Notes on the Book of Genesis. Charles Henry Mackintosh

CHAPTER II.

       Table of Contents

      This chapter introduces to our notice two prominent subjects, namely, "the seventh day" and "the river." The first of these demands special attention.

      There are few subjects on which so much misunderstanding and contradiction prevails as the doctrine of "the Sabbath." Not that there is the slightest foundation for either the one or the other; for the whole subject is laid down in the Word, in the simplest possible manner. The distinct commandment, to "keep holy the Sabbath-day," will come before us, the Lord permitting, in our meditations on the book of Exodus. In the chapter now before us, there is no command given to man whatever; but simply the record that, "God rested on the seventh day." "Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. 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." There is no commandment given to man, here. We are simply told that God enjoyed his rest, because all was done, so far as the mere creation was concerned. There was nothing more to be done, and, therefore, the One who had, during six days, been working, ceased to work, and enjoyed his rest. All was complete; all was very good; all was just as he himself had made it; and he rested in it. "The morning stars sang together; and all the sons of God shouted for joy." The work of creation was ended, and God was celebrating a sabbath.

      And be it observed, that this is the true character of a sabbath. This is the only sabbath which God ever celebrated, so far as the inspired record instructs us. After this, we read of God's commanding man to keep the sabbath, and man utterly failing so to do; but we never read again the words, "God rested:" on the contrary, the word is, "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." (John v. 17.) The sabbath, in the strict and proper sense of the term, could only be celebrated when there really was nothing to be done. It could only be celebrated amid an undefiled creation—a creation on which no spot of sin could be discerned. God can have no rest where there is sin; and one has only to look around him in order to learn the total impossibility of God's enjoying a rest in creation now. The thorn and the thistle, together with the ten thousand other melancholy and humiliating fruits of a groaning creation, rise before us, and declare that God must be at work and not at rest. Could God rest in the midst of thorns and briers? Could he rest amid the sighs and tears, the groans and sorrows, the sickness and death, the degradation and guilt of a ruined world? Could God sit down, as it were, and celebrate a sabbath in the midst of such circumstances?

      Whatever answer may be given to these questions, the word of God teaches us that God has had no sabbath, as yet, save the one which the 2d of Genesis records. "The seventh day," and none other, was the sabbath. It showed forth the completeness of creation-work; but creation-work is marred, and the seventh-day rest interrupted; and thus, from the fall to the incarnation, God was working; from the incarnation to the cross, God the Son was working; and from Pentecost until now, God the Holy Ghost has been working.

      Assuredly, Christ had no sabbath when he was upon this earth. True, he finished his work—blessedly, gloriously finished it—but where did he spend the Sabbath-day? In the tomb! Yes, my reader, the Lord Christ, God manifest in the flesh, the Lord of the Sabbath, the maker and sustainer of heaven and earth, spent the seventh day in the dark and silent tomb. Has this no voice for us? Does it convey no teaching? Could the Son of God lie in the grave on the seventh day, if that day were to be spent in rest and peace; and in the full sense that nothing remained to be done? Impossible! We want no further proof of the impossibility of celebrating a sabbath than that which is afforded at the grave of Jesus. We may stand beside that grave amazed to find it occupied by such an one on the seventh day; but, oh! the reason is obvious. Man is a fallen, ruined, guilty creature. His long career of guilt has ended in crucifying the Lord of glory; and not only crucifying him, but placing a great stone at the mouth of the tomb, to prevent, if possible, his leaving it.

      And what was man doing while the Son of God was in the grave? He was observing the Sabbath-day! What a thought! Christ in his grave to repair a broken sabbath, and yet man attempting to keep the sabbath as though it were not broken at all! It was man's sabbath, and not God's. It was a sabbath without Christ—an empty, powerless, worthless, because Christless and Godless, form.

      But some will say, "the day has been changed, while all the principles belonging to it remain the same." I do not believe that scripture furnishes any foundation for such an idea. Where is the divine warrant for such a statement? Surely if there is scripture authority, nothing can be easier than to produce it. But the fact is, there is none; on the contrary, the distinction is most fully maintained in the New Testament. Take one remarkable passage, in proof: "In the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn towards the first day of the week." (Matt. xxviii. 1.) There is, evidently, no mention here of the seventh day being changed to the first day; nor yet of any transfer of the Sabbath from the one to the other. The first day of the week is not the Sabbath changed, but altogether a new day. It is the first day of a new period, and not the last day of an old. The seventh day stands connected with earth and earthly rest: the first day of the week, on the contrary, introduces us to heaven and heavenly rest.

      This makes a vast difference in the principle; and when we look at the matter in a practical point of view, the difference is most material. If I celebrate the seventh day, it marks me as an earthly man, inasmuch as that day is, clearly, the rest of earth—creation-rest; but if I am taught by the Word and Spirit of God to understand the meaning of the first day of the week, I shall at once apprehend its immediate connection with that new and heavenly order of things, of which the death and resurrection of Christ form the everlasting foundation. The seventh day appertained to Israel and to earth. The first day of the week appertains to the Church and to heaven. Further, Israel was commanded to observe the sabbath day; the Church is privileged to enjoy the first day of the week. The former was the test of Israel's moral condition; the latter is the significant proof of the Church's eternal acceptance. That made manifest what Israel could do for God; this perfectly declares what God has done for us.

      It is quite impossible to over-estimate the value and importance of the Lord's day, (ἡ κυριακη ἡμερα,) as the first day of the week is termed, in the first chapter of the Apocalypse. Being the day on which Christ rose from the dead, it sets forth not the completion of creation, but the full and glorious triumph of redemption. Nor should we regard the celebration of the first day of the week as a matter of bondage, or as a yoke put on the neck of a Christian. It is his delight to celebrate that happy day. Hence we find that the first day of the week was pre-eminently the