I’ll confess, I know very little about the Sabbath.
I know that God rested on the 7th day.
I know the Sabbath was given as a law to the Israelites
I know that in Jesus’ day, the Sabbath was taken very seriously
I know that until very recently, most businesses honored Sunday by being closed
Beyond that, I’ve never really made the effort to study what the Scriptures say about the Sabbath….
until now.
And what I’m learning is life-changing.
The first place in Scripture where we see the idea of Sabbath rest is in Genesis 2:2, “And 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.”
This is the first time the Hebrew word Shabbat shows up in the Old Testament.
It reads: שָׁבַת
Hebrew reads from right to left, and the first letter is שָׁ - Shin commonly known as a symbol for God’s name, and appears in Shaddai.
God’s name is in the Hebrew word rest.
I wanted to find an equivalent for the Hebrew word Shabbat in the New Testament, and found it in Matthew 11:28. The meaning of the word in this verse is pretty much identical to Shabbat.
Matthew 11:28 - “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
This is the first time the Greek word Anapauo shows up in the New Testament (and has the exact same meaning as Shabbat in Hebrew).
ἀναπαύω
The first letter is Alpha, and the last letter is Omega.
“I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End,” says the Lord, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.” Revelation 1:8
God’s name is in the Greek word rest.
We can say with certainty: God is our rest.
But there’s more.
There is a distinct difference when you do a word search for the word Sabbath in the Old Testament and the New Testament.
In the Old Testament, God instructs His people over and over to keep the Sabbath, gives them promises of blessing for the Sabbath, and warns them of what will happen if they violate the Sabbath.
In the New Testament, there are surprisingly few instances where the word Sabbath appears, and mainly in a ceremonial sense.
Then, you come to this verse in Colossians 2:16-17, “So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.”
What does this mean?
The Sabbath God gave the Israelites was a shadow of things to come.
The Old Testament is the New Testament concealed, the New Testament is the Old Testament revealed.
“…but the substance is of Christ.”
Christ is our rest. Christ is our Sabbath.
And in the weeks and months to come, I want to explore this more with you - because when it comes to Sabbath, we can either go to the extreme in one of two directions, or we can discover what God’s will is for us as New Testament believers.
Until next time….
Love this explanation. So interesting. Thank you! 😊