Have We of All People,
Been NEGLECTING God's Sabbath?
Many have NOT REALIZED they have been
NEGLECTING to keep the Sabbath as they should!
We need to WAKE UP to the real SERIOUSNESS
of this! Here is surprising, eye-opening NEW TRUTH for many
of our members!
By Herbert W. Armstrong
MANY OF US
HAVE BEEN in the predicament of the rich young ruler. He came to
Jesus asking, "Good Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?"
Jesus told him
to keep the Commandments, naming five of them.
"All
these," the young man said, "have I kept from my youth up."
"Yet
lackest thou," said Jesus, "one thing!"
What
Many Lack
God used Mrs.
Armstrong's recent critical illness to PURGE a great deal
of spiritual waste, filth, and leaven out of His Church. True, there was
much humbling, repenting, and spiritual rejuvenating in the Church. But even
after this, to MANY, Jesus says, in effect, "YET
lackest thou one thing!"
Multiple
hundreds in the Church have come to realize our minds had been too much on
the physical duties, cares, burdens, interests, even pleasures of this life!
We had been too much concerned with physical and material interests
neglecting sufficient Bible study and PRAYER! And hundreds
repented. A great CHANGE was made.
But we had to
realize GOD'S CHURCH was not yet fully CLEANSED!
There was, indeed one thing yet lacking a MOST SERIOUS
thing!
Often the
thing we would least suspect neglecting is that on which we have put
MOST emphasis that which we have accepted as so BASIC
we have come to take it for granted that with which we were so
FAMILIAR that the familiarity had bred contempt. It had become so
COMMON to us we didn't realize we were becoming
CARELESS about it!
WHY
Stress TWO Commands?
Did you ever wonder
why, in that pivotal of all Old Testament prophecies, Leviticus 26,
God mentioned and emphasized only TWO of the Ten
Commandments?
He said:
"Ye shall make you no idols nor graven image ... for I am the
ETERNAL your God. Ye shall keep my Sabbaths ... I am the
ETERNAL."
Then, He
promised: "IF ye walk in MY statutes, and keep
MY commandments, and do them: then I will . . ." and there,
followed promises of matchless, unprecedented prosperity, wealth, abundance,
peace, physical and national blessings. (Lev.26:3-13.)
"But
IF ye will not harken unto me, and will not do all these
commandments, .." and then followed the CURSES for
disobedience, including military invasion, defeat, and slavery to a foreign
enemy.
WHY
emphasize just these two Commandments?
Because these
two, more than others, were given to keep us in close contact with
GOD!
We don't see
God! We are far more prone to get out of contact with God, whom we don't
see, than those humans whom we do see! It is easier to obey the Commandments
that regulate our relationship with human associates, whom we see, and with
whom we talk, than to keep a close and right relationship with God, whom we
don't see or hear.
Having our
minds and interests too closely on material cares, duties, interests
unaccompanied with sufficient PRAYER and Bible study,
becomes a form of IDOLATRY putting material things
BEFORE God in our minds, hearts and affections! Hundreds
had seen this, and repented of it!
But hundreds
had NOT seen that they had not been properly keeping God's
Sabbath really keeping it as God intended!
And this thing
we lacked is NO LIGHT THING IT is A MOST
TREMENDOUS THING!
HOW
Keep It?
On the very seventh
day of what we call Creation Week, GOD Himself rested on
the Sabbath day, and was refreshed. He delighted in it! He greatly
ENJOYED that Sabbath Day! He rested from GREAT
ACCOMPLISHMENT, drinking in the JOY that comes
from achievement even as we ought to do, every Sabbath. For we should have
accomplished worthwhile things by our week's labor! And what is so
satisfying as the thrill of accomplishment?
He set that
day apart for HOLY use and purpose SANCTIFIED
it! He made that interval of TIME, between what is now
called Friday sunset and Saturday sunset, HOLY time. He
made FUTURE TIME holy!
Then, in the
4th Commandment, He commanded us to "REMEMBER ... to
KEEP it holy." You can't keep ice-water hot. You can't
keep time not made holy HOLY. And none but God can make
future TIME HOLY! No one can "KEEP Sunday
holy!" God never made it holy!
