I want to begin here in Genesis
2, and I want to read the first three verses to you this morning. Genesis 2, verses 1-3. Thus the heavens and the earth
were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day
God ended his work which he had made, and he rested on the seventh
day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the
seventh day and sanctified it, because that in it he had rested
from all his work which God had created and made." Now, I want
to stress again this morning, I stress this, I hope that I
don't have to be ashamed to do it again, that how critical it
is for us to look at Genesis as a book of beginnings. as a
book that relates to us the creation of God, the original creation. That we would look to this, and
at this, and study this, and be settled in this one thing
about this book, and this creation of God. That these things are
actual. These are fact. As we look in
here and we read about God finishing His work, that that is fact. This is something that really
took place. Some have tried to tell us in
our generation that these things could very well be a myth, that
the first five books of the Bible, it doesn't matter if they're
true or not. I was sure this Jewish theologian was trying
to say that it makes no difference if Abraham was a real man or
if he was a myth, that what we were to glean from his life was
simply what his life taught us. It laid down some moral principles,
and that was the main thing. Well, if there's no Abraham,
then there's no Isaac. If there's no Isaac, there's
no Jacob. If there's no Jacob, then there's
no Judah. If there's no Judah, there's
no King David. And if there's no King David,
there's no Christ, who came out of the lineage of David. If there's
no Christ, there's no redemption. So we're yet in our sins. See
that? We must, first of all, as we
look at this scripture, Get it in our hearts that these things
are not myths. These aren't simple stories to
teach us how to live, or glean from them some moral lesson. These are actual facts. In the
beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Now, this first
verse tells us here that this is a fact. That in the beginning,
God created the heavens and the earth in their original form. Their original form. And it was
finished. It was finished. And I don't
know, brothers and sisters, what all has happened and how the
creation has changed since the beginning. Sin has entered, we know that. The judgments of God has been
upon this world, upon creation. This creation is aging. We have
lost, no doubt, many species that we had here in the beginning. I don't know how things have
changed from the beginning. But in the beginning, in its
original form, it was finished. It was completed, and we're told
two facts here concerning that, concerning creation in its original
form was finished here in verse 2. Look at this. This confirms
to us that creation was finished. He says here in verse 2, And
on the seventh day God ended His work which He had made, and
He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had
made. Now what is the Holy Spirit teaching
us here? Well, He's implying this. He's
implying this. That when God puts His hand to
work, absolutely. When He determines to work and
perform something, that He does not stop until He's completed
that work. Now, ain't that what the Holy
Spirit's teaching us here? God began to work on the first
day, and He never ceased to work until He looked at that work
and says, it's good, it's finished, it's completed. And God's that
way today. Did you know that? When he begins
to work a new creation in a man's soul, he never ceases to work
until he's finished that work which he began. That's what the
Holy Ghost teaches us by this. And He also teaches us this. He implies this, that when God
rests from His work, when God begins to work, He never ceases
until it's completed. And when he rests from that work,
he does so because it is complete. When did God rest? When he says
it's finished. He says the work is done. And
then when he rests, that means to us that the work is finished. There's not anything else that's
necessary to be done. There's not anything else that's
necessary to be added. How do we know that? Because
God's resting. He's rested. And you can bet
this, brothers and sisters, if there was anything else that
needed to be done, He would have done it. The fact that He rested
tells us that everything was completed. It was done. Verse
2 doesn't mean here that the Lord has ceased to do anything. He's still working today. We're
His workmanship, aren't we? created in Christ Jesus into
good works. He works in a slurry to will
and to do of His good pleasure. The Lord Jesus said, My Father
works here too, and I work. The Godhead is still at work
today, but what He means here, the creation in its original
form was complete. God finished that work, and therefore
He rested. And we're told here something
else in verse 3. of his attitude about this seventh
day. And that's what I want to look
at today. That's why I want to dwell on
this particular aspect of these three verses, the seventh day.
