The Best Gift

We can be ever thankful to God for the gift of life, and everything good and lovely. But the most precious of all gifts He has given man is the gift of Himself. His presence, and involvement in our lives is the greatest of His gifts. In the garden of Eden the scripture tells us how God walked in the garden at the cool of the day (morning and evening) to commune with our first parents. God knew we needed instruction, guidance, and fellowship. Not only did we have a need, but He wanted our fellowship. 

Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created. Revelation 4:11.

Among all the gifts that one can give in a relationship is the gift of their time. All the gifts that money can buy will not equal the spending of time together. This is a gift God gave to man. Besides spending morning and evening with man every day, God also spent man's entire first day of life with him, as well as every seventh day after that. (Man was created Friday, and at sunset, the seventh day, the Sabbath began.)

Consider the fact that time is governed by the celestial bodies and their relationship with one another.

And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years. Genesis 1:14.

The day is determined by the rotation of the earth, the month by the rotation of the moon around the earth, and the year by the rotation of the earth around the sun. But have you ever wondered where the week comes from? The only reason we can point to is the fact that creation week was seven days. Let’s bear in mind also that it took God just six days to create the heaven and the earth. So why seven days? God created one more day, and concerning this day we are told “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.” Genesis 2:3.

This day was created for the express purpose of blessing us. 

Moreover also I gave them my sabbaths, to be a sign between me and them, that they might know that I am the lord that sanctify them. Ezekiel 20:12.

This is the day upon which God especially wanted us to remember Him. God knew we would be prone to forget, so He said “remember.”

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it. Exodus 20:8-11.

God is jealous of our time on this day. He says:

If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the lord, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: Then shalt thou delight thyself in the lord; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the lord hath spoken it. Isaiah 58:13-14.