To keep holy
this HOLY time that belongs to God means to "take our foot
off of it" as Moses was commanded to take his foot off of holy ground!
(Exodus 3:5.)
"If thou
turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on MY
HOLY DAY; and call the Sabbath a delight, the HOLY
of the ETERNAL, honorable; and shalt honor HIM,
not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine
own words: THEN shalt thou DELIGHT thyself
in the ETERNAL; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high
places of the earth, and feed thee with the HERITAGE
[eternal life in God's Kingdom] of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of
the ETERNAL hath spoken it!" (Isa. 58:13-14.)
"Saturday Is Not MY Day!"
God calls the Sabbath
"MY Holy Day." The space of time that is the
Sabbath day belongs to GOD, not to us.
I am reminded
of the time when I was holding Sunday night services in the Chamber of
Commerce Auditorium in Seattle. Shaking hands with the people at the front
entrance after the service, one woman paused to ask a question.
"Mr.
Armstrong," she said, "someone distressed me a great deal by telling me that
SATURDAY is your day instead of Sunday. That is not true,
is it?"
"No," I
replied promptly, "that is not true. Saturday is not my day SUNDAY
is my day."
"0
THANK you, Mr. Armstrong!" she exclaimed. "I'm greatly relieved. I
was sure that was not true."
"But I think
you don't understand," I added. "You see, Sunday is MY day
and so is Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. But the hours
between Friday sunset and Saturday sunset are not my day that day is
GOD'S DAY God's Holy Sabbath. It belongs to HIM
!"
HOW
Important?
But is it
IMPORTANT? Does it make much DIFFERENCE?
Go back and
read the blessings for obedience, and the curses for Sabbath-breaking, in
Leviticus 26!
Notice what
God said to JUDAH through Jeremiah: "But if ye will not
hearken unto me to hallow the Sabbath day . .. then will I kindle a fire in
the gates thereof, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem, and it
shall not be quenched!" (Jer. 17:27.) This was Judah's LAST
WARNING, before their captivity into SLAVERY!
They didn't
heed! They didn't think Sabbath-keeping important!
RESULT?
"Now in the fifth
month, in the tenth day of the month, which was the nineteenth year of
Nebuchadrezzar King of Babylon, came Nebuzaradan, captain of the guard, . .
. into Jerusalem, and burned the house of the ETERNAL
[Solomon's multi-billion-dollar temple], and the King's house; and all
the houses of Jerusalem, and all the houses of the great men, burned he with
fire!" (Jer. 52:12-13).
More than a
hundred years before, the northern Kingdom, ISRAEL, had
been driven out of their land as slaves by the Assyrians, BECAUSE
of Sabbath-breaking! (Ezek. 20:10-25.)
IMPORTANT? Carelessness in keeping HOLY God's day
can KEEP YOU OUT OF GOD'S KINGDOM! That's how
IMPORTANT it is!
Made
PLAIN in NEW Testament!
Now what does
GOD say to us, TODAY?
I want all in
God's Church to NOTICE how God says this carelessness about
His Sabbath can KEEP YOU FROM BEING BORN INTO GOD'S KINGDOM!
It is JUST as important to us, TODAY, as
to Judah, then!
The Book of
Hebrews is the Book of the LIVING Christ, TODAY!
I want you to
see, how, what this world's theologians have never SEEN!
I want to take
you, quickly and in brief, through the first four chapters. This was written
for GOD'S CHURCH, for TODAY! And you will
see why I keep emphasizing that word "TODAY!"
"...
GOD .. has spoken to us by a Son a Son whom He has
appointed heir of the UNIVERSE, as it was by Him that He
created the world. He, reflecting God's bright GLORY, and
stamped with God's own character, sustains the universe with the word of His
POWER . . " (Heb. l;l-3 Moffatt translation).
Notice the
"all things" of the King James translation means the entire
UNIVERSE!
This
introduction, shows HOW GREAT is the living CHRIST
now on the THRONE OF GOD the THRONE OF THE
ENTIRE UNIVERSE having been given the Administration of the
GOVERNMENT of the UNIVERSE by God the
Father! Following verses of Chapter I show the glory of angels, but the far
SUPERIOR glory of the living CHRIST.
