DECEMBER
22.
"And call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honorable."
ISAIAH 58:13.
This is to characterize the heirs of an exceeding great
and precious promise here subjoined. They are to he known not by their
observance of the Lord's day- only, but by their endeared and exalted regard
for it. They call the Sabbath a delight, and the holy of the Lord,
honorable. And what reason they have for this will appear from its leading
aspects and bearings.
Let us connect it with the brute creation. Any thing that
tends to make them happier will he pleasing to a benevolent mind, especially
since " we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain,"
and "was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who
hath subjected the same in hope." Though man is the lord of this lower
world, and all creatures are, put under his dominion, He is not to oppress
and enslave them. If his power over them be abused, and his tender mercies
towards them be cruel, God will resent it. These helpless beings are his
creatures and his care. I love to hear him telling the fretful prophet, as a
reason why he spared Nineveh, that there were in it not only more than
sixscore thousand persons that could not discern between their right hand
and their left," but " also much cattle." I love to hear him forbidding the
Jewish husbandman to muzzle the ox while treading out the corn. I love to
read the tenderness of the fourth commandment, " That thine ox and thine ass
may rest as well as thou." If the brutes had reason, they would all bless
God for the Sabbath.
We may view the Sabbath in reference to the business of
life. In the sweat of thy brow thou shalt eat bread, till thou return to the
dust, was the sentence passed upon man for sin ; but in judgment God
remembers mercy. Who could bear incessant application and toil? Some change
is obviously wanting to unbend the mind and the body. And man goes forth to
his work and to his labor until the evening, when he returns home and
retires to rest ; and his sleep is sweet, whether he eats little or much.
But this is not all. The Sabbath furnishes a fixed pause. a needful
relaxation. Those who are in easy circumstances, and like the lilies of the
field, toil not, neither do they spin, feel little interest in the Sabbath
on this account. But let them think of thousands of their fellow-creatures.
Let them think of those who, by mental pursuits and professional
engagements, get their bread by the sweat of the brain. Let them think of
those who sit at the loom, stand at the forge, work in the field, drudge
under ground. What a relief, what a privilege is one day in seven felt by
them. How dull would be the monotony of their time without the break and
variety of the Sabbath. What a drag would their life be, if they were to
carry their loads unloosened even to the grave. But the day of repose
returns ; the worn laborer lays down his burden, stretches his limbs,
refreshes himself by cleanliness and change of raiment, and after six days,
during which he is almost reduced to the brute, on the seventh he feels
himself to be a man. And 0, ye rigid, if not sanctimonious souls, envy not
the sons and daughters of drudgery and confinement a little of the fresh air
of heaven which you, perhaps, can always breathe, nor be too severe with
those who only once a week can look forth and glance on the beauties of
nature, the very works, too, of Him who ordained the Sabbath.
This day also contributes to the harmony of families. The
members. may be much divided and dispersed through the week, and have few or
slender opportunities of social intercourse. But the Sabbath brings them
more fully together, and produces and cherishes those feelings which endear
and unite them relatively, and dispose them by love to serve one another.
Persons and families are, especially among the common people, always unkind
and rude and savage, both in their temper and manners, where the Sabbath is
neglected. But they are respectful and humane and tender where it is
observed, because they see each other to advantage, and mingle under moral
and religious impressions, which, though riot always powerful enough to
sanctify, contribute to soften and civilize.
The Sabbath is also a period of devotion and reflection.
If we are godly, we shall not go through the week without God. Some pious
thoughts and feelings will Blend with all our busy concerns. But weekdays
are, in a sense, worldly ones; and even our allowed contact with earthly
things tends to impair our heavenly impressions, and to make us forgetful of
our highest good. We want a day of retreat from this world, that we may
think of another, and have opportunities to compare the claims of the
various objects that court our hearts. We want a day of silence from the
passions, to consider more deeply the principles and motives of religion,
and to have excited and carried upward those affections which cleave unto
the dust. To a man concerned to advance in the divine life, how welcome is
the, return of a day all for his soul and eternity, in which, by waiting on
the Lord, his strength is renewed, and his heart is enlarged, and lie
obtains fresh preparations to meet the temptations, the duties, and the
troubles of life.
Again, without the aid of such a day, how would even the
face of religion be maintained in the community at large? We may learn front
an enemy. When the French wished to destroy every thing like Christianity,
they were wise enough to know how much the Sabbath stood in their way, and
therefore abolished it, and established their decades. Let any one imagine
the Lord's day given up for a time in our own country. The effect would be a
thousand times more injurious to the interests of piety and morality than
all the writings and attempts of infidelity. Let this fence of every thing
sacred and useful be broken down, and what an inundation of ignorance and
vice of every kind would overspread the land! It is in the services of this
day the rich and the great are reminded of their accountableness, their
dependence on God, and their being only on a level with those below them in
their origin and end. This they are too prone to forget : but once in the
week the master is a servant, the king a subject, the judge a criminal
crying for mercy. And as to the poor and working classes, how little time
have they for religious exercises but the Sabbath. It is then principally
the Bible is taken down front the shelf, and the child, placed between the
knees, is heard to read it. Then the children of our Sunday-schools cry
hosannas in our temples. Then the family goes to the house of God in
company. Then the poor have the gospel preached unto them ; and the common
people, unless the preacher misrepresents him by his fineness, again hear
the Saviour gladly. How, without these auxiliaries, would a sense of the
divine presence, and the moral providence of God, and of a future state, be
kept alive in the minds of the multitude? Is not all the knowledge of
religion thousands possess derived from what they read and hear on the
Sunday?
And how impressive and interesting is the Sabbath as the
chief period of divine operations. How distinguished will it be in the
annals of eternity. How many thousands, how many millions on this day have
been awakened, enlightened, converted, made new creatures. What triumphs has
the cross gained over the powers of darkness. What noble schemes and
enterprises for the glory of God and the welfare of mankind, have taken
their rise from some impression in the closet, or excitement in the church,
on this accepted time, this day of salvation.
Nor is it less delightful and honorable as an emblem of
heaven, and a preparation for it. Philip Henry would often say, at the close
of his Sabbath devotions, Well, if this be not heaven, it must be the way to
it. Yes ; it is then that Christians often feel themselves, like Jacob in
his vision, at the gate. They have earnests and foretastes of the glory to
be revealed. Perhaps they are never so willing as then to go. Many of them
have wished to be released on this day, and many have been gratified. But if
they do not leave on the earthly Sabbath, they enter on the heavenly one.
For there remaineth a rest, a sabbatising, as the word is, to the people of
God. And what an exchange for the better. Here we worship with a few ; and
these, like ourselves, are imperfect. Here we groan, being burdened; and if
we are not weary of our divine work, we are soon wearied in it. And when,
satisfied with favor, and filled with the blessing of the Lord, we can say,
"My willing soul would stay
In such a frame as this,"
the world calls us down, and leads us out into its cares
and griefs and dangers again. Oh, why do we not sin„
Thine earthly Sabbaths, Lord, we love;
But there 's a nobler rest above
To that our laboring souls aspire,
With ardent pangs of strong desire.
To more fatigue, no more distress,
Nor sin, nor hell, shall reach the place;
No groans to mingle with the songs
That warble from immortal tongues.
0 long expected day, begin;
Pawn on these realms of woe and sin
Fain would we leave this weary load,
And sleep in death to rest with God."
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