we are no longer required to observe Saturday as the Sabbath, and the Sabbath as a complete day of rest.

But, the Third Commandment DOES still apply to us today!  In the Small Catechism, Dr. Martin Luther explains the Christian meaning and New Testament significance of the Third Commandment: “We should fear and love God that we may not despise preaching and his Word, but hold it sacred, and gladly hear and learn it.”

Although the Sabbath is no longer required to be specifically on Saturday, or a complete day of rest, the Sabbath day is still for us Christians a day to remember.  To remember and confess that like the Israelites in Egypt we too were slaves—slaves to sin.  For the Bible says “all have sinned” and “everyone who sins is a slave to sin.”

The Christian Sabbath is still a day to remember, to remember the Good News that, like the Israelites in the Old Testament, we have been set free from slavery, set free by God. For God’s Son, Jesus Christ, paid the price that bought us our freedom, he purchased and won us, not with silver or gold, but with his holy precious blood, and with his innocent suffering and death.  The Christian Sabbath is still a day to remember, to remember that just as God rescued the Israelites from Egypt, Jesus Christ rescued us, from the power of sin, death, and the devil.  He paid for all our sins and earned us forgiveness and eternal life.

Why did the early Christians transfer our chief day of worship from Saturday to Sunday?  The Christian Sabbath is still a day to remember, to remember that Jesus rose from the dead on Easter Sunday; to remember God’s promise that all who trust in Jesus will also rise to eternal life.

The Christian Sabbath is still a day to remember, to remember that the Holy Spirit came upon the disciples on Pentecost Sunday.  To remember that the Holy Spirit still comes to us through God’s Word and the Holy Sacraments.

So, although in the New Testament era we are free to choose any day of the week as our chief day of worship, the Christian Church traditionally celebrates the Christian Sabbath on Sunday instead of Saturday, because on Sunday Christ rose from the dead, and on Sunday the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost. 

The book of Hebrews says: “Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing.”  And St. Paul writes in Colossians, “Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. . . As you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing Psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God.” The Christian Sabbath day is a special day we have set aside, to gladly hear and learn God’s Word, and as the Psalms say, to “enter into his gates with thanksgiving and into his courts with praise,” to “sing and make music to the Lord.”

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.”  Keep it holy by coming to God’s holy house; keep it holy by gladly hearing and learning God’s holy Word; keep it holy by receiving the blessings of his holy Sacraments. As Psalm 122 says, “I was glad when they said unto me, ‘Let us go into the house of the Lord.’”

The habit of going to the Lord’s house on the Lord’s day is not a relic of the past, it is not an obsolete tradition that has no place in our modern world.  As long as this world endures, God’s people will gather together.  Make it your habit to be there, make it your habit to be here.

Rejoice and be glad!  Give thanks to the Lord, call on his name!  “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.”