The last verse
of Chapter 1, speaking of angels, says:
"Are they
not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be
HEIRS of salvation?"
Now skip
briefly through the WEIGHTY Chapter 2.
I say weighty,
because this chapter, perhaps more than any other writing in recorded
history, reveals the PURPOSE of human life the true
MEANING of life WHY humans were put on
earth what is our true goal and destiny our HERITAGE!
This last
verse of Chapter 1 suggests, but does not define it. It refers to
those who are Christ's who have, and in whom, the Holy Spirit dwells as
the HEIRS of salvation.
Important We HEED!
But notice how this
chapter begins: "Therefore we" the "WE"
being the aforementioned HEIRS of salvation "ought to
give the more earnest HEED to the things which we have
heard" that is things heard from GOD, about our
coming salvation "lest at any time we should let them slip." (Verse
1.) Moffatt translates the last few words, "lest we drift away."
We could!
Unless we diligently HEED, we might!
"How shall
WE" we Spirit-begotten Christians "escape, if
we NEGLECT so great salvation?" (Emphasis is mine
throughout.) (Verse 3.) Few realize HOW GREAT is
this salvation but, beginning verse 6 this chapter reveals it!
Now verse
5: "For unto the angels hath He NOT put in subjection the
world to come, whereof we speak." When the apostle Paul, whom God
inspired in writing this, spoke of "so GREAT SALVATION"
he was speaking of "the world to come" the WORLD TOMORROW
to be ruled by Christ and God's Kingdom. It has not been put in subjection
to angels. Then TO WHOM has God put it in subjection?
The
PURPOSE of Human Life
He explains in the
very next words: "But one in a certain place testified, saying, . . ."
It was David who testified, in the 8th Psalm, verses 4-6. There he
said, quoted here in Hebrews 2:6: "WHAT IS man, that
Thou art mindful of him?"
Yes, what
IS a man ?
And
WHY should the Great GOD be mindful of HIM
insignificant, sinning MAN? He explains, continuing the
quote from the Psalms, Verse 7: "Thou madest him a little lower than the
angels." Or, in the R.S.V., "Thou didst make him for a little while
lower than the angels." The meaning is, man is now, for a time, lower
but in the world to come shall be much HIGHER than the
angels. Read I Corinthians 6:2-3.
Continuing,
same verse, "... thou crownedst him with glory and honor, and didst set
him over the work of thy hands." What is "the work of God's hands,"
that man is set or to be set over? ALL THAT GOD HAS CREATED!
Verse 8:
"Thou hast put ALL THINGS in subjection under his feet"
In verse 3 of Chapter 1 we saw that "ALL
THINGS" means the entire UNIVERSE. Notice
what follows! It means that HERE! "For in that He
[God] put ALL in subjection under him [man],
He left nothing that is not put under him. But now we see not yet
ALL THINGS [the universe] under him."
Now compare
with verse 5. The WORLD TO COME, "whereof we
speak," has NOT been put IN SUBJECTION
to the angels but what of MAN? God has put not only the
WORLD to come, but the WHOLE UNIVERSE,
"in SUBJECTION under him" under MAN.
Not under angels but under MAN! Man is, now, for a little
while, lower than angels. Yet angels are sent as ministers to those
HUMANS who are HEIRS of this salvation.
How
GREAT, then, is this salvation? So GREAT, that the
entire universe, beside the WORLD TOMORROW, has been
assigned under our feetonly, we see NOT YET all this under
our feet. BUT, what DO we see, NOW?
Next verse: "But we see JESUS, who for a little while
was made lower than the angels, [NOW] CROWNED with
GLORY and HONOR ..." (verse 9, RSV).
Yes, Jesus is
now, already, CROWNED, and RULING the
UNIVERSE! He is in GLORY His eyes like
flames of fire His face shining like the sun, full strength (Rev.
1:14-16).
And He is
called the "CAPTAIN" or, (RSV) PIONEER
of our salvation. He is the PIONEER who has already gone on
ahead, paving the way for us, as His CO-HEIRS. He has
already INHERITED the Kingdom!
THAT
is HOW GREAT a salvation we could NEGLECT!
And the theme
carries on to show that we could NEGLECT it by becoming
careless about God's SABBATH! So continue on!
