Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation. (Genesis 2:1-3 ESV)
When I come to the beginning of Genesis 2, I read such verses above, and the thing that strikes my mind straight away is the statement that “God rested”. We know the fact that God is almighty and He never gets tired - and so we probably wonder why God rested? One thing we know from this verses is that God rested to indicate that He finishes His work of creation, and so God Rest. But is that all? If God never gets tired, there must be a theological meaning or purpose that the writer of Genesis was trying to make when he wrote these verses in Genesis 2 using the word “rest”.
First of all we need to understand that sabbath is not what we do in our sunday service. Sabbath is on the seventh day which is saturday, but when we look on the new testament, every day christians meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together, praising God. If there was a day where Christians met regularly, it is on sunday (the first day of the week - the Lord’s day) not saturday (sabbath). It is because Jesus was risen on the first day. From there the early christians gather together on the first day of the week up until now (Acts 20:7; 1 Cor 16:2).
People also sometimes used this verse to prove an observance to a physical sabbath rest, but the thing is this verse does not command humanity to observe sabbath.. It is indeed written that God made it holy, but there is no command for human beings to rest from labor. So God made it “holy”, meaning that God set it apart in some way for His special use, or to use something set apart to explain part of His purpose. But again this verses does not tell us what is the purpose that God made it holy through His resting from all His work. Again what is the intention of the writer of Genesis to put it this way?
In order to understand this, we need to go through as the scripture progress. If we look on the way God works throughout the history of humanity, we see God’s work in a progressive unfolding pattern - meaning that God lovingly teach His people by progressively revealing His Character and purpose to His people.
When we look on the history written in scripture, Whatever this word “rest” means, after the fall the ensuing story does not indicate that humanity enjoys this “rest”, even when Adam fell in sin, God in his “Rest” has to go and find Adam and ask him “Where are you?” to Adam. After the fall, we see that every woman experience the pain work of childbearing (Gen 3:6), and every man has to go through the painful toil of the cursed ground, Cain killed Abel, and because of his sin, God tells Cain that the ground will no longer yield crops to him, he will be a restless wanderer on the earth (Gen 4:12) - and we look to Cain’s response that he feels that it was too much for him. This notion of “anti-rest” continues since then in humanity because of the sin. Then God made a covenant with Abraham and was confirmed again with Isaac and Jacob that He will bless them, and the nations through Abraham. The first covenant of blessing can be found in Genesis 12:2-3. The story continues and we know the Israelites move to Egypt, and after Joseph died, the Egyptians put the Israelites into slavery and hard bondage (Exodus 1). The Israelites cried out to God, and God heard them and sent a help through Moses (Exodus 2:23-25). See this word below that God asked Moses to speak to the Israelites before God delivers the Israelites out of the bondage of Egyptian’s slavery:
Say therefore to the people of Israel, ‘I am the LORD, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will deliver you from slavery to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgment. I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God, and you shall know that I am the LORD your God, who has brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. I will bring you into the land that I swore to give to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. I will give it to you for a possession. I am the LORD.’ (Exodus 6:6-8 ESV)
We see here and soon after God fights against the Egyptians through the 10 plagues, and delivers His people. God providing freedom from slavery, and hence rest from unending labor. This rest which was not attained by human action because of sin, was now promised in a kind of a - Promised land.
Now at this moment, put yourselves as an Israelites, and you are at mount Sinai, and you heard this word which Moses read it out loud..
“God spoke all these words, saying, I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. Therefore (emphasis added) ...”
“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
(Exodus 20:1,8-11 ESV)
What do we feel? Do we feel glad or do we feel a burden? I think the right attitude knowing what the Israelites had been so far, namely as a slave with no such thing as rest in their life, and then God told them to rest, they should feel glad - it was a grace. God gave them rest because they never find rest; and this rest has also another purpose so that they remember God and what He had done for them (God their deliverer, and savior). This is also restated in Deuteronomy 5:12-15 - therefore they have to observe the Sabbath day.
