The Sabbath as Rest and Hope for the People of God E-Book

Guy Prentiss Waters

• Herausgeber: Crossway
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Serie: Short Studies in Biblical Theology
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

A Short Study of the Sabbath from Creation to Consummation When it comes to the Sabbath, Christians have different ideas on what it means and how to observe it. For many people, it is a day to go to church and have fellowship with other believers. What they often miss, though, is that the Sabbath is intricately tied to rest and worship—both of which ultimately point to the Lord as our creator and redeemer. In this addition to the Short Studies in Biblical Theology series, Guy Prentiss Waters offers an introductory study of the Sabbath from the creation of the world to the consummation of all things when Jesus returns. He shows how the Sabbath is observed through the major themes and genres of the Bible—creation, law, prophets, Jesus, and the apostles—and how that applies to our lives today. Waters teaches us about the Sabbath's full restoration in the new heavens and the new earth and its continual reminder of the covenant that God has made with his people.  - Written for New Believers and Seasoned Saints Alike: Perfect for laypersons, pastors, college and seminary students, and academics  - Practical: Examines how the Sabbath is relevant to the church now as well as how it will be restored in the new heavens and the new earth  - Short Studies in Biblical Theology: Part of a series designed to give readers accessible volumes on God's word

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“‘Call the Sabbath a delight,’ bids the Lord (Isa. 58:13), and, in this book, Guy Waters helps us to do just that. Tracing the theological framework and biblical commands for keeping the Sabbath day holy, Waters leads God’s people to recognize this often-misunderstood day as essential for our growth in grace. Thanks to Waters’s accessible writing and thorough exegesis, this book leaves readers with a clear sense of what the Lord commands and a fresh conviction that ‘his commandments are not burdensome’ (1 John 5:3). In a day when Christians talk frequently about the practice of ‘Sabbath,’ Waters invites us to see that the biblical Sabbath is much more than a day to enjoy bodily rest—it’s a day to enjoy God himself.”

Megan Hill, author, Praying Together and A Place to Belong; Managing Editor, The Gospel Coalition

“How and whether we are to observe the Sabbath commandment today has proven to be a tricky question. Waters helps us navigate this complexity with nuanced simplicity. He explains the role of Sabbath in creation and redemption, covering key texts from the Old and New Testaments. He covers tricky issues, like the way Jesus related to the Sabbath and why the Sabbath is now celebrated on Sunday. Waters also shows the ongoing relevance of the Sabbath and provides practical suggestions for observing the Sabbath today. This short book is long on helpful insights: it will show you why the Sabbath is good news, how it relates to Jesus himself, and why it is important that we continue to observe it today.”

Brandon D. Crowe, Professor of New Testament, Westminster Theological Seminary

“What a timely and necessary book, calling us out of our fast-paced and productivity-driven lives to rightly regard and observe the Sabbath. Waters expertly moves us from Genesis to Revelation, tracing the Sabbath through creation, redemption, and consummation. Far from an outdated practice, the Sabbath day is a necessary reset that gives us perspective and promotes fruitfulness during our six days of labor. Waters reminds us that the Sabbath rest is an important means of imitating God and a weekly invitation to enjoy him. I found myself longing for the Sabbath, ready to joyfully submit to this command given at the beginning of time.”

Colleen D. Searcy, Bible teacher; speaker; creator, Meet Me in the Bible resources

The Sabbath as Rest and Hope for the People of God

Short Studies in Biblical Theology

Edited by Dane C. Ortlund and Miles V. Van Pelt

The City of God and the Goal of Creation, T. Desmond Alexander (2018)

Covenant and God’s Purpose for the World, Thomas R. Schreiner (2017)

Divine Blessing and the Fullness of Life in the Presence of God, William R. Osborne (2020)

From Chaos to Cosmos: Creation to New Creation, Sidney Greidanus (2018)

The Kingdom of God and the Glory of the Cross, Patrick Schreiner (2018)

The Lord’s Supper as the Sign and Meal of the New Covenant, Guy Prentiss Waters (2019)

Marriage and the Mystery of the Gospel, Ray Ortlund (2016)

The New Creation and the Storyline of Scripture, Frank Thielman (2021)

Redemptive Reversals and the Ironic Overturning of Human Wisdom, G. K. Beale (2019)

The Royal Priesthood and the Glory of God, David S. Schrock (2022)

Resurrection Hope and the Death of Death, Mitchell L. Chase (2022)

The Sabbath as Rest and Hope for the People of God, Guy Prentiss Waters (2022)

The Serpent and the Serpent Slayer, Andrew David Naselli (2020)

The Son of God and the New Creation, Graeme Goldsworthy (2015)

Work and Our Labor in the Lord, James M. Hamilton Jr. (2017)

The Sabbath as Rest and Hope for the People of God

Guy Prentiss Waters

The Sabbath as Rest and Hope for the People of God

Copyright © 2022 by Guy Prentiss Waters

Published by Crossway 1300 Crescent Street Wheaton, Illinois 60187

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher, except as provided for by USA copyright law. Crossway® is a registered trademark in the United States of America.