What
"DAY"?
Come now to
Chapter 3.
Verse 1:
"Wherefore, HOLY BRETHREN, partakers of the heavenly
calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ
Jesus;..."
Notice, the
salvation to which we are heirs is so GREAT, that we, even
now, are called "HOLY brethren."
Verse 2:
Jesus was faithful to God the Father who appointed Him, even as Moses was
faithful in God's house. But (verse 3), Christ is worthy of much
more GLORY than Moses, because the BUILDER
(Creator) of the house has more glory than the HOUSE. And
GOD is the Builder of "ALL THINGS"
the Universe (verse 4), which He created by Jesus Christ.
Verse 6
makes plain that WE are the "House" today as the
"Church in the wilderness" of Moses' day (Acts 7:38) was
then. So Moses was only a part of the House Christ made a ruling servant,
who was faithful.
Verse 6:
"But Christ, as a Son over His own House, whose House are we, . .." And
this Message is to us, TODAY. Now we come to the heart of
the Message to us!
Verse 7:
"Wherefore, as the Holy Spirit saith, Today if ye will hear His voice,
harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in
the wilderness: . . " It is plainer in the RSV: "Today, when you
hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the REBELLION,
on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your father put me to the
test and saw my works for forty years."
This is the
Message for God's Church TODAY of the present
"Philadelphia" era. As the first six verses compared Moses and Christ,
showing that Christ is far greater; so beginning verse 7 it
compares the "Church in the wilderness" under Moses with
OUR Church TODAY, under our High Priest
JESUS CHRIST!
Christ is
GREATER than was Moses. Christ is our Leader our High
Priest, our Lord and Master, our coming KING! And, by way
of further comparison, let us remember WE have God's Holy
Spirit they under Moses did not!
This 7th
verse is a quotation, applied here to us of the Philadelphia era, from
the 95th Psalm, verses 7-11. As David said to the Congregation of
Israel in his time, "Today, if ye will hear His voice, harden not your
hearts as in the provocation, and as in the day of temptation in the
wilderness: when our fathers tempted me, . . ."
The marginal
references render the word "provocation" as "at Meribah,"
and "temptation" as Massah. The RSV translates it: "Harden not
your hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at Massah in the wilderness."
Moffatt also renders it "Meribah" and "Massah."
A
SABBATH Psalm
This 95th Psalm,
on which virtually the entire 3rd and 4th chapters of Hebrews is
based, is a SABBATH PSALM. It records what David said, or
preached, to the Congregation on a SABBATH day.
It begins the
Sabbath service: "O come, let us SING unto the
ETERNAL: let us make a joyful noise to the Rock of our salvation.
Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving, and make a JOYFUL
noise unto Him with psalms [songs]." The Congregation came
before Him in assembly ON THE SABBATH!
David's
Message, or sermon, on that Sabbath begins verse 7: "TODAY"
(and that "Today" was a SABBATH day) "TODAY,
if ye will hear His voice." God inspired the 3rd and 4th chapters
of the Book of Hebrews, His Message to His Church OF THIS TIME,
around this same SABBATH Message.
HOW
They "Hardened Hearts"
As David preached to
the Congregation of Israel, so God inspires the WARNING to
His Church, "Harden not your hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at
Massah in the wilderness."
This
REBELLION was rebellion AGAINST GOD'S SABBATH!
The ancient
Israelites under Moses had come to the wilderness of Sin (Ex. 16:1).
It was on the 15th day of the 2nd month, a SABBATH, and
after leaving Egypt. They left Egypt on "the morrow after the Passover"
that is on the 15th day of the first month, the year of 1487 B. C. That
year the Passover fell on a Wednesday, and they left on a Thursday
(Wednesday night).
These
Israelites had griped, grumbled, complained, doubted God and blamed Moses
ever since they had left Egypt in spite of the stupendous miracles God had
performed in saving and preserving them. Now they "murmured" and
blamed God and Moses; because they , were, hungry.
"Then said
the ETERNAL unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from
heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every
day, that I may PROVE them, whether they will walk in my
Law or no" (Ex. 16:4). See verses 10-12. This was a Sabbath.
Verse 13, after sunset.
This test was
a SABBATH test.
