‘Tis the Season! (6)

And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak also to the children of Israel, saying: ‘Surely My Sabbaths you shall keep, for it is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the LORD who sanctifies you.” Exodus 31.12, 13

“Above all…”
It would be, I suspect, an unfruitful exercise to try to discover precisely how the holy days of our national calendar came to be mere holidays, how they changed from being days of religious celebration and reflection to seasons of shopping and self-indulgence. Many factors have affected this situation, and no shortcuts will be found to turn back the clock. We cannot make other people see the holidays as we do, although we can do much to recover the inherent meaning and purpose of those days, simply by participating in them as though they were still holy days unto the Lord.

There’s plenty of blame to go around for the secularization of our holy days. And the “road to recovery” of a better use of them is certainly long and, at this point, unclear. Perhaps the best strategy Christians could follow, who long to see more reverence and spiritual vitality returned to our holy days, is to attack the problem one day at a time.

Beginning, I suggest, with the Lord’s Day.

It seems rather hypocritical for Christians to complain about the secularization of Thanksgiving and Christmas when, as a community, we have done very little to preserve the sanctity of the Lord’s Day. Among all the commandments and statutes of God’s Law – all the precepts, testimonials, and rules accompanying and clarifying all the Ten Commandments – only one of these is prefaced by the emphatic particle, “Ach” which means, variously, “surely, only, certainly,” or, as the English Standard Version has it, “above all.”

It is the fourth commandment, the commandment to remember and observe the Lord’s Sabbath.

The Lord’s Day today
“Above all you shall keep my Sabbaths,” (ESV) the Lord instructed Moses to command the people of Israel. Christians today generally put no stock in that emphatic statement, since they generally attach little significance to the Law of God itself, and they have come to believe that Sunday is a kind of holiday with church thrown in at the beginning. The Lord’s Day, such as it is, ends around noon for most believers. The rest of Sunday is ours for football, work, or whatever we want to do in the name of personal recreation or renewal.

Can you see how this “personalizing” of the Lord’s Day might have led to the rampant personalizing of all our holy days?

How can we expect to recover entire seasons of the year for God’s purposes when we aren’t willing to take seriously His instructions concerning our weekly holy day? I’m well aware of the arguments contending that the Lord’s Day is no longer an essential part of the Ten Commandments, or that any “day of rest” will do, as long as it’s one in seven.

And I know that every believer who thinks about the Lord’s Day in even the most remotely holy terms feels free to interpret how he may use that day, based on his own preferences and needs.

But all such fumbling and fidgeting with the Lord’s Day does not address the issue of God’s intention in giving us one day in seven to rest from our labors and personal recreations in order to focus more specifically on Him and His work.

The Lord’s Day – the New Testament Sabbath – is a sign between the Lord and His people for all generations – that, presumably, would include our own. It recalls God’s grace and power in creation and redemption, symbolizes His finished work, and offers us a weekly arena within which to renew covenant with our Savior and King.

How we remember and observe the Lord’s Day will in many ways tell the tale concerning how we follow Him in all the rest of our lives.

Begin here
If we want to see Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter recover more of their true purpose, character, and design, we’ll have to start smaller – one day at a time, beginning with the Lord’s Day. Glories and wonders of rest await us on this day, and if we can discover the true blessings of keeping this holy day as God intends, we might just be able to affect the way we and others approach all the holy days of the year.

Next steps: What general guidelines govern your use of the Lord’s Day? What is the basis for those guidelines? How do you know they are in line with God’s purposes? Share your answers to these questions with a Christian friend, and pray together for a better understanding of how you should approach this and all the holy days of the Lord.

T. M. Moore

We’re taking a 3-week intermission from our series on The Disciplined Life to review three archive series on the meaning of Christmas. This week’s study, ‘Tis the Season, is part 1 of a 3-part series on Christmas, As Advertised, and is available as a free download.

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Except as indicated, Scripture taken from the New King James Version. © Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.