Do any SDAs keep the Sabbath?

Just to add to what I said in my last message...

I think that a lot of the time, on these "Christian" message boards, much of the exchanges between people are just done to try to impress everybody as to how good of an "arguer" you can be. And I dont know, it just doesnt really strike me as being Christian to do that.

I cant think of Jesus doing that... He usually just said whatever He had to say and that was that. He didnt sit around for hours argueing with everyone about it.

I also think of the passage where Jesus said not to "cast your pearls before the swine".

First of all, I am NOT meaning that I think of anyone here as being "swine" in the typical sense of the word.

Its just that I believe that the setting in these message boards is not often the very best atmosphere to use to try to convince someone of the truth.

For instance, I have been on lots of boards where they will have unbelievers, atheists, etc... and they argue back and forth with Christians on things. And if there is someone who is an unbeliever, but you can tell that he seems open to hear the truth, the problem is that there are all the OTHER unbelievers, atheists, etc. that are sitting there trying to contradict everything you are trying to tell them.

Consequently, you are sometimes doing worse than if you hadnt told them anything at all, and they may come away being even more dead set in their unbelief because of the negative influence of all the others on the message board.

Well I kind of view things the same way here and on most message boards.

I think sometimes it is best to state what you have to say, and just leave it at that. And pray to God that He will send the Holy Spirit to do the rest to those who have an open mind and who might listen to what you have to say. Otherwise you get yourself into some really nit-picking arguements, which only end in confusion. And I am much more interested in saving souls than in trying to impress anyone with my ability to debate.

anyway, I hope this helps.

Claudia

 

Quoting Bob,
"Christ the Creator GAVE US His own Seventh-day Holy day as a "MEMORIAL" of His creative act in making life and SHOWING His Role as our LORD and Creator."

Once more a typical example how the monopolists of the Seventh Day Sabbath give reason for the faith that in them is.
It does not satisfy me, also a Seventh Day Sabbath-believer though!

Christ the Saviour GAVE US His own Seventh-day Holy day as a "MEMORIAL" of His resurrection-act in making life and SHOWING His Role as our LORD and Creator.
That's MY reason, and fully satisfactory!

 

Quoting Link, Sept 23, "The issue was what was requires of the Gentiles. James uses scripture to show that the name of the Lord would be called the residue of the nations or 'man' (interpeting 'dm as 'adam' rather than 'Edom'). This argument demonstrated that Gentiles did not need to be come Jews (through circumcision, etc.) to be in right standing with God. It follows, then, that Gentiles would not be required to keep all the laws given to Israel, but that they would be required to act rightouesly according to the principles the Old Testament teaches for Gentile righteousness. These principles include abstaining from things strangled and from blood, from meat offerred to idols, and from fornication.
My question is, where did God command the nations to rest on the Sabbath. He commanded the Hebrews to rest the Sabbath day. Gentiles living in Jews households were required to keep the sabbath and to keep kosher. But that is a differen issue.
The sabbath is a typeof the rest we find in Christ Jesus."

Before answering, my apologies without excuses for attitude and accusation made as pointed out by yourself! I really stand in need of grace!

"what was required of the Gentiles"? Absolutely nothing! Join the Christian Faith and Church, and you're free to go on with your life as usual - just drop those ugly things you may still do - those things you did as pagans, strangling animals etc. Not James or the Council prohibited anything! They did NOT even distribute the circular no Christian should be circumcised!
Why? Because the real topic of the Council was: Was Paul's Gospel OK? So everything this Council would have stood on and would have stood for - you will find it all in Paul's Gospel - you may safely believe his preaching - it's genuine! Just thos residued of your former religion - nothing of it any longer!
Which implies: The acceptance of the status quo in the Christian Church! You go to Church on Sabbaths - that goes on; You hear the Law read every Sabbath - it is indispenable! You don't circumcise - it is the better and christian way; You don't believe the Law saves you or doing what the Law says, saves you - that is the Gospel of Jesus because you are saved by grace through faith just as Paul has taught you - so therein continue, and it shall be well with you! Greetings in Christ! That's it! That is what the Council prescribed without having prescribed it because it all was most natural for Christians!

