Our epistle is from Hebrews 3 and 4. Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. Exhort one another every day, as long as it is called today, so that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end. As it is said, today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. For who were those who heard and yet rebelled? Was it not all those who left Egypt, led by Moses? And with whom was he provoked for 40 years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose body fell in the wilderness? And to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest but to those who were disobedient? So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief. Therefore, while the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it. For good news came to us just as to them. But the message they heard did not benefit them, because they were not united by faith with those who listened. For we who have believed enter that rest. As he has said, as I swore in my wrath, they shall not enter my rest. Although his works were finished from the foundation of the world. For he has somewhere spoken of the seventh day in this way, and God rested on the seventh day from all his works. And again in this passage, he said, they shall not enter my rest. Since therefore it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly received the good news failed to enter because of disobedience, again he appoints a certain day, today, saying through David, so long afterward in the words already quoted, today if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts. For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken of another day later on. So then there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. For whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his. Let us therefore strive to enter that rest so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Guide us, O God, by your word and spirit. so that in your light, we may see light. In your truth, find wisdom, and in your will, discover peace. Add your blessing to the reading, the hearing, and the preaching of your word, and grant us all the grace to trust and obey you, and all God's people said, amen. We normally save our announcements for after worship, but Phineas's post on Realm this week actually fits our text so well, I figured I would do him and Paul a solid by announcing that the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Dishwashers, or CRED, is looking for young men ages 10 and over to assist in cleaning and other duties before and after our weekly agape feast. upon enlistment in the CRED, sons will be assigned to a presbytery to await instructions for when they will be serving the church by distributing water pitchers, cleaning and drying dishes, and running the dishwasher. If you are a young man, 10 and over, please see Phineas or Paul for further instructions as to how you can serve the Lord on his day. Do it, they don't have any volunteers yet. You see, a Pharisee would hate an announcement like that because Phineas and Paul are asking boys to work on Sunday, but Jesus would love it because their willingness to put out extra effort so that other people can be freed to enjoy the Lord and his day and his people is exactly what the Lord's Day Sabbath keeping is all about. In fact, Luke's whole gospel is crafted in such a way to drive this very point home. Jesus, the King of Jubilee, has come to set the world free, to worship God and to serve one another. And the day that the King chooses to go to battle, at least in Luke's gospel, is on the Sabbath. Now I know it might feel like all we do is talk about the Sabbath, but we're just sticking to the texts in front of us. And again, one of Luke's major themes is the right response to Jesus on the Lord's Day. If you remember, Luke's Gospel of Jubilee is structured around seven Sabbaths, seven sevens. And on each of these Sabbaths, Jesus goes to war by preaching and teaching and relieving people of their various burdens. The people who should be the most glad that the King of Jubilee had finally come to set sinful, sick, and sorrowful people free are the people who consistently prove to be the most angry, the most unwilling to serve, and the most willing to allow others to remain enslaved. even on the Lord's Day, which, as we'll see in a minute, is a direct violation of God's commands that they were so hypocritically giving lip service to. Now, it's been a while, so we'll run through them again quickly, but back in Luke 4, on the first Sabbath, Jesus took the scroll from Isaiah, stood up, and announced in his first sermon that the King of Jubilee had finally come. He declared that the spirit of the Lord had come upon him. He had been anointed to preach the good news to the poor, to proclaim freedom to the captives, to grant sight to the blind, to lift the burdens of those who were pressed down, and to usher in the year of the Lord's favor. The church he was preaching at that morning was really excited about that. Until that is, Jesus told them that he would come to do that for people who didn't look like them, people who didn't think like them, and for people who didn't act like them, but for people who were a complete disaster. That should comfort some of us. On hearing that Jesus had come to save Gentile sinners on that first Sabbath, their adoration turned to anger, and God's people rose up and attempted to murder Jesus, something that they will eventually accomplish on the seventh Sabbath. On the second Sabbath, Jesus went into another church where apparently demons were welcome and released a man from the clutches of the