A DAY OF REJOICING

“’If you turn back your foot from the Sabbath, from doing your pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight and the holy day of the Lord honorable; if you honor it, not going your own ways, or seeking your own pleasure, or talking idly; then you shall take delight in the Lord, and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth;…’” (Isa 58:13-14 ESV)

“[And call the Sabbath a delight] This appropriately expresses the feelings of all who have any just views of the Sabbath….They esteem it a privilege, not a task, to be permitted once a week to disburden their minds of the cares, and toils, and anxieties of life. It is a ‘delight’ to them to recall the memory of the institution of the Sabbath, when God rested from his labors; to recall the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, to the memory of which the Christian Sabbath is consecrated; to be permitted to devote a whole day to prayer and praise, to the public and private worship of God, to services that expand the intellect and purify the heart” Barnes’ Notes (ref#16, [Isa 58:13]).

“…now that we are His, the first day of the week…has become a feast! We look with eager delight for Sundays to come round one after another—Charles Spurgeon (ref#182).

“It is a day of rejoicing: God made it to be a joyful day to the Church…They that receive…the Sabbath aright, call it a delight and honorable (Isa 58:13-14). It is a pleasant and a joyful day to them; it is an image of the future heavenly rest of the Church…” Jonathan Edwards (ref#186).