The following internet site contains a book concerning the very numerous Sunday laws throughout history.
http://www.archive.org/stream/sundaylegislat00lewi#page/n3/mode/2up
In light of the fact, that Sunday keepers have repeatedly throughout history appealed to the civil authorities to enforce their day of worship upon all, how is it that those who keep the fourth commandment by faith in the word of God, are the ones always accused of being legalistic?
We appeal to all to obey all the commandments of God by faith in His holy word, which admonishes us to do so from one end of the bible to the other. We appeal to personal conviction and reason alone for this act of faith, and never to civil legislation which Sunday keepers habitually appeal to, and yet we are the ones accused of legalism. This makes no sense at all. How can appealing to others to believe and obey the word of God by faith in that word be considered legalism, while appealing to others to keep a day holy which the scriptures never even address as such, and then making laws to force everyone to do so, be considered faith?
While it is certainly possible to keep the seventh day Sabbath for the wrong reason, i.e. legalistically, it is just as certainly possible to keep the commandment by faith in the word of God, and out of love for the author of the same. The same can not be said though about Sunday observance. There is no command concerning it in the word of God, nor is it even addressed at all as a day of worship in the same. Thus it is impossible to keep it by faith in the word of God, or out of love and respect for the authority of His word. The writer contends that this is exactly why Sunday keepers have appealed to civil legislation to enforce their day upon all throughout history. That is, because there is no command or authority from God and His scriptures to do so. Thus the establishment of Sunday as a sacred day by civil law is in fact verily the establishment of legalism.
Yet it is those of us who keep the seventh day by faith alone in the word of God, that are continually accused of being the legalistic. How unfortunate that child or reverse psychology is so successful among professing adults.
17 So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. Romans 10:17 (KJV)
If what you believe and preach is not to be found in the word of God, then it is not by faith. If it is not by faith, then it is of works. The latter alone is not acceptable to God. The only works that are acceptable to God, are those performed by faith. This is of course because they demonstrate ones willing submission to God, and therefore their faith and trust in His word, and trustworthy authority.
31 Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law. Romans 3:31 (KJV)
True faith does not make void the law of God, but rather establishes the same.
Who is forcing you to keep Sunday? No one. It is all in your brainwashed mind.
Please use the Bible and the Bible only to prove doctrine. What the devil said at one time, or what other liars have said as documented in history should not be used as proof of any doctrine.
Now, ... watch the self praise and the accusing of others ... here it comes .... watch ! watch !
In light of the fact, that Sunday keepers have repeatedly throughout history appealed to the civil authorities to enforce their day of worship upon all, how is it that those who keep the fourth commandment by faith in the word of God, are the ones always accused of being legalistic?
Oh there is plenty of legalism on all sides of the question.
The fact is that Saturday is more scripturally defensable than any other day, but scripture also says it is specifically for Israelites/Jews. (not gentiles)
For Israelites to force it on gentile believers puts said Israelites in the place of the Judaizers of Acts 15.1. (not good) For gentile believers to try to force a first day (Sunday) time scheme on Israelites is equally bad. It is the stuff of replacement theology.
Who is forcing you to keep Sunday? No one. It is all in your brainwashed mind.
Please use the Bible and the Bible only to prove doctrine. What the devil said at one time, or what other liars have said as documented in history should not be used as proof of any doctrine.
Now, ... watch the self praise and the accusing of others ... here it comes .... watch ! watch !
I never said anything about anyone forcing me right now to keep Sunday. That must just be in your brainwashed mind.
I only referred to the fact that all through history, Sunday keepers have passed laws trying to force everyone to observe their day. Since you mentioned it though, there are certainly many blue laws in effect in many places today, which do not allow stores to open or certain activities to take place on Sundays until certain times, if at all on that day. There are also countless blue laws on the books all over the place, which have never been removed and could be enforced at any time.
I cannot use the bible alone to address the issue of Sunday sacredness, because the issue is found nowhere at all in the entirety of the scriptures. Therefore it's reasoning, observation, and enforcement must be discussed extra biblically.
Perhaps you can explain to me why Sunday keepers have appealed to civil legislation so very many times throughout history, and still do today, and yet claim they are not legalistic. While at the same time claiming that all who would keep the fourth commandment by faith in the word of God are legalistic for doing so.
Oh there is plenty of legalism on all sides of the question.
The fact is that Saturday is more scripturally defensable than any other day, but scripture also says it is specifically for Israelites/Jews. (not gentiles)
For Israelites to force it on gentile believers puts said Israelites in the place of the Judaizers of Acts 15.1. (not good) For gentile believers to try to force a first day (Sunday) time scheme on Israelites is equally bad. It is the stuff of replacement theology.
The bible does not say anywhere that the Sabbath is specifically for the Jews. It was instituted before there ever was a Jew. It will be observed in heaven as well. The bible admonishes all to keep the commandments of God from one end of the bible to the other. There is not one gospel for the Jews, and another for the rest of the world. Nor are any of the truly converted to be considered Gentiles any longer, but fellow citizens and saints, and of the very household of God.
11 Wherefore remember,
that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands; 12 That at that time ye were without Christ,
being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world: 13
But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. 14 For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; 15 Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances;
for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace; 16 And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby: 17 And came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh. 18 For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father. 19 Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners,
but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God; 20 And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; 21 In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: 22 In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit. Eph 2:19-22 (KJV)
You are the replacement theologian, separating that which God has joined together.
: Amo Mon Feb 13, 2012 - 18:36:03
The bible does not say anywhere that the Sabbath is specifically for the Jews.
Ex 31.12 And the Lord said to Moses,
13 "You are to speak to the people of Israel and say, 'Above all you shall keep my Sabbaths, for this is a sign between me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you.
14 You shall keep the Sabbath, because it is holy for you. Everyone who profanes it shall be put to death. Whoever does any work on it, that soul shall be cut off from among his people.
15 Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day shall be put to death.
16 Therefore the people of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, observing the Sabbath throughout their generations, as a covenant forever.
17
It is a sign forever between me and the people of Israel that in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed.'
: DaveW Tue Feb 14, 2012 - 05:30:25
: Amo Mon Feb 13, 2012 - 18:36:03
The bible does not say anywhere that the Sabbath is specifically for the Jews.
People of Israel = Jews
not totally true
Children of Israel = Israels Children who was Jacob, Jew-dah came after..
Seed of JUDAH celebrated Jew
H3063 JUDAH celebrated
of the tribe descended from the first, and of its territory: - JUDAH.
H3064, Judaite or Jew
Patronymic from H3063; a Jehudite (that is, Judaite or Jew), or descendant of Jehudah (that is, JUDAH): - Jew.
The word "Jew" never appears in the Bible until 2nd kings, this was when the Two nations split into Judah southern and Northern ten tribes under the name of Israel was uniting with Asyria.
2Ki_16:6 At that time Rezin king of Syria recovered Elath to "Syria", and drave the "JEWS
The word "Jew" never appears in the Bible until 2nd kings, this was when the Two nations split into Judah southern and Israel Northern tribe was uniting with Asyria.
I understand that but by NT times that had changed. Paul identifies himself as a Jew (Acts 21.39) and as a Benjaminite (Phil 3.5).
By the first century the term "Jew" meant ANY decendants of the 12 tribes. That is how I use it.
: DaveW Tue Feb 14, 2012 - 12:05:59
The word "Jew" never appears in the Bible until 2nd kings, this was when the Two nations split into Judah southern and Israel Northern tribe was uniting with Asyria.
I understand that but by NT times that had changed. Paul identifies himself as a Jew (Acts 21.39) and as a Benjaminite (Phil 3.5).
By the first century the term "Jew" meant ANY decendants of the 12 tribes. That is how I use it.
I understand that but by NT times that had changed. Paul identifies himself as a Jew (Acts 21.39) and as a Benjaminite (Phil 3.5). By the first century the term "Jew" meant ANY descendants of the 12 tribes. That is how I use it.
[/quote]
No not totally true,
It was the BENJAMITES that followed the Southern kingdom JUDAH, the BENJAMITES were ADOPTED into the Family of the southern tribe Judah because they chose as nation to followed the Southern kingdom of Judah.. That's why Paul is able to call himself a Jew, he was a Benjamite.
Same principles in the bible of many, a couple examples are concerning Ruth the Moabites she followed Naomi to Judah and married Boaz, she was adopted into being part of Judah, and another example is Lot, Lot was counted as a Child of Abraham, same law of adoption, the child Lot chose to followed Abraham out of Babylon and became his follower, a Son by adoption.
And now let's look at NT history,
the Samaritan woman at the well who was remnant of the ten tribes of Israel called herself a Child of Jacob, because she was from the 10 tribes of the northern kingdom of ISRAEL who followed Assyria.. They intermarried and had Many husbands from outside their race.. You will also notice she said that Jews from Judah did not associate with her tribes because they had chose not to follow the Kingdom of Judah..
The Jews never accepted the Samaritans even though they gave testimony they were Israel's children.. the woman at the well said this well was given to us by our father Jacob, and Jesus did not disagree with her, but affirmed their apostasy of intermarrying with many husbands and that's NT history and that's history today.. All the children that were in Judah were scattered throughout the earth when Jerusalem was destroyed in 70AD , and they intermarried, so essentially they are in the same boat as the Samaritan woman, all have sinned in apostasy and fall short of the Kingdom of God unless they repent and be reborn again..
BTW when you say, "By the first century the term "Jew" meant ANY descendants of the 12 tribes. That is how I use it."
That's what people may say but that's not biblical, and that's were false teaching comes from..
BTW, after the Assyrian exile that deleted the Northern Kingdom, a smattering of escappees from all the other tribes came back to Judah. That is why they ended up being called Jews.
Those who have claimed decendancy from the other tribes are now called Jews. (like the benei Ephraim in India) and there are 2 tribes in Ethiopia that were the decendants of converts at the time when the Queen of Sheba visited Solomon. (the Ethiopian eunuch of Acts 8 was of from there) are also called Jews. Records indicate that Ethiopians came to the pilgrim feasts during the 2nd temple period. To get in, they HAD to be considered Jews.
Whether you think it is biblical or not, it was the first century custom and the NT says nothing to change it.
BTW, the samaritans were a totally different story. And your statements about the woman in Jn 4 show you know little of their society.
: DaveW Tue Feb 14, 2012 - 13:47:46
BTW, after the Assyrian exile that deleted the Northern Kingdom, a smattering of escappees from all the other tribes came back to Judah. That is why they ended up being called Jews.
Those who have claimed decendancy from the other tribes are now called Jews. (like the benei Ephraim in India) and there are 2 tribes in Ethiopia that were the decendants of converts at the time when the Queen of Sheba visited Solomon. (the Ethiopian eunuch of Acts 8 was of from there) are also called Jews. Records indicate that Ethiopians came to the pilgrim feasts during the 2nd temple period. To get in, they HAD to be considered Jews.
Whether you think it is biblical or not, it was the first century custom and the NT says nothing to change it.
Most of these were no doubt from the Kingdom of Southern Judah after Jerusalem was destroyed in 6th century BC, they were scattered throughout the world in 600 BC, no doubt the kingdom of Judah kept a record of the linage of the kingdom of Judah, for the promised seed who was Christ was to come out of the tribe of Judah and that's why Luke and Mathew posted it in their Gospel to prove the prophecy that the SEED singular, Jesus Christ would arise out of Judah from Adam .. the same prophecy given to Adam the only Son of God in the flesh who aslo fell,
other than pointing to Jesus as the saviour, there is no reason for any record of an individual be traced back to their linage, no one is saved by their linage , Christ is the Saviour not Jews,
Jesus said to Peter thou shalt call no man unclean, and the Jews and Gentiles were to join in a Common goal of preaching the Gospel together to the world, the linage of Christ had no other purpose then to prove that Gods will, will be done on earth as it is heaven, the prophecy of the savoir would arrive in his first coming to the earth in his Son.
Sad that some still cling to some hope in belonging to Linage other than Christ's seed,
This does not mean that God has excluded anyone from the promise, the Bible is not about Jew or Gentile it's all about Jesus Christ and the salvation of all souls from the beginning to end,
This is what the Jewish leaders in Christ time did not understand in the pattern of the "SANCTUARY
1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. 2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. 3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made. Gen 2:1-3 (KJV)
How could the Sabbath be only for Jews, when it was instituted 2000 years before there ever was a Jew?
1 Thus saith the Lord, Keep ye judgment, and do justice: for my salvation is near to come, and my righteousness to be revealed. 2 Blessed is the man that doeth this, and the son of man that layeth hold on it; that keepeth the sabbath from polluting it, and keepeth his hand from doing any evil. 3 Neither let the son of the stranger, that hath joined himself to the Lord, speak, saying, The Lord hath utterly separated me from his people: neither let the eunuch say, Behold, I am a dry tree. 4 For thus saith the Lord unto the eunuchs that keep my sabbaths, and choose the things that please me, and take hold of my covenant; 5 Even unto them will I give in mine house and within my walls a place and a name better than of sons and of daughters: I will give them an everlasting name, that shall not be cut off. 6 Also the sons of the stranger, that join themselves to the Lord, to serve him, and to love the name of the Lord, to be his servants, every one that keepeth the sabbath from polluting it, and taketh hold of my covenant; 7 Even them will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer: their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted upon mine altar; for mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people. 8 The Lord GOD which gathereth the outcasts of Israel saith, Yet will I gather others to him, beside those that are gathered unto him. Isaiah 56:1-8 (KJV)
Sorry, scripture just does not support your theory that the Sabbath was and is just for the Jews.
22 For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain. 23 And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord. Isaiah 66:22-23 (KJV)
Apparently we will be keeping it in heaven also. All flesh will worship the Lord on His Sabbath in heaven.
27 And he said unto them, The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath: 28 Therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath. Mark 2:26-28 (KJV)
Straight from the mouth of Christ, the Sabbath was made for man, not just the Jews.
Usage Notes:
English Words used in KJV:
man 552
not tr 4
miscellaneous translations 3
[Total Count: 559]
from <G435> (aner) and ops (the countenance; from <G3700> (optanomai)); man-faced, i.e. a human being :- certain, man.
—Strong's Talking Greek & Hebrew Dictionary
other than pointing to Jesus as the saviour, there is no reason for any record of an individual be traced back to their linage, no one is saved by their linage , Christ is the Saviour not Jews,
I have NEVER said anyone was saved by being Jewish. NEVER. You are arguing against me on a point I do not believe at all.
I do not understand why I cannot get that point thru to you.
What I have said is that being Jewish entails certain covenantal responsibilities that can ONLY be fulfilled by being a New Covenant believer in Yeshua/Jesus. Gentile believers can do them too but they are not required of Gentile believers. And all Gentile believers have a HUGE covenantal responsibility that the Jews do not: drive the 'natural branches' i.e. the unbelieving Jews, to jealousy in our relationship with the God of Israel.
There is SO MUCH MORE for believers than just getting saved. It only takes a few minutes or hours to get saved. It takes a lifetime to walk it out. I am talking about stuff AFTER salvation. You keep dragging it back to the starting line.
: DaveW Wed Feb 15, 2012 - 06:15:49
other than pointing to Jesus as the saviour, there is no reason for any record of an individual be traced back to their linage, no one is saved by their linage , Christ is the Saviour not Jews,
I have NEVER said anyone was saved by being Jewish. NEVER. You are arguing against me on a point I do not believe at all.
I do not understand why I cannot get that point thru to you.
What I have said is that being Jewish entails certain covenantal responsibilities that can ONLY be fulfilled by being a New Covenant believer in Yeshua/Jesus. Gentile believers can do them too but they are not required of Gentile believers. And all Gentile believers have a HUGE covenantal responsibility that the Jews do not: drive the 'natural branches' i.e. the unbelieving Jews, to jealousy in our relationship with the God of Israel.
There is SO MUCH MORE for believers than just getting saved. It only takes a few minutes or hours to get saved. It takes a lifetime to walk it out. I am talking about stuff AFTER salvation. You keep dragging it back to the starting line.
Look Dave you posted in another topic quoting Romans 11 : 26, that all literal Jews will be saved, and I have explained to you that the verse implies to spiritual Israel, meaning People who have prevailed, overcome with God, this includes Jew and Gentile alike. All of Paul's writings support this, he concludes according to God's judgment there is no respecter of person, all believers in Christ, Jews and Gentiles are one body one bread, one church in preaching the Gospel.
Because you are taught as a Masonic Jew movement, that the Jews are someway special today because of Gods promise to their fathers. Well I hate to burst your bubble, the bible concludes we are all Adams Children under the same condemnation of sin, and the Good news says we are all saved by the same promise that was given to Adam no difference, that being saved by the seed singular, that seed being Jesus Christ, no difference..
The bible teaches very clearly that Jews did get the first opportunity to preach the good news about Christ, the Jewish nation was given the Oracles of God and they were the perfect teachers because of their preceding knowledge of God's promise in the OT bible and Knowledge of the sanctuary services that pointed to Jesus Christ. One thing they needed however was to believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of God and receive the Holy Spirit to open their understanding of the scriptures to accomplish the Goal.
Jesus Christ already fulfilled his promise to the Jewish nation in his first coming and taught them personally in the synagogue about the fulfillments of the prophecies and then he completed the promise by sending the Holy Spirit at Pentecost as the seal of his promise. The promise to the Jewish Nation would be to empower them to go out preach the Gospel to the world, they were to share in God's work in his plan, they were to hand the bread out to the multitude of Hearers, to their own people first and then the Gentile, that was the commission given by Jesus Christ. Once this is accomplished then the end would come. But the Nation kept the bread for themselves and did not share it with the world.
When Jesus was here on earth, the Jewish Nation leaders rejected the commission, Jesus already prophesied that they would reject it, and knowing this pointed it out by the conclusion of the temple and Jerusalem being destroyed in 70 AD. meaning the fulfillment of their Apostasy had come to end..
Jesus however had another plan already set up for his church with Jewish Apostles as the Foundation and him being the Chief corner stone, and they did receive the Promise of the Holy Spirit and they all were given gifts to accomplish the preaching of the Gospel to the world with boldness Paul being a Good example of a Jew being reborn of God, all being executed for doing so.
Since 34 AD the Gospel was given to the Gentiles, the Gentiles preach it, many people since have died in Christ both Jew and Gentile and they will all be saved based on their Belief in Jesus Christ, No difference today in any believer.
The only special rewards will be great honor and gratitude in their hearts and minds for eternity of what God did for them and the end result was many people saved because of their good works for God..
Just because one is chosen and they do not accept the commission does not give them any special reward or favor in the end.. Matter of fact quite the opposite..
Look Dave you posted in another topic quoting Romans 11 : 26, that all literal Jews will be saved, and I have explained to you that the verse implies to spiritual Israel, meaning People who have prevailed, overcome with God, this includes Jew and Gentile alike. All of Paul's writings support this, he concludes according to God's judgment there is no respecter of person, all believers in Christ, Jews and Gentiles are one body one bread, one church in preaching the Gospel.
Yes, I do believe that all physical and converted Jews will AT SOME POINT IN THE FUTURE will come to repentance and accept the Lord Yeshua/Jesus. That is both prophetic and miraculous. It is analogous to the Exodus when all Jews (and a mixed multitude of other slaves) were expelled from Egypt. I see no record that any Jews were left there. Did they continue on in faith? Clearly not. Korah had his rebellion in the Levites. The spies brought back an evil but accurate report on giants in the Promised Land and caused the deaths in the desert of everyone (except 2) over 20 years old.
But at the point of leaving Goshen crossing the Red Sea, ALL were saved.
Do you not believe God is big enough to do that again?
: DaveW Thu Feb 16, 2012 - 06:21:49
Look Dave you posted in another topic quoting Romans 11 : 26, that all literal Jews will be saved, and I have explained to you that the verse implies to spiritual Israel, meaning People who have prevailed, overcome with God, this includes Jew and Gentile alike. All of Paul's writings support this, he concludes according to God's judgment there is no respecter of person, all believers in Christ, Jews and Gentiles are one body one bread, one church in preaching the Gospel.
Yes, I do believe that all physical and converted Jews will AT SOME POINT IN THE FUTURE will come to repentance and accept the Lord Yeshua/Jesus. That is both prophetic and miraculous. It is analogous to the Exodus when all Jews (and a mixed multitude of other slaves) were expelled from Egypt. I see no record that any Jews were left there. Did they continue on in faith? Clearly not. Korah had his rebellion in the Levites. The spies brought back an evil but accurate report on giants in the Promised Land and caused the deaths in the desert of everyone (except 2) over 20 years old.
But at the point of leaving Goshen crossing the Red Sea, ALL were saved.
Do you not believe God is big enough to do that again?
Brother your leaving out important scripture about literal Israel nation of people who did not follow the congregation of Korah who will also perish in their own sins..
Num 16:30 then ye shall understand that these men have PROVOKED the LORD.
Num 16:31 And it CAME TO PASS, as he had made an end of speaking all these words, that the ground clave asunder that was under them:
Num 16:32 And the EARTH OPENED her mouth, and SWALLOWED THEM UP, and their houses, and all the men that appertained unto Korah, and all their goods.
Num 16:33 They, and all that appertained to them, WENT DOWN ALIVE INTO THE PIT, and the EARTH CLOSED UPON THEM: and THEY PERISHED from AMONG the CONGREGATION
Num_27:3 Our father DIED in the WILDERNESS, and HE WAS NOT in the COMPANY of them that GATHERED THEMSELVES together against the LORD in the COMPANY OF KORAH; but DIED in HIS "OWN
: Talking Donkey Sun Feb 12, 2012 - 12:11:27
Who is forcing you to keep Sunday? No one. It is all in your brainwashed mind.
Please use the Bible and the Bible only to prove doctrine. What the devil said at one time, or what other liars have said as documented in history should not be used as proof of any doctrine.
Now, ... watch the self praise and the accusing of others ... here it comes .... watch ! watch !
Physician heal thyself, you never seem to use scripture if I may point out.
Here in the South many of the "Blue Laws" which regulated the selling of alcohol, opening of a business and other activities were centered around Sunday but never the Sabbath.
Most places of employment will be open from Monday thru Saturday but are closed on Sunday, why?
My brother is a Baptist and he's as "legalistic" about Sunday as many Sunday Keepers say Sabbath keepers are suppose to be about the Sabbath.
You can be Legalistic about any day, not just the Sabbath. Most Christians are Legalistic about Easter and Christmas, both Pagan Holidays(not God's Holy Days) and many Christians are Legalistic about alcohol even though prohibition is No Where mentioned in the Bible, heck, Paul even told Timothy to drink some wine for his stomach's sake. It's commonly know that wine can help aid in digestion and I'm talking WINE and Not Grape Juice. Even Jesus Christ Himself made some very good alcoholic wine for His very first miracle at the Wedding Supper. Why would he make something that would be a sin for Christians to drink? The truth is that it actually is ok to drink alcohol in moderation as long as one doesn't become drunk.
Legalism can and will kill a Church Fellowship but we also need to see that it takes many different forums, not just the so called Legalism of Sabbath Keeping, which I really don't feel is legalistic at all, it's just God's Holy Day and we should worship him on it.
: Amo Mon Feb 13, 2012 - 18:36:03
The bible does not say anywhere that the Sabbath is specifically for the Jews.
Exo 31:16 Therefore the children of Israel [i.e. the Jews] shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant.
Exo 31:17 It is a sign between me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.'"
Do you pray before you eat? This is a yes or no question. YES... or .... NO?
This guy is so predictable! I said watch the accusing, and it was so. So predictable !!!
I wrote something on February and it took you 7 months to answer it...
SDAs are taken on the oldest kind of satanic bait... self righteousness.
Let me explain it at the kindergarten level... according to the 4th commandment...
1. We must work 6 days, not 5.
2. We must not work on the 7th day. ANY kind of WORK is strictly forbidden on the 7th day. There is not one single kind of WORK allowed on this day.
3. 33/42 times the word "Sabbath" appears in the gospels is to show Jesus WORKING on the 7th day.
4. When confronted about why he was not resting, but WORKING on the day that WORK was forbidden, Jesus answered that both his Father and him WORK on the 7th day.
5. The Holy Spirit, the narrator of the gospels stated (and he cant lie) that Jesus broke the Sabbath (John 5:16-18)
6. That is why all 9 commandments are quoted in the NT DIRECTLY except the 4th, because we cant have Jesus BREAKING the 4th commandment and at the same time have a verse in the NT stating:"woe to the Sabbath breakers, for they shall not inherit the kingdom of God".
7. The 4th commandment is clear, it starts with "REMEMBER"!!!! and it is clear, God FORGOT ABOUT IT!
TIMES IN THE NEW TESTAMENT THAT EACH ONE OF THE TEN COMMANDMENTS ARE REITERATED THROUGH DIRECT EXHORTATION OR DIRECT WARNING FOR THE BELIEVER...
Commandment # 1: Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Mark 12:29,32; Rom 3:30; 1The 1:9; 1Cor 8:4,6; Gal 3:20; Eph 4:6; 1Tim 2:5; James 2:19. Love the Lord your God (Mat 22:39; Mark 12:30; Luke 10:27; 2Ti 3:4; Luke 11:42).
Commandment # 2: Stay away from idols. Acts 15:20,29; Eph 5:5; 1Cor 5:11; 1Th 1:9; Acts 17:16; Acts 21:25; 1Cor 6:9; 1Pe 4:3-4; 1Cor 10:7,14; 1John 5:21; Rev 2:14,20; Rev 9:20; Rev 21:8; Rev 22:15.
Commandment # 3: Do not take the name of the Lord in vain. Rom 2:24; 1Tim 6:1; Rev 16:9; Rev 13:6; Mat 12:31; Rev 16:9; James 2:7.
Commandment # 4: NOT ONE VERSE IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
Commadment # 5: Honor your father and mother. Rom 1:30; 2Tim 3:2; Mat 19:19; Luke 18:20; Mat 15:4; Mark 10:19; Eph 6:2; Mark 7:10.
Commandment # 6: Do not kill. Mark 10:19; Mat 19:18; Luke 18:20; Rom 13:9; Rom 1:29; Gal 5:21; 1Tim 1:9; 1Pe 4:15; 1John 3:15; Rev 9:21; Rev 21:8; Rev 22:15.
Commadment # 7: Do not comit adultery. Mar 10:19; Mat 19:18; Luke 16:18; Luke 18:20; Heb 13:4; Mat 5:27; Gal 5:19; Mat 15:19-20; Mark 7:121; Mark 10:11-12; Rom 13:9; 1Cor 6:9.
Commandment # 8: Do not steal. Mat 19:18; Mark 10:19; Luke 18:20; 1Cor 6:9; Rom 13:9; Rom 2:21; 1Cor 6:9-10; Eph 4:28; 1Pe 4:15.
Commandment # 9. Do not lie. Mat 19:18; Mark 10:19; Luke 18:20; Rom 13:9; John 8:44; Acts 5:3; Col 3:9; Rev 21:27; Rev 22:15.
Commandment # 10. Do not covet. Eph 5:3,5; Mark 7:22-23; 2Pe 2:14; 1Cor 6:9; Rom 13:9; luke 12:15; 1Cor 5:11; 1Tim 6:10; 1Tim 3:2; Rom 1:29; Rom 7:7; Col 3:5-6.
Commandment # 4 is the exception to this rule. God indeed FORGOT about it.
And Mat 12:1-6 clearly shows why Jesus did not commit sin when he broke the Sabbath rest by working on that day.
: Talking Donkey Tue Oct 30, 2012 - 15:17:12
Do you pray before you eat? This is a yes or no question. YES... or .... NO?
