In the fifth chapter, “Rest Assured,” Dr. Horton delves into the fourth commandment which states, “8Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, 10but 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, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. 11For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy” (Exodus 20.8-11, ESV).
Early in the chapter, Horton admits that his view is at odds with many, perhaps the majority, protestant Bible scholars. The historic position on the Sabbath is summed up in Westminster Shorter Catechism #58-62.
“Q. 58. What is required in the fourth commandment? A. The fourth commandment requireth the keeping holy to God such set times as he hath appointed in his Word; expressly one whole day in seven, to be a holy sabbath to himself.
“Q. 59. Which day of the seven hath God appointed to be the weekly Sabbath? A. From the beginning of the world to the resurrection of Christ, God appointed the seventh day of the week to be the weekly sabbath; and the first day of the week ever since, to continue to the end of the world, which is the Christian sabbath.
“Q. 60. How is the sabbath to be sanctified? A. The sabbath is to be sanctified by a holy resting all that day, even from such worldly employments and recreations as are lawful on other days; and spending the whole time in the public and private exercises of God’s worship, except so much as is to be taken up in the works of necessity and mercy.
“Q. 61. What is forbidden in the fourth commandment? A. The fourth commandment forbiddeth the omission, or careless performance, of the duties required, and the profaning the day by idleness, or doing that which is in itself sinful, or by unnecessary thoughts, words, or works, about our worldly employments or recreations.
“Q. 62. What are the reasons annexed to the fourth commandment? A. The reasons annexed to the fourth commandment are, God’s allowing us six days of the week for our own employments, his challenging a special propriety in the seventh, his own example, and his blessing the sabbath day.”
Horton sums up his position when he writes, “Nevetheless, I wish to make the case for my conviction that the fourth commandment belongs in what we call the ‘ceremonial’ rather than the ‘moral’ part of the law. Remember, the ‘moral’ part of God’s law is what is eternally binding on believers in both testaments, whereas the shadows of Christ in the civil and ceremonial laws disappear when the reality (Christ) appears. To suggest that the fourth commandment, then, is part of the ceremonial, rather than the moral, law is to say that it is no longer binding on Christians” (Horton, 124-25).
To support his view, Dr. Horton makes two key points that we must test. First, he puts forth the idea that the origin of the Sabbath is in the Ten Commandments rather than at Creation. Second, Dr. Horton argues that the Sabbath is not part of the moral law.
In response to Dr. Horton’s first point, we can simply read the reason given in the Ten Commandments for celebrating a Sabbath. “11For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy” (Exodus 20.11, ESV). Granted, the reason given in Deuteronomy 5, a later repeating of the Ten Commandments, is the remembrance of the Exodus, but the Exodus 20 reason still gives cause to see the Sabbath as rooted, at least partially, in God’s rest from Creation in Genesis 2.
Horton’s second point, that the Sabbath is not part of the Moral law runs into problems with the very reasons he gives to support his thesis. He writes, “First, the apostle Paul argues in the first two chapters of Romans that the law written on the conscience and the law written on tablets of stone are one and the same. In other words, the moral law (Ten Commandments) is the written expression of the natural law engraved on the human conscience” (Horton, 125). The obvious conclusion then is either that the Sabbath is part of the Moral law, or that the fourth commandment was not part of the Ten Commandments. However, Horton comes up with a third option. He views the Sabbath as part of the Ten Commandments, but as unique among the other nine in that while it is part of the Ten, unlike the other nine, it is not part of the Moral law. In the end, Dr. Horton’s argument, that unlike the other nine commandments we do not find a Sabbath principle stamped on the human conscience, seems tenuous.
The second reason Dr. Horton gives for not seeing the Sabbath as part of the Moral law is that we find each of the other nine commandments dealt with in the New Testament but not the Sabbath. He writes, “We search in vain to find one single New Testament commandment concerning the Sabbath” (Horton, 126). However, Matthew 12.1-13, Mark 2.27-28, and other passages do deal with the Sabbath in light of Jesus Christ. Admittedly, one difficulty is the shift from the Sabbath on Saturday, the last day of week to the Lord’s Day on Sunday, the first day of the week. Again, multiple verses deal with this shift as well, such as Acts 20.5-12 and 1 Corinthians 16.1-2. Finally, Hebrews 3.7-4.13, which some scholars have called “an inspired commentary…on Genesis 2.2 and Psalm 95.7-11,” lays out a robust understanding of the Sabbath in light of Jesus Christ.
In the end, Dr. Horton makes some very helpful points on two fronts. First, his work is helpful to work through for our understanding of the implications of the work of Jesus Christ on the ceremonial aspects of the Sabbath; however, I think he goes too far by saying that the Sabbath is only ceremonial. Second, his work at the end of the chapter dealing with the practical benefits not only of a weekly Sabbath, but also of corporate worship is a much-needed reminder.
As someone who holds a higher view of the Lord’s Day the questions that I come back to again and again are these – Am I so satisfied in and trusting of God and his will that I am willing, and even desirous, to set aside my agenda to celebrate the Lord’s Day? Am I living under the illusion that I am such an island that a day of purposeful worship and rest is not of profound benefit to me?
What are your thoughts on this thorny issue?
If you want to dig deeper there are multiple resources here, including a position paper (with minority reports of course) from the Orthodox Presbyterian Church that can also be accessed here. Or, you could check out Edmund Clowney’s book, How Jesus Transforms the Ten Commandments.
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