evil one before spending the rest of that Sabbath rebuking illnesses and relieving people of their various diseases from dawn till dusk. On the third Sabbath, Jesus and his disciples were hungry and so they plucked grain and ate it. When the Pharisees challenged him, Jesus responded by declaring that he was Lord of the Sabbath and it was completely consistent for the Lord to provide bread for his hungry people in his house on his day. Having apparently caught on to Jesus' pattern on the fourth Sabbath, the scribes and Pharisees are sitting in a synagogue waiting to catch Jesus breaking their rules. Luke tells us that Jesus, knowing their thoughts, calls a man with a withered hand to come and stand before him, which the man does. Jesus then asks the audience, is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm? to save life or destroy it. After they give no answer, Jesus heals the man's hand, which fills them with such fury that they begin to discuss what they might need to do to this Jesus. And if you read the accounts back to back, you can feel the rage and the anger rising as Jesus over and over challenges their so-called Sabbath observances, which have become anything but. Our gospel lesson for today basically tells the same story as all the others, showing that the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy, is growing. On this, Luke's fifth Sabbath, Jesus is again teaching in a synagogue on the Sabbath. And our attention is drawn to a woman who has had a disabling spirit for 18 years, the same number of years as men who had just died when the tower fell. Perhaps another point of emphasis to the fact that The men who reject Jesus's actions toward this woman will find themselves dying in like manner under a heap of rubble when the temple falls. When Jesus sees this woman like the others, he calls her to present herself before him and with his word declares her free from her disability. And then showing that the hands of the rightful king are the hands of a healer, Jesus lays both hands on the woman and immediately she straightens up and glorifies God. Now surely the response of any and every God-fearing and neighbor-loving man to Jesus, turning this synagogue into a house of healing on the Lord's day, would join this woman in rejoicing. Surely those who had been waiting for the King of Jubilee to come and set his people free would respond to this clear display of power and authority and grace and mercy with praise and with song. But no. Just like every other time, Jesus embodies the fourth commandment rather than respond in faith and love and joyful obedience to their king, the ruler of this synagogue, like the others before him gets heated. He turns to the people and in case anyone else thought that they might come to Jesus for relief, says there are six days in which work ought to be done. Y'all come on those days and be healed, not on the Sabbath. blinded by self-righteousness. This guy who is at least faithful enough to be in church on the Lord's day probably thought he was right to tell everyone they shouldn't make Jesus work on the Sabbath. But Jesus' response shows how badly this guy misunderstands the whole point of the Sabbath. This guy's basically saying this woman has been carrying this burden on her back for 18 years. So what's another day? She's used to this. She's been living like this most of her life. She could have come to Jesus yesterday and she could have come to him tomorrow. Today is a day of rest. Get relief on some other day, not on the Sabbath. But the Lord of the Sabbath is having nothing of that, pointing out that his Pharisaical Levin was showing. Jesus answers, you hypocrites, does not each of you, even on the Sabbath, untie his ox or his donkey and give it water? Ought not this woman then, the daughter of Abraham, who has had to labor under this affliction for 18 years, not be loosed from her bonds today on the Sabbath, especially on the Sabbath? You see, this guy was trying to use the fourth commandment as an excuse to get out of work. But his feigned obedience was not obedience. He chose the part of the law that was convenient for him. But to do that, he had to ignore the rest of the law, which was the part of the law that would require him to actually do something to help this woman be relieved of her burden, even if he couldn't necessarily heal her. And so Jesus, acting like a very bad pastor, if you ask most Christians, turns the table on this guy. and in public uses language directly from our Old Testament lesson in Deuteronomy 5 to shame this man for his selfish disregard of God and neighbor. There we heard God tell his people that they were to honor the Sabbath day and keep it holy, regarded as special, and make sure they set it apart by not doing any work because it belonged to God. And that's where most people's understanding of the fourth commandment begins and ends. For them, like that synagogue ruler, the fourth command is the command not to work, which for the most part they like because they're lazy and have an unbiblical view of work anyway. And so on the Lord's day, they pray, thank you, Lord, for giving me a day where I don't have to work and where I get to go to church and then do what I want to do. Thank you, Lord, for giving me a Sabbath. I might even go to church if it works for my schedule or I don't have a vacation or a fishing trip or a race to run. Don't worry, Lord. I know Jesus said if we love him, we'll obey, but I'm resting on the fact that Jesus obeyed so I don't have to. I still value church in my heart, Lord, and I presume my kids will grow up to do the same. albeit perhaps