If you are addressing me with this (and I have no clue what this has to do with the topic) I di not understand why. But the answer you seek is NO. I say a bracha [blessing] before eating and pray AFTER the meal as commanded in scripture:
"When you have eaten and are satisfied, you shall bless the LORD your God."(Deuteronomy 8:10a)
It puts the eating FIRST.
Since you have broached the subject, do you have any verse commanding a prayer BEFORE the meal? (and not just a bracha?)
I wrote something on February and it took you 7 months to answer it...
Really? Did you not notice I also answered you in the very next post?
But as that point keeps getting ignored, I post again. When you argue against it, you are arguing against scripture.
ETA:
In case you missed it:
The Saturday Sabbath is still in effect. FOR JEWS.
If you are a christian of gentile stock, you do not need to follow it. PERIOD.
: DaveW Tue Oct 30, 2012 - 15:52:26
I wrote something on February and it took you 7 months to answer it...
Really? Did you not notice I also answered you in the very next post?
But as that point keeps getting ignored, I post again. When you argue against it, you are arguing against scripture.
ETA:
In case you missed it:
The Saturday Sabbath is still in effect. FOR JEWS.
If you are a christian of gentile stock, you do not need to follow it. PERIOD.
The Saturday Sabbath is still in effect for Jews? Yes, if they are still Jews (not Christians).
<<I say a bracha [blessing] before eating and pray AFTER the meal as commanded in scripture:>>
Jesus did neither.
Mark 14:18 And as they sat and did eat, Jesus said, Verily I say unto you, One of you which eateth with me shall betray me.
19 And they began to be sorrowful, and to say unto him one by one, Is it I? and another said, Is it I?
20 And he answered and said unto them, It is one of the twelve, that dippeth with me in the dish.
21 The Son of man indeed goeth, as it is written of him: but woe to that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! good were it for that man if he had never been born.
22 And as they did eat, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and brake it, and gave to them, and said, Take, eat: this is my body.
23 And he took the cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them: and they all drank of it.
24 And he said unto them, This is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many.
25 Verily I say unto you, I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine, until that day that I drink it new in the kingdom of God.
26 And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the mount of Olives.
Peace
I don't see why so many folks get so bent out of shape over the Sabbath. It's not a burden or something hard to do. It's the Day that God rested from the work of Creation, it's also the day that we rest to Honor God for his Creative Work and to take a break from our work and worry to think on God and Family.
Some of ya'll make it seem like it's an imposition on you to rest and give God one day a week yet these very same people think nothing of taking Sunday off.
Just do the same thing you do on Sunday but on Saturday the Sabbath, it's just that simple.
: TN.Frank Tue Oct 30, 2012 - 19:08:51
I don't see why so many folks get so bent out of shape over the Sabbath. It's not a burden or something hard to do. It's the Day that God rested from the work of Creation, it's also the day that we rest to Honor God for his Creative Work and to take a break from our work and worry to think on God and Family.
Some of ya'll make it seem like it's an imposition on you to rest and give God one day a week yet these very same people think nothing of taking Sunday off.
Just do the same thing you do on Sunday but on Saturday the Sabbath, it's just that simple.
We do need to rest and give God his due honour, but we are free to choose to do that on a Wednesday, if we desire or if that is all we have. God doesn't carry a big stick about it.
: Lively Stone Tue Oct 30, 2012 - 19:46:03
We do need to rest and give God his due honour, but we are free to choose to do that on a Wednesday, if we desire or if that is all we have. God doesn't carry a big stick about it.
So why would God, on the first week of Creation, have went to all the trouble to Sanctify and make Holy the 7th Day if any ol' day would do?
It's clear to me that the Word of God says the Sabbath is God's Holy Day, not any other day.
It's also "funny"(as I stated earlier) that it's always Sunday Keepers that are pointing their fingers at Sabbath Keepers saying that they(the Sabbath Keepers) are "Legalistic" but as I also pointed out there's a lot of Sunday Keepers that are just as Legalistic.
: TN.Frank Tue Oct 30, 2012 - 23:28:07
: Lively Stone Tue Oct 30, 2012 - 19:46:03
We do need to rest and give God his due honour, but we are free to choose to do that on a Wednesday, if we desire or if that is all we have. God doesn't carry a big stick about it.
So why would God, on the first week of Creation, have went to all the trouble to Sanctify and make Holy the 7th Day if any ol' day would do?
It's clear to me that the Word of God says the Sabbath is God's Holy Day, not any other day.
That was before the Messiah. Jesus is the Sabbath and we rest in Him, free from keeping any particular day as separate. If anyone desires to keep the Sabbath, they are free to, but no one is commanded to.
: Lively Stone Tue Oct 30, 2012 - 23:52:42
: TN.Frank Tue Oct 30, 2012 - 23:28:07
: Lively Stone Tue Oct 30, 2012 - 19:46:03
We do need to rest and give God his due honour, but we are free to choose to do that on a Wednesday, if we desire or if that is all we have. God doesn't carry a big stick about it.
So why would God, on the first week of Creation, have went to all the trouble to Sanctify and make Holy the 7th Day if any ol' day would do?
It's clear to me that the Word of God says the Sabbath is God's Holy Day, not any other day.
That was before the Messiah. Jesus is the Sabbath and we rest in Him, free from keeping any particular day as separate. If anyone desires to keep the Sabbath, they are free to, but no one is commanded to.
Yep and we are told NOT to judge each other on this matter, although some here still do it time after time after time. ::shrug::
: Talking Donkey Tue Oct 30, 2012 - 18:41:49
<<I say a bracha [blessing] before eating and pray AFTER the meal as commanded in scripture:>>
Jesus did neither.
Mark 14:18 ..
Oh really.
Mark 14:18 As they were reclining and eating, Yeshua said, "Amen, I tell you, one of you who is eating with me will betray me."
19 They began to be sorrowful, and to say to him one by one, "I am not the one am I?"
20 He said to them, "It is one of the twelve, one who dips with me in the bowl.
21 For the Son of Man indeed goes, just as it is written about him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would be better for that man if he had not been born."
22 And while they were eating, He took matzah, and after he had
offered the bracha, He broke it, and gave to them, and said, "Take, This is my body."
23 And He took a cup, and when he had
made the bracha, he gave to them. They all drank of it.
24 He said to them, "This is my blood of the new covenant, which is poured out for many.
25 Amen, I tell you, I will no more drink of the fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it anew in God's Kingdom."
26 And after
singing the Hallel, they went out to the Mount of Olives.
In the Passover Seder, the Hallel (psalms of praise) is part of the Blessing after the Meal (birkat hamazon)
I submit that he did both.
: Talking Donkey Tue Oct 30, 2012 - 18:39:30
The Saturday Sabbath is still in effect for Jews? Yes, if they are still Jews (not Christians).
Once a Jew always a Jew.
So apparently it is a good thing that New Covenant believing Jews are called Messianics instead of Christians.
And if the Sabbath was not in effect for New Covenant Jewish believers, why would Our Lord tell his
Jewish audience this:
Matt 24.20 Pray that your flight will not be in the winter,
nor on a Sabbath,
Many keep missing the point that the Sabbath was brought into being before there were any Jews. The Sabbath was also brought into being BEFORE any Sin had entered into the World. The Saturday Sabbath is a Celebration of God and His Creation. It was the Jews that turned it into something Legalistic with all their "shall not" rules.
Also some of ya'll keep saying "Jews", well, I've got news for ya'll. Through Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, Free or Slave, Male nor Female but we are all one in Christ. You can't say "Well, that's just for the Jewish Believers, not for us Christians" because there is no such thing, we are all "Believers" , not Jewish or Gentile.
And another point, God didn't do something New, he Grafted us Gentiles into the Old. We, the "wild branches" have been Grafted into the Tree of the Old Covenant by the Blood of Christ so that we may be called Children of Israel even though we're not originally of the Tree. Through Christ's sacrifice we who were born Gentiles can now call Abraham, Isaac and Jacob our Fathers and YHVH Our God.
It's like if you have a Car Insurance Policy that covers you and your spouse and you go in and modify it(i.e. make a new covenant with the insurance agency) to allow your 16 year old son to now be covered. It's the same old policy but amended to include your son now. Same "Old" policy but with "New" drivers added. That's how the Old Covenant is compared to the New. Christ paid for the Sins of ALL the Word so we're now on the "Jewish" Insurance Policy too even though we're Gentiles.
Also, someone tried to say that the Saturday Sabbath was no longer in effect because it was no where mentioned in the NT like some of the other 10 Commandments were. It didn't need to be Spoke of because Christ, Paul and all the other Believers LIVED it, they worshiped on the Sabbath, it was the Only Game in Town, you either worshiped YHVH God on the Sabbath or you didn't worship at all. There was no option for Sunday worship or any other day for that matter unless you were a Pagan who worshiped the Sun, in which case you did worship on the First Day of the Week, SUNday.
The Jury is still out for me on just HOW we are to Worship. Tradition(i.e. what I grew up with) says we "Go to Church" on "A DAY", (you pick, Sabbath, Sunday) and Worship but I still don't see "Going" someplace in the Bible. Sure they "came together" but does that mean in a formal building with a formal, organized service like we have today, I don't really know and the Bible is silent on that point.
Was it more like our modern day Bible Studies where everyone joined in, probably since in 1st Corinthians Paul address how everyone had a gift to use in the Church.
I really don't think it was as formal or organized as we see it today and I really don't think that only one person(i.e. the Pastor) was the only one allowed to speak during the Service.
Frank you keep missing the point that God said it was a sign between Himself and Israel forever. He never said that with the gentiles.
You love to bring up the "neither Jew nor Greek, Free or Slave, Male nor Female" rant but the same Paul who wrote that gave separate instructions to males and females, to parents and children, to slaves and slave owners. If you do not see those separate sets of instructions as "another gospel," why do you single out the separate instructions for Jews as another gospel? Be consistent.
And again, as you said gentiles are grafted in, and in that same exact chapter, the exact same apostle wrote that (in context speaking of the Jews) that God's gifts and callings were irrevocable/without repentance. IOW they NEVER CHANGE. The sabbath is one of those gifts given specifically to Israel. While you rightfully point out that the sabbath existed BEFORE there were any Jews, the writer of Hebrews reminds us that Levi paid tithes to Melchizedek generations before he was born by his ancestor Abraham. IT is the same with the Sabbath. While it existed, the sabbath was never mandated until Sinai. But it was kept by Judah's ancestor Adam.
You said "It didn't need to be Spoke of because Christ, Paul and all the other Believers LIVED it, they worshiped on the Sabbath." Very true. Tell me, which one of those listed here are NOT Jewish? Jesus is a Jew. Paul was a Jew. The 12 apostles were all Jews. They were MANDATED to worship on the Sabbath.
: Amo Sat Feb 11, 2012 - 10:39:55
The following internet site contains a book concerning the very numerous Sunday laws throughout history.
http://www.archive.org/stream/sundaylegislat00lewi#page/n3/mode/2up (http://www.archive.org/stream/sundaylegislat00lewi#page/n3/mode/2up)
In light of the fact, that Sunday keepers have repeatedly throughout history appealed to the civil authorities to enforce their day of worship upon all, how is it that those who keep the fourth commandment by faith in the word of God, are the ones always accused of being legalistic?
We appeal to all to obey all the commandments of God by faith in His holy word, which admonishes us to do so from one end of the bible to the other. We appeal to personal conviction and reason alone for this act of faith, and never to civil legislation which Sunday keepers habitually appeal to, and yet we are the ones accused of legalism. This makes no sense at all. How can appealing to others to believe and obey the word of God by faith in that word be considered legalism, while appealing to others to keep a day holy which the scriptures never even address as such, and then making laws to force everyone to do so, be considered faith?
While it is certainly possible to keep the seventh day Sabbath for the wrong reason, i.e. legalistically, it is just as certainly possible to keep the commandment by faith in the word of God, and out of love for the author of the same. The same can not be said though about Sunday observance. There is no command concerning it in the word of God, nor is it even addressed at all as a day of worship in the same. Thus it is impossible to keep it by faith in the word of God, or out of love and respect for the authority of His word. The writer contends that this is exactly why Sunday keepers have appealed to civil legislation to enforce their day upon all throughout history. That is, because there is no command or authority from God and His scriptures to do so. Thus the establishment of Sunday as a sacred day by civil law is in fact verily the establishment of legalism.
Yet it is those of us who keep the seventh day by faith alone in the word of God, that are continually accused of being the legalistic. How unfortunate that child or reverse psychology is so successful among professing adults.
17 So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. Romans 10:17 (KJV)
If what you believe and preach is not to be found in the word of God, then it is not by faith. If it is not by faith, then it is of works. The latter alone is not acceptable to God. The only works that are acceptable to God, are those performed by faith. This is of course because they demonstrate ones willing submission to God, and therefore their faith and trust in His word, and trustworthy authority.
31 Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law. Romans 3:31 (KJV)
True faith does not make void the law of God, but rather establishes the same.
: Amo Sat Feb 11, 2012 - 10:39:55
The following internet site contains a book concerning the very numerous Sunday laws throughout history.
http://www.archive.org/stream/sundaylegislat00lewi#page/n3/mode/2up (http://www.archive.org/stream/sundaylegislat00lewi#page/n3/mode/2up)
In light of the fact, that Sunday keepers have repeatedly throughout history appealed to the civil authorities to enforce their day of worship upon all, how is it that those who keep the fourth commandment by faith in the word of God, are the ones always accused of being legalistic?
We appeal to all to obey all the commandments of God by faith in His holy word, which admonishes us to do so from one end of the bible to the other. We appeal to personal conviction and reason alone for this act of faith, and never to civil legislation which Sunday keepers habitually appeal to, and yet we are the ones accused of legalism. This makes no sense at all. How can appealing to others to believe and obey the word of God by faith in that word be considered legalism, while appealing to others to keep a day holy which the scriptures never even address as such, and then making laws to force everyone to do so, be considered faith?
While it is certainly possible to keep the seventh day Sabbath for the wrong reason, i.e. legalistically, it is just as certainly possible to keep the commandment by faith in the word of God, and out of love for the author of the same. The same can not be said though about Sunday observance. There is no command concerning it in the word of God, nor is it even addressed at all as a day of worship in the same. Thus it is impossible to keep it by faith in the word of God, or out of love and respect for the authority of His word. The writer contends that this is exactly why Sunday keepers have appealed to civil legislation to enforce their day upon all throughout history. That is, because there is no command or authority from God and His scriptures to do so. Thus the establishment of Sunday as a sacred day by civil law is in fact verily the establishment of legalism.
Yet it is those of us who keep the seventh day by faith alone in the word of God, that are continually accused of being the legalistic. How unfortunate that child or reverse psychology is so successful among professing adults.
17 So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. Romans 10:17 (KJV)
If what you believe and preach is not to be found in the word of God, then it is not by faith. If it is not by faith, then it is of works. The latter alone is not acceptable to God. The only works that are acceptable to God, are those performed by faith. This is of course because they demonstrate ones willing submission to God, and therefore their faith and trust in His word, and trustworthy authority.
31 Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law. Romans 3:31 (KJV)
True faith does not make void the law of God, but rather establishes the same.
Amo, if its alright I would like to share this on some of the other sites I am on with your permission.
Hobie, before you go quoting Amo on some other site, why not wait for his answer to my post on the previous page. If he cannot, then perhaps he is not that good a source:
: DaveW Tue Oct 30, 2012 - 14:40:33
: Amo Mon Feb 13, 2012 - 18:36:03
The bible does not say anywhere that the Sabbath is specifically for the Jews.
Exo 31:16 Therefore the children of Israel [i.e. the Jews] shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant.
Exo 31:17 It is a sign between me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.'"
I contend that the Sabbath remains but not for gentiles. HE has yet to respond to a simple couple of verses.
: LivelyStone
That was before the Messiah. Jesus is the Sabbath and we rest in Him, free from keeping any particular day as separate. If anyone desires to keep the Sabbath, they are free to, but no one is commanded to.
You _quote_, "Jesus is the Sabbath ", and THEN, try say 'we rest ON Him'Don't be ridiculous, is all I'm saying especially not when you have no Scripture to back up your silliness.
Quote from: Amo on February 13, 2012, 05:36:03 PM
The bible does not say anywhere that the Sabbath is specifically for the Jews.
Exo 31:16 Therefore the children of Israel [i.e. the Jews] shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant.
Exo 31:17 It is a sign between me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.'"
GE:
"Israel" is NOT, " the Jews". That is 'your Bible'. I do not accept 'your Bible', but reject it with all due disrespect.
Dave W:
>>I contend that the Sabbath remains but not for gentiles.<<
GE:
Sure: "not for gentiles". "THEREFORE ... BECAUSE JESUS HAD GIVEN THEM REST ... for The People of God, remains valid keeping of the Sabbath Day, _He_ having entered [upon it] into his own Rest as God into his [did] ... God _THUS_ concerning the Seventh Day having spoken: And God the day The Seventh Day, from all his works, rested."
'Gentiles' is not defined as "people of God." It is defined as Non Israelites (in modern vernacular non-Jews).
The 'people of God' consists of the physical descendants of Jacob, those who have joined the Israelites in proselytization and New Covenant believing Gentiles.
Acts 15 clearly exempts the New Covenant believing Gentiles from Torah observance, including the Sabbath.
A good Biblical teaching on the sabbath
http://www.thegracetabernacle.org/studies/gtsn_sabbath.html (http://www.thegracetabernacle.org/studies/gtsn_sabbath.html)
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Thu Nov 15, 2012 - 04:26:47
: LivelyStone
That was before the Messiah. Jesus is the Sabbath and we rest in Him, free from keeping any particular day as separate. If anyone desires to keep the Sabbath, they are free to, but no one is commanded to.
You _quote_, "Jesus is the Sabbath ", and THEN, try say 'we rest ON Him'
Don't be ridiculous, is all I'm saying especially not when you have no Scripture to back up your silliness.
Nothing I say in earnest according to the word is ridiculous.
You find rest in Jesus Christ. Jesus said you would:
Matthew 11:29Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
That rest is all it implies in terms of fruitfulness and dominion, reigning, ruling, producing that which is worthwhile and satisfying in life. That is the secret of life. This is why Jesus said, "If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it." (Matthew 16:25; Mark 8:35; Luke 9:24).
Jesus has offered us His rest. He has fulfilled, completed the law concerning the Sabbath. Now, have you received His rest?
: TN.Frank
The Sabbath was also brought into being BEFORE any Sin had entered into the World.
Genesis 1
the evening [late] and the morning [early] the First Day :5b
the evening [late] and the morning [early] the Second Day :8b
the evening [late] and the morning [early] the Third Day :13b
the evening [late] and the morning [early] the Fourth Day :19b
the evening [late] and the morning [early] the the Fifth Day :23b
the evening [late] and the morning [early] the Sixth Day :31b
the cool of the day ... the Seventh Day ...
"In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made him ... male and female created them and blessed them ... in the day they were created 5:1,2 ... God saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good 1:31 ... And the LORD GOD took man and put him into the garden of Eden ... 2:15 ... And they heard the VOICE of the LORD GOD [Jesus Christ, Saviour] walking in the garden in the cool OF THE DAY ..." 3:8 IMMEDIATELY AFTER they had sinned the very past "DAY that God created man".
"God on the Seventh Day ENDED his work which He had made IN THAT God on the Seventh Day from ALL his work which God created, RESTED ..." in Jesus Christ, through Jesus Christ, by Jesus Christ and FOR, Jesus Christ in HAVING WORKED SALVATION THAT VERY "SABBATH DAY" that God RESTED, Genesis 2 to Genesis 3 its last verse!
: TN.FrankNothing I say in earnest according to the word is ridiculous.[/size][/size]
You find rest in Jesus Christ. Jesus said you would:
Matthew 11:29
Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
That rest is all it implies in terms of fruitfulness and dominion, reigning, ruling, producing that which is worthwhile and satisfying in life. That is the secret of life. This is why Jesus said, "If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it." (Matthew 16:25; Mark 8:35; Luke 9:24).
Jesus has offered us His rest. He has fulfilled, completed the law concerning the Sabbath. Now, have you received His rest?
Now ... forget about 'me'. It's not about me or you or us trying to hang on to our life. We're not talking about that right here or now. Don't change the subject. The subject is whether or not Jesus gave a NEW LAW IN HIMSELF that includes or excludes "SABBATHS' FEAST OF CHRIST", ASSEMBLING TOGETHER OF CHRISTIAN BELIEVERS. In other words, stop preaching now. How can you preach if you do not preach the SCRIPTURES truthfully? But make void the Word of Jesus Christ whom "God gave to be Head over all things [the Sabbath Day included] to the CHURCH WHICH IS HIS BODY", SO THAT "THEREFORE – Jesus having had given them Rest – KEEPING OF THE SABBATH DAY REMAINS FOR THE PEOPLE OF GOD."
: DaveW Thu Nov 15, 2012 - 06:43:44
'Gentiles' is not defined as "people of God." It is defined as Non Israelites (in modern vernacular non-Jews).
The 'people of God' consists of the physical descendants of Jacob, those who have joined the Israelites in proselytization and New Covenant believing Gentiles.
Acts 15 clearly exempts the New Covenant believing Gentiles from Torah observance, including the Sabbath.
Which words in Acts 15 clearly exempts the New Covenant believing Gentiles from Torah observance, including the Sabbath?
Place them here ... let's see them ...
The results of the Jerusalem Council.
No!
You couldn't find it ... don't shove your methods over to me to clean up the mess you made.
YOU CANNOT QUOTE THE WORDS. THEY ARE NOT THERE.
I feel no compulsion to quote it to you. You can go read it for yourself.
Comment deleted.
'MeMyself', "yuck" for 'MeMyself'.
My, you get a little testy when we won't play your game, don't you?
If you don't like the Jerusalem Council letter, perhaps you might refer to Peter's sheet. You can look that up for yourself too.
And if that isn't clear enough for you, you might take a stroll through Romans.
Have a nice day.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Thu Nov 15, 2012 - 15:40:49
'MeMyself', "yuck" for 'MeMyself'.
rudeness is not a fruit of the spirit. There is no need to be rude to make a point...if you have one that can stand on its own, that is. ::pondering::
::eatingpopcorn:
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Thu Nov 15, 2012 - 14:52:52
: Lively StoneNothing I say in earnest according to the word is ridiculous.
You find rest in Jesus Christ. Jesus said you would:
Matthew 11:29
Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
That rest is all it implies in terms of fruitfulness and dominion, reigning, ruling, producing that which is worthwhile and satisfying in life. That is the secret of life. This is why Jesus said, "If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it." (Matthew 16:25; Mark 8:35; Luke 9:24).
Jesus has offered us His rest. He has fulfilled, completed the law concerning the Sabbath. Now, have you received His rest?
Now ... forget about 'me'. It's not about me or you or us trying to hang on to our life. We're not talking about that right here or now. Don't change the subject. The subject is whether or not Jesus gave a NEW LAW IN HIMSELF that includes or excludes "SABBATHS' FEAST OF CHRIST", ASSEMBLING TOGETHER OF CHRISTIAN BELIEVERS. In other words, stop preaching now. How can you preach if you do not preach the SCRIPTURES truthfully? But make void the Word of Jesus Christ whom "God gave to be Head over all things [the Sabbath Day included] to the CHURCH WHICH IS HIS BODY", SO THAT "THEREFORE – Jesus having had given them Rest – KEEPING OF THE SABBATH DAY REMAINS FOR THE PEOPLE OF GOD."
Scripture?
: LivelyStone
Scripture?
You cannot distinguish them? You don't recognize them?Then you do not know the Scriptures.And make more obvious the obvious, that you are the one with NO Scripture(s) for grounds or back-up or refuge. Sorry indeed.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Fri Nov 16, 2012 - 00:15:31
: LivelyStone
Scripture?
You cannot distinguish them? You don't recognize them?
Then you do not know the Scriptures.
And make more obvious the obvious, that you are the one with NO Scripture(s) for grounds or back-up or refuge.
Sorry indeed.
I know scripture, and I use scripture to support myself. You need to provide quoted passages and their references, as asked, instead of blustering about.
We all need to settle down and at least act like Christians so that the world can distinguish us apart from them. Since this is a Christian forum, if you've something to say in making a point, scripture would be an asset in letting the rest of know what the point is. Thanks.
::smile::
Hey hey I have a scriptue Larry. Many here ignore it and condemn others anyway ::shrug:: but still its worth another try.
col 3v16
"Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath"
.
NO ONE means NO ONE is to judge others as to whether they keep one day as special or not. Cant be clearer can it. ::disco::
: ChosenoneHey hey I have a scriptue Larry. Many here ignore it and condemn others anyway but still its worth another try.
col 3v16
Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath.
NO ONE means NO ONE is to judge others as to whether they keep one day as special or not. Cant be clearer can it.
That was good dear sister; I know where you're coming from and I don't have to wonder which scripture you want me to guess at.
How about Romans 14:3 Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth: for
God hath received him.
Romans 14:6
He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord; and he that regardeth not the day, to the Lord he doth not regard it. He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, for he giveth God thanks; and he that eateth not, to the Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Thu Nov 15, 2012 - 15:11:36: DaveW
Acts 15 clearly exempts the New Covenant believing Gentiles from Torah observance, including the Sabbath.
Which words in Acts 15 clearly exempts the New Covenant believing Gentiles from Torah observance, including the Sabbath?
Place them here ... let's see them ...
You got it:
Acts 15 (NASB)
13 After they had stopped speaking, James answered, saying, "Brethren, listen to me.
14 Simon has related how God first concerned Himself about taking from among the Gentiles a people for His name.
15 With this the words of the Prophets agree, just as it is written,
16 'AFTER THESE THINGS I will return,
AND I WILL REBUILD THE TABERNACLE OF DAVID WHICH HAS FALLEN,
AND I WILL REBUILD ITS RUINS,
AND I WILL RESTORE IT,
17 SO THAT THE REST OF MANKIND MAY SEEK THE LORD,
AND ALL THE GENTILES WHO ARE CALLED BY MY NAME,'
18 SAYS THE LORD, WHO MAKES THESE THINGS KNOWN FROM LONG AGO.
19 Therefore it is my judgment that
we do not trouble those who are turning to God from among the Gentiles, 20 but that we write to them that they abstain from things contaminated by idols and from fornication and from what is strangled and from blood.
21 For Moses from ancient generations has in every city those who preach him, since he is read in the synagogues every Sabbath."
22 Then it seemed good to the apostles and the elders, with the whole church, to choose men from among them to send to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas-Judas called Barsabbas, and Silas, leading men among the brethren,
23 and they sent this letter by them, "The apostles and the brethren who are elders, to the brethren in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia who are from the Gentiles, greetings.
24 "Since we have heard that some of our number to whom we gave no instruction have disturbed you with their words, unsettling your souls,
25it seemed good to us, having become of one mind, to select men to send to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul,
26 men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
27"Therefore we have sent Judas and Silas, who themselves will also report the same things by word of mouth.
28 "For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us
to lay upon you no greater burden than these essentials:
29 that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication; if you keep yourselves free from such things, you will do well. Farewell."
Those 4 laws were the ONLY things absolutely required of Gentile believers. Note the "no greater burden than these essentials" phrase.
Yes the sabbath is mentioned but it is somewhat of a veiled suggestion for gentiles to go to the synagogues to hear Moses and understand the Mosaic covenant. (as it is foundational to the New Covenant) but it comes no where near a command.
: larry2 Fri Nov 16, 2012 - 03:11:25
: ChosenoneHey hey I have a scriptue Larry. Many here ignore it and condemn others anyway but still its worth another try.
col 3v16
Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath.
