God's Sabbath

Would you imagine making something? Don't know if any of you are inventors, but imagine making something. You create it from nothing and you make something. Maybe it's of value. Maybe like, perhaps, Thomas Edison, who actually, they say, made the light bulb more or less. What would you think of an inventor who invented something like Charles Parsons, who invented the turbine engine which powered ships? It was his idea created it. It worked. Someone like Nikola Tesla, who really tamed electricity, per se, necessary for the alternating current that we have today. He was the founder of it. He had these ideas and these projects. Can you imagine someone coming to Edison and telling Edison, you didn't make that right. You didn't really know what you were doing. That's really not a light bulb. And no way Edison's spunk. You've read much about him. He probably would not be in a loss for words. But the same thing happened around 2,000 years ago. Except this happened to a being who not only created the world, but he created the Sabbath. He created the Sabbath day. And he was told, you just don't understand it. And that's where in Mark 2, going to turn there, Mark 2 and verse 27, the disciples were going through a grain field and they got some grain, rubbed it in their hand, put it in their mouth, and ate it. Yet the leaders of that time said, uh-uh, you're wrong. Why, they're harvesting grain. That's a sin. At which Jesus Christ said the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. How did he know? He created it. It was his creation, God's Sabbath. So why was the Sabbath made? Well, the Bible is pretty clear on that, isn't it? Bible is very clear on why the Sabbath was made. Really, you can break it down into two parts. To rest and to worship. Rest and worship. That's it. It's pretty simple. It's good for mankind, physically, because we are restored to a better, stronger state. Spiritually, we are to be restored to a better, stronger state, which is great for mankind, if only more understood that. Spiritually, we hopefully grasp the purpose and meaning of the Sabbath day. Christ was referencing that the Sabbath in Mark 2, in verse 27, and many times in the Scriptures, he's referencing that the Sabbath wasn't about a list of things that the nation of Judah had come up with to make themselves holy, because that's what they've done. I think it was Paul Simon many years ago, had a song, 50 Ways to Leave Your Lover. Well, the Jews came up with 631 ways to break the Sabbath. 631 things you could do that would break the Sabbath. That's not what the Sabbath was intended for. See, they actually were worshipping the day, and the day they created in their image. See, the main reason for the conflict when the Creator walked among us was the Hebrew creators were failing to worship God in here. It wasn't a matter of the heart. They were failing to worship God in here, and also out there. By the way, they lived their lives. It's not what they were about. They made sure that everyone knew who they were, and how important they were, and how righteous they were. Humility was not in their vocabulary.

I guess that's why Christ is so known to say, in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrine the commandments of men. Because that's what so many things were. Why they were on him so much about the Sabbath. They chastised him. They corrected him, and he created the Sabbath.

They even went so far as to have just the proper way of washing your hands. If it was not done their way, you were considered unclean. They didn't have running water except the streams, but they had pails or pans that everyone would wash their hands before they ate. Like, very simple, little bowl, wash their hands. But that wasn't the correct way, because you didn't do it the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the scribes way. The proper way, and the only way to wash your hands, according to them, was you were to take the bowl, wash your hands all the way up your elbow. And then you were to shake off in the bowl. And then you were to take your hands and put them just like this. And then someone would come and pour water down from the top, and you had to turn your elbow just so, so that the water would come down and wash your arm and drip off your elbow. Both hands. Any other way was improper, unlawful. He was even corrected about how he washed his hands, because in their vision, the water came down and it washed all this. After they'd already washed it this way, then it came down and washed your hand this way, so that when you lowered your hand, nothing impure came from the rest of your arm down to your fingers, where it might touch the face. Monotonous, yes. But that's what he had to contend with. But back to the Sabbath question, do you rest on the Sabbath? Do you worship on the Sabbath? On the Sabbath. Those are the two things laid out for us. And what do you mean, rest? Lay in bed all day? Well, you might if you're sick. Or perhaps you may just get a few extra hours of sleep that you don't normally get. No one I know gets to rest at work. Maybe you have, I never had a job where I could rest at work. Two opposite things, rest and work. The title of the sermon is God's Sabbath. Because it's His. He created it. He owns it. And if you really think about it, this may cause some deep thinking. Because it's really hard to picture with our puny little minds. Time did not exist before the original Sabbath week. Time was eternal. And in the future, time will also be eternal to all the spirit beings. Our destiny. Time, we will someday be able to grasp a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years like a day. Because really, we can't understand that. I'm 54 years old. If somebody said, well, a day is like 54 years of age, I'm gonna go, I can't grasp that. It's taken me 54 years to get this much gray hair.

