[The text below represents an edited transcript of this Tomorrow’s World program.]

The Fourth Commandment Explained: The Sabbath Day

Longtime viewers—and even most new ones—are aware that we here at Tomorrow’s World are passionate about keeping the Ten Commandments, including the Fourth Commandment about keeping the seventh-day Sabbath.

• Jesus kept the seventh-day Sabbath.
• His first-century followers—both Jew and Gentile—kept it.
• And a continuous line of faithful Christians throughout history have kept it, as well—just as God commands.

But exactly HOW do you keep the seventh-day Sabbath?

Well, today we’re going to give you God’s own answer to that question.

The Sabbath Was Made for Man—Not Just for Jews

But first, I want to highlight two ditches to avoid.

The first is believing we should look to Hebrew or Jewish practices and Judaism to understand how to keep the Sabbath.

This is a mistake for a number of reasons.

First, over the centuries, Judaism added many additional man-made regulations, restrictions, and conditions that God never intended to be part of Sabbath-keeping. In fact, one of the themes of Jesus Christ’s ministry in the first-century was His confrontations with the Jewish leadership about how they’d made God’s Sabbath a burden.

For instance, let’s look at His example and instruction in Mark 2, beginning in verse 23.

Now it happened that He went through the grainfields on the Sabbath; and as they went His disciples began to pluck the heads of grain. And the Pharisees said to Him, “Look, why do they do what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” (Mark 2:23-24).

Now, you can search the Scriptures from Genesis to Revelation and see no passage at all in which God says you can’t feed yourself by plucking a few heads of grain on the Sabbath day. Now you’ll find instructions not to use busy times of the year, such as plowing and harvesting times, as an excuse not to keep the Sabbath—that’s in Exodus 34:21. But no one would rightly call what Jesus and His Apostles were doing “harvesting.”

God Created the Sabbath as a Blessing—Not a Burden

They were violating the overly strict, unbiblical regulations of Judaism, but they were not guilty of breaking the Fourth Commandment. If they were, then Jesus was too—yet we know that He never broke even one of God’s commands.

So after highlighting how the high priest in King David’s day had done a better job of administering God’s law according to its intent, Jesus concludes in verses 27 and 28:

“The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. Therefore the Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27-28).

There are multiple insights to be gained here, and we’ll touch on some later. For now, note that Jesus pointed out that the Sabbath was created by God to benefit man, not the other way around. And the unbiblical requirements that the Jewish authorities had added to the Sabbath command were turning it into a burden God never intended it to be.

Such examples of Jesus’ instruction to the supposed experts concerning proper Sabbath keeping abound in the gospels. The scribes, Pharisees, and priests may have been experts in Judaism, but that doesn’t equate with being experts in how to keep God’s laws as He intended. And that is still true today.

Paul spoke of his fellow Jewish citizens as “hav[ing] a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge” (Romans 10:2). It is God’s Spirit working through the ministry of His Church, the Body of Christ, that brings truth and understanding of the Scriptures—not an obsession with any one historical language, culture, or people.

Keeping the Sabbath doesn’t mean adopting practices rooted in Judaism or the teachings of various so-called “Hebrew roots” movements. God’s commands are often far simpler than people give them credit for. To keep the Sabbath, no one needs to adopt Judaism or any of the many movements that seek credibility by imitating it.

Saturday Is the Sabbath Day—Set It Apart

The other ditch we need to identify at the beginning is the mistake of treating the Sabbath as if it were a generic principle of “one day in seven,” and not the specifically designated seventh day of the week—the only day of the week God set aside as the Sabbath.

We saw earlier in the book of Mark how Jesus said “the Sabbath was made [or created] for man” (Mark 2:27) This points to a profound truth about the Sabbath: That it was directly created by God. Let’s read about that creation in Genesis 2. When we do, we’ll see that the Sabbath was very unique—something God made by NOT working.

Thus the heavens and the earth, and all the host of them, were finished. And 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 God had created and made (Genesis 2:1-3).

Here we see that God did not set apart just any day of the week, but the seventh day specifically.

Remember the Sabbath and Keep it Holy

We see this reflected in the Fourth Commandment itself in Exodus 20, beginning in verse 8.

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD your God (Exodus 20:8-10).

We’ll read the rest of the commandment later, but notice how plain it is that God, who alone has the authority to designate holy time, set apart the seventh day of the week specifically as the Sabbath. To observe any other day of the week is simply not Sabbath-keeping. Resting? Sure. Taking some “me time”? Perhaps. But not keeping the Sabbath.

The Fourth Commandment | Exodus 20:8–11

Let’s begin our look at three keys to keeping God’s Sabbath by starting with the Sabbath command, itself. This time, though, let’s read it in full.