NO ONE means NO ONE is to judge others as to whether they keep one day as special or not. Cant be clearer can it.
That was good dear sister; I know where you're coming from and I don't have to wonder which scripture you want me to guess at.
How about Romans 14:3 Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth: for God hath received him.
Romans 14:6 He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord; and he that regardeth not the day, to the Lord he doth not regard it. He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, for he giveth God thanks; and he that eateth not, to the Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks.
yes let everything that we do, be done for Gods glory. ::smile::
... what you call the words of Acts 15 and what they are, are different things altogether ... Is English, English, or no?
And this you call "words in Acts 15" that "clearly exempts the New Covenant believing Gentiles from ... observance ... [of] the Sabbath?"
Is "Sabbath" perhaps " things contaminated by idols and fornication" or is Sabbath observance equivalence of "things strangled" or "blood"?
If one must believe DaveW, yes! "If you keep yourselves free from such things, you will not keep the Sabbath", is what DaveW says. DaveW says if you keep the Sabbath [or just believe the Seventh Day Sabbath] it means you yourselves partake in strangling things to death and in the eating of it; that in fact you practice fornication!
God, your Sabbath is muder by strangling and fornication; DaveW says so! DaveW says that is what your earliest Church practiced until the Jerusalem Council decided against such things for Christians and chose Sunday, because "Acts 15 clearly exempts the New Covenant believing Gentiles from ... observance", of "... the Sabbath"!
God from now on I will never again believe or observe your Sabbath Day, because DaveW has given me understanding of true Christian values.
And DaveW and his conscience lived happily ever after.
: DaveW
Those 4 laws were the ONLY things absolutely required of Gentile believers. Note the "no greater burden than these essentials" phrase.
Nothing of the sort was ever "required of Gentile believers"; ANY Christian was FORBIDDEN SUCH PAGAN AND IDOLATROUS PRACTICES! "... no greater burden than these NECESSARY FORBIDDEN things for ANY Christian, FORBIDDEN are idol sacrifices; FORBIDDEN is idolatrous blood; FORBIDDEN is (idolatrous ritual) fornication." Even the 'rendering' you use, is rape of the Written Word! Even your counting is as false as any of the forbidden atrocities, you including God's Holy Sabbath's observance a fourth atrocity among the other three! Are you not ashamed of yourself, DaveW?!
GE - you are taking one of the pivotal moments in early church history of great doctrinal import and are turning it into theater of the absurd.
Did you not understand the text? Out of all 613 Torah commands, the only ones Gentiles are REQUIRED to keep are those 4:
No idols
No illicit sex
No blood
No eating strangled meat
It is just that simple.
If you think these verses are saying something else, please enlighten us.
You do realize that I keep a Saturday sabbath, right? (sundown friday to sundown saturday)
"613 Torah commands" 'understood' in "the text", "Acts 15"?!
Speak of the "theater of the absurd"!
I do not care which day you or anyone else in the world "keep a Saturday sabbath, right? (sundown friday to sundown saturday)" OR NOT!
What is WRITTEN is all that interests me.
Dave, In verse 21 of Acts Chapter 15, there is a phrase injected there after the 4 requirements were listed:
"For Moses from generations of old hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every sabbath."
It appears the 4 requirements given were a compromise for initial conversion, BUT the unstated implication seems to be that since Moses (the Law) is preached in the synagogues in every city, these folks will naturally absorb the rest. Why make their lives miserable now. Let's make these 4 the initial filter.
That may not be the case, but it is a curious insertion in my opinion. Would like to hear other thoughts about it.
I don't find anything curious in or about the whole of Acts 15.
The Sabbath's observance is the taken for granted in all of 'apostolic Christianity'. It's like The Body's breathing.
Send this letter and have it read in the whole world before every Congregation ... the Sabbath's Going-to Church all over the earth [then known] affords the opportunity.
We, the apostles do not even have any prescription for you our brethren, on the issue of circumcision - the original reason we have had this council.
All we want to make clear to our new Gentile brothers is to stay away from their former ways!
Galatians 4 addresses the very same tendency among the rookies; they were getting homesick. They were steeped in the ways of their forefathers.
This was the problem with Christianity from the word go. IT HAS BEEN THE SAME PROBLEM TO THIS DAY:
PAGAN IDOLATRY! On the hidden individual side, fornication; on the open congregational side, Sun and Sunday worship.
Behind every other ailment of the Church lie these, too horrible to be mentioned so crudely, SINS!
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Fri Nov 16, 2012 - 11:19:38
"613 Torah commands" 'understood' in "the text", "Acts 15"?!
Speak of the "theater of the absurd"!
James at this point had 2 hats he was wearing - he was the senior elder of the Jerusalem congregation (the Catholics call him "bishop of Jerusalem")
plus he was a highly noted Torah scholar that taught in the schools of the Pharisees. (probably Shammai's school)
So he would have been VERY FAMILIAR with the 613 Torah commands. (3 of which deal specifically with the Sabbath) There are 248 positive (thou shalt ...) and 365 negative (thou shalt not ...)
Of course they can be broken down other ways including by subject matter. For a basic list of positive and negative: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/613_mitzvot.html (http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/613_mitzvot.html)
History my good man! It is important!
: Jaime Fri Nov 16, 2012 - 11:24:12
Dave, In verse 21 of Acts Chapter 15, there is a phrase injected there after the 4 requirements were listed:
"For Moses from generations of old hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every sabbath."
It appears the 4 requirements given were a compromise for initial conversion, BUT the unstated implication seems to be that since Moses (the Law) is preached in the synagogues in every city, these folks will naturally absorb the rest. Why make their lives miserable now. Let's make these 4 the initial filter.
That may not be the case, but it is a curious insertion in my opinion. Would like to hear other thoughts about it.
There is a catholic tradition that has James the Just advocating for strict Torah observance for all gentiles at least initially. But the texts of Acts 15 and 21 say the opposite. Perhaps his mind was changed in 15.
As to what he was saying in verse 21 has been debated.
One school says that the 4 requirements were only initial, and that James was advocating for gentiles going to the synagogues to learn and observe Moses as they grew into it. (the position you state)
Another school says that in order to understand the New Covenant properly one must have a decent grasp on what was in the Mosaic covenant and the synagogue was a good place to get that knowledge. (my position as well)
Some others ignore it altogether since it did not make it into James' letter to the gentile churches.
Historically we know that synagogues allowed (some even welcomed) Gentile New Covenant believers until the 70 ad Siege of Jerusalem that destroyed the temple. They were all kicked out at that point, but it had started to change back and was almost there again when the Bar Kochba revolt started in 134 ad and in 135 Bar Kochba was declared "messiah" by a leading rabbi and the new covenant believers both Jew and Gentile would not fight for a false messiah. So we got kicked out again and it lasted that time.
So it looks as if for at least a few decades the gentile believers COULD go en mass to traditional synagogues to learn.
I can see it as a compromise of initial conversion.
Another curious thing I have noted is about Cornelius in Chapter 10. He is noted as a righteous man, a Godly man and he prayed apparently on the 9th hour which was the time of prayers for the Jews. My question is, did Luke, the writer of Acts consider him righteous and Godly BECAUSE he was worshipping God and holding God up in the manner that a Jew would recognize as right and Godly even as a Gentile, possibly already observing the Sabbath and other things?
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Fri Nov 16, 2012 - 11:46:54
I don't find anything curious in or about the whole of Acts 15.
The Sabbath's observance is the taken for granted in all of 'apostolic Christianity'. It's like The Body's breathing.
Send this letter and have it read in the whole world before every Congregation ... the Sabbath's Going-to Church all over the earth [then known] affords the opportunity.
We, the apostles do not even have any prescription for you our brethren, on the issue of circumcision - the original reason we have had this council.
All we want to make clear to our new Gentile brothers is to stay away from their former ways!
Galatians 4 addresses the very same tendency among the rookies; they were getting homesick. They were steeped in the ways of their forefathers.
Not to EVERY congregation, but to the
Gentile congregations.
It was in the light of the decision in Acts 15 that Paul could even write Galatians.
Sabbath observance was taken for granted in the Jewish ranks of the church (see Acts 21) along with full Torah observance. "See how many thousands have come ... and they are ZEALOUS for the Law!"
: Jaime Fri Nov 16, 2012 - 12:05:10
Another curious thing I have noted is about Cornelius in Chapter 10. He is noted as a righteous man, a Godly man and he prayed apparently on the 9th hour which was the time of prayers for the Jews. My question is, did Luke, the writer of Acts consider him righteous and Godly BECAUSE he was worshiping God and holding God up in the manner that a Jew would recognize as right and Godly even as a Gentile, possibly already observing the Sabbath and other things?
Cornelius, Jairus in Mark 5 and the Centurion in Luke 7 all fit the description in the Talmud of "God Fearer."
Paul addresses them in Acts 13. "Men of Israel, and
you who fear God, listen:" (v 16)
They were ALMOST Jewish converts; led a completely Torah observant Jewish life but had not been circumcised (the final step of formal conversion)
So yes, they all would have observed the Sabbath.
: DaveW Fri Nov 16, 2012 - 12:18:08
: Jaime Fri Nov 16, 2012 - 12:05:10
Another curious thing I have noted is about Cornelius in Chapter 10. He is noted as a righteous man, a Godly man and he prayed apparently on the 9th hour which was the time of prayers for the Jews. My question is, did Luke, the writer of Acts consider him righteous and Godly BECAUSE he was worshiping God and holding God up in the manner that a Jew would recognize as right and Godly even as a Gentile, possibly already observing the Sabbath and other things?
Cornelius, Jairus in Mark 5 and the Centurion in Luke 7 all fit the description in the Talmud of "God Fearer."
Paul addresses them in Acts 13. "Men of Israel, and you who fear God, listen:" (v 16)
They were ALMOST Jewish converts; led a completely Torah observant Jewish life but had not been circumcised (the final step of formal conversion)
So yes, they all would have observed the Sabbath.
Thanks.
: DaveW
Not to EVERY congregation, but to the Gentile congregations.
It was in the light of the decision in Acts 15 that Paul could even write Galatians.
Sabbath observance was taken for granted in the Jewish ranks of the church (see Acts 21) along with full Torah observance. "See how many thousands have come ... and they are ZEALOUS for the Law!"
Yes; to every OTHER Congregation than the Jerusalem Congregation which were all Gentiles and before whom "Moses [who] since long had preachers in every city that read him in the Church every Sabbath ---Congregations where the CHRISTIAN council's decisions were read to CHRISTIANS whether Jews or Gentiles; almost everyone, Gentiles. If that does not say something for Sabbath's observance among the early Gentile Christians, what will? Poor Sunday propagandists!
: Gerhard EbersöhnYes; to every OTHER Congregation than the Jerusalem Congregation which were all Gentiles and before whom "Moses [who] since long had preachers in every city that read him in the Church every Sabbath ---Congregations where the CHRISTIAN council's decisions were read to CHRISTIANS whether Jews or Gentiles; almost everyone, Gentiles. If that does not say something for Sabbath's observance among the early Gentile Christians, what will?
Poor Sunday propagandists!
Do you faithfully keep all the law or just the Sabbath? If breaking the law, which sacrifice do you offer?
Larry, the ceremonial law (animal sacrifices etc) was nailed to the cross. The moral law was transferred to our hearts.
: JamieLarry, the ceremonial law (animal sacrifices etc) was nailed to the cross. The moral law was transferred to our hearts.
2 Corinthians 3:7 But if the ministration of death, written and engraven in stones . . which glory was to be done away.
Is this the moral law we're talking about? I imagine you understand that the sacrifices made represented that made by Christ? Today we have the finished work of Jesus and He has become our rest (Sabbath)
Hebrews 4:9-10 There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God. 10 For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his.
Which law do you reckon was written on our hearts that was prophecied in Jer. 31:31? The glory of the stone tablets is no more. That law is written on our hearts. I concede that the Sabbath is arguably also ceremonial law, but the other nine were not done away with, they were transcribed on our hearts.
Also the ministration of death was the PENALTY of the law of sin and death that Jesus of course resolved.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Fri Nov 16, 2012 - 12:43:09
Poor Sunday propagandists!
I am not a "Sunday propagandist." Like I said, I keep a Saturday sabbath.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Fri Nov 16, 2012 - 12:43:09
Yes; to every OTHER Congregation than the Jerusalem Congregation which were all Gentiles
No, only Paul had started Gentile congregations.
The rest of the Apostles had ministered primarily in Jewish areas.
and before whom "Moses [who] since long had preachers in every city that read him in the Church every Sabbath ---Congregations where the CHRISTIAN council's decisions were read to CHRISTIANS whether Jews or Gentiles; almost everyone, Gentiles. If that does not say something for Sabbath's observance among the early Gentile Christians, what will?
What it says is that gentiles CAN observe a Saturday sabbath if they so choose but it is NOT REQUIRED. For a Jewish believer IT IS REQUIRED.
the part of Moses being taught every Sabbath was NOT IN THE LETTER. And look at Acts 21 you will see James NEVER INTENDED that decision to apply to Jewish believers. In fact that was a false rumor that he sought to silence.
21 and they have been told about you, that you are teaching all the
Jews who are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children nor to walk according to the customs. 22 What, then, is to be done? They will certainly hear that you have come.
23 Therefore do this that we tell you. We have four men who are under a vow;
24 take them and purify yourself along with them, and pay their expenses so that they may shave their heads; and
all will know that there is nothing to the things which they have been told about you, but that you yourself also walk orderly, keeping the Law.
25
But concerning the Gentiles who have believed, we wrote, having decided that they should abstain from meat sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what is strangled and from fornication."
Again, we have those 4 laws for GENTILES, and the Law of Moses for Jewish believers.
Do you NOT see the distinction that James is making?
Hi Jaime, let me ask; is not lying, not killing, not stealing that which gets us to heaven? Is there any work added to believing on the Lord Jesus? Galatians 3:3 ". . having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh? Galatians 3:10 "For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse . ."
2 Corinthians 3:2 Ye are our epistle written in our hearts, known and read of all men:
Hebrews 8:10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the HOUSE OF ISRAEL after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:
Back in Hebrews 7:22 By so much was Jesus made a surety of a better testament.
Hebrews 7:27 Who needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for the people's: for this he did once, when he offered up himself.
Hebrews 8:6 But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises.
Hebrews 8:7 For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second.
Now I ask what law was written in Israel's heart after which days of Hebrews 8:10?
Hebrews 10:10 By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
: Larry
Do you faithfully keep all the law or just the Sabbath? If breaking the law, which sacrifice do you offer?
Who by implication or directly is the boaster here? He who NEVER claimed he kept ANY Law or he who lampooning brags his wonderful hull compliance to the Great Law of all? The hypocrite! Not he who has NO sacrifice or offering to offer; but he who presents his own example in full obedience to the Law of Jesus Christ. In other words, he, who makes himself equal with God like Lucifer and Nebuchadnezzar did. Pride comes before the fall. It is the miserable fallen only who cannot fall further being the chief of sinners already. But the MOMENT the hypocrite fails to find an answer to a challenge, he resorts to belittling of the simple and wanting sinner under the Law searching the Scriptures for answers to his heart's questions, and accuses him, of hypocrisy! The presumptuous' strategy that works every time ... almost.
Reply to post Reply #81 on: Yesterday at 12:56:11 PM
No I do not see it ... or for that matter, ANYTHING you say or make or imagine. And I don't care. Except that I do not _see_ what _you_ say, "it says" ---because that, is plain and openly not true.
: Larry2
Do you faithfully keep all the law or just the Sabbath? If breaking the law, which sacrifice do you offer?
: Gerhard EbersöhnWho by implication or directly is the boaster here? He who NEVER claimed he kept ANY Law or he who lampooning brags his wonderful hull compliance to the Great Law of all?
I'm not sure what was complicated by my question, but repeated in another manner: do you keep all the law? The sacrifice I present is Jesus, not works. Maybe you can tell me of your works. My thinking is that if we go to God asking forgiveness for anything, and He is faithful to forgive us from all unrighteousness, it is no longer me doing the work. Now God can and does fulfill the righteousness of the law in us (Not by us) who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit (Romans 8:4), and men will know us by our fruit, but God knows us through His Son. Before men a faith not producing righteous works is a dead faith.
My thoughts.
David Pawson is a much loved and highly respected Christian Bible teacher here in the UK. He has been teaching for well over 50 years now. Some of you may have seen him on one of the God tv channels
Here is a small part of what he says about the sabbath.
"The Sabbath law is fulfilled for us every day of the week when we cease to do our own works and do God's instead, thus entering into the rest that remains for the people of God. We are still free to keep one day special if we wish, but we are also free to regard every day alike. So we cannot even impose Sunday observance on other believers, never mind unbelievers, for we are all free in Christ."
Got it in one David ::smile::
: chosenone Sat Nov 17, 2012 - 07:12:07
David Pawson is a much loved and highly respected Christian Bible teacher here in the UK. He has been teaching for well over 50 years now. Some of you may have seen him on one of the God tv channels
Here is a small part of what he says about the sabbath.
"The Sabbath law is fulfilled for us every day of the week when we cease to do our own works and do God's instead, thus entering into the rest that remains for the people of God. We are still free to keep one day special if we wish, but we are also free to regard every day alike. So we cannot even impose Sunday observance on other believers, never mind unbelievers, for we are all free in Christ."
Got it in one David ::smile::
The truth is spoken! ::tippinghat::
Sozomen reported in the mid-5th Century,
The people of Constantinople, and almost everywhere, assemble together on the Sabbath, as well as on the first day of the week, which custom is never observed at Rome or at Alexandria (Sozomen. THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY OF SOZOMEN. Comprising a History of the Church, from a.d. 323 to a.d. 425. Book VII, Chapter XIX. Translated from the Greek. Revised by Chester D. Hartranft, Hartford Theological Seminary UNDER THE EDITORIAL SUPERVISION OF PHILIP SCHAFF, D.D., LL.D., AND HENRY WACE, D.D., Professor of Church History in the Union Theological Seminary, New York. Principal of King's College, London. T&T CLARK, EDINBURGH, circa 1846).
Also in the fifth century, the historian Socrates noted:
For although almost all churches throughout the world celebrate the sacred mysteries on the sabbath of every week, yet the Christians of Alexandria and at Rome, on account of some ancient tradition, have ceased to do this. The Egyptians in the neighborhood of Alexandria, and the inhabitants of Thebais, hold their religious assemblies on the sabbath, but do not participate of the mysteries in the manner usual among Christians in general (Socrates Scholasticus. Ecclesiastical History, Book V, Chapter XXII. Excerpted from Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Volume 2. Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace. American Edition, 1890. Online Edition Copyright © 2005 by K. Knight).
See also the histories of Ireland and Ethiopia (early 1600) which kept the seventh-day Sabbath till Rome found out about it.
In the fourth century, but in Ethiopia, Frumentius reported:
"And we assemble on Saturday," he continues; "not that we are infected with Judaism, but to worship Jesus, the Lord of the Sabbath" (Davis, Tamar. A General History of the Sabbatarian Churches. 1851; Reprinted 1995 by Commonwealth Publishing, Salt Lake City, pp. 41-42).
Ethiopian Emperor Galawdewos (A.D. 1540-1559):
We do celebrate the Sabbath, because God, after He had finished the Creation of the World, rested thereon...and that especially, since Christ came not to dissolve the law but to fulfill it. It is therefore not in the imitation of the Jews, but in obedience to Christ, and His holy apostles, that we observe that day (Quoted in Bradford C.E. Sabbath Roots, The African Connection. L. Brown and Sons, Barre (VT), 1999, p. 26).
Ethiopia - A.D. 1534
(Ethiopian legate at court of Lisbon) "It is not therefore, in imitation of the Jews, but in obedience to Christ and His holy apostles, that we observe the day." Gedde's "Church History of Ethiopia," pp. 87-88.
Alphonsus Mendes, who was sent out as patriarch of Ethiopia, demanded that all Ethiopian Christians be re-baptized, and the priests re-ordained, though he permitted the married priests to remain married. He prohibited the Ethiopian custom of circumcision, and insisted that Saturday be turned from the Sabbath as observed by the Ethiopians to a fast day as observed by Ethiopian Christians.
And in India till Xavier arrived (1st visit in 1542, next in 1548).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Francis_Xavier (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Francis_Xavier)
"The Jewish wickedness" of which Xavier complained was evidently the Sabbath-keeping among those native Christians as we shall see in our next quotation. When one of these Sabbath-keeping Christians was taken by the Inquisition he was accused of having *Judaized*; which means having conformed to the ceremonies of the Mosaic Law; such as not eating pork, hare, fish without scales, of having attended the solemnization of the Sabbath." Account of the Inquisition at Goa, Dellon, p.56. London, 1815
A Catholic Provincial Council suppressed the practice of keeping the Sabbath in Norway in 1435 CE.
The reign of Vasily (1505-1533) was characterized by cruelty and a return to ignorance. His son and successor Ivan IV (1531-1584) turned out to be a bloody ruler who terrorized all Russia, earning from history the infamous title, Ivan the Terrible. Even during his reign, there were people in Russia who were true to the teachings of the Bible, especially the Sabbath. The "One Hundred Head" Church Council, called in 1551 during the reign of Ivan IV, adopted a resolution which until today has not been annulled by the Russian Orthodox Church. This regulation states that the people, besides worshiping on Sunday, could also worship on Saturday in the confines of the Russian Orthodox Church—a statement which was recognized by the church council as authorized by the Apostles Peter and Paul (D. E. Kozhachnikov, ed., Stoglav [Source: One-Hundred-Head Council] (St. Petersburg: Tipografiia Imperatorskoi Akademy Nauk, 1863), pp. 270, 271. As cited by Zhigankov, Oleg. Ahead of their time? The 15th century Reformation in Russia. College and University Dialogue Journal). Online at http://dialogue.adventist.org/articles/12_3_zhigankov_e.htm (http://dialogue.adventist.org/articles/12_3_zhigankov_e.htm)
2.
: Lively Stone Sat Nov 17, 2012 - 10:30:29
: chosenone Sat Nov 17, 2012 - 07:12:07
David Pawson is a much loved and highly respected Christian Bible teacher here in the UK. He has been teaching for well over 50 years now. Some of you may have seen him on one of the God tv channels
Here is a small part of what he says about the sabbath.
"The Sabbath law is fulfilled for us every day of the week when we cease to do our own works and do God's instead, thus entering into the rest that remains for the people of God. We are still free to keep one day special if we wish, but we are also free to regard every day alike. So we cannot even impose Sunday observance on other believers, never mind unbelievers, for we are all free in Christ."
Got it in one David ::smile::
The truth is spoken! ::tippinghat::
He is an amazing speaker of the truth who I have listened to from time to time for 25 years. A great man of Gods Word. We are blessed today to have so many opportunities to hear such annointed teaching from the wider family of God. ::smile::
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Fri Nov 16, 2012 - 11:02:28
Even the 'rendering' you use, is rape of the Written Word!
The "rendering" I used here was the New American Standard Bible, the most accurate translation available.
Are you King James only? It says pretty much the same.
Isn't the word in italics? Thereby indicating that it is supplied?
: Amo Sat Feb 11, 2012 - 10:39:55
In light of the fact, that Sunday keepers have repeatedly throughout history appealed to the civil authorities to enforce their day of worship upon all, how is it that those who keep the fourth commandment by faith in the word of God, are the ones always accused of being legalistic?
Well actually being called legalistic doesnt bother me a bit. I couldnt imagine standing before Christ and saying save me Lord, im an illegalist..i did nothing you commanded me to do
: larry2 Sat Nov 17, 2012 - 05:47:10
... do you keep all the law? The sacrifice I present is Jesus, not works. Maybe you can tell me of your works. ....
"The sacrifice I present ..."
Verb:
"present"
Subject:
"I"
"...not works"?
It is, 'works' – the subject's, very own, 'works'!
I would lie if I said I have no works ... works of unrighteousness, too much of – even my own righteousness is like filthy rags. Were it not for grace I would have been lost.
I see, after being gone for quite some time, that pretty much no one answered my original question starting this thread.
Dave pointed out the following words of mine, and then I suppose, believes he refuted them with Exo. 31:16&17.
The bible does not say anywhere that the Sabbath is specifically for the Jews.
Exo 31:16 Therefore the children of Israel [i.e. the Jews] shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant.
Exo 31:17 It is a sign between me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.'"
If you want to do a play on my words then very well, you have a point. However, I think it fairly obvious that my intent was not to say that God never specifically told the Jews to observe His Sabbath, but only that His Sabbath was not intended specifically and only for the Jews. Nevertheless, if you are intent upon making the point that I meant as you determined, very well then. I give you that one.
Now can you please tell me how you have determined that God's Sabbath was only and specifically for the Jews, when it was created by Him 2000 years before there was a Jew? Kept by those who were not yet called Jews? Why Gentiles were admonished to keep it and be blessed for doing so even after God gave it specifically to the Jews, and during that time? Why it was kept by Jesus, the apostles, and other Christians for centuries after Christ's death, and why it is said that the saved, including many so called non Jews will observe it in heaven? Thank you.
If you would like the scriptural and historic evidence for all of the above, please do just ask for it. Though most of it has already been posted on this thread.
Amo, if its alright I would like to share this on some of the other sites I am on with your permission.
Sorry Hobie, I was gone for quite a while. Of course you could have and can use it. I have no monopoly upon the truth. Nor would I dare try to prevent anyone from sharing it as though I or anyone else could claim to be the progenitor of truth.
What did Jesus say regarding to the Sabbath?
Mark 2:27, "Then he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. 28 So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."
So, did he say "The Sabbath was made for Jews"? No, He did not. He said it was made for man (human kind), and He also declared Himself "Lord of the Sabbath". Thefore, the Sabbath is the Lord's Day.
What else did Jesus say?
Matthew 5:17-19, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 18 For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. 19 Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven."
Have heaven and earth disappeared? Clearly neither have, nor will. Also, a warning is given that "least in the kingdom of heaven" doesn't denote a position in heaven, but means that heaven will regard them with disdain after Jesus' return.
Jesus spoke of the Sabbath in the future:
Matthew 24, Jesus speaks of the Sabbath in the future:
"Jesus left the temple and was walking away when his disciples came up to him to call his attention to its buildings. 2 "Do you see all these things?" he asked. "Truly I tell you, not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down."
3 As Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately. "Tell us," they said, "when will this happen, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?"
4 Jesus answered: "Watch out that no one deceives you. 5 For many will come in my name, claiming, 'I am the Messiah,' and will deceive many. 6 You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. 7 Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. 8 All these are the beginning of birth pains.
9 "Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. 10 At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, 11 and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. 12 Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, 13 but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved. 14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.
15 "So when you see standing in the holy place 'the abomination that causes desolation,'[a] spoken of through the prophet Daniel—let the reader understand— 16 then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. 17 Let no one on the housetop go down to take anything out of the house. 18 Let no one in the field go back to get their cloak. 19 How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! 20 Pray that your flight will not take place in winter or on the Sabbath. 21 For then there will be great distress, unequaled from the beginning of the world until now—and never to be equaled again.
22 "If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened. 23 At that time if anyone says to you, 'Look, here is the Messiah!' or, 'There he is!' do not believe it. 24 For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. 25 See, I have told you ahead of time.
26 "So if anyone tells you, 'There he is, out in the wilderness,' do not go out; or, 'Here he is, in the inner rooms,' do not believe it. 27 For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. 28 Wherever there is a carcass, there the vultures will gather.
29 "Immediately after the distress of those days
"'the sun will be darkened,
and the moon will not give its light;
the stars will fall from the sky,
and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.'