How is that like one day? How is a thousand years?

You study the stars, and the light we see from the stars are anywhere from thousands to hundreds of thousands, even millions years old by the time we see it. Can you really picture that?

You know, they're that far away. Space and time. The Hubble telescope now is out in space. And the last pictures it sent back to us as it is far into space, bringing these pictures back, they are now, it is now taking pictures of the universe, or the light in front of it, and the Hubble telescope is 13.8 billion years old.

Can you grasp that?

It's hard for us to understand all these things. I'd like you to turn to Isaiah 55. Isaiah 55, verse 6. I love 6 through 9, very unique scriptures. Isaiah 55, verse 6, says, Seek the Lord while he may be found. Call upon him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts. Let him return to the Lord, and he will have mercy on him and to our God. For he will, what? I love this one. Abundantly pardon. Boy, when you realize how many times you slip up during the day, you pray in the morning, get the slate clean, and then pray in the evening, and you realize, the sins of omission and commission. For he will abundantly pardon, and I'm thankful that he abundantly pardons. But then, verse 8 says, For my thoughts, this is God saying this, God says, My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor your ways my ways. For as the heavens, three heavens, right? Clouds, stars, God, three levels of heaven. We see the clouds, first heaven, see the stars. Second, God's throne, he said, the third. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.

We are pathetic, puny humans. I'm definitely one. But I'm not intelligent enough to improve on God's instructions.

Never have been, never will be.

See, God understood his creation, what we needed, what we didn't need. And then he thought it was necessary that we needed some choices. So he lets us choose to build that character so that we can make the decisions of our own. But, you know, some people have actually said, well, we just are hereby fiat. And they're actually excited about the Hubble telescope, because it's sending back these pictures, which now are rated at 13.8 billion years ago. They're seeing what the universe was like. And so they know somewhere close, maybe within the next year or two years, they will actually get to see what is perceived as the Big Bang. So their thought is, we can see how the universe was created. Yes. I'll be waiting for that one. Because we're not smart enough. As a matter of fact, I was reading a book the other day, and reading is very deep. It's a book I picked up that said, God According to God. It's a book I picked up that said, God According to God. A scientist discovers we've been wrong all about God all along. And it's actually MIT physicist and author of the science of God, as he takes his brain, which is a lot smarter than this brain, and he puts it down because he came to the realization that science, all it does is prove God. But not that it doesn't exist, and he can bring it down into ways you've never even, you can't even comprehend what the scientists can. But he actually brings out the fact that for everything to be random, a random order, as so many scientists believe, that it just happened and we've evolved, and everything just happens to be the way that they are. It is. He explains here, as he calls it, the nominal doubling pattern, and that he shows that all the planets are amazingly in line by distance from the sun, and that they all exist, and Mercury's like 58 million kilometers from the sun, and then Venus is like around 108, almost double kilometers from the sun, and then Mars is almost double, about 220 million kilometers, and then it shows the asteroid belt that's in there, which takes up twice the space, and then you have Jupiter then you have Jupiter, which is a 780, Saturn, which is 14, and yeah, the next planet, which is 28, and the amazing part of this is it all fits except Earth, and it's as if Earth was moved in between Venus and Mars, because it doesn't fit. If there was random, it should have been doubled just like the others, but it isn't. It's just at the right distance that human life can exist on this planet. It's like it was just put there just for life, because none of the other planets were found can support life. Now, I don't want to bog anybody down, but I just want you to see, because it doesn't take much to see how great and how powerful and what an amazing job and how just amazing God we have. And I don't want to be like Job. I don't want to be called Job, too, where Job questioned God about certain things, and God says, well, Job, where were you when I laid the foundations of the world?

So I want to look at something today from one individual's perspective. That individual was a man by the name of Isaiah. Isaiah was a prophet. Isaiah was a royal descent.

