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Part 3 - The Fall and the Restoration
The Model of Restoration: Commandment Four
"Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as the LORD your God
commanded you. 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 ox, nor your donkey, nor any of your cattle, nor your
stranger who is within your gates, that your male servant and your female
servant may rest as well as you. And remember that you were a slave in the
land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out from there by a mighty
hand and by an outstretched arm; therefore the LORD your God commanded you
to keep the Sabbath day" (Deut. 5:12-15).
Resting in a finished work
The explanation for the Sabbath is different here than in chapter twenty
of Exodus. There, the last part of the commandment reads, "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" (Ex. 20:11). As previously seen, both the creation account and
the deliverance from Egypt are types of the redemptive and sanctifying work
of Christ. This is a work of establishing the standing of man before God.
This work includes redemption, justification, and sanctification. It is
finished. There can be no other work accepted by God concerning the
redemption of fallen man. It is required of those who would be reconciled to
God that they rest in the finished work of Christ (See
Part 1: The Creation of the Church). This forms the
foundational fourth point in a proper relationship with God.
In the fall Eve attempted to make herself into a better person, seeing
the tree as "a tree desirable to make one wise." She did not rest in her
state before God as His work, but attempted by her own strength to make
herself into something. The essence of the Fourth Commandment is that one's
standing and who one is before God is His doing, and this work of God must
be rested in. One must rest in God, knowing that one stands before
God based on His strength, not one's own. The redeemed are the work of His
hands.
A restoration to God's righteousness
The model of restoration shows that it is God's "mighty hand" and
"outstretched arm" that creates and establishes the redeemed. Those who
would come to God must reject the use of their own strength and instead rest
in God's strength. It is God who exercises righteousness in the earth (Jer.
9:24). Romans states, "What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not
pursue righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness
of faith; but Israel, pursuing the law of righteousness, has not attained to
the law of righteousness. Why? Because they did not seek it by faith, but as
it were, by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumbling stone"
(Rom. 9:30-32). To pursue righteousness by the works of the law is to use
one's own strength and engage in a work. But this avenue of pursuit is not
God's way. God's way is rest in His strength and work which requires faith
in Him.
Commandments two, three, and four are aspects of keeping the First
Commandment
where Yahweh is to be the only God with no other gods beside Him. When man's heart
rebelled in the fall, the actions of his soul, mind, and strength reflected
his heart. Man placed himself in God's place and the rest of his makeup
acted in the place of God as well. It is God's fullness and love, God's understanding
and judgment, and
God's strength and righteousness that must not be competed against or replaced.
This is
where there is to be no other god and where Yahweh is to be all in all.
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