30 "Then will appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven. And then all the peoples of the earth[c] will mourn when they see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory.[d] 31 And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.
32 "Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. 33 Even so, when you see all these things, you know that it[e] is near, right at the door. 34 Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. 35 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.
The Day and Hour Unknown
36 "But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son,[f] but only the Father. 37 As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 38 For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; 39 and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 40 Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. 41 Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left.
42 "Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. 43 But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. 44 So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.
45 "Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom the master has put in charge of the servants in his household to give them their food at the proper time? 46 It will be good for that servant whose master finds him doing so when he returns. 47 Truly I tell you, he will put him in charge of all his possessions. 48 But suppose that servant is wicked and says to himself, 'My master is staying away a long time,' 49 and he then begins to beat his fellow servants and to eat and drink with drunkards. 50 The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware of. 51 He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth."
In the OP Sunday legislation throughout history was brought forward as a sign of true legalism, as compared to the accusation of legalism cast upon those who observe the sabbath according to the fourth commandment, by faith in God's word. A link was and is presented for those wishing to examine a book addressing much of that legislation. I thought it pertinent to the subject to look at some more recent developments relating to the same, and the efforts of many still, towards legislation. Along with this is the newest development of Sunday significance among Secularists, Humanists, and Atheists also. Not to mention the all important decision of the government of Israel to recognize Sunday as a legal holiday. Yes, it seems that Sunday is truly becoming the rest day of this world, which will no doubt eventually be legislated into reality. The following internet sites address much of the same.
http://www.ucg.org/doctrinal-beliefs/always-sunday-europes-official-day-rest/ (http://www.ucg.org/doctrinal-beliefs/always-sunday-europes-official-day-rest/)
http://www.catholicsun.org/2012/06/06/sundays-must-be-a-day-of-rest-dedicated-to-god-family-pope-says/ (http://www.catholicsun.org/2012/06/06/sundays-must-be-a-day-of-rest-dedicated-to-god-family-pope-says/)
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-07-05/israeli-proposal-to-make-sunday-day-of-rest-may-benefit-retail.html (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-07-05/israeli-proposal-to-make-sunday-day-of-rest-may-benefit-retail.html)
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/european_bishops_back_proposed_eu_law_on_sunday_rest/ (http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/european_bishops_back_proposed_eu_law_on_sunday_rest/)
https://www.au.org/church-state/may-2009-church-state/au-bulletin/church-groups-push-eu-to-approve-sunday-law (https://www.au.org/church-state/may-2009-church-state/au-bulletin/church-groups-push-eu-to-approve-sunday-law)
http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/croatia-bans-sunday-shopping-and-encourages-citizens-to-devote-time-to-fami (http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/croatia-bans-sunday-shopping-and-encourages-citizens-to-devote-time-to-fami)
http://www.baptiststandard.com/resources/archives/48-2008-archives/8330-pastors-ask-town-to-ban-sunday-morning-sports (http://www.baptiststandard.com/resources/archives/48-2008-archives/8330-pastors-ask-town-to-ban-sunday-morning-sports)
http://www.mspca.org/programs/animal-protection-legislation/government-affairs/current-legislation/wildlife-legislation/hunting-on-sundays-2.html (http://www.mspca.org/programs/animal-protection-legislation/government-affairs/current-legislation/wildlife-legislation/hunting-on-sundays-2.html)
7602 - Sunday Law / AD News - Grace Mackintosh (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZQiB1vJHHg#)
http://sundayassembly.com/ (http://sundayassembly.com/)
http://www.neontommy.com/news/2013/12/sunday-assembly-gathering-offers-community-atheists (http://www.neontommy.com/news/2013/12/sunday-assembly-gathering-offers-community-atheists)
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/11/10/mega-church-where-god-is-unwelcome-atheists-unite-at-sunday-assemblies-across/ (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/11/10/mega-church-where-god-is-unwelcome-atheists-unite-at-sunday-assemblies-across/)
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/14/atheist-sunday-assembly-branches-out (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/14/atheist-sunday-assembly-branches-out)
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-11-09/church-for-atheists-comes-to-australia/5080996 (http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-11-09/church-for-atheists-comes-to-australia/5080996)
http://religioninireland.net/2013/11/10/secular-sunday-brunch-with-atheist-ireland/ (http://religioninireland.net/2013/11/10/secular-sunday-brunch-with-atheist-ireland/)
http://www.christianpost.com/news/atheists-flock-to-secular-sunday-school-30231/ (http://www.christianpost.com/news/atheists-flock-to-secular-sunday-school-30231/)
http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pch24.pl%2Fkonferencja-w-sejmie-o-potrzebie-wolnej-niedzieli%2C18708%2Ci.html&act=url (http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pch24.pl%2Fkonferencja-w-sejmie-o-potrzebie-wolnej-niedzieli%2C18708%2Ci.html&act=url)
http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.datasantafeonline.com%2Fultimas-noticias%2Fdestacadas%2F19410-diputados-dio-media-sancion-al-descanso-dominical-.html&act=url (http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.datasantafeonline.com%2Fultimas-noticias%2Fdestacadas%2F19410-diputados-dio-media-sancion-al-descanso-dominical-.html&act=url)
http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.opais.net%2Fpt%2Fopais%2F%3Fdet%3D33184&act=url (http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.opais.net%2Fpt%2Fopais%2F%3Fdet%3D33184&act=url)
http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.refdag.nl%2Fnieuws%2Fbuitenland%2Fkortrijk_peilt_bevolking_over_verbod_op_grasmaaien_op_zondag_1_779536&act=url (http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.refdag.nl%2Fnieuws%2Fbuitenland%2Fkortrijk_peilt_bevolking_over_verbod_op_grasmaaien_op_zondag_1_779536&act=url)
http://www.thejournal.ie/france-sunday-shopping-laws-1107689-Sep2013/?com_ord=date (http://www.thejournal.ie/france-sunday-shopping-laws-1107689-Sep2013/?com_ord=date)
http://www.ksl.com/index.php?nid=968&sid=25460743&fm=most_popular (http://www.ksl.com/index.php?nid=968&sid=25460743&fm=most_popular)
CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH
Excerpts from
DOCTRINAL NOTE
on some questions regarding
The Participation of Catholics in Political Life
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, having received the opinion of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, has decided that it would be appropriate to publish the present Doctrinal Note on some questions regarding the participation of Catholics in political life.
This Note is directed to the Bishops of the Catholic Church and, in a particular way, to Catholic politicians and all lay members of the faithful called to participate in the political life of democratic societies.By fulfilling their civic duties, guided by a Christian conscience, in conformity with its values, the lay faithful exercise their proper task of infusing the temporal order with Christian values, all the while respecting the nature and rightful autonomy of that order, and cooperating with other citizens according to their particular competence and responsibility. The consequence of this fundamental teaching of the Second Vatican Council is that the lay faithful are never to relinquish their participation in 'public life', that is, in the many different economic, social, legislative, administrative and cultural areas, which are intended to promote organically and institutionally
the common good. This would include the promotion and defence of goods such as public order and peace, freedom and equality, respect for human life and for the environment, justice and solidarity.
II. Central points in the current cultural and political debate
The growth in the sense of responsibility towards countries still on the path of development is without doubt an important sign, illustrative of a greater sensitivity to
the common good. At the same time, however, one cannot close one's eyes to the real dangers which certain tendencies in society are promoting through legislation, nor can one ignore the effects this will have on future generations.
A kind of cultural relativism exists today, evident in the conceptualization and defence of an ethical pluralism, which sanctions the decadence and disintegration of reason and the principles of the natural moral law. Furthermore, it is not unusual to hear the opinion expressed in the public sphere that such ethical pluralism is the very condition for democracy. As a result, citizens claim complete autonomy with regard to their moral choices, and lawmakers maintain that they are respecting this freedom of choice by enacting laws which ignore the principles of natural ethics and yield to ephemeral cultural and moral trends, as if every possible outlook on life were of equal value. At the same time, the value of tolerance is disingenuously invoked when a large number of citizens, Catholics among them, are asked not to base their contribution to society and political life – through the legitimate means available to everyone in a democracy – on their particular understanding of the human person and
the common good. The history of the twentieth century demonstrates that those citizens were right who recognized the falsehood of relativism, and with it, the notion that there is no moral law rooted in the nature of the human person, which must govern our understanding of man,
the common good and the state. 3. Such relativism, of course, has nothing to do with the legitimate freedom of Catholic citizens to choose among the various political opinions that are compatible with faith and the natural moral law, and to select, according to their own criteria, what best corresponds to the needs of
the common good. Political freedom is not – and cannot be – based upon the relativistic idea that all conceptions of the human person's good have the same value and truth, but rather, on the fact that politics are concerned with very concrete realizations of the true human and social good in given historical, geographic, economic, technological and cultural contexts.
In this context, it must be noted also that a well-formed Christian conscience does not permit one to vote for a political program or an individual law which contradicts the fundamental contents of faith and morals. The Christian faith is an integral unity, and thus it is incoherent to isolate some particular element to the detriment of the whole of Catholic doctrine.A political commitment to a single isolated aspect of the Church's social doctrine does not exhaust one's responsibility towards
the common good. Nor can a Catholic think of delegating his Christian responsibility to others; rather, the Gospel of Jesus Christ gives him this task, so that the truth about man and the world might be proclaimed and put into action.
Excerpt from
ENCYCLICAL LETTER
CARITAS IN VERITATE
OF THE SUPREME PONTIFF
BENEDICT XVI
TO THE BISHOPS
PRIESTS AND DEACONS
MEN AND WOMEN RELIGIOUS
THE LAY FAITHFUL
AND ALL PEOPLE OF GOOD WILL
ON INTEGRAL HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
IN CHARITY AND TRUTH
7. Another important consideration is
the common good. To love someone is to desire that person's good and to take effective steps to secure it. Besides the good of the individual, there is a good that is linked to living in society:
the common good. It is the good of "all of us", made up of individuals, families and intermediate groups who together constitute society[4]. It is a good that is sought not for its own sake, but for the people who belong to the social community and who can only really and effectively pursue their good within it. To desire
the common good and strive towards it is a requirement of justice and charity. To take a stand for
the common good is on the one hand to be solicitous for, and on the other hand to avail oneself of, that complex of institutions that give structure to the life of society, juridically, civilly, politically and culturally, making it the pólis, or "city". The more we strive to secure
a common good corresponding to the real needs of our neighbours, the more effectively we love them. Every Christian is called to practise this charity, in a manner corresponding to his vocation and according to the degree of influence he wields in the pólis. This is the institutional path — we might also call it the political path — of charity, no less excellent and effective than the kind of charity which encounters the neighbour directly, outside the institutional mediation of the pólis. When animated by charity, commitment to
the common good has greater worth than a merely secular and political stand would have. Like all commitment to justice, it has a place within the testimony of divine charity that paves the way for eternity through temporal action. Man's earthly activity, when inspired and sustained by charity, contributes to the building of the universal city of God, which is the goal of the history of the human family. In an increasingly globalized society,
the common good and the effort to obtain it cannot fail to assume the dimensions of the whole human family, that is to say, the community of peoples and nations[5], in such a way as to shape the earthly city in unity and peace, rendering it to some degree an anticipation and a prefiguration of the undivided city of God.
Excerpts from
ENCYCLICAL LETTER
CARITAS IN VERITATE
OF THE SUPREME PONTIFF
BENEDICT XVI
TO THE BISHOPS
PRIESTS AND DEACONS
MEN AND WOMEN RELIGIOUS
THE LAY FAITHFUL
AND ALL PEOPLE OF GOOD WILL
ON INTEGRAL HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
IN CHARITY AND TRUTH
36. Economic activity cannot solve all social problems through the simple application of commercial logic. This needs to be directed towards the pursuit of
the common good, for which the political community in particular must also take responsibility. Therefore, it must be borne in mind that grave imbalances are produced when economic action, conceived merely as an engine for wealth creation, is detached from political action, conceived as a means for pursuing justice through redistribution.
The link consists in this: individual rights, when detached from a framework of duties which grants them their full meaning, can run wild, leading to an escalation of demands which is effectively unlimited and indiscriminate. An overemphasis on rights leads to a disregard for duties. Duties set a limit on rights because they point to the anthropological and ethical framework of which rights are a part, in this way ensuring that they do not become licence. Duties thereby reinforce rights and call for their defence and promotion as a task to be undertaken in the service of
the common good. Otherwise, if the only basis of human rights is to be found in the deliberations of an assembly of citizens, those rights can be changed at any time, and so the duty to respect and pursue them fades from the common consciousness. Governments and international bodies can then lose sight of the objectivity and "inviolability" of rights. When this happens, the authentic development of peoples is endangered[108]. Such a way of thinking and acting compromises the authority of international bodies, especially in the eyes of those countries most in need of development. Indeed, the latter demand that the international community take up the duty of helping them to be "artisans of their own destiny"[109], that is, to take up duties of their own. The sharing of reciprocal duties is a more powerful incentive to action than the mere assertion of rights.
Hence the principle of subsidiarity is particularly well-suited to managing globalization and directing it towards authentic human development. In order not to produce a dangerous universal power of a tyrannical nature, the governance of globalization must be marked by subsidiarity, articulated into several layers and involving different levels that can work together. Globalization certainly requires authority, insofar as it poses the problem of a
global common good that needs to be pursued.
67. In the face of the unrelenting growth of global interdependence, there is a strongly felt need, even in the midst of a global recession, for a reform of the United Nations Organization, and likewise of economic institutions and international finance, so that the concept of the family of nations can acquire real teeth. One also senses the urgent need to find innovative ways of implementing the principle of the responsibility to protect[146] and of giving poorer nations an effective voice in shared decision-making. This seems necessary in order to arrive at a political, juridical and economic order which can increase and give direction to international cooperation for the development of all peoples in solidarity. To manage the global economy; to revive economies hit by the crisis; to avoid any deterioration of the present crisis and the greater imbalances that would result; to bring about integral and timely disarmament, food security and peace; to guarantee the protection of the environment and to regulate migration: for all this, there is urgent need of a true world political authority, as my predecessor Blessed John XXIII indicated some years ago. Such an authority would need to be regulated by law, to observe consistently the principles of subsidiarity and solidarity, to seek to establish
the common good[147], and to make a commitment to securing authentic integral human development inspired by the values of charity in truth. Furthermore, such an authority would need to be universally recognized and to be vested with the effective power to ensure security for all, regard for justice, and respect for rights[148]. Obviously it would have to have the authority to ensure compliance with its decisions from all parties, and also with the coordinated measures adopted in various international forums. Without this, despite the great progress accomplished in various sectors, international law would risk being conditioned by the balance of power among the strongest nations. The integral development of peoples and international cooperation require the establishment of a greater degree of international ordering, marked by subsidiarity, for the management of globalization[149]. They also require the construction of a social order that at last conforms to the moral order, to the interconnection between moral and social spheres, and to the link between politics and the economic and civil spheres, as envisaged by the Charter of the United Nations.
Development is impossible without upright men and women, without financiers and politicians whose consciences are finely attuned to the requirements of
the common good. so too the meaning and purpose of the media must be sought within an anthropological perspective. This means that they can have a civilizing effect not only when, thanks to technological development, they increase the possibilities of communicating information, but above all when they are geared towards a vision of the person and
the common good that reflects truly universal values.
CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
2187
Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic constraints,
public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees.
2188
In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."[125]
Sundays must be a day of rest dedicated to God, family, pope says
By Carol Glatz
Catholic News Service
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- The demands of work can't bully people out of needed time off, Pope Benedict XVI said.
Sunday must be a day of rest for everyone, so people can be free to be with their families and with God, the pope said.
"By defending Sunday, one defends human freedom," he said during his weekly general audience in St. Peter's Square June 6.
In his catechesis, the pope told an estimated 15,000 pilgrims and visitors about his trip June 1-3 to Milan for the seventh World Meeting of Families.
He thanked everyone who made the "unforgettable and wonderful event" possible and praised the willingness he witnessed of people striving to live a "Gospel of the family."
"Humanity has no future without the family," he said. Young people need to be born and raised in "that community of life and love that God himself wanted," that is, a family based on marriage between a man and woman, he said.
He reminded young people that they, too, have a responsibility to contribute to the well-being of the family, such as by saying "yes" to God's will, working hard in their studies, being generous to others, being active in the community and using their talents to better the world.
The pope said when he met government representatives in Milan, he reminded them of the importance of policies and laws that protect the family. The most essential is the right to life, "whose its deliberate suppression can never be allowed." The identity of the family, based on marriage between a man and a woman, needs recognition, too, the pope said.
During an evening vigil of testimonies, the pope answered the questions of five families from different countries because "I wanted to show the open dialogue that exists between families and the church, between the world and the church," he said.
He said he was quite taken by people's testimonies, which dealt with "hot-button issues" such as the difficulties families experience because of separation, divorce, the economic crisis and long hours on the job.
The pope said he wanted to come to the defense of free time, which is "threatened by a kind 'bullying' by the demands of work."
"Sunday is the day of the Lord and of man, a day which everyone must be able to be free -- free for the family and free for God."
Family, work, rest and celebration are gifts from God and important aspects of human life that must find a "harmonious balance" in order to build a more humane world, he said.
He said the World Meeting of Families was a way to send a message to the whole world that "it is possible and joyful, even if it takes work, to live love faithfully forever and be open to life" and that it's also possible for the whole family to take part in the mission of the church and help create a better world.
- - -
Editor's Note: The text of the pope's audience remarks in English will be posted online at www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/audiences/2012/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20120606_en.html (http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/audiences/2012/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20120606_en.html).
The text of the pope's audience remarks in Spanish will be posted online at www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/audiences/2012/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20120606_sp.html (http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/audiences/2012/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20120606_sp.html).
END
Excerpts from -
Ioannes Paulus PP. II
Centesimus annus
To His Venerable Brothers
in the Episcopate
the Priests and Deacons
Families of Men and Women religious
all the Christian Faithful
and to all men and women
of good will
on the hundredth anniversary of
Rerum Novarum
I. CHARACTERISTICS OF "RERUM NOVARUM"
Work thus belongs to the vocation of every person; indeed, man expresses and fulfils himself by working. At the same time, work has a "social" dimension through its intimate relationship not only to the family,
but also to the common good, since "it may truly be said that it is only by the labour of working-men that States grow rich".14 These are themes that I have taken up and developed in my Encyclical Laborem exercens.15
Another important principle is undoubtedly that of the right to "private property".16 The amount of space devoted to this subject in the Encyclical shows the importance attached to it. The Pope is well aware that private property is not an absolute value, nor does he fail to proclaim the necessary complementary principles,
such as the universal destination of the earth's goods.17
9. To these rights Pope Leo XIII adds another right regarding the condition of the working class, one which I wish to mention because of its importance: namely, the right to discharge freely one's religious duties. The Pope wished to proclaim this right within the context of the other rights and duties of workers, notwithstanding the general opinion, even in his day, that such questions pertained exclusively to an individual's private life.
He affirms the need for Sunday rest so that people may turn their thoughts to heavenly things and to the worship which they owe to Almighty God.28 No one can take away this human right, which is based on a commandment; in the words of the Pope: "no man may with impunity violate that human dignity which God himself treats with great reverence", and consequently, the State must guarantee to the worker the exercise of this freedom.29
It would not be mistaken to see in this clear statement a springboard for the principle of the right to religious freedom, which was to become the subject of many solemn International Declarations and Conventions,30 as well as of the Second Vatican Council's well-known Declaration and of my own repeated teaching.31 In this regard,
one may ask whether existing laws and the practice of industrialized societies effectively ensure in our own day the exercise of this basic right to Sunday rest.If Pope Leo XIII calls upon the State to remedy the condition of the poor in accordance with justice, he does so because of his timely awareness that
the State has the duty of watching over the common good and of ensuring that every sector of social life, not excluding the economic one, contributes to achieving that good, while respecting the rightful autonomy of each sector.
II. TOWARDS THE "NEW THINGS" OF TODAY
In contrast, from the Christian vision of the human person there necessarily follows a correct picture of society. According to Rerum novarum and the whole social doctrine of the Church,
the social nature of man is not completely fulfilled in the State, but is realized in various intermediary groups, beginning with the family and including economic, social, political and cultural groups which stem from human nature itself and have their own autonomy, always with a view to the common good. This is what I have called the "subjectivity" of society which, together with the subjectivity of the individual, was cancelled out by "Real Socialism".40
However, what is condemned in class struggle is the idea that conflict is not restrained by ethical or juridical considerations, or by respect for the dignity of others (and consequently of oneself);
a reasonable compromise is thus excluded, and what is pursued is not the general good of society, but a partisan interest which replaces the common good and sets out to destroy whatever stands in its way.
21. Lastly, it should be remembered that after the Second World War, and in reaction to its horrors, there arose a more lively sense of human rights, which found recognition in a number of International Documents52 and, one might say, in the drawing up of a new "right of nations",
to which the Holy See has constantly contributed. The focal point of this evolution has been the United Nations Organization. Not only has there been a development in awareness of the rights of individuals, but also in awareness of the rights of nations, as well as a clearer realization of the need to act in order to remedy the grave imbalances that exist between the various geographical areas of the world. In a certain sense, these imbalances have shifted the centre of the social question from the national to the international level.53
IV. PRIVATE PROPERTY AND THE UNIVERSAL DESTINATION OF MATERIAL GOODS
30. In Rerum novarum, Leo XIII strongly affirmed the natural character of the right to private property, using various arguments against the socialism of his time.65 This right, which is fundamental for the autonomy and development of the person, has always been defended by the Church up to our own day.
At the same time, the Church teaches that the possession of material goods is not an absolute right, and that its limits are inscribed in its very nature as a human right.While the Pope proclaimed the right to private ownership, he affirmed with equal clarity that the "use" of goods, while marked by freedom, is subordinated to their original common destination as created goods, as well as to the will of Jesus Christ as expressed in the Gospel. Pope Leo wrote: "those whom fortune favours are admonished ... that they should tremble at the warnings of Jesus Christ ... and that a most strict account must be given to the Supreme Judge for the use of all they possess"; and quoting Saint Thomas Aquinas, he added: "But if the question be asked, how must one's possessions be used?
the Church replies without hesitation that man should not consider his material possessions as his own, but as common to all...", because "above the laws and judgments of men stands the law, the judgment of Christ".66
The Successors of Leo XIII have repeated this twofold affirmation: the necessity and therefore the legitimacy of private ownership, as well as the limits which are imposed on it.67 The Second Vatican Council likewise clearly restated the traditional doctrine in words which bear repeating: "In making use of the exterior things we lawfully possess, we ought to regard them not just as our own but also as common, in the sense that they can profit not only the owners but others too"; and a little later we read: "Private property or some ownership of external goods affords each person the scope needed for personal and family autonomy, and should be regarded as an extension of human freedom ... Of its nature private property also has a social function which is
based on the law of the common purpose of goods".68 I have returned to this same doctrine, first in my address to the Third Conference of the Latin American Bishops at Puebla, and later in the Encyclicals Laborem exercens and Sollicitudo rei socialis.69
31. Re-reading this teaching on the right to property and the common destination of material wealth as it applies to the present time, the question can be raised concerning the origin of the material goods which sustain human life, satisfy people's needs and are an object of their rights.
The original source of all that is good is the very act of God, who created both the earth and man, and who gave the earth to man so that he might have dominion over it by his work and enjoy its fruits (Gen 1:28). God gave the earth to the whole human race for the sustenance of all its members, without excluding or favouring anyone.
This is the foundation of the universal destination of the earth's goods. The earth, by reason of its fruitfulness and its capacity to satisfy human needs, is God's first gift for the sustenance of human life. But the earth does not yield its fruits without a particular human response to God's gift, that is to say, without work. It is through work that man, using his
intelligence and exercising his freedom, succeeds in dominating the earth and making it a fitting home.
Mention has just been made of the fact that people work with each other, sharing in a "community of work" which embraces ever widening circles. A person who produces something other than for his own use generally does so in order that others may use it after they have paid a just price, mutually agreed upon through free bargaining. It is precisely the ability to foresee both the needs of others and the combinations of productive factors most adapted to satisfying those needs that constitutes another important source of wealth in modern society. Besides, many goods cannot be adequately produced through the work of an isolated individual;
they require the cooperation of many people in working towards a common goal. Organizing such a productive effort, planning its duration in time, making sure that it corresponds in a positive way to the demands which it must satisfy, and taking the necessary risks — all this too is a source of wealth in today's society. In this way, the role of disciplined and creative human work and, as an essential part of that work, initiative and entrepreneurial ability becomes increasingly evident and decisive.70
34....Even prior to the logic of a fair exchange of goods and the forms of justice appropriate to it, there exists something which is due to man because he is man, by reason of his lofty dignity. Inseparable from that required "something" is the possibility to survive and, at the same time, to make an active contribution to
the common good of humanity.40.
It is the task of the State to provide for the defence and preservation of common goods such as the natural and human environments, which cannot be safeguarded simply by market forces. Just as in the time of primitive capitalism the State had the duty of defending the basic rights of workers, so now, with the new capitalism, the State and all of society have the duty of defending those collective goods which, among others, constitute the essential framework for the legitimate pursuit of personal goals on the part of each individual.
43. The Church has no models to present; models that are real and truly effective can only arise within the framework of different historical situations, through the efforts of all those who responsibly confront concrete problems in all their social, economic, political and cultural aspects, as these interact with one another.84 For such a task
the Church offers her social teaching as an indispensable and ideal orientation, a teaching which, as already mentioned, recognizes the positive value of the market and of enterprise, but which at the same time points out that these need to be oriented towards the common good. In the light of today's "new things", we have re-read the relationship between individual or private property and the universal destination of material wealth. V. STATE AND CULTURE
44.
Pope Leo XIII was aware of the need for a sound theory of the State in order to ensure the normal development of man's spiritual and temporal activities, both of which are indispensable.89 For this reason, in one passage of Rerum novarum he presents the organization of society according to the three powers — legislative, executive and judicial — , something which at the time represented a novelty in Church teaching.90 Such an ordering reflects a realistic vision of man's social nature, which calls for legislation capable of protecting the freedom of all. To that end, it is preferable that each power be balanced by other powers and by other spheres of responsibility which keep it within proper bounds. This is the principle of the "rule of law",
in which the law is sovereign, and not the arbitrary will of individuals.Even in countries with democratic forms of government, these rights are not always fully respected. Here we are referring not only to the scandal of abortion, but also to different aspects of a crisis within democracies themselves,
which seem at times to have lost the ability to make decisions aimed at the common good. Certain demands which arise within society are sometimes not examined in accordance with criteria of justice and morality, but rather on the basis of the electoral or financial power of the groups promoting them. With time, such distortions of political conduct create distrust and apathy, with a subsequent decline in the political participation and civic spirit of the general population, which feels abused and disillusioned. As a result, there is a growing inability to situate particular interests within the framework of a coherent vision of
the common good. The latter is not simply the sum total of particular interests; rather it involves an assessment and integration of those interests on the basis of a balanced
hierarchy of values; ultimately, it demands a correct understanding of the dignity and the rights of the person.98
The Church respects the legitimate autonomy of the democratic order and is not entitled to express preferences for this or that institutional or constitutional solution.
Her contribution to the political order is precisely her vision of the dignity of the person revealed in all its fulness in the mystery of the Incarnate Word.99
Malfunctions and defects in the Social Assistance State are the result of an inadequate understanding of the tasks proper to the State. Here again the principle of subsidiarity must be respected:
a community of a higher order should not interfere in the internal life of a community of a lower order, depriving the latter of its functions, but rather should support it in case of need and help to coordinate its activity with the activities of the rest of society,
always with a view to the common good.100
In order to overcome today's widespread
individualistic mentality, what is required is a concrete commitment to solidarity and charity, beginning in the family with the mutual support of husband and wife and the care which the different generations give to one another.