 

I am sympathy with you, Claudia.
Jesus spoke with "authority" such as being the "end of all controversy".
We haven't got that authority, so it becomes necessary for us to 'argue' the faith. The Apostles did a lot of it in the Church and persuaded many of Jesus thereby - it should be a means to proclaiming Christ.
If we claimed such authority as Christ's, we must become Roman Catholics or SDA's who have 'the Spirit of Prophecy' as the last word on matters of dispute.
But I agree with you, Christians should not argue with atheists or other unbelievers like Islam, for that would be like throwing God's Word to the swines.
No one can avail anything by arguing with unbelief. Karl Barth supplied me with a motto in that respect. He said, there is no bridge to be built between Faith and Unbelief but Confession.
Then, let our arguing be an exercise in Christian behaviour - I have found it exposes much of the bad in me that should be crucified with the old man.
Many ideas are evoked through argument that would not otherwise have been discovered. I have found this very rewarding of the forum Baptist Board offers. SDANet refuses to place anything they don't like.

 

ascund,

I just wanted to add something else to what I said in response to what you said about me "not having enough respect" to answer anybody on these message boards.

First of all, sometimes I do answer if I have time and feel like doing it... but second of all.... I used to go to many message boards and get really involved in "discussions" (if you can call it that).

Usually what would happen is that I would explain something, then they would make some snide remark and want me to answer. So I would carefully put down every objection that they had to what I was saying, using Scriptures to do it with. Then when they saw they were backed into a corner they would get angry and just begin to make mean crude remarks and taunt me. Then if I finally dared to answer back in the same way, I would be kicked off the message board. They would not, of course, even though they started the entire thing and were 10 times worse in their remarks towards me as I was towards them. They could be pretty vicious in trying to defend their holding onto their sins, not keeping the commandments or the Sabbath, etc.

I just got tired of "playing the game" so to speak and learned to just state my case and pretty much leave it at that. Then pray that the Holy Spirit would lead people to the truth.

Many Christians absolutely hate the seventh-day Sabbath issue and the keeping the Ten Commandments issue, and I realize that.

And to be honest, If I just glance over some of the remarks that certain people give to me when I post something and it strikes me as "goofy" then I cant see any reason to put time and effort into replying back to them about it. And when it comes to the Sabbath and keeping the Law of God, people can come up with some pretty silly excuses. Sometimes I see it as that I dont even want to dignify their question or their remarks with an answer.

But anyway if you dont like what I say or dont want to read what I say, the solution is... use the scroll bar and just scroll down the page past it.


Claudia

 

Well Claudia, it is a "debate" forum. I ignore snide remarks and use every fiber in me to abstain from punching back. Sometimes I fail and I am called on it. When i fail I try to immediatly humble myself and apologize. We are all still humanly sinful. This is why keeping commandments cannot save, they are for our sanctification process. You are saved by grace alone through faith. You think you keep the commandments when in your heart you and I break everyone of them almost daily. For if we break one we are guilty of them all each and every day of our pitiful lives. Thanks be to God for His unspeakable gift!

God Bless!

 

Dear Claudia T,

You last post, referring.
I have found out - to my surprise - that SDA and others of like 'Law-faith', and Christians of 'Grace-faith' live and think in different worlds and spheres! The one simly CANNOT understand the other - not that they don't want to!
The divide can only be crossed by the principle of Ephesians 2:13f. That principle is Jesus Christ who to the Christian is - and should be - all Grace and Law 'kissing one another'.
Then we shall at least begin to reconcile our terminology. How? By realising Jesus Christ is God's Law Ultimate, for is He not "The Word of God"? There is no Law besides for the Christian! the worst is "the Law" in COMPETITION for allegiance with Christ! Then, we create enmity between Christ and the Law; then we in fact, denegrade the Law making it steall the lustre that belongs - or should belong - to Christ!
The Law a 'motive' for the Christian? Ag no, when "in Him" "we have the Fulness"? Impossible! The Sabbath because the Law says so? Yes, if Christ is that Law speaking live within the heart of flesh, and not from dumb, disappeared stone-tables!
Christians aren't Jews, to put it simply.

 

Actually QUOTING GOD would be "REMEMBER THE Sabbath day to keep it holy... FOR IN SIX DAYS THE LORD MADE... THEREFORE THE LORD BLESSED the Sabbath day AND made IT HOLY" Ex 20:8-11.

If you believe that my statement above is NOT an accurate representation of GODS OWN STATEMENT in Exodus 20 - please point to something "substantive" to make your case that "it is just bob that thinks that way".

Otherwise we have "yet another" false accusation from you.

So what is your response the the points of Exodus 20 that I am highlighting??

I see. "How DARE I highlight what GOD said in Exodus 20 instead of what GE says" !!!???