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it (Exodus 20:8–11).

The Sabbath Rest Means Stop Work

There are several things worth noting in that commandment, but for now, let’s focus on the fact that:

1. We should cease from our work on the Sabbath.

We saw earlier that God did this Himself at creation.

On the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work (Genesis 2:2).

So, too, He commands us to cease from our own work on the seventh day.

In today’s busy world, it’s easy to find ourselves working 24/7. But God commands us to pause and cease from our labors when the seventh day begins.

When Does the Sabbath Begin? At Sunset Friday

By the way, when does that day begin? As Genesis 1 and other passages of the Bible reveal, God counts days from sunset to sunset. So, the seventh-day Sabbath begins from sundown on Friday and continues to sundown on Saturday.

And when sundown arrives on Friday, God commands that we set aside our labor, cease from our regular pursuits, and take a rest—just as He did 6,000 years ago.

God doesn’t get tired. He didn’t need to rest on the seventh day He didn’t think, “Wow, those six days of creating were really hard. I need a break!”

He did that as an example for us to follow.

And “work” doesn’t just mean “employment.” How many people spend their Saturdays mowing the lawn, maintaining their home, or doing other laborious chores? The commandment is plain: “On the seventh day… you shall do no work”—neither you, nor those over whom you have authority.

Now, some of you might say, “My job has times that are just too busy to take a break.”

If you think this applies to you, I hear you. I used to be an actuarial mathematician for a large insurance company, and our department had its own seasons in the year when work was especially crazy, often involving important legal reporting.

But are we to abandon the Sabbath rest during those busy seasons? What does God say?

God’s Work Week: Six Days You Shall Labor

Consider Exodus 34:21, which we mentioned earlier. And as we read it, remember that ancient Israel was an agricultural society.

Six days you shall work, but on the seventh day you shall rest; in plowing time and in harvest you shall rest.

Now plowing time and harvest time were just about the busiest times of year in their society. Yet God told them not to make an exception in those days. They were to honor His command and to rest from labor on the seventh-day Sabbath.

Come sundown Friday evening, God commands us to focus on different things, as we’ll discuss further later in the program.

Use the Preparation Day to Protect the Sabbath

Part of making this work is properly preparing for the Sabbath. God taught ancient Israel this principle after freeing them from Egypt. Many people have heard of the miraculous “manna from heaven,” but few realize that a major purpose of the miracle was to test God’s people to see if they would take the Sabbath command seriously.

I recommend you read the entire account in Exodus 16. For now, let me summarize it by saying that, for the first five days of the week, God rained down enough manna for one day, every day. But on the sixth day, what we’d call Friday, He rained down two days’ worth, so that they could prepare enough for that day and for the Sabbath day that followed. And on the Sabbath, they were not to go out looking for more—since God had given them enough for two days the day before.

Then Moses said, “Eat that today, for today is a Sabbath to the LORD; today you will not find it in the field. Six days you shall gather it, but on the seventh day, which is the Sabbath, there will be none.” Now it happened that some of the people went out on the seventh day to gather, but they found none. And the LORD said to Moses, “How long do you refuse to keep My commandments and My laws?” (Exodus 16:25–28).

God had warned them to prepare properly for the seventh day during the time leading up to it. And that’s what we should do, as well.

God wants us to protect the blessing His Sabbath represents by planning for it—taking care of household chores and other mundane work on the other six days of the week, and preserving the seventh day for the divine rest God intended.

Yet the Sabbath is about far more than mere relaxation. As helpful as physical rest is, the real power and blessing of the Sabbath begins to be unlocked as we engage with the two keys that remain.

Keep the Sabbath Holy | Exodus 20:8 Explained

A second vital key is that:

2. We should keep the Sabbath holy.

Far more than a mere day of rest, the Sabbath is a day that is holy and set apart by God. In fact, we see this mentioned in the Fourth Commandment even before we’re told to rest. Look with me again at the commandment listed in Exodus 20.

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy (Exodus 20:8).

There it is, right at the beginning.

We saw this in Genesis 2, as well. Let’s read that again and note what God does.

Thus the heavens and the earth, and all the host of them, were finished. And 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 God had created and made (Genesis 2:1-3).

Now notice, God didn’t just rest on the seventh day. He blessed it and sanctified it—made it holy. Those who want to say that the sacredness of the Sabbath began at Mount Sinai or that it is only for Jewish people have no leg to stand on. The Sabbath was made holy from creation.

As a day sanctified and set apart from the other days as holy time, the seventh-day Sabbath is not a day we spend like we spend other days. After all, you might rest or recharge on a Sunday, Tuesday, or Thursday all sorts of ways—go to the movies, watch some sports, play a little golf, go to a concert, or read a few chapters in your favorite book.

