Thursday, January 27
Compare Exodus 20:8-11, Deuteronomy 5:12-15, and Hebrews 4:8-11. What differences do you find regarding the meaning of the Sabbath rest?
As we have already seen, these texts in Exodus and Deuteronomy invite us to look to the past. They exhort us to rest on Sabbath in order to celebrate God’s accomplishments at Creation and at Redemption. Hebrews 4:9-11, however, invites us to look to the future. It tells us that God has prepared a Sabbath rest that is in the future. It suggests a new dimension for Sabbath keeping. Sabbath rest memorializes not only God’s victories in the past, but also celebrates God’s promises for the future.
The future dimension of Sabbath observance has always been there, but it has often been neglected. After the fall, it came to imply the promise that God would one day restore creation to its original glory through the Messiah. God commanded us to celebrate His acts of redemption through Sabbath observance because Sabbath pointed forward to the culmination of redemption in a new creation. Sabbath observance is an anticipation of heaven in this imperfect world.
This has always been clear in Jewish tradition. Life of Adam and Eve, a work composed between 100 B.C. and A.D. 200 (in James H. Charlesworth, ed., The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha [New Haven, London: Yale University Press, 1985], vol. 2, p. 18}, said: “The seventh day is a sign of the resurrection, the rest of the coming age.” Another ancient Jewish source said: The coming age is “the day which is wholly Sabbath rest for eternity.” — Jacob Neusner, The Mishnah, a New Translation (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988), p. 873. The Othiot of Rabbi Akiba, a later source, said: “Israel said before the Holy One, Blessed Be He, ‘Master of the World, if we observe the commandments, what reward will we have?’ He said to them: ‘The world-to-come.’ They said to Him: ‘Show us its likeness.’ He showed them the Sabbath.” — Theodore Friedman, “The Sabbath Anticipation of Redemption,” Judaism: A Quarterly Journal, vol. 16, pp. 443, 444.
Sabbath is for celebration, for joy and thanksgiving. When we keep the Sabbath, we indicate that we believe God’s promises, that we accept His gift of grace. Sabbath is faith alive and vibrant. As far as actions go, Sabbath observance is probably the fullest expression of our conviction that we are saved by grace through faith in Him.
How can you learn to keep the Sabbath in a way that, indeed, shows our understanding of what salvation by faith, apart from the deeds of the law, is about? How is resting on the Sabbath an expression of salvation by grace?
Friday, January 28
It is very significant that Paul in Hebrews used the Sabbath rest, and not Sunday, as a symbol of the salvation through grace that God offers us. The use of Sabbath rest in this way implies that Sabbath was cherished and observed by believers. From the second century A.D. forward, however, we find evidences of a decisive change in the church. Sabbath observance ceased to be considered a symbol of salvation and was, instead, considered a symbol of allegiance to Judaism and the old covenant, one that had to be avoided. To keep the Sabbath became the equivalent of to “Judaize.” For example, Ignatius of Antioch (around A.D. 110) remarked: “Those who lived according to the old order have found the new hope. They no longer observe the Sabbath but the day of the Lord — the day our life was resurrected with Christ.” — Jacques B. Doukhan, Israel and the Church: Two Voices for the Same God (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 2002), p. 42. Similarly, Marcion ordered his followers to fast on Sabbath as a sign of rejection of the Jews and their God, and Victorinus did not want to appear that he “observed the Sabbath of the Jews” (See Israel and the Church, pp. 41-45). It was the loss of the understanding of Sabbath observance as a symbol of salvation by grace that led to its demise in the Christian church.
“The Sabbath is a sign of Christ’s power to make us holy. And it is given to all whom Christ makes holy. As a sign of His sanctifying power, the Sabbath is given to all who through Christ become a part of the Israel of God. …
The Sabbath points them to the works of creation as an evidence of His mighty power in redemption. While it calls to mind the lost peace of Eden, it tells of peace restored through the Saviour. And every object in nature repeats His invitation, ‘Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.’ Matthew 11:28.” — Ellen G. White, The Desire of Ages, pp. 288, 289
Discussion Questions:
1. What is the relationship between Sabbath observance and justification by faith?
2. What is the difference between true observance of the Sabbath and a legalistic observance of the Sabbath? How can we not only know the difference but experience that difference in our own Sabbath observance?
