Ye shall keep my Sabbaths. From these two passages it is manifest that the service of the tabernacle was annexed to the Sabbath, and that the two things were not only connected by an indissoluble tie, but that the rest from labor had reference to the sacrifices; since it would have been a mere mockery to rest without any ulterior object; nay more, after Moses has spoken of the rest, he seems to subjoin the reverencing of the sanctuary, as if it were the generic ordinance; so that the people might understand that all impediments were removed which are wont to withdraw them from the service of God. The expression, "fear the sanctuary," [1] is a figurative one; but is equivalent to this, that they should shew by their very reverence of the sanctuary how truly and sincerely they fear God, who had promised that He would be present there, whenever He should be invoked.

Footnotes

1 - "Reverence my sanctuary." -- A.V. Ainsworth says, "In Targum Jonathan this law is explained thus, Ye shall go to the house of my sanctuary in fear;" and then quotes from Maimon many Jewish rites observed in the temple.

Ye shall keep my sabbaths,.... By attending to the worship and service of God on sabbath days, they and their children would be preserved from the idolatry of the Gentiles, and all the filthy practices attending it:
and reverence my sanctuary; and not defile it by such impurities as were committed in the temples of idols: the sanctuary being an holy place, sacred to him whose name is holy and reverend, and where was the seat of his glorious Majesty, and therefore not to be defiled by fornication or idolatry, or by doing anything in it unseemly and unbecoming; see Gill on Mark 11:16,
I am the Lord; who had appointed the observance of the sabbath day, and dwelt in the sanctuary, and therefore expected that the one would be kept and the other reverenced, and neither of them polluted.

Ye shall keep my sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary--This precept is frequently repeated along with the prohibition of idolatrous practices, and here it stands closely connected with the superstitions forbidden in the previous verses.

The exhortation now returns to the chief point, the observance of the Lord's Sabbaths and reverence for His sanctuary, which embrace the true method of divine worship as laid down in the ritual commandments. When the Lord's day is kept holy, and a holy reverence for the Lord's sanctuary lives in the heart, not only are many sins avoided, but social and domestic life is pervaded by the fear of God and characterized by chasteness and propriety.