Full Sermon Is the Sabbath Day Still Important Today? based on Mark 2:23-28

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

I. Sabbath in Israel. I remember going to Israel with a group of Lutherans around 30 years ago. When we arrived at one of the hotels we stayed at, there was a sign about not smoking cigarettes on the Sabbath. I learned that the Sabbath day in Israel started on Friday when the sun went down and lasted until the sun went down on Saturday.

II. Closed businesses on Sunday. In some towns in America there used to be an understanding that businesses would not be open on Sundays. Restaurants and other businesses were not supposed to be open on Sundays. Sundays in America back then were for attending worship services and resting. Sundays in America were like Sabbath days in Israel. On Sundays in Ocheyedan and May City you will not have businesses open still today.

III. Working without days off. Some people like to work long hours each day. Some people do not like to take any days off. Some people work weeks at a time without taking a day off. Some of those people end up getting ill because they do not give their bodies any rest. Illness forces people to rest their bodies whether they want to or not. I used to work 7 days a week as a groundskeeper at a softball complex in Billings, MT, in the summers when I was home from college and seminary. God knew that working 7 days a week was not good for me, so a couple weekends each summer He sent rain and the tournaments were rained out and I could rest.

IV. Sabbath law in Deuteronomy 5:13-14 and 5:15. In the Old Testament lesson in Deuteronomy 5 the people of Israel were reminded to keep the Sabbath day holy. How were they supposed to keep the Sabbath day holy? Deuteronomy 5:13-14 states, “Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter or your male servant or your female servant, or your ox or your donkey or any of your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates, that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you.” Why were they to observe the Sabbath day? Deuteronomy 5:15 states, “You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day.”

V. Is the Sabbath day still important today? If you are a conservative Jewish person, then observing the Sabbath day is still important. From sundown on Friday to sundown on Saturday no work was to be done not even by your livestock. If you are a Christian, then observing the Sabbath day is different. What makes the difference for a Christian? Jesus arose from the dead on a Sunday morning. Because Jesus arose on a Sunday, many Christians spend at least a part of their Sundays by worshiping and praising the Lord. Christians worship and praise the Lord on Sunday mornings to celebrate Jesus winning the victory over death by rising from the dead on a Sunday morning.

VI. Mark 2 and the Sabbath day. In today’s Gospel lesson in Mark 2 we hear about Jesus and His disciples getting in trouble with some Pharisees. The disciples of Jesus were going through a field with Jesus and plucking some heads of grain and eating the grain. Jesus was not eating, but His disciples were eating. The Pharisees had a number of rules about what was considered work on the Sabbath day. People were supposed to only walk so far, a Sabbath day’s journey, and no farther on the Sabbath day. The Pharisees accused the disciples of Jesus of violating the law against resting on the Sabbath day by plucking the heads of grain. The disciples of Jesus were supposedly “harvesting” on the Sabbath, according to the Pharisees.

VII. Read Mark 2:25-26 and comment about David. In Mark 2:25-26 Jesus said, “Have you never read what David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him: how he entered the house of God, in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him?” Jesus pointed back a time before David became king of Israel and was running away from King Saul who was trying to capture him. David asked for and ate the special bread of the Presence at the house of God and gave some of the loaves of that special bread to his men with him. Only the priests of God were supposed to eat the bread of the Presence at the house of God.

VIII. Read Mark 2:27-28 and Romans 14:5-6. Then Jesus made His point by saying in Mark 2:27-28, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.” Paul in writing his letter to the Romans made a similar point in Romans 14:5-6, “One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. The one who observes the day, observes it in honor of the Lord. The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God.”

IX. The Sabbath is about honoring God and resting. So the Sabbath day is not so much about the exact day. The Sabbath is more about honoring God and resting. The Sabbath day is about worship of God. The Sabbath day is about thanking and praising God. Whether we worship God on a Saturday or a Sunday is not as important as worshiping God for His goodness and mercy toward us. We can worship God one day a week. We can worship God every single day of the week. We can start the day with reading the Bible and prayer. We can end the day with reading the Bible and prayer.

X. Luther on the Sabbath. Martin Luther, the German reformer from the sixteenth century, wrote about the Sabbath day, “Man was especially created for the knowledge and worship of God; for the Sabbath was not ordained for sheep and cows but for men, that in them the knowledge of God might be developed and might increase” (Luther’s Works Vol.1, page 80).

XI. Is the Sabbath day important still today? Yes. Whether we worship God on Saturday or Sunday or any other day, the worship of God is good for us to do.

XII. Conclusion. Read Psalm 119:105, Colossians 3:16, and Acts 17:10-11. Psalm 119:105 states, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” Colossians 3:16 tells us, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.” We can strive to be like the believers in Berea that Acts 17:10-11 tells us about, “The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived they went into the Jewish synagogue. Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so.” Amen.