God, we thank you this morning for sending your son Jesus to pay the price for our sin and unrighteousness. God, we thank you for sending your son Jesus to pay the price for our peace, to pay the price for illness so that we could walk in healing in Jesus' name. God, we surrender to you all of the things that we're dealing with. We repent for falling short of the mark. And we thank you, God, for forgiveness.
And church, as we get ready to partake in communion, if you didn't grab the elements on the way in, raise your hand, and we'll get it to you. Just raise your hand all around the sanctuary. And he said, "This is my body, which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me." So God, this morning, we proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.
And God, this morning, as we continue to worship, we turn all of our attention to you. And we thank you, God, for the sacrifice of Jesus. We thank you. And church, as you worship now, just surrender. Lay down those things before the Lord this morning, those issues, those burdens, those things that perhaps you've been trying to do in your own strength. Submit them to him this morning and declare it.
This morning, we thank you for who you are and every single one of your redemptive names that show us a part of your character. God, we thank you for you are Jehovah Sitkinu, my righteousness. We thank you, God, for you are the most high God. God, we thank you for you are Jehovah Rapha.
And Father, even right now, even if what we see in the natural, in the lives of people within our family, it's bondage and tribulation and anguish, we declare Jesus enters the room and freedom comes. God, we thank you for the work that you started; you will finish. Lord, in my life, in the life of my spouse, in the life of my children and grandchildren, God, what you've started, you will finish.
We exalt you for who you are, Father, even as we launch service this morning. And Barb, you read it. You read that verse when Moses says, "If your presence isn't going, we don't go." God, we declare it. We want to be in your presence. And Father, we want to be in your presence every day. And God, we thank you because the veil was torn and gives us access, and Jesus is our high priest. And God, we can remain tied to you.
God, we thank you for who you are, and we give you glory in Jesus' name. Amen and amen. Amen, church. Give God a shout and a hand of praise all around the sanctuary. Turn to someone around you. Tell them, "Hey, God's not done yet." Look at somebody. Tell them, "God's not done with you yet. God's not done with me yet."
God's not done with you. God's not done with me. God is still working, and he will finish what he starts. He'll finish what he starts. We want to welcome you this morning. And if you're online today as well, we welcome you. And we're 3W Church. My name is David. I'm the lead pastor here at 3W Church.
And our vision, our why, we describe it, we explain it this way: We exist to get people to a place where they will acknowledge, trust, and lean on God. Oh, help me out. Come on. Acknowledge, trust, and lean on God. We need him every single day and throughout the day.
You know, for those of you that know me, you all know I equate things to food because I like to eat. And I don't eat but once a week. As a matter of fact, my wife gets upset at me sometimes because I am finishing to eat a meal while thinking and planning my next one. And she says, "How can you think of your next meal when you are eating right now?" We'll finish eating. She'll be like, "I'm done. This is litter. I'm not eating till tomorrow." And I'm like, "What? No, we need again."
And in the same way, it's not enough to eat spiritually once a week. It's not enough to eat spiritually once a week. It's not enough for us to eat spiritually once every so often. It is a daily thing for us to eat spiritual food and spend time with God in worship and spend time with God in prayer and spend time with God in the reading of the word. In the Bible, listening to what God has in store for us, and he will speak to us. Amen.
I saw this little video that somebody did the other day. I don't know if it's a fad. Maybe they met people. People making it now. But somebody asked somebody else, like, "Hey, how do I hear God?" It says, "Read your Bible." There's no, "No, but how do I hear him out loud?" And the guy says, "Read your Bible out loud." And so it's the reality. You want to hear God? Read his word, and he will speak to you.
And it is imperative, and it's great. And my function as pastor of 3W Church is to preach that which God puts in my heart as I pray and I fast and I study and I deliver that message from God. But God desires. He desires to and wants to and has the ability to speak to each and every one of us individually and daily.
And so I encourage you to set time aside to spend with God every day. Your life will never be the same. Intentionally set time aside, make a plan. And if you make the plan, you will be able to hear him. But when we don't make a plan, chances are it's not going to happen.
So I encourage you, make a plan, follow the plan. If you want help with crafting and designing a plan to pursue God, let us know. We'll help you. And follow the one-year Bible reading plan along with us. Read the word every day and spend time with him. Amen? Come on, give God one more hand of praise, everyone.
