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*Note: This is the first installment in a three-part series. You can access each subsequent article as they are released on the Covenant Confessions blog.

Throughout the history of the Western world, few philosophers have managed to define the meaning of human life as succinctly as Saint Augustine. In the opening remarks contained in his Confessions, Augustine lucidly declared that “[God] made us for [Himself], and our heart is restless until it finds its place of rest in [Him.]”[1] Echoing the words of the Lord Jesus Christ, Augustine recognized that rest is a luxury that can only be attained through intimate communion with the living God (Matt. 11:28-30). Tragically, very few will ever discover the rest they seek in this life because they look for it in the wrong sources (Isa. 44:9-20). Instead of seeking to know God and enjoy Him forever,[2] most sinners will work tirelessly to be satisfied through indulging the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the boastful pride of life (1 John 2:16). Although such pleasures are often satisfying for a season, they ultimately lead to more weariness than before.[3] In a world governed by the God from whom, through whom, and to whom are all things, it is impossible to garner abiding gratification apart from receiving it on His terms (Rom. 11:36).

Thankfully, God has gone to tremendous lengths to direct His image-bearers to the rest that their souls long to acquire (Ps. 19:1-14).[4] As can be discerned from the testimony of conscience (Rom. 2:12-16), the created order (Gen. 4:3-5), and the canon of Scripture (Heb. 4:9), God’s prescribed means of finding rest is in Him alone. Indeed, communion with God is the telos for which man was created, and it is solely through communion with God that man may receive rest for his soul (Ex. 33:12-14). From the Garden of Eden to the inauguration of the eternal state, there is never a moment in which man’s purpose for existence can be divorced from blissful and restful communion with God (Gen. 1:26-2:3; Rev. 21:1-4). These realities above are substantiated through observing God’s integration of the Sabbath pattern into creation itself.[5] In God Heaven and Har Magedon: A Covenantal Tale of Cosmos and Telos, Meredith G. Kline charts the relationship between God’s providential ordering of the Sabbath pattern in creation and how God’s intentional design of the created order points to the rest that He welcomes man to enter.

As revealed in the Genesis prologue (1:1-2:3), the history of creation had a sabbatical form. An era of divine work (the six days) issued in the divine sabbath (the seventh day)… And since man’s activity is patterned after his Creator’s, human history has, like its divine archetype, a sabbatical structure… By imprinting the sabbatical pattern on man’s days, God was promising nothing less than that he would bring his human image-bearer to participate in the royal rest of his own seventh day.[6]

Having established the biblical-theological certitude that man has been created for rest in God,[7] and that an intrinsic Sabbath pattern (six days of work and one day of rest) has been fixed into creation to facilitate man’s rest in God,[8] there are at least four contentions that logically follow and necessitate critical reflection.

1. As a natural law, the Sabbath pattern is universally binding throughout every generation of human history.
2. From the outset of creation, God sanctified one day to be reserved for resting from weekly labor and worshipping Him as man’s source of eternal rest.
3. Moreover, God has transcribed His moral law upon the hearts of every human being, leaving man without excuse to abide by the Sabbath pattern that is embedded in creation and subsequent divine revelation.
4. Therefore, all human beings have a moral obligation to observe the Sabbath pattern that is declared throughout natural law, and proactively safeguard the Sabbath pattern within broader cultural settings.

 Each of these contentions will be unpacked in the upcoming segments of this series: the first and second premises will be addressed in the second article, whereas the third and fourth premises will be explored in the third article. For the glory of God and the spiritual good of His people, may this study lead the reader to an increased awareness and observance of the Sabbath pattern.

[1] A paraphrase of Augustine’s famous prayer in The Confessions of St. Augustine: Modern English Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Revell, 2008), SCRIBD, 14.

[2] On page 4 of The Westminster Shorter Catechism (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 2008), SCRIBD, the Westminster Divines state that “man’s chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” This confessionally Reformed conviction is broadly shared across multi-denominational lines.

[3] Haggai 1:6 encapsulates the emptiness that accompanies a life that is not surrendered to the Lordship of the triune God: “You have sown much, but harvest little; you eat, but there is not enough to be satisfied; you drink, but there is not enough to become drunk; you put on clothing, but no one is warm enough; and he who earns, earns wages to put into a purse with holes.”

[4] Psalm 19 is a foundational passage for delineating God’s efforts to reveal Himself through creation (general revelation) and Scripture (special revelation). God’s self-disclosure to humanity is exclusively contained in these “two books.”

[5] The term Sabbath pattern refers to the “six and one” pattern that is observable in the creation week (Gen. 2:1-4) and is subsequently adhered to by man prior to the formal establishment of the Sabbath in theocratic Israel (Gen. 4:3-5; Ex. 12:15-20; 16:22-30). Eventually, the Sabbath proper would be regarded as the sign of the Old Covenant (Ex. 31:12-18) and would be accompanied by many rigid ceremonial dimensions (Num. 28:9-10; Lev. 23:37-38; 1 Chron. 23:30-32; etc). Thus, it is important to distinguish between the Sabbath pattern that is rooted in creation, and the Sabbath proper that is rooted in the Old Covenant. In his dissertation, “There Remains a Sabbath Rest for the People of God’: A Biblical, Theological, and Historical Defense of Sabbath Rest as a Creation Ordinance” (dissertation, 2018), Jon English Lee demonstrates that despite their close connection, the Sabbath pattern and Sabbath proper must be carefully differentiated: “ceremonial elements were certainly added to the creation pattern of weekly Sabbath rest [on the basis of the Sabbath proper in the Old Covenant]; however, these were, in a sense, secondary to the primary emphasis of Sabbath: cessation [rest]. Just as God ceased from his activity on the previous six days, so also does the biblical evidence emphasize that old covenant believers were to cease from their activities of the previous six days [on the basis of the Sabbath pattern in creation], 69.

[6] Meredith G. Kline, God, Heaven and Har Magedon: A Covenantal Tale of Cosmos and Telos (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2006), 61-2.

[7] As emphasized in the preceding paragraphs, one of the chief reasons for God’s creation of man was to enable those who bore the divine image to eternally commune with the Divine Himself. Even in light of man’s fall into sin, God has still provided ample means for allowing humanity to know Him and enjoy Him forever: through faith in Jesus Christ alone (Heb. 10:1-25).

[8] Namely, through the consecration of one day, in seven, to rest from ordinary weekly activities and allocate time to worship God, with God’s people, in the way that God has prescribed (Acts 20:7; 1 Cor. 16:1-2; Rev. 1:10).