Sabbath Revisited

you have to register with that board to view - right?

 

D.L.Moody "on the Sabbath"

…

Mr. Gladstone recently told a friend that the secret of his long life is that amid all the pressure of public cares he never forgot the Sabbath, with its rest for the body and the soul.
•
When I was a boy, the Sabbath lasted from sundown on Saturday to sundown on Sunday,
…
Make the Sabbath a day of religious activity. First of all, of course, is attendance at public worship. "There is a discrepancy," says John McNeill, "between our creed about the Sabbath day and our actual conduct. In many families, at ten o'clock on the Sabbath, attendance at church is still an open question. There is no open question on Monday morning- 'John, will you go to work today.'"

…
Someone has said that without the Sabbath, the Church of Christ could not, as a visible organization, exist on earth.
…
Parents, if you want your children to grow up and honor you, have them honor the Sabbath day.

.
SABBATH DESECRATION
Men seem to think they have a right to change the holy day into a holiday. The young have more temptations to break the Sabbath than we had forty years ago.
.
PUNISHMENT OR BLESSING?
No nation has ever prospered that has trampled the Sabbath in the dust. Show me a nation that has done this and I will show you a nation that has got in it the seeds of ruin and decay. I believe that Sabbath desecration will carry a nation down quicker than anything else. Adam brought marriage and the Sabbath with him out of Eden, and neither can be disregarded without suffering. When the children of Israel went into the Promised Land, God told them to let their land rest every seven years, and He would give them as much in six years as in seven. For four hundred and ninety years they disregarded that law. But mark you, Nebuchadnezzar came and took them off into Babylon, and kept them seventy years in captivity, and the land had its seventy sabbaths of rest. Seven times seventy is four hundred and ninety. So they did not gain much by breaking this law. You can give God His day, or He will take it.

On the other hand, honoring the fourth commandment brings blessing:
"If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on My holy day; and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the LORD, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: then shalt thou delight thyself in the LORD; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it." (Isaiah 58:13-14)
…

? Hasn't the time come to call a halt if men want power with God? Let men call you narrow and bigoted, but be man enough to stand by God's law, and you will have power and blessing. That is the kind of Christianity we want just now in this country. Any man can go with the crowd, but we want men who will go against the current.

Sabbath-breaker, are you ready to step into the scales?

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Here are "more" non-legalistic views of Christ our Creator's Holy day - His OWN memorial of HIS creative act in making the world!

 

I clicked on your link and immediately got a register-popup.. Maybe they view that as "causing trouble"

 

BTW SMM - would your "non-legalistic acceptance" of Christ the Creator's Holy Day "have worked" in Exodus 20 as "obedience" or would God have called it then "rebellion".

If "obedience" then do you find the saints of the OT restricting themselves to that form of "obedience" when it comes to the scripture written in Ex 20:8-11??

IF that is in fact "Actual" compliance with the command given by God (Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ) in Exodus 20 -- then how is it you would suggest that we consider Exodus 20 to be abolished?

Since I can't view that link without registering - I am just asking for the information.


In Christ,

Bob

 

SMM

Okay you win buddy, you can not keep the Sabbath and we wont insinuate that you are a Sabbath Breaker... but you can keep outright calling us Legalists just because we think that if God says we should keep His Commandments, we ought to actually do what He says and keep them... and we will always be happy with these rules of the game you have concocted for us to play by and never complain.

 

First of all, the 10 commandments were not given to me (us). They were given to the Hebrews alone (Deut. 5:1-5).

Secondly, if one argues for the re-institution of the Ten Commandments or contends that they are still binding, they must, if consistent, contend that the sabbath requirements are still binding as well.

Here are 3 points I would like to look at to show that the sabbath is not binding today.

1) The church of the first century did not observe the sabbath. While it is true that the apostles went to synagogues on the sabbath for the purpose of preaching the gospel to the concentration of gathered Jews, where is the evidence that the early church, came together to worship God on the sabbath day? There is none. Let me state that again, there is no evidence that the early church ever “observed” the sabbath. They came together on Sunday. Sunday is not the sabbath or the Christian sabbath, that is unbiblical. The disciples “were gathered together” upon “the first day of the week” to break bread, i.e., to worship, (Acts 20:7). Paul then hastened to be in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost, which is always on a Sunday (Acts 20:16). The saints in Corinth were assembling, and contributing into the church treasury, “every first day of the week” (1 Cor. 16:2). It’s no wonder that they met on the First day of the week, or Sunday, since that is the day the church was established (Acts 2), since Pentecost was always on Sunday (Lev 23:15-16). History also tells us that the disciples worshipped on Sunday, not on sabbath.

2) The unique features of the Old Testament sabbath demonstrate that it was never designed to be a universal requirement. Under the Old Covenant, there were many “Sabbaths”, other than Saturday, that the Hebrews were required to keep (Lev 19:3, 26:2). Also, every 7th year was a Sabbatical year, while ever 50th year was sabbatical as well (Lev 25:1-4, 8-13). Someone who only keeps “Saturday” as holy falls far short of the divine standard.
Furthermore, the Sabbath observance was only given to the Israelites. It was not a part of any patriarchal covenant (Deut. 5:2-3) since it was not given to their fathers, but to them.
If the sabbath with its regulations were never abolished, then all men everywhere would be required to keep the sabbath. One of the restrictions was, “You shall not light a fire in any of your homes on the sabbath day” (Ex. 35:3). While in the warm climate of Arabia and Palestine artificial warmth was not needed, it is essential to those living in frigid conditions. Imagine all the people who have lived and are still living in Alaska or Siberia trying to keep this ordinance.
An interesting case of someone violating the Sabbath is found in Numbers 15:32-36. They found a man gathering sticks on the Sabbath day and God said to stone him to death. Would one contend today that is still appropriate?

