What if I told you that the Sabbath is not a day in the week but is a Person! By making that statement, I have your full attention, I’ve piqued your curiosity, or you’ve moved on to something else. The best way to know for sure about the Sabbath is to find out what God says—after all, He created it.
When I want to learn what God means about something, I find it best to go back to the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis 2:1-3 says, “Thus the heavens and the earth, and all the host of them, were finished. 2 And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. 3 Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made.”
I believe the key word in Genesis 2:1-3 is “rest.” God created everything including mankind and then He rested from His work. God finished His work and then turned it all over to mankind. Genesis 1:26-28 says, “Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28 Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”
Genesis 1:26-28 are three of my favorite verses because they show that God created each one of us in His own image and then gave us authority over all the earth. We were created to replicate the nature of God, and He lives in an eternal state of rest (or we could say peace.) God’s original design was not a day of rest but an eternal state of peace. Unfortunately, sin interrupted this eternal peace and man became spiritually separated from God, requiring God to introduce the law and a “day of rest” was established. The law forced man to stop working and rest in order to remember God and what had been lost through sin. The Sabbath rest that God had created was not a day, but was a spiritual position of peace with God. Unfortunately, Adam messed it up when he ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Jesus fixed what Adam had lost when He was crucified on the cross, and on the third day He rose to restore all of God’s blessings such as rest, peace, healing, deliverance, prosperity, etc.
The New Testament doesn’t specify a specific day for the Sabbath. We are free to observe or not observe a specific day based on our faith and what we believe. Many Christians, after Jesus’ death, set aside Sunday to gather and worship; however, according to the Bible, there is no spiritual significance. Any day of the week carries the same importance. Our Sabbath rest is fulfilled in Christ who has delivered us from the bondage of sin, giving us the opportunity to enter into His rest. It is through our faith in God that we can enter into His rest and peace. “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1). Hebrews 4:1-11 reveals the promise of the rest for the people of God—it is called “Today.” The rest described in Hebrews 4 is rest from works of righteousness in trying to please God. You have a choice every day to enter into the rest, peace, and a state of being Jesus provided, and that includes healing.
There were several occasions when Jesus healed someone on the Sabbath and alarmed the religious leaders of that day. The Sabbath was meant to benefit and bless people, not to oppress and keep them in bondage. Sickness is bondage. Mark 2:27 says, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.” Jesus’ healing on the Sabbath was fulfilling God’s purpose for the Sabbath and that purpose is available for you today. The Sabbath (peace, rest, healing) was made for you. Accept what Jesus did on the cross over 2,000 years ago and enter into His rest, peace, and healing. The Sabbath is spiritual rest and peace by faith.
Jesus Christ is the Person of the Sabbath!
~Donna Jones