The Third Commandment.
Which is the Third Commandment?
_Thou shalt sanctify the holy-day._
What does this mean?
_We should fear and love God that we may not despise preaching and His
Word, but hold it sacred, and gladly hear and learn it._
1. _"Thou shalt sanctify the holy-day,"_ that is the Third Commandment.
We Christians have a _holy-day._ We celebrate as our holy-day the first
day in week, Sunday. We do not do this because God has commanded us to
keep this day or any other day holy, more sacred than the rest of the
week. In the Old Testament, before Christ came into the world, God had
given His people a certain day as a holy-day, the seventh day of the
week, the _Sabbath._ In the New Testament, after Christ was born, God
has given no such commandment. _The Church, the Christians themselves,_
has chosen a holy-day. The Church chose Sunday, because it was on a
Sunday that our dear Lord, our Savior and our King, arose again from the
dead. Every Sunday should remind us of the resurrection of our Savior,
of His victory over sin, death, and the power of the devil.--We also
keep other days holy, for instance, Christmas, New Year's Day, Easter,
and other festival days. Can you name some other Christian festival?
2. _Why do we Christians celebrate certain days as holy-days though God
has not commanded us to do so?_ It is God's will that His children
should come together for services of _preaching and hearing His Word,_
that they should come together in their churches for public worship. In
order to do this, it is necessary to set aside a _certain day._ That is
the reason why the Church celebrates Sunday and other feasts. _We
celebrate them not by divine command, but in order to have time for
public worship,_ for going to church, for services of preaching and
hearing the Word of God. To the question, "What does this mean?" namely,
to sanctify the holy-day, our Catechism rightly answers: _"We should
fear and love God that we may not despise preaching and His Word, but
hold it sacred, and gladly hear and learn it."_
3. _We should not despise preaching and His Word, but hold it sacred,_
that is the will of God according to the Third Commandment. Remember, it
is _His_ Word, the holy Word of our _heavenly Father,_ whom we should
fear and love. It is God Himself who speaks to us in His Word, in the
Bible, when we read it. It is God Himself who sends His messengers to
us, our pastors and teachers, to preach His Word that we may the better
understand it. Our Savior says concerning His messengers: _"He that
heareth you heareth Me; and he that despiseth you despiseth Me; and he
that despiseth Me despiseth Him that sent Me."_ Luke 10, 16. In
despising His Word, we despise our Lord, yea, our God and Father
Himself. A child does not despise the words of his respected and beloved
father. How deeply would we, then, offend our heavenly Father by
despising His Word!--If we really fear and love God, we shall not
despise His Word, but hold it sacred. We shall not forget that we are
hearing our dear Father's voice when we are reading our Bible. When
God's Word is preached to us in our churches, we shall hear and receive
it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the Word of God.
1 Thess. 2,13.
4. _When is this done?_ When do we not despise God's Word, but rather
hold it sacred? God's Word is _preached to to us in public worship._ We
despise the preaching of His Word when we do not go to church at all, or
only now and then, at long intervals, because we prefer to stay at home
to do our work or to amuse ourselves. We despise preaching when we
go to church, but hear the sermon carelessly when we do not pay
attention to the pastor. He that will not hear God's Word is not of God;
such a one cannot remain God's child. John 8,47.--If we keep the
preaching of God's Word sacred, we shall go to church regularly every
Sunday, unless sickness, or something else that we cannot avoid, hinders
us. We shall go to church in order to hear the sermon, to listen
attentively to it. We shall hear the Word willingly and gladly and
rejoice that we may again hear the dear Gospel of the love of God in
Jesus Christ, our Lord. We shall rejoice and say: _"Lord, I have loved
the habitation of Thy house, and the place where Thine honor dwelleth."_
Ps. 26,8.--God's Word is also preached and taught us in our
_day-schools_ and _Sunday-schools._ Come to your school regularly, hear
the lessons from the Word of God diligently and attentively and you will
hold His Word sacred; you will do the will of your Father.
5. God's Word is not only preached, God has also given us the _Bible,
His written Word._ He wants us to read His Word in our _homes. "Search
the Scriptures,"_ John 5,39, our Savior says. We should not only read
it, but read it carefully and often, read it with prayer to God that we
may more thoroughly understand it. The Word of God should dwell among us
_richly, abundantly._ Col. 3,16. If we do not read and study our Bible
at home, we are despising the Word of God.
6. We should not only hear and read the Word of God, and hear and read
it gladly; our Catechism also tells us _that we should learn it._ Like
Mary, the mother of Jesus, _so we, too, should keep all these words and
ponder them in our hearts._ Luke 2,19. We should try with the help of
our Lord to live more and more according to God's Word. _"Thy Word is a
lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path."_ Ps. 119,105. If we do
this, we are holding God's Word sacred and shall be blessed by it.
_"Blessed are they that hear the Word of God and keep it."_ Luke 11,28.
Remember _Hannah,_ the mother of little Samuel, 1 Sam. 1,2; _Mary_
sitting at Jesus feet and hearing His Word, Luke 10,39. Remember
especially how our _Lord_ loved His Father's house. Luke 2,41-52.
7. There is one thing we should not forget: to keep God's Word sacred.
God sends His messengers to us, our pastors and preachers. We should
_honor and esteem and love them_ for their work's sake. We should obey
them when they preach God's Word and _pray_ for them. We should help
that the blessed Word of God may be preached to all nations, to
all men, that all may hear it and be saved by it.
8. In the First Commandment we learned that throughout our life we
should fear and love God and trust in Him with our whole heart; in the
Second, that we should not misuse His holy name, but use it to the
praise of God and the salvation of our neighbors and ourselves; in the
Third, that we should diligently hear and learn God's Word, so that all
our actions, our entire life, may be ordered according to it. _These
three commandments relate to God. They teach us the love of God._ Now
follow the other seven, which relate to our neighbor, _whom we should
love as ourselves._