Everyone, listen, I'm really excited today because the Dolphins are out of the playoffs, which means I'm not going to get frustrated today because they're not playing. So the season's over, and I'm done. Anybody else excited for that too? Next season will come and deal with its own set of stuff. The Hurricanes got a new quarterback, so I'm excited for that. And if you didn't know, I like food and sports. So now you know a little bit more about me.
2025, we're starting a new series today. And the series is titled... And last week, and if you haven't heard the message, you can go back to our YouTube channel, listen to last week's message, where we delivered the prophetic word for our church for the year 2025. And the word is "anchored."
And we talked about the fact that God is the only anchor to which we can be tied. And I asked the question, "What anchor are we tied to?" Because many times we will tie ourselves to different anchors, and anchors, they're proportional to the boat. You're not going to use a small little anchor on a yacht, right? You're not going to use a small little anchor on a cruise ship.
And the purpose that God has placed in your life, which, by the way, there is a purpose, the plan that God has for your life, and by the way, there is a plan, it's only going to be accomplished if you're tied to the anchor, which is God. He's the only anchor.
What is an anchor? An anchor, when it comes to boating terms, is something that's going to hold you in place. It's usually made out of metal, and it has hooks at the edge of it, and it's thrown into the water, and it digs down into the ground or the bottom of the seafloor, and there is a chain or a rope that is tied to it, which is then tied to the vessel.
And what does the anchor do? It keeps you in place. Aside from boating, we talk about anchors. We put anchors when we're going to put a screw in the wall. And have you ever hung something without an anchor? Only to see it fall?
Anybody ever use an anchor that still failed? God's not going to do that. God will always be there. And as I was preparing for this year and asking the Lord, I felt him impress upon my heart. And we said this last week. I want to say this statement again. And it's that the anchor is only good if you're tied to it. Right? It only works if it's actually tied to the ship.
I actually gave you something that happened to me one time. We were out on a small boat. We wanted to put the anchor down in order to fish. And the person that owned the boat forgot that he had done some work. And he gave me the anchor to toss. And with the anchor went the rope because it wasn't tied to the boat. So after the rope, we went because the anchor does nothing if it's not then attached to the boat.
And so, church, we have to remain anchored to God. But there are links. There are links to this chain that keeps us tied to him. And throughout the next few weeks and months, we're going to be talking about links that keep us tied to him and actually things that also break away or break the link with God.
And today, I want to start with a crucial one, an important one. As a matter of fact, it's also one of our church values, and it's Sabbath. Sabbath is a link that keeps us tied to God. And Sabbath is something that a lot of us don't do.
What does the word Sabbath mean? It means to cease, to stop, to rest, to end. Cease what? Stop what? End what? Rest from what? Work. Sabbath is to cease, to stop. And Sabbath is something that many of us fail miserably at doing.
I went through a stretch in my life of probably two and a half to three years where I did not take a Sabbath. Where I felt bad if I was going to take time off, and I would go and go and go. It's very interesting. One of the first times I preached on Sabbath was in 2021. It was a series that was titled "Refresh."
And at the end of that series, I actually spoke to all of you, and if you were here, I talked about the fact that I had been a chronic offender repeatedly. I was a great offender of not Sabbathing, and how at that summer, the church, the board had decided, "Pastor, you need to take a sabbatical and reclaim a lot of these Sabbaths."
And I announced in that series that we were going to be taking a Sabbath, six weeks where I did not do anything related to the church and spent time with God. And it's very interesting. The Lord just reminded me about this when I saw Belinda. She called me after that and said, "Pastor, I don't know if you remember, but a couple of years ago, the Lord showed me a vision of a tree that was starting to dry. The roots were starting to dry. It was starting to hurt. And when you announced you're going on sabbatical, the Lord showed me a tree starting to get life again."
I don't know if you remember that. Because I was drying up. The very way that all of us, if we don't do what God has asked us to do, we will. And as a matter of fact, if you're taking notes, write this down. Sabbath is a commandment. It's a commandment that God has given.
Watch. Go with me to Exodus chapter 20. That's where we're going to start this morning. Exodus chapter 20. I know that all of you Bible scholars, you know that in Exodus chapter 20, we get the what? Ten commandments. Go ahead. You can say it loud. What do we get in Exodus 20?
Okay. I'm going to read through all 10. We're going to start in verse number one, Exodus chapter 20. This is what it says. "And God spoke all these things, saying, 'I am the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Number one, you shall have no other gods before me.'
