Previously: Coming out of Babylon
Another issue with coming out of Babylon has to do with the day of rest. Any way you slice it, Sunday as a day of rest had its same origin with the Roman church wanting to distance itself from “Judaizing” believers who still kept Saturday as the day of rest, as did Jesus and the apostles. The fact that the Protestant church kept the Sunday day of worship — which the Roman church instituted, not God, not Scripture, not Jesus, and not the apostles — has been used by the Roman church to prove to the world that the Protestants aren’t really serious about Sola Scriptura, but they inherently accept the authority of the Roman church, and are just being rebellious.
“Prove to me from the Bible alone that I am bound to keep Sunday holy. There is no such law in the Bible. It is a law of the holy Catholic Church alone. The Bible says ‘Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.’ The Catholic Church says, No. By my divine power I abolish the Sabbath day and command you to keep holy the first day of the week. And ho! The entire civilized world bows down in reverent obedience to the command of the Holy Catholic Church.” —Priest Thomas Enright, CSSR, President of Redemptorist College, Kansas City, Mo., in a lecture at Hartford, Kansas, February 18, 1884, and printed in the Hartford Kansas Weekly Call, February 22, 1884, and the American Sentinel, a New York Roman Catholic journal in June 1893, page 173.
Well? How does one answer that argument? If we were serious about Sola Scriptura, wouldn’t we be observing the feast days of the Lord instead of the feast days of the Pope? Wouldn’t we be obeying all of the Ten Commandments? These are the questions I have been asking myself.
The Sabbath is the first feast day listed in Leviticus 23. It is so holy to YHVH, that in the original Hebrew which Moses wrote under the direction of the Holy Spirit, the instructions for celebrating it are also set apart (the Hebrew meaning of “holy”) from the instructions concerning the rest of the feast days in Leviticus 23. If someone were to begin keeping the Lord’s feast days, keeping the Sabbath is the best starting place.
The essentials of Sabbath keeping are: set the day apart from the other days of the week, remembering YHVH our Creator on that day, and doing no work on it, since the Sabbath as a foreshadow represents the 7th millennium of rest we will enjoy under the kingship of Jesus. “Work” is also what Adam and Eve were cursed with after their fall, so by resting on the 7th day from our work as God rested from His, we are acknowledging Jesus our Redeemer, who redeemed us from the curse brought on us by sin, and our complete dependence on Him for our salvation. We desist from our works, and enter into His rest. It is a very Protestant commemoration, a day for renewing the joy of our salvation by grace through faith, not by works, lest any man should boast!
To be continued …
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