Sabbath "Remains" for the People of God Heb 4

This is all just copies of the same stuff you have said before, which I answered. How do you figure to answer me with the very statements that I was answering? You think your arguments are that infallible or "self-evident" or something?

Once again:

1) No one is calling the "word of God" or even "the Law" bondage, slavery, “The weak and elemental things of this World”, or “worthless” and “pertaining to that “which by nature is not God”. It was the Jews' condemned state trying to justify themselves by the works of the Law (without Christ) that was the bondage and the rest of those things. ***PLEASE NOTE THIS POINT AND STOP IGNORING IT!!! (and all were condemned, so your dichotomy of "the problem of Judaism ends here, and it is only the problems of paganism afterward" is manufactured).

2) "observe days and months and seasons and years" is NOT the same as "observe times" in Lev. Two totally different words in two totally different languages. You can't just pair things up like that without making sure it is the same thing.

3) the fact that "observe" in Gal. is “...to inspect alongside" (i.e. to note insidiously). Where "Insidious" can be to "intended to entrap or beguile", or "stealthily treacherous or deceitful", is the biggest proof of all, because it is the SAME WORD used for when the JEWS tried to "trap" both Jesus and Paul! There is NOTHING in the Greek AT ALL about "astrology"! Now are you saying the Jews used astrology to trap Jesus and Paul? Or was it the LAW they used?
Likewise, their WATCHing the NT Christians and juding them for not keeping OT laws was the same thing, as is those who continue to do it today!

4) Your schalars are only a handful, and do not make the majority. And your whole claim about "emperor worship" having "days and months and seasons" may or may not be true, but it is from extrabiblical sources, and cannot be used to decide an matter of interpretation such as this!. Scripture can interpret itself.

5) Nobody says there were only Jewish influences in the NT church. However, people do seem to think there were only pagan influences, and have underestimated the Jewish pressure and even persecution of Christians.

So put away your stock material and your sources and deal with these points only, and stop pretending not to even see them!

And this too is just more hot air that has been already repeately answered. No matter what you say, you basically pick and choose which aspects of the Law are still mandatory, and create a false dichotomy between the 10 and the rest, and you don't keep the fourth like it was to be done on the OT, and meanwhile you keep others outside the 10. God's Word never says "the dietary Laws are made for mankind" - no are they included in the 10 commandments nor are they included in the pre-cross institutions given to mankind". What a mess of contradiction. But you want to judge everyone else! Once again YOU are the one "watching with evil intent"! YOU keep the sabbath unto the Lord. If you can't do that without judging everyone else, then it is not about the Lord at all, but nothing but sinful pride. And you continuously have to LIE about God's Word being called paganism to get you accusations across. You need to repent of this instead of counting how many commandments others are keeping!

[ August 14, 2005, 01:48 AM: Message edited by: Eric B ]

 

Dear Bob,
You chose this thread's theme - that it should be Hebrews 3-4; not Galatians 4.
Galatians 4 doesn't have the Sabbath in mind - you yourself say so. so why bring it in here?
As for Hebrews, it says the People of God - Christians - have valid reason for keeping of the Sabbath "BECAUSE"-"ARA" of what Jesus had acomplished - which was: 1, that He had given them rest (4:8) - a clear allusion to His resurrection from the dead; 2, that He had entered in into His own rest from His own works as God (4:10) - again a clear implication of His resurrection from the dead. In a word as Hebrews says by way of introduction: "God in these last days SPEAKING through the SON", and then in chapter 4:4-5, "God thus concerning the Seventh Day spoke", that "On the Seventh Day God RESTED from ALL His works" - yet another and strongest possible reference to Jesus' resurrection from the dead. It SIMPLY means: The Christian "NO LONGER keep the Sabbath" (in word's of Ignatius') for the sake of 'Sabbatising' merely, or, for reason of the Law, merely; but for Christ's sake - for reason of HIM. For HE, being "LORD", IS, the Law for the Christian.

Now here's the difficulty for your point of view - the legalistic approach, allow me to call it - that if one would "Sabbatise", i.e., keep the Sabbath to honour the Law through doing so, he in effect dishonours Christ, who, by His Resurrection, had given the full and only, REASON for the believers' keeping of the Sabbath Day. And, if one would keep the Sabbath to honour the Law through doing so while being a Christian, he in effect would DISHONOUR the LAW, whose SOLE honour and glory it is, to honour and glory Christ!

 

The Sabbath functions like the Holy Spirit; the Sabbath that testifies of itself is a false Sabbath; the Sabbath - and its keeping - that testifies of Christ Jesus, is the true "Sabbath of the LORD your God, for on the Seventh Day God RESTED" - and rested He rested in Christ or nohow!

 

Why surrender into the hands of the Sunday-worshippers the ONLY and the BEST reason, motive, inspiration, grounds, justifying, LAW for a keeping of the Sabbath Day? Did not, WOULD not God had given it to the day He had appointed for this blessing, for this sanctification, for this completion, for this rest, for this reviving, since He had created the world - AND everything in it - promising its entire and ultimate history - the climax of the ages - in Christ in resurrection from the dead?