Verse number four is commandment number two. 'You shall not make for yourself a carved image, any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that's in the earth beneath or that's in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord, your God, am a jealous God visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing mercy to thousands to those who love me and keep my commandments.'
Number three, verse seven, but it's commandment number three. 'You shall not take the name of the Lord, your God, in vain. For the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.'
Number eight, 'Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord, your God. In it, you shall do no work. You, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who's within your gates. For in six days, the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in it, and rested the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.'
'Honor your father and your mother that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord, your God, is giving you. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his offspring. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, nor his male servant, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor.'
Again, verse number eight, 'Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.' Church, Sabbath is a commandment. It is a commandment. I would venture to say it is most likely the most violated commandment of the Ten Commandments. Like, we can all agree, "Thou shalt not murder." Hey, we're not murdering. "Thou shalt not covet." "Thou shalt not steal." "Thou shalt not lie." But listen to what God says. "Remember the Sabbath day. Keep it holy."
We violate it all the time. And again, the definition of Sabbath is to cease, to stop, to rest, to end of work. God himself, it says there, he worked six days at creation. He worked six days at creation. He worked six days at creation. He worked six days at creation. And rested on the seventh. It's a commandment.
Now, we're living in a society where we're too busy to take a day off. Anybody ever said that? Have any of you ever heard this? And you can finish it with me. Finish the phrase with me. If you're watching online, pull out the keyboard and type it in. Watch. I'll rest when I'm...
Anybody ever heard that? Has anybody ever said that before? Can I tell you something? If you don't Sabbath, you're going to die quicker. As a matter of fact, in the early 80s... You can fact-check me, and you can look it up. In the early 80s in Japan, they coined a term called "kiroshi." Kiroshi literally means death by work. They were finding in Japan in the early 80s where people, they would find them dead at their desks. They would find them dead at their cubicles because people were working seven days a week, 16, 17, 18 hours. Death by overwork.
And church, many believers are headed down the same path. If you read through scripture, as a matter of fact, Sabbath is one of the things that's most talked about through Genesis all the way to the end. And when you looked at what scripture says was the penalty for Sabbath, it was death. The penalty for breaking or violating Sabbath was the death penalty.
In Exodus, just a few chapters later, some of you are going to see that. And you're going to see that. And you're going to... somebody comes up to Moses and says, "Moses! We found somebody violating the Sabbath." Moses said, "What did they do?" It says he was gathering sticks. "What do we do with the stick gatherer?" Literally, you can look it up. Moses says, "Let me pray. Let me ask God." He says, "God, there's a guy, shame on you. He was doing really bad stuff. He was gathering sticks."
When was he gathering sticks? On the Sabbath day, stoned him to death. "Remember the Sabbath, keep it holy." Now, we're not under the law because I know that's the thing we're going to, "Oh, but we're not under the law, pastor. We don't follow the law. The Sabbath is law. The Sabbath is Old Testament."
We'll get back to the stick gatherer in a moment, but I want you to jot this down. Sabbath predates the law. The Sabbath predates the law. Go to Genesis chapter two. Genesis, first book of the Bible, so all the way from the beginning, okay? Genesis chapter number two.
If you know how to get to Genesis, just go to the front of your Bible and then flip a few pages, and you're going to get there to Genesis chapter two. We know that in Genesis chapter one, we see creation, right? Day one, he created the heavens and the earth. He saw that it was good. He did this. He did that. He saw that it was good. And day six, he makes man. He saw that it was good. Day seven, chapter number two, verse number one.
"Thus the heavens and the earth and all the host of them were finished. And the seventh day, on the seventh day, God ended his work, which he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work, which he had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it," means set apart, "because in it he rested from all his work, which God had created and made."
God modeled that you need to rest and that you're not done until you rested. Listen, here's the reality. We live in a society full of workaholics. We live in a society that what was invented as something to be helpful.
Anybody here ever own a Blackberry? Some of you are young. You don't know what a Blackberry is. You think it's what you get at the supermarket. But other than the Blackberries that you eat at the supermarket, there was this phone that came out many, many years ago, and it was like a square, and it had a full actual keyboard on it, like a full entire keyboard with a big screen. It was the first real smartphone. It was before the Apple phone and all this stuff.
