Why not just take 2 days for the Sabbath, Saturday and Sunday and spend time with other Christians, or do Sabbath on Friday like Islam. Why is the Sabbath so important, between God and His people. What would you tell someone to enlighthen them on this question?

If a person rests on the Sabbath, would it be wrong of them to also go to church on the sunday?

Depends on the person's motive. There is nothing wrong per se with going to church on Sunday, though it is mildly akin to entering a place of amusement or a tavern, etc. If you are entering there, not for your own selfish reasons but to find and help others who are there, there is no problem.

Jesus ate with sinners and prostitutes. It did not corrupt His pure mind to do so, and it need not corrupt us either if we remain connected to Him. Go to that church on Sunday and preach!

If, on the other hand, one attends Sunday church strictly for political reasons, or to give the impression that one keeps Sunday as the sabbath, or for some other selfish or anti-biblical purpose, "be sure your sin will find you out."

God reads the heart.

Blessings,

Green Cochoa.

Ask that person if he or she would like to celebrate their wedding anniversary and/or birthday on a different day, just because others thought it was a good idea. Is their special day really any different from another day? Why not just celebrate it a different time...or not at all?

Blessings,

Green Cochoa.

If someone is willing to disregard Sabbath observance now, think of how much easier it will be for them to make the same decision when under threat of losing their job or their life.

If it be wrong to go to church on Sunday, too, would it be wrong to go to church on Wednesday? Or Sunday evening? Or is it wrong to go to any other church on any day?

Could that problem be solved by recogniseing "church" as the body of Christ rather than as a building which you can be inside and which you leave after your 2 hours of sabbath service are up?

Not to complicate the issue, but I once went to a large church that had four services, one of which was on Saturday.

The biggest flaw I see in discussions like these is how man starts to look at his own understanding above God's. Who are we to debate the true virtue of God's laws? Scripture clearly defines God's law regarding obedience to the Sabbath, it is left to man to freely obey it. God can wink at our ignorance, but once a person willingly rejects or intentionally breaks any of the commandments, they will be held accountable.

JCS your last post didn't really say anything. Can you be more specific?

Furthermore, there are no post-resurrection injunctions to keep the Sabbath, which was part of the Jewish law, and early Christians almost immediately began meeting on Sunday as well as Saturday, as shown by the following quote from Justin Martyr, who died AD 165:

"And we afterwards continually remind each other of these things. And the wealthy among us help the needy; and we always keep together; and for all things wherewith we are supplied, we bless the Maker of all through His Son Jesus Christ, and through the Holy Ghost. And on the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one place, and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as time permits; then, when the reader has ceased, the president verbally instructs, and exhorts to the imitation of these good things. Then we all rise together and pray, and, as we before said, when our prayer is ended, bread and wine and water are brought, and the president in like manner offers prayers and thanksgivings, according to his ability, and the people assent, saying Amen; and there is a distribution to each, and a participation of that over which thanks have been given, and to those who are absent a portion is sent by the deacons. And they who are well to do, and willing, give what each thinks fit; and what is collected is deposited with the president, who succours the orphans and widows and those who, through sickness or any other cause, are in want, and those who are in bonds and the strangers sojourning among us, and in a word takes care of all who are in need. But Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly, because it is the first day on which God, having wrought a change in the darkness and matter, made the world; and Jesus Christ our Saviour on the same day rose from the dead. For He was crucified on the day before that of Saturn (Saturday); and on the day after that of Saturn, which is the day of the Sun, having appeared to His apostles and disciples, He taught them these things, which we have submitted to you also for your consideration.

This is from Justin's "First Apology", dated around AD 150-155. Since the dating of the NT books ranges from AD 45 - AD 120, depending on your sources, this is not far off the beginnings of Christianity.

Only if you believe that the moral law was abolished.

Actually, for the Christian, it was; read Galatians 4. It was replaced by the commandment of Jesus, ie: John 15:17 "This is my command: love each other."

Therefore the requirement to love God, and love each other, and express this love in meaningfull ways, remains. The moral law, on the other hand, is gone. It is replaced by "the law written on our hearts", the inner desire to do good, prompted by the Holy Spirit which dwells in us.