Cover illustration and design: Jordan Singer

First printing 2022

Printed in the United States of America

Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. The ESV text may not be quoted in any publication made available to the public by a Creative Commons license. The ESV may not be translated into any other language.

All emphases in Scripture quotations have been added by the author.

Paperback ISBN: 978-1-4335-7354-5 ePub ISBN: 978-1-4335-7357-6 PDF ISBN: 978-1-4335-7355-2 Mobipocket ISBN: 978-1-4335-7356-9

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Waters, Guy Prentiss, 1975- author.

Title: The Sabbath as rest and hope for the people of God / Guy Prentiss Waters.

Description: Wheaton, Illinois : Crossway, 2022. | Series: Short studies in biblical theology | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2022001337 (print) | LCCN 2022001338 (ebook) | ISBN 9781433573545 (paperback) | ISBN 9781433573576 (epub) | ISBN 9781433573569 (mobipocket) | ISBN 9781433573552 (pdf)

Subjects: LCSH: Sabbath. | Sunday. | Rest–Religious aspects–Christianity.

Classification: LCC BV111.3 .W38 2022 (print) | LCC BV111.3 (ebook) | DDC 263/.3–dc23/eng/20220224

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022001337

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022001338

Crossway is a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

Contents

Series Preface

Introduction

1  Creation

2  Law

3  Prophets

4  Christ

5  New Creation

6  Practice

General Index

Scripture Index

Series Preface

Most of us tend to approach the Bible early on in our Christian lives as a vast, cavernous, and largely impenetrable book. We read the text piecemeal, finding golden nuggets of inspiration here and there, but remain unable to plug any given text meaningfully into the overarching storyline. Yet one of the great advances in evangelical biblical scholarship over the past few generations has been the recovery of biblical theology—that is, a renewed appreciation for the Bible as a theologically unified, historically rooted, progressively unfolding, and ultimately Christ-centered narrative of God’s covenantal work in our world to redeem sinful humanity.

This renaissance of biblical theology is a blessing, yet little of it has been made available to the general Christian population. The purpose of Short Studies in Biblical Theology is to connect the resurgence of biblical theology at the academic level with everyday believers. Each volume is written by a capable scholar or churchman who is consciously writing in a way that requires no prerequisite theological training of the reader. Instead, any thoughtful Christian disciple can track with and benefit from these books.

Each volume in this series takes a whole-Bible theme and traces it through Scripture. In this way readers not only learn about a given theme but also are given a model for how to read the Bible as a coherent whole.

We have launched this series because we love the Bible, we love the church, and we long for the renewal of biblical theology in the academy to enliven the hearts and minds of Christ’s disciples all around the world. As editors, we have found few discoveries more thrilling in life than that of seeing the whole Bible as a unified story of God’s gracious acts of redemption, and indeed of seeing the whole Bible as ultimately about Jesus, as he himself testified (Luke 24:27; John 5:39).

The ultimate goal of Short Studies in Biblical Theology is to magnify the Savior and to build up his church—magnifying the Savior through showing how the whole Bible points to him and his gracious rescue of helpless sinners; and building up the church by strengthening believers in their grasp of these life-giving truths.

Dane C. Ortlund and Miles V. Van Pelt

Introduction

Over the last several decades, the Sabbath has undergone rapid decline in American life. A Sabbathless world promises heightened productivity and greater economic gain. It flatters the illusion that we have autonomous control over our schedules and our lives. But it leaves its frenetic inhabitants weary and empty. We deprive ourselves of the very thing that we most need—rest.

This book is not a plea to state and federal legislators to put blue laws back on the books. It is, rather, an exploration of what the Bible says to all human beings about the Sabbath. Many associate the Sabbath with Judaism or with certain movements in Protestant Christianity (e.g., Puritanism), but the Scripture teaches that the Sabbath concerns every human being. God has given us one day every week to remind us of some of the most important truths about himself, the world, and ourselves—he created us to worship him and to enjoy fellowship with him; he has redeemed sinners at the cost of his own Son, Jesus Christ; he has prepared a heavenly rest for each and every one of his people. In our 24/7 world, it is easy to lose sight of these basic truths. The Sabbath offers all people a weekly reset. In taking up God’s call to meet with him in Jesus Christ on his appointed day, we find renewed clarity of vision. We see God, the world, and ourselves for what they really are. More than that, we find rest and refreshment of soul and body. That renewal equips us to serve God faithfully for the rest of the week, and it points us toward our heavenly home that lies at the end of our earthly pilgrimage.

