Leviticus 23:3–8

Hey, hey, good morning, good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions. This is where every day you and I, we get together, we have a little bit of coffee, we get into God's Word, and we grow in our love for the Lord together. And this year, 2023, Lord willing, we'll make it from Genesis through Leviticus. I'm so glad to be with you this morning. We are going to continue on where Ellie and I left off yesterday with the beginning of the feast, and we'll work through things together. Why don't we have some coffee, we'll pray, and we'll get into God's Word. Let's pray.
Father, we thank you so much for this day. We thank you for the gift of your word. Thank you for being in a language we can understand and communicate in. Father, we thank you for the work that you have done in our lives and for so much we have to be thankful for. We pray that your spirit would help us to understand these words this morning and that you would teach us to live them in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, so we are at Leviticus chapter 23. Leviticus chapter 23, and we're going to read verses 3 through 8. So, here we go. Six days you shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation.
You shall do no work in it. It is the Sabbath of Jehovah in all your dwellings. These are the Feasts of the Lord, holy convocations which you shall proclaim at their appointed times. On the 14th day of the first month at twilight is the Lord's Passover, and on the 15th day of the same month is the Feast of Unleavened Bread to Jehovah. Seven days you must eat unleavened bread. On the first day you shall have a holy convocation, You shall do no customary work on it, but you shall offer an offering made by fire to the Lord for seven days. The seventh day shall be a holy convocation. You shall do no customary work on it."
Well, we need to ask ourselves our three normal questions. A, what is this about? B, what's the best verse to summarize this? And C, what do we call to do in response to this? So, A, what's this about? Well, verse three is specifically about the Sabbath.
So the weekly Shabbat, six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh is a Sabbath rest unto the Lord your God. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth and all that is in them. And on the seventh day he's rested. So we should hallow the Sabbath.
So, this is one of those things where Christians disagree on whether or not there is still a Christian Sabbath, whether or not this law pertains to us. We can look at the rest of the laws and see that we believe that they're fulfilled in Christ. We don't have to participate in these celebrations anymore, especially when there's no temple or tabernacle here on earth. But the Sabbath is one of these interesting things.
I'm going to go off on just a little bit of a rabbit trail here and say the reason why historically Protestants have still held to a Christian Sabbath, the Lord's Day, is because it's not just in this passage, but it's also in the moral law. It's not just ceremonial law here in Leviticus chapter 23. It does have ceremonial aspects to it, right? That's where they would go, and that's when they would go to the temple at times, to the tabernacle at times, that's where they would offer praise.
There's a ceremonial aspect to it, but the reason for it is rooted as a creation ordinance. In Genesis chapter 1 and 2, it's the Lord who made the entire universe in six days. And on the 7th, He rested. And so he sanctified that day and he hallowed it.
And so we see we don't want to take the Ten Commandments and take out the Fourth Commandment and become a Nine Commandment type church or type people. We want to be a Ten Commandment people. And so we see that there's a moral aspect, a way in which across all civilizations, all people have a day of rest. Why? Because God's the one who made the universe and made all of us.
And so Here, the ceremonial aspects of it, we say, have been fulfilled in Christ, that's why Christ is our eternal rest, but we don't get rid of, necessarily, the whole gamut of the Sabbath, just because it's also here in the ceremonial. The ceremonial aspects of it are fulfilled in Christ, but not the essential moral aspects of it is still needing that one in seven rest. So, with that said, let's go into what is peculiar to the Israelite people in verses 5 through 8.
These are two different feasts. They're lumped together and they're often thought of as one, but they're really two different ones. On the first day, or the 14th day of the first month, right? This is the month of Nisan. Jewish people go by a lunar calendar. On that 14th day at twilight, that's the day they remember something historically happening.
What historically happened was God redeemed his people with the last plague. He killed all of Egypt's firstborn. That's when they were to eat the Passover lamb with their shirts tucked in and their staffs ready and they were ready to go out of Egypt. Interestingly, in Deuteronomy, when it repeats the Ten Commandments, God redeeming his people, that historical fact, is what ties the Passover to the Sabbath, right? For the Lord redeemed you out of the land of bondage is the reason annexed there in Deuteronomy. The point being with all of this, right, is that On the 14th day of Nisan, at twilight, they were to remember that the Lord, the Lord himself, redeemed them.
And then the next day, for seven days, there was a period of a festival, of thanksgiving for his deliverance. seven days of unleavened bread. And on the 15th day of the same month, in the feast of unleavened bread to the Lord, seven days you must eat unleavened bread, right?
So seven days of nothing but stuff like flatbread, matzo bread, right? And so that's what they would eat. On the first day, there's a holy convocation, right? Everybody gets together and they celebrate and they eat this bread and you don't do any work on it.
But you shall offer an offering made by fire to the Lord for seven days." So for the next seven days, every day, there's an offering. Then the seventh day shall be a holy convocation. You shall do no customary work on it. So it's bookend on both sides. Sabbath and a Sabbath. A rest and a rest. Sacrifice each day the whole time. Eating nothing but unleavened bread.
All of this to remind them that they were redeemed out of Egypt by a God. And so their hearts would be remembering and would be thankful for what God had done for them. So these are the first few holy convocations that we see. So what's the best verse to summarize this?
Well, in my Bible, I would underline, well, verse 3 would be fine. I just have the word Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation. And then in the next section, verses 4 through 8, I have verse 8 underlined, but I have little bits and parts of this underlined, right? So, I don't know. You can let me know what you would underline in your Bible if you think there's a best verse to summarize, verses 4 through 8.
What's this calling us to do now? This is why I still think there is a place for a Sabbath rest, because I think weakly we need to remember that God redeemed us, that the Lord purchased me with the price of his own blood. I need to be reminded of the gift of grace he has shown to me and to take a day of rest, to realize I can't govern the whole world. I can't even govern my own life as well as I want to. I don't have everything under control. We can't do everything. We'll never be able to do everything. And if we work ourselves constantly, we're going to work ourselves to death.
There's a time for us just to stop on a regular routine basis, lift up our eyes to heaven. and to remember the King of Glory who has redeemed us, to rest in Him, to praise Him, to enjoy our brothers and sisters around us, and to be able to rejoice and build each other up.
This is the beauty of the Christian Sabbath. It's not a slavishness. It's not, oh, we have to do this drudgery of the law. I want to remember that God redeemed me. I want to remember that God gave me rest and that Jesus is the ultimate fulfillment of this. He has given me an eternal rest. He is my eternal Sabbath. And each week is a reminder of something even greater to come.
Let's go ahead and pray. Father, we pray that we would indeed rest in you, that we would find our peace and hope in you. Father, please, Let us love you all the days of our lives. And never forget that you are our Redeemer, our Covenant King, and our God. In Jesus' name, Amen. Well, may you find rest and peace in Jesus Christ. May you love Him with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. And I'll see you next time. Bye.
Thanks for listening to this week's message from God's Word for You, a ministry of Sharon R.P. Church in rural southeast Iowa. We pray that the message would be used by God to transform your faith in your life this week. If you'd like to get more information about us, feel free to go to the website, SharonRPC.org. we'd love to invite you to worship with us. Our worship time is 10 a.m. every Sunday at 25204 160th Avenue, Morning Sun, Iowa, 52640. May God richly bless you this week.