And it was like companies would give it to all their employees. I had one from the company I worked with, and it was like, "You can do your email here. You can do... You can do this here. You can do all here." And you know what happened? There was never an end time. You left work at five, the deal? Instead of disconnecting, we're living in times where we're always connected to work. We're never ceasing to work. It's work, work, work, work, work.
But God commanded that we Sabbath, and God modeled that we Sabbath. He finished. What did God do? Created on day one, created on day two, created on day three, created on day four, created on day five, created on day six, on day seven, said, "Let's refresh, let's refill, let's sanctify this."
Let's go back to the stick gatherer. Because we're not under the law, and we are under grace, we are not taken outside and stoned for violating the Sabbath. But violate the Sabbath long enough, and you yourself are going to end up sick, sick, diseased, chronically fatigued, ourselves to death, literally, because we're not enjoying God's Sabbath.
If you're taking notes, write this down. The Sabbath is a gift. It's something that he gave us. If you go back to the commandment, think about it for a second, there's a whole lot of "you shall nots." The Sabbath, God said, "Remember it. Keep it holy, set apart."
And so every single one of us, one day a week, should cease from whatever is our work. It looks a little different for all of us. As a matter of fact, many of you, perhaps today is your Sabbath. You don't go into the office. You don't work. You came to church to receive. I'm not Sabbathing today. How many of you know I'm at work?
Just be honest. Just be real. Let's break it down, right? I am called to pastor, 100%. I do this because it's a calling. I have the privilege of leading you guys closer to God, but on a Sunday, yeah, I get up early and do my personal encounter with God. I have my prayer time, my Bible reading time, but then it's finishing going over my notes, going over my study, and delivering the sermon twice. That's work.
So what do I need to do? I need to schedule a day this week that's my day where I Sabbath. And what do I not do on Sabbath? I don't do anything related to pastoring through 3W Church. I don't check my church email. I don't carry the church phone. I don't come to the church office. It's my day to spend extra time with God, not because I have to, because I get to.
And I get to experience and have a relationship with him today where I have extended time in prayer and in worship and in the Bible and reading for me, not for study, for me to fill. And many of us, we're just always so connected.
Now, now what's the reality? Can emergencies come? Because here's the problem with Sabbath. Many people have made a religious thing. Many people have made the Sabbath about religiosity. They've made it a religion thing.
Oh, you have to, right? Like, as a matter of fact, do you know that there's been so many rules added to the Sabbath in the Jewish community that there's such inventions as a Sabbath elevator? If you go to a building that is predominantly Jewish down at Miami Beach or whatever the case might be, or in other countries or in Israel, elevators have a function where right before Sabbath starts at sundown on Friday, the maintenance person will turn a key, and it turns the elevator to Sabbath mode.
And what that does is that they enter the elevator, and they don't have to press anything. The elevator will close, and it will stop at every single floor because they think that pressing a button is work. Rules, regulations. As a matter of fact, some of you very... I want you to check this when you get home. Look up the model of your refrigerator. If it is a newer model refrigerator, check if it has a Sabbath mode.
Many refrigerators that are made today have a function that you turn on Sabbath mode, and what it does is that on the day of Sabbath, you turn it on right before Sabbath starts. They open the refrigerator door, and the light doesn't turn on because if the light turns on, they said it was working.
And the verse said, "Nor your cattle, nor your oxen, nor your this, nor your that." I finished the first service here, and we have somebody who comes to our church, the state trooper, says, "You know, you were talking about that. Do you know that in certain communities by the state, because it has been done and there's funding for it, on Sabbath days, patrol officers are stationed there to press the button so that the Sabbath mode is on and the lights don't turn on because if the light turns on, they can cross the street because if they can't press the button to cross the street."
Rules, regulations. This is man adding to religiosity stuff, which we all tend to do. We're not supposed to, but we do. It happened with Eve, right? Like, watch, watch. Do you remember what God says to Eve and to Adam, right? What is it to Adam? Adam relays it to Eve, but God says to Adam, "You can eat anything, but do not eat the tree of knowledge of good and evil."
When the serpent asked Eve, "Did God truly say this?" Eve replied, "God said you shall not eat it nor touch it because if you do, you shall surely die." God never said, "Don't touch it." God said, "Don't eat it." She added that, "Don't touch it either."
And so throughout years, in many different things that God intended for relationship, we've made it into religion. No pressing a button doesn't work. What is my job? You see, let's go to look around. If you're a teacher, one day a week you should not lesson plan. You should not grade papers. You should not teach. You should do nothing related to that work.
