Now, I've titled the lesson this
morning, The Sabbath Was Made for Man. Our lesson begins in
Mark chapter two, verse 23. And it came to pass as he went
through the cornfields on the Sabbath day, that his disciples
began as they went to pluck the ears of corn. And the Pharisee
said unto him, behold, why do they on the Sabbath day that
which is not lawful? Now, I'll tell you from the get-go,
the subject of this passage that we're going to look at this morning
is spiritual rest, not physical rest. It's spiritual rest in
Christ. It's resting in Him because we
trust Him. Now, there can't be any rest for our souls. and trying
to keep the law because we can't do it. There can't be any rest
for our souls in observing all the religious traditions of men. There's a lot of them, aren't
there? A lot of religious traditions, but they don't give rest for
our souls. Spiritual rest for our souls can only be found in
our Lord Jesus Christ, and that's the message and subject of this
passage. But there's several very good
lessons for us to learn here, and I hope you listen to them
carefully. Number one is this. The self-righteous always want
to point out the faults in others. And boy, they're quick to do
it. It's easy for them to see the faults in others. As I go
through this point, I want you to bear this in mind. I'm not just pounding on the
self-righteous. I'm pointing this out, hoping
you and I can avoid it, okay? Now the Pharisees came and said,
why are your disciples doing that which is not lawful? It's
not right for them to work on a Sabbath day, pick ears of corn
on a Sabbath day. For these Pharisees, it wasn't
good enough that they just do what they're supposed to do,
what they think the scriptures tell them to do. They had to
impose rules and regulations on other people. And then they
had to set themselves up as the judge to see whether people are
doing right or wrong. And they didn't want to judge
others so that they could tell them, pull them aside privately
and say, look, this is wrong. And here's what this means. Here's how you look to Christ.
They weren't trying to help other people come to believe on God.
They wanted to set themselves up as a judge so they could feel
superior to everybody else and say, look what you're doing wrong.
That's what they wanted. And that's what the self-righteous
always want. And they loved the law and the ceremonies so much
that what God gave them, as far as the law and the ceremonies,
wasn't good enough. They had to add to it. They had some of
their own laws. They had some of their own ceremonies.
A few weeks ago, we looked at how they added fasting. They
added different washings. We'll see that coming up here
in a few weeks. They added the tithing. You know, tithing 10%
wasn't good enough. They had to add to it. They added
more outward show of religion through different ceremonies,
more than what God required, and they did that, even though
in Isaiah chapter one, God said he hates it. They did it anyway
because they love the law and the ceremonies. Look over a few
pages at Mark chapter seven. When we get here to Mark chapter
seven, the Lord will deal with this in more detail, but I want
you to see what he says about this. Mark chapter seven. Verse 5. Then the Pharisees and
scribes asked him, Why walk not thy disciples according to the
tradition of the elders? See, this is the problem. It
wasn't the law of God, was it? It was the tradition of the elders,
but eat bread with unwashing hands. He answered and said unto
them, Well hath Isaiah the prophesied of you hypocrites? As it is written,
This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is
far from me. This is all an outward show.
How be it in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the
commandments of men? For laying aside the commandment
of God, you hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots
and cups and many other such like things ye do. And he said
unto them, full well ye reject the commandment of God, that
ye may keep your own tradition. Now you see there how it is.
These men took the commandments and traditions of men and made
them more important than the word of God. That's how much
they hung on to these traditions. And I'm telling you, we have
to be careful today, because don't think this stopped with
the Pharisees. The same thing goes on today in our circles.