3) The scriptures teach that the sabbath has been abolished. The law with its ordinances is what separated the Jews and the Gentiles. The Jews were given the law. The Gentiles were never required to keep the law with its ordinances. Thus when Paul stated “law of commandments” was abolished “through the cross” (Eph. 2:11-22), he is talking about the Old Law which included the 10 commandments. Until that was removed, there would always be a division between the Jews and Gentiles. Similarly, the “bond written in ordinances” (which contained such things as feast days, sabbaths, etc.) was taken out of the way, having been nailed to the cross (Col. 2:14-16).

Some may claim that only the ceremonial features (e.g., animal sacrifices) of the Mosaic covenant were abolished at the cross and the moral elements of the law (e.g., the ten commandments) remain valid today.

God promised to make a “new covenant,” which would not be like the one given to Israel when they left Egypt (Jer. 31:31-34). The old law that was give when Israel came out of Egypt contained the ten commandments (1 Kgs. 8:9,21).
Paul stated in Rom 7 that the Christian is “dead to the law through the body of Christ” (vs 4) and that the child of God is “discharged from the law” (vs 6).

What law was Paul talking about? A “ceremonial” law? No, he’s talking about the law that contains the 10 commandments because in the very next verse he states, “Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, "You shall not covet."” (Rom 7:7; Ex. 20:17).

Clearly, the law to which the Christian is “dead and from which he is “discharged,” included the ten commandments. Therefore, the Christian is not under obligation to keep the sabbath.
Col 2:14 states that the law was “nailed to the cross”. Paul then says that no one could “judge,” or in other words “condemn” a Christian for not keeping feast days, sabbaths, etc. (Col. 2:16). If the sabbath observance was binding, that statement could not have been made.

All of the 10 commandments, except for the regulations concerning the sabbath, are included under the new covenant. Since the old covenant was abolished, all laws and regulations, are therefore abolished. Only those included under the new covenant, are valid.

 

mman said that the ten commandments were written to the jews.

i can agree with that - the new covenant was given only to the jews as well. jeremiah 31:31.

 

We do a lot of things today that would be considered "rebellion" in OT times. For instance, do you wear a mix of fibers in your clothing? That was considered wrong. Do you have a parapet on your roof? You should. (Deut. 22:8). There were 613 laws in the OT. Some are virtually impossible to follow nowadays.

 

Not to the Jews, but to the house of Israel and Judah.

A careful inspection of the New Covenant will show that Christians are "spiritual" Israel.

James refers to the twelve tribes who are scattered abroad, when refering to Christians.

The letter to the churches of Galatia show that Christians are the seed of Abraham and heirs to the promise (Gal 3).

Now compare that with Rom 9:6-8 "But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel, and not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring, but "Through Isaac shall your offspring be named." This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as offspring."

Therefore, the promise is not to Jews, but to the children of the promise, or spiritual Israel.

When that statement was made in Jer 31:31, it made reference to an old and new. That statement shows that the old was passing away and becoming obsolete and would vanish away (Heb 8:13).

 

…

Mr. Gladstone recently told a friend that the secret of his long life is that amid all the pressure of public cares he never forgot the Sabbath, with its rest for the body and the soul.
•
When I was a boy, the Sabbath lasted from sundown on Saturday to sundown on Sunday,
…
Make the Sabbath a day of religious activity. First of all, of course, is attendance at public worship. "There is a discrepancy," says John McNeill, "between our creed about the Sabbath day and our actual conduct. In many families, at ten o'clock on the Sabbath, attendance at church is still an open question. There is no open question on Monday morning- 'John, will you go to work today.'"

…
Someone has said that without the Sabbath, the Church of Christ could not, as a visible organization, exist on earth.
…
Parents, if you want your children to grow up and honor you, have them honor the Sabbath day.

.
SABBATH DESECRATION
Men seem to think they have a right to change the holy day into a holiday. The young have more temptations to break the Sabbath than we had forty years ago.
.
PUNISHMENT OR BLESSING?
No nation has ever prospered that has trampled the Sabbath in the dust. Show me a nation that has done this and I will show you a nation that has got in it the seeds of ruin and decay. I believe that Sabbath desecration will carry a nation down quicker than anything else. Adam brought marriage and the Sabbath with him out of Eden, and neither can be disregarded without suffering. When the children of Israel went into the Promised Land, God told them to let their land rest every seven years, and He would give them as much in six years as in seven. For four hundred and ninety years they disregarded that law. But mark you, Nebuchadnezzar came and took them off into Babylon, and kept them seventy years in captivity, and the land had its seventy sabbaths of rest. Seven times seventy is four hundred and ninety. So they did not gain much by breaking this law. You can give God His day, or He will take it.

On the other hand, honoring the fourth commandment brings blessing:
"If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on My holy day; and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the LORD, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: then shalt thou delight thyself in the LORD; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it." (Isaiah 58:13-14)
…

? Hasn't the time come to call a halt if men want power with God? Let men call you narrow and bigoted, but be man enough to stand by God's law, and you will have power and blessing. That is the kind of Christianity we want just now in this country. Any man can go with the crowd, but we want men who will go against the current.

Sabbath-breaker, are you ready to step into the scales?

</font>[/QUOTE]</font>[/QUOTE]Do you really not know Moody constantly speaks of the Sunday as 'the Sabbath', Bob?

 

And so with these wonderful Christian men - they all mean Sunday when saying 'Sabbath'. You could add Luther here too.

I do not question their integrity; just their insight.

 

And Wesley

 

Bob, why do you always refer to Christ as Creator - nor even mentioning that He in the first place is Christ Jesus - Saviour of His People?

Then start from there to re-discover the Sabbath - you'll find the Christian Sabbath, I promise.