If you're a plumber, one day a week you don't do anything related to your work. If you are a banker, one day a week you don't do your... like whatever it is that you work in. If you're a student, that's your job.
So we started doing Sabbath a lot in my house years ago, right? And I have very smart children. And on a day that was our family Sabbath, I said, "Hey, can you go unload the dishwasher?" And they said, "No, Dad, today's my Sabbath."
I think I might have laughed out loud too. "No, no, no, sweetheart. No, no, no, no. Your job is school. One day a week you don't do school work." So on Friday, Abigail sat with me, right? It was evening. I think she was, "Dad, I have a lot of homework this weekend." I said, "Okay, like how much homework?"
She's like, "Well, I have biology homework. I got history homework. I've got geometry homework. I got that." I was like, "All right, how much time?" She's probably going to take me two to three hours. I said, "Okay, cool. What day do you want to do it, and which day you're going to Sabbath?"
And so she Sabbathed yesterday. She didn't do any of that school work, but the plan was already made. Today after church, when we get home and we have lunch and she changes, she's going to her dad's house, and she's going to finish her three hours of homework.
But you know what she did yesterday when she woke up and read and did her stuff? We were in PJs most of the day yesterday, and the three girls just played with their dolls, and they did things, and we had family lunch, and we had time together.
And if she learns now that one day a week I cease from whatever it is my work and understand this is a gift from God. God, yes, it's a command, but it's a gift. Gifts are made to use.
So what does it look like? And by the way, can emergencies happen? Absolutely. Look, look, if God forbid one of you have an emergency. This happened to me, I want to say it was December. I was going to rest that day, and I saw the phone ring, and it was somebody that doesn't call me during the daytime.
And I almost ignored it. But I said, "No, this person never calls." And I answered, and it was an emergency. And we talked, and we prayed, and then we met. I didn't say, "Oh, no, no, not today, man. You got the crisis? Hold on until tomorrow." Is that loving my brother as I love myself? Right?
No. What did Jesus get reprimanded for, if you would, right? The Pharisees. "You can't heal. You can't go on the Sabbath." What do you mean I can't heal? I'm extending love to my neighbor. Jesus actually looked at them and said, "Bro, which one of y'all, if your donkey falls in a hole on the day of the Sabbath, you don't go out there and pull it out of the hole?"
So what he responded, New David translation, all right? I think he says horse and whatever, and he says ditch. I said hole, whatever. Emergency can happen. And if an emergency happens on the Sabbath, you can deal with the emergency.
But if every single Sabbath, you have that same emergency, the donkey's falling in the same hole, fill the hole or put a fence around it, one or the other. So what are we doing? Again, emergencies can happen, but we need to be intentional on setting aside the day that we are going to rest, cease from working, Shabbat, it's the word that is used in Genesis chapter number two, where we get that word Sabbath from, where we cease.
And because we're not under the law, because we are in the new covenant, we have that flexibility of I'm going to do it on this day. Sometimes what works for me, and I do it that way, I'm going to Sabbath from 2 p.m. till tomorrow at 2 p.m.
When I look at my schedule in the week, sometimes my schedule is not going to work. My schedule, there's meetings, there's this, there's that, or the other. And okay, where can I intentionally fit in 24 hours that I'm not going to do anything related to God?
I'm not talking about eight hours a day, three tomorrow and thing, and I'm adding them up. I'm saying a consistent, those 24. And we rest, and we do extended time with God. And because God created us in his image and likeness. You know God created us in his image and likeness, right? And he rested. We're wired for this.
And this is the other part that I challenge you with. Find things that refresh you in the Sabbath because it's a gift. So if you're not ashamed to say it, okay, how many of you do not like going on the water? You don't like going out on water?
Anybody here not like going out on the water? You can raise your hands. Everybody, okay, look. So I love the water, and I love to go out on a paddleboard. And now if you don't like water, if you don't know how to swim, if you don't like to go out in the thing, what refreshes me will terrify you.
So on my Sabbath, I like, if I can fit it in, if it's not this cold week, it was way too cold. I was not going out there at 48 degrees. But to me, non-negotiables, extended time in prayer, worship, reading of the word on my Sabbath, but what are things that fill me?
