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Why God Said Remember
by Joe Crews
Numerous surveys and questionaires have confirmed that the
most popular form of modern skepticism is to deny the creation
story. Seventy-two percent of ministers interviewed expressed
varying degrees of doubt that God actually spoke the world
into existance according to the biblical account. This fun-
damental disbelief has led to the rejection of other foundati-
onal doctrines of Christendom such as the virgin birth and the
atonement.
It is interesting to note that God apparently anticipated a lot
of controversy over the Genesis record of fiat creation. His
claims of manufacturing all the staggering mass of matter by
merely commanding it to exist-well,there would certainly be
doubters and disbelievers of such an account. And even those
who read about it and believed it would soon forget the mira-
culous fact under the confusing influence of a million false
gods who would arise.
So God needed to do something unusual to perserve the knowledge
of His mighty act of creation. That power to speak heaven and
earth into existence would distinguish Him from all the counter-
feit gods and their deceptive claims. What could He do that
would constantly point mankind back to the focal week of creation
when He forever established His divine authority.
Creation-The Mark of God's Sovereignty
God chose to memorialize that convincing display of creative power
by setting aside the seventh day of creation week as a holy day
of rest and remembering. It would constitute a tremendous safe-
guard of God's sovereignty-a mark of His right to rule as the
only true God. It would, at the same time, stand as a devastating
debunking of every god who has not created the heavens and earth.
The writings of Old Testament prophets are saturated with reminders
of God's peculiar powers of creation. David wrote, "For all the
gods of the nations are idols: but the Lord made the heavens."
Psalm 96:5. Jeremiah expressed it: "But the Lord is the true
God, he is the living God. ... The gods that have not made the
heavens and the earth, even they shall perish. ... He hath made
the earth by his power." Jermiah 10:10-12.
Did God Himself demonstrate an extreme urgency in keeping the
truth of creation vividly before the eyes of the world? Yes.
To such a degree that He wrote into the heart of His great moral
law the binding obligation of every living soul to keep the
Sabbath holy, and thus, to acknowledge His divine authority.
Within those eternal principles forming the foundation of His
government and reflecting His own perfect character, God wrote
these words: "Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work: But the seventh
day is the sabbath of thy Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not
do any work. ... For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth,
the sea, and all that in them is ... wherefore the Lord blessed
the sabbath day, and hallowed it." Exodus 20:8-12
What an act to highlight the omnipotent work of creation! Once
a week, as the earth rotated on its axis, the Sabbath reminder
would travel around the earth reaching every man, woman, and
child with a message of an instant creation. Why did God say
remember? Because to forget the Sabbath is to forget the creator
also.
Conversion-Creative Power at Work
Parallel to the accounts of a physical creation we find the re-
cord of God's power to recreate the human heart. Evidently, the
two processes stem from the same omnipotent source. It requires
just as much power to effect conversion or recreation as to call
something into existence by creation. Said the apostle, "Put on
the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true
holiness. " Ephesians 4:24 "
Pointing beyond the mere fact of a physical creation, God spoke
these words also, "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
Please note that a sanctified Sabbath was to be the mark of a
sanctified people. The word, "sanctify," meaning to set aside
for a holy use (a day which spoke of God's creative power),
served also as a reminder that God could set people apart for
a holy use through regeneration or recreation.
In the light of these facts, it is easy to understand why the
devil has waged a continuing, desperate battle against the
seventh-day Sabbath. For almost six millenniums he has worked
through pride of tradition, misinformation and relgious bigotry
to destroy the sanctity of God's special sign of authority-the
Sabbath.
As a mark of God's right to rule, the Sabbath challenged Satan's
boast that he would take God's place. Said the adversary, " I
will exalt my throne above the stars of God. ... I will be like
the most High." Isaiah 14:13,14. Satan actually wanted to be
worshipped. To accomplish this, he had to nullify God's claim
as the rightful ruler. God's authority rested on His claim to
be the Creator, and the Sabbath was the mark of that authority.
By destroying the Sabbath, Satan would prepare the way to set
up a counterfeit government based on counterfeit claims of au-
thority symbolized by a counterfeit day of worship.
The Battle Over Authority
It is fascinating to look over the ages and see the outworking
of the great controversy between Christ and Satan. The contest
has always focused upon the issue of authority.