I do like GE's SPIN (that is NOT a quote of ANYTHING NOR even a paraprhase of anything)

Ahh - if only you had an ACTUAL VERSE that said "FOR IN THREE DAYS the LORD RAISED Christ...THEREFORE HE BLESSED The Sabbath day and made it HOLY"

How perfect if instead of your "spin upon spin" non-quotes you actually were speaking DIRECTLY of God's Word as I DIRECTLY point to it in the way God ACTUALLY established HIS OWN memorial of Creation - eh?

Maybe I should chastise you as mercilessly for NOT holding to God's Word in that "spinning" that you do -- as YOU chastise me for HOLDING TO GOD's Word in Exodus 20??!!

Nahhh.

In Christ,

Bob

 

how about the using the bible to intrepret the bible:


Deu 5:13 Six days thou shalt labour, and do all thy work:
Deu 5:14 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou.
Deu 5:15 AND REMEMBER THAT THOU WAST A SERVANT IN THE LAND OF EGYPT, AND THAT THE LORD THY GOD BROUGHT THEE OUT THENCE THROUGH A MIGHTY HAND AND BY A STRETCHED OUT ARM: THEREFORE THE LORD THY GOD COMMANDED THEE TO KEEP THE SABBATH DAY.


oops you forgot these verses, which give the reason for the sabbath and when it started.

Col 2:16 Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days:


somehow the New Testament writters could give us direct imparatives on all aspects of life (1648 of them) but manage not to have one mention to the church about the sabbath, but to say it was a "shadow", and to let no man judge you in reguard to it. the Jerusalem council failed to tell the gentile believers about it.

oh and:

Rom 14:5 One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.


so enjoy your Sabbath, and do you really keep the jewish sabbath or like all the SDA's i know have their own personally acceptable version of it, have you read the OT Law, and keep all aspects of the Sabbath?

 

GE:
Bob Ryan wrote, September 24, 2005 06:17,
“Nice of you to admit that it is not simply "Christ entering Christ" -- finally!”

Unable to recognise your own remark? It Was this,
Bob Ryan, 10 Sept, “Apparently the NT shows the heavenly sanctuary to be REAL - to be a PATTERN SEEN after which the literal earthly sanctuary was modelled. So it is REAL. Built by God without hands. AND it has functional areas just as God says.”
I was not the writer of this nonsense – you were.
Note your contradictions: “the heavenly sanctuary to be REAL”, yet, “to be a PATTERN”; “without hands”, yet, “has functional areas” (like the sanctuary built with hands of men). A ‘pattern’s’ ‘function’ is to serve as ‘model’. Moses was shown the ‘model’ for, or of, the earthly sanctuary – not of the ‘heavenly sanctuary’ – to repeat.

Again, you falsely use quotation marks as though I said, “"Christ entering Christ"”. These are not my words, but yours! My words – and argument – have been this, all along, Christ in being raised from the dead, entered into exaltation and glorification of the heavenly sanctuary – and into its ‘Most Holy Place’. He in capacity of the New Man entered High Priest, into full fellowship of the Trinity, for us and for our atonement with God in the unity of perfect peace. I stand by it. This Christ’s entering in, was and is The Sanctuary not made with hands, that has no compartments, and wherein all division is removed and only eternal and perfect Peace reigns through Christ once for all. Impossible for man to see and live it is even less imaginable, for it is God in the Glory of His Triumph by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.
The nature of its event is essential of Sabbath’s Rest. Therefore I say it must have occurred the destined and prepared place and time, the Seventh Day on earth (as it is in heaven) through this Man returned from the dead.

Yes, you read me right, I understand the Sanctuary of heaven as an Event – The Event of it of all its time and creation; as its perfection, fulfilment, completion, sanctification, glorification, and blessing and peace promised and prophesied in Jesus Christ.
Worlds separate your SDA-conception of the ‘heavenly sanctuary’ from what I believe is the Scriptures’ presentation of it, and debating the differences in fact won’t serve any purpose but to confirm each of us in his own ideas. I’ve found that richly rewarding.

The essence of all differences amounts to this, that Jesus entered into the heavenly Sanctuary High Priest – He did not start officiating High Priest only two millennia later; He entered in to make final atonement once and for all and for eternity – not ever to be repeated or reviewed or re-enacted or reconfirmed; He did it in crowning Act of triumph over death and sin in the rising of Him from death and grave – not through any process of each in its own imperfect and insecure, consecutive stages of priesthood; Not in any way atonement not finished by the exceeding greatness of His power when God raised Christ from the dead.

 

]

Maybe it is your context-less snippet posts that are causing the problem.

Why not include some tiny bit of context for the word fragments from previous posts that you quote so that an actual discussion can be had??

