The Fourth Commandment

"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Six days you shall labor and do all your work,
but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God.
In it you shall do no work:
you, nor your son, nor your daughter,
nor your male servant, nor your female servant,
nor your cattle,
nor your stranger who is within your gates.
For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth,
the sea, and all that is in them,
and rested on the seventh day.
Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it."

This fourth of the ten commandments has been the source of a lot of conflict and confusion, but there are some simple principles behind this complicated command.

Our week is seven days long. It is seven days long because that is the way God ordered things in the beginning. For six days, and the Bible reads as if they were six literal twenty-four hour periods, God labored in the creation of the world that we now know, and on the seventh he ceased from His labors and rested. That seventh day He called the Sabbath, and ordained that men should labor as He did, and then rest from their labors, just as He did.

So this command says, "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy."

First of all, to remember means to make a memorial of. The seventh day, designated from the beginning of the world as a day of rest, was also to be a day of reflection. The first six days were focused on work. This seventh day was for redirecting our attention from our labors and our production to the strength of our labors and the source of our produce. No man derives his ability to work from himself, but rather from the gifts and strength that God has created within Him. Therefore, it is only fitting that we spend a day honoring God as the ultimate source of all that we are and all that we are able to do.

Additionally, we are to consecrate this day as special unto the Lord. It was to be set apart from the other days, in purpose and in fulfillment. It was a day of rest, of worship, of dedication. The first six days were about us; the seventh day was about Him. 15 Centuries later, Jesus revealed that the Sabbath was actually a day for our benefit, personally, physically, and spiritually. As we use a day to cease from our labors and seek the Lord, we are renewed inwardly and outwardly. And therein is the practical importance of the Sabbath.