God’s Seal And Satan’s Mark
George Burnside
WHICH DAY SHALL WE KEEP AS THE SABBATH?
ONE of the Creators first gifts to man was the Sabbath. The Lord made man on the sixth day; and on the vary next day-the seventh day of that first septenary cycle of time He made the Sabbath. After His six days of creative work, "He rested on the seventh day from all his work." Then He “blessed, the seventh day, and sanctified it.” Genesis 2:1-3.
The word "Sabbath" means rest. Before the seventh day could be a holy day for man's observance, the Lord must hallow it and set it apart Therefore, at the very beginning of this world's history, God made the seventh day the Sabbath, by resting on that particular day, and blessing and sanctifying it "because that in it He had rested from all His work." Every seventh day from that time onward, as long as the world should abide, was set apart as a holy and blessed day for man's observance. Today the majority of professed Christians are observing Sunday, the first day of the week. But a careful investigation will convince the candid mind that this widespread practice of Sunday keeping is a human ordinance, a man-made custom, which stands entirely without Scriptural warrant or divine authority.
God blessed and sanctified the seventh day at the close of creation's week. There is no Scripture that says He has removed His blessing and sanctity from the seventh day. Therefore that blessing and sanctification must be on the seventh day still
SIX REASONS FOR GOD’S SABBATH
Look at these notable facts concerning the seventh day:
These six immutable facts forever prove that the seventh day, commonly called Saturday, is the only true Sabbath day.
The keeping of the seventh day holy is not a temporary arrangement or secondary plan introduced long after creation for some certain age merely; but it dates from the creation of the world, and will continue as long as the world itself shall endure. The seventh-day Sabbath is not only one of the oldest institutions in this world to-day, but it is one institution that will be perpetuated throughout the eternal ages in the world to come. (Isaiah 66: 22, 21) In the time of restitution of all things, when God makes all things new, and Paradise blooms again upon this renovated earth, the saints of God will observe the same Sabbath that was kept by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden before sin entered the world. Thus the seventh-day Sabbath stands as a great rainbow arch spanning all the time frown Paradise lust to Paradise restored. It covers all the ages of this world's history; and there is therefore in God's plan no room for the introduction of any other so-called Sabbath. The seventh day is the only divinely intended Sabbath for this world.
THE SABBATH NOT CONFINED TO ONE PEOPLE OR TIME
Many people to-day think that Saturday is "the old Jewish Sabbath" and that Sunday is "the Christian Sabbath.” But these ideas are erroneous. The seventh-day Sabbath was made over two thousand years before there was a Jew upon the face of the earth; hence it cannot be exclusively Jewish. It was made for man (Mark 2:27); not for the Jews only, but for mankind, for all nations. The obligation to keep the seventh-day Sabbath of the fourth commandment can no more be limited to the Jews than can the prohibition against stealing in the eighth precept, or that against adultery in the seventh. Those commands were simply given through the Hebrew people to all mankind.
Sunday is not the Christian Sabbath. You can read your Bible through a hundred times, and you will not find a single word there about keeping the first day of the week in honor of Christ's resurrection. There is no place in all the Bible where the first day of the week is said to be a holy day. Sunday keeping originated from a false system of worship known as sun worship, and was introduced in the Christian church long after the Bible was written. Cut the word "Sunday" in two-Sun-day-and you will see where it came from.
You ask, “If Sunday is not the Christian Sabbath, then which day is?" Several New Testament scriptures declare, in the clearest possible language, that Christ was the active agent through whom the creation of the heavens and the earth was wrought (Colossians 1:16; John 1:1-3; Hebrews 1:1-3; Ephesians 3:9.) It was Jesus Christ who made the Sabbath. It was Jesus Christ who rested on the seventh day, after six days of creative work. Thus the seventh day became His rest day, or Sabbath day. Whatever is of Christ is Christian; therefore, the seventh day being Christ's rest day, Christ's Sabbath day, then of course the seventh day is the Christian Sabbath, the Lord’s day. And it is the only Christian Sabbath, or Lord's day, that the Bible knows.
