If Israel was meant to honor the Sabbath and to keep it holy, why was it so?

The creation we are told was the work of God taking place over six days. It was on the seventh day that He rested.  But is there more meaning to us for this day of rest. Is it to be more to us than what we know of God’s seven days of creation?  

Genesis 2:3  And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made. (KJV)

God placed utmost importance on this day of rest. He named it the Sabbath or Shabbat.  He asked that Israel honor this His day of rest?  the fact is that Paul tells us that we will all enter into this day of rest with him at a particular time.  Listen:

2 Thessalonians 1:6  Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you;  7  And to you who are troubled “rest” with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels,  8  In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: (KJV) my emphasis added. 

This day that is known as the day of rest is very much attached to Gods rest on the seventh Day.  In fact early church fathers Barnabas and Irenaeus had both put forth the idea surrounding creation, wherein we now live, as lasting only 6 of Gods days or 6000 years from the creation of man, until we would enter into this rest during a time known as the millennium. 

The writer of Hebrews in Chapter three brings up this rest or God’s future rest which He has promised.  He speaks of it in a negative way for a people who refuse to walk in God’s ways of belief. 

Hebrews 3:18  And to whom sware he that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that believed not? (KJV)

Sometimes I shutter when I ponder such questions as what does God mean in his statements to us through the men He had chosen to give us His word.  When we think of unbelief we think of the people be they Jew or Gentile who reject Jesus as God’s savior to mankind.  But what are men really rejecting when they reject Jesus?  

Jesus is so much more than the God man who hung on the cross for our forgiveness of sin.  He is God’s truth (The Truth); He is God’s gift of life (The Life); He is God’s Word to us (The Word).  He, in God’s purpose represents to us all that God has revealed through the Life that Jesus lived; Through the Word’s that God gave man to live by; through the truth contained in that life and those words, which will bring us His life, and He then bring us believers into His rest. 

When Jesus returns Paul told us in the verses in 2 Thessalonians above, that we who suffered Tribulation by these unbelievers will enter into this rest.  This day represents God’s day of rest. It is promised to every believer in Him, and it is yet future. The writer of Hebrews made that clear. 

There is a warning attached to this day concerning this rest:

Hebrews 4:1  Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it. (KJV)

The long and short of this promise of rest is contained in believing all that God calls on us individually to believe; about all that He has revealed to us through His Son our savior: Jesus.  We call these truths that we are to believe Doctrine.  But man did not invent that term or those truths.  God did.  And He made something very clear concerning “Doctrine”.  

1 Timothy 4:16  Take heed unto thyself, and unto the doctrine; continue in them: for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear thee. (KJV)

Paul tells us elsewhere, that we are to work out our salvation in fear and trembling.  James tells us: you show me your faith and I’ll show you my faith by my works.  John tells us in the Revelation in the midst of Tribulation:

Revelation 14:12  Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.  13  And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may “rest” from their labours; and their works do follow them. (KJV) emphasis added. 

Yes, in the midst of our works for Him, even though they may include tribulation and even death for our belief in Him, there is in the midst this promise of rest. It is the same for all who are in Christ Jesus: those who have gone on and those yet to be established in Him. 

If your teachers have taught you a doctrine that you are already in His rest; you are not.  Not because I say so but because Jesus, the Word, the Truth says so.  If you think that that doctrine means nothing???   You must decide that based upon what God reveals to you

Men, who think that they are already in this day of rest, need to think on these things.  There is a millennial day of rest coming when Jesus will rule this earth following His coming.  We the Church will not bring in this day. Jesus will upon His return.