Ten Reasons I'm a Sabbatarian [moved thread]

[Aaron112]

Good Testimony, and True.

3. Jesus Kept the Sabbath
Luke 4:16
[Jesus] went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. And he stood up to read.
It was Jesus's regular practice to assemble together with other believers on the Sabbath day. Leviticus 23:3 says that the Sabbath is "a day of sacred assembly." You can certainly worship God on all days of the week, but the Sabbath is the day Jesus set aside for worshipping with other believers in a corporate setting. It is a day set apart—a "holy day"—on which holy people are to rest from their own works and be blessed on the day that Jesus blessed.

1 Peter 2:21
To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.
Jesus is our example in all things and following the things He did should not give anyone cause for concern. On the contrary, it is in doing those things which Jesus never did and never told us to do which we should seriously question the safety of such position. Keeping the Sabbath is in keeping with following Jesus's steps.

1 John 2:6
Whoever claims to live in Him must walk as Jesus did.
Again, if we are to "walk as Jesus did" it is a simple thing to ascertain that the example He left was to regularly assemble together with believers on the day He personally blessed and continues to make holy.

4. Disciples Kept the Sabbath After the Cross
Luke 23:56
Then they went home and prepared spices and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment.

 

[Bob S]

But for the grace of God go I,

Hi Aaron, since you posted sparks post to me, I suppose you must agree with his analysis that we have all the evidence we need to know God did give the Sabbath to other nations besides Israel. Spark hangs his hat on the fact that other nations used the seven-day cycle and they named the day a derivative of Sabbath. If spark had to defend, in court, those other nations kept the Sabbath on the evidence of the weekly cycle and had nothing else to support his belief he wouldn't stand a chance of winning.

Spark said it isn't enjoyable to be corrected, I take it he should know because I have been doing a lot of correcting his posts.

As for breaking the Sabbath and the law of stoning, in all of the scripture there is only one instance of a person being put to death by stoning for breaking the Sabbath.

The following are some instances of Sabbath breaking that God apparently excused.

2Kings 11: 4
In the seventh year Jehoiada sent for the commanders of units of a hundred, the Carites and the guards and had them brought to him at the temple of the Lord. He made a covenant with them and put them under oath at the temple of the Lord. Then he showed them the king’s son. 5 He commanded them, saying, “This is what you are to do: You who are in the three companies that are going on duty on the Sabbath—a third of you guarding the royal palace, 6 a third at the Sur Gate, and a third at the gate behind the guard, who take turns guarding the

Neh 13:15
In those days I saw people in Judah treading winepresses on the Sabbath and bringing in grain and loading it on donkeys, together with wine, grapes, figs and all other kinds of loads. And they were bringing all this into Jerusalem on the Sabbath. Therefore I warned them against selling food on that day. I wonder why they were not stoned?

Is 1:13

Stop bringing meaningless offerings! Your incense is detestable to me. New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations— I cannot bear your worthless assemblies. I wonder why God would say such a thing? If the Sabbath observers today are anything like the Israelites according to
Is 58:13
“If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath and from doing as you please on my holy day, if you call the Sabbath a delight and the Lord’s holy day honorable, and if you honor it by not going your own way and not doing as you please or speaking idle words,

The Israelites were constantly desecrating the Sabbath, but there is no recording of anyone being stoned.

 

[Yekcidmij]

Hi Aaron, since you posted sparks post to me, I suppose you must agree with his analysis that we have all the evidence we need to know God did give the Sabbath to other nations besides Israel. Spark hangs his hat on the fact that other nations used the seven-day cycle and they named the day a derivative of Sabbath. If spark had to defend, in court, those other nations kept the Sabbath on the evidence of the weekly cycle and had nothing else to support his belief he wouldn't stand a chance of winning.

There is evidence of other nations in the ancient near east observing some sort of regular/recurring day(s) of "rest", but not necessarily identical to Israelite practice in the bible nor for the same exact reasons.

I think it's worth observing the original purpose of the sabbath, which was primarily to take a day off of work and Israel wasn't the sole nation to receive or, for other nations, to recognize, the value in this proposition. The reasons for doing this are pretty simple. If you work non-stop every day in perpetuity, you're going to "work yourself to death." When Isreal was in Egypt as slaves, this was probably the experience - they were overworked every day for long hours. Hence the reason in Deut 5 for the sabbath, "remember how you were slaves in Egypt ." In Ex 20, the basic reason is appealing to God's design for man - you're to rest as God rested - this is modeled for man in Genesis . We're not designed to work every day in perpetuity. And as anyone who has done so would probably attest, doing so leads to health problems (and a shorter life expectancy if you do it long enough).

One of the primary purposes of the law was that if you follow it, you'd have a long life, "‘So you shall keep My statutes and My judgments, by which a man may live if he does them;" - Lev 18:5. On top of that consider Jesus' comments, "the sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath" -Mk 2:27. In other words, in keeping with Jesus' principle and Lev 18:5, the purpose of the sabbath was to lead to promote life - if you take a regular day off work, you'll more likely have a better, longer life.

This take leaves some room for interpretation since basically everyone on this forum is "observing" the sabbath in this way. Most occupations today have regular time off work built in. In fact, I would guess quite a number of people have both Saturday's and Sunday's off work. Usually the consternation comes with specific requirements and prohibitions - which day of the week, does it matter, what exactly is prohibited, what is required.