VI. MAN IS THE WAY OF THE CHURCH
Thus the Church's social teaching is itself a valid instrument of evangelization. As such, it proclaims God and his mystery of salvation in Christ to every human being, and for that very reason reveals man to himself. In this light, and only in this light,
does it concern itself with everything else: the human rights of the individual, and in particular of the "working class", the family and education, the duties of the State, the ordering of national and international society, economic life, culture, war and peace, and respect for life from the moment of conception until death.It is not merely a matter of "giving from one's surplus", but of helping entire peoples which are presently excluded or marginalized to enter into the sphere of economic and human development. For this to happen, it is not enough to draw on the surplus goods which in fact our world abundantly produces;
it requires above all a change of life-styles, of models of production and consumption, and of the established structures of power which today govern societies. Nor is it a matter of eliminating instruments of social organization which have proved useful, but rather of orienting them according to an adequate notion of
the common good in relation to the whole human family. Today we are facing the so-called "globalization" of the economy, a phenomenon which is not to be dismissed, since it can create unusual opportunities for greater prosperity. There is a growing feeling, however, that this increasing internationalization of the economy ought to be accompanied
by effective international agencies which will oversee and direct the economy to the common good, something that an individual State, even if it were the most powerful on earth, would not be in a position to do.
In concluding this Encyclical I again give thanks to Almighty God, who has granted his Church the light and strength
to accompany humanity on its earthly journey towards its eternal destiny. In the third Millennium too, the Church will be faithful in making man's way her own, knowing that she does not walk alone, but with Christ her Lord. It is Christ who made man's way his own, and who guides him, even when he is unaware of it.
Mary, the Mother of the Redeemer, constantly remained beside Christ in his journey towards the human family and in its midst, and she goes before the Church on the pilgrimage of faith. May her maternal intercession accompany humanity towards the next Millennium, in fidelity to him who "is the same yesterday and today and for ever" (cf. Heb 13:8), Jesus Christ our Lord, in whose name I cordially impart my blessing to all.
Given in Rome, at Saint Peter's, on 1 May, the Memorial of Saint Joseph the Worker, in the year 1991, the thirteenth of my Pontificate.
JOHN PAUL II
Quote from: Amo on February 13, 2012, 05:36:03 PM
The bible does not say anywhere that the Sabbath is specifically for the Jews. >>
<<Ex 31.12 And the Lord said to Moses,
13 "You are to speak to the people of Israel and say, 'Above all you shall keep my Sabbaths, for this is a sign between me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you.
14 You shall keep the Sabbath, because it is holy for you. Everyone who profanes it shall be put to death. Whoever does any work on it, that soul shall be cut off from among his people.
15 Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day shall be put to death.
16 Therefore the people of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, observing the Sabbath throughout their generations, as a covenant forever.
17 It is a sign forever between me and the people of Israel that in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed.'>>
OK let's get it clear, in these scriptures the Sabbath, being a pivotal part of the Law and Covenant is specifically reissued to Israel which includes the Jews; the Law including the 4th commandment are already in the ark.
What the statement should have said, "The bible does not say anywhere that the Sabbath is exclusively for Israel/Jews". But I knew what he meant. In two places in the OT the scriptures state that the Law (covenant) will go to the Gentiles; no where does it say the good news will go to the Gentiles; and this happened via Jesus Christ, Jews first, lost sheep second and Gentiles 3rd . So as well as reissuing the Law including the Sabbath to the Jews and the lost sheep He also issues the Law including the Sabbath and Holy Days:
Quote: Paul told members of the Church at Corinth—both Jews and gentiles (non-Israelites)—that they should put out leaven, symbolic of sin, because "Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us" (1 Corinthians 5:7). In the next verse Paul said to this mixed group of Jews and gentiles, "Therefore let us keep the feast," referring to the same festival God had instituted in ancient Israel many centuries before. Unquote.
This is a quote and opinion from one of my earlier posts which seems to be relative here:
I'll try to explain to you how I see God's Law and covenant working; God's Law as the Ten Commandments, is pure in the same way mathematic can be pure, but pure mathematics is next to useless until it is applied and when it is applied it assumes the purity of that to which it is applied; if mathematics is applied to garbage then garbage is the purity. The Covenant of God can also be applied to garbage and this is what the Pharisees did. Beware of the word "legalism", it is a derogative with no realistic concept, it is one of Satan's tools of deception. Consider the man who keeps the Ten Commandments perfectly he is like the mathematician who plays with pure mathematics all day; nothing good or bad in it but nothing gained. The person who is in covenant with Christ has the Law living in them, most are not able to recite the Ten Commandments, but applying the Law in everything they do. This is different to those new covenants where the Law is nailed to the cross or thrown in the dust bin; their covenant is a word without a concept, like an egg with innards sucked out and often filled up with multiple versions of good news.
http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/ (http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/)
http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/emire/GREECE/WEEKLYRESTDAY-GR.htm (http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/emire/GREECE/WEEKLYRESTDAY-GR.htm)
http://www.atg.wa.gov/AGOOpinions/opinion.aspx?section=archive&id=7488#.UrRi9bQ6-QI (http://www.atg.wa.gov/AGOOpinions/opinion.aspx?section=archive&id=7488#.UrRi9bQ6-QI)
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14335a.htm (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14335a.htm)
http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2013/11/08/243952070/france-rethinks-the-sanctity-of-its-day-of-rest (http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2013/11/08/243952070/france-rethinks-the-sanctity-of-its-day-of-rest)
http://catholicmom5.wordpress.com/2012/02/28/sunday-is-a-day-of-rest/ (http://catholicmom5.wordpress.com/2012/02/28/sunday-is-a-day-of-rest/)
http://www.vrijheidslijst.nl/E-vrijheidslijst/Viewpoints/Sunday.html (http://www.vrijheidslijst.nl/E-vrijheidslijst/Viewpoints/Sunday.html)
http://thisourtask.wordpress.com/2013/10/13/sunday-a-day-of-rest/ (http://thisourtask.wordpress.com/2013/10/13/sunday-a-day-of-rest/)
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/vatican-official-exhorts-catholics-to-set-aside-sundays-for-god-and-rest/ (http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/vatican-official-exhorts-catholics-to-set-aside-sundays-for-god-and-rest/)
http://languageofbeauty.wordpress.com/2013/11/24/sunday-day-of-make-up-rest/ (http://languageofbeauty.wordpress.com/2013/11/24/sunday-day-of-make-up-rest/)
http://sundayassemblyleeds.com/public-charter/ (http://sundayassemblyleeds.com/public-charter/)
http://sundayassembly.com/public-charter-for-the-sunday-assembly/ (http://sundayassembly.com/public-charter-for-the-sunday-assembly/)
Hey Amo, great posting of that Catholic stuff, have you entered the Holy Catholic Church?
: Ladonia Fri Dec 20, 2013 - 10:53:15
Hey Amo, great posting of that Catholic stuff, have you entered the Holy Catholic Church?
That's not likely to ever happen Ladonia. I just want people to understand the issues, and know who stands where, and why. The Catholic church was a crucial element of establishing the first Sunday laws, maintaining them throughout history, is heavily involved in the process now, and will continue to support and spearhead the same all the way through to the end. They may choose to stay in the background at times, but they are the creator and sustainers of "Christian" Sunday laws and the illicit relationsip between church and state that fosters such.
Rev. 17:1 And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters:
2 With whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication.
3 So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns.
4 And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication:
5 And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.
6 And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration........................................................................................
18 And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth.
http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showsite.php?org_id=843 (http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showsite.php?org_id=843)
: Amo Fri Dec 20, 2013 - 11:49:39
: Ladonia Fri Dec 20, 2013 - 10:53:15
Hey Amo, great posting of that Catholic stuff, have you entered the Holy Catholic Church?
That's not likely to ever happen Ladonia. I just want people to understand the issues, and know who stands where, and why. The Catholic church was a crucial element of establishing the first Sunday laws, maintaining them throughout history, is heavily involved in the process now, and will continue to support and spearhead the same all the way through to the end. They may choose to stay in the background at times, but they are the creator and sustainers of "Christian" Sunday laws and the illicit relationsip between church and state that fosters such.
Rev. 17:1 And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters:
2 With whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication.
3 So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns.
4 And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication:
5 And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.
6 And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration........................................................................................
18 And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth.
http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showsite.php?org_id=843 (http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showsite.php?org_id=843)
: Amo Fri Dec 20, 2013 - 11:49:39
: Ladonia Fri Dec 20, 2013 - 10:53:15
Hey Amo, great posting of that Catholic stuff, have you entered the Holy Catholic Church?
That's not likely to ever happen Ladonia. I just want people to understand the issues, and know who stands where, and why. The Catholic church was a crucial element of establishing the first Sunday laws, maintaining them throughout history, is heavily involved in the process now, and will continue to support and spearhead the same all the way through to the end. They may choose to stay in the background at times, but they are the creator and sustainers of "Christian" Sunday laws and the illicit relationsip between church and state that fosters such.
Rev. 17:1 And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters:
2 With whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication.
3 So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns.
4 And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication:
5 And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.
6 And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration........................................................................................
18 And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth.
http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showsite.php?org_id=843 (http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showsite.php?org_id=843)
I see. And you are still standing by your erroneous interpretation of the Scriptures. How nice.
I see. And you are still standing by your erroneous interpretation of the Scriptures. How nice.
Perhaps you can point out another religion which has more political relations with the kings, politicians, and governments of this world, than the Roman Catholic church. I don't think so. As far as I know the papacy is the only religion that demands political status in this world, and is it's own sovereign state. What other religion entertains ambassadors from virtually every nation on earth, and has a permanent seat at the United Nations? Sorry my friend, the church of Rome is the only one that fits the details. Denial cannot change the facts.
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0705123.htm (http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0705123.htm)
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/1102039.htm (http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/1102039.htm)
http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=6592&repos=4&subrepos=2&searchid=1213732 (http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=6592&repos=4&subrepos=2&searchid=1213732)
http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=13557&repos=4&subrepos=2&searchid=1213732 (http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=13557&repos=4&subrepos=2&searchid=1213732)
http://www.catholicculture.org/news/features/index.cfm?recnum=9823&repos=4&subrepos=1&searchid=1213732 (http://www.catholicculture.org/news/features/index.cfm?recnum=9823&repos=4&subrepos=1&searchid=1213732)
http://www.catholicculture.org/news/features/index.cfm?recnum=182&repos=4&subrepos=1&searchid=1213732 (http://www.catholicculture.org/news/features/index.cfm?recnum=182&repos=4&subrepos=1&searchid=1213732)
http://wwrn.org/articles/40332/ (http://wwrn.org/articles/40332/)
http://wwrn.org/articles/30349/?&place=france (http://wwrn.org/articles/30349/?&place=france)
http://townhall.com/news/business/2013/09/30/france-to-examine-laws-curbing-sunday-shopping-n1713078 (http://townhall.com/news/business/2013/09/30/france-to-examine-laws-curbing-sunday-shopping-n1713078)
http://townhall.com/columnists/rebeccahagelin/2013/12/11/the-disappearance-of-leisure-n1760684/page/full (http://townhall.com/columnists/rebeccahagelin/2013/12/11/the-disappearance-of-leisure-n1760684/page/full)
It is interesting regarding France's Sunday Laws, considering only 5% of Frenchmen own a Bible. More on the Catholic Church; I don't hate Catholics; the following is intended to add to earlier comments as to why Catholic do not see anything wrong with their Church.
The Black pope: http://www.remnantofgod.org/blackpope.htm (http://www.remnantofgod.org/blackpope.htm)
The Current Pope is a Jesuit.
Below are extracts from this link http://remnantofgod.org/jes-oth.htm#oath (http://remnantofgod.org/jes-oth.htm#oath)
The Jesuit Oath of Induction is also recorded in the Congressional Record of the U.S.A. (House Bill 1523, Contested election case of Eugene C. Bonniwell, against Thos. S. Butler, Feb. 15, 1913, pp. 3215-3216) It can also be found in the book entitled, "Subterranean Rome" by Charles Didier translated from the French and published in New York in 1843. Dr.
~~~~~~
. After reading this, ask yourself the question: Is this REALLY the church of Jesus Christ???
"When a Jesuit of the minor rank is to be elevated to command, he is conducted into the Chapel of the Convent of the Order, where there are only three others present, the principal or Superior standing in front of the altar. On either side stands a monk, one of whom holds a banner of yellow and white, which are the Papal colors, and the other a black banner with a dagger and red cross above a skull and crossbones, with the word INRI, and below them the words IUSTUM, NECAR, REGES, IMPIOUS. The meaning of which is: It is just to exterminate or annihilate impious or heretical Kings, Governments, or Rulers. Upon the floor is a red cross at which the postulant or candidate kneels. The Superior hands him a small black crucifix, which he takes in his left hand and presses to his heart, and the Superior at the same time presents to him a dagger, which he grasps by the blade and holds the point against his heart, the Superior still holding it by the hilt, and thus addresses the postulant:"
Superior speaks:
My son, heretofore you have been taught to act the dissembler: among Roman Catholics to be a Roman Catholic, and to be a spy even among your own brethren; to believe no man, to trust no man. Among the Reformers, to be a reformer; among the Huguenots, to be a Huguenot; among the Calvinists, to be a Calvinist; among other Protestants, generally to be a Protestant, and obtaining their confidence, to seek even to preach from their pulpits, and to denounce with all the vehemence in your nature our Holy Religion and the Pope; and even to descend so low as to become a Jew among Jews, that you might be enabled to gather together all information for the benefit of your Order as a faithful soldier of the Pope.
You have been taught to insidiously plant the seeds of jealousy and hatred between communities, provinces, states that were at peace, and incite them to deeds of blood, involving them in war with each other, and to create revolutions and civil wars in countries that were independent and prosperous, cultivating the arts and the sciences and enjoying the blessings of peace. To take sides with the combatants and to act secretly with your brother Jesuit, who might be engaged on the other side, but openly opposed to that with which you might be connected, only that the Church might be the gainer in the end, in the conditions fixed in the treaties for peace and that the end justifies the means.
You have been taught your duty as a spy, to gather all statistics, facts and information in your power from every source; to ingratiate yourself into the confidence of the family circle of Protestants and heretics of every class and character, as well as that of the merchant, the banker, the lawyer, among the schools and universities, in parliaments and legislatures, and the judiciaries and councils of state, and to be all things to all men, for the Pope's sake, whose servants we are unto death.
You have received all your instructions heretofore as a novice, a neophyte, and have served as co-adjurer, confessor and priest, but you have not yet been invested with all that is necessary to command in the Army of Loyola in the service of the Pope. You must serve the proper time as the instrument and executioner as directed by your superiors; for none can command here who has not consecrated his labors with the blood of the heretic; for "without the shedding of blood no man can be saved." Therefore, to fit yourself for your work and make your own salvation sure, you will, in addition to your former oath of obedience to your order and allegiance to the Pope, repeat after me---
The Extreme Oath of the Jesuits:
~~~~~~~
I do now renounce and disown any allegiance as due to any heretical king, prince or state named Protestants or Liberals, or obedience to any of the laws, magistrates or officers.
I do further declare that the doctrine of the churches of England and Scotland, of the Calvinists, Huguenots and others of the name Protestants or Liberals to be damnable and they themselves damned who will not forsake the same.
I do further declare, that I will help, assist, and advise all or any of his Holiness' agents in any place wherever I shall be, in Switzerland, Germany, Holland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, England, Ireland or America, or in any other Kingdom or territory I shall come to, and do my uttermost to extirpate the heretical Protestants or Liberals' doctrines and to destroy all their pretended powers, regal or otherwise.
~~~~~~~~~~~
I furthermore promise and declare that I will, when opportunity present, make and wage relentless war, secretly or openly, against all heretics, Protestants and Liberals, as I am directed to do, to extirpate and exterminate them from the face of the whole earth; and that I will spare neither age, sex or condition; and that I will hang, waste, boil, flay, strangle and bury alive these infamous heretics, rip up the stomachs and wombs of their women and crush their infants' heads against the walls, in order to annihilate forever their execrable race. That when the same cannot be done openly, I will secretly use the poisoned cup, the strangulating cord, the steel of the poniard or the leaden bullet, regardless of the honor, rank, dignity, or authority of the person or persons, whatever may be their condition in life, either public or private, as I at any time may be directed so to do by any agent of the Pope or Superior of the Brotherhood of the Holy Faith, of the Society of Jesus.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Superior speaks:
"You will now rise to your feet and I will instruct you in the Catechism necessary to make yourself known to any member of the Society of Jesus belonging to this rank.
In the first place, you, as a Brother Jesuit, will with another mutually make the ordinary sign of the cross as any ordinary Roman Catholic would; then one cross his wrists, the palms of his hands open, and the other in answer crosses his feet, one above the other; the first points with forefinger of the right hand to the center of the palm of the left, the other with the forefinger of the left hand points to the center of the palm of the right; the first then with his right hand makes a circle around his head, touching it; the other then with the forefinger of his left hand touches the left side of his body just below his heart; the first then with his right hand draws it across the throat of the other, and the latter then with a dagger down the stomach and abdomen of the first. The first then says Iustum; and the other answers Necar; the first Reges. The other answers Impious." (The meaning of which has already been explained.) "The first will then present a small piece of paper folded in a peculiar manner, four times, which the other will cut longitudinally and on opening the name Jesu will be found written upon the head and arms of a cross three times. You will then give and receive with him the following questions and answers:
Question —From whither do you come? Answer — The Holy faith.
Q. —Whom do you serve?
A. —The Holy Father at Rome, the Pope, and the Roman Catholic Church Universal throughout the world.
Q. —Who commands you?
A. —The Successor of St. Ignatius Loyola, the founder of the Society of Jesus or the Soldiers of Jesus Christ.
Q. —Who received you? A. —A venerable man in white hair.
Q. —How?
A. —With a naked dagger, I kneeling upon the cross beneath the banners of the Pope and of our sacred order.
Q. —Did you take an oath?
A. —I did, to destroy heretics and their governments and rulers, and to spare neither age, sex nor condition. To be as a corpse without any opinion or will of my own, but to implicitly obey my Superiors in all things without hesitation of murmuring.
Q. —Will you do that? A. —I will.
Q. —How do you travel? A. —In the bark of Peter the fisherman.
Q. —Whither do you travel? A. —To the four quarters of the globe.
Q. —For what purpose?
A. —To obey the orders of my general and Superiors and execute the will of the Pope and faithfully fulfill the conditions of my oaths.
Q. —Go ye, then, into all the world and take possession of all lands in the name of the Pope. He who will not accept him as the Vicar of Jesus and his Vice-regent on earth, let him be accursed and exterminated."
It is interesting regarding France's Sunday Laws, considering only 5% of Frenchmen own a Bible. More on the Catholic Church; I don't hate Catholics; the following is intended to add to earlier comments as to why Catholic do not see anything wrong with their Church.
http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showkb.php?org_id=867&kb_header_id=826&order=kb_rank%20ASC&kb_id=1496 (http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showkb.php?org_id=867&kb_header_id=826&order=kb_rank%20ASC&kb_id=1496)
http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showtopic.php?org_id=867&kb_header_id=849 (http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showtopic.php?org_id=867&kb_header_id=849)
http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showtopic.php?org_id=867&kb_header_id=850 (http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showtopic.php?org_id=867&kb_header_id=850)
http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showtopic.php?org_id=867&kb_header_id=2181 (http://www.concordatwatch.eu/showtopic.php?org_id=867&kb_header_id=2181)
: johnm Mon Dec 23, 2013 - 00:01:35
It is interesting regarding France's Sunday Laws, considering only 5% of Frenchmen own a Bible. More on the Catholic Church; I don't hate Catholics; the following is intended to add to earlier comments as to why Catholic do not see anything wrong with their Church.
The Black pope: http://www.remnantofgod.org/blackpope.htm (http://www.remnantofgod.org/blackpope.htm)
The Current Pope is a Jesuit.
Below are extracts from this link http://remnantofgod.org/jes-oth.htm#oath (http://remnantofgod.org/jes-oth.htm#oath)
The Jesuit Oath of Induction is also recorded in the Congressional Record of the U.S.A. (House Bill 1523, Contested election case of Eugene C. Bonniwell, against Thos. S. Butler, Feb. 15, 1913, pp. 3215-3216) It can also be found in the book entitled, "Subterranean Rome" by Charles Didier translated from the French and published in New York in 1843. Dr.
~~~~~~
. After reading this, ask yourself the question: Is this REALLY the church of Jesus Christ???
"When a Jesuit of the minor rank is to be elevated to command, he is conducted into the Chapel of the Convent of the Order, where there are only three others present, the principal or Superior standing in front of the altar. On either side stands a monk, one of whom holds a banner of yellow and white, which are the Papal colors, and the other a black banner with a dagger and red cross above a skull and crossbones, with the word INRI, and below them the words IUSTUM, NECAR, REGES, IMPIOUS. The meaning of which is: It is just to exterminate or annihilate impious or heretical Kings, Governments, or Rulers. Upon the floor is a red cross at which the postulant or candidate kneels. The Superior hands him a small black crucifix, which he takes in his left hand and presses to his heart, and the Superior at the same time presents to him a dagger, which he grasps by the blade and holds the point against his heart, the Superior still holding it by the hilt, and thus addresses the postulant:"
Superior speaks:
My son, heretofore you have been taught to act the dissembler: among Roman Catholics to be a Roman Catholic, and to be a spy even among your own brethren; to believe no man, to trust no man. Among the Reformers, to be a reformer; among the Huguenots, to be a Huguenot; among the Calvinists, to be a Calvinist; among other Protestants, generally to be a Protestant, and obtaining their confidence, to seek even to preach from their pulpits, and to denounce with all the vehemence in your nature our Holy Religion and the Pope; and even to descend so low as to become a Jew among Jews, that you might be enabled to gather together all information for the benefit of your Order as a faithful soldier of the Pope.
You have been taught to insidiously plant the seeds of jealousy and hatred between communities, provinces, states that were at peace, and incite them to deeds of blood, involving them in war with each other, and to create revolutions and civil wars in countries that were independent and prosperous, cultivating the arts and the sciences and enjoying the blessings of peace. To take sides with the combatants and to act secretly with your brother Jesuit, who might be engaged on the other side, but openly opposed to that with which you might be connected, only that the Church might be the gainer in the end, in the conditions fixed in the treaties for peace and that the end justifies the means.
You have been taught your duty as a spy, to gather all statistics, facts and information in your power from every source; to ingratiate yourself into the confidence of the family circle of Protestants and heretics of every class and character, as well as that of the merchant, the banker, the lawyer, among the schools and universities, in parliaments and legislatures, and the judiciaries and councils of state, and to be all things to all men, for the Pope's sake, whose servants we are unto death.
You have received all your instructions heretofore as a novice, a neophyte, and have served as co-adjurer, confessor and priest, but you have not yet been invested with all that is necessary to command in the Army of Loyola in the service of the Pope. You must serve the proper time as the instrument and executioner as directed by your superiors; for none can command here who has not consecrated his labors with the blood of the heretic; for "without the shedding of blood no man can be saved." Therefore, to fit yourself for your work and make your own salvation sure, you will, in addition to your former oath of obedience to your order and allegiance to the Pope, repeat after me---
The Extreme Oath of the Jesuits:
~~~~~~~
I do now renounce and disown any allegiance as due to any heretical king, prince or state named Protestants or Liberals, or obedience to any of the laws, magistrates or officers.
I do further declare that the doctrine of the churches of England and Scotland, of the Calvinists, Huguenots and others of the name Protestants or Liberals to be damnable and they themselves damned who will not forsake the same.
I do further declare, that I will help, assist, and advise all or any of his Holiness' agents in any place wherever I shall be, in Switzerland, Germany, Holland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, England, Ireland or America, or in any other Kingdom or territory I shall come to, and do my uttermost to extirpate the heretical Protestants or Liberals' doctrines and to destroy all their pretended powers, regal or otherwise.
~~~~~~~~~~~
I furthermore promise and declare that I will, when opportunity present, make and wage relentless war, secretly or openly, against all heretics, Protestants and Liberals, as I am directed to do, to extirpate and exterminate them from the face of the whole earth; and that I will spare neither age, sex or condition; and that I will hang, waste, boil, flay, strangle and bury alive these infamous heretics, rip up the stomachs and wombs of their women and crush their infants' heads against the walls, in order to annihilate forever their execrable race. That when the same cannot be done openly, I will secretly use the poisoned cup, the strangulating cord, the steel of the poniard or the leaden bullet, regardless of the honor, rank, dignity, or authority of the person or persons, whatever may be their condition in life, either public or private, as I at any time may be directed so to do by any agent of the Pope or Superior of the Brotherhood of the Holy Faith, of the Society of Jesus.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Superior speaks:
"You will now rise to your feet and I will instruct you in the Catechism necessary to make yourself known to any member of the Society of Jesus belonging to this rank.
In the first place, you, as a Brother Jesuit, will with another mutually make the ordinary sign of the cross as any ordinary Roman Catholic would; then one cross his wrists, the palms of his hands open, and the other in answer crosses his feet, one above the other; the first points with forefinger of the right hand to the center of the palm of the left, the other with the forefinger of the left hand points to the center of the palm of the right; the first then with his right hand makes a circle around his head, touching it; the other then with the forefinger of his left hand touches the left side of his body just below his heart; the first then with his right hand draws it across the throat of the other, and the latter then with a dagger down the stomach and abdomen of the first. The first then says Iustum; and the other answers Necar; the first Reges. The other answers Impious." (The meaning of which has already been explained.) "The first will then present a small piece of paper folded in a peculiar manner, four times, which the other will cut longitudinally and on opening the name Jesu will be found written upon the head and arms of a cross three times. You will then give and receive with him the following questions and answers:
Question —From whither do you come? Answer — The Holy faith.
Q. —Whom do you serve?
A. —The Holy Father at Rome, the Pope, and the Roman Catholic Church Universal throughout the world.
Q. —Who commands you?
A. —The Successor of St. Ignatius Loyola, the founder of the Society of Jesus or the Soldiers of Jesus Christ.
Q. —Who received you? A. —A venerable man in white hair.
Q. —How?
A. —With a naked dagger, I kneeling upon the cross beneath the banners of the Pope and of our sacred order.
Q. —Did you take an oath?
A. —I did, to destroy heretics and their governments and rulers, and to spare neither age, sex nor condition. To be as a corpse without any opinion or will of my own, but to implicitly obey my Superiors in all things without hesitation of murmuring.
Q. —Will you do that? A. —I will.
Q. —How do you travel? A. —In the bark of Peter the fisherman.
Q. —Whither do you travel? A. —To the four quarters of the globe.
Q. —For what purpose?
A. —To obey the orders of my general and Superiors and execute the will of the Pope and faithfully fulfill the conditions of my oaths.
Q. —Go ye, then, into all the world and take possession of all lands in the name of the Pope. He who will not accept him as the Vicar of Jesus and his Vice-regent on earth, let him be accursed and exterminated."
I know this is a month old but I have only just come across it.
This is the kind of junk that circulates on the internet and is simply false.
The above is a bit of a mixture. Someone got their lies confused.
