THE TRUTH ABOUT SABBATH

The Sabbath, as we know it from the New Testament, is NOT the keeping of a certain day. We have no command whatsoever to keep Saturday for a Sabbath, nor do we have any commandment to keep the first day of the week, which is Sunday, as a Sabbath.

Many people keeps days. Others make Sunday an idol, a worship day. Others make Saturday as the worship day. Both the Sunday worshipper and the Sabbath keeper are absolutely wrong, according to the Word of God. Sabbath to a Christian is no longer the keeping of holy days, new moons or seasons. It means "eternal rest" to one's soul by the New Birth. We have to go by the Word of God, not by what the Adventists say, nor by what the Protestant says, nor by what the Catholic says.

Here is the truth of the Sabbath, which means "REST."

Hebrews 4:8, "For if Jesus had given them REST (or rest day), then would He not afterward have spoken of another day. There remaineth therefore a rest (Sabbath keeping) to the people of God. For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from His."

Reading the key phrase in the last part of the verse, it says that "God ceased from His own works." God gave Israel the seventh day for their Sabbath, in commemoration of His own work wherein He created the world and all that was therein, and then stopped creating. He ceased from His labors. He rested. Now it was fine to give a Sabbath rest to a people who were all in one place at one time, so they could all keep a certain day. Today half the world is in light while the other half is in darkness, so it wouldn't work at all. But that is just an argument from the natural.

Let's see what the Bible teaches us about this Sabbath rest. "For he that is entered into his rest." This entering in is not only entering in, but remaining in, the rest. It is an `eternal rest' of which the seventh day is but a type, to the Christian.

`Seven' is completion. `Eight' is the `first' day again.

Jesus' resurrection was in the first day of the week, giving us eternal life and eternal Sabbath rest. Thus we see why God could not give us any one certain day of the week as a Sabbath (rest). We've `entered into' and do `remain in' our rest, which Israel could not do, having only a shadow of the true substance which we enjoy. Why go back to a shadow when we have reality now?

How we receive this rest, or continuing Sabbath, is at the invitation of Jesus. He said in Matthew 11:28,29, "Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me;... and ye shall find rest (or keeping of the Sabbath, not a day, but eternal life, Sabbath) unto your souls."

No matter how long you have been laboring under your load of sin, whether it is ten years, thirty years or fifty years, or longer, come with your tired weary life and you will find His rest (the true Sabbath). Jesus will give you rest.

Now exactly what is that rest that Jesus will give?

Isaiah 28:8-12, "For all tables are full of vomit and filthiness, so that there is no place clean. Whom shall He teach knowledge? and whom shall He make to understand doctrine? them that are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breasts. For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little: For with stammering lips and another tongue will He speak to this people. To whom He said, This is the rest (Sabbath) wherewith ye may cause the weary to rest (or keeping of His Sabbath); and this is the refreshing: yet they would not hear."

Here it is prophesied right here in Isaiah. And it came to pass about 700 years later at Pentecost when they were all filled with the Holy Ghost exactly as it was said they would be. This is the true Sabbath that was promised. Thus when they were filled with the Holy Ghost they ceased from their worldly works, their worldly doings, their evil ways. The Holy Ghost took charge of their lives. They entered into rest. There is your rest. That is your Sabbath. It is not a day, nor a year, but the eternity of being filled and blessed in the Holy Spirit. It is you ceasing, and God doing. It is God in you willing and doing of His good pleasure.

Oh, that people might come unto Him and find that rest. There is a cry in all hearts for that rest but the majority don't know the answer. So they try to still the cry by a religious process of keeping certain days or accepting denominational creeds and dogmas. But failing in that, many try drinking, carousing, and every physical excess, thinking that by worldly pleasures there can be some satisfaction. But in such there is no rest. They smoke and take pills to quiet their nerves. But there is no rest in earthly potions. They need Jesus. They need the heavenly remedy, the rest of the Spirit.

Then the most of them go to church on Sunday. That is good but even there they have no idea of how to approach God and how to worship Him. Jesus said that true worship was in Spirit and in truth, John 4:24. But what kind of worship can you get in a church that knows so little of God it puts up a Santa Claus at Christmas and bunnies at Easter? Where did they get that? They got it from the pagans and made it a part of the church doctrine.

But when one turns to the Lord and is filled with the Holy Ghost he ceases from all such things. He has a rest in his soul. He really begins to live, and love God and worship Him.

The Law of the Old testament was only a shadow of things that was to come in the New Testament. The Old says, "Thou shalt not commit adultery". The New saith "Whosoever looketh upon a woman with lust has already committed "adultery" with her in his heart". The Old Testament states, "Thou shalt not kill". The New Testament states, "He that hateth his brother without a cause is already guilty of killing or murdering his brother." Notice that the New Testament even magnified the meaning of the Law. And so is the same concerning the Sabbath. The Old saith, "Keep holy the Sabbath Day". The New saith, "Come unto Me all of you who labour and are heavily-laden, and I will give you Sabbath (rest). For I am the Lord of the Sabbath." If Jesus Himself never hesitated to heal the sick on the Sabbath Day and was condemned by the Pharisees for doing such, it just follows that Jesus was not anymore concerned about making holy that certain literal observance of a Sabbath day. Jesus was pointing us to the "New Birth" as the real true Sabbath or "rest". Didn't Jesus say to Nicodemus, "Except a man be born of water and of Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven." This "New Birth" or in the state of "being born again" is now the real Sabbath to the Christian believers of today.

Here in the succeeding verses, we find God solemnly warning us to fear, lest we fail to enter into that Sabbath (rest) of God just like the children of Israel who provoked God and perished in the wilderness HEBREWS 3:7-19, 4:1-11:

Wherefore (as the Holy Ghost saith, To day if ye will hear his voice, Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness: when your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works forty years. Wherefore I was grieved with that generation, and said, They do alway err in [their] heart; and they have not known my ways. So I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest).

Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God. But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end; While it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation.
For some, when they had heard, did provoke: howbeit not all that came out of Egypt by Moses. But with whom was he grieved forty years? [was it] not with them that had sinned, whose carcases fell in the wilderness? And to whom sware he that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that believed not? So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.

Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left [us] of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it. For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard [it].

For we which have believed do enter into rest, as he said, As I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into my rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of the world.

For he spake in a certain place of the seventh [day] on this wise, And God did rest the seventh day from all his works. And in this [place] again, If they shall enter into my rest.

Seeing therefore it remaineth that some must enter therein, and they to whom it was first preached entered not in because of unbelief:

Again, he limiteth a certain day, saying in David, To day, after so long a time; as it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts. For if Jesus had given them rest, then would he not afterward have spoken of another day. There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God. For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God [did] from his. Let us labour therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief."

No, sir, there's not, not a Scripture in the Bible, nor in the New Testament, for us to keep either Saturday or Sunday. But the reason we keep Sunday, is a memorial of the resurrection.

(SOURCE: WWW.ENDTIMEMESSAGE.INFO)