In this book, we are undertaking a biblical theology of the Sabbath.1 The Sabbath appears in Genesis, in Revelation, and at many points in between. It is woven into the warp and woof of Scripture. Thus, we will look at the Bible’s testimony to the Sabbath from cover to cover. In chapter 1, we will explore what God says about the Sabbath at the creation of the world. God built the Sabbath into the creation such that human beings have never been without the Sabbath. This weekly rest points to the glorious goal of human existence—that we would glorify God in drawing near to him in worship and adoration. We will also see that God instituted a covenant in the garden of Eden so that Adam (representing all human beings who would trace their ordinary descent from him) might bring himself and us into the everlasting rest to which that weekly rest pointed. Adam would have achieved that goal had he continued to be obedient to God. Sadly, he sinned and fell (and we sinned and fell in him). In mercy, God appointed a Savior, the last Adam, to do what Adam failed to do (by obeying God perfectly) and to undo what Adam did (by bearing on the cross the penalty for his people’s sins). In this way, God brings sinners from every tribe, tongue, people, and race into that promised heavenly rest.

God set to work saving sinners right away, and thus he began to prepare the world for the arrival of Jesus Christ. In chapters 2 and 3, we will explore how the Law and the Prophets spoke of the Sabbath in such a way as to point the faith of God’s people forward to their coming Savior. While retaining its significance as a creation ordinance, the Sabbath comes to take on additional meaning as a redemptive commemoration of the exodus. Every week, Israel would remember that God had redeemed them from bondage in Egypt—a glimpse of the coming redemption that Christ would accomplish at the cross. The Prophets, in particular, remind us that God intends the Sabbath to be a day of joy and delight for all kinds of people as the redeemed gather in the presence of their Creator and Deliverer.

In the New Testament, Jesus Christ’s teachings and miracles also had a lot to say about the Sabbath. In chapter 4, we will see how his earthly ministry served to clarify the Sabbath’s true meaning and purpose. His miracles were glimpses into the restoration and redemption that he had come to bring sinners. And his teaching about the Sabbath both stripped away the burdens that human teachers had laid upon it as well as highlighted the genuine joy and freedom that sinners receive and experience through faith in him.

But it was the resurrection of Christ from the dead that transformed the Sabbath. In chapter 5, we will see how the Gospels, Acts, the Letters, and Revelation all point to “the first day of the week” as the day on which the new covenant community, by divine commandment, gathers to worship God. As the seventh day of the week commemorated God’s work of creation, so the first day of the week commemorates God’s work of new creation, which dawned in human history at Christ’s resurrection. As such, it comes to be known as “the Lord’s day” (Rev. 1:10)—Christ’s name is stamped upon this day, a fitting tribute to the one on whom creation, redemption, and consummation converge.

Overall, a biblical theology of the Sabbath has a lot to say about how Christians and the church should observe the Sabbath today. Thus, in chapter 6, we will explore some of these practical implications. They speak to our mindset, our attitudes, our choices, and our relationships with other Christians. Honoring the Sabbath, we will see, is critical to the pursuit of a Christian life that is healthy and vibrant.

For many in the church, the Sabbath is little more than a point of contention, a list of dos and don’ts. For others, it is utterly foreign. If your impressions of the Sabbath are either negative or nonexistent, I hope that you’ll come away from this book with a sense of the good that God intends in your life and mine when we take up his call to observe the Sabbath. After all, the Sabbath is a weekly invitation from God to draw close and enter into renewed fellowship with the one who made us and who redeemed sinners at the cost of his own Son. And it is a weekly reminder that in Christ, the best is yet to come. May this book encourage you to find and to experience the rest that you and I need in the only place where it can be found—Jesus Christ.

1. For a sketch of the project of biblical theology, see my book, The Lord’s Supper as the Sign and Meal of the New Covenant, Short Studies in Biblical Theology (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019), 15–16.