THE SABBATH INDISSOLUBLY LINKED WITH REDEMPTION
Redemption is regeneration, or recreation. (2 Corinthians 5:17; Ephesians 2:10.) The power that created the heavens and the earth is the same power that redeems, sanctifies, and saves. Hence the seventh-day Sabbath is not simply a memorial of the great power of Jesus Christ in creation, but it is also a sign of Christ's power to save us from sin in redemption, or re-creation. Sabbath keeping is a sign of our acceptance of God's power working through Christ for our salvation from sin. The observance of the seventh-day Sabbath is an acknowledgment of Jesus Christ as our Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier. The Sabbath stands as a memorial of creation, a sign of redemption, a seal of sanctification.
People highly prize keepsakes given them in remembrance of dear friends. Now, the Sabbath is a keepsake from our dearest Friend and elder Brother. Jesus says, "Moreover also I gave them My Sabbaths, to be a sign between Me and them, that they might know that I am the Lord that sanctify them." Ezekiel 20:12. Every child of God will highly prize the Sabbath as a remembrance from his Savior.
That command which relates to this institution begins with the word "Remember." To forget the Sabbath is to forget God. It is a golden clasp that binds man to his Maker. On Christ's part, the Sabbath is the sign of His saving power, the token of His ability to sanctify those who acknowledge His sovereignty by observing it. On our part, it In a sign that we have chosen Jehovah to be our God, a mark that identifies us an worshippers of the Creator of the heavens and the earth as the only true God, and a token of our acceptance of Christ's power to save and sanctify us.
NO ROOM FOR THE SUNDAY-SABBATH
Sometimes the claim is made that it was necessary for Christ to change the Sabbath from the seventh day to the first day, after His resurrection, in order that His followers might have a Sabbath that would commemorate His redemptive work. This claim cannot stand in the light of Scripture, because It would charge Jesus with rejecting His own memorial of creation.
There is no need nor room for a new memorial day to come in under the gospel dispensation, for the memorial of creation is the memorial of redemption. Creative power is the power of the gospel. (Psalm 51:10.) So that which celebrates creation, also celebrates redemption. Therefore, as the seventh-day Sabbath is the memorial of Christ's creative power in the beginning, how fitting that this same Sabbath should stand as a memorial of Christ's power in the redemption or sanctification of man!
Some people will say, "It doesn't make any difference what day we keep, just so we keep one day in seven." But God's commandment does not give us permission to do this. God does not say for us to keep one day in seven. He does not say for us to keep a seventh day, or just any seventh day, according to the way we may wish to count. The fourth commandment of Exodus 20:8-11 requires, us to keep that definite, particular day of the week on which the Creator rested from the work of creation. Man is to rest on the same day on which God rested; that is, the seventh day, the last day of the week. To insert any other day into the fourth commandment, would destroy the commandment.
The fourth commandment shows us that there are four essential facts because of which the seventh day Is the Sabbath:
Before any other day can take the place of the seventh as the Lord's day, four things must be proved concerning it:
Anyone can plainly see that these four essential facts can never be true of any other day than the seventh. Therefore the seventh day is the only true Sabbath for man to observe to-day.
A SPIRITUAL INSTITUTION
Some regard the observance of the seventh-day Sabbath as a matter of hard and fast legality; but on one can properly observe the Sabbath who does it only as a matter of law keeping. The Sabbath is more than a law; it is a spiritual institution. God intended it to be such. Man is to cease from his own works, as God did from His, as he' enters into God's spiritual rest. The Sabbath is time made holy. It is holy because God's presence, His Holy Spirit, is in this day in a sense in which it is not in other days. It is time set apart by God wherein He can especially minister to the souls of men, and wherein they can hold communion with Him undisturbed by the cares of the workaday world.
A QUESTION OF OBEDIENCE
"The Sabbath was made for man." God put His presence and blessing into this day as into no other. But there is no blessing, can be no blessing, in the Sabbath, for the willfully disobedient. No one would expect to reap a blessing for lying, or stealing, or committing adultery, or killing his neighbor. No; the blessing is found, and found only, in doing the will of God as made known to us in His commandments. This Sabbath question is not merely a question of days, but a question of obedience. God says, Keep the seventh day.
Man says, Keep the first day. The question to, Whom will we obey? Remember that whoever we obey, his servants we are. (Romans 6:16.) May God help us to way with His true servants of old. "We ought to obey God rather than men." Acts 5:19.