People make their religious traditions as important or more important
than the word of God. They make their ceremony, the
things that they like to do, they make those things as important
as the word of God. And when someone tells you, now
you've got to do this, or you've got to do that, or you've got
to do something, you've got to do this, or you don't have faith. If you don't do this, that proves
you don't have faith. You've got to do this, or you're
not worshiping God right. They're adding something you
do to Christ, aren't they? You see that? And when someone tells
you that, you run away from them as fast as you can and get as
far away from them as you can. They're the people, these are
the exact people the Apostle Paul warned Timothy about in
Saint Timothy chapter three. Paul said they have a form of
godliness and their form is what they do. It's their outward traditions,
it's their outward ceremonies. They have a form of godliness,
but they deny the power. Thereof, Paul said, Timothy,
from such you turn away. Get away from them. And man by
nature gets so caught up in the form and the ceremony of religion
that we miss the whole purpose of religion. We miss the life
and the blessing that's found in Christ because we're so caught
up looking at our traditions and looking at our ceremonies. And this is a good warning for
you and me, for those people who at least should be well-taught
in the scriptures. You know, people can become so
rigid and so doctrinally straight that they become mean to people
instead of being helpful to them. I cannot express to you how much
I want us to avoid that here. I just can't even tell you how
much I want us to avoid that here. Now look back at Deuteronomy
chapter 23. Here's something, there's a couple
things in this lesson I've never seen before. Look here at Deuteronomy
chapter 23. To make matters worse, These self-righteous people,
they take their pet issue, their pet ceremony, their pet doctrine,
and they try to wrap it up in scripture, and they try to make
their ceremony, their tradition, the thing that's so important
to them, they try to make it a matter of faith, and when they
do, they put burden on others. You know when somebody does that?
100% of the time, they're wrong. 100% of the time, they're wrong. The Pharisees were wrong in this
case too. Look at Deuteronomy 23 verse
25. When thou comest into the standing
corn of thy neighbor, then thou mayest pluck the ears of corn,
or the ears with thine hand, but thou should not move a sickle
into thy neighbor's standing corn. Now God said that it was
okay for people to pluck ears of corn like his disciples were
doing on this day. then nothing the Pharisees could
add with their traditions of men could ever make it wrong.
The law specifically said it was all right for them to do
that. How about them adults? Well, the Pharisees and the self-righteous
today, they're still dead wrong on what the law says when they
try to add the law to the gospel of God. Here's the second thing. I had never thought of this,
never seen this before, but I love it. The Lord does not answer
their legal question with the law. They want to argue about
a point of the law and they're wrong. The Lord knows they're
wrong, but he doesn't answer their legal question with the
law. He answers them with mercy. Look at verse 25 back in our
text. And he said unto them, have you never read what David
did when he had need and was in hunger, he and they that were
with him? How he went into the house of God in the days of Abiathar,
the high priest, and did eat the showbread, which is not lawful
to eat but for the priest, and gave also to them that were with
him Now these Pharisees were so furious that the Lord's disciples
had picked ears of corn and ate them on Sabbath day. They said,
they've broken the law. They've broken the tradition
of the elders. You can't be a religious leader
while you all are heretics. And the Lord didn't answer them.
You big dummies. Haven't you ever read the law?
I mean, you guys are supposed to be the experts on the law.
Don't you know what the law says? The Lord didn't say, Wrong answer. He didn't argue law with these
lawmongers. Instead, he preached mercy to
them. Acts of necessity, acts of mercy, and acts of worship
are always permitted work on the Sabbath day. Always. I mean, on the Sabbath day, the
high priests were doing all kinds of work, weren't they? Those
things are permitted. And the Lord said, haven't you
read about David in God's word? Don't you know what happened
with that event, what it's teaching us? And the example the Lord
used was the showbread in the tabernacle. Now the only people
who were allowed to eat that showbread in the tabernacle were
the priests. That was the law. It was against
the law for anybody else to eat that showbread. But David and
his men, when they were starving to death, they were out there
in the wilderness, they didn't have anything to eat. They could come and eat
that showbread and not be guilty of breaking the law because that
was an act of necessity. And Abiathar could give them
the showbread to eat and not be guilty of breaking the law
because it was an act of mercy to hungry men. And acts of mercy
are always okay. An act of mercy is never against
God's law. So the Lord said, it's just fine
for my disciples to pick corn and eat it because they're so
hungry. And it's an act of mercy. I mean, here these hungry men
are walking through a cornfield and the law of God says it's
okay to pick your corn and eat it. Now can you imagine the Lord
telling them, now don't do that, we can't eat this corn. I mean,
I know you're hungry and you're walking through this corn, I
mean, you're brushing up against it, it's all right here, but
now you can't eat it because we've got to observe the traditions
of men. That would be unmerciful. That
would be cruel of the master, wouldn't it? It's merciful to
let them eat. It's an act of mercy. Now the
subject of all of the scriptures, including the law of God, is
grace and mercy in Christ. That's the subject of every passage
of scripture, grace and mercy in Christ. And if our preaching
and our study of the scriptures doesn't make us merciful and
gracious people, I'm afraid that's because we've missed the meaning
of the scriptures. I'm afraid we've missed Christ
and mercy and grace in him if our study of the scripture does
not make us merciful and gracious people. People who have received
mercy from God ought to be merciful people, shouldn't they? If I've
seen Christ by faith, How can I be legalistic? If I've seen
Christ by faith, I should not be looking for righteousness
in my own actions. I'm looking to Christ for it,
right? And the sad thing is, the self-righteous
are more concerned about the insignificant than they are about
the souls of people. Let me show you that back in
Matthew chapter 12. The self-righteous are more concerned
with the insignificant than they are the souls of men and women. They're more concerned about
an animal, particularly their animal, than they are about other
people. Matthew 12, verse 10. And behold, there was a man which
had his hand withered, and they asked him, saying, is it lawful
to heal on the Sabbath days? Now, they asked him this that
they might accuse him. They didn't want the Lord to heal. I think
they figured out by this point the Lord had the power to heal
this man. They didn't care about this man's suffering. They did
not want the Lord to heal. See, they're more concerned about
the insignificant than this poor man. And he said unto them, what
man shall there be among you that shall have one sheep, and
if it fall into a pit on the Sabbath day, will he not lay
hold on it and lift it out? How much then is a man better
than a sheep? Wherefore, it is lawful to do
well on the Sabbath days. Then saith he to the man, stretch
forth thine hand, and he stretched it forth, and it was restored
whole like as the other. Now the Lord says if you met,
you had an animal, fell into the pit on the Sabbath day, of
course you'd reach down and lift it out. I mean, that's work,
but of course you're not gonna let that animal suffer down that
hole. And for these Pharisees, the bigger issue is this, you're
not gonna suffer the loss of that animal. You're not gonna
suffer the monetary loss of that animal. You're gonna reach down
and pull it out of that pit. Of course you are. It's your
animal, it's your responsibility to take care of it. It's your
responsibility to see that animal does not suffer. Now, the law
permits you to do an act of mercy for that animal like that because
it's just kind. It's just merciful. Now, if that's
so, why on earth are we not more interested in showing mercy to
people than we are an animal, than the insignificant? You know,
God is merciful. That's the character of God.
He is merciful. So his law is always going to
allow acts of mercy. You never violate God's law by
being merciful. Acts of mercy are always permitted
because that's the point of the whole law. God gave the law so
we'd see, I need mercy from God. The law was not given so we could
do something to make God happy with us. The law is written to
show us we need mercy because we can't keep God's law. And
when the self-righteous heard that message, and they saw the
Lord act in mercy on that man, I want you to look what they
did, verse 14. Then the Pharisees went out and held a council against
him, how they might destroy him. They so hated seeing God show
mercy on that man with the withered hand, they wanted to kill the
Lord. We're a mess, aren't we? We're
a mess. All right, here's the third thing.
Now look back in our text. The law of the Sabbath was given
for the good of man. In verse 27, he said unto them,
the Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath.
You know, God did not give the law to make man miserable. He didn't say don't do this and
don't do this and don't do this and do this and do this and do
this to make you miserable. God gave the law for the good
of man. And I won't go into the whole law of God, but let me
just give you a couple of examples from the Ten Commandments. Now
let me ask you, aren't you better off worshiping God instead of
idols? Aren't you better off worshiping the true and living
idols instead of worshiping a God, an idol, that can't save you,
that can't do anything for you? He's dead. Of course you are.
Of course you are. Aren't you better off honoring
your parents? Aren't you better off not killing
folks, not committing adultery? Aren't you better off not stealing
and lying and coveting your neighbor's good? I mean, isn't it just miserable
to be coveting what don't belong to you? Isn't it miserable trying
to come up with a plan to steal what doesn't belong to you and
then living with the guilt of stealing something that doesn't
belong to you, always afraid you're going to get caught? Of course it is. Of course. I mean, God's law is given for
our good. Well, the same thing is true
of the Sabbath. You're better off if you've got a day off work
to rest, aren't you? I was watching a show the other
day, but these, I don't forget what business titan it was, made
people work 14, 15, 16 hours a day, seven days a week. That's not good. That's not good. So in that way, the Sabbath that
forced man to rest, it was good for man, isn't it? Because our
bodies need rest. But here's the thing about the
Sabbath day. The law of the Sabbath was probably the most difficult
law to obey outwardly. It's just hard not to do something
that you see needs to be done, isn't it? It's just hard to do.
And I tell you what else is impossible for this flesh, to spend a whole
24 hour period only worshiping God. That's hard, isn't it? That's hard to obey. It's impossible
for this flesh. So here's the most important
way the Sabbath is given for the good of man. The law of the
Sabbath was given to show us our inability to obey the law
of the Sabbath. We can't rest. We can't do it. And we especially can't spiritually
rest in Christ. The law of the Sabbath was given
to show us how much we need Christ, our Sabbath, to come for us.
And that same thing is true with all of the law of God. All the
law of God is given for man. It's given to show us I can't
obey God's law. I can't keep it. I can't do it.
So I need Christ to come and obey it for me as my representative.
Now, whatever it is that shows me my need of Christ, that's
a good thing for me. That's why the law was given
to show us our need of Christ. So the law of the Sabbath is
given for the good of man. And now here's the fourth thing.
The whole point of the law of the Sabbath is rest in Christ. It's spiritual rest in Christ.
In verse 28, the Lord says, therefore the son of man is Lord also of
the Sabbath. Christ is the Lord of the Sabbath. He's over it all. Now I tell
you, don't try to find rest in how well that you keep the law.
Because you'll never find rest there. All the law can do is,
suppose you could keep the law for just a few seconds. I mean,
you can, but suppose you could. But at the end of those few seconds,
you know what the law is gonna demand? More obedience. It's
always gonna demand more. You can't find rest in the law.
You can't find rest in the ceremonies and the traditions of men because
they're just outward ceremonies. They don't reach the heart. The
law can't do anything but condemn us. the traditions of men, the
religious ceremonies of men, all they can do is leave us empty.
Now the Sabbath, how is it that the Sabbath started? Well, the
Sabbath is Saturday, the seventh day of the week. The Sabbath
fell on the seventh day of the week because for the first six
days, God worked in creation. And the seventh day, Saturday,
God rested. God didn't rest because he's
like you and me. If you and me work six days, we're tired, we need
rest. God didn't need rest. God rested
because his work of creation was finished. And it was perfect. It was all done. When it was
all done, God looked at it and said, it's very good. It's very
good. So God rested because everything
was very good. That was the very first Sabbath.
Well, that day and all the rest of the Sabbath days that followed
were all pictures of Christ, our spiritual Sabbath rest. You
know, the law gives us so many commandments. The law takes up
pages and pages and pages of scripture. And you and I can't
keep one of those commandments. So Christ came into flesh. The
Son of God was made flesh. He came to this earth, and as
a man, as the representative of his people, he obeyed every
commandment of the law. You know, Adam was our first
representative, and he just had one commandment. Christ had thousands
and thousands and thousands of commandments to keep. Adam just
had one, and he couldn't keep one, could he? That's how we
got in this mess we're in. Christ came and obeyed the whole
law of God. Perfectly. Perfectly. He did
every thou shalt of the law, and he didn't do one thou shalt
not of the law. He obeyed it perfectly. And during
his earthly ministry, now don't you know this, the Lord Jesus
worked hard. I mean, he worked hard in this
earthly ministry to do the work the Father gave him to do. I
suppose the earliest recorded statement that we have of the
Lord Jesus is don't you know, I must be about my father's business. I mean, this was serious work
to him. And when all that work was done, when righteousness
was established by the obedience of Christ, when he had obeyed
God's law perfectly, and when his sacrifice had completely
put away the sin of his people, what did the Savior say? It is
finished. And the father looked, and you
know what he saw? It was very good. His righteousness
is very good. His sacrifice is very good. His sacrifice made his people
very good. His sacrifice made them the righteousness
of God in him. The father said, it's very good. And since all the work was done,
And it was all very good. You know what the Savior did?
He rested. He rested. He rested from all
of his work because the work's done. And since his work is perfect,
all of his people now have rest in Christ. Spiritual rest in
Christ. That's the whole point of the
Law of the Sabbath. It's spiritual rest in Christ.
Now, after the sacrifice of Christ, we're still Sabbath keepers.
We sure are. Spiritual Sabbath keepers. We
obey the law of the Sabbath by believing Christ, by trusting
Christ. You know, if you try to, here's
how you violate the law of the Sabbath. Try and add something
you do to Christ. That violates the law of the
Sabbath, doesn't it? The law of the Sabbath says,
rest in Christ. I believe Christ. By faith, I'm
gonna quit trying to please God by my works and just rest in
Christ because I trust him to be perfect. I trust him as my
righteousness. I trust him as my righteousness. We rest because there's no more
work left to do to satisfy God because Christ did it all. Look
at Hebrews chapter four. I'll show you this. Hebrews chapter
four. Hebrews four verse nine. There remaineth therefore a rest.
And he's talking about here a spiritual rest to the people of God. For
he that hath entered into his rest, into Christ's rest, he
also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his."
Let us labor, therefore, to enter into that rest, lest any man
fall after the same example of unbelief. See, it's unbelief
that makes us not rest in Christ. It's unbelief that makes me think
I've got to do some work to make myself righteous. I've got to
do these form and ceremony of religion in order to make myself
accepted with God. The whole matter here is faith
in Christ. Faith in Christ is a spiritual
rest. And if a person believes Christ, this is what we believe.
Christ finished all the work. He finished it all. There's no
more works of the law left to do. I don't have to worry about
the law. I don't have to go look to the law to see what I'm supposed
to do because Christ already kept it for us. So I just rest
in Him. Just rest in Christ. I can quit
trying to please God by what I do or don't do. I just rest
in Christ because He's already pleased the Father. The father
said, so from heaven, this is my beloved son in whom I'm well
pleased. And that lets me rest, just rest
in Christ. Trusting Christ and believing
him, that's entering into his rest, his rest. Christ's rest
is the rest that he earned for his people when he obeyed the
law for them. Christ's rest is the rest he
earned for his people when he suffered and died for their sins.
Now they don't have to fear. They can just rest from that
fear. They don't have to fear. Christ was already condemned for them.
And the same justice that demanded Christ's death also demands your
life if you trust him. That just lets you rest, doesn't
it? That's how Christ is the Lord of the Sabbath. Now the
writer for the Hebrews says something, it kind of sounds like a contradiction.
Let us labor, therefore, to enter into that rest. You mean labor
work to rest? That sounds like a contradiction
in terms, doesn't it? But you understand exactly what he means
if you trust Christ. The believer has to constantly
work. to quit trusting in anything
that I do and trust Christ alone. You know why you have to constantly
work at that? Because the flesh is constantly working, trying
to get you to trust in your works. Your flesh is constantly working,
trying to get you to think, ooh, you're going to be more righteous.
You're going to be more holy. You're going to be more accepted
if you go through these traditions, you know, and you're a very straight
doctrinal person. The believer has to constantly
work. The new man has to constantly work to put down that old man,
to not listen to that old man. The new man has to constantly
work because the old man's constantly working. That's what the flesh
wants. We have to constantly work to
quit trusting the works of the flesh and just rest in Christ
alone. Now that's the lesson that the
Lord is teaching us here. I hope it causes us to rest and
I want you to have to enjoy The peace, the rest that there
is in resting in Christ. That's what the Lord's teaching
here. I hope that'll be a blessing to you.