of the law written on tablets of stone, or pages of a book. Hence the Word of God turns us to 'the glory that excelleth’ and the One who empowers us for its realization. 'Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty’ (2 Cor. 3 :1 7 ).” What About the First Day of the Week? The Christian need not concern himself about any change in the day of worship. Actually, there is no connection at all between the Jewish Sabbath and the Lord’s day. The Chris tian has no Sabbath in the truest meaning of the word. But he has a "rest,” and that precious repose of the soul is in Christ. For the .Christian worker, the Lord’s day is not a day of physical rest at all but the day in which he is busiest serving his risen Lord whose resurrection the first day of the week commemorates. For all such it is truly “day of all the week, the best, emblem of eternal rest.” No more blessed words were ever spoken or written than those of Matthew 11:28-30 in which the Lord Jesus Christ invites us: "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; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” Christ is our peace and Christ is our rest. The children of Israel in the wilderness missed this spiritual rest or rest of faith as we read in Hebrews 4:9-11: "There remaineth therefore a rest [or a Sabbath — a perpetual cessation from spiritual strain and anxiety] to the people of God. For he that is entered into his [Christ’s] rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his. Let us labour therefore [seek] to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief.” Those who insist that something must be added — whether it be a day, a religious rite or any work of the flesh — cannot know the true Sab bath, which is rest-of-heart and peace-of-mind which result from relying completely upon the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ and ceasing utterly from one’s own works. Annihilation, Soul-sleep, Conditional Immortality Space permits but a bare mention of these heresies which Seventh-day Adventists hold in common with the Jehovah Witnesses cult. From a pamphlet entitled, What do Seventh- day Adventists Believe? published by the Seventh-day Ad ventist Pacific Press Publishing Association of Mountain View, Calif., I quote the position of the sect on these subjects -."The Mortality o f Man. We believe God alone has immortality; that a man may have immortality only as a gift from God through Christ; that upon conversion, the Chris tian receives eternal life by faith in the promises of God; that immortality will be conferred upon the righteous at the second coming o f Christ and the first resurrection. The Unconscious State o f the Dead: W e believe that when a man dies he enters a state of silence, inactivity, and entire
its non-observance? . . . The Seventh-day Adventists stress the failure to keep the Sabbath as the great sin. Then why is it that in the lists of sins recorded in the New Testament, the sin against the Sabbath is never once mentioned? For example, in Mark 7:21, 22, there are 13 sins listed. Why did our Lord not mention breaking the Sabbath ? In Romans 1:29-31, there is a list of 19 sins; in Galatians 5:19-21, a list of 17 sins; and in 2 Timothy 3:1-4, a list of 18 sins. In all the great warnings concerning sins, why was not failure to keep the seventh day given prominence? It was not even mentioned. "One of the best opportunities Jesus had to preach Sabbath-keeping was when a lawyer asked Him, 'Master, which is the great commandment in the law.?’ (Matt. 2 2 :3 6 ). In His answer, our Lord made not the slightest reference to the Sabbath. Neither here, nor elsewhere, did our Lord teach the keeping of the Sabbath day; nor did He warn against not keeping it. ‘Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets’ (Matt. 2 2 :3 7 -4 0 ).” * In the difficulty with the Judaizers in the early church, described in Acts 15, why is there not one single reference to the Sabbath day? The Council at Jerusalem declared what "laws” were to be observed by Gentile converts, and all had to do with idol worship! It is obvious that the Sabbath was not binding on those Gentile Christians nor is it binding on any believer today, Jew or Gentile. Dr. Rowell also deals helpfully with this matter of Christ’s abolition of the law, including the Sabbath, in these words: "When the substance is come, we no longer need the shadow (Col. 2:16, 17 ). If, when walking, we see a shadow overtaking us, our thought may be on the shadow; but, when our friend catches up with us, we are no longer occupied with the shadow, but with our friend himself. So, since Christ came, we are no longer occupied with the shadow of things to come, but with the glorious person of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, for 'Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us’ (Gal. 3 :1 3 ). Let God’s Word make this clear: 'Wherefore then serveth the law ? It was added because of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the promise was made . . . that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. Wherefore the law was our school master to bring us unto Christ, [or until Christ] that we might be justified by faith’ (Gal. 3 :1 9 -2 4 ). '. . . Ye are not under law, but under grace’ (Rom. 6 :1 4 ). Grace in the power of the Holy Spirit in the heart can effect truest obedience to the will of God more readily than the letter
*The Sunday School Times.
The King's Business/June 1957
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