The Jesuit Oath of Induction is also recorded in the Congressional Record of the U.S.A. (House Bill 1523, Contested election case of Eugene C. Bonniwell, against Thos. S. Butler, Feb. 15, 1913, pp. 3215-3216)
This is actually referring to the supposed "KOG oath" (Knights of St. Columbus) not the supposed "Jesuit Oath". The Jesuits were not mentioned
It was in the Congressional record because it was part of the documents submitted during the hearing. It was in a document circulated anonymously during a heated election campaign.
Both sides repudiated its authenticity. It was included in a House Report summarizing an investigation of that election, because it was attached to a document submitted by one of the candidates.
The following statement was made by Thomas Butler on behalf of whose campaign someone circulated it.
I have no knowledge of "any man, set of men, political organization, or its representative, employing or procuring messengers to traverse this congressional district and to circulate on my account or on any account the publication which you characterize as a blasphemous and infamous libel, known as Knights of Columbus oath." That this paper was circulated through this congressional district during this campaign I both admit and regret. I deny that I had anything whatever to do, directly or indirectly, with either its publication or its circulation. It came into this district though the mails, I am informed, and as fast as it appeared those who took my advice destroyed it. I am advised by those who know, that the same article was circulated and distributed in other parts of Pennsylvania than this congressional district during the last campaign, and I am further informed that this same article has been circulated not only in Pennsylvania, but in other States during political campaigns for many years. I had no knowledge whatever of it until it appeared here during the last campaign, and from a source I know nothing about. Two or three of my political advocates showed me copies of this paper, which they had received through the mails. I requested them to ascertain where other copies of it had been received and to have all of them destroyed. I apprehended with alarm the use of such a document in a political campaign, or at any other time.
I do not believe in its truthfulness, and so stated my judgment concerning it on November 4, 1912 (as soon as complaint was made to me of its general circulation), through the columns of the West Chester Daily Local News . . .
No sane person could conclude that this constitutes any sort of "authentication" of this document by Congress.
As to the "Jesuit Oath" that is supposed to be in the Library of Congress, it is a fabrication with no factual basis. According to the
Catholic Encyclopedia this oath was the product of the imagination of the forger Robert Ware (mid to late 1600's).
Here's an excerpt from the
Catholic Encyclopedia article "Impostors":
"Robert Ware the forger, the author of "Foxes and Firebrands", who has of late years been so thoroughly exposed by Father Bridgett, traded upon the same prejudices. His more public career began contemporaneously with that of Oates in 1678, and by sheltering himself behind the high reputation of his dead father, Sir James Ware, amongst whose manuscripts he pretended to discover all kinds of compromising papers, he obtained currency for his forgeries, remaining almost undetected until modern times. Many foul aspersions upon the character of individual popes, Jesuits, and other Catholics, and also upon some Puritans, which have found their way into the pages of respectable historians, are due to the fabrications of "this literary skunk", as Fr. Bridgett not unjustifiably calls him (see Bridgett, "Blunders and Forgeries", pp. 209-296).
As to its insertion into the Library of Congress, anyone can put any junk into library on completion of Form TX and a $30 fee.
Form FL 109 explains:
COPYRIGHT REGISTRATION OF BOOKS, MANUSCRIPTS, AND SPEECHES
A published or unpublished book or manuscript may be submitted for registration in the Copyright Office. FormTX should be used to apply for copyright registration for textual works, with or without illustrations. FormTX is appropriate for registration of nondramatic literary works including: fiction, nonfiction, poetry, contributions to collective works, compilations, directories, catalogs, dissertations,
theses, reports, speeches, bound or looseleaf volumes, pamphlets, brochures, and single pages containing text. There is no specific requirement as to the printing, binding, format, or paper size and quality of unpublished manuscript material. Typewritten, photocopied, and legibly handwritten manuscripts, preferably in ink, are all acceptable for deposit.
I think FormTX is being phased out and the registration fee has gone up since the web site I got this information from published it, but the point is any fictional junk can be registered in the Library of Congree on payment of a fee. It says nothing about its authenticity.
Unfortunately these things continue to circulate and are leapt upon by anti-Catholic bigots.
<<Unfortunately these things continue to circulate and are leapt upon by anti-Catholic bigots.>>
What does this make you; a pro-Catholic bigot. I don't know if the oath is authentic; I do know that the oath fiction or otherwise describes Satan and explains what has been going on in the world. Since the Reformation the Papacy has developed skills to defend itself; such as rewriting the history of the inquisitions and the reformation; creating Preterism which has Nero 68AD as the Antichrist and Futurism which puts the Antichrist at the end of time, the seventieth week after a perceived interval of silence; this silence not only erases the sins of the Papacy including the 400 year inquisition in Spain where the Jesuits were brought into existence and play but it also silences the seventieth week of Christ and his work in it. The main charge of the Spanish inquisition was Judaism; that is, the keeping the commandments of God and the Sabbath and were tortured until they accepted Papal authority and Sunday or until death. These are people slaughtered for Christ' name sake and Dispensationalism wants it silenced. Without referring to the people, Dispensationalism is the spearhead of Satan's lie; referring to the people, Dispensationalists are someone useful idiot. I distinguish between the Catholic church (laitan or laity) and the Papacy (nico's) secret societies within secret societies. Any bigotry I have is to the Priesthood and to the doctrine.
: johnm Thu Jan 16, 2014 - 18:51:28
<<Unfortunately these things continue to circulate and are leapt upon by anti-Catholic bigots.>>
What does this make you; a pro-Catholic bigot. I don't know if the oath is authentic; I do know that the oath fiction or otherwise describes Satan and explains what has been going on in the world. Since the Reformation the Papacy has developed skills to defend itself; such as rewriting the history of the inquisitions and the reformation; creating Preterism which has Nero 68AD as the Antichrist and Futurism which puts the Antichrist at the end of time, the seventieth week after a perceived interval of silence; this silence not only erases the sins of the Papacy including the 400 year inquisition in Spain where the Jesuits were brought into existence and play but it also silences the seventieth week of Christ and his work in it. The main charge of the Spanish inquisition was Judaism; that is, the keeping the commandments of God and the Sabbath and were tortured until they accepted Papal authority and Sunday or until death. These are people slaughtered for Christ' name sake and Dispensationalism wants it silenced. Without referring to the people, Dispensationalism is the spearhead of Satan's lie; referring to the people, Dispensationalists are someone useful idiot. I distinguish between the Catholic church (laitan or laity) and the Papacy (nico's) secret societies within secret societies. Any bigotry I have is to the Priesthood and to the doctrine.
I'm someone who likes the truth to be known and not to promote lies.
You say "I don't know if the oath is authentic" but you circulate it. Jesus is the TRUTH. If you continue to circulate lies, not caring whether they are lies or not, what does that say about you?
You say "I do know that the oath fiction or otherwise describes Satan and explains what has been going on in the world." If the oath is fiction then what relevance has it to anything that is gouing on in the world?
You are trying to defend the indefensible - promoting evil lies about the Catholic Church. What does that about your character?
Incidentally I notice that in your diatribe you provide not one fact, no evidence of any kind, to support your opinions.
: winsome Fri Jan 17, 2014 - 02:28:05
: johnm Thu Jan 16, 2014 - 18:51:28
<<Unfortunately these things continue to circulate and are leapt upon by anti-Catholic bigots.>>
What does this make you; a pro-Catholic bigot. I don't know if the oath is authentic; I do know that the oath fiction or otherwise describes Satan and explains what has been going on in the world. Since the Reformation the Papacy has developed skills to defend itself; such as rewriting the history of the inquisitions and the reformation; creating Preterism which has Nero 68AD as the Antichrist and Futurism which puts the Antichrist at the end of time, the seventieth week after a perceived interval of silence; this silence not only erases the sins of the Papacy including the 400 year inquisition in Spain where the Jesuits were brought into existence and play but it also silences the seventieth week of Christ and his work in it. The main charge of the Spanish inquisition was Judaism; that is, the keeping the commandments of God and the Sabbath and were tortured until they accepted Papal authority and Sunday or until death. These are people slaughtered for Christ' name sake and Dispensationalism wants it silenced. Without referring to the people, Dispensationalism is the spearhead of Satan's lie; referring to the people, Dispensationalists are someone useful idiot. I distinguish between the Catholic church (laitan or laity) and the Papacy (nico's) secret societies within secret societies. Any bigotry I have is to the Priesthood and to the doctrine.
I'm someone who likes the truth to be known and not to promote lies.
You say "I don't know if the oath is authentic" but you circulate it. Jesus is the TRUTH. If you continue to circulate lies, not caring whether they are lies or not, what does that say about you?
You say "I do know that the oath fiction or otherwise describes Satan and explains what has been going on in the world." If the oath is fiction then what relevance has it to anything that is gouing on in the world?
You are trying to defend the indefensible - promoting evil lies about the Catholic Church. What does that about your character?
Incidentally I notice that in your diatribe you provide not one fact, no evidence of any kind, to support your opinions.
I think his point and theory is that, there is no telling if the info you provided refuting the Jesuit oath is not in fact Roman Catholic revisionist history, since the said church has proved itself to go to any lengths to destroy, manipulate, and revise all negative history about itself that it can. Deny the authenticity of the said oath if you wish, but you know as well as I do, that I could begin to give one testimony after another after another after another of the actual deeds of Jesuits throughout history which prove the truthfulness of the oath supplied regardless of your claims. There is a reason the Jesuits were banned from so many countries so many times, even predominantly Catholic countries.
: Amo Fri Jan 17, 2014 - 04:58:28
: winsome Fri Jan 17, 2014 - 02:28:05
: johnm Thu Jan 16, 2014 - 18:51:28
<<Unfortunately these things continue to circulate and are leapt upon by anti-Catholic bigots.>>
What does this make you; a pro-Catholic bigot. I don't know if the oath is authentic; I do know that the oath fiction or otherwise describes Satan and explains what has been going on in the world. Since the Reformation the Papacy has developed skills to defend itself; such as rewriting the history of the inquisitions and the reformation; creating Preterism which has Nero 68AD as the Antichrist and Futurism which puts the Antichrist at the end of time, the seventieth week after a perceived interval of silence; this silence not only erases the sins of the Papacy including the 400 year inquisition in Spain where the Jesuits were brought into existence and play but it also silences the seventieth week of Christ and his work in it. The main charge of the Spanish inquisition was Judaism; that is, the keeping the commandments of God and the Sabbath and were tortured until they accepted Papal authority and Sunday or until death. These are people slaughtered for Christ' name sake and Dispensationalism wants it silenced. Without referring to the people, Dispensationalism is the spearhead of Satan's lie; referring to the people, Dispensationalists are someone useful idiot. I distinguish between the Catholic church (laitan or laity) and the Papacy (nico's) secret societies within secret societies. Any bigotry I have is to the Priesthood and to the doctrine.
I'm someone who likes the truth to be known and not to promote lies.
You say "I don't know if the oath is authentic" but you circulate it. Jesus is the TRUTH. If you continue to circulate lies, not caring whether they are lies or not, what does that say about you?
You say "I do know that the oath fiction or otherwise describes Satan and explains what has been going on in the world." If the oath is fiction then what relevance has it to anything that is gouing on in the world?
You are trying to defend the indefensible - promoting evil lies about the Catholic Church. What does that about your character?
Incidentally I notice that in your diatribe you provide not one fact, no evidence of any kind, to support your opinions.
I think his point and theory is that, there is no telling if the info you provided refuting the Jesuit oath is not in fact Roman Catholic revisionist history, since the said church has proved itself to go to any lengths to destroy, manipulate, and revise all negative history about itself that it can. Deny the authenticity of the said oath if you wish, but you know as well as I do, that I could begin to give one testimony after another after another after another of the actual deeds of Jesuits throughout history which prove the truthfulness of the oath supplied regardless of your claims. There is a reason the Jesuits were banned from so many countries so many times, even predominantly Catholic countries.
The citation is given by johnm:
The Jesuit Oath of Induction is also recorded in the Congressional Record of the U.S.A. (House Bill 1523, Contested election case of Eugene C. Bonniwell, against Thos. S. Butler, Feb. 15, 1913, pp. 3215-3216)You can look it up. Apparently it should be available in any law school library.
You can also look up, in the Congressional Record, this statement by the Committe of Elections:
This committee cannot condemn too strongly the publication of the false and libelous article referred to in the paper of Mr. Bonniwell, and which was the spurious Knights of Columbus oath, a copy of which is appended to the paper. (H.R. Rep. No. 62-1523 (1913), reprinted in the Congressional Record for February 15, 1913, at p. 3221)
The citation is given by johnm:
The Jesuit Oath of Induction is also recorded in the Congressional Record of the U.S.A. (House Bill 1523, Contested election case of Eugene C. Bonniwell, against Thos. S. Butler, Feb. 15, 1913, pp. 3215-3216)
You can look it up. Apparently it should be available in any law school library.
You can also look up, in the Congressional Record, this statement by the Committe of Elections:
This committee cannot condemn too strongly the publication of the false and libelous article referred to in the paper of Mr. Bonniwell, and which was the spurious Knights of Columbus oath, a copy of which is appended to the paper. (H.R. Rep. No. 62-1523 (1913), reprinted in the Congressional Record for February 15, 1913, at p. 3221)
Time allowing, I will look into the matter. Apart from this though, the following testimonies are highly suggestive that even if the said oath is not authentic, the intent and liberties granted the Jesuits within the same concerning the end justifying the means, are certainly tenable and applicable. I will start a new topic concerning the following testimony also, since this subject is getting somewhat off topic for this thread.
Wherever the Jesuits have planted missions, opened seminaries, and established colleges, they have been careful to inculcate these principles in the minds of the youth; thus sowing the seeds of future tumults, revolutions, regicides, and wars. These evil fruits have appeared sometimes sooner, sometimes later, but they have never failed to show themselves, to the grief of nations and the dismay of kings. John Chatel, who attempted the life of Henry IV., had studied in the College of Clermont, in which the Jesuit Guignard was Professor of Divinity. In the chamber of the would-be regicide, a manuscript of Guignard was found, in which, besides other dangerous articles, that Father approved not only of the assassination of Henry III. by Clement, but also maintained that the same thing ought to be attempted against le Bearnois, as he called Henry IV., which occasioned the first banishment of the order out of France, as a society detestable and diabolical. The sentence of the Parliament, passed in 1594, ordained "that all the priests and scholars of the College of
Clermont, and others calling themselves the Society of Jesus, as being corrupters of youth, disturbers of the public peace, and enemies of the king and State, should depart in three days from their house and college, and in fifteen days out of the whole kingdom."
But why should we dwell on these written proofs of the disloyal and murderous principles of the Jesuits, when their acted deeds bear still more emphatic testimony to the true nature and effects of their principles? We have only to look around, and on every hand the melancholy monuments of these doctrines meet our afflicted sight. To what country of Europe shall we turn where we are not able to track the Jesuit by his bloody footprints? What page of modern history shall we open and not read fresh proofs that the Papal doctrine of killing excommunicated kings was not meant to slumber in forgotten tomes, but to be acted out in the living world?
We see Henry III. falling by their dagger. Henry IV. perishes by the same consecrated weapon. The King of Portugal dies by their order.
The great Prince of Orange is dispatched by their agent, shot down at the door of his own dining-room. How many assassins they sent to England to murder Elizabeth, history attests. That she escaped their machinations is one of the marvels of history. Nor is it only the palaces of monarchs into which they have crept with their doctrines of murder and assassination; the very sanctuary of their own Popes they have defiled with blood. We behold Clement XIV. signing the order for the banishment of the Jesuits, and soon thereafter he is overtaken by their vengeance, and dies by poison. In the Gunpowder Plot we see them deliberately planning to destroy at
one blow the nobility and gentry of England. To them we owe those civil wars which for so many years drenched with blood the fair provinces of France. They laid the train of that crowning horror, the St. Bartholomew massacre. Philip II. and the Jesuits share between them the guilt of the "Invincible Armada," which, instead of inflicting the measureless ruin and havoc which its authors intended, by a most merciful Providence became the means of exhausting the treasures and overthrowing the prestige of Spain. What a harvest of plots, tumults, seditions, revolutions, torturings, poisonings, assassinations, regicides, and massacres has Christendom reaped from the seed sown by the Jesuits! Nor can we be sure that we have yet seen the last and greatest of their crimes.(THE HISTORY OF
PROTESTANTISM,VOL. 2, by Rev. J. A. Wylie BOOK 15, THE JESUITS., CHAPTER 5 THE JESUIT TEACHING ON REGICIDE, MURDER, LYING, THEFT, ETC., pgs. 665&666)
THE HISTORY OF
PROTESTANTISM
VOL. 2 by Rev. J. A. Wylie
THE JESUITS.
CHAPTER 9.
COMMERCIAL ENTERPRISES AND BANISHMENTS.
(Emphasis mine)
OF the entrance of the Jesuits into England, the arts they employed, the
disguises they wore, the seditions they sowed, the snares they laid for the
life of the sovereign, and the plots they concocted for the overthrow of the
Protestant Church, we shall have an opportunity of speaking when we
come to narrate the history of Protestantism in Great Britain. Meanwhiie,
we consider their career in Poland.
Cardinal Hosius opened the gates of this country to the Jesuits. Till then
Poland was a flourishing country, united at home and powerful abroad. Its
literature and science during the half-century preceding had risen to an
eminence that placed Poland on a par with the most enlightened countries
of Christendom. It enjoyed a measure of toleration which was then
unknown to most of the nations of Europe. Foreign Protestants fled to it
as a refuge from the persecution to which they were exposed in their
native land, bringing to their adopted country their skill, their wealth, and
their energy. Its trade increased, and its towns grew in population and
riches. Italian, German, French, and Scottish Protestant congregations
existed at Cracow, Vilna, and Posnania. Such was Poland before the foot
of Jesuit had touched its soil.
But from the hour that the disciples of Loyola entered the country Poland
began to decline. The Jesuits became supreme at court; the monarch
Sigismund III, gave himself entirely up to their guidance; no one could
hope to rise in the State who did not pay court to them; the education of
youth was wholly in their hands, and the effects became speedily visible
in the decay of literature,2 and the growing decrepitude of the national
mind. At home the popular liberties were attacked in the persons of the
Protestants, and abroad the nation was humiliated by a foreign policy
inspired by the Jesuits, which drew upon the country the contempt and
hostility of neighboring powers. These evil courses of intrigue and faction
within the country, and impotent and arrogant policy outside of it, were
persisted in till the natural issue was reached in the partition of Poland. It
is at the door of the Jesuits that the fall of that once-enlightened,
prosperous, and powerful nation is to be laid.
It concerns us less to follow the Jesuits into those countries which lie
beyond the boundaries of Christendom, unless in so far as their doings in
these regions may help to throw light on their principles and tactics. In
following their steps among heathen nations and savage races, it is alike
impossible to withhold our admiration of their burning zeal and intrepid
courage, or our wonder at their prodigiously rapid success. No sooner had
the Jesuit missionary set foot on a new shore, or preached, by an
interpreter it might be, his first sermon in a heathen city, than his converts
were to be counted in tens of thousands. Speaking of their missions in
India, Sacchinus, their historian, says that "ten thousand men were
baptized in the space of one year." When the Jesuit mission to the East
Indies was set on foot in 1559, Torrez procured royal letters to the
Portuguese viceroys and governors, empowering them to lend their
assistance to the missionaries for the conversion of the Indians. This
shortened the process wonderfully. All that had to be done was to
ascertain the place where the natives were assembled for some religious
festival, and surround them with a troop of soldiers, who, with leveled
muskets, offered them the alternative of baptism. The rite followed
immediately upon the acceptance of the alternative; and next day the
baptized were taught the sign of the cross. In this excellent and summary
way was the evangelization of the island of Goa effected!
By similar methods did they attempt to plant the Popish faith and
establish their own dominion in Abyssinia, and also at Mozambique
(1560) on the opposite coast of Africa. One of the pioneers, Oviedo, who
had entered Ethiopia, wrote thus to the Pope:—"He must be permitted to
inform his Holiness that, with the assistance of 500 or 600 Portuguese
soldiers, he could at any time reduce the Empire of Abyssinia to the
obedience of the Pontificate; and when he considered that it was a country
surrounded with territories abounding with the finest gold, and promising a
rich harvest of souls to the Church, he trusted his Holiness would give the
matter further consideration."5 The Emperor of Ethiopia was gained by
flatteries and miracles; a terrible persecution was raised against the native
Christians; thousands were massacred; but at last, the king having detected
the authors of these barbarities plotting against his own life and throne,
they were ignominiously expelled the country.
Having secured the territory of Paraguay, a Portuguese possession in
South America, the Jesuits founded a kingdom there, and became its
sovereigns. They treated the natives at first with kindness, and taught
them several useful arts, but by-and-by they changed their policy, and,
reducing them to slavery, compelled them to labor for their benefit.
Dealing out to the Paraguayan peasant from the produce of his own toil as
much as would suffice to feed and clothe him, the Fathers laid up the rest
in large storehouses, which they had erected for the purpose. They kept
carefully concealed from the knowledge of Europe this seemingly
exhaustless source of wealth, that no one else might share its sweets. They
continued all the while to draw from it those vast sums wherewith they
carried on their machinations in the Old World. With the gold wrung from
the Paraguayan peasants' toil they hired spies, bribed courtiers, opened
new missions, and maintained that pomp and splendor of their
establishments by which the populace were dazzled.
Their establishments in Brazil formed the basis of a great and enriching
trade, of which Santa Fe and Buenos Ayres were the chief depots. But the
most noted episode of this kind in their history is that of Father Lavalette
(1756). He was Visitor-General and Apostolic Prefect of their Missions in
the West Indies. "He organized offices in St. Domingo, Granada, St. Lucia,
St. Vincent, and other islands, and drew bills of exchange on Paris, London,
Bordeaux, Nantes, Lyons, Cadiz, Leghorn, and Amsterdam." His vessels,
loaded with riches, comprising, besides colonial produce, negro slaves,
"crossed the sea continually."7 Trading on credit, they professed to give
the property of the society as security. Their methods of business were
abnormal. Treaties obeyed by other merchants they disregarded.
Neutrality laws were nothing to them. They hired ships which were used
as traders or privateers, as suited them, and sailed under whatever flag was
convenient. At last, however, came trouble to these Fathers, who were
making, as the phrase is, "the best of both worlds." The Brothers Lioncy
and Gouffre, of Marseilles, had accepted their bills for a million and a half
of livres, to cover which two vessels had been dispatched for Martinique
with merchandise to the value of two millions, unfortunately for the
Fathers, the ships were captured at sea by the English.
The house of Lioncy and Gouffre asked the superior of the Jesuits in
Marseilles for four thousand livres, as part payment of their debt, to save
them from bankruptcy. The Father replied that the society was not
answerable, but he offered the Brothers Lioncy and Gouffre the aid of
their prayers, fortified by the masses which they were about to say for
them. The masses would not fill the coffers which the Jesuits had emptied,
and accordingly the merchants appealed to Parliament craving a decree for
payment of the debt. The appeal was allowed, and the Jesuits were
condemned to honor the bills drawn by their agent. At this critical moment
the General of the society died: delay was inevitable: the new General sent
all the funds he could raise; but before these supplies could reach
Marseilles, Lioncy and Gouffre had become bankrupt, involving in their
misfortune their connections in all parts of France.
Now that the ruin had come and publicity was inevitable, the Jesuits
refused to pay the debt, pleading that they were protected from the claims
of their creditors by their Constitutions. The cause now came to a public
hearing. After several pleas had been advanced and abandoned, the Jesuits
took their final stand on the argument which, in an evil hour for
themselves, they had put forth at first in their defense. Their rules, they
said, forbade them to trade; and the fault of individual members could not
be punished upon the Order: they were shielded by their Constitutions.
The Parliament ordered these documents to be produced. They had been
kept secret till now. They were laid before Parliament on the 16th of
April, 1761. The result was disastrous for the Jesuits. They lost their
cause, and became much more odious than before. The disclosure revealed
Jesuitism to men as an organization based on the most iniquitous maxims,
and armed with the most terrible weapons for the accomplishment of their
object, which was to plant their own supremacy on the ruin of society.
The Constitutions were one of the principal grounds of the decree for the
extinction of the order in France, in 1762.
That political kingdoms and civil communities should feel the Order a
burden too heavy to be borne, is not to be wondered at when we reflect
that even the Popes, of whose throne it was the pillar, have repeatedly
decreed its extinction. Strange as it may seem, the first bolt in later times
that fell on the Jesuits was launched by the hand of Rome. Benedict IV, by
a bull issued in 1741, prohibited them from engaging in trade and making
slaves of the Indians. In 1759, Portugal, finding itself on the brink of ruin
by their intrigues, shook them off. This example was soon followed in
France, as we have already narrated. Even in Spain, with all its devotion to
the Papal See, all the Jesuit establishments were surrounded, one night in
1767, with troops, and the whole fraternity, amounting to 7,000, were
caught and shipped off to Italy. Immediately thereafter a similar expulsion
befell them in South America. Naples, Malta, and Parma were the next to
drive them from their soil. The severest blow was yet to come. Clement
XIII, hitherto their firm friend, yielding at last to the unanimous demands
of all the Roman Catholic courts, summoned a secret conclave for the
suppression of the Order: "a step necessary," said the brief of his
successor, "in order to prevent Christians rising one against another, and
massacring one another in the very bosom of our common mother the
Holy Church." Clement died suddenly the very evening before the day
appointed for the conclave. Lorenzo Ganganelli was elevated to the vacant
chair under the title of Clement XIV. Ganganelli was studious, learned, of
pure morals, and of genuine piety. From the schoolmen he turned to the
Fathers, forsaking the Fathers he gave himself to the study of the Holy
Scriptures, where he learned on what Rock to fix the anchor of his faith.
Clement XIV strove for several years, with honest but mistaken zeal, to
reform the Order. His-efforts were fruitless. On the 21st of July, 1773, he
issued the famous bull, "Dominus ac Redemptor noster," By which he
"dissolved and for ever annihilated the Order as a corporate body," at a
moment when it counted 22,000 members.
The bull justifies itself by a long and formidable list of charges against the
Jesuits. Had this accusation proceeded from a Protestant pen it might have
been regarded as not free from exaggeration, but coming from the Papal
chair it must be accepted as the sober truth. The bull of Clement charged
them with raising various insurrections and rebellions, with plotting
against bishops, undermining the regnlar monastic orders, and invading
pious foundations and corporations of every sort, not only in Europe, but
in Asia and America, to the danger of souls and the astonishment of all
nations. It charged them with engaging in trade, and that, instead of seeking
to convert the heathen, they had shown themselves intent only on
gathering gold and silver and precious jewels. They had interpolated pagan
rites and manners with Christian beliefs and worship: they had set aside
the ordinances of the Church, and substituted opinions which the
apostolic chair had pronounced fundamentally erroneous and evidently
subversive of good morals. Tumults, disturbances, violences, had followed
them in all countries. In fine, they had broken the peace of the Church, and
so incurably that the Pontificates of his predecessors, Urban VIII,
Clements IX, X, XI, and XII, Alexanders VII and VIII, Innocents X, XI,
XII, and XIII, and Benedict XIV, had been passed in abortive attempts to
re-establish the harmony and concord which they had destroyed. It was
now seen that the peace of the Church would never be restored while the
Order existed, and hence the necessity of the bull which dispossessed the
Jesuits of "every office, service, and administration;" took away from
them "their houses, schools, hospitals, estates; " withdrew "all their
statutes, usuages, decrees, customs, and ordinances;" and pronounced "all
the power of the General, Provincial, Visitors, and every other head of the
same Order, whether spiritual or secular, to be for ever annulled and
suppressed." "The present ordinance," said the bull, in conclusion, "shall
remain in full force and operation from henceforth and for ever."