The strategy of the evil one has been a two-pronged attack on
God's claim to be the creator. First, by the theory of evolution
with its humanistic doctrine of natural selection. Second, by
an age-long effort to destroy the observance of the seventh-day
Sabbath, the mark of creative power.
We can only say in passing that each of these hellish attempts
to discredit God's authority has produced a bitter success be-
yond all expectation. Millions have been turned into religious
skeptics and agnostics as a result of Darwin's doctrine of or-
ganic evolution. Denying any fall of man which would necessi-
tate a Saviour from sin, evolution struck at the plan of red-
emption as well as the fact of creation.
In a similar vein, Satan's attacks on the Sabbath have led
millions to disobey the one commandment in the Decalogue which
God has made the specific test of obedience to the entire law.
A sucessful plan to subvert the loyalty of millions who were
devoted to the true God required a masterpiece of satanic st-
rategy. It would take time. It would involve centuries of
deceptive mind-bending. There would be no dramatic turn from
serving God to serving Satan. The secret would be to win
obedience through religious subterfuge. Satan understood the
principle of Romans 6:16 long before Paul ever penned the
words, "Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants
to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey?"
Obedience is the highest form of allegiance and worship. If
Satan could create an issue that would cause people to dis-
obey God, he had an even chance of winning their obedience to
his cause. The decisive contest would take place over the law
of God. It constituted the foundation of God's government.
How could Satan destroy confidence in the law and make people
obey him instead? And which commandment should he attack?
Obviously, the one which pointed to God's creative power and
His right to rule. As the idendtifying sign of the true God,
the Sabbath has always been an object of satanic hate. God
had chosen the Sabbath as a test of loyalty to His law in the
Old Testament: "That I may prove them," said the Lord, "whether
they will walk in my law, or no." Exodus 16:4
The Test Point of the Law
Since God had made the Sabbath the test point of all the Ten
Commandment, Satan determined to make it the giant issue of the
ages. By destroying the Sabbath, Satan would be prepared to
launch his super-plan to claim obedience to a counterfeit day
of worship. Manipulating the weakness of a compromised Chri-
stianty which had slowly acceded to pagan influences, Satan set
up his masterpiece- a worldwide church-state-which would ruth-
lessly enforce compliance with his counterfeit system of worship.
For over a thousand years, beginning with the so-called conve-
rsion of the pagan Emperor Constantine, the dark history of
apostasy unfolded. Almost the first act of the newly-professed
Christian emperor was the make a law against Sabbath-keeping and
to institute other laws requiring rest on the first day of the
week, a wild solar holiday dedicated to pagan sun worship.
We will not dwell, at present, upon the well-documented history
of the papal church councils which enforced the observance of
the pagan Sunday on pain of death. The facts are well-known
to those who have been willing to search the records with an
open mind. During the fouth and fifth centuries, the first
day of the week was exalted by papal decree to displace the
true Sabbath of the Bible.
Unfortunately, prejudices and false information have led thou-
sands of Christians to close their eyes to the overwhelming
historical evidences of this substitution. The roots of their
prejudice are not hard to identify. Satan has worked too long
on his opposition systen to allow it to be rejected easily.
Through the ages he has perfected a series of subtle false
arguements to bolster obedience to his counterfeit day of wor-
ship. He still hates the Sabbath which identifies the true
God.
Only as we expose these attacks on the seventh-day Sabbath will
we be able to understand why millions continue to observe the
first day of the week, a day for which there is not a single
supporting Bible text. No one disagrees with the meaning of
God's handwritten law, "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the
Lord ... in it thou shalt not do any work." Yet millions do not
obey it. No one can refute the overwhelming evidence of Sunday's
pagan origin, yet millions keep it instead of the plainly comm-
anded Sabbath of the Ten Commandments. Why? I repeat, the reason
is rooted in the clever arguements of Satan which have created
a climate of prejudice against the holy Sabbath of the Lord.
We shall now examine some of the major fallices of those arg-
uments.