After the
first week of raining manna from heaven, came the Sabbath day. They had
gathered a double portion the day before. "And Moses said" (verse :'25),
"Eat that today; for TODAY is a Sabbath unto the Eternal:
today ye shall not find it in the field. Six days ye shall gather it; but on
the seventh day, which is the Sabbath, in it there shall be none.
"And it
came to pass, that there went out some of the people on the seventh day for
to gather, and they found none. And the ETERNAL said, . . .
How LONG refuse ye to keep my Commandments and my Laws?
See, for that the ETERNAL hath given you the Sabbath;...
abide ye every man in his place, let no man go out of his place on the
seventh day" (verses 26-29).
Now the people
had FOOD provided. But they still GRUMBLED
and complained and DOUBTED GOD. Now they demanded of Moses,
"Wherefore is this that, thou hast, brought us up out of Egypt, to kill
us and our children and our cattle with thirst? And Moses cried unto the
ETERNAL, saying, What shall I do unto this people? They be
almost ready to stone me. And the ETERNAL said unto Moses,
Go on before the people, and take with thee of the elders of Israel: and thy
rod, wherewith thou smotest the river, take in thine hand, and go. Behold I
will stand before thee there upon the ROCK. ..." ("For they
drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them and that Rock was
CHRIST. But with many of them God was not well pleased.... Now
these things were our examples; ... Neither let us tempt Christ, as some of
them also tempted, and were destroyed ... Neither murmur ye, as some of them
also murmured, and were destroyed of the destroyer. Now all these things
happened unto them for ensamples: and they arc written for OUR
admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come. Wherefore let
him that thinketh he standeth TAKE HEED, lest he fall" (I
Cor. 10:4-12).
Again, pick up
the passage back in Exodus 17: "...and thou shalt smite the Rock, and
there shall come water out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did
so, in the sight of the elders of Israel. AND HE CALLED THE NAME OF
THE PLACE MASSAH, AND MERIBAH, because of the chiding of the
children of Israel, and because they tempted the ETERNAL,
saying, Is the ETERNAL among us, or not?" (Ex. 17:3-7.)
And the very
next verse records the event of King Amalek and his army coming to fight
Israel and of their WEAKENING, and failing to
TRUST God to fight their wars for them and of Israel for the
first time GOING TO WAR !
In
Joshua's Day
Compare all this with
Psalm 95 and Hebrews 3 and 4 and you GET THE
MESSAGE FOR US, TODAY!
None of that
generation, except Joshua and Caleb were permitted to enter into the
Promised Land type of OUR entering into THE
KINGDOM OF GOD!
Now back to
Hebrews 3. Pick up where we. left off:
Begin
verse 7: "Today (on the Sabbath day in congregation) when you hear his
voice, do not harden your hearts as in the REBELLION, on
the DAY OF TESTING [the Sabbath was the test Ex.
16:4] in the wilderness, where your fathers put me; to the test and
saw my works for forty years. Wherefore I was grieved with that generation,
and said, They do always err in their heart; and they have not known
MY WAYS. So I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest"
(verses 7-11, RSY). All this is a citation from Psalm.95:7-11.
Those
Israelites under Moses were on their way to the PROMISED LAND,
even as we today are aiming at the goal of entering into GOD'S
KINGDOM.
The word
"rest"; in verse 11 is translated from the Greek "katapausis"
- defined as ''reposing down", i.e. (by Hebrew) abode: or rest. As used, it
denotes, for ancient Israel, the rest from the rigors of the wilderness by
entering the Promised Land. This is a TYPE of the
believer's spiritual rest, being born into (at Christ's coming) the
KINGDOM OF GOD - made immortal.
Because they
hardened their hearts doubted God disbelieved lacked faith and
DISOBEYED even after stupendous MIRACLES they
saw in wonder and awe DISOBEYED, "hardened their
hearts," PROFANED His SABBATH when
God made that the VERY TESTING POINT (''that I may
PROVE THEM, whether they will walk in my Law or no"Ex.
16:4). God said of that generation, "They shall not enter my rest."
And none, but
Joshua and Caleb of that generation, did!
But their
children born along the way in the wilderness did enter under Joshua.
God had PROMISED this land to Abraham for his descendants.
