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Thursday, April 10. 2008The Forgotten Commandment
When we gave up on the 4th commandment, we opened the door to a great, exponential, downward slide... because we gave up on something that was so clearly, manifestly mandated by God. - Alistair Begg (1952-present)
A man shall show his heart and life, what they are, more by one Lord's Day than by all the days of the week besides. To delight ourselves in God's service upon His Holy Day gives a better proof of a sanctified nature than to grudge at the coming of such days. - John Bunyan (1628-1688) It is not too much to say that we almost, if not, owe the blessings we enjoy to the Lord's day. Without it there is no true Christianity. And without Christianity there is no real lasting spiritual blessing. That we in our generation [at least a generation ago], are in danger of losing this day altogether, few serious minded men or women will dispute. In our day the Lord's day is not so much argued about anymore. People simply ignore it. We are living in perilous times. A mock Christianity, with its vile breed of atheism, modernism, and immorality is the religion of the vast majority of our people. If this mock Christianity continues to advance at its present alarming rate, the time may be near, when in Britain, the Lord's day as a divine institution will be nothing but a relic of history. Even now literally millions of people turn their backs upon it and refuse to acknowledge it. Many of these are as T.S. Eliot describes them, "Decent, Godless people their only monument the asphalt road and a thousand lost golf balls." Tens of thousands of others make a formal recognition of it, not the whole of it, but of 45 or 60 minutes of it. The rest of it they claim as their own. - Donald MacDonald(?-1975) "You must observe the Sabbath rather than doing anything you please on my holy day. You must look forward to the Sabbath and treat the Lord’s holy day with respect. You must treat it with respect by refraining from your normal activities, and by refraining from your selfish pursuits and from making business deals. Then you will find joy in your relationship to the Lord, and I will give you great prosperity, and cause crops to grow on the land I gave to your ancestor Jacob.” Know for certain that the Lord has spoken. - Isaiah 58:13-14 As it is the law of nature, that, in general, a due proportion of time be set apart for the worship of God; so, in His Word, by a positive, moral, and perpetual commandment binding all men in all ages, He has particularly appointed one day in seven, for a Sabbath, to be kept holy unto him: which, from the beginning of the world to the resurrection of Christ, was the last day of the week: and, from the resurrection of Christ, was changed into the first day of the week, which, in Scripture, is called the Lord's Day, and is to be continued to the end of the world, as the Christian Sabbath. This Sabbath is to be kept holy unto the Lord when men, after a due preparing of their hearts, and ordering of their common affairs beforehand, do not only observe an holy rest all the day from their own works, words, and thoughts about their worldly employments and recreations, but also are taken up the whole time in the public and private exercises of His worship, and in the duties of necessity and mercy. - Westminster Confession of Faith Comments
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