The Sabbath Was Made Only for the Jews
This falsehood has gained such strength that multitudes of Chris-
tians refer to it as the "Jewish Sabbath." but nowhere do we
find such an expression in the Bible. It is called "the sabbath
of the Lord," but never "the Sabbath of the Jews." Exodus 20:10
Luke was a Gentile writer of the New Testament and often made
reference to things which were particuliarly Jewish. He spoke
of the "nation of the Jews," "the people of the Jews," "the
land of the Jews," and the "synagogue of the the Jews." Acts 10:22;
12:11; 10:39; 14:1. But please note that Luke never referred
to the "sabbath of the Jews," although he mentioned the Sabbath
repeatedly.
Christ clearly taught that "the sabbath was made for man." Mark
2:27. The fact is that Adam was the only man in existence at the
time God made the Sabbath. There were no Jews in the world for at
least 2,000 years after creation. It could never have been created
for them. Jesus used the term "man" in the "generic" sense, re-
ferring to mankind. The same word is used in connection with the
institution of marriage which was also introduced at creation.
Woman was made for man just as the Sabbath was made for man. Cer-
tainly no one believes that marriage was made only for the Jews.
The fact is that two beautiful, original institutions were set up
by God Himself before sin ever came into the world-marriage and
the Sabbath. Both were made for man, both received the special
blessing of the Creator and both continue to be just as holy now
as when they were sanctified in the Garden of Eden.
It is also interesting to note that Jesus was the One who made the
Sabbath in the first week of time. There was a reason for His
claim to be Lord of the Sabbath day (Mark 2:28). If He is the
Lord of the Sabbath day, then the Sabbath must be the Lord's
day. John had a vision on "the Lord's day," according to Rev-
alation 1:10. That day had to be the Sabbath. It is the only
day so designated and claimed by God in the Bible. In writing
the Ten Commandments, God called it "the sabbath of the Lord."
Exodus 20:10. In Isaiah He is quoted as saying, "The sabbath,
my holy day."
But we must not overlook the fact that this God who created the
world and made the Sabbath was Jesus Christ Himself. John
wrote: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with
God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with
God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any
thing made. ... And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us,
(and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of
the Father), full of grace and truth." John 1:1-3, 14.
Paul clearly identified Jesus as the Creator, "... his dear Son:
In whom we have redemption through his blood. ... For by him
were all things created." Colossians 1:13-16.
For Christians to separate Jesus from the Sabbath is a tragic
mistake. For He is the Author, the Maker, the Sanctifier, and
the Architect of the Sabbath. To discount the blessing which
He placed on that day is to deny His Authority.
This argument has led many to believe that the Sabbath existed
only for a limited period of time following creation. But is
this a fact? Actually, the Sabbath could never be just a type
or shadow of anything, for the simple reason that it was made
before sin entered the human family. Certain shadows and typical
observances were instituted as a result of sin and pointed fo-
ward to the deliverance from sin. Such were the sacrifices em-
ployed to symbolize the death of Jesus, the Lamb of God. There
would have been no animal sacrifices had there been no sin.
These offerings were abolished when Christ died on the cross,
because the types had met their fulfillment (Matthew 27:14-16).
But no shadow existed before sin entered this world; therefore,
the Sabbath could not be included in the ceremonial law types
and shadows.
Paul referred to the temporary system of ordinances in Colossians
2:14-16 as being "against us" and "contrary to us." He tied it
to the meat offerings, drink offerings, and yearly festivals
of the law that was "blotted out." It is true he referred to
sabbaths also in the text, but take careful note that he called
them "sabbath days which are a shadow of things to come." Were
some sabbath days blotted out at the cross? Yes, there were at
least four yearly sabbaths which came on on certain set days of
the month, and they were nailed to the cross. They were shadows
and required specified meat and drink offerings. All of these
annual sabbaths are described in Leviticus 23:24-36, and then
summarized in verses 37 and 38: "These are the feasts of the
Lord, which ye shall proclaim to be holy convocations, to offer
an offering made by fire unto the Lord, a burnt offering, and
a meat offering, a sacrifice, and drink offerings, every thing
upon his day: BESIDE THE SABBATHS OF THE LORD."
The scripture plainly differentiates between the annual, shadowy
sabbaths and the weekly "sabbaths of the Lord." The ceremonial
sabbaths were blotted out at the cross; they had been added as
a consequence of sin. But the Sabbath of the Ten-Commandment
law had been hallowed before sin was introduced and was later
incorporated into the great moral law written by the finger
of God. It was eternal in its very nature.