And I want you to look here at his attitude towards this seventh
day. He said here in verse 3, He said
some things concerning it. First of all, He said God blessed
the seventh day. That is, He bestowed honor upon
it. He magnified it. He looked upon
it in a sense as adoring and adorning this seventh day. He put special recognition upon
it. When God blesses something, it's
blessed. That means he recognized it,
put some significance upon it. And he said here, and this is
the first time this word is used, that he separated it. He sanctified
it. That is, he set it aside and
he exalted it above all other days. The seventh day is a day
that was exalted in the heart and the mind of God. Now why
did he do this? Well, we're told here in the
last portion of verse 3, the reason that God blessed this
day and separated it, because, he said, this is the reason he
blessed it. This is the reason he recognized
it, because that in it he had rested from all his work which
God created and made. That's why he left. That's why
he set it apart. Because he said, I finished the
work and now I'm at rest. This is a blessed day. This is
a blessed day. I'm going to set it aside. So
you and I can conclude from this passage, the seventh day represents
to us rest. Rest from and because of a completed
work. Isn't that what that represents
to us? God is saying to you and I, this seventh day is a day
that represents a completed work. Rest. Rest. But as we look further and closer
at this verse, it's not so much what it represents to us, but
what it really meant to God. Did you notice that? He blessed
it. He sat inside. He sanctified
the day. He had called it the day and
He rested. He rested. Said that twice. God
rested. This day meant something to God. That He would rest and bless
this day. Now I want to show you for just
a minute from the scriptures, the honor that God put upon this
Sabbath day. And I want you to try if you
can to stay with me. I've got this great gift that
I've had for years that I can confuse just about everybody
that listens to me very long. I have this gift and I can't
get rid of it. I'd like to bury it, but I can't. So if you can,
stay with me for just a minute. I want to show you two things
from the scripture that tells us the honor that God has put
upon this seventh day. And there's a point that I'm
going to make from this morning. First of all, the fact that He
kept this day secret in His own heart. God kept this day in His
own mind, in His own thoughts, and nobody knew anything of this
day but God Himself. Now, I challenge you sometime,
if you want to, and I've done this, and other men have done
this, you read your Bible through the book of Genesis, and you
look and see if God ever let any man know anything about this
day of rest. This was the Sabbath day, but
nobody knew anything about it. You find men beginning in the
book of Genesis chapter 4 to bring sacrifices to the Lord
and walk with God. Abraham built an altar to God. All through the book of Genesis,
men worshiped the Lord. And they sacrifice to the Lord,
but you don't find one place that tells us on what day they
did that. The Sabbath day, or the Sabbath
day, or the day of rest is never mentioned all through the book
of Genesis. You don't find anything. I read
a historian, a commentator the other day, and he was talking
about the old fathers in the book of Genesis keeping the Sabbath
day. And he says, now the scriptures
don't say this, but he says, historians tell us they did.
Well, you know something, brothers and sisters, I'm not interested
in what the historians say. You know, do you and I, are we
going to base our rule of faith and practice upon what historians
tell us? No. What do we base what we know
upon? The Holy Spirit. And if somebody
can find me one place where Abraham or Isaac or Jacob or Joseph or
any of those holy men in the book of Genesis knew anything
about this seventh day, I'd like to see it. God kept this day
in His own heart. He did not reveal it to anybody,
not even to Abraham, his freeman. It's almost like that treasure
a man found in a field, and he hid it until he went and sold
all he had and bought that field. This day had been so honored
of God and so blessed of God, it's as though he said, I'm going
to keep it in my own heart. I ain't going to tell anybody
about it. It's a treasure. It's a treasure. Let me show
you a couple of verses of Scripture. Look over in Exodus. Look over
in Exodus. And here's why I say that the
Lord kept this in His heart. In Exodus chapter 16, we never
find anything about the seventh day until God revealed it unto
Moses and the children of Israel. Look here what He says in Exodus
chapter 16, in verse 23. Exodus chapter 16, verse 23.
You remember the context of it. The children of Israel were out
in the desert. They had nothing to eat. And the Lord sent them
down this manna from heaven. Down this manna. And they went
out and they gathered up this manna. And they gathered it up
and they tried to lay too much of it up in store and it bred
worms and it started to smell bad. And the Lord said, you just
gather every day what you need. But then He told them one day
there's going to be a salad day. There's going to be a Sabbath
day. I want you to honor that day. Don't want you to work.