Nothing but the most tremendous necessity could have made Clement XIV
issue this bull. He knew well how unforgiving was the pride and how
deadly the vengeance of the Society, and he did not conceal from himself
the penalty he should have to pay for decreeing its suppression. On laying
down his pen, after having put his name to the bull, he said to those
around him that he had subscribed his death-warrant. The Pope was at
that time in robust health, and his vigorous constitution and temperate
habits promised a long life. But now dark rumors began to be whispered in
Italy that the Pontiff would die soon. In April of the following year he
began to decline without any apparent cause: his illness increased: no
medicine was of any avail: and after lingering in torture for months, he
died, September 22nd, 1774. "Several days before his death," says
Caraccioli, "his bones were exfoliated and withered like a tree which,
attacked at its roots, withers away and throws off its bark. The scientific
men who were called in to embalm his body found the features livid, the
lips black, the abdomen inflated, the limbs emaciated, and covered with
violet spots. The size of the head was diminished, and all the muscles were
shrunk up, and the spine was decomposed. They filled the body with
perfumed and aromatic substances, but nothing could dispel the mephitic
effluvia."
The suppression with which Clement XIV smote the Society of Jesus was
eternal; but the "forever" of the bull lasted only in actual deed during the
brief interval that elapsed between 1773 and 1814. That short period was
filled up with the awful tempest of the French Revolution—to the fallen
thrones and desecrated altars of which the Jesuits pointed as the
monuments of the Divine anger at the suppression of their Order. Despite
the bull of Clement, the Jesuits had neither ceased to exist nor ceased to
act. Amid the storms that shook the world they were energetically active.
In revolutionary conventions and clubs, in war-councils and committees,
on battle-fields they were present, guiding with unseen but powerful touch
the course of affairs. Their maxim is, if despotisms will not serve them, to
demoralize society and render government impossible, and from chaos to
remodel the world anew. Thus the Society of Jesus, which had gone out of
existence before the Revolution, as men believed, started up in full force
the moment after, prepared to enter on the work of moulding and ruling
the nations which had been chastised but not enlightened. Scarcely had
Pins VII returned to the Vatican, when, by a bull dated August 7th, 1814,
he restored the Order of Jesus. Thaddeus Borzodzowsky was placed at
their head. Once more the brotherhood stalked abroad in their black
birettas. In no long time their colleges, seminaries, and novitiates began to
flourish in all the countries of Europe, Ireland and England not excepted.
Their numbers, swelled by the sodalities of "St. Vincent de Paul,"
"Brothers of the Christian Doctrine," and other societies affiliated with the
order, became greater, perhaps, than they ever were at any former period.
And their importance was vastly enhanced by the fact that the contest
between the "Order" and the "Papal Chair" ended—temporarily, at any
rate—in the enslavement of the Popedom, of which they inspired the
policy, indited the decrees, and wielded the power.
Amo,
I'm not interested in your long cut and paste's about Jesuits.
The issue I was addressing was the fictititious "Jesuit Oath"
: winsome Sat Jan 18, 2014 - 10:26:32
Amo,
I'm not interested in your long cut and paste's about Jesuits.
The issue I was addressing was the fictititious "Jesuit Oath"
Nor am I interested in whether or not you are interested in the truth about the Jesuit institution. While it would of course be in your interest to deny any truth to or about the oath, again, the facts of history paint a picture more in tune with supporting the authenticity of the oath, than denying the same.
: Amo Sat Jan 18, 2014 - 13:28:40
: winsome Sat Jan 18, 2014 - 10:26:32
Amo,
I'm not interested in your long cut and paste's about Jesuits.
The issue I was addressing was the fictititious "Jesuit Oath"
Nor am I interested in whether or not you are interested in the truth about the Jesuit institution. While it would of course be in your interest to deny any truth to or about the oath, again, the facts of history paint a picture more in tune with supporting the authenticity of the oath, than denying the same.
I think you are referring, not to the facts of history, but to the bigoted opinions of anti-Catholic Protestants.
: winsome Sat Jan 18, 2014 - 14:19:20
: Amo Sat Jan 18, 2014 - 13:28:40
: winsome Sat Jan 18, 2014 - 10:26:32
Amo,
I'm not interested in your long cut and paste's about Jesuits.
The issue I was addressing was the fictititious "Jesuit Oath"
Nor am I interested in whether or not you are interested in the truth about the Jesuit institution. While it would of course be in your interest to deny any truth to or about the oath, again, the facts of history paint a picture more in tune with supporting the authenticity of the oath, than denying the same.
I think you are referring, not to the facts of history, but to the bigoted opinions of anti-Catholic Protestants.
What is all history that points out the negative facts of the same in relation to the Roman Catholic church to a Roman Catholic, but bigoted opinion?
<<I think you are referring, not to the facts of history, but to the bigoted opinions of anti-Catholic Protestants>>
To be fair most Catholics are born into their situation, as are most other people. A bigot isn't necessarily wrong but merely one eyed, lopsided, and gives his foe no quarter. Statistically most people are more wrong than they are more right.
Realistically, we need to take long look at what is wrong with the Catholic Church, in respect to Sabbath, Sunday and Legalism. It is a legal matter changing the Sabbath to Sunday.
Changing the fourth commandment Sabbath to Sunday requires enormous authority; even Jesus could not change the Law; not without destroying everything that had been established by the Law including His own authority. Even though people are keeping Sunday, even the Presbyterians, the Law, the fourth commandment is unchanged; Sunday law is the law of the Papacy not of God.
Daniel 7:25 (KJV)
25 And he shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time.
The Catholic Church freely acknowledges there is no scriptural authority for Sunday only the authority of the Church.
The authority and identity of the Roman Church stems from the wrongful interpretation of Matt 16:18; Jesus is the rock upon which the church is built, not Peter, as the few earlier verses show.
Paul established the Roman Church and the only time Paul refers to Peter is in Galatians; no church has the authority to make decisions on behalf of God or in place of God.
Quote,
Below is an actual document given to Catholics to carry into the confessional as a guide to "repentance." It was forwarded to me by a friend of the ministry from the Catholic Dispatch Internet Apostolate. Notice how they have AGAIN re-written the Ten Commandments so as to glorify themselves as well as the flesh instead of the Lord Jesus Christ. My Biblical comments below are in Bold.
Before going further understand this. The Ten Commandments of the Bible total 295 words in length. However, the Roman Catholic ten commandments are a total of only 77 words. This is an open attempt to change the Law of God, regardless of the fact that Jesus Christ Himself declared in Matthew 5:18, "For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law..." The Catholic church has removed 218 jots and tittles from the Law of God just as Daniel stated they would in Daniel 7:25
Here is an "examination of conscience" - a guide for CHILDREN to be used before receiving the Sacrament of Penance. It can be carried into Church; or the parish priest may decide to make copies and have them available for the parish children to be used when they go to Confession.
[You should have already received the "Examination of Conscience for Adults".]
EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE FOR CHILDREN
Prayer before Beginning
O MY SAVIOUR JESUS! I COME TO CONFESS MY SINS AND TO BEG YOUR FORGIVENESS
IN THE HOLY SACRAMENT OF PENANCE. HELP ME TO REMEMBER MY SINS AND TO
CONFESS THEM CAREFULLY. O MARY, MY HEAVENLY MOTHER, PRAY FOR ME THAT I MAY
MAKE A GOOD CONFESSION! MY DEAR GUARDIAN ANGEL, HELP ME TO RECALL EVERY
SIN SINCE MY LAST WORTHY CONFESSION.
Examination of Conscience
- HOW LONG HAS IT BEEN SINCE MY LAST GOOD CONFESSION?
- DID I HIDE ANY SIN FROM THE PRIEST?
- DID I DO THE PENANCE THE PRIEST GAVE ME?
1st Commandment
- HAVE I REFUSED TO BELIEVE ANYTHING WHICH THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH TEACHES? WHAT WAS IT?
- HAVE I FAILED TO LEARN MY CATECHISM: THE APOSTLES CREED? THE TEN COMMANDMENTS? THE SEVEN SACRAMENTS? MY PRAYERS?
- HAVE I FAILED TO STUDY MY CATECHISM AS I SHOULD?
NOTICE: This commandment has been re-written in such a way that it has placed the glory of God Himself upon the Church of Rome instead. The first Commandment deals with our belief in God Almighty as our one and only God. It states plainly in Exodus 20:2-3, "I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before me."
2nd Commandment
- HAVE I TAKEN THE HOLY NAME OF GOD IN VAIN? HOW MANY TIMES?
- HAVE I SPOKEN DISRESPECTFULLY OF PRIEST? OR HOLY THINGS? HOW MANY TIMES?
- HAVE I USED OTHER BAD LANGUAGE? HOW MANY TIMES?
NOTICE: This is NOT the "real" 2nd Commandment of the Christian God. For it is written in Exodus 20:4-6, "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments."
They removed it simply because it is common practice to BOW DOWN before graven images in ALL Catholic churches. This is a Babylonian ritual of Sun worship that they refuse to remove simply because this church is in fact the WHORE OF BABYLON. It cannot go against its own grain.
3rd Commandment
- HAVE I MISSED MASS ON SUNDAY THROUGH MY OWN FAULT? HOW MANY TIMES?
- HAVE I MISBEHAVED IN CHURCH? HOW MANY TIMES?
- HAVE I PAID NO ATTENTION TO MY PRAYERS?
NOTICE: Not only is this and ALL the following commandments in the incorrect Biblical order due to the fact the Roman Catholic church REMOVED the 2nd Commandment. And besides the fact that Daniel told us in Daniel 7:25 that the BEAST would in fact "try" to change the Law of God as well as the "times." This commandment of the Roman Catholic church is placing the Biblical 7th day Sabbath on the Un-Biblical 1st day of the Pagan day of worship for the Babylonian Sun gOD Mithra.
4th Commandment
- HAVE I BEEN DISOBEDIENT OR DISRESPECTFUL TO MY PARENTS OR TEACHERS? HOW
MANY TIMES?
- HAVE I TRIED TO PROVOKE THEM? HOW MANY TIMES?
NOTICE:The real "5th" (they changed the order) commandment reads... Exodus 20:12, "Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee."
Do you see anything in there about TEACHERS? Why do you suppose they want you to OBEY TEACHERS? Have you been to the ungodlike Catholic schools as well as public schools lately? have you seen what they teach? Understand now?
NOTICE NO SABBATH COMMANDMENT.
Above Catholic documentation was supplied by:
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Reprint our original work freely with above information
A few points
1.
We have not changed the order of the commandments, or left one out
There is no numbering in scripture. Numbering is a "tradition of men".
Catholics and Lutherans number them in one way.
Orthodox and Protestants (except Lutherans) number them in a different way.
2.
The Catholic Church has not moved the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday. The Sabbath remains Saturday.
3.
When you give what you think is Catholic teaching can you quote from official Catholic sources. SDA's seem to love to quote from various unofficial periodicals, individuals etc.
If you look at the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which is an official source for Catholic teaching you will find all the Ten Commandments listed and discussed.
4.
Legally the Ten Commandments, along with the whole of the Jewish Law:
a) was never applicable to Gentiles
b) was legally abrogated by Christ's death on the cross.
If you want to discuss any of these points I am happy to do that if you:
a) use official Catholic sources (where available)
b) leave off the negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church
: winsome Tue Jan 28, 2014 - 06:01:40
We have not changed the order of the commandments, or left one out
There is no numbering in scripture. Numbering is a "tradition of men".
Catholics and Lutherans number them in one way.
Orthodox and Protestants (except Lutherans) number them in a different way.
Here is a grid showing how the commands are broken down by number:
http://www.thetencommandmentslist.com/ (http://www.thetencommandmentslist.com/)
Dave you are a skilled apologist, so skilled has apologetics become there should be a place for it in the Olympic Games; tuning a lie into a perceived truth, neutralising the truth by confusion; for the last ten years I have been watching politicians do this. What the Catholic teaches seems to variy from person to person and from time to time.
<<A few points
1.
We have not changed the order of the commandments, or left one out
There is no numbering in scripture. Numbering is a "tradition of men".
Catholics and Lutherans number them in one way.
Orthodox and Protestants (except Lutherans) number them in a different way.>>
The order may not be that important so long as the first four are kept together as well as the last six. But I am not going to be the one to suggest God ordered them in vain. The wording of the Ten Commandments was engraved on stone, but we do not know what that was; when Moses listed them three times the wording each time was different but the meaning and the order was unchanged.
<<2.
The Catholic Church has not moved the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday. The Sabbath remains Saturday.>>
This reminds me of the old proverb, "You can have your cake and eat it also."This is both a truth and a lie. It is true the Law of God cannot be changed, but it is also true that Sunday is the day of rest for most people including Atheists and Muslims. Changing the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday is the Papacy's greatest claim to fame; it has been cited by the Papacy as proof of the Papacy's divine authority.
•The word of Rome says:
"The Pope has the power to change times, to abrogate laws, and to dispense with all things, even the precepts of Christ." "The Pope has the authority and often exercised it, to dispense with the command of Christ." -Decretal, de Tranlatic Episcop. Cap. (The Pope can modify divine law.) Ferraris' Ecclesiastical Dictionary.
Letter from the Roman Catholic Church
We all like to receive mail. Here is a letter from the Roman Catholic Church, originally published in America in 1869. The message was written to Protestants and is forceful and to the point, with lots of Scriptural proofs for its position.
I am going to propose a very plain and serious question to those who follow "the Bible and the Bible only" to give their most earnest attention. It is this: Why do you not keep holy the Sabbath Day?
The command of Almighty God stands clearly written in the Bible in these words: "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work" (Exodus xx. 8-10). And again, "Six days shall work be done; but on the seventh day there shall be unto you an holy day, a Sabbath of rest to the Lord; whosover doeth work therein shall be put to death" (Exodus xxxv. 2, 3).
How strict and precise is God's commandment upon this head! [in this matter!] No work whatever was to be done on the day which He had chosen to set apart for Himself and to make holy. And, accordingly, when the children of Israel "found a man that gathered sticks upon the Sabbath day," "the Lord said unto Moses, The man shall surely be put to death; all the congregation shall stone him with stones without the camp" (Numbers xv. 32, 35). Such being God's command, then I ask again: Why do you not obey it? Why do you not keep holy the Sabbath day?
You will answer me, perhaps, that you do keep holy the Sabbath day; for that you abstain from all worldly business and diligently go to church, and say your prayers, and read your Bible at home, every Sunday of your lives.
But Sunday is not the Sabbath day. Sunday is the first day of the week; the Sabbath day is the seventh day of the week. Almighty God did not give a commandment that men should keep holy one day in seven; but He named His own day, and said distinctly: 'Thou shalt keep holy the seventh day,' and He assigned a reason for choosing this day rather than any other—a reason which belongs only to the seventh day of the week, and cannot be applied to the rest. He says "For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it" [Exodus xx. 11].
Almighty God ordered that all men should rest from their labor on the seventh day, because He too had rested on that day; He did not rest on Sunday, but on Saturday. On Sunday, which is the first day of the week, He began the work of creation, He did not finish it [then]; it was on Saturday that He "ended His work which He had made; and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made" (Genesis ii. 2). Nothing can be more plain and easy to understand than all this; and there is nobody who attempts to deny it; it is acknowledged by everybody that the day which Almighty God appointed to be kept holy was Saturday, not Sunday. Why do you then keep holy the Sunday, and not Saturday?
You will tell me that Saturday was the Jewish Sabbath [God gave the Bible Sabbath to mankind 2,000 years before the first Jew existed], but that the Christian Sabbath has been changed to Sunday; changed! but by whom? Who has authority to change an express commandment of Almighty God? When God has spoken and said, Thou shalt keep holy the seventh day, who shall dare to say, Nay, thou mayest work and do all manner of worldly business on the seventh day; but thou shalt keep holy the first day in its stead? This is a most important question, which I know not how you can answer.
You are a Protestant, and you profess to go by the Bible and Bible only; and yet in so important a matter as the observance of one day in seven as a holy day, you go against the plain letter of the Bible, and put another day in the place of that day which the Bible has commanded. The command to keep holy the seventh day is one of the Ten Commandments. You believe that the other nine are still binding; but who gave you authority to tamper with the fourth? If you are consistent with your own principles, if you really follow the Bible and the Bible only, you ought to be able to produce some portion of the New Testament in which this fourth commandment is expressly altered.
Let us see whether any such passages can be found. I will look for them in the writings of your own [Protestant] champions, who have attempted to defend your practice in this matter.
1. The first text which I find quoted upon the subject is this: "Let no man judge you in respect of an holy day, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days" (Colossians ii. 16). [That refers to the ceremonial—sacrificial—yearly sabbaths of Leviticus 23, which were done away at the cross.] I could understand a Bible Christian imagining from this passage, that we ought to make no difference between Saturday, Sunday, and every other day of the week. But not one syllable does it say about the obligation of the Sabbath being transferred from one day to another.
2. Secondly, the words of St. John are quoted, "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day (Apocalypse [Revelation] i. 10). Is it possible that anybody can for a moment imagine that here is a safe and clear rule for changing the weekly day of worship from the seventh to the first day? This passage is utterly silent upon such a subject; it only give Scriptural authority for calling some one day in particular (it does not even say which day) "the Lord's day."
3. Next we are reminded that St. Paul bade his Corinthian converts, "upon the first day of the week, lay by them in store, that there might be no gatherings" when he himself came (1 Corinthians xvi. 2). How is this supposed to affect the law of the Sabbath? It commands a certain act of almsgiving [doing one's finances at home] to be done on the first day of the week. It says absolutely nothing about not doing certain other acts of prayer and public worship on the seventh day.
4. But, you will say, it was "on the first day of the week" when the disciples were assembled within closed doors for fear of the Jews, and Jesus stood in the midst of them" (John xx. 19). What is there in these facts to do away with the obligation of keeping holy the seventh day? Our Lord rose from the dead on the first day of the week, and on the same day at evening He appears to many of His disciples. Let Protestants, if they will [in obedience to Catholic tradition], keep holy the first day of the week in grateful commemoration of that stupendous mystery, the Resurrection of Christ, and of the evidences which He vouchsafed to give of it to His doubting disciples; but this is no scriptural authority for ceasing to keep holy another day of the week which God had expressly commanded to be kept holy for another and altogether different reason.
5. But lastly, we have the example of the Apostles themselves. "Upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow, and continued his speech until midnight" (Acts xx. 7). Here we have clear proof that the disciples heard a sermon on a Sunday. But is that not proof they had done the same on the Saturdays also? [Acts xiii. 14, 42-44; xvi. 12-13; xvii. 1-2; xviiii. 1-4, 11]. [After the night meeting on the first day in Troas (Acts xx. 7), Paul held a meeting on Tuesday in Miletus (Acts xx. 17-38). But no one considers that meeting sacred.]
You will say, is it not expressly written concerning those early Christians, that they "continued daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house?" (Acts ii. 46). As a matter of fact, do we not know from other sources that, in many parts of the church, the ancient Christians were in the habit of meeting together for public worship, and to perform the other [religious] offices, on Saturdays? Again then, I say, [in obedience to our command] let Protestants keep holy, if they will their first day of the week; but let them remember that this cannot possible release them from the obligation of keeping holy another day which Almighty God has ordered to
be kept holy, because on that day He "rested from all His work." [The Troas meeting was held on Sunday in Acts 20:7, just prior to a Miletus meeting on Tuesday in Acts 20:17-38, although no one today keeps Tuesday sacred because of that meeting].
I do not know of any other passages of holy Scripture which Protestants are in the habit of quoting to defend their practice of keeping holy the first day of the week instead of the seventh; yet, surely those which I have quoted are not such as should satisfy any reasonable man, who looks upon the written word of God as they [the Protestants] profess to look upon it, namely, as the only appointed means of learning God's will, and who really desires to learn and to obey that will in all things with humbleness and simplicity of heart. For in spite of all that anyone might say to the contrary, it is fully and absolutely impossible that a reasonable and thoughtful person should be satisfied, by the texts that I have quoted, that Almighty God intended the obligation of Saturday to be transferred to Sunday. And yet Protestants do so transfer it, and never seem to have the slightest misgivings lest, in doing so, they should be guilty of breaking one of God's commandments.
Why is this? Because, although they talk so largely about following the Bible and Bible only, they are really guided in this matter by the voice of [Roman Catholic] tradition. Yes, much as they may hate and denounce the word [tradition], they have in fact no other authority to allege for this most important change.
The present generation of Protestants keep Sunday holy instead of Saturday, because they received it as part of the Christian religion from the last generation, and that generation received it from the generation before, and so on backwards from one generation to another, by a continual succession, until we come to the time of the so-called "Reformation," when it so happened that those who conducted the change of religion [from Catholicism to Protestantism] left this particular portion of Catholic faith and practice untouched.
.
.
.
.
.
We Catholics, then, have precisely the same authority for keeping Sunday holy instead of Saturday as we have for every other article of our creed, namely, the authority of "the Church of the living God, and ground of truth" (1 Timothy iii. 15); whereas you who are Protestants have really no authority for it [Sunday sacredness] whatever; for there is no authority for it in the Bible, and you will not allow that there can be authority for it anywhere else. Both you and we do, in fact, follow [Catholic] tradition in this matter; but we follow it, believing it to be a part of God's word, and the [Catholic] Church to be its divinely appointed guardian and interpreter. You follow it [Catholicism], denouncing it all the time as a fallible and treacherous guide which often "makes the commandment of God of none effect" (Matthew xv. 6).
—"Why Don't You Keep Holy the Sabbath Day?" pages 3-15, in The Clifton Tracts, Vol. 4, published by the Roman Catholic Church. Originally released in North America in 1869 through the T. W. Strong Publishing Company of New York City, so that those outside the papal fold might return to the not partial, but full, authority of the Mother Church of the Vatican.
<<3.
When you give what you think is Catholic teaching can you quote from official Catholic sources. SDA's seem to love to quote from various unofficial periodicals, individuals etc.
If you look at the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which is an official source for Catholic teaching you will find all the Ten Commandments listed and discussed.>>
The SDA may not always be right but they are as articulated as any theological group, most of their evidence that I have seen come from old Papal documents from the reformation when half of the Catholic Priesthood left the Church, taking their laity and documentation with them. If you knew anything about the SDA you would quickly realise I am not one.
<<4.
Legally the Ten Commandments, along with the whole of the Jewish Law:
a) was never applicable to Gentiles
b) was legally abrogated by Christ's death on the cross.>>
You must live in fairyland; it is the Pope who abrogates illegally.
The Law of God has always existed. Cain is declared a murderer by the Law of God, all men ever judged are judged according to God's Law; as a Catholic you would be an amillenniumist and not have knowledge of the first and second resurrections or the millennium Sabbath in between; it is God and Is Law who judges those of the second resurrection to the second death and the principles of this resurrection are Gog and Magog; it is the Law that judges these gentiles; in as far as the Law did not apply to them neither was salvation offered.
The Ten Commandments are an abstract of God's Law; the essence of the law; Israel was used by God as a light to introduce Himself and His Law/Covenant to the world; the world has learned nothing from the light, but the world stands naked before God without excuse.
: winsome Sat Jan 18, 2014 - 14:19:20
I think you are referring, not to the facts of history, but to the bigoted opinions of anti-Catholic Protestants.
Give the Catholics tenth a chance and make Protestants free game and within one month nine tenths of Protestants will have become Roman Catholics and one tenth will have been murdered by former Protestants and the Roman Catholics.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Tue Jan 28, 2014 - 20:12:00
: winsome Sat Jan 18, 2014 - 14:19:20
I think you are referring, not to the facts of history, but to the bigoted opinions of anti-Catholic Protestants.
Give the Catholics tenth a chance and make Protestants free game and within one month nine tenths of Protestants will have become Roman Catholics and one tenth will have been murdered by former Protestants and the Roman Catholics.
....
you ARE kidding.................
: johnm Tue Jan 28, 2014 - 18:06:58
Dave you are a skilled apologist, so skilled has apologetics become there should be a place for it in the Olympic Games; tuning a lie into a perceived truth, neutralising the truth by confusion; for the last ten years I have been watching politicians do this. What the Catholic teaches seems to variy from person to person and from time to time.
<<A few points
1.
We have not changed the order of the commandments, or left one out
There is no numbering in scripture. Numbering is a "tradition of men".
Catholics and Lutherans number them in one way.
Orthodox and Protestants (except Lutherans) number them in a different way.>>
The order may not be that important so long as the first four are kept together as well as the last six. But I am not going to be the one to suggest God ordered them in vain. The wording of the Ten Commandments was engraved on stone, but we do not know what that was; when Moses listed them three times the wording each time was different but the meaning and the order was unchanged.
Dave has already dealt with this.
In scripture there are 12 commandments listed. Therefore to arrive at 10 some are conflated. Dave's lists explains this well.
No, the order does not change. The Catholic Church has not changed the order. It just conflates them differently to you.
: johnm Tue Jan 28, 2014 - 18:06:58
<<2.
The Catholic Church has not moved the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday. The Sabbath remains Saturday.>>
This reminds me of the old proverb, "You can have your cake and eat it also."This is both a truth and a lie. It is true the Law of God cannot be changed, but it is also true that Sunday is the day of rest for most people including Atheists and Muslims. Changing the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday is the Papacy's greatest claim to fame; it has been cited by the Papacy as proof of the Papacy's divine authority.
•The word of Rome says:
"The Pope has the power to change times, to abrogate laws, and to dispense with all things, even the precepts of Christ." "The Pope has the authority and often exercised it, to dispense with the command of Christ." -Decretal, de Tranlatic Episcop. Cap. (The Pope can modify divine law.) Ferraris' Ecclesiastical Dictionary.
Letter from the Roman Catholic Church
We all like to receive mail. Here is a letter from the Roman Catholic Church, originally published in America in 1869. The message was written to Protestants and is forceful and to the point, with lots of Scriptural proofs for its position.
I am going to propose a very plain and serious question to those who follow "the Bible and the Bible only" to give their most earnest attention. It is this: Why do you not keep holy the Sabbath Day?
The command of Almighty God stands clearly written in the Bible in these words: "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work" (Exodus xx. 8-10). And again, "Six days shall work be done; but on the seventh day there shall be unto you an holy day, a Sabbath of rest to the Lord; whosover doeth work therein shall be put to death" (Exodus xxxv. 2, 3).
How strict and precise is God's commandment upon this head! [in this matter!] No work whatever was to be done on the day which He had chosen to set apart for Himself and to make holy. And, accordingly, when the children of Israel "found a man that gathered sticks upon the Sabbath day," "the Lord said unto Moses, The man shall surely be put to death; all the congregation shall stone him with stones without the camp" (Numbers xv. 32, 35). Such being God's command, then I ask again: Why do you not obey it? Why do you not keep holy the Sabbath day?
You will answer me, perhaps, that you do keep holy the Sabbath day; for that you abstain from all worldly business and diligently go to church, and say your prayers, and read your Bible at home, every Sunday of your lives.
But Sunday is not the Sabbath day. Sunday is the first day of the week; the Sabbath day is the seventh day of the week. Almighty God did not give a commandment that men should keep holy one day in seven; but He named His own day, and said distinctly: 'Thou shalt keep holy the seventh day,' and He assigned a reason for choosing this day rather than any other—a reason which belongs only to the seventh day of the week, and cannot be applied to the rest. He says "For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it" [Exodus xx. 11].