Just Keep Any Day in the Seven
By this argument Satan prepared the world to accept a substitute
in place of the Sabbath God had commanded. Upon the tables of
stone God wrote the great, unchanging law of the ages. Every
word was serious and meaningful. Not one line was ambiguous or
mysterious. Sinners and Christians, educated and uneducated,
have no problem understanding the simple, clear words of the
Ten Commandments. God meant what He said and He said what He
meant. No one has tried to void that law as too complicated to
comprehend.
Most of the ten begin with the same words: "Thou shalt not,"
but right in the heart of the law we find the fourth commandment
which is introduced with the word, "Remember." Why is this one
different? Because God was commanding them to call something to
memory which already existed but had been forgotten. Genesis
describes the origin of the Sabbath in these words, "Thus the
heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.
And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made. ...
And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that
in it he had rested from all his work which God created and
made. " Genesis 2:1-3"
Which day did God bless and sanctify? The seventh day. How
was it to be kept holy? By resting. Could any of the other
six be kept holy? No. Why? Because God commanded not to rest
those days but to work. Does God's blessing make a difference?
Of course. This is why parents pray for God to bless their ch-
ildren. They believe it makes a difference. The seventh day is
different from all the other six days, because it has God's
blessing.
Some more questions: Why did God bless the day? Because He
had created the world in six days. It was the birthday of the
world, a memorial of a mighty act. Can the Sabbath memorial
be changed? Never. Because it points backward to an accomp-
lished fact. July 4 is Independence Day. Can it be changed?
No. Because the Declaration of Independence was signed on July
4, 1776. Your birthday cannot be changed, either. It is a
memorial to your birth, which happened on a set day. History
would have to run through again to change your bithday, to
change Independence Day, or to change the Sabbath day. We can
call another the Sabbath, but that does not make it so.
Did God ever give man the privilege of choosing his own day
of rest? He did not. In fact, God confirmed in the Bible
that the Sabbath was settled and sealed by His own divine se-
lection and should not be tampered with. Read Exodus 16 con-
cerning the giving of manna. For 40 years God worked three
miracles every week to show Israel which day was holy. (1)
No manna fell on the seventh day. (2) They could not keep it
without spoilage, but (3) when they kept it over the Sabbath,
it remained sweet and fresh.
But some Israelites had the same idea as many modern Christians.
They felt that any day in seven would be alright to keep holy:
"And it came to pass, that there went out some of the people
on the the seventh day to gather, and they found none. And
the Lord said unto Moses, How long refuse ye to keep my comm-
andments and my laws?" Exodus 16:27,28.
Get the picture? These people thought another day could be
kept just as well as the seventh day. Perhaps they were pla-
nning to observe the first day of the week, or some other
day which was more convenient. What happened? God met them
and accused them of breaking His law by going forth to work on
the seventh day. Would God say the same thing to those who
break the Sabbath today? Yes. He is the same yesterday,
today and forever--He changes not. God made it very clear
that, regardless of their feelings, those who go forth to
work on the Sabbath are guilty of breaking His law. James
explains that it is a sin to break even one of the Ten Comm-
andments: "For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet
offend in one point, he is guilty of all. For he that said,
Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou
commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a trans-
gressor of the law." James 2:10,11.
We Can't Locate
the True Seventh Day
This is a fallacy that has comforted many in their disobedience
of the forth commandment. It is just not true. Here are four
positive proofs which identify the true Sabbath today:
1. According to the Scriptures, Christ died on Friday and rose
on Sunday, the first day of the week. Practically all churches
acknowledge this fact by observing Easter Sunday and Good
Friday. Here is the Bible evidence: "This man went unto Pilate,
and begged the body of Jesus. And he took it down, and wrapped
it in linen, and laid it in a sepulchre that was hewn in stone,
wherein never man before was laid. And that day was the prep-
aration, and the sabbath drew on." Luke 23:52-54.
Here is proof that Jesus died the day before the Sabbath. It
was called the "preparation day" because it was time to get
ready for the Sabbath. Let us read the next verses: "And the
women also, which came from Galilee, followed after, and beheld
the sepulchre, and how his body was laid. And they returned,
and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the sabbath day
according to the commandment." Verses 55, 56.