Isaiah was a man of God. And Isaiah, he had a very long and close relationship with God. And so I want to look at God's Sabbath day through the writings of Isaiah, because, frankly, I had not done this before I went through it. I worked on the sermon right after the recent tabernacles. And I can honestly say after studying this that Isaiah had an up close and personal relationship with God. See, Isaiah was a prophet for over 60 years in Jerusalem, the nation of Judah. And he saw during his time, he was about 30 years old when he became a prophet. And he lived to be 90 when he was finally killed by King Manasseh, who, according to tradition, actually put him in a log and then saw the log in too at 90 years of age. But he actually saw the northern kingdom fall to Assyria and actually prophesied against them. Told them what was going to happen, but they would not pay any attention. And the amazing thing about that I think about Isaiah is he's most like the New Testament writers. He mentions Jesus Christ more than any other Old Testament prophet or writer. He has an understanding and actually really can see the kingdom of God. And you can too through his writings. He's arguably the greatest visionary in the Old Testament. Daniel's up there, but when you study Isaiah, you realize just what God could teach him. And that last 27 chapters of his 66 chapters in Isaiah all talked about the future and what we should be, what we will be when the kingdom of God is here on earth.

I like to turn because Isaiah was to address a nation similar to this one. This one. A stiff-necked people, descendants of the church in the wilderness and like the church in the world today. A lot of them knew the Sabbath. They just had a more intelligent, better way to keep the Sabbath, God's Sabbath. But God needed a person who would be willing to say the hard things that need to be said. So if you will, I'd like you to turn back to Isaiah 6. Isaiah chapter 6. We see what a visionary was. Isaiah 6 verse 1 says, In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up. So he was given a vision like most people have not even dreamed about. He was given a vision of what it's like at the throne of God. And he saw the Lord high and lifted up, and the train of his road filled the entire temple because God does dwell in a spiritual temple in the third half. And that's why the physical temple, another sermon totally, that was built down here, was a model of replica of the one that was up there. Still is. But in verse 2 it says, Above it, the throne of God, stood seraphim, angels, and one, each one had six wings. With two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and two he flew. And one cried to another, Holy, Holy, Holy, three times, the Hebrew superlative of the holiest of all. Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him, who cried out, and the house was then filled with smoke. Then I said, Whoa is me, for I am destroyed, because I am a man of unclean lips. I dwell in the midst of the people of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the King. So he realized when he came and saw the holiness of God, he saw he was at the throne, he saw this seraphim, I'm sure he saw the millions of angels that were there, and he realized, I am a sinner. What am I doing here in this presence of all this holiness? And he's humble enough, and I'm sure we would be too, because you can see through different parts of the Bible when these angels would actually show up at different times. Most men would hit their knees, because they realized, oh, I'm in the presence of something. I'm not even able to comprehend.

Verse 6, Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a live coal, which he had taken with the tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth as it, and behold, this has touched your lips. Your iniquity is taken away, and your sins purged symbolic of how they used to sacrifice animals and what it was done and how it took a sacrifice. But those coals represent the holiness of God, so they touched his lips, and he was automatically cleaned.

And then verse 8, Also, I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send? And who will go for us? Do what? Proclaim God's words. Teach the people. Proclaim the gospel, the good news of the coming kingdom of God, the righteousness that we need to be striving for now. Who's going to send? Then Isaiah said, Here I am. Here I am, send me. Kind of like going and visiting a store that sells puppies, and you always get these little puppies running around, and when you walk by, there's always one going, Pick me, pick me. You know, there's always, Oh, I want to go, I want to go. This is what he was like. This is Isaiah. He was pumped. He felt good. He realized he'd been cleansed. He was in the, he was viewing holiness, and he said, Send me. And he said, Go and tell the people. Go and tell the people. Tell the people what? Let's look at the part of that message as he addresses the Sabbath for God. And I hope you realize that we must believe 2 Timothy 3 and verse 16. Should be a memory scripture, right? It was written about the Word of God, not only old, but new. And so all scripture is given by the inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, right? Reproof, correction, and instruction in righteousness. So we're going to look at Isaiah telling the people 2,500 years ago, because the same message hasn't changed today. What God wants them to know and learn. So let's go to Isaiah 1. So, if you'll turn to the first book of Isaiah. Isaiah chapter 1. This is the message that he was to start out saying. This is what he was saying, send me. Well, this is his message to the people. In verse 2, Hear, O heavens, and give ear over earth, for the Lord has spoken. The Lord has said, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have what? Repelled. They have rebelled against me. The ox knows its owners and the donkey its master's crib. But Israel does not know. My people do not consider. Alas, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a brood of evildoers, children who are corrupt. They have forsaken the Lord. They have provoked to anger the Holy One of Israel. They have turned away, what? Backward. They have turned away from God. Back. They're just like, I don't want. I don't even want to look at God. I don't want to see anything about it. I'm going to go my own way.