Almighty God ordered that all men should rest from their labor on the seventh day, because He too had rested on that day; He did not rest on Sunday, but on Saturday. On Sunday, which is the first day of the week, He began the work of creation, He did not finish it [then]; it was on Saturday that He "ended His work which He had made; and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made" (Genesis ii. 2). Nothing can be more plain and easy to understand than all this; and there is nobody who attempts to deny it; it is acknowledged by everybody that the day which Almighty God appointed to be kept holy was Saturday, not Sunday. Why do you then keep holy the Sunday, and not Saturday?
You will tell me that Saturday was the Jewish Sabbath [God gave the Bible Sabbath to mankind 2,000 years before the first Jew existed], but that the Christian Sabbath has been changed to Sunday; changed! but by whom? Who has authority to change an express commandment of Almighty God? When God has spoken and said, Thou shalt keep holy the seventh day, who shall dare to say, Nay, thou mayest work and do all manner of worldly business on the seventh day; but thou shalt keep holy the first day in its stead? This is a most important question, which I know not how you can answer.
You are a Protestant, and you profess to go by the Bible and Bible only; and yet in so important a matter as the observance of one day in seven as a holy day, you go against the plain letter of the Bible, and put another day in the place of that day which the Bible has commanded. The command to keep holy the seventh day is one of the Ten Commandments. You believe that the other nine are still binding; but who gave you authority to tamper with the fourth? If you are consistent with your own principles, if you really follow the Bible and the Bible only, you ought to be able to produce some portion of the New Testament in which this fourth commandment is expressly altered.
Let us see whether any such passages can be found. I will look for them in the writings of your own [Protestant] champions, who have attempted to defend your practice in this matter.
1. The first text which I find quoted upon the subject is this: "Let no man judge you in respect of an holy day, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days" (Colossians ii. 16). [That refers to the ceremonial—sacrificial—yearly sabbaths of Leviticus 23, which were done away at the cross.] I could understand a Bible Christian imagining from this passage, that we ought to make no difference between Saturday, Sunday, and every other day of the week. But not one syllable does it say about the obligation of the Sabbath being transferred from one day to another.
2. Secondly, the words of St. John are quoted, "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day (Apocalypse [Revelation] i. 10). Is it possible that anybody can for a moment imagine that here is a safe and clear rule for changing the weekly day of worship from the seventh to the first day? This passage is utterly silent upon such a subject; it only give Scriptural authority for calling some one day in particular (it does not even say which day) "the Lord's day."
3. Next we are reminded that St. Paul bade his Corinthian converts, "upon the first day of the week, lay by them in store, that there might be no gatherings" when he himself came (1 Corinthians xvi. 2). How is this supposed to affect the law of the Sabbath? It commands a certain act of almsgiving [doing one's finances at home] to be done on the first day of the week. It says absolutely nothing about not doing certain other acts of prayer and public worship on the seventh day.
4. But, you will say, it was "on the first day of the week" when the disciples were assembled within closed doors for fear of the Jews, and Jesus stood in the midst of them" (John xx. 19). What is there in these facts to do away with the obligation of keeping holy the seventh day? Our Lord rose from the dead on the first day of the week, and on the same day at evening He appears to many of His disciples. Let Protestants, if they will [in obedience to Catholic tradition], keep holy the first day of the week in grateful commemoration of that stupendous mystery, the Resurrection of Christ, and of the evidences which He vouchsafed to give of it to His doubting disciples; but this is no scriptural authority for ceasing to keep holy another day of the week which God had expressly commanded to be kept holy for another and altogether different reason.
5. But lastly, we have the example of the Apostles themselves. "Upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow, and continued his speech until midnight" (Acts xx. 7). Here we have clear proof that the disciples heard a sermon on a Sunday. But is that not proof they had done the same on the Saturdays also? [Acts xiii. 14, 42-44; xvi. 12-13; xvii. 1-2; xviiii. 1-4, 11]. [After the night meeting on the first day in Troas (Acts xx. 7), Paul held a meeting on Tuesday in Miletus (Acts xx. 17-38). But no one considers that meeting sacred.]
You will say, is it not expressly written concerning those early Christians, that they "continued daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house?" (Acts ii. 46). As a matter of fact, do we not know from other sources that, in many parts of the church, the ancient Christians were in the habit of meeting together for public worship, and to perform the other [religious] offices, on Saturdays? Again then, I say, [in obedience to our command] let Protestants keep holy, if they will their first day of the week; but let them remember that this cannot possible release them from the obligation of keeping holy another day which Almighty God has ordered to
be kept holy, because on that day He "rested from all His work." [The Troas meeting was held on Sunday in Acts 20:7, just prior to a Miletus meeting on Tuesday in Acts 20:17-38, although no one today keeps Tuesday sacred because of that meeting].
I do not know of any other passages of holy Scripture which Protestants are in the habit of quoting to defend their practice of keeping holy the first day of the week instead of the seventh; yet, surely those which I have quoted are not such as should satisfy any reasonable man, who looks upon the written word of God as they [the Protestants] profess to look upon it, namely, as the only appointed means of learning God's will, and who really desires to learn and to obey that will in all things with humbleness and simplicity of heart. For in spite of all that anyone might say to the contrary, it is fully and absolutely impossible that a reasonable and thoughtful person should be satisfied, by the texts that I have quoted, that Almighty God intended the obligation of Saturday to be transferred to Sunday. And yet Protestants do so transfer it, and never seem to have the slightest misgivings lest, in doing so, they should be guilty of breaking one of God's commandments.
Why is this? Because, although they talk so largely about following the Bible and Bible only, they are really guided in this matter by the voice of [Roman Catholic] tradition. Yes, much as they may hate and denounce the word [tradition], they have in fact no other authority to allege for this most important change.
The present generation of Protestants keep Sunday holy instead of Saturday, because they received it as part of the Christian religion from the last generation, and that generation received it from the generation before, and so on backwards from one generation to another, by a continual succession, until we come to the time of the so-called "Reformation," when it so happened that those who conducted the change of religion [from Catholicism to Protestantism] left this particular portion of Catholic faith and practice untouched.
.
.
.
.
.
We Catholics, then, have precisely the same authority for keeping Sunday holy instead of Saturday as we have for every other article of our creed, namely, the authority of "the Church of the living God, and ground of truth" (1 Timothy iii. 15); whereas you who are Protestants have really no authority for it [Sunday sacredness] whatever; for there is no authority for it in the Bible, and you will not allow that there can be authority for it anywhere else. Both you and we do, in fact, follow [Catholic] tradition in this matter; but we follow it, believing it to be a part of God's word, and the [Catholic] Church to be its divinely appointed guardian and interpreter. You follow it [Catholicism], denouncing it all the time as a fallible and treacherous guide which often "makes the commandment of God of none effect" (Matthew xv. 6).
—"Why Don't You Keep Holy the Sabbath Day?" pages 3-15, in The Clifton Tracts, Vol. 4, published by the Roman Catholic Church. Originally released in North America in 1869 through the T. W. Strong Publishing Company of New York City, so that those outside the papal fold might return to the not partial, but full, authority of the Mother Church of the Vatican.
As I have already said you should be looking at official (authoritative) documents not some random publications.
Why do you keep quoting from this sort of stuff? "The Clifton Tracts" – whatever they are – are not official documents
Is it because you cannot find any official backing for your errors about the Catholic Church?
Here are a couple of authoritative quotes. Note my emboldening.
Sunday is expressly distinguished from the sabbath which it follows chronologically every week; for Christians its ceremonial observance replaces that of the sabbath. In Christ's Passover, Sunday fulfills the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath and announces man's eternal rest in God. For worship under the Law prepared for the mystery of Christ, and what was done there prefigured some aspects of Christ (
Catechism of the Catholic Church, para 2175)
We move from the "Sabbath" to the "first day after the Sabbath", from the seventh day to the first day: the dies Domini becomes the dies Christi! (Apostolic Letter,
Dies Domini, Pope John Paul II).
As a very crude guide: If you can find it on the Vatican web site (www.vatican.va (http://www.vatican.va)) it is official/authoritative. If you can't it is not.
[ Added: I was thinking here of relatively recent documents (say last 100 years). Older official documents such as the decrees of past Ecumenical Councils (e.g. Trent) and Papal decrees will not be on the Vatican web site]
: johnm Tue Jan 28, 2014 - 18:06:58
<<3.
When you give what you think is Catholic teaching can you quote from official Catholic sources. SDA's seem to love to quote from various unofficial periodicals, individuals etc.
If you look at the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which is an official source for Catholic teaching you will find all the Ten Commandments listed and discussed.>>
The SDA may not always be right but they are as articulated as any theological group, most of their evidence that I have seen come from old Papal documents from the reformation when half of the Catholic Priesthood left the Church, taking their laity and documentation with them. If you knew anything about the SDA you would quickly realise I am not one.
Then why is a non-SDA attacking Catholics in the SDA forum?
But I think you will find that SDA's do NOT quote from official Catholic sources.
: johnm Tue Jan 28, 2014 - 18:06:58
<<4.
Legally the Ten Commandments, along with the whole of the Jewish Law:
a) was never applicable to Gentiles
b) was legally abrogated by Christ's death on the cross.>>
You must live in fairyland; it is the Pope who abrogates illegally.
The Law of God has always existed. Cain is declared a murderer by the Law of God, all men ever judged are judged according to God's Law; as a Catholic you would be an amillenniumist and not have knowledge of the first and second resurrections or the millennium Sabbath in between; it is God and Is Law who judges those of the second resurrection to the second death and the principles of this resurrection are Gog and Magog; it is the Law that judges these gentiles; in as far as the Law did not apply to them neither was salvation offered.
The Ten Commandments are an abstract of God's Law; the essence of the law; Israel was used by God as a light to introduce Himself and His Law/Covenant to the world; the world has learned nothing from the light, but the world stands naked before God without excuse.
The Ten Commandments, along with the rest of the laws of the Sinai Covenant are an implementation of moral laws, ceremonial observances, statutes etc. for the Israelites.
As such they were never applicable to the Gentiles.
You need to distinguish between a moral law that is applicable to everyone and a legal expression of that law which is applicable to a particular group.
Yes, murder is morally wrong for everyone. I doubt there have ever been a civilisation without a law against murder. But the legal expression of that law for a particular country/civilisation is only applicable for those under that juridiction.
I live in England. If I commit a murder here I will be convicted under English Law. But if I go to France and commit a murder I will not be convicted under English law. It is not applicable to me in France. I will be charged and convicted under French law.
Similarly I do not live under the Old Covenant but the New Covenant. Old Covenant Law has no legal jurisdiction over me.
Saturday Sabbath keeping is not a moral issue. It was given to the Israelites as a sign of the Sinai Covenant. (Ex 31:12-13, 16-17).
The following site contains what looks to be an interesting read concerning the topic of this thread.
https://archive.org/stream/sundayworldsrest00inte#page/n9/mode/2up
The following is an interesting Jewish perspective regarding the issue at hand.
http://strangeside.com/sunday-rest-laws/ (http://strangeside.com/sunday-rest-laws/)
An interesitng article concerning France.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2013/11/08/243952070/france-rethinks-the-sanctity-of-its-day-of-rest (http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2013/11/08/243952070/france-rethinks-the-sanctity-of-its-day-of-rest)
http://www.jta.org/1929/03/29/archive/modification-of-sunday-rest-law-in-lithuania-awaited (http://www.jta.org/1929/03/29/archive/modification-of-sunday-rest-law-in-lithuania-awaited)
http://mygospelworkers.org/mgwministry/deputies-gave-preliminary-approval-to-sunday-rest/ (http://mygospelworkers.org/mgwministry/deputies-gave-preliminary-approval-to-sunday-rest/)
http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/emire/FRANCE/SUNDAYREST-FR.htm (http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/emire/FRANCE/SUNDAYREST-FR.htm)
http://www.atg.wa.gov/AGOOpinions/Opinion.aspx?section=archive&id=7488#.Uukln7S69co (http://www.atg.wa.gov/AGOOpinions/Opinion.aspx?section=archive&id=7488#.Uukln7S69co)
http://www.theparisblog.com/sunday-rest-or-work/ (http://www.theparisblog.com/sunday-rest-or-work/)
<<As I have already said you should be looking at official (authoritative) documents not some random publications.
Why do you keep quoting from this sort of stuff? "The Clifton Tracts" – whatever they are – are not official documents
Is it because you cannot find any official backing for your errors about the Catholic Church?>>
<<[ Added: I was thinking here of relatively recent documents (say last 100 years). Older official documents such as the decrees of past Ecumenical Councils (e.g. Trent) and Papal decrees will not be on the Vatican web site]>>
This seems to me to be an admission of guilt; it is amazing the way things get twisted around. You have missed the whole point; it is the authority of the Catholic Church that is accused and primarily Catholic documents older than 100 years are acceptable as evidence.
>>Then why is a non-SDA attacking Catholics in the SDA forum?>>
I'm sure I don't know what to make of this; can you quote a Bible verse or an official document?
<<But I think you will find that SDA's do NOT quote from official Catholic sources.>>
You may not be an official source but any Bishop or Cardinal is and the SDA and I are not limited to the 100 year time zone you suggest. We also accept evidence from victims as late as the 1940's.
The Roman Catholic Church is the Greatest Church the world has ever seen because God made it; but it is not the Bride of Christ, it is the goat pen. The Roman Church is the continuation of Babylon; the beast with the gold head, silver chest, bronze middle and iron legs; the fate of the Papacy is set in history and prophesy and these are unchangeable, regardless of ecumenicalism and the success of apologising Futurism. So your attempt to exclude the evidence that condemns the Papacy won't work; the course of prophesy and history cannot ultimately be changed; people can change, most people still have the offer of salvation.
<<The Ten Commandments, along with the rest of the laws of the Sinai Covenant are an implementation of moral laws, ceremonial observances, statutes etc. for the Israelites. >>
True.
<<As such they were never applicable to the Gentiles.>>
Can you quote a verse for this or an official document? This is not a literal interpretation; this is an assumption at best. The Ten Commandments are the Covenant:
Exodus 34:28 (KJV)
28 And he was there with the LORD forty days and forty nights; he did neither eat bread, nor drink water. And he wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments.
Of course there is more to the covenant than the Ten Commandments, such as the kingdom of God and the shedding of Christ's blood, yet God defines the covenant as the Ten Commandments.
The Jews were always converting Gentiles, sometimes at the point of a sword, and this involved circumcision and the Ten Commandments.
Matthew 23:15 (NIV2011)
15 "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are.
It is true that the Covenant (Ten Commandments) was not specifically or universally offered to gentiles until Pentecost but gentiles have never been specifically excluded; conversion into Israel was always an option for gentiles.
We have a recent document wherein Catholics no longer hate Jews. I suggest that hatred of Jews was never the real issue but hatred of the God of Israel and His Covenant with Israel was the issue; the recrucifying Christ each Mass and the abrogating the covenant to the cross proves this point.
<<Yes, murder is morally wrong for everyone. I doubt there have ever been a civilisation without a law against murder. But the legal expression of that law for a particular country/civilisation is only applicable for those under that juridiction.
I live in England. If I commit a murder here I will be convicted under English Law. But if I go to France and commit a murder I will not be convicted under English law. It is not applicable to me in France. I will be charged and convicted under French law.>>
You do not distinguish between the Law of God and the Law of men. The Law of God is the covenant; the law of men is the antithesis of God's Law.
<<Similarly I do not live under the Old Covenant but the New Covenant. Old Covenant Law has no legal jurisdiction over me.>>
You have disavowed God, He has no jurisdiction over you, little you know; the heart of both covenants is the Ten Commandments.
<<Saturday Sabbath keeping is not a moral issue. It was given to the Israelites as a sign of the Sinai Covenant. (Ex 31:12-13, 16-17). >>
The keeping of the Sabbath was and still is a sign of having entered into the Covenant. The Sabbath was sanctified and defined on the seventh day of creation presumably for the benefit of Adam and Eve and their descendants, and is called the Sabbath of the Lord. The fourth commandment is the greatest of the ten; it defines the God being worshiped.
The New Covenant is where one has the Law on one's forehead and no longer needs to learn the Law. It has never been the case that one could earn one's salvation by keeping the Law with either old or new; it has always the case that keeping the Law not in the spirit is to mock God; the difference between the old and the new: the old was where it was natural to not keep the Law and one had to deliberately keep the Law: the new is where it is natural for those who are called and chosen to keep the Law and to not keep the Law one has to deliberately resist keeping the Law of God. A test for whether one is Born again is does one have a desire to keep the commandments of God. Today people are taught that when saved it is offensive to God to keep His commandments; how many times has Christ said, "Keep my commandments", has anyone counted?
Hebrews 4:1-9 (ASV)
1 Let us fear therefore, lest haply, a promise being left of entering into his rest, any one of you should seem to have come short of it.
2 For indeed we have had good tidings preached unto us, even as also they: but the word of hearing did not profit them, because it was not united by faith with them that heard.
3 For we who have believed do enter into that rest; even as he hath said, As I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of the world.
4 For he hath said somewhere of the seventh day on this wise, And God rested on the seventh day from all his works;
5 and in this place again, They shall not enter into my rest.
6 Seeing therefore it remaineth that some should enter thereinto, and they to whom the good tidings were before preached failed to enter in because of disobedience,
7 he again defineth a certain day, To-day, saying in David so long a time afterward (even as hath been said before), To-day if ye shall hear his voice, Harden not your hearts.
8 For if Joshua had given them rest, he would not have spoken afterward of another day.
9 There remaineth therefore a sabbath rest for the people of God.
: johnm Wed Jan 29, 2014 - 23:32:07
<<As I have already said you should be looking at official (authoritative) documents not some random publications.
Why do you keep quoting from this sort of stuff? "The Clifton Tracts" – whatever they are – are not official documents
Is it because you cannot find any official backing for your errors about the Catholic Church?>>
<<[ Added: I was thinking here of relatively recent documents (say last 100 years). Older official documents such as the decrees of past Ecumenical Councils (e.g. Trent) and Papal decrees will not be on the Vatican web site]>>
This seems to me to be an admission of guilt; it is amazing the way things get twisted around. You have missed the whole point; it is the authority of the Catholic Church that is accused and primarily Catholic documents older than 100 years are acceptable as evidence.
An admission of guilt of what?
And why do you think it is an admission of guilt?
I'm pointing out that if you want to know what the Catholic Church actually teaches then you should be using official/authoritative sources. Quoting from some random non authoritative source is not evidence of that the Catholic Church actually teaches.
I have given you two quotations from good official/authoritative sources that show that the Church does not teach that it changed the Sabbath to Sunday.
: johnm Wed Jan 29, 2014 - 23:32:07
>>Then why is a non-SDA attacking Catholics in the SDA forum?>>
I'm sure I don't know what to make of this; can you quote a Bible verse or an official document?
What?
: johnm Wed Jan 29, 2014 - 23:32:07
<<But I think you will find that SDA's do NOT quote from official Catholic sources.>>
You may not be an official source but any Bishop or Cardinal is and the SDA and I are not limited to the 100 year time zone you suggest. We also accept evidence from victims as late as the 1940's.
A Bishop or Cardinal is more of an official sources than some random publication but it is still just his opinion. It does not carry the same weight as something like the decrees of an Ecumenical Coluncil, the Catechism of the Catholic Church or major Papal statements. They should always be consulted first.
I didn't suggest you keep only to documents in the last 100 years. I suggested that a crude guide for authoritativeness was whether it was on the Vatican web site - but that only applies to documents within the last 100 years. Prior to that you need to go to other sources. But you need to go to authoritative sources not random publications.
: johnm Wed Jan 29, 2014 - 23:32:07
The Roman Catholic Church is the Greatest Church the world has ever seen because God made it; but it is not the Bride of Christ, it is the goat pen. The Roman Church is the continuation of Babylon; the beast with the gold head, silver chest, bronze middle and iron legs; the fate of the Papacy is set in history and prophesy and these are unchangeable, regardless of ecumenicalism and the success of apologising Futurism. So your attempt to exclude the evidence that condemns the Papacy won't work; the course of prophesy and history cannot ultimately be changed; people can change, most people still have the offer of salvation.
Totally off topic.
It's typical of Catholic Bashers than when cornered they try and divert into some rant against the Catholic Church that has nothing to do with the topic.
Do you want a sensible discussion or just to sound off your anti-Catholic bigotry?
: johnm Wed Jan 29, 2014 - 23:32:07
<<The Ten Commandments, along with the rest of the laws of the Sinai Covenant are an implementation of moral laws, ceremonial observances, statutes etc. for the Israelites. >>
True.
<<As such they were never applicable to the Gentiles.>>
Can you quote a verse for this or an official document? This is not a literal interpretation; this is an assumption at best. The Ten Commandments are the Covenant:
Exodus 34:28 (KJV)
28 And he was there with the LORD forty days and forty nights; he did neither eat bread, nor drink water. And he wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments.
Of course there is more to the covenant than the Ten Commandments, such as the kingdom of God and the shedding of Christ's blood, yet God defines the covenant as the Ten Commandments.
The Jews were always converting Gentiles, sometimes at the point of a sword, and this involved circumcision and the Ten Commandments.
Matthew 23:15 (NIV2011)
15 "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are.
It is true that the Covenant (Ten Commandments) was not specifically or universally offered to gentiles until Pentecost but gentiles have never been specifically excluded; conversion into Israel was always an option for gentiles.
Gentiles that converted to Judaism became Jews and entered into the Sinai Covenant.
Do you consider yourself a Jew and bound by the Jewish laws?
: johnm Wed Jan 29, 2014 - 23:32:07
We have a recent document wherein Catholics no longer hate Jews. I suggest that hatred of Jews was never the real issue but hatred of the God of Israel and His Covenant with Israel was the issue; the recrucifying Christ each Mass and the abrogating the covenant to the cross proves this point.
This is another attempt to divert away from the topic.
: johnm Wed Jan 29, 2014 - 23:32:07
<<Yes, murder is morally wrong for everyone. I doubt there have ever been a civilisation without a law against murder. But the legal expression of that law for a particular country/civilisation is only applicable for those under that juridiction.
I live in England. If I commit a murder here I will be convicted under English Law. But if I go to France and commit a murder I will not be convicted under English law. It is not applicable to me in France. I will be charged and convicted under French law.>>
You do not distinguish between the Law of God and the Law of men. The Law of God is the covenant; the law of men is the antithesis of God's Law.
All the Laws that God gave to the Israelites at Sinai are God's Law forthe Israelites not just the Ten Commandments. The Law is indivisible.
: johnm Wed Jan 29, 2014 - 23:32:07
<<Similarly I do not live under the Old Covenant but the New Covenant. Old Covenant Law has no legal jurisdiction over me.>>
You have disavowed God, He has no jurisdiction over you, little you know; the heart of both covenants is the Ten Commandments.
I have done no such thing. The heart of both Covenants are God's moral laws. They are more than the Ten Commandments and not all the Ten Commandments are eternal moral laws. I live under the New Covenant not the Old Covenant.
: johnm Wed Jan 29, 2014 - 23:32:07
<<Saturday Sabbath keeping is not a moral issue. It was given to the Israelites as a sign of the Sinai Covenant. (Ex 31:12-13, 16-17). >>
The keeping of the Sabbath was and still is a sign of having entered into the Covenant. The Sabbath was sanctified and defined on the seventh day of creation presumably for the benefit of Adam and Eve and their descendants, and is called the Sabbath of the Lord. The fourth commandment is the greatest of the ten; it defines the God being worshiped.
No it is not the sign of both Covenants. It was the sign of the Old Sinai Covenant. The one that was legally abrogated.
: johnm Wed Jan 29, 2014 - 23:32:07
The New Covenant is where one has the Law on one's forehead and no longer needs to learn the Law. It has never been the case that one could earn one's salvation by keeping the Law with either old or new; it has always the case that keeping the Law not in the spirit is to mock God; the difference between the old and the new: the old was where it was natural to not keep the Law and one had to deliberately keep the Law: the new is where it is natural for those who are called and chosen to keep the Law and to not keep the Law one has to deliberately resist keeping the Law of God. A test for whether one is Born again is does one have a desire to keep the commandments of God. Today people are taught that when saved it is offensive to God to keep His commandments; how many times has Christ said, "Keep my commandments", has anyone counted?
Hebrews 4:1-9 (ASV)
1 Let us fear therefore, lest haply, a promise being left of entering into his rest, any one of you should seem to have come short of it.
2 For indeed we have had good tidings preached unto us, even as also they: but the word of hearing did not profit them, because it was not united by faith with them that heard.
3 For we who have believed do enter into that rest; even as he hath said, As I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of the world.
4 For he hath said somewhere of the seventh day on this wise, And God rested on the seventh day from all his works;
5 and in this place again, They shall not enter into my rest.
6 Seeing therefore it remaineth that some should enter thereinto, and they to whom the good tidings were before preached failed to enter in because of disobedience,
7 he again defineth a certain day, To-day, saying in David so long a time afterward (even as hath been said before), To-day if ye shall hear his voice, Harden not your hearts.
8 For if Joshua had given them rest, he would not have spoken afterward of another day.
9 There remaineth therefore a sabbath rest for the people of God.
More off topic stuff /I shall ignore it.
: johnm Tue Jan 28, 2014 - 18:06:58
Dave you are a skilled apologist, so skilled has apologetics become there should be a place for it in the Olympic Games; tuning a lie into a perceived truth, neutralising the truth by confusion; for the last ten years I have been watching politicians do this. What the Catholic teaches seems to variy from person to person and from time to time.
Interesting. I am "apologist" for the Catholic Church? Since when?
I will submit that to TRUE catholics Winsome and Catholica: When have I ever spoken on behalf of or been an apologist for the RCC?
A few more sites if interest concerning the topic at hand.
http://www.free-sunday.eu/en (http://www.free-sunday.eu/en)
http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/euelections2014thepledge (http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/euelections2014thepledge)
http://csc.ceceurope.org/fileadmin/filer/csc/SundayAlliance/European_Sunday_Alliance_Programme_Jan2014.pdf (http://csc.ceceurope.org/fileadmin/filer/csc/SundayAlliance/European_Sunday_Alliance_Programme_Jan2014.pdf)
http://andreasmoser.wordpress.com/2012/03/04/church-sunday/ (http://andreasmoser.wordpress.com/2012/03/04/church-sunday/)
http://spectator.sme.sk/articles/view/52757/10/work_free_sunday_supported_by_tens_of_thousands.html (http://spectator.sme.sk/articles/view/52757/10/work_free_sunday_supported_by_tens_of_thousands.html)
http://www.florencedailynews.com/news/european-day-for-a-work-free-sunday-demonstrations-in-florence/ (http://www.florencedailynews.com/news/european-day-for-a-work-free-sunday-demonstrations-in-florence/)
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120304/local/leave-sunday-work-free-bishop-grech.409645#.UursZ7S69co (http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120304/local/leave-sunday-work-free-bishop-grech.409645#.UursZ7S69co)
<<[ Added: I was thinking here of relatively recent documents (say last 100 years). Older official documents such as the decrees of past Ecumenical Councils (e.g. Trent) and Papal decrees will not be on the Vatican web site]>>
This seems to me to be an admission of guilt; it is amazing the way things get twisted around. You have missed the whole point; it is the authority of the Catholic Church that is accused and primarily Catholic documents older than 100 years are acceptable as evidence.
<<An admission of guilt of what?
And why do you think it is an admission of guilt?>>
<<I'm pointing out that if you want to know what the Catholic Church actually teaches then you should be using official/authoritative sources. Quoting from some random non authoritative source is not evidence of that the Catholic Church actually teaches.>>
Now it is you who is off topic; what the Catholic Church teaches has never been on topic; changing the Sabbