Deuteronomy 5:12-15 Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the LORD your God has commanded you.… I. THE SINS FORBIDDEN. 1. The omission of the duties required. This is a casting away a great prize put into our hands. 2. The careless performance of holy duties; that is, when our hearts are not engaged in them, or we content ourselves with a form of godliness, denying the power there of. 3. When we profane the day by idleness. II. THE REASONS ANNEXED. 1. It is highly reasonable that we should sanctify the Lord's day, since He is pleased to allow us six days out of seven for the attending to our worldly affairs, and reserves but one to Himself. 2. Another reason annexed to enforce our observation of the Sabbath day is taken from God's challenging a special propriety in it: thus it is called the Sabbath day of the Lord thy God, a day which He has consecrated or separated to Himself, and so lays claim to it. Therefore it is no less than sacrilege, or a robbing of Him, to employ it in anything but what He requires to be done therein. 3. God sets His own example before us for our imitation therein. 4. The last reason assigned for our sanctifying the Sabbath is taken from God's blessing and sanctifying it, or setting it apart for a holy use. To bless a day is to give it to us as a particular blessing and privilege; accordingly we ought to reckon the Sabbath as a great instance of God's care and compassion to men, and a very great privilege, which ought to be highly esteemed by them. Again, for God to sanctify a day is to set it apart from a common to a holy use; and thus we ought to reckon the Sabbath as a day signalised above all others with the character of God's holy day; and as such, it is to be employed by us in holy exercises, answerable to the end for which it was instituted. (Thomas Ridglet, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee.WEB: "Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as Yahweh your God commanded you. |
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