Here we will look at the claims of Sabbatarians (which include the 7th Day Adventist Church and its key figure Ellen G. White) who claim that Christians are required to keep the Saturday Sabbath as Jews were required to under the Old Covenant (aka the Mosaic Covenant).  

We read the 4th of the 10 Commandments in Exodus 20:8-11: “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 the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.”

Isn’t it clear that one who claims to be obedient to God’s commandments ought to keep the Sabbath Day?  And if one won’t, shouldn’t they just rather have a light attitude towards God’s commandments in the Bible altogether so they won’t risk being a hypocrite?  

Not so fast.  

Though a Jew under the Mosaic Covenant should indeed have observed the Sabbath Day, there is indeed a marked difference between the commandment to observe the Sabbath Day and the other nine commandments.  

It is important to understand that though the Ten Commandments generally reflect truths related to God’s eternal moral law, the command about the Sabbath is the obvious exception.  

God’s Law given through Moses to Israel would obviously include principles of His eternal moral law which He requires all people at all times to live by.  The Ten Commandments were particularly chosen by God as specimens of emphasis for Israel to teach them how He is to be feared and obeyed.  These Ten Commandments were given as a primer to everything else God would go on to command Israel (He commanded much to Israel after He had given them the Ten Commandments).  

You could go to any group of people at any time and the people already have made good and bad decisions in relation to nine of the ten commandments.  The various forms of idolatry which can be expressed, taking God’s name in vain, honoring father and mother, not murdering, not committing adultery, not stealing, not bearing false witness against one’s neighbor, and not coveting that which belongs to one’s neighbor.  However, they wouldn’t know what you were talking about in bringing up the Sabbath Day if they had never been exposed to the Bible before.  This is common sense.

The reckoning of the 4th commandment about the Sabbath as a ceremonial law which was only for Israel for a certain period of time, rather than as a reflection of God’s eternal moral law, is not a matter of being arbitrary or just saying what seems convenient.  

Ezekiel 20:10-12: “Wherefore I caused them to go forth out of the land of Egypt, and brought them into the wilderness.  And I gave them my statutes, and shewed them my judgments, which if a man do, he shall even live in them.  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.”

Israel was given the Sabbath after they came out of Egypt.  They had not known it before.  

When you read Exodus chapter 16 and see the confusion there about gathering manna on the Sabbath Day, it is obvious that the Sabbath was a new law which Israel had just been introduced to.  The same cannot be said of the other nine commandments nor any other moral principle seen in the Law of Moses or in the Bible as a whole.

Then a little later we read in Exodus 31:12-17: “And the Lord spoke unto Moses, saying, Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, Verily my sabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations; that ye may know that I am the Lord that doth sanctify you.  Ye shall keep the sabbath therefore; for it is holy unto you: every one that defileth it shall surely be put to death: for whosoever doeth any work therein, that soul shall be cut off from among his people.  Six days may work be done; but in the seventh is the sabbath of rest, holy to the Lord: whosoever doeth any work in the sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death.  Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the sabbath, to observe the sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant.  It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for ever (my note- but God eventually cast Israel away as His own political nation for breaking His covenant and rejecting the Messiah whom He sent to them- a fact sealed by the Second Temple’s destruction in AD 70): for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.”

Further proof that the Sabbath had been new to Israel in Exodus chapter 16 is that God did not command those who went to gather manna on the Sabbath Day then to be put to death at that point.  The people were not attentive like they should have been- but they were more confused than rebellious at that point.  God was patient with them because the Sabbath really was still new to them.  

Later on in Numbers chapter 15 a man was found gathering sticks on the Sabbath Day.  God commanded Moses that the man should be put to death.  There was no plausible deniability in relation to  misunderstanding the Sabbath Day and the lesson about it had been drilled home deeply to Israel by then (including and especially through the command about keeping the Sabbath Day being included in the Ten Commandments).  

The fact that God had indeed been patient with the Israelites who didn’t keep the Sabbath when Israel first came out of Egypt confirms that it is proper to conclude that Ezekiel 20 verses 10-12 indeed teach that the Sabbath was indeed not given to Israel until they had been brought into the wilderness after they came out of Egypt.

All of this proves that the commands in the Old Testament related to keeping the Sabbath Day were ceremonial.  They are thus proper to be categorized within the package of the ceremonial law that was specifically for Israelites under the Old Covenant.

God is eternal and His character is unchanging.  Whether a moral principle is pure or corrupt, it is such because it is either consistent with God’s character or because it is inconsistent with God’s character.  The moral law of God is unchanging and binding upon every moral agent because God is unchanging and human beings are created in His image with an inherent obligation to walk in the ways of their Creator.  

A moral law is inherently right and holy while a ceremonial law is only right and holy by appointment.  It’s not inherently right and holy to keep a certain day or a feast- yet when the Living God, the Ultimate Authority, tells you to do it, then you’d better do it.  And when He tells you not to do it anymore, then you’d better not do it anymore.

Since the Lord commanded the Christian church under the New Covenant in Christ not to do the ceremonial law for Israel anymore, then the Seventh Day Adventist Church along with all who teach that the Jewish Sabbath ought to be kept now are deceivers leading people into sin.

In Acts chapter 15, Christ’s Apostles, through the obvious implications of what God had already done among them (regarding the conversion of Cornelius in Acts chapter 10 without him coming under Judaism), and through the prophecy of Scripture itself foretelling God accepting gentiles without conversion to Judaism, they decreed through the Holy Spirit that imposing the Jewish ceremonies upon gentiles was to cease.

We even see the Apostles of Christ making it clear in their instruction that the Sabbath days are indeed part of the ceremonial law (and there were other Sabbaths in the Law of Moses beside the weekly Sabbath- the holy convocations in the feasts and the Day of Atonement are examples).  

The following instruction is an example of how those who try to bind Christians to keeping the Sabbath are deceivers.  Look at how the Apostle Paul instructed Christians in the Apostolic churches of the first century.

Colossians 2:13-17 (this is after the Acts 15 council): “And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened (made alive) together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses; Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross; And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it.  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: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ.”

The Jewish ceremonies did not atone for sin (though many misguided Jews supposed that observing them would atone for their sins).  Apart from the substance of Jesus Christ Himself whom the Jewish ceremonies pointed to, the Jewish ceremonial law simply further testified of man’s just condemnation for transgressing against God.  

When people cling to a shadow when they could embrace the substance instead, they prove that they do not adequately value the substance.  Though the Judaizers (which include modern Sabbath keepers) will deny this, that is what they are doing.  

Since the Jews so often abused the ceremonial law which God gave them to follow, how much more is a ceremony a danger when the requirement to do it has been lifted or if the ceremony isn’t even derived from the Bible at all?  

Wouldn’t reverting to Jewish ceremonies when they weren’t binding upon you any longer rather be subversive to faithfully worshiping God?  Most definitely. 

We also know that Biblical Judaism centered around the Temple at Jerusalem.  In AD 70, this Temple was destroyed by the Romans.  The Jewish Christians had already escaped Jerusalem altogether at that point.  The destruction of the Temple made the faithful practice of Biblical Judaism as a whole impossible for anyone, as the vast majority of the Jewish ceremonies required the Tabernacle, which had become incorporated into the Temple, as well as a functioning Levitical Priesthood, to faithfully perform.  The Temple has never been rebuilt to this day, in spite of many plans to do so over the last 1,950 years.  That is how the Jewish Christians were also practically released from keeping the Mosaic ceremonies.

The entire counsel of the Bible, Old Testament and New Testament, demonstrates that we are required now to observe everything which God has commanded in the New Covenant.  Heeding that entire counsel means we are yet bound to follow God’s eternal moral Law (and thus to adhere to the moral principles set forth in the Law of Moses and throughout the Old Testament) as well as to observe God’s ordinances for New Covenant Christians.  

Being subject to God’s moral law and the ceremonial requirements of the particular covenant which we are under (and this is how the 4th commandment yet stands in principle) is the Law of Christ which is still required for us to follow today.  We must yet use the Law of Christ as a guide to doing what is right in God’s eyes in order to walk by faith acceptably (like Paul spoke of himself as being under the law to Christ in 1 Corinthians 9:21).  

It is no wonder that the biggest proponent of keeping the Jewish Sabbath in modern times is Ellen G. White- a woman who is regarded as a prophetic authority by the church which she was instrumental in establishing (the 7th Day Adventist Church).  Though much more could be said about White and her errant teachings on many things, the fact that she was wrong on her key doctrine of alleging that Christians are to keep the Sabbath, and the fact that she spoke as a prophet who took spiritual authority over men, are enough to prove that she was a heretical false prophetess.  This logically means that her writings and the church which she founded ought to be fled from.  

Note also how the following Bible passages demonstrate that the precedents and principles of the Old Testament still stand even though the ceremonial law therein is not to be observed now (due to how it had accomplished its purpose by the time the One who gave it decreed that it need not be observed any longer under the new covenant arrangement which He had appointed and set in place).

1 Corinthians 14:33-37: “For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.  Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law.  And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church.  What?  came the word of God out from you?  or came it unto you only?  If any man think himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord.”

1 Timothy 2:11-14: “Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection.  But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence.  For Adam was first formed, then Eve.  And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression.”

Isaiah 8:20: “To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.”

God’s true commandment-keeping people receive His verdicts and keep His instructions while marking and avoiding those who contradict these.  

Aaron’s email is: [email protected]

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