Now, rebelled.

Chapter 1, verse 13. Part of this preaching he is doing. And God tells to the people of that time who were supposed to be worshiping him, bring me no more futile sacrifices. Incense is an abomination to me. The new moons, the Sabbath, and the callous of assemblies. I cannot endure iniquity or sin. That's what iniquity is. Sin. And your sacred meetings. Your new moons and your appointed feast. My soul hates. They are a trouble to me. I am weary of bearing them. So we have iniquity on the Sabbath. Something's wrong. Their sin, not only on the holy days, but on the Sabbath. It's the way they're living. And their younger sister got captured and dispersed into the rest of the world when Israel was taken by a serial. And one of the main reasons God gives for that, or going into captivity, is the breaking of the Sabbath and the holy days. He makes that clear time and time and time again. The Sabbath was made for them. It is made for us to do what? To rest and to worship.

And what's happened? So let's go over to Isaiah 56. Part of his message. Isaiah 56.

Isaiah 56 and verse 1. That says the Lord. Okay, God's speaking here. And he says, keep justice and do righteousness. Do righteousness. It's something we do. How we act, that's righteousness. You're either righteous or you're not. Right? Okay. For my salvation is about to come and my righteousness is to be revealed. Blessed is the man who is the man who does this and the son of man who lays hold on him. That means you're living righteously. And then he says that blessed man does what? Who keeps from defiling the Sabbath? Who keeps from defiling the Sabbath? Defiling the Sabbath.

It's actually the Hebrew word is kalah, which actually means polluting. You may find another translation. Polluting the Sabbath, profaning the Sabbath, and it means to defile, to wound. Okay? Who would we wound on the Sabbath? Do you see? It's a wound to God because He gave it to us. It's His gift. He made it. It's special because it's that tie to Him. It is a sign between me and my people, the Scriptures tell us. And actually the root word for kalah actually means to make sick, to make sick. See, to profane means to violate, to desecrate, which is the opposite of respect.

I have a picture. Except for the moment I didn't even ask my wife this morning. I took a picture. It's the only picture I've ever had of my mother-in-law. That's Mary's mother when she was, what, 19. And we've had this picture ever since we were married. And because her mother died when she was 14 years of age, it's special because it's the only way, only connection, other than reading some of her writings I've ever had.

And this is special because there's not a lot of pictures of her mother looking at all the animals. And so this is a very special picture. It's precious to her. Now, what would you think if I went and got a can of black spray paint and just sprayed all over? If I defiled the picture, if I polluted this picture, what would she think? What does God think about His Sabbath when we do that? How much more would that mean? Isaiah 56 and verse 3.

Look at what these words say because you have to remember, this is unique. This is unique teaching. Hello, Jonathan. How are you, Lisa? Nice to have you guys. Good to have you here. You'll know about Sabbath and never ever forget it, will you? Nope. I don't think your parents are over let you forget that.

But it says here in verse 3, do not let the Son of the foreigner, who has joined himself to the Lord, speak, saying, the Lord has utterly separated me from His people. Because you see, back when they were the tribes coming out of Egypt, He said, don't let the foreigners come in. Why He was trying to preserve them?

Because they were so corrupted by Egypt. God, He was trying to keep that from happening. He said, don't let them do that. Well, we saw it didn't make any difference when you study the history, because what did they do? He kept them separate, but they just kept jumping over and joining the world. And so here we see the Lord shows that He cares more about the spiritual state than the outward physical state.

So He has modified things somewhat, because He just wants people to worship Him. That's it! All He asks is just worship Him His way, so that He's going to love us with all His heart, His soul, mind, and people. And He asks us to do the same. And He chose these people. He wanted them to do it. And what happened? Most did not. So He says, here's a foreigner who's actually joined himself to the Lord. And so He says, fine, come on!

