Hello All,
(Just a general disclaimer that I must insert here at the beginning. I am but a lay person, like most of you. And these weekly “thoughts” are but my own. Not the definitive word on this or any topic. Just my own conclusions derived from my own study and faith in God. The greatest hope I have for these weekly “thoughts” is to have them be a springboard for further study on your part. Not to be a weekly treatise to be blindly accepted. So, please read them with this intent, this motive in mind).
This week’s lesson from “The Adult Sabbath School Guide” is titled “The Sabbath and the End”. Our quarterly makes a point about “the Sabbath and the Law”. It makes the case that the Sabbath alone among the commandments is behind everything, because it alone points to God as Creator. It makes the case that “those who refuse the final call of the three angels to worship God on His Holy day and who worship the beast on his counterfeit sabbath, Sunday, will receive the mark of the beast” (Quarterly for Wednesday). Boy, is this comment rife with ideas that could be misinterpreted or misunderstood!
The very religious Jews of Christ’s day were arguably the greatest Sabbath-worshippers ever! They had taken Ezekiel’s council, Nehemiah’s council and Ezra’s council seriously centuries before. They took God seriously and did all that the law stipulated. Unfortunately, they did not know God… nor His Son whom He had sent. This is one of the great lessons of Christ’s incarnation. That people can be strictly keeping all of God’s commandments, as the outward symbol of the final divide between those who worship the Lord and those who worship the beast and not know the God of the commandments at all. And “not know” God to the extent that they would deny Him, hate Him, and seek to actively destroy Him and destroy those who truly know Him and truly follow Him. Yikes! This is serious! Like all God’s commandments, Sabbath-keeping must be accurately understood. Paul gives us some help with this.
Paul tells us that “love is the fulfillment of the law” (Romans 13:10). Therefore, love is the fulfillment of the Sabbath, too. Love is what it means to truly “worship” because true worship is not confined to something done in a formal setting, especially at church services and especially on those Sabbath-day services. EGW tells us what true worship really is:
“Faithful work is more acceptable to God than the most zealous formal worship. True worship consists in working together with Christ. Prayers, exhortations, and talk are cheap fruits, which are frequently tied on; but fruits that are manifested in good works, in caring for the needy, the fatherless, and widows, are genuine, and grow naturally upon a good tree” (Signs of the Times, 2/17/1887).
Therefore, worship is who you are. We worship every moment of the day. It is the motive behind all that we do. And that motive, for which we were created, is the same motive that moves our Creator God. Love. True loving is true worship. Nothing else qualifies as such. Only love. True loving is also true Sabbath-keeping, too. No wonder Paul also tells us that “the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor (no longer under the law)” (Galatians 3:24-25). Once faith comes, we are no longer under the law, no longer to be governed by law, no longer to be led by law. We are under love, to be governed by love, and to be led by love. Love is the fulfilling of the Sabbath, too. And in this “loving” is where we find our Sabbath “rest”.
“Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matthew 11: 28-29). What does true Sabbath-keeping look like? What does the true Sabbath-loving look like? We have two great examples:
1. After remonstrating with the Pharisees over condemning the 12 disciples about perceived Sabbath violations, Christ said, “I desire mercy and not sacrifice” (Matthew 12:7). Sabbath-keeping is about mercy or loving-kindness. Christ also said after this, that “it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath” (Matthew 12:12). Meaning, it is unlawful to not do good on the Sabbath. The Sabbath is to be a day where we do not do our usual work, in order to have the time to intentionally do good… which is to truly rest in God.
2. Isaiah gives us counsel regarding fasting. And then uses this understanding to include Sabbath-keeping (Read Isaiah 58). Sabbath-keeping is about relieving those in need… about doing good.
So, let us not confuse the outward sign of Sabbath-keeping with the true Sabbath-keeping. In the end, the wheat and the chaff will be separated. But God alone judges the heart, where true Sabbath-keeping resides.
With brotherly love,
Jim