The Mighty Works of God

The Bible Dictionary say this about the Sabbath Day: “The Sabbath was a holy day before the giving of the law, even from the earliest times… but we have no evidence of its observance in patriarchal times. This is no doubt due to the scantiness of the record, for the Sabbath is an eternal principle and would have existed from the days of Adam, whenever the gospel was on the earth among men.” So while we assume that the Sabbath would have been observed by prophets such as Adam, Enoch, Noah, and Abraham, there is no record of it.  When Moses gave the law to the children of Israel in the wilderness, two separate reasons were given for observing the Sabbath Day. He told them, “But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it” (Exodus 20:10-11). The first reason was to mimic what the Lord did in the story of Creation: He labored for six “days” and then rested on the seventh. So perhaps one implication of this instruction is that we should remember the creation and the power of God on the Sabbath. As we rest from our normal labors, we should reflect upon the fact that He is all-powerful and made us and the world in which we live. In our dispensation the Lord again tied the instruction of keeping the Sabbath with creation. He said, “And that thou mayest more fully keep thyself unspotted from the world, thou shalt go to the house of prayer and offer up thy sacraments upon my holy day; For verily this is a day appointed unto you to rest from your labors, and to pay thy devotions unto the Most High…. Verily I say, that inasmuch as ye do this, the fulness of the earth is yours, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, and that which climbeth upon the trees and walketh upon the earth; Yea, and the herb, and the good things which come of the earth, whether for food or for raiment, or for houses, or for barns, or for orchards, or for gardens, or for vineyards; Yea, all things which come of the earth, in the season thereof, are made for the benefit and the use of man, both to please the eye and to gladden the heart; Yea, for food and for raiment, for taste and for smell, to strengthen the body and to enliven the soul” (Doctrine and Covenants 59:9-10, 16-19). Thus, one of the blessings of honoring the Sabbath is to be able to enjoy the fruits of creation. As we rest from our labors and pay our devotions to the Most High, He promises us that we will have the good things of the earth which please the eye, gladden the heart, strengthen the body, and enliven the soul.

The second reason given in the law of Moses for observing the Sabbath was described in this passage: “Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee. Six days thou shalt labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou. And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day” (Deuteronomy 5:12-15). So, the Israelites were to not do any work and not let even their servants or animals do work, remembering that they were servants in the land of Egypt once. Thus the Sabbath was to be for them a time to remember their deliverance from Egypt and to be grateful that they could rest, for in Egypt as slaves they presumably did not get the chance to rest. We too in our day can then use the Sabbath to remember the miracles that the Lord has performed for us and in the past. And perhaps more importantly, just as the children of Israel were to remember their redemption from Egypt, we should remember our redemption through Christ who saved us from death and hell.

Anciently they celebrated the Sabbath on the last day of the week, as given in the pattern of the creation story, and Jews still do this today. For most Christians, we now honor the command to rest on a sacred day on the first day of the week as a reminder of the resurrection of the Jesus from the dead, for he arose on the first day: “The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre, and seeth the stone taken away from the sepulchre” (John 21:1). It was that “first day of the week” that the Savior appeared to Mary, the day after the Sabbath. So, this gives us a third reason to honor the Sabbath: to remember His resurrection from the grave. I like the way that the Bible Dictionary summarizes it: “The change from observing the last day of the week to the first day of the week is not so important as is the concept and principle of the Sabbath. In either case, the Sabbath was symbolic of the mighty works of God: the creation of the earth, the deliverance of Israel from Egypt, and the resurrection of Jesus from the dead.” The Sabbath should be for us a day to remember the mighty works of God.