EXCELLENT QUOTE ON SABBATH

[Slawek G 3]

Quote derived from my favourite commentary on the book of Hebrews written by Jack Sequeira:

“We must never separate the Sabbath from Christ our Righteousness, because it is the Lord of the Sabbath that makes the day important. Without the Lord of the day, the day itself becomes meaningless. There are today many sincere Christians who are fully resting in Christ but are Sunday keepers. They keep the wrong day for the right reason. Likewise, there are many sincere Sabbath keepers who think their Sabbath keeping will save them. They are keeping the right day for the wrong reason. Both need to be corrected by the Holy Spirit, who is to lead us into all truth. Before the second coming of Jesus all who come under the banner of Christ will finally worship the Lord of the Sabbath and their Sabbath keeping will be the outward sign or the seal of the righteousness they have already received by faith. In contrast, Sunday as the Mark of the Beast will represent human attempts to earn the salvation by works. In this way accepting Sunday and deliberate rejecting the Sabbath will become an outward expression of rejecting the salvation by faith in Jesus.”

“We had twenty two Adventist students at one of the universities in Ethiopia. And those students were told that they would have to have an exam in zoology on the Sabbath. So, because of that they asked me if I would speak to the zoology professor on their behalf. The problem was that the zoology professor was known as a very tough, unyielding and stubborn German teacher. So I said to those students, ‘Before I go and speak to him I want to ask you a question: If he will not agree to postpone your exam will you take the exam on Sabbath? If you say ‘Yes’ I’m not going to speak to him for you. I will go to him only if you give me your word that you will not take the exam even if he won’t agree to change the date of your exam. Now, in Africa only the cream of the crop goes to university. So any person who gives up university is regarded in Africa as the greatest fool in the world. So because of this they said, ‘Boy, this is tough.” And they decided to spend three days in fasting and prayer. After those three days only five of them came back to me. Out of those twenty-two young Adventist students only five said to me, ‘We are willing to deprive ourselves of a university education but we will not let our Lord down.’ The rest said, ‘It is too much of a sacrifice.’ So I went to the professor for those five students. I tried to explain to him why they can’t have the exam on the Sabbath, but he stopped me and said, ‘You don’t need to explain. I come from Darmstadt where we have lots of Adventists. I know your policy. They can have the exam on Sunday. No trouble at all.’ I don’t know what was behind the professor but all those five students passed with flying colours. The others failed. Whether the professor did it deliberately or not I don’t know, but he never penalized those five who decided to not brake the fourth commandment regardless the consequences. And later this Sunday keeping professor said to me, ‘I wish we had students that were as loyal to Christ as these five’.”

Sabbath and the Gospel | Salvation1

[TrevorL 98]

Greetings Slaweck G,

8 hours ago, Slawek G said:

Before the second coming of Jesus all who come under the banner of Christ will finally worship the Lord of the Sabbath and their Sabbath keeping will be the outward sign or the seal of the righteousness they have already received by faith. In contrast, Sunday as the Mark of the Beast will represent human attempts to earn the salvation by works. In this way accepting Sunday and deliberate rejecting the Sabbath will become an outward expression of rejecting the salvation by faith in Jesus.”

There is no Scripture to support the SDA hypothesis that the great test at the end times will be the Sabbath question. Is such a belief based on EGW's book "The Great Controversy"? I consider the Mark of the Beast as relating to the acceptance of the Catholic Church and her doctrines, and the SDA Church accepts some of these doctrines, and is possibly softening her approach to the RCC. 

Kind regards Trevor

[phkrause 3,701]

13 hours ago, TrevorL said:

Greetings Slaweck G,

There is no Scripture to support the SDA hypothesis that the great test at the end times will be the Sabbath question. Is such a belief based on EGW's book "The Great Controversy"? I consider the Mark of the Beast as relating to the acceptance of the Catholic Church and her doctrines, and the SDA Church accepts some of these doctrines, and is possibly softening her approach to the RCC. 

Kind regards Trevor

I agree that there is no verse that says the actual words, but the book is all about worship? No? So it becomes something that, at least to me, seems pretty obvious!!

[TrevorL 98]

Greetinga phkrause,

7 hours ago, phkrause said:

I agree that there is no verse that says the actual words, but the book is all about worship? No? So it becomes something that, at least to me, seems pretty obvious!!

An SDA used to advertise in a local paper about the anticipated Sunday Law, but here in Australia the Catholics seem to be the greatest supporters of sport on Sundays. Many churches have their meetings on Sunday mornings, but the local Catholics have their Mass Saturday evening and early Sunday. They then spend nearly the full day at sport or other activities. I doubt that the Pope will be successful in imposing a Sunday Law and thus oppressing the local SDAs. The great controversy at the end times as prophesied in the Bible, including the many OT prophecies and Revelation 16:12-16, appears to be centred in Israel, and Jerusalem. 

Kind regards Trevor  

[Gregory Matthews 6,477]

At least in North America, there is a segment in the SDA denomination who doubt that there is going ot be a "Sunday law" enacted into law that will be global in application.

NOTE:  As a congregational pastor, a physician in my church had to close his medical practice  on Sundays due to a local Sunday law that was enacted in that State.[NOTE:  I have no idea as to what the present  situation is.]  He filed a lawsuit against the State, asking that he be allowed to have his medical office open on Sundays and he lost that battle.

NOTE:  In an interesting side-note to this, the Religious Liberty department of the SDA Church refused to support him in his legal battle against being forced to close his medical practice on Sundays.