a little less than I do because I've taught them church is the only important thing when it's conveniently so, but you're sovereign over salvation, Lord, so I'm not worried. We'll still be holy and have a little devotional with our buddies, but don't worry, Lord. Lord, Lord, I'll keep the fourth commandment. I won't work, amen. Now, beloved, don't work on the Lord's day is not the command, let alone the heart of the command. We discussed this in our series on the Ten Commandments last fall, and we reminded you even this morning when we received the Edmonds into fellowship. But at the heart of every commandment is the command to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself. That's the grid for interpreting every command the Lord has ever given, including the fourth. Listen to the fourth commandment again. This time, not thinking about yourself and your not having to work on your day, but for how this command was given as a gift for you to love God and others on his day. Observe the Sabbath day to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work. You or your son or your daughter, or your male servant or your female servant, or your ox or your donkey, or the sojourner who is within your gates, so that your male servant and your female servant may rest like you. You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore, the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day. Did you hear who the Sabbath is for? Yes, the Lord's day belongs to him and was given by him as a gift so that his people wouldn't have to work all day every day like in Egypt, but did you hear what we're supposed to do with the gift? Having been freed from work and our ordinary labors on the Sabbath, we are commanded by God to free others on the Sabbath. God graciously commands people, particularly people in positions of power and authority, to use the gift of rest God has given them to in turn give rest. And the list that he gives is in concentric circles of influence. So parents, having been given the gift of rest by God, You are to extend that gift of rest to your children by not forcing them to do unnecessary chores on the Lord's Day. Business owners, having been gifted a day by God where you are not permitted by God to work, you likewise must gift your employees the requirement to take the Lord's Day off of work. People with working animals are even commanded by God to give their animals rest. God rested in creation and he wants you and the little bit of creation he's given you to go and do likewise. And finally, this command isn't just given to you and your family and your business and your household animals. God commands that his people refrain from working on his day, and he commands his people not to be the direct cause of anyone in their towns to work. This isn't just a command to bless you with rest, and this isn't just a command to bless your friends and your family and your animals on the Lord's day. This is a command to bless everyone, even those who are strangers, with the same blessing God has given you, rest. And at the very least, the opportunity and invitation to worship. This command isn't just about you being blessed by God, though it is absolutely a blessing God commands you to enjoy. It's about you having your burdens been relieved by God, been healed and refreshed and granted rest by God. and then in turn, as faithful image bearers, reflecting his character to relieve burdens, refresh others, and maybe put in a little bit of effort so that they can rest on the Lord's day. This is actually one of the reasons, it's probably all you're gonna remember from this sermon, that we're gonna start checking in for family camp on Mondays instead of Sundays. For a while, we thought it was just a few people blatantly defying God in the church, stopping at restaurants on the way to Twin Rocks and posting it all over social media. And then this year, to my shame, like the man in Luke 13, we showed up and realized the staff of Twin Rocks had been rushing to get everything ready for us to rest. Now, I think we, or at least I, defaulted into thinking the staff wasn't having to work on Sunday, and so us checking in that night really wasn't that big of a deal, but to hear that we were the direct cause of a dozen or so workers having to scramble to get everything ready for 300 people caused us to reconsider some things. Now, we can't control if Twin Rocks still makes them get ready for us on Monday on Sunday, but we had to consider, in light of God's words and Jesus's actions, what would honor the Lord more on his day? What would bless those strangers more? Us getting a few more hours of lovely fellowship in, or us having been freed from our labors and commanded to rest, doing what we could so those dozen or so folks could be freed from having to carry our burdens for us on the Lord's day. So Mondays it is. Moms will be even happier than the staff at Twin Rocks. Now if you've been with us in our new members class, you know we spend a lot of time talking about this particular command because it's foreign to most people and we don't want to surprise anyone. One of the distinctives of our church is that along with almost the entire church for 2,000 years, we believe that God's gift of the Sabbath didn't disappear when Jesus came. It wasn't like God was really gracious in creation to give Adam and Eve one day in seven to rest in the garden, really gracious to redeem Israel out of slavery in Egypt and then give them a day of rest, and really gracious to send Jesus to give rest to all these people on the Sabbath during his earthly ministry. But now that the King of Jubilee has ascended, no more rest. Well, you can rest spiritually, but not physically. No. We believe God's character, God's pattern of behavior in creation, at redemption, and in glory is to give his people one day of rest out of seven to rest from our labors, worship him, and bless others. To read it directly from our statement, We believe that after his work of creation, God rested on the seventh day and established the Sabbath for man. Therefore, by both example and precept, God has graciously conferred to us one day out of seven, the Lord's day, to worship and to rest in the finished work of Jesus Christ, the risen Savior. God's purpose being that we and all our neighbors may pause from our customary labors and commerce to engage in joyful fellowship, give rest to the weary, and do acts of mercy. Now for people who are new to the faith, it seems to actually make total sense to them when we explain it this way. God gave us a day of rest and to be refreshed, And as people who have received such a wonderful gift, we're called to extend that gift and offer rest and refreshment to others? Makes sense to me. But for people who have had their brains whitewashed by antinomian evangelicals, who actually have more rules than God, the tendency is for them to bristle, to want to pick apart this command to the nth degree and to find out where all the lines are that they can and can't cross before God takes away all their fun on their day. You know, like the Pharisees. Now look, if you've heard this once, you have an obligation to obey God in this matter and not make him repeat himself over and over again. But if this is new to you and you've never heard this taught on before, I don't blame you for having questions. About 10 years ago, I was you. I was taught that because Jesus is our Sabbath rest, and he is, There is no longer a Sabbath rest for the people of God. Despite the fact that's the exact opposite of what we just read in our epistle reading in Hebrews 4. Do you remember it? So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his. So let us therefore strive to enter that rest so that no one may fall by their kinds of disobedience. Now, I remember when an older pastor loved me enough to tell me the truth about this command. My first reaction was to pull a Jesus juke and point out that because Jesus was my rest, I didn't have to obey that command anymore. Like a good presuppositionalist, he kindly questioned my premise until it didn't hold. And then my second reaction, which is actually probably closer to the heart of the matter, was, well, what about all the things we like to do on Sundays? What about that great salsa bar we eat at on our way home from church? What about our hobbies? What about golf and Rachel's Races and the movies we want to go see? Do you notice all the focus of my questions were essentially what about us? What about what we like? What about what we want? What were we going to have to give up not what has Christ done so that we can go and do likewise. You see, we weren't worried as much about our disobeying and what that had been costing others or what benefit others might get from our obedience. You see, we had unknowingly turned the Lord's day into our day. a day for us to be enjoyed by us in whatever way seemed best to us, regardless of how much work it would put on others for us to enjoy our day. There were six other days those people could have their burdens relieved. Let them get their rest then. Sound familiar? We had become like the man in the synagogue that day. Evangelical Pharisees, blinded by our own limited application of God's law such that we felt justified in making other people carry our burdens on the Sabbath because, well, they'd already been carrying them anyway. Having been set free, we hadn't been seeking to set others free. We used our freedom as a cover-up for evil. And I remember it hitting me so hard when this guy pointed out we were acting more like Pharaoh and the Pharisees than Jesus. I wonder if any of you might resonate with that. When you hear a sermon like today's, and don't worry, you'll get at least two more while we're in Luke, A sermon emphasizing that the Lord's Day is meant for you to worship God and for you then to do what you can to serve others and relieve their burdens is your first reaction. What will that cost me, myself, and I? What about the thing my family likes to do? What about our traditions, our hobbies, or that awkward conversation I'll have to have if I start obeying Jesus? Or is your response to hearing about God's gift to you, one of joy and gratitude and eagerness to give that same gift to others? Is your response to the blessing you've received to bless? Or is your response like a ruler who doesn't want to be inconvenienced? Or, or, or. Is your response like a bunch of young men, 10 and over, who have been raised to love God, love their neighbor, and transform the fallen world by voluntarily cleaning dishes on Sunday? I know it seems small. Like a mustard seed, maybe. But like I said at the outset, the work the CRED boys are doing is a living example of what it looks like to have been freed by the King of Jubilee. Freed to serve, especially on the Lord's Day, which is our template for every day. Jesus emphasizes this by the last words of his rhetorical question. Ought not this woman, daughter of Abraham, be loosed from her bond on Sabbath? Loosing bonds, forgiving sins, lifting burdens is what the Lord's Day service is all about. You didn't just come here to serve Him. He's serving you. He's your example. He's your template. Today, Jesus saw you bent over, infirmed, carrying heavy burdens of guilt and shame and weakness, and he called you to himself. You kneeled before him and confessed that it's true. And like Jesus, Matt, Invited you like the woman in Luke 13 to stand up and he lifted his hands over you Declaring the good news your sins are forgiven your bonds are loosed your burdens are lifted and carried by your king And then like these people in the story, you responded like the faithful Sabbath keepers by glorifying God and rejoicing with those around you at the work that he's done. Beloved, if this is what he does for you, most clearly and assuredly on this day, how could you dream of doing anything but lifting others' burdens? Jesus came to set people free. to give them rest, to give them life, and to give them freedom, and there's no better day for us to put that mission on display than the Lord's day for His glory and the life of the world, amen? Let's pray. Our Father, we have heard wonderful things out of your word. We praise you for revealing Christ by promise and shadow in the Old Testament and for revealing Him as the fulfillment of all these things in the new. Give us your spirit so that we might understand these words and the fullness of your truth as you have revealed it to us in the person and work of Jesus, who with you and the Holy Spirit be all honor and glory, both now and forever. Amen. And still, the leaven, despite their enemies, Moses says, the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied, and the more they spread abroad and continued to grow and grow. Eventually, God's people began to groan and cry out under the oppression, and God heard their cries. And so, 430 years after the call of Abram, after God's promise to give him Canaan for his possession, and to bless him with offspring as numerous as the stars in the sky, God delivered almost two million sons and daughters out of Egypt, sustaining them with bread on their way home. Now this story in Genesis 18 and the subsequent events we just discussed were like prequels to what Jesus, the true seed of Abraham, the even better Joseph, would come to do. Like the promises of God to Abraham were kicked off with a woman needing three measures of flour and resulted in leaven that filled the known world, so too does Jesus say his kingdom will be like a woman needing leaven into three measures of fine flour until it is all leavened. Father Abraham's son who had sons who had sons until they filled Egypt and Canaan was just the tip of the iceberg. God the father who sent his son down not into a coffin in Egypt but into a tomb in Jerusalem likewise arose and led many sons and daughters out of slavery and into glory. And since that day, since that seed, that little bit of leaven was hidden for three days only to sprout forth and rise, it has been spreading and will continue to spread until the whole world is leavened. Through the church, another Eve and Sarah, God, will by water and the Spirit continue to birth sons and daughters. until the whole world is filled. Now that spread and that growth will likely never look glorious to those without eyes to see. It may even look like our enemies and our slave masters are ruling over us, but no one, not even Western uncivilization, can thwart God's promises. They may actually oppress us. And yet, we can trust Jesus that the leaven of his kingdom will continue to grow. And even if it ends up looking like the days of Moses, the more we are oppressed, the more we will multiply, and the more we will spread, and the more we will grow, and grow, and grow. At this table, we are reminded Not just that Christ died and rose again and feeds us with his body, which is the true bread from heaven. We are reminded of his promise to fill and feed the world by and through his church at his table with bread. We mentioned we're weird for believing God's grace in the Sabbath, but we're also weird for believing this. We read our fourth distinctive earlier as being in Luke 13, but guess what? So are our distinctives 17 through 19 in Luke 13. We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ has commissioned his church to go into all the world to make disciples of the nations, baptizing them and teaching them to obey all he's commanded. We believe that we are to proclaim the whole counsel of God's word at every opportunity so that God in his providence may impart faith by the word to the hearer. And we believe that as the church fulfills Christ's commission by the grace and power of the Holy Spirit, the knowledge of the Lord will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea and the gates of hell will not withstand the earthly advance of the church. Amen. So saints of Reformation Covenant Church, knowing that God always keeps His promises and will keep His promise to leaven the world, let's keep Portland weird. Let's keep gathering together with the Lord on His day, doing our dead-level best to extend Christ's invitation to burdened, weary, heavy-laden sinners, to join us in coming to Him for rest and refreshment at His small, seemingly insignificant, but world-saving table. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Sacrificed. For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus, on the night that he was betrayed, took bread. Let us give thanks for the bread. We thank you, Father, for sending your Son, the true bread from heaven, to be life for us, in us, and through us. In Jesus' name, we give you thanks. Amen. When he had given thanks, he broke it and said, take, eat, this is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. These are the gifts of God for the people of God.