Brother Mantle Nance reads First Day, Morning Worship from

The Valley of Vision, Puritan Prayers and Devotions

Pastor Steve Martin gives a good, short explanation of where the ‘Five Points’ came from and what they mean for us today.

OH LORD,
We rejoice in another Lord’s Day
when we call off our minds from the cares of the world
and attend upon thee without distraction;

Let our retirement be devout,
our conversation edifying,
our reading pious,
our hearing profitable,
that our souls may be quickened and elevated.

We are going to the house of prayer,
pour upon us the spirit of grace and supplications;

We are going to the house of praise,
awaken in us every grateful and cheerful emotion;

We are going to the house of instruction,
give testimony to the Word preached,
and glorify it in the hearts of all who hear;
may it enlighten the ignorant,
awaken the careless, reclaim the wandering,
establish the weak, comfort the feeble-minded,
make ready a people for their Lord.

This prayer is from a little book called The Valley of Vision, A Collection of Puritan Prayers & Devotions, edited by Arthur Bennett. I highly recommend this book; you can purchase it through Banner of Truth Trust

This morning in Bible Study, we read the following passage from Isaiah 58:13-14:

If because of the sabbath, you turn your foot From doing your own pleasure on My holy day, And call the sabbath a delight, the holy day of the LORD honorable, And honor it, desisting from your own ways, From seeking your own pleasure And speaking your own word, Then you will take delight in the LORD, And I will make you ride on the heights of the earth; And I will feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father, For the mouth of the LORD has spoken. (NASB)

The Lord tells us that if we will refrain from seeking our own pleasures and speaking our own words; if we call the Sabbath a delight, then we are given a glorious promise. That promise is that we will then take delight in the Lord. We will ride on the heights of the earth. He will feed us with the heritage of Jacob. In other words, if we take time to sanctify the Sabbath, we will derive from the Lord a delight greater than any the world can offer us. Do you want to have great joy and pleasure? Then this passage tells us that if we will honor the Sabbath as God commands us, then we will have that joy available only in this sanctifying of the day. Let us delight in the Sabbath for in doing so we are delighting in the Lord of the Sabbath.