1

Creation

The Bible introduces the Sabbath at its beginning. We first meet the Sabbath in the account of God making heaven and earth (Gen. 1:1–2:3). Strikingly, it is God who, in a sense, observes the first Sabbath (2:3). In this chapter, we are going to look, with the help of the New Testament, at what Genesis says about that Sabbath. We will make the case that God intends all human beings to observe a weekly Sabbath as a day of holy resting. We will then see that the Sabbath is a window into what God intended for the world at its creation. In this respect, the Sabbath is eschatological—that is to say, it points to the goal that God had for creation from the very beginning. Although the fall of humanity into sin appeared to thwart that goal, our fall in Adam actually prepared the way for its fulfillment in the last Adam, Jesus Christ. The Sabbath, then, draws together the great concerns of the Bible—creation, redemption, and the glory of God in Jesus Christ.

God Works, God Rests

In the creation account, God makes the world and everything in it in six days. A seventh day follows that is set apart from the previous six in some important ways. Genesis 2:1–3 reads,

Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation.

These verses conclude the account of God’s creating the world that started in Genesis 1:1.1 We may now look at what they tell us about God and the creation and then further reflect on their message in light of Genesis 1:1–2:3 as a whole.

First, it is clear that the work of creation is completed—verse 1 reads, “the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them” (cf. 1:2, 30). This work was done in six days, so the seventh day will be different. It is not a day of work for God, but rest—verses 2 and 3 say that he “rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done” and that “on [the seventh day] God rested from all his work that he had done in creation.” Though the word “Sabbath” does not appear here, a related word does. The Hebrew verb translated “rested” (shbt) in Genesis 2:2–3 is related to the Hebrew noun translated “Sabbath” (shabbat). There is, therefore, an implicit connection established between God’s rest and what later revelation will call the “Sabbath.”

Further, the beginning of Genesis shows us that this day is set apart from the previous six days in at least two more ways. In the first place, it is a day that “God blessed” (2:3). Earlier, God is said to have “blessed” the birds and the sea creatures and to have “blessed” Adam and Eve at their creation (1:22, 28). In each case that benediction is followed by the command to “be fruitful and multiply and fill” (1:22, 28). Thus, when God blesses the seventh day, our expectation is that this day will be marked by fruitfulness and fullness appropriate to that day.

In the second place, God “made [the seventh day] holy” (2:3). This is the first time in Genesis that God is said to make something “holy,” and it means that this seventh day was deemed different from the other six days. What distinguishes the “holy” seventh day is that it is set apart for purposes of worship.2

The resting in view on this seventh day is therefore a holy resting. To be sure, it is a day marked by the cessation of God’s work in creating the world and everything in it. But that cessation is only the penultimate characteristic of the day. The ultimate characteristic of the day is worship, a worship that is tied to fruitfulness and fullness.

The Sabbath: God’s Ordinance for Human Beings

This observation raises the question, “What kind of worship is in view, and by whom?” The answer of Genesis is, “Humanity’s worship of the God who made them.” Human beings are unique within Genesis 1:1–2:3 as those said to be made after the “image” and “likeness” of God (1:26), after God’s “own image, in the image of God” (1:27). As such, people are uniquely capable among all the creatures mentioned in Genesis 1:1–2:3 of fellowship and communion with God.3 Thus, the worship for which God provides in Genesis 2:1–3 is given so that his image bearers may have fellowship with him. Strikingly, then, “humanity . . . is not the culmination of creation, but rather humanity in Sabbath day communion with God.”4

Genesis 1:1–2:3, in fact, presents a twofold imitation of God on the part of his image bearers. First, God creates human beings to work (1:28–30). In part, people express the image of God as they labor in their various callings. The God who exercises dominion over the works of his hands calls humanity to “have dominion” over the earth and all the animals in it (1:26). The God who fills the world that he has made calls human beings to “be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it” (1:28). Thus, humans will exercise dominion as they are faithful to marry and produce offspring (see 2:23–25). But it would be a mistake to say that Genesis 1:1–2:3 conceives no higher human imitation of God than labor. As human beings imitate God at work, so also are they to imitate God at rest. As God made the world and everything in it within the space of six days and rested on the seventh day, so are human beings to engage in six days of labor and one day of holy resting.

In sum, God intends for human beings to imitate his rest by taking the weekly Sabbath to rest from their labors and devote the whole day to his worship. The word translated “bless” (barak) in Genesis 2:3 “is normally restricted to living beings in the [Old Testament] and typically does not apply to something being blessed or sanctified only for God’s sake.”5 Thus, God does not bless the seventh day for his own sake but for humanity’s sake. He is setting apart this one day in seven to be a regular day of rest in the weekly cycle of human existence. He is, in effect, commanding human beings to observe the Sabbath. Further, we have noted above that the word translated “made . . . holy” (qadas) frequently relates to the worship of God in the Old Testament.6 This clarifies that human beings are to observe this seventh day as a day devoted to such worship. As it is dedicated to the worship of God, the Sabbath promises blessing to human beings who comply with this divine command.