The Torah itself seems to require nothing much more specific than resting from work. Sure, Rabbinical opinion has specified much more detail, but I think more explanation would be needed as to why Christians would be bound by Rabbinical halakah. There is mention of "holy convocations" in Lev 23, but it's hard for me to see how this is applicable. A "holy assembly" in Lev 23 is having to do with sacrifices and activity for Levites in the physical temple. To translate this into "meeting for church" looks like a stretch to me. That said, if someone thinks that a "holy convocation" is the same as "going to church" or "going to synagogue," that this is a requirement on them and so wants to do it, I don't have a problem with them doing it. By all means, do what your conscience is dictating here. But as far as I can tell, taking a day off work would meet the Torah's requirement and so one could say that they "observe" this command.

 

[Bob S]

Hi Yek, hope you don't mind me abbreviating your name. My premise is and has been that there is no evidence that our Creator ever asked any other nation or people to observe a day, any day. I do support anyone that comes to the conclusion that they should keep a day Holy. I am very concerned with those who wish to convince others that their salvation hinges on observing a particular day every week. You may not read such on the forum, but then again some have made it very clear. The Sabbath observing groups posting on this forum are Messianic and SDA. I happen to have been SDA and know what they really believe. I have yet for a Messianic to tell us we will be lost if we do not keep all the rituals they observe.

SDAs get many of their beliefs from a lady who claimed to be more than a prophet. In her writings that SDAs take as equal to scripture she wrote the following: But if we turn aside from the fourth commandment, so positively given by God, to adopt the inventions of Satan, voiced and acted by men under his control, we cannot be saved. We cannot with safety receive his traditions and subtleties as truth. {RH, July 6, 1897 par. 4}

No one who disregards the fourth commandment, after becoming enlightened in regard to the claims of the Sabbath, can be held guiltless in the sight of God. {RH, July 6, 1897 par. 14}

All will be judged according to the light that has shone upon them. If they have light upon the Sabbath, they cannot be saved in rejecting that light.{HS 234.3}

As persons become convinced from the Scriptures that the claims of the fourth commandment are still binding, the question is often raised, Is it necessary in order to secure salvation that we keep the Sabbath? This is a question of grave importance. If the light has shone from the word of God, if the message has been presented to men, as it was to Pharaoh, and they refuse to heed that message, if they reject the light, they refuse to obey God, and cannot be saved in their disobedience. {RH, January 5, 1886 par. 2}

All this was and is a ploy to scare outsiders into the fold. Salvation for the Israelites was never tied to Sabbath observance. Salvation is a gift from God to those who claim the Promises. Abraham was not lost because he didn't observe Sabbath. He was saved because of his faith and trust. That is the only way man is saved.

 

[Yekcidmij]

I am very concerned with those who wish to convince others that their salvation hinges on observing a particular day every week.

Sure, I get your point. I don't take that position myself.

 

[Leaf473]

I think they simply met together house to house, in each other's homes, in small groups/usually?/ , and followed Jesus, talked about Jesus, loved and obeyed Jesus, and kept His Word.

I like the idea of house churches. At some point, it looks like they started making central meeting places.

When that happened, did they begin saddling up horses, or hitching them to wagons?

Exodus 31
Six days shall work be done, but on the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day shall surely be put to death.

 

[Leaf473]

There is evidence of other nations in the ancient near east observing some sort of regular/recurring day(s) of "rest"...

Once you move away from the middle east, what do you find? Ancient China, Aztecs, Mayans? I'm interested.

 

[Yekcidmij]

Once you move away from the middle east, what do you find? Ancient China, Aztecs, Mayans? I'm interested.

I honestly don't know. I'm not as familiar with those.

 

[Yekcidmij]

Once you move away from the middle east, what do you find? Ancient China, Aztecs, Mayans? I'm interested.

There is another possibility as well that Sabbath rest originally was designed to commemorate God's rest at creation with the prescriptions and prohibitions of the sabbath being oriented specifically for temple liturgy (Explained in this paper and its references). On this view, there are strong connections between God's activity in, and the descriptions of creation in Gen 1-2 and the construction of the tabernacle by Moses. The connections are significant enough where it looks like Gen 1 -2 is describing creation as God constructing his dwelling place - his tabernacle. He is constructing the entire universe as his tabernacle, and the earthly tabernacle is either a mirror image or microcosm of creation.

On this view, God's "resting" on the 7th day is his enthronement - he is taking his seat on the throne as King of Creation (see the ref's in the paper linked above). The Sabbath in ancient Israel, then, is a continuous reenactment of the enthronement of God in the tabernacle (and later temple). Sabbath activity, then, was temple oriented - it was oriented to specific temple liturgy. Originally at least, it wasn't about man resting, as in needing time off of work, but about God resting, and man participating in temple liturgy to reenact and commemorate God's rest/enthronement at the completion of his "tabernacle" building. God builds the universe as his temple, then enters it and enthrones himself to dwell with man as King of Creation.

On this view, and at least for me as a Christian, I initially see no specific requirement or need to observe the Sabbath given that the resurrection of the Messiah has inaugurated a new creation that is ongoing. The Temple itself has been re-located in the body of Christ and is being extended to all of creation, as God intended in Gen 1-2, through the proclamation of the gospel and the expansion of the Kingdom of God.