Stop And Rest, Fevered Child 

Lent 3, March 3, 2024 

Exodus 20:1-17

Grace, mercy, and peace from God our heavenly Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The text is from the Ten Commandments: 

"Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy."

1. In the Third Commandment, we struggle with whether we should be concerned with the Ten Commandments at all. 

It's right here in this Third Commandment that Christians really struggle with whether they should be concerned with the Ten Commandments at all. That was the Old Testament, That was the Law, and aren't we under grace? And didn't even St.Paul say, "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.(Col 2:16)?

      2. Original sin causes us confusion and struggle to understand the true meaning of the Third Commandment.

The fact that we fallen sinners find that God's Ten Commandments condemn us has no bearing on the fact that those Commandments are wonderful. 

The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul: the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple; the precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart: the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes: the fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever: the rules of the Lord are true, and righteous altogether. ( PS 19:7-9)

It was suspicion of God's love that was the original sin, and that same genetic defect that we all share still suspects that those Commandments come from a hard God, as if the Torah were one thing and the loving Jesus another altogether. Enter confusion and struggle. 

So some confused Christians say, "Well, as Christians, we retain the moral law, but not the ceremonial law." But having only one God (1st Commandment) is not a moral issue.  It's a faith issue. That's beyond who's right and who's wrong. It's about who's tired. Who's hungry? Who's thirsty? Who longs for the courts of the living God?

Perhaps we can better understand this commandment by looking closely at the words themselves. 

"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy." The first word is the easiest. It doesn't mean simply "to recall." In Hebrew, remember means much more than "recall," but even in our language, it does. "Did you remember my prescription? Means, "Did you pick up my prescription? it's just as obvious that nobody would come up to me  with a straight face after missing church for eight weeks in a row and say, "Pastor, I just want you to know that right before I hit my snooze alarm, I remember, yup, it's the Sabbath all right." No. Everyone knows that remember means "observe, keep, do."

But the word Sabbath isn't quite as obvious. For one thing, Sabbath does not mean "Saturday." It doesn't even mean "seventh," Yes, it was the seventh day on which the Lord instituted the Sabbath in Israel on the lunar calendar, but our solar week is completely different. Our seventh day isn't even called the same thing as theirs, and besides, the word Sabbath means the same thing no matter how you measure weeks. 

Sabbath means "stop." Israel was to stop work for one day. To imitate the Lord God, who stopped after creating the world in six days, and to be with God, their Creator and Savior. To remember, once a week, together, what they were doing on this earth, to come to an oasis from the storm of busyness and distraction- it was for them. That's why Jesus said, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (MK 2:27). It wasn't an extra duty; it was a break from duty. But even understood correctly, "These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ" (Col 2:17). 

So why are we even talking about Sabbath? Why talk about stopping? Jesus has fulfilled the Law. Jesus swallows up every prophecy and type, the age of fulfillment is here, so why talk about stopping? What does this commandment have to do with you? Why should you observe a stop day? 

To keep it holy. 

Holy is an underrated word! Translated into popular opinion: "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it boring."  "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it no fun whatsoever." What does holy mean when you come right down to it? "Sacred." Oh, that's a big help!

We often hear holy defined as "set apart." Set apart for God. But that can also be misleading. So, it is that what it means when the Bible says God is Holy? He's set apart? It doesn't tell me anything except what God isn't. Maybe that's why when people stop coming to church, and when we ask, "What's wrong?" they say, "I'm good, I'm fine." They think being set apart is being lonely, so they stay away. They stay set apart. Not apart with God. Just aoart. They only know what they aren't. It's not what they wanted. It was never what God wanted.

When the Bible says, "God is holy," the Bible never says God is set apart from anything good.If by holy you mean he's set apart from everything damaged by sin, then he's set apart, because God is totally pure from sin. If by holy you mean he's set apart from all creaturely limitations, then he's set apart, because he is free from fever and terrors of the night. God is completely clean, completely good, and completely well.

What it boils down to is that God is free from anything that causes death. God is totally alive. That's what holy means. The Lord is surrounded by living beings-living beings, they're called, who cover their faces because they can't look upon him who is so alive! we could translate this command, Observe the stop day, to keep it totally alive, because the Lord blessed the stop day and made it totally. alive." "God made the stop day for human beings, not human beings for the stop day." This keeps the day totally alive, especially in the Divine Liturgy, in which all the words we speak and all the words we hear are God's own words, and his words are spirit and they are life. And when we receive the bread of life, we have life in us. Stop. Take, eat. Take, drink. Stop. Hear him tell you again, "Your sins are forgiven." Stop. He will restore to you the joy of his salvation and uphold you with his free Spirit. 

    3. Properly understood, God's Sabbath is for him to stop our fevered terrors, bring us into the real world, and hold us. 

Ever see a fevered child with night terrors? You must wake them and get them to stop. Our Son Josh had night terrors. You must bring them out into the real world, away from the dark horror in their head. You wake them, comfort them, and hold them. God has a world of lost children with night terrors. His Sabbath is to make it stop, to bring you into the real world, to hold you. 

The Third Commandment is an invitation to Real Life. 

The more we study this command and the Ten Commandments as a whole, the less and less they sound like hard demands and more and more like invitations to live! After all, are they not all commands to love? There is no confusion between the God of Sinai and our Savior. He is one and the same."I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of egypt, out of the house of slavery."

     4.  After the High Sabbath, when God the crucified rested in the tomb, every day can be the stop day from terror and for rest. 

The mind-bender happens on the Sabbath when the bread and wine are unveiled, and we sing, "Holy holy, holy, Lord" (LSB p. 161) because the very life of God is coming into these dying mouths. All because God, totally alive, finished his work, not of the old creation, but of the new creation. St. John writes, 

 "After this, Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished, in order that the Scripture be fulfilled, said, 'I thirst!' Now a vessel full of sour wine was sitting there; and they filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on hyssop, and put it to his mouth. So when Jesus has received the sour wine, he said, 'it is finished!' And bowing his head, he handed over the Spirit. Therefore, because it was the Preparation Day, that the bodies should not remain on the cross on the Sabbath(for that Sabbath was the high day), the Jews asked Pilate that their legs be broken, and that they might be taken away"

That Sabbath was the high day. It's that Sabbath, that high day, that we keep holy. We believe one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church, and the apostles have told us that God has chosen that foolish Sabbath to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen that weak Sabbath to put to shame the things that are mighty; that base Sabbath of a despised corpse-God had chosen!We rest in Jesus because Jesus rested after he had done his work of salvation.

After that Sabbath, when God the crucified, rested in the tomb from all his work, when he made that day holy by taking your sins away, and blessed it by pronouncing you innocent, any child of God baptized into the Sabbath can make any day the stop day, and it's always holy. "There remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God' (Heb 4:9). It is Jesus. "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy Laden, and I will give you rest" (Mt 11:28). 

    5.  On Sunday, then, the Lord of the Sabbath says, "Stop for a while, fevered child. Let me hold you." 

Why Sunday, then? That he might come into this upper room, the doors being shut-holy Jesus, the Lord of Sabbath, totally alive from the dead, flesh and blood, saying, "Peace be with you. I'm glad you remembered. Don't be afraid. Stop for a while, fevered child. Let me hold you.' Amen.