Regardless of Israelite sins, GOD WAS BOUND BY HIS PROMISE!
Before the
Israelites crossed the Jordan River into Palestine, Joshua said to the men
of three tribes: "...The ETERNAL your God hath given
you REST, and hath given you this land..." (Joshua 1:13).
Again, as at
the Red Sea, God parted the waters of the Jordan, so all Israel went over on
the DRY riverbed.
The day they
went over was the 10th day of the first month (Joshua 4:19). Dr.
Herman L Hoeh's researches have proved this was the weekly SABBATH,
just before the PASSOVER, which came the 14th day of that
same first month. This was in the year 1447precisely 40 years from the time
their fathers had left Egypt! On this year 1447, as in the year 1487 at the
first Passover, the Passover was on a WEDNESDAY!
God
does things ON TIME!
They entered that
"rest" Palestine ON A SABBATH DAY! Crossing the
Jordan into Canaan was a mere short "Sabbath day's journey!"
How
significant! In the year 31 A.D., the Sabbath before the Passover day on
which Jesus was crucified, was the day of His Triumphal entry into
Jerusalem! That entry was on the SABBATH, also the 10th day
of the first month and that year, again, the Passover came on a Wednesday!
Under Joshua
these people were reminded on entering the Promised Land type of
OUR entering God's Kingdom - NOT to "harden
their hearts," as their forefathers had done, profaning God's Sabbath;
which prevented that generation from ENTERING this
"REST," the Promised Land!
New
Testament COMMAND to Keep the SABBATH!
Later, in the days of
King DAVID, during a SABBATH DAY service
before the Congregation (Church) of Israel, he said: "TODAY"
and it was the SABBATH DAY "if ye will hear His
voice" yes, those of King David's generation "harden not your
hearts, as at Meribah [margin], and as in the day of Massah in the
wilderness" (Psalm 95:7-8).
Then, for
OUR GENERATION, the very LAST generation
preparing the way for CHRIST'S COMING, and for
ENTRY INTO GOD'S KINGDOM, the Message of the living Christ, our
High Priest, comes to US:
"Wherefore, as the HOLY SPIRIT SAYS, TODAY, if ye will hear
His voice, harden not your hearts"you people of the
PHILADELPHIA era of GOD'S CHURCH! "as in the
provocation ... when your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works
forty years" (Heb. 3:7-9).
They rebelled
AGAINST His SABBATH! (Exodus 16.)
The Message of the living Christ to us continues:
"TAKE
HEED Brethren, lest, there be in any of yon an evil heart of
unbelief, in departing from the living GOD. But exhort one
another daily, while it is called Today; lest any of you be hardened through
the deceitfulness of sin"... (Hebrews 3:7-13).
NOTICE, the word Today begins in your Bible with a CAPITAL
"T." That is because it is speaking of the Holy SABBATH
day. The Moffatt translation has it: "So long as the word Today is
uttered." It is printed with a capital "T"
and in italics for emphasis. It is put in quotes in the RSV, It means the
SABBATH DAY! Protestant churches have been blinded to this.
But this is a message for GOD'S CHURCH!
Verse 14.'
"For we are made partakers of CHRIST ..." They, who
hardened their hearts, were under Moses. We have God's Holy Spirit. They did
not. We are without excuse!
Verse 15:
"... while it is said, Today, if ye will hear His voice,..." and
continuing to verse 19: "So we see that they could not enter in because
of UNBELIEF." The Greek word for "unbelief"
is "apeitheia," indicating obstinate and rebellious disbelief
disobedience unbelief.
Now
Chapter 4
Verse 1: "Let us
therefore FEAR, lest a promise being left us of entering
into His REST, ...." meaning, for us, God's Kingdom,
"any of YOU should seem to come short of it For unto us
was the Gospel preached, as well as unto them:..." THEY
had the GOOD NEWS of God's PROMISE of
entering into the Promised Land the glory of all lands, flowing with milk
and honey. THEY had physical and national promises for
THEIR GOOD NEWS (Gospel). . But, Brethren, WE have
the glorious GOOD NEWS of entering ETERNAL LIFE
in God's Kingdom! The NEW Covenant, for us, is established
on FAR better PROMISES (Heb. 8:6).
