Ezekiel 20:16
Because they despised my judgments, and walked not in my statutes, but polluted my sabbaths: for their heart went after their idols. Because they despised my judgments, and walked not in my statutes, but polluted my sabbaths: for their heart went after their idols.
In the wilderness Israel despised God's judgments, refused to walk in His statutes, and profaned His Sabbaths because their hearts went after idols. The profaning was great laxness in keeping the fourth commandment through the forty years in the wilderness, even though the weekly miracle of the manna reminded them of its sacred obligation and even though open, bold Sabbath-breaking had been punished with death. Because of this disobedience God declared that that wilderness generation would not enter the promised land He had promised them. Yet He spared that generation from being destroyed in the wilderness.
Because their children also failed to learn the lesson and continued the same neglect, God declared that though they would enter Canaan they would afterward be scattered among the heathen. The surrounding verses identify God's Sabbaths as a sign between Him and His people that He sanctifies them and that He is the Lord their God, specify the seventh day as holy, ground His appeal for them to return and walk in His statutes and keep His judgments and hallow His Sabbaths, and warn that rebellion brings divine punishment. Faithful observance of the Sabbath keeps people mindful of accountability to God as Creator and Redeemer and prevents idolatry, while setting aside the Sabbath precept leads to forgetting the Creator and worshiping other gods, so Sabbath-breaking belongs to idolatry, apostasy, and disobedience.
The Sabbath is God's test and a sign of loyalty to Him, the sign of His government and the King's mark upon those chosen and set apart to honor Him, and despising His judgments and polluting His Sabbaths breaks the contract with Him so He cannot work in behalf of His people. Keeping the Sabbath requires honest dealing with no robbery, extortion, or dishonest transaction in marketplaces, stores, courts, lawyers' offices, or medical work, and those who keep it must not dishonor its sign through dishonest conduct. Those who break God's laws and despise and trample His Sabbath dishonor that sign, corrupt their faith, change leaders, no longer bear the King's sign, and cannot be trusted in test or trial. Promoting a false rest day and seeking to compel others to obey human laws opposes God's law and brings His wrath unless there is change. A heart going after idols describes people who delight in music without making melody to the Lord from a sanctified, soft, and holy heart, leading them to disregard God's judgments and statutes and to profane His Sabbaths.