Every Day is a Blessing From the LORD
Seeing the 4th Commandment's Application to the Rest of the Week
Good Morning!
Today is a day few thought would be coming. It’s not that something important is taking place and it’s not anyone’s birthday that I know of (though it may be yours, so happy birthday!). What makes today special is that today is the day that the Lord has made! Let us rejoice and be glad in it! Hold on a minute. What about the folks I mentioned at the opening? Why would they think Tuesday may not happen? Well, it’s not so much that they didn’t plan on it. The problem is that they don’t comprehend what makes every day distinct and a blessing to God’s people. For them it’s just another turn of the calendar, another day to go about the mundane things of life. They fail to see what we see when we look at the rising of the sun and the moon. In today’s worship and prayer help we’re going to think a little bit more about what it signifies that the very day in which we are reading and writing this post is the best day God has made yet, how we have the hope and the assurance that tomorrow will be even better in the peace of the believer, and how that should effect the way we work, and most especially how we worship on the Lord’s Day.
As an aside that is not to say that every day is the same. We certainly testify that the Sabbath Day is the market day of the soul. Romans 14 is not a denial of the continuance of the day of rest, as Hebrews 4 makes clear that it does continue. The Lord’s Day has a unique place in the life of all people, not just Christians. As you read the 4th Commandment you notice it has in it the statement that one day in seven is set aside by Jehovah in order to give a spiritual respite to the covenant family as well as pagans.
Sunday is not a second Saturday to get all the stuff done you didn’t get done the day before. It’s special and purposefully provided for all men everywhere at all times.
Everyone benefits from keeping the Sabbath Day holy. However, as part of that law of God we hear that we are not only to honor Sunday, but every day of the week as well. How we go about that might be different, but each day is a gracious gift of our Triune God. Exodus 20:5,11 says, “Six days you shall labor and do all your work…For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them.” Something we need to take from what we read there in comparison to what I’ve said above is that one of the ways we honor the goodness of God in a random Tuesday is by remembering that when the LORD went about His labors to make the Creation each day was done not only with intentionality, but in answer in some sense to what came before. Each day of Creation built upon what came before and we can learn from that.
Our work testifies to what we believe about God, and most especially what we understand about what He has called us to do as redeemed believers. Another passage worth considering here comes from Ephesians 6:5-8:
“Bondservants, be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in sincerity of heart, as to Christ; not with eyeservice, as men-pleasers, but as bondservants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, with goodwill doing service, as to the Lord, and not to men, knowing that whatever good anyone does, he will receive the same from the Lord, whether he is a slave or free.”
As we go about our labors day-by-day it is not so much that we are mimicking or recreating the opening week of the world. What we are doing in keeping that part of the 4th Commandment as we read there in Ephesians 6 is serving our bosses (if you are a boss go and read 6:9) not just in the sense of what we are required to do in accordance with the 5th Commandment, but when we think about why we enjoy every day in the Lord is that when we get up, get dressed, and go in to the office what we are doing is not being men-pleasers we are being God-pleasers as not only the aforementioned commandments tell us to be, but in honoring the 1st Commandment as well. I’ve noted before that whatever we do from the moment we wake up until we go to sleep flows out of how we understand our desire to serve Jehovah. If we keep Him top of the pops then the observing and keeping the other statures of God will naturally flow from that meditation.
Yet consider again for a moment why it is we do that.
In looking at the 4th Commandment and the six days of labor we are being reminded that God by His sovereign grace has ordained all that comes to pass, that by His providence He guides and directs the outflowing of His perfect decrees, and our obedience to that is not born out of a kind of mechanical automation. It is the result of our being ingrafted in Christ Jesus in the blessed gift and grant of redemption. Our working to the glory of God Monday-Saturday, as much as Sunday is not based off the works of the flesh, but the outpouring of the reborn heart of grace. In the Sermon on the Mount when we hear Immanuel speak of the taking of the cloak twice as far as they were asked we see a bit of the sweetness of the matter. We treat every day sacred unto the Lord, because He has made every day not only to be His, yet so that others might know through our quiet example of faithfulness and diligence that there is something more to what we do every day than just being a “good employee”. We work hard only by the mercy of the Spirit in His applying the finished labor of Christ at the cross. It is an outgrowth of the new life we have in and through the Gospel of grace.
Here's another word to consider:
https://www.geneva.edu/blog/biblical-wisdom/proverbs-16-4
Blessings in Christ,
Rev. Benjamin Glaser
Pastor, Bethany ARP Church