JAK,

There are many who have been drinking from some polluted streams of truth. Some of these streams, unfortunately, come to us under the name of "Holy Bible." They are, however, misguided translations in which men have inserted their own doctrines.

If you are reading from the NIV Bible, it is inevitable that you would conclude the law was abolished. But if you go back to the original Greek from which the KJV was translated, you will find that the moral law was never abolished. Find a KJV Bible and read Colossians 2:14 and Ephesians 3:15, and then compare those verses with the NIV. You will see a big difference.

There were two "laws of Moses." One was the Ten Commandments, usually referred to as the law or the commandments. The other was handwritten laws and instructions for daily living which were placed in a pocket on the outside of the ark and usually referred to as ordinances or statutes. Of these ordinances, provided in the books of Exodus thru Deuteronomy, there were two classes: 1) the ceremonial laws (those which pointed forward to Christ), and 2) the laws of healthful living and which governed relationships. The latter set of laws, along with the Ten Commandment Law, were never to be abolished. The ceremonial laws, however, were abolished at the cross. There was no longer a need for sacrifices, etc. after Jesus, the Antitype, had fulfilled that to which the type had pointed.

Blessings,

Green Cochoa.

KJV or NIV, they both say the same thing. "[24]Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one from the mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar.... [30]Nevertheless what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman.
[31] So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free." Gal. 4:24, 30-31 (KJV)

One cannot just brush off an argument by saying "You're using the wrong translation." A doctrine that can only be supported by a single translation of Scripture is on pretty shaky ground. Besides, the idea that the law was "abolished" is older than the NIV.

EGW herself used many available translations. Here is a comment from the White Estate website:

"Did Ellen White use any translations of the Bible other than the King James Version?

Yes. While it was Ellen White's custom to use the King James Version, she made occasional use of the various English translations that were becoming available in her day. She does not, however, comment directly on the relative merits of these versions, but it is clear from her practice that she recognized the desirability of making use of the best in all versions of the Bible. For example, in her book The Ministry of Healing, Ellen White employed eight texts from the English Revised Version, 55 from the American Revised Version, two from Leeser's translation, and four from Noyes, in addition to seven marginal renderings. In her preaching, however, Ellen White preferred to use the language of the King James Version as it was the most familiar to her listeners. (I added the bold.)

Notice that she did not use KJV because it was doctrinally pure, but because it "was most familiar to her readers."

The idea that "There were two 'laws of Moses.'" although prevalent, cannot be shown from Scripture. None of the Bible writers had this understanding, certainly not Paul. It falls into the category of "teaching for doctrine the commandments of men."

As for the ten words inside the ark, they are called עדות (`eduwth) in the hebrew and (testimony) in the KJV. Exodus 25:16
The law outside of the ark is called תורה (towrah) in hebrew and (law) in the KJV. Deu 31:26

In the LXX, the word used in Exo 25:16 is μαρτύριον (martyrion).
The LXX word used in Deu 31:26 is νόμος (nomos). This happens to be the same word used in Eph 2:15 (I assume it is the verse you are interested in Greenie?).

In Col 2:14, the interesting word is δόγμα (dogma). It is interestingly used twice of imperial orders and once of an apostolic order (Luk 2:1; Act 17:7; Act 16:4). Could it here be a reference to such laws we make up and impose upon each other naively thinking that we are thus helping one another to keep the commandments of God?

Could it be that the strongest argument concerning post-resurrection law is made in Galatians and Romans? The law is good, it has a purpose, which is to show us our sinfulness and kill us as lawbreakers. By grace we are then resurrected with Jesus to live with Him and by the Spirit. Anyone who still tries to obtain righteousness by lawful acts has not yet been (allowed him/herself to be) killed by it as a lawbreaker, and having thus not died has also not risen to live through the Spirit, and is therefore still struggling vainly in their own strength.

The law justifies no-one in the sight of God, and the one who strive to do the law lives by the law, ignorant of the fact that the law has no life to give. The law has fulfilled its duty the moment it brings a sinner to Christ, who has life to give, life overflowing. The law which does not bring the sinner to Christ binds the sinner in his sins and indeed becomes one of those laws which the events on the cross set us free from.

And finally, lest someone take this to be a gospel of anything goes, the apostle makes clear that those who walk with the Spirit do not walk in sin.

