In the foregoing message we saw that the real meaning of keeping the Sabbath is that we cease from our doing, stop our work, and enjoy what the Lord has done for us, drinking of Him as the waters. In the Old Testament, to keep the Sabbath was not to do any work but to remember what God had done in His creation. In the New Testament, to keep the Sabbath is to believe in the Lord Jesus. To believe in Christ is actually to be "fired," to be replaced with Christ, and to drink of Him as the waters. In the sight of God, this is the real keeping of the Sabbath. If we keep the Sabbath in this way, we will be able to say, "I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me" (Gal. 2:20). The more we realize that it is no longer we who live but that it is Christ who lives in us, the more we drink of the waters. The crucial point in Isaiah 55 and 56 is learning how to drink the divine waters and to keep the Sabbath by being fired and replaced with Christ.
The crucial point in chapters fifty-seven and fifty-eight is how to fast. The real meaning of fasting is to stop eating all things other than the Lord Jesus and to not have the taste for anything other than Him. We should be weary of "eating" worldly styles, fashions, and beautification. We need to fast, to cease from all other kinds of eating, to stop the taste for all other foods, and to eat Jesus as the bread of life embodied in His word (John 6:48, 51, 63, 68). This is our fasting.
Let us keep this understanding of fasting in mind as we see in Isaiah 57 and 58 the evil condition and the need of the wicked of the house of Jacob who have nothing to do with Christ as the Servant of Jehovah. Christ was willing to serve them, but they were not willing to receive His service.
The evil condition of the wicked is that they do not come to the Lord to eat and enjoy the Lord. They do many things, but they do not come to contact Him, to take Him, to receive Him, to taste Him, and to enjoy Him. In the sight of God, nothing is more evil than this. Today, we may have a morning revival, come to the meetings, sing hymns, and even pray without contacting the Lord. To do this is to be a hypocrite.