Lord of the Sabbath

Scripture: Matthew 12:1-8

Song: Redeemed

When the disciples of Jesus picked grain on the Sabbath, the Pharisees accused them of breaking the Sabbath. They ignored the spirit of the Law in making their criticisms. The Sabbath law restricted men from working to make a profit, from doing chores, from doing work that showed ingratitude or irreverence for God. The disciples did none of these things. Their work was incidental. In fact they’d been busy doing the bidding of God.

The Sabbath had a three-fold significance: (1) it was a day of rest from man’s toil, and so a reprieve from part of sin’s curse, (2) it identified men with God who also rested on the seventh day from His work of creation, (3) it foreshadowed the rest that men would ultimately enjoy from sin itself, and in perfect fellowship with God.

Jesus proclaimed Himself Lord of the Sabbath. He came not to break the Sabbath nor to abolish it. He came to fulfill it. Just as Jesus fulfilled the animal sacrifices in becoming the perfect sin offering, just as He fulfilled the purpose of the temple when He tabernacled in the flesh, and just as He fulfilled the Levitical priesthood by becoming our perfect High Priest, so He fulfilled the Sabbath by providing the perfect rest from sin and alienation that the Sabbath had only foreshadowed.

There is no Sabbath Day under the New Covenant. The Lord’s Day is certainly God’s day of worship, but it’s not His Sabbath. Jesus fulfilled the Sabbath so that every day is a day of rest for the believer.

Jason Moore