And then He says here, nor let the eunuch say, here am I a dry tree, for thus says the Lord. Because you could go back, and there's Deuteronomy 25 somewhere in 2325. I can't remember which one, but it talks about eunuchs. Oh, if you're a eunuch, you cannot be in with the people of God. Now, come into the temple and worship Him. He's changed that. Because He found, as He often said to Judah and Israel, you know, you have now, you're worse than the nations that I replaced in this place.

You've become so corrupt. And so He's saying, I just want people to worship me. Just think about the eunuchs. How about Daniel? How about Meshach, Shadrach, and Abednego? Okay. They serve God. They were eunuchs. How about the Ethiopian eunuch that was baptized?

You see, it's here. It's here. That's what God wanted. He keeps talking about the heart to Israel. But pretty soon, it's all about how they want to worship Him. They make their rules. It says, for thus says the Lord, to the eunuchs who keep my Sabbath, and choose what pleases me, and hold fast my covenant, even to them I will give in my house, and within my walls a place, and a name better than that of sons and daughters. I will give them an everlasting name that shall never be cut off. Who keep my Sabbath, and choose what pleases me. That's what He wants. That's what He wants from us. But it says, to keep my Sabbath, which I keep in the Hebrew, is Shemar. And we talked about that, I don't know, a year and a half ago when I gave two or three Sabbaths from me. But Shemar means to hedge about with thorns, to build a hedge around the Sabbath, to keep the world out. But it means to guard, it means to protect, attend to, preserve, regard highly. But that's what He wants us to do with the Sabbath. And He's saying this eunuch. He's not saying, oh, I only want this nation, this nation. No, He's called the all nations of the world. And that's what John 3 16 tells. For God so loved the entire world that He gave His only Son. That whoever, no matter where you're from, who you are, may have eternal life. That's the plan of God. But to guard and to protect. And I think about that. I think how special that is to God, because that's His Sabbath. And I think about that.

And I think about this wine glass.

And it's a nice wine glass. It's a little dirty. You can wash it. But it's interesting because you can actually tell crystal.

Making sure that it's fine. And somebody gave you something like this. Wouldn't you say, yeah, I want to keep it? And so you would, if you had to store it, you would do what? Well, might just make sure you wrapped it. You know, wrapped it real good. Like this. And you would make sure maybe you can put it in a bag like this. Wrap it up so maybe it can get broken. And then you have these little things in here, little peanuts that you'd make sure as you strive to keep that. Then you would try to make sure, actually, make sure you packaged it good and made sure that it didn't get broken. And then you'd make sure. You wouldn't just drop it on the floor, would you? You wouldn't just stop on it!

Would you?

Brethren, you and I have done this at times to God's seven. It is special to Him. And we have trampled on it. We have stepped on it. We have polluted it. And it's His. And it's special.

And it's a gift. Down in verse 6. And He says, Also the sons of the foreigner, who's that? Remember Ruth? Remember Ruth, who joined God's nation? Who joined themselves to the Lord to do what? To serve Him. To serve Him. And to love the name of the Lord, to be His servants. Isn't that amazing? That's all He wants. Someone to love Him, right? And to serve Him. And then what does it say? To be His servants. Everyone who keeps from devouring the Sabbath. Jonathan's right. Everyone keeps from defiling the Sabbath. See, common tasks are done during the week. We all do our common tasks. But there's nothing common about God's Sabbath. He calls it kadesh. Holy. Sanctified. He said foreigners joined themselves to the Lord to do what? To serve Him. That's why God says, I tried. Israel, I tried. He rejected me. I just want people who will worship me. So how do we serve God on the Sabbath? How do we serve God? Well, it's simple. Exodus 20 and verse 8, 10 commandments, right? What does it say? Don't do stuff. Physical stuff. Don't do your stuff. Okay, pretty simple. Don't work, worship. Don't work, worship. And then he goes in Isaiah 58. We can jump over there.