Please notice that the women rested over the Sabbath "according
to the commandment." The commandment says, "The seventh day is
the Sabbath" so we know they were observing Saturday. But the
very next verse says "Now upon the first day of the week, very
early in the morning, they came into the sepulchre, bringing the
spices which they had prepared. ... And they found the stone
rolled away from the sepulchre." Luke 24:1, 2.
How clearly these three days are described for us. He died Friday,
the preparation day, commonly called Good Friday. He rested in
the tomb on the seventh day, Sabbath, "according to the comm-
andment. " That was Saturday. Then on Sunday, the first day of"
the week, Easter Sunday to many, Jesus rose from the grave.
Anyone who can locate Good Friday or Easter Sunday will have
absolutely no difficulty finding the true Sabbath.
2. The calendar has not been changed so as to confuse the days
of the week. We can be positive that our seventh day is the
same day Jesus observed when He was here. Pope Gregory XIII
did make a calendar change in 1582, but it did not interfere
with the weekly cycle. Our present Gregorian calendar was
named after him when he made that small change in 1582.
What did Pope Gregory do to the calendar? Before 1582 the
Julian calendar had been in effect, instituted by Julius
Ceasar about 46 B.C. and named after him. But the Julian ca-
lendar had calulated the length of the year as 365 1/4 days,
and the year is actually eleven minutes less than 365 1/4
days. Those eleven minutes accumulated, and by 1582 the num-
bering of the calendar was ten days out of harmony with the
solar system. Gregory simply dropped those ten days out of
the numbering of the calendar. It was Thursday, October 4,
1582, and the next day, Friday, should have been October 5.
But Gregory simply made it October 15 instead, dropping ex-
actly ten days to bring the calendar back in harmony with
the heavenly bodies. Were the days of the week confused?
No. Friday still followed Thursday, and Saturday still fol-
lowed Friday. The same seventh day remained, and the weekly
cycle was not disturbed in the least. When we keep the sev-
enth day on Saturday, we are observing the same day Jesus kept,
and He did it every week according to Luke 4:16.
3. The third evidence for the true Sabbath is the most con-
clusive of all. The Jewish people have been observing the
seventh day from the time of Abraham, and they still keep it
today. Here is a whole nation-millions of individuals-who
have been counting off time meticulously, week after week,
calendar or no calendar, for thousands of years. Could they
have lost track? Impossible. The only way they could have
lost a day would have been for the entire nation to have slept
over for an extra 24 hours and for no one ever to tell them
about afterwards.
There has been no change or loss of the Sabbath since God made
it in Genesis. The origin of the week is found in the creation
story. There is no scientific or astronomical reason for mea-
suring time in cycles of seven days. It is an arbitrary arra-
ngement of God and has been miraculously preserved for one
reason-because the holy Sabbath day points to the creative
power of the only true God. It is a sign of His Sovereignty
over the world and over human life; a sign of creation and
redemption.
Is this not the reason God will preserve Sabbathkeeping thr-
oughout eternity? We read in Isaiah 66:22, 23: "For as the
new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, saith the
Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain. And it shall
come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one
sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me,
saith the Lord."
The Sabbath is so precious to God that He will have His people
observe it throughout all time to come in the beautiful new
earth. If it is so precious to Him, should it not be precious
to us? If we are going to keep it then, should we not keep
it now?
In an age of false gods, of atheistic evolution, and traditions
of men, the world needs the Sabbath more than ever as a test of
our loyalty to the great Creator-God and a sign of our sanct-
ification through His power.
4. Proof number four lies in the fact that over one hundred
languages of the earth use the word "Sabbath" for Saturday.
For example, the Spanish word for Saturday is "Sabado," meaning
Sabbath. What does this prove? It proves that when those hun-
dred languages originated in the long, long ago, Saturday was
recoginized as the Sabbath day and was incorporated into the
very name of the day.
The Sabbath Was Only a Memorial
of Deliverance Out of Egypt
This strange idea is drawn from a single text in the Old Testa-
ment and is disstorted to contradict many clear statements about
the true origin of the Sabbath. The text is found in Deuteronomy
5:14, 15: "But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy
God: in it thou shalt not do any work, 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 man-
servant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou. And re-
member 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 streched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded
thee to keep the sabbath day."