Exodus 20:8–11 confirms our findings from Genesis 2:1–3. Here, God draws an explicit parallel between his creating the world in six days but resting the seventh and human beings working six days but resting the seventh. Exodus reads:

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. . . . For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

Thus the basis for the weekly Sabbath, according to Exodus, is God’s resting on the seventh day of Genesis 2:1–3.7 This relationship between God’s resting and the weekly Sabbath is precisely what we have observed in Genesis itself, where this relationship implicitly grounds the Sabbath command as a perpetual ordinance for human beings.

In addition to this confirmation from Exodus, the New Testament provides indirect testimony to the Sabbath as an ordinance for humanity established at the creation. Early in Mark’s Gospel, we read of a series of incidents in which Jesus comes under criticism by the religious authorities (Mark 2:1–3:6). One of these incidents takes place in “grainfields” through which Jesus and his disciples are traveling on the Sabbath (2:23). The Pharisees accuse Jesus of “doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath” (2:24). But he defends his disciples’ activity as proper to the Sabbath day and then proceeds to clarify the true nature of the day. As he does so, he tells the Pharisees, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath” (2:27). Here, Jesus makes at least three points that bear on our study of Genesis 2:1–3. The first is that the Sabbath is not unique to the Jew, nor is it exclusively intended for any other subset of the human race. Rather, it is something that pertains to human beings as human beings (“man”).8 The second point that Jesus makes is that the Sabbath “was made” for man. The passive voice here points to divine agency—it is God who made the Sabbath for human beings, and thus the Sabbath is a divine ordinance. Third, God instituted the Sabbath as a help to humanity (“for man”). The Sabbath is intended to promote and to further the purposes for which God made human beings. Although Jesus does not explain those purposes or how the Sabbath advances them in this passage, his words echo what we have observed from Genesis 1:1–2:3—that the Sabbath is a means to an end, specifically, the end for which God created human beings, which is to commune with him and to find rest and refreshment in this divine communion.

Conclusions

In conclusion, by setting aside the seventh day as a time of resting from his work of creating the world, God institutes the weekly Sabbath as an ongoing ordinance for human beings. The Sabbath commandment does not oblige Israel alone; it binds all human beings by virtue of them being made in the image of God. Thus, humanity did not receive the Sabbath commandment at some point far into the course of human history—God gave the Sabbath to humanity at the beginning of history, at the creation of the world.

So how are human beings to keep the Sabbath? And what does God intend to bring about through their Sabbath keeping? Humans are to imitate God by engaging in labor for six days of the week. But they are no less designed to imitate God by resting the seventh day. This means that God wants people, for twenty-four hours, to cease the work that occupies them six days of the week. Yet, that cessation of labor—and the refreshment that comes from that cessation—is a means to a greater end.9 God wants human beings to worship him. The Sabbath is a day that God has “made . . . holy”—it is set apart to him and to his worship. And it is precisely because the day is directed toward God that it carries blessing for human beings. It is a day that God has “blessed.” In light of the testimony of Genesis 1:1–2:3, that blessing carries potential for fruitfulness and fullness. Thus, as God meets with people who truly worship him on that day, they experience all of these gifts—spiritual blessing, fruitfulness, and fullness.

It is this latter point that brings us to the heart of the Sabbath. God made human beings to worship him, to have fellowship with him, and to find blessing and happiness in that worship and fellowship. We were created to labor, to be sure, but the ultimate goal of human existence is to worship and glorify the God who made us. As we read farther into Genesis 2, with the help of the New Testament, we get additional clarity and insight into how God disclosed that goal at the dawn of history. And that additional light will, in turn, help us to understand the beginnings of the Sabbath even better.

The Sabbath: Eschatological and Covenantal

When systematic theologians use the term “eschatological,” they usually refer to the “four last things”—death, judgment, heaven, and hell. When biblical theologians use that term, they often have in mind a different but complementary definition. “Eschatology” brings into view the fact that human history has meaning and direction. Specifically, it has a God-assigned meaning and direction. History is going somewhere, namely, to the goal that God has set for it. This goal is one that he purposed in eternity and revealed at the very beginning of history—the blessed communion of image bearers with the God who made them (Gen. 1:1–2:3).

Genesis 2:4–25 helps us to understand that goal better. If Genesis 1 is the wide-angle portrait of God’s creation of the world in six days, then Genesis 2 is the zoom-lens close-up of God’s work on the sixth day. Here we learn that, after he had created Adam (2:7), God “planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed” (2:8). God’s purpose for setting Adam in the garden is that he would “work it and keep it” (