Isaiah 58. Very, very concise words by Isaiah. As he's wrapping up his book, he's just not finishing his book here, but this is what he's been telling the nation. This is all through the book of Isaiah. It's a wonderful read. Well, he's talked about the Sabbath. He's talked about the Sabbath. He's talked about the Sabbath, and now what's he doing? He's finishing up talking about the Sabbath. And in Isaiah 58 and verse 13, in case there's ever been any doubt, he gives us one verse to make it crystal clear how to keep God's Sabbath day holy.

Ten commandments. Fourth commandment. It's pretty important. It's number four. It has to do with God. Ties us to Him. But here's what he says. If you turn away your foot from the Sabbath day, from the Sabbath. Okay, what does that mean? If you turn your foot, your foot, you have control. You turn your foot. It's on you. You're the one that does this.

It says, from doing your pleasure on who? Look at the words. Look at the pronoun. My holy day. My holy day. See, this is holy to Him. That's what the big deal is about the Sabbath. It's holy to God. That's why it's so important.

From doing your pleasure on my holy day. Your pleasure is about who? You. Your pleasure is about you. What you want to do? Your pleasure. A book you want to read. Okay? Because the one thing we're not going to do, we don't do in United, is make a list of things that you should and shouldn't do. I don't, we don't want to be like the Pharisees. We're not going to have 631 things that you cannot do on the Sabbath. But we're going to give you what God tells us in His book, which is enough. And then you have to apply the Holy Spirit. Apply what God wants you to do and understand God.

I used to love to read, still read, read a lot. I love to read. I always like to read. Except I didn't always read books like this. Okay? Something stimulate my mind. I was a John Gresham band. I don't know if any of you read John Gresham, but I like John Gresham books. And I would read them and read them. So I look forward to the Sabbath day. Go to church. Come back from church. Okay, let me grab my John Gresham book. What happened to the hedge? Hedge about with thorns? I just stepped over the hedge and grabbed my book. Okay. Your pleasure. It's what you want to do. Hey, there's a TV show you want to see. Is it your pleasure? You have to answer those questions. Because it's sad about the time where you spend more time on Facebook than the good book. Okay. You spend more time on Facebook than you do in the good book. That's happened.

I've known people who've watched ballgames. It's sad. It's their pleasure. I know a minister one time that actually told my brother and some others that were there on Sabbath as it was ending. And there was 20 minutes to go for the Sabbath. Oh, we'll just watch the last of this ballgame because it's okay. Maybe for him, not for me. You have to make those decisions.

Movies, parties. I've had to make those decisions. Birthday parties. Somebody say, well, I want to go. It's, you know, it's just a birthday party. Well, I have to look at Jesus Christ being my who I will marry, the church. I look at him as God is pleasing him. The same thing, I try to talk to God and say, well, God, really, I'm going to go to this birthday party. That's only going to take an hour or two out of Sabbath. Not a problem for me. And I have to think about him. How would I like to turn to Mary? And say, Mary, you know, that old girlfriend that I almost married back 30 years ago, she's having a birthday party. I'm just going to go. And now, now, now, you don't need to go. You aren't invited. It's me. I don't think Mary go. Oh, good. You go. She might say, oh, you go. Well, I look at God, too. And I look at that and I look, look at him and I want to please him. I want to serve him. So these things have to go through our minds. We have to decide.

