Christ the Lord is Risen Today!
The W's and H of Worship • Sermon • Submitted • Presented • 28:24
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· 68 viewsChrist has give to his church a new day of rest to assemble in worship, it is Sunday, the Lord's Day.
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This morning’s Scripture lesson is taken from Revelation 1:10-18.
10 I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet 11 saying, “Write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea.” 12 Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, 13 and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. 14 The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, 15 his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. 16 In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength. 17 When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, “Fear not, I am the first and the last, 18 and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades.
I chose this passage of Scripture because it helps us answer our next investigative question about worship, “When is the church to worship?”
For many Christians today this question is not even on their radar screen. If asked that question they would answer, “When ever we want.” We see this demonstrated in the weekly schedule of many churches. Worships services are now offered on Saturday and many weekday evenings. Such a wide variety of choices is very agreeable to our consumer oriented society, but does it agree to the Word of God?
What we find in texts such as Revelation 1:10-18 and the witness of the early church is that Sunday, called the “Lord’s Day” is the New Sabbath.
The “Lord’s Day” is the New Sabbath
The “Lord’s Day” is the New Sabbath
Perhaps no change is more unexpected and shocking than the shift in days in which the early church worshipped. One only needs to read the Old Testament in a very cursory way to discover how important to God Sabbath keeping was. Even though the early Jewish Christians would still worship with their Jewish brethren on Saturdays for evangelistic purposes, but it was on Sunday they gather with their fellow Christians to worship!
The name they chose for this new day of worship is significant, they called it the “Lord’s Day”. This indicates that they considered Sunday to be a holy day. We find similar language used for Communion, they called it the “Lord’s Supper.” No one would consider the “Lord’s Supper” just another meal—it is a holy meal meal, set apart for God’s people to commune with Christ Jesus!
In fact, by calling it the “Lord’s Day” rather than the “Sabbath” the early Christians were communicating that this new day of worship was even more holy than the Old Covenant Sabbath. The Old Covenant Sabbath commemorated God’s completing his creative work. In contrast, the Lord’s Day commemorated the completion of God’s redemptive work in Christ, for it was on Sunday that Jesus rose from the dead! This is why I entitled my sermon today, “Christ the Lord is Risen Today!” and why we are closing our service today by singing this hymn. Every Sunday is a celebration of Jesus’ resurrection!
Notice in our text today how prominently the resurrection is in Christ’s message to John and his churches.
17 When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, “Fear not, I am the first and the last, 18 and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades.
This is the message we all so desperately need to hear. Death is our great enemy and we need to be reminded constantly that Christ has defeated death. This is way Christ has ordained Sunday as His Day and has give this day to the church as its day of worship!
If Sunday is even more special and more holy than the Old Covenant Sabbath, how do we honor and keep it?
How to Honor and Keep the Lord’s Day
How to Honor and Keep the Lord’s Day
It is here that God’s teaching in the Old Testament is so helpful to us. Remember that Paul teaches the Corinthian church that everything that was written in the Old Covenant was written to teach us in the New Covenant. Let’s remind ourselves what God inspired is prophet Moses to write in the Old Covenant.
8 “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, 10 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, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. 11 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.
The first thing God tells us to do in order to honor and keep His holy day of worship is to Remember to Keep it Holy.
Remember to Keep it Holy
Remember to Keep it Holy
In the pressures of daily life it is easy to forget that the Lord’s Day is a holy day. There never seems to be enough hours in a day, days in a week and weeks in a year to accomplish all that life demands of us. We all know the feeling of having one day flow into another without us being aware of it. The pressure is always there to treat the Lord’s Day as just another day.
If we don’t conscientiously remember and set Sunday aside as a special day it become just like any other day. Even in the early church this was a problem. The author of Hebrews writes this:
24 And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, 25 not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.
If we don’t intentionally remember to keep the Lord’s Day holy we will quickly fall into the habit of treating it just like any other day. This is why we need to Rest from the Ordinary on the Lord’s Day.
Rest from the Ordinary on the Lord’s Day
Rest from the Ordinary on the Lord’s Day
In the Fourth Commandment we read from earlier, God reminds Israel that they have six other days each week to devote to the ordinary, common pursuits of life. All of life falls under God’s sovereign blessing and care—the common everyday labors and activities we do are good and should be done to the glory of God. There is a real sense in which all of life is worship, but the importance of God’s people gathering together in corporate worship is so important that we need to intentionally rest from the ordinary to insure we keep the Lord’s Day holy.
I am not going to devote time this morning on what or what not a Christian can do on the Lord’s Day. This is a very important topic, but I don’t have time to cover it as a should. What I want to do is establish firmly the general principle of resting from the ordinary or common pursuits in order to protect the holy pursuits we should be doing on the Lord’s Day.
In other words, if some type of labor or recreation is causing you to forsake the meeting together of the saints on a regular basis you have a problem that can quickly get out of control. This breaking of fellowship not only hurts you spiritually, but it hurts others. Hear again what the author of Hebrews writes:
24 And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, 25 not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.
As we established earlier in this series, corporate worship is the primary way Christ has ordained for his church to make disciples. If you are neglecting Lord’s Day worship, your growth as a disciple and the growth of others will be hindered. Your presence in worship is an encouragement to growth in others. Your absence is a discouragement.
Perhaps this call to rest from the ordinary seems like a burden to you—you are being asked to give up something—be it an opportunity to make more money or an opportunity to enjoy some time of recreational pursuit. This is why it is so important that we Rejoice in the Gift of the Lord’s Day.
Rejoice in the Gift of the Lord’s Day
Rejoice in the Gift of the Lord’s Day
Isaiah wrote this:
13 “If you turn back your foot from the Sabbath, from doing your pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight and the holy day of the Lord honorable; if you honor it, not going your own ways, or seeking your own pleasure, or talking idly; 14 then you shall take delight in the Lord, and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth; I will feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”
In these verses Isaiah the prophet is reminding us that God’s holy day of worship—the Sabbath under the Old Covenant and the Lord’s Day under the New Covenant—is a gift that should be delighted in. We should delight in this gift of a holy day of worship, because if we honor and keep it as we should we will be blessed in the rest of life. The world is filled with people who work hard and never get ahead; people who play hard and are never refreshed. They don’t get ahead and they are not refreshed because they don’t have the Lord’s blessing!
On the Lord’s Day...
The Lord Has Prepared a Place of Refreshment for His People
The Lord Has Prepared a Place of Refreshment for His People
A text that is found in almost every Christian’s favorite list is Psalm 23.
1 The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. 2 He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. 3 He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. 4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. 5 You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. 6 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
Jesus is the Good Shepherd and He has prepared a place of refreshment for His people—the Lord’s Day! The Lord’s Day worship is to be an oasis for God’s people in the wilderness of this world. The worldly will find Lord’s Day worship boring. Living in Vanity Fair as they do, they want the excitement of a water park rather than the refreshing waters of Christ’s Word. The replacement of Lord’s Day worship with programming as found in many of today’s mega-churches is not a sign of progress, but of worldliness. Christian, Lord’s Day worship, doesn’t look like the world, because it is not of this world. Jesus is the living bread and living water that has come down from heaven.
51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”
and
37 On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. 38 Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’ ”
Because Jesus rose from the dead on the first day of the week, he ever lives to be our true bread and true drink! The church gather’s on the Lord’s day to feast on Christ, the living bread and water. This is what makes this day so special and holy. It is unlike any other day. Let us not neglect it as some are in the habit of doing.