The writer of Genesis (Moses) had already gone through the experience with God’s saving act towards His people. Moses experienced the felt of being restless. Israel was once being a captive with painful toil, and Moses really knew what it meant. But God had purposed to fulfill his covenant with Abraham whereby he would rescue his descendants from terrible toil in slavery. The nations would find true prosperity, peace and rest in God, as God had fight for them and had given them freedom. God promised them a promised land where the nations can dwell, prosper, and have rest. And when they have those various “rest” days, it reminded them of this God’s saving act, it reminded them that in God they find rest. Now if we go back to Genesis 2, Moses (the writer of Genesis) associated this rest in exodus to God’s rest in genesis. Genesis was written firstly for the Israelites who live in the promised land. Whenever the Israelites reads Genesis on what God did from first day to the sixth day, Israelites will see that their God is supreme, their God is the creator of all; but when they read on the seventh day, they know that He is not just God the Creator, but also God the Redeemer, because in Him they find the true rest. Genesis 2:2-3 become a reflection first of all to the writer of Genesis and to the Israelites; and now also to us all humanity that we can only find rest in Him. Moses most probably saw that what God had done with Israel was the beginning of a restoration of God’s purpose for all humanity. His purpose which dimly seen in the Genesis story (in the garden of eden) was that humanity should live in a relationship with Him, so that they could be blessed. If humanity were one with God the Creator, then they would enter His rest - this is what God’s intent from the beginning. This is the eschatological meaning of the seventh day. Look also from Hebrew 4:9-11, and we will find that the purpose of our life is to be found in the Sabbath-Rest - to enter God’s rest as God also rest. “God, having completed His work of creation, rests, as if to say, ‘This is the destiny of those who are My people; to rest as I rest, to rest in Me.” (Boice)
When we look at the new testament in regards to this “rest”, Jesus came as the fulfilment to this rest. We know that Israelites failed to live up the covenant that God has made, but God is faithful, as we read from Isaiah 11:10 states that God would renew His covenant once again:
“In that day the root of Jesse, who shall stand as a signal for the peoples—of him shall the nations inquire, and his resting place shall be glorious.” (Isaiah 11:10 ESV)
Yes, indeed once again God would send a deliverer for all humanity through His Son, Jesus Christ. And When Jesus came, we read in Matthew 11:28 “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28-30 ESV)
We read on those 2 verses above a fact about Jesus. Who is He? He is the one who will give us rest - the true rest, God Himself. What a glorious promise to a hurting humanity. Jesus was not necessarily promising physical rest, but an eternal and spiritual rest and peace. So we see here the connection between the Old Testament and the New Testament: what is not completely understood in old covenant, progressively being revealed and fulfilled in its final sense through Christ - Jesus is our Sabbath Rest.
For us today, knowing this fact about God’s rest should have a profound implication in our lives.
It should makes us to remember God and His work. Rest become a “sign” for us to remember Him. Rest is a good thing for us, and we need rest both physically and spiritually, and God designed us with that need. We sleep, we eat, we sit, are few actions of “rest”, and all of these should make us remember who we are: that we are so dependent on God. We are weak, but God is strong, and if we are strong it is because God is our deliverer. That also means “Rest” should teach us not to have confident in ourselves, it should teach us to rely on God - that is why Israelites are commanded to rest and not to do any work - because God will bless them. Some people nowadays are so busy and they even who called themselves Christian, does not have time for God, to be in relationship with Him, to spend each day with prayer, to worship together each sunday with our brothers and sisters in Christ, to spend time with God’s family and they just busy with themselves making money, and their own fame. God set the pattern for us 6 days to work and 1 day to rest, to teach us not to rely on ourselves. It does not mean that on 6 days we don’t rely on God, in fact as we know above that our true rest is found in Christ, every day is a rest in Christ. All true blessing comes from his grace, not our labor.
Here is a bit of quote from John Piper:
“The reason that so many people feel it as a burden is partly that we have so much leisure, we don't feel the need for the sabbath rest; but more important, I think, is the fact that not many people really enjoy what God intended us to enjoy on the sabbath, namely, himself. Many professing Christians enjoy sports and television and secular books and magazines and recreation and hobbies and games far more than they enjoy direct interaction with God in his Word or in worship or in reading Christian books or in meditative strolls. Therefore, inevitably people whose hearts are set more on the pleasures of the world than on the enjoyment of God will feel the sabbath command as a burden not a blessing. This is what John says in 1 John 5:3, "For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome." The measure of your love for God is the measure of the joy you get in focusing on him on the day of rest. For most people the sabbath command is really a demand to repent. It invites us to enjoy what we don't enjoy and therefore shows us the evil of hearts, and our need to repent and be changed.“
To conclude, Let us also read the following verses:
“Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.” (Colossians 2:16-17 ESV)
“But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more? You observe days and months and seasons and years! I am afraid I may have labored over you in vain.” (Galatians 4:9-11 ESV)
Those verses above make it clear that Christians are not under obligation to observe the Sabbath as a legal law today, because Jesus fulfilled the purpose and plan of the Sabbath for us and in us (Hebrews 4:9-11). Yet Christians do not lose the Sabbath; every day is a day of rest in the finished work of Jesus Christ. Every day is specially set apart to God. Though we are free from the legal obligation of the Sabbath, we dare not ignore the importance of a day of rest. God has built us so we need one. But we are also commanded to work six days. “He who idles his time away in the six days is equally culpable in the sight of God as he who works on the seventh.” (Clarke)
In Christ,
Paul Hartono
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