Get on my paddleboard, go out on the water, put my speaker in worship. Maybe you enjoy gardening. Maybe you enjoy organizing stuff. And so, "Oh, it's my Sabbath day. I'm going to just put this in order," or whatever, and it refills your cup. No, not to me.
What is it? And it's not about legalism. It's about a gift that many of us are in opening. It's about a gift that many of us aren't using. And what happens when we chronically break and violate this Sabbath? God's keep account of it.
As a matter of fact, by the way, notice that God instituted Sabbath not just before the law, but before the fall of man, which is why I can tell you that Sabbath is not a reward for you. It's a reward for work. Sabbath is what God gives us to fill before we work.
Man was supposed to tend the garden. Tending the garden was not a result of the fall. He was going to work on the garden. The curse as a result of the fall was that there was going to be thistles and thorns and all kinds of different stuff associated with it. But before the fall, God already had told man to tend the land, to store the land, right?
But what's happening? What do we see? God then also implemented and instituted not just the Sabbath for the people, but Sabbath for the land. If you remember, if you read your Bible, God tells them you need to, every seventh year, don't plant anything on a field so that the land can have its Sabbath.
God tells Israel, on the sixth year, I will give you such a harvest that you will eat that seventh year and the first year of the new seven-year cycle, and on that year, you plant again. But what did Israel start doing? They started overworking it. They didn't give the land a Sabbath, according to Scripture, for 490 years.
Now, my quick mathematicians in here, what's 490 divided by seven? Seventy. Do you know that Scripture recounts when Israel was then fallen into slavery and bondage for 70 years, and the verse says, "So that the land can have its Sabbath."
Many of us, we're toiling the ground. We're toiling the ground. We're working our business. We're doing this. We're doing that. We're putting so much effort, and fruit's not yielding because of no Sabbath. Because of no Sabbath.
Again, it's not legalism because it's not law, although it was a command, because it happened before the law. And then in Mark, watch, go to Mark chapter 2, New Testament now, Mark chapter 2, starting in verse number 17, it said 23, Mark 2 chapter 23, it happened that he went through the grain fields on the Sabbath. He is Jesus, and as they went, his disciples began to pick heads of grain.
And the Pharisees, verse 24, said to him, "Look, why do they do what is not lawful on the Sabbath?" They're not supposed to pick grain. Well, none of them were grain pickers. They weren't grain pickers. Many of them were fishermen. And Matthew was a tax collector. He wasn't a grain picker.
And Jesus then actually even answers, even if they were, watch Jesus' reply, verse 25, "Have you never heard, read what David did when he was in need and hungry? He and those with him, how he went into the house of God in the days of Abimelech, the high priest, and ate the showbread, which is not lawful to eat except for the priest, and also gave some to those who were with him."
He said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath." The Sabbath was made for man. It is a gift. It was tailored for the man, not man to fit into a Sabbath. And then Jesus says this famous thing. "Therefore, the Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath."
We know that he's the Lord of the harvest. And many of us as workers, like he is the Lord of the harvest. He's the Lord of the harvest. He's the Lord of the habit of the... he is the Lord of the harvest, but he's also the Lord of the Sabbath.
And when we intentionally walk in this gift and spend this time with God, man, he fills you anew. He gives you creativity. He gives you all kinds of different things. And you get to do it. And you get to do it. And you get to do it. And you get to do it. And you get to do it.
And you get to do it. And you get to do it. And you get to do it. And you get back to work refreshed. But we live in a society of workaholics. I'm currently actually going through this book that's called "Subversive Sabbath."
And there's a statement in there that says this: "Sabbath without work is laziness. Work without Sabbath is laziness. Work without Sabbath is slavery. Sabbath without work is laziness."
Listen, you can't live in an eternal, "I'm just, it's my Sabbath every day of the week." You know, "God, I'm, you know, I was an alcoholic, so I don't touch alcohol anymore, God. And I gave it all up, you know, and then you're like, 'Well, I'm a workaholic, so I'm just not going to... I'm going to be an eternal sabbather.'"
No, no, no, no, no. "Six days you shall work." "Six days you shall work." In the country we live in, they tend to make you work five, but scripture said six days you shall work. And on the seventh, Sabbath, rest, disconnect.
We need to learn how to unplug. Learn. I love something that my wife does. I admire it. I respect it. When she's taking her Sabbath, she opens her settings on her phone and goes to the mail function and turns off her work email.