(Gal 2-5; Rom 6-8)

So far with theory, what about practise?

I propose that this means the proper response to conviction of sin in our lives is not to put more efforts into keeping the law, but rather to put more efforts into seeking Jesus in all those places where He can be found, through prayer, study of His testimony (by which I of course mean the bible) and through His body on earth (by which I of course mean all and any christian who embody the commandments of Jesus in the gospels).

That is not true at all for the case I am referring to, but you may be saying this based on my own mistake of saying "3:15" instead of "2:15" as Vaster has pointed out just above. While you are on the right track that the covenants are tied to God's Law, these verses may not be saying what you seem to think they are saying.

Undoubtedly it is older....much, much older...as old as Satan himself. Satan's first lie was that God's law could not be trusted. He has always wished to abolish it from the beginning of time. And yet we read from the Bible how the law was not to be changed in the slightest..."till heaven and earth pass." (See Matthew 5:18, Luke 16:17.)

It is true that Ellen White occasionally used other versions of the Bible. It is my understanding that she carefully supervised which translations were used by her editors, and at times she authorized another translation to be used while in other places she kept to the King James Version. I believe she was given prophetic discernment to know which translations were pure, and sometimes even the NIV does a better job than the KJV. However, the NIV presents so many errors as to have brought me to the point of naming it the "Never Inspired Version." There is an entire thread elsewhere on this forum dedicated to this topic. NOTE: Ellen White never once quoted from the NIV.

I'm not sure which scripture you are reading. It can certainly be shown from the scriptures which I use that there were at least two unequal parts of the "law of Moses." The King James Version of the Bible shows this more clearly than the NIV in the verses I mentioned.

Blessings,

Green Cochoa.

Do you take me for a fool? If this was intended for a joke it was not perceived in that manner. You realize, of course, that the NIV was first released in 1978? And Ellen White died in 1915

I'm reminded of the old adage which says "When arguing with a fool be sure they are not doing the same thing."

This is cute. Haven't heard this before.

E. J. Hibbard wrote an excellent book on this subject called, "The Two Laws." Some of what he wrote can be seen here:

http://books.google.com/books?id=Pk27zLR...p;q&f=false

(I tried to tiny this twice, but it didn't take. You can Google "Hibbard Two Laws" if the long link doesn't work.)

******* NOTE: I edited this and used the 2nd icon from the list in the text box to make this linkable. - Daryl F. *******

Hibbard makes use of the following verse, "For when there is a change of the priesthood, there must also be a change of the law." (Heb. 7:12) I don't remember his argument, however.

Regarding the moral law being gone, I would assume that only the moral law could be written in our heart and mind, which is Jer. 31, quoted again in Heb. 8. I don't see what law this could possibly be other than the moral law. You couldn't argue that the law written in the heart quoted in Heb. 8 refers some new law which didn't exist previously, because it's quoting from Jer. 31.

It looks like the argument you're wishing to make here is the following:

1.Paul is saying that the Old Covenant, and its corresponding law (which includes the moral law) was done away with at the cross.
2.Now we're under a New Covenant, and a new law.

Assuming I've understood your argument correctly (if not, please restate it), this begs the question of how anyone was saved before the cross. The only way anyone could be saved is by faith in Christ, right? And this is the New Covenant. So the New Covenant must have existed before the cross, or nobody could have been saved (nobody was saved by keeping the law, right?).

Sorry if I've misunderstood a point you were making, but this seems to be an obvious flaw in what I understood you to be saying.

This is New Covenant Theology. I don't believe this. I believe in Covenant Theology, that is, that the new covenant existed before the cross, as Tom pointed out. In fact, the new covenant is the only means of salvation. Nobody has ever been saved through the old covenant.

"And this I say, that the law, which was four hundred and thirty years later, cannot annul the covenant that was confirmed before by God in Christ, that it should make the promise of no effect" (Gal. 3:17).

About the commandaments of Jesus, they existed long before Jesus lived on earth. They were not new, and were right there in the law of Moses. How do you see that?

If we are talking about covenants, a question to ask is, what were covenants sealed with?