Verse 3:
"For WE which have believed do enter into rest, as He said,
As I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into my rest: although the
works were finished from the foundation of; the world." Here He speaks
of the completion of the physical CREATION in SIX
DAYS by WORK. The next verse shows plainly He is
speaking of God's SABBATH REST; after the
"works were finished from the foundation of the world."
Verse 4:
"For He spake in a certain place of the SEVENTH DAY on this
wise, 'And God did rest the seventh day from all His works.'" (This is
quoted from Genesis! 2:1-3). It refers directly back; to the first
WEEKLY SABBATH DAY, as the TYPE of the
"REST" these two chapters are speaking of.
The Sabbath
day was the TYPE of ancient ISRAEL'S
"REST" by entering the Promised Land. It, and that,
are types of OUR entering the KINGDOM OF GOD.
And we enter the KINGDOM after the SIX MILLENNIAL
DAYS,end of 6,000 years since Adam.-The Millennium shall be a
REST from sin for the whole mortal world-as well as for us
who become immortals in God's Kingdom!
Verse 5:
"And in this place again {again He spake of the Sabbath day}, " 'If they
shall enter into my rest,' " again quoting from Psalm 95
David's SABBATH DAY Message on a weekly Sabbath!
Verse 6:
"Seeing therefore it remaineth that some must enter therein, and they to
whom it was first preached entered NOT in because of
unbelief:
Verse 7:
"Again, He limiteth [points out, specifies, sets apart] a certain day,
saying in David, 'TODAY after so long a time; as it is
said, TODAY if ye will hear His voice, harden not your
hearts.'" The CERTAIN DAY He limited, (Psalm 95),
we have clearly shown, was that WEEKLY SABBATH DAY the
TYPE of this "REST" of our
entering, God's KINGDOM! If we despise and NEGLECT
the one, we shall lose the OTHER, even as those Israelites
did!
Did you
notice? AGAIN and AGAIN the
SABBATH command is REPEATED !
Verse 8:
"For if Joshua [margin this should NOT have been
translated "Jesus"] had given them rest, then would He not [or, God
would not see RSV] afterward have spoken of another day:" It is a
little surprising, to those who understand, but the Adam Clarke Commentary
actually does properly explain this verse: "The Apostle shows that, although
Joshua did bring the children of Israel into the Promised Land, yet this
could not be the [finally] intended REST, because long
after this time, the Holy Spirit, by David, speaks of this rest;" [The
"rest" of Israel entering the Promised 'Land was the TYPE
of the KINGDOM OF GOD even as the SABBATH DAY
rest is a TYPE of the KINGDOM!] Clarke
concludes: "The Apostle, therefore, concludes, "Verse 9: 'There
remaineth therefore, a REST [Greek: keeping of the
7th-day Sabbath] to the people of God.' Here the word "rest"
is translated from an altogether different Greek word, originally inspired,
as Paul wrote it, in GREEK: 'Sabbatismos,' which means,
NOT the same as 'katapausis' but the keeping of a 7th-day
SABBATH!' "
This is a
plain, direct, New Testament COMMAND for God's Church to
keep God's SABBATH! IN THE PLAINEST OF LANGUAGE, rightly
translated, THIS VERSE SAYS THE 7TH-DAY SABBATH REMAINS FOR GOD'S
PEOPLE TODAY!
Verse 10;
"For he that is entered into His [God's] rest, he also hath ceased
from his own works, as God did from His." How did God cease from His
works? Verse 4, quoted Genesis 2:1-3, shows it was
BY RESTING ON THE WEEKLY SABBATH DAY.
Plainly, if
WE enter the REST ahead for us entering God's
KINGDOM we also DO cease from our 6-days' work,
AS GOD DID, on the SABBATH DAY!
Verse 11:
"Let us LABOR therefore to enter into that rest, lest any
man fall after the same example of unbelief." Labor six days to enter
the Sabbath Day rest, as a TYPE of laboring AGAINST
SIN, to ENTER GOD'S KINGDOM.
If we are
CARELESS, NEGLECTING the Sabbath, it may cost us our
INHERITANCE IN GOD'S KINGDOM.
Let us STOP NEGLECTING God's Sabbath