So that it doesn't show. And then after the 24-hour period, when she's going back to work, she goes back on there and turns it back on. Because that way, if she opens her phone, she has her personal email on there, different stuff. It's not going to show her work email.
Let the... train the people that you work with. Teach them, "No, no, this is my Sabbath." Because you know what scripture also tells us? That the Sabbath becomes a witness for the world.
Because Sabbath, this is what it's about. It's about relationship and trust. Sabbath is about relationship. Relationship and trust. Relationship with who? With God. Trust in who? God. Man's made it religious. God wants it for relationship. That time together. Where we can sit.
And again, do the things that fill your cup. And enjoy it. And be filled. But what does society tell us? Oh, no, no, no, no. You're a good, hard worker if you don't take days off. I'm accumulating them. I'm doing this.
And then what do our companies want to do sometimes? "Hey, if you don't use your vacation, I'll cash them out to you." And our God money speaks loudly. Ooh, I can work extra. Or we're always available. Work can always call us, and we're willing to go in.
No, no, no. I trust God enough to say, "I ain't working one day a week. I'm not. I'm going to rest in God. I trust him as my provider. I trust him that he's in control. And that it's going to be okay." It's trust in him. Trust in him. He's got it. He's in control. It's okay.
The Bible actually never talks about vacations. By the way, nothing wrong going on vacation. Plan vacation, go on vacation. I actually encourage people, always think of... because it gives you something to think about and plan. I'm not talking against vacation.
But I will tell you this. In the cultures where you see people live out a Sabbath, I'm not talking about a Sabbath. They don't necessarily need the vacations. And what am I talking about that many of us we take vacation? And what do we do in our vacation?
We're just going to rest because I'm so tired. I don't have strength to go anywhere. I don't have anything. I just use my days to just... No, no, no, no. Rest so that when you go on vacation, you can enjoy. You're refreshed. You can hit the ground running.
Do your different things, but rest, refill. If God did it and rested and was refreshed, how much more should we not do what God did? What he showed.
So whatever it is that you and I do, one day a week cease, disconnect. Put a buffer. Put a buffer so that you can spend extra time in God, worship. You start coming to the altar and know that it's for relationship.
We have access directly to God. And we can pray, we can worship, we can read scripture. We can have access directly to him. So let us rest in him, in him find peace.
And if you go back to Exodus chapter 20, go back to Exodus chapter 20. It's very interesting that the Sabbath is the law of God. I want you to read the Sabbath commandment with description. There's 10 of them there. If you count every verse that was one of the commandments, the Sabbath one is the longest section.
And I want to read it again. "Remember the Sabbath day. Don't forget it. Come on. Remember it. And do all your work. But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. The day is his. In it, you shall do no work. You, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who's in within your gates.
For in six days, the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it."
I didn't talk about this in the first service because I didn't even remember about it until I saw Belinda and I started preaching. Scariest, one of the scariest moments in my life in ministry, announcing I'm going on a six-week Sabbath.
At that point in time, in the years that we were in 3W Church, I preached almost every single Sunday. The church was still somewhat relative, you know, it was still growing and stuff. And man, it's pretty scary to say, "I ain't going to be there for six weeks."
But this is supposed to be built about me or around me. And I was going to go on an extended Sabbath, a sabbatical. And to do that, I had to trust in God. We came back. Nobody had left 3W Church. As a matter of fact, there were a couple of new families that I hadn't met yet.
And after that year, we've been able to keep it where at least 10 to 12 Sundays a year, I'm here, but somebody else preaches. Because it's not built about me. If you're here because of David Perez, you're in the wrong spot. You need to be here for God because God told you to be here.
And that whoever is going to be at the altar preaching on a given Sunday, you trust that God told us that's who we want to share the word that day. Amen. I'm not Jesus. I'm not your savior. Your eyes can't be on me. It's why we say, read the word of God every single day. Trust him.
And if you trust him with your finances, with your children, with your time, with your rest, he'll take care of you. So one of the links that keeps that chain connected to the anchor, which is God: Sabbath.
So I want us to stand to your feet this morning. And this is the challenge for the next few minutes as we worship. Some of you, perhaps the Holy Spirit's been convicting you throughout this message. Repent. You and God. God, I'm sorry that I haven't trusted you fully, that I thought I got to make this work. Spend extended time with you. Amen.
God, I thank you for the gift of the Sabbath, and we'll honor it in Jesus' name.
on Jan 12, 2025