Not just everyone doing what's right in their own eyes, but look through God's eyes. And it says, and called the Sabbath a delight, which actually means pleasant. The actual root word means soft. Soft. That's what the, that's what the delight means. And you have to realize from the Middle East, there was nothing soft in the desert. They didn't have a nice, you know, beds like we have now that we go, oh, that's a soft pillow. A soft bed. It's something they were describing that was delightful to have. The Holy Day of the Lord, honorable, and shall honor him. See, God does not want us keeping the Sabbath because we're told to. He wants us to keep the Sabbath because we want to, and we see the delight in it. And it is an incredible time, as it's not doing your own ways, nor finding your own pleasure, nor speaking your own words. Let's look at that as we wrap this sermon up. Doing your own ways. People working, what? On the Sabbath. I have this issue in the Caribbean now, having to deal with it, because people are saying, but I'm doing good. I'm doing good. Have a policeman. I'm doing good. I'm a nurse. Say I'm doing good. A doctor. What about a farmer? The farmer could actually say, well, wait a minute, I got to grow crops. Otherwise, I'm doing good. Otherwise, the world dies. They need my food. I could have looked at it when I had a construction company for 20 years and said, wait a minute, I'm doing nothing but good because I'm helping these people because there's a lot of crooks out there. We can all do that, but we have to answer to the Creator. You don't answer to me. You answer to Him, the Maker of the Sabbath. That's what it's about. That's my purpose in the sermon is to make you realize it's God's Sabbath, not the United Churches of God. Then I hear the excuse in the Caribbean, well, but the Seventh-day Adventists do it. We're not Seventh-day Adventists. A lot of those are most of us keeping Christmases here. You want to keep Christmases? See, you've got to come notice. It's simple, and He explains it. Acts is 20. Verse 8, don't work worship. How much plainer can God make it? It says, nor finding your own pleasure. So I must ask, what's our pleasure? Are we really pleased, content, and confident with our study of the book? I realize when I want to read something else, oh, wait a minute, there's a lot. I still need to do some reading here. This is my instruction book. My instruction, man. You know, fishing relaxes me. I haven't been fishing in a long time, but, boy, when I used to go, I was so relaxing, I guess, because I wasn't a very good fisherman. I sat on the shore all the time to give weight. So, can we go fishing? See, those are things that you have to answer. I'm not going fishing. That's me. Is God content with our study of his book? Because what? Because we're training? We're apprentices. We're interns. We're interning in this world for the next world to rule the world. We're not just there to, oh, well, we're just going to show up. We're interning to help rule the world with our father and our elder brother. That's why it's important this time. And it says, nor speaking your own words. If God says not to speak your own words, then whose words are we speaking? Guts. That's what Jonathan said. Guts! If we're not speaking our words, then who are we supposed to speak on Sabbath by who? Guts. He's going to take my place here in a few years.

You'd be amazed what comes out of people's mouths on the Sabbath. Now, the abundance of the what? Heart? Mouth speaks? Maybe we need to start looking at some heart transplants. Turn those hearts towards God as He wanted.

We're called a royal priesthood, a kingdom of priests. That's what we're interning for. So you bust your tails all week. Work. Stuff at home. Life. Stuff. The Sabbath is supposed to be different. The Sabbath was made to be different. Okay? Some stuff we still have to do for life, but it's made to be different. So someone asked me to do this, so I'll do this real quick in the last three minutes. Someone asked me in the Caribbean, could you just care to give me your basic Sabbath Christian checklist? I had to think about it. In fact, I had to put some of this stuff together on the plane, flying back because that's something I hadn't entered my mind. And so I have this checklist of seven things. The first is prayer. Now, I pray every day, but what's different about the Sabbath? Longer. Longer prayer. Praying for things that I usually, sometimes I'm busy and I'm out the door or phone call, this, this, this, this, this, and I can't do this, but during the Sabbath, if I rest on the Sabbath, I have time to longer prayer. The second is extra study. On the Sabbath, that's one of my checklists. Number two was the Sabbath. On the Sabbath, I have extra good study, as I put it, because sometimes you can just read a book and you just, okay, you don't even know five minutes later what you read. That's one of the blessings of the Sabbath. The third is extra rest. What about that extra hour or two of sleep that you don't normally get? It's a good way to get that rest. And there's services. I want to be of services. I want to be with my family. Okay? The Holy Spirit, same Father. Then number five on my checklist is family. I want extra time. Mary and I may have more of a sit-down meal than we ever have. Because we're on the go or she's on the go. We're doing this or that. It gives time, maybe, to take a longer walk. To walk by the beach if you're by the beach on the Sabbath. These are the things to enhance your Sabbath. Basic checklist. And number six is meditation. Hopes and dreams. Most people don't even have the time to sit and spend 10 minutes or even 30 minutes sitting somewhere looking out at the ocean just dreaming. And then finally, fellowship. We're iron sharp and diamond. Maybe it's time to call someone on a basic checklist. But you're worried about it. Isaiah taught it. He lived it. Will we? Isaiah closes the book in his last chapter in 66. Actually, he says he shall come to pass from one month to another. And from one Sabbath to another, all flesh shall come and worship me on the Sabbath day. God's Sabbath. It's a gift. Let's treasure it. Let's not stomp on it, trample on it, let's admire, honor its maker. Let's keep, let's all of us strive to keep God's Sabbath holy.