Some people draw from this text that God gave the Sabbath as a
memorial of the Exodus from Egypt. But the Genesis story of
the making of the Sabbath (Genesis 2:1-3) and the wording of
the fourth commandment by God Himself (Exodus 20:11) reveals
the Sabbath as a memorial of creation.
The key to understanding these two verses rests in the word
"servant." God said, "Remember that thou wast a servant in
the land of Egypt." And in the sentence before this one He
reminds them "that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest
as well as thou." In other words, their experience in Egypt
as servants would remind them to deal justly with their se-
rvants by giving them Sabbath rest.
In similar vein God had commanded, "And if a stranger sojourn
with thee in your land, ye shall not vex him ... for ye were
strangers in the land of Egypt." Leviticus 19:33, 34.
It was not unusual for God to hark back to the Egyptian del-
verance as an incentive to obey other commandments. In Deu-
teronomy 24:17, 18, God said, "Thou shalt not pervert the
judgement of the stranger, nor of the fatherless; not take a
widow's raiment to pledge. ... Thou wast a bondman in Egypt,
and the Lord thy God redeemed thee thence: therefore I
commanded thee to do this thing."
Neither the command to be just nor to keep the Sabbath was
given to memorialize the Exodus, but God told them that His
goodness in bringing them out of captivity constituted a
strong additional reason for their dealing kindly with their
servants on the Sabbath and treating justly the strangers
and widows.
In the same way, God spoke to them in Leviticus 11:45, "For
I am the Lord that bringeth you up out of the land of Egypt. ...
ye shall therefore be holy." Surely no one would insist that
holiness did not exist before the Exodus, or that it would
be afterwards limited only to the Jews, to memorialize their
deliverance.
Keep Sunday in Honor
of the Resurection
It is true that Jesus rose on the first day of the week, but
nowhere is there the slightest intimation in the Bible for
anyone to keep that day holy. The basis for Sabbathkeeping
is the direct handwritten command of God.
Many wonderful events occurred on certain days of the week, but
we have no command to keep them holy. Jesus died for our sins
on Friday. That is probably the most significant event in all
of recorded history. It marks the moment my death sentence was
commuted and my salvation assured. But not one Bible text hints
that we should observe this day of such great significance.
It was a dramatic moment when Jesus rose from the grave on that
Sunday morning, but there is not a scintilla of biblical evi-
dence that we should observe it in honor of the resurrection.
Not one instance of Sunday observance has been found in the
recorded Scriptures.
There is, of course, a memorial of the resurrection commanded
in the Bible, but it is not Sundaykeeping. Paul wrote: "There-
fore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like
as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father,
even so we also should walk in newness of life." Romans 6:4.
Baptism is the memorial of Christ's death, burial and ressur-
ection. Those who believe that Sunday observance honors His
ressurection cite the upper room meeting of the disciples on
the same day He arose from the grave. To them that gathering
was to celebrate His resurrection. But when we read the
Bible record of the event, we discover that the circumstances
were quite different. Luke tells us that, even though the
diciples were confronted with the eyewitness story of Mary
Magdalene, they "believed not," "After that he appeared in
another form unto two of them, as they walked into the
country. And they went and told it unto the residue: neither
believed they them. Afterward he appeared unto the eleven
as they sat at meat, and upbraided them with their unbelief
and hardness of heart, because they believed not them which had
seen him after he was risen." Mark 16:12-14.
Obviously, none of those upper room disciples believed that He
was raised, so they could not have been joyously celebrating
the resurrection. John explains their reason for being to-
gether in these words: "The doors were shut where the dis-
ciples were assembled FOR FEAR OF THE JEWS." John 20:19.
Thus, we have examined the major arguements used against the
observance of God's holy Sabbath day. Not one of the objections
provides a scintilla of evidence that God ever changed His
mind about the Sabbath. When He wrote the word "remember"
into the fourth commandment, it was in reference to the same
seventh day that appears on our wall calendar. Neither men
not demons can diminish the validity of that eternal moral
law.
May God grant each one of us the courage to honor the Sabbath
commandment AS heaven's special test of our love and loyalty.
As we have discovered, when Jesus returns, we will keep that
same Sabbath with Him, ages without end. Even so, come Lord
Jesus.
Copyright 1980 by
Joe Crews
All Rights Reserved
Published by:
Amazing Facts, Inc.
P.O. Box 680
Fredrick, MD. 21701