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Third Commandment Treasure God's Word When we read the second commandment, it is obvious that the commandment is about God’s name. With the third commandment, it is not so easy to see what the commandment is about. What does God want us to treasure when He tells us to “remember the Sabbath day”? In the Old Testament, God set apart the seventh day of the week. It was a day of rest. The Israelites stopped their ordinary labors to gather as God’s people. Most importantly they came together to hear what God had to say to them. God does not require His New Testament people to meet on a particular day of the week, but He does want us to gather to hear His word, just as His Old Testament people did. It is the word of God that is at the heart of this commandment. God’s word is the precious gift God wants us to use and treasure. Some of the Laws given through Moses passed away with the coming of the Savior. Paul tells us, for example, that the Sabbath day was a shadow of the things to come (Colossians 2:16-17). With the arrival of the Messiah, the shadow has become obsolete. Therefore, meeting on Saturday or any other day is no longer required. When the New Testament repeats a command that was given through Moses, this show us that the command is universal. That is, it is for all people of all times. In the New Testament, we find only the heart of the third commandment, not the outward observance of a day of rest. Jesus said, “Blessed are those who hear the word of God, and keep it” (Luke 11:28; see also Matthew 4:4). Passages like this show us that God wants all people of all time to hear His word. We gather to hear God’s word because it is the one thing that makes us holy in God’s sight (John 15:3). God uses His word to cleanse us of our sins. Nothing else can deliver forgiveness to us. Certainly our own good deeds do not balance the scales of justice. Instead God freely gives us what our Savior won for us on the cross. He passes on to us forgiveness, life and salvation through our weekly worship services. This is why it is so vital that we do not give into the temptation to stop “meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing” (Hebrews 10:25). Luther often commented that the people of his day neglected the word of God. It saddened him that even though the Gospel was finally being proclaimed clearly many people saw little need to hear that Good News. His comments in the Large Catechism sound like they were written yesterday. He points out that people break this command when they “listen to God’s Word as to some entertainment and come to the preaching service merely by the force of habit and leave again with as little understanding of the Word at the end of the year as at the beginning.” He also wrote, “Those conceited individuals are to be similarly rebuked who when they have heard one or two sermons turn up their noses at any more, imagining that they now know it all and need no more instruction.” He warns against apathy and indifference to God’s word because the devil uses this as a means of stealing the word of God away from many people. Knowing God’s word is not so easy as many think. This is because the devil, the world and our flesh tempt us to twist God’s word so it says what we want to hear. And when we remember correctly what God says, it is even more difficult to put that word into practice. Therefore, we gather to hear the word of God often because through this word God gives us the strength to resist temptation. He strengthens us in our faith so we can hold onto the truth and put it into practice. The word bears fruit in our lives because God has promised, “It will not return to me empty, but will ... achieve the purpose for which I sent it” (Isaiah 55:11). |