Don't want you to do anything in that day. On that day, you
go out and you gather enough that you'll have enough to eat
on that day. And on that day you rest. And
you know something? This is the first time we find
anything about a Sabbath day or a Sabbath day since we first
read about it in Genesis chapter 2. And look here what he said
in verse 23. They went out and they gathered
twice as much on Friday. And some of the elders came and
they told Moses, they gathered up twice as much again. And Moses
said, look at verse 23, and he said to them, Moses said to them,
this is that which the Lord hath said. The Lord told Moses something.
Here's what it was. Tomorrow is the rest of the holy
Sabbath unto the Lord. Bake that which you have baked
today, and seed that which you will seed, and that which remaineth
over, lay up for you to be kept until the morning. And they laid
it up until the morning as Moses' bed, and it did not stink. Neither
did it breed any worms therein. And Moses said, Eat that today,
for today is a Sabbath unto the Lord. Today ye shall not find
it in the field." Six days he shall gather it, but in the seventh
day, which is the Sabbath, in it there shall be none. And it
came to pass, there went out some of the people on the seventh
day, there it is, first time it's mentioned, the seventh day,
for together and they found none. And the Lord said unto Moses,
How long refuse ye to keep my commandments and my laws? See,
for that the Lord hath given you the Sabbath, Therefore he
giveth you on the sixth day the bread of two days, abides ye
every man in his place, let no man go out of his place on the
seventh day, so the people rested on the seventh day." Now God
kept this in His heart. until he revealed it here to
Moses and the children of Israel, and they are the first ones that
knew anything about this seventh day." This is Everest. And Nehemiah
9, verse 14, if you'd like to turn over there sometime and
read this, Nehemiah said, when the Lord brought the children
of Israel out of the land of Egypt, out here into the desert,
He gave them manna from heaven, and He made known unto them His
holy Sabbaths. He made known to them. Why did
He have to make known to them? You mean Abraham didn't practice
keeping the Sabbath? He never did. Nobody did, and
all through the book of Genesis, because nobody knew anything
about the Sabbath. The seventh day, until here,
the Lord revealed it to the children of Israel. Ain't that amazing?
That's how He pries that day, the seventh day. And in Deuteronomy
chapter 5, don't turn over there, but I can quote this for you
too, I think. The Lord said to Moses, what
nation is it that has the laws that you have? A law that the
Lord made with you that He did not make with your father. And
what was one of the things that that law contained? Remember
the Sabbath day to keep it holy. And second proof I offer you
this morning that the Lord Christ this Sabbath day, not only that
He hid it in His own heart, but when He was pleased to reveal
it, He made a covenant with the Jews, the children of Israel.
And that covenant was so rigid concerning this Sabbath day,
if any man broke it, he did so at the peril of his own life.
Now turn over here with me right quickly to Numbers chapter 15
and look at this. When it came time for the Lord
in Numbers 15 to make a covenant with the children of Israel, It concerned this Sabbath day,
in Numbers chapter 15, look here in verse 32. It concerned this
Sabbath day, and if you broke this Sabbath day, you were in
trouble. Why was that? God put a high
regard upon this day. Now look here what he says in
Numbers chapter 15, look here in verse 32. And while the children of Israel
were in the wilderness, they found a man that gathered sticks
upon the Sabbath day. They that found him gathered
sticks, brought him unto Moses and Aaron, and to all the congregation,
and they put him inward, because it was not declared what should
be done unto him. Now there's another proof that
nobody in the book of Genesis kept the seventh-day holy. They
knew nothing about it. If they had of, then they'd have
known what to have done to a man that broke the Sabbath. They
knew nothing about it. They said, Lord, you've given
us this law, these commandments, and one of them is that we keep
the Sabbath day holy. Well, here's a man that we caught
breaking the Sabbath. What are we going to do with
him? What's the penalty for breaking the Sabbath day Sabbath? Well,
look in verse 35. And the Lord said unto Moses,
The man shall be surely put to death. All the congregation shall
stone him with stones without the camp. And all the congregation
brought him without the camp, and stoned him with stones, and
he died as the Lord commanded Moses. So what have we seen about
the seventh day? What have we seen about it? First
of all, we've seen God bless him.