A Sabbath-Breaking to be Avoided by Believers

The Old Testament Sabbath - a type and shadow - brought God's people into Rest with Him in the finished work of His Creation, and thereby signified that He had sanctified His people.

Now its antitype, the Gospel Sabbath, is the Saints' joining in rest with Christ in His finished work of Redemption - and our rest with Christ in His work is the sign that He is our Sanctifier.

Hebrews tells us we enter into Christ's rest by faith - indeed, to Rest in Christ is Gospel faith truly lived from day to day.

But the Hebrews passage is also a warning against refusing to rest in Christ - it is an explication of the charge given believers in Isaiah 56 that they must keep the Sabbath unpolluted.

To labor for our own righteousness, and refuse to rest in Christ's, is to pollute His Sabbath with the filthy rags of self-righteousness.

The example of Israels' refusal to enter God's rest of the promised land tells the true end of those who refuse Christ's rest through unbelief: judgment and death.

A rest does remain for God's people - a Sabbath-keeping. This language emphasizes the active nature of our rest. Similar to the Jews of old, we must consciously and deliberately rest in Christ's Sabbath by eschewing all law-works of righteousness in ourselves for Christ's perfect obedience and blood. A failure in vigilence will result in a slide into sabbath-breaking.

How often the Scriptures exhort us to an active and lively faith in Christ's work. He intends us to rest in His finished work as if our rest were an holy day unto Him; not taking it for granted, not presuming upon it, but resting in it moment by moment.

Then we will know that the Lord is our Sanctifier!