"Is the Sabbath that important?" No, not more than the other nine commandments. Yes, Sabbath-keeping is beautiful and extremely rewarding, however, it is not more satisfying than living in harmony with the other nine commandments. It is one law, not ten laws. So, in reality, it is impossible to keep or break one without also keeping or breaking all ten. The only reason SDA's emphasize Sabbath-keeping is because it is the only commandment under attack. Defending it becomes important because breaking it has become a non-issue for most Christians. The same would hold true if one of the other commandments was under attack.

I know of no Christian who argues believers are at liberty to break the moral law because Jesus abolished it at the cross. No one, that I know of, believes it is right or righteous to have other gods before God, to make idols representing God, to take His name in vain, to dishonor parents, to murder, to commit adultery, to steal, to lie, or to covet. Yet, most people are perfectly fine with disregarding the Sabbath commandment. It doesn't make sense to me. If all we do is imitate Jesus' godly example and live in harmony with the ten commandments we cannot go wrong. To say otherwise is to imply Jesus got it wrong.

Seriously, you claim to know american christians who see something wrong with coveting and therefore joining the race of outscoring whatever the neighbours bought last time?

(I know they exist, but they are also few enough to be newsworthy)

This is an old and unsubtantiated arguement which fails the test of even casual scrutiny. (Essentially it is saying that if you keep all the commandments but break one, you are breaking all the commandments. Therefore you are keeping all and breaking all at the same time.) There is a quantum difference between not keeping Sabbath and killing someone or sleeping with your neighbor's wife (or husband).

Breaking one commandment does not break all the commandments. Period. True, breaking one commandment is just as much a sin as breaking another, but falls far short of "breaking all".

Very good, I like that....what I use is what if you find your beloved and you tell her she means so much to you and declare your love and she sets a date for you to spend time together..But you feel you can skip it or worse go see a old flame, and then tell your beloved it wasnt that big of a deal so you didnt make the date, hmmm...

So your beloved writes a law which says that 24 hours every week will be your special date, and if you ever fail to make this date, your relationship is not only over but your beloved will have her brothers kill you...

It's in fact an old argument, since it comes from biblical times.

"For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it. For he who said, 'Do not commit adultery,' said also, 'Do not kill.' If you do not commit adultery but do kill, you have become a transgressor of the law" (James 2:10, 11).

And that one point also includes the 4th Commandment, which wouldn't have been written there by the finger of God in the first place, if the Sabbath wasn't that important to Him.

Assuming you're referring to my last post. Please note what I said - "I know of no Christian who argues believers are at liberty to break the moral law because Jesus abolished it at the cross."

James wrote, "For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all." (2:10) Again, it's one law, not ten laws.

We had a good time with this in class yesterday, so it's fresh in my mind.

Galatians contrasts Hagar/Ishmael and Sarah/Isaac, as a way to contrast the Old Covenant with the New. What's the contrast?

Before we go there, let's see what it was NOT contrasting. The promise was that Abraham would have a son. In both cases, doing what God said - Abraham gets a son - was the goal. So also, in both the Old and New Covenants, doing what God said - living in harmony with Him - was the goal. So the common idea that the Old Covenant required obedience to God's law but the New Covenant abolished it, is not supported by Galatians.

What is the contrast Paul was making? The goal was for Abraham to have a son. The Hagar plan was that Abraham would use human effort to fulfill God's word. It was an ingenious plan, and it worked. However, it was not what God wanted.

What God wanted was for Abraham to accept His promised blessing, without trusting to human works. Isaac was to come in spite of the obvious human impossibility - an unmerited gift from God.

That's the difference between the Old and New Covenants. The Old Covenant was based on the people's promise to obey God by their own untiring efforts. The New Covenant is based on the people receiving God's merit, in spite of their feeble efforts.

But let's not forget that the New Covenant requires effort also. Isaac was not a virgin birth. But it would be foolish to say that the efforts of Abraham and Sarah went an iota toward the miracle of Isaac. So also in the New Covenant.

But to say that the New Covenant abolished the law is wrong. It made it even more crucial. Rather than a list of requirements on stone, it becomes a list of blessings that God writes on our hearts.

But even if they got it right, the Jews were still obligated to observe the OC rites and rituals. In other words, being under the NC did not obviate the requirements of the OC. So, what does that say about the OC?

Well said.