It’s One of God’s Holy Days in the Bible

But the Sabbath isn’t just a day off or some restful vacation time. It is holy, sacred time, set apart by God for special purposes.

God highlights this in the book of Isaiah. In Isaiah 56 God makes plain that He is speaking to people of any origin or nationality, not just Jewish people, and He says in verse 2:

Blessed is the man who does this, and the son of man who lays hold on it; who keeps from defiling the Sabbath, and keeps his hand from doing any evil (Isaiah 56:2).

Now note, that is a blessing for not defiling something God has declared holy—His Sabbath. God elaborates two chapters later, in Isaiah 58, beginning in verse 13.

If you turn away your foot from the Sabbath, from doing your pleasure on My holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy day of the LORD honorable, and shall honor Him, not doing your own ways, nor finding your own pleasure, nor speaking your own words, then you shall delight yourself in the LORD; and I will cause you to ride on the high hills of the earth… (Isaiah 58:13-14).

So what do these words really mean? Certainly, the Sabbath is a day we should seek to spend more time than we normally do in prayer and in reading and studying from God’s word. But it really is more than that.

Roderick Meredith—an evangelist of Jesus Christ for more than 60 years and one who LIVED God’s way of life for even longer—explains what God means by these passages in Isaiah:

So we are not to be doing our own pleasure on God’s Holy Day. That means we are not to be pursuing our hobbies or leisure activities. That does not preclude doing any enjoyable things on the Sabbath whatsoever, for we are to find delight in it. The point is that whatever we do, God must be an intrinsic part of it. A family walk through a natural setting, for example, is a wonderful way to get in touch with the great God who made the beautiful creation we see.

When the seventh day arrives, we must stop pursuing our “own ways” (the things we normally do), seeking our “own pleasure” (just trying to have fun), and speaking our “own words” (the everyday things we talk about that do not involve God). This last one is often very hard to follow because “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” (Matthew 12:34). To truly keep the Sabbath in spirit, we must focus our minds on God and those things He wants us to be concerned with during His holy time. Then, as God promises, we will be truly blessed (Which Day Is the Christian Sabbath?, Roderick C. Meredith, p. 38).

Learning to honor God’s command by resting from our usual, day-to-day lives—and treating the seventh-day Sabbath as the holy time it is—truly is life-changing.

The Sabbath Day Is a Holy Convocation

Yet there is a vital third key to keeping that Sabbath.

• We should cease from our work on the Sabbath.
• We should keep the Sabbath holy.

Many sincere people stop there, but doing so prevents you from experiencing the full blessings of the seventh-day Sabbath as God designed it. For that, we need the third vital key, as well.

3. We should meet in holy convocation on the Sabbath.

We see this explained in Leviticus 23, beginning in verses 1 and 2.

And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: ‘The feasts of the LORD, which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations, these are My feasts’” (Leviticus 23:1-2).

Notice here that He doesn’t call these days “the Feast of the Jews” or even the “Feasts of Israel.” God says that these are HIS Feasts, “the Feasts of the LORD”! And He says further that they are “holy convocations.” Let’s continue.

Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation. You shall do no work on it; it is the Sabbath of the LORD in all your dwellings (Leviticus 23:3).

Holy Convocation Meaning

Now as we’ve seen, God speaks to the holiness of the Sabbath and the need to treat it as a sacred rest. But again He highlights that it is a “holy convocation.”

What does this mean?

Well, we’ve already covered what it means to be “holy”—something set apart by God for His own use. And a “convocation” is a calling together of people out of the world to a meeting. In this case, a HOLY meeting of HOLY people, commanded by their HOLY God!

God’s People Gather Together on the Sabbath to Worship

The seventh-day Sabbath is THE day of the week God Himself set aside for His worshippers to gather together—to praise Him together, worship Him together, and learn together from His ordained teachers out of His inspired word. And when we meet and fellowship with each other—not on a day set aside by human tradition or doctrines, but on the day the Lord Himself set apart as holy, we do more than fellowship with each other—we fellowship with God the Father and Jesus Christ, as well.

It’s no wonder that the Apostle Paul wrote what he did in Hebrews 10:24-25.

And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.

Today’s free offer explains how the seventh-day Sabbath pictures the beautiful rest Christ is bringing to the whole world. And as we see that approaching, we should long ALL THE MORE to meet in holy convocation on the day picturing that time of peace and wonder.

For anyone seeking to truly observe the biblical Sabbath, just as Jesus Christ and His faithful followers have done for almost two millennia, these three keys are the essential ingredients:

• Cease from your own work.
• Keep the day holy.
• And gather together in holy convocation with the people of God.

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