In Christ,

Bob

 

If you had taken the time to include YOUR remark with MY RESPONSE you would SEE that YOUR REMARK Makes CHRIST the Sanctuary so that WHEN the text says CHRIST ENTERED THE SANCTUARY your OWN spin of that - turns it into "CHRIST ENTERING CHRIST".

Get it?

That is the point you need to respond to - to carry the discussion forward.

Taking this time to merely repeat the context for the previous discussion ALREADY HAD does not further your point or mine - it just serves to derail the topic.

Lets keep things moving instead of trying to find ways to stop the discussion.

In Christ,

Bob

 

Are you distilling your own position down to the point where you are now claiming that the High Priestly work of Christ was NOT finished on the Cross?

Do you now admit that the UNIQUE High Priestly function that we SEE in Lev 16 IN the Day of Atonement is what Christ took up AFTER the cross?!!

Is it your confession now that the FULL Day of Atonement process DID NOT END with the slaying of the "Lord's Goat" at the start of the chapter?

Is it your position now that ATonement was NOT finished at the cross - but RATHER (As John says in 1John 2) that the "Atoning SACRIFICE" was finished at the cross?

Are you now admitting to the texts SHOWING that Christ ENTERED heaven - ENTERED the heavenly sanctuary as our High Priest AFTER the cross?

Is this where you have gone GE?

In Christ,

Bob

 

I say that atonement is finished in Christ in dying and rising being exalted and ascended above all heavens and principalities and every name - High Priest after the order of Melchisedec - which is timeless - "without beginning" and without end - in the twinkling of an eye, when the DEAD, Rose in victory of eternal life.
Grasp it, accept it, or maintain your IJ-doctrine.

 

I say that GOD's statement on Atonement that HE GIVES in Lev 16 SHOWING that it contains BOTH the role of the Lamb of God SACRIFICED for the sins of the world AND it contains the UNIQUE role of Christ as High Priest - Post Cross (as Heb 4,7-10 emphatically show) is "correct".

That is right - God is correct.

And I say that God's WORD is correct in 1John 2:2 when it declares the "Atoning SACRIFICE" (NIV) is completed at the cross.

GE -- your alternative story above just is not true to the text of scripture.

In Christ,

Bob

 

On the other hand - you seemed almost willing to confess to the Bible truth of Christ entering the temple in heaven at His ascension INSTEAD of "Christ entering Christ".

So - you were "getting close".

In Christ,

Bob

 

I shall tell you once more, I continue with this for my own sake. I know you cannot be persuaded otherwise.
If Jesus finished atonement "at the cross" but had not risen, He would not have made atonement at all. Did He not raise from the dead, He could never afterwards make atonement. So in resurrrection He made atonement full and final, once for all, "entering into His own rest as God". This is God "working" according to the exceeding greatness of His power. This is God "resting". This everything God ever wanted to do - to save man and His own works from death - "finished / completed / fulfilled /perfected", "blessed" "sanctified", glorified, ascended above every name in this world and also in the world to come. This is Christ entering into fellowship perfect with the trinity. This is Christ entering - not himself as Bob Ryan wnats to hear it from my mouth - Vhrist entering in, by, through, with RESURRECTION from the dead. This is Atonement as understood by Reformation-Faith. You stick to your Romish error of hereafter completing what Christ had done finished and perfect first time last time.

 

That point is "internally conflicted" you can not start with a premise "IF HE HAD Finished the atonement at the cross" and then add - "BUT LATER did not RISE from the dead then He did NOT finish the Atonement at the Cross".

The "IF" "Then" sequence you propose is logically bankrupt!

You need to make an actual argument.

True - but again - this does not fit your stated premise of "Make full atonement on the cross BEFORE rising from the dead".

You now seem to confess that only AFTER the CROSS event - and AFTER rising from the Dead can the full Lev 16 model of ATONEMENT that INCLUDES the High Priestly work of Christ AFTER rising from the dead and AFTER ascending into heaven and AFTER entering into "heaven itself" - entering the "Holy place" made without hands.. only then can the key work of ATONEMENT in the form of the HIGH PRIESTLY work of Christ ALSO be completed in addition to the "ATONING SACRIFICE" 1John 2:2 completed at the Cross.

No text of scripture say "In resurrection He made Atonement".

You seem to deny that Heb 4, 7-10 presents HIM IN HEAVEN as our High Priest and NEVER ON EARTH as High Priest "IF He were on earth HE WOULD NOT BE a PRIEST AT ALL" Heb 8:4.

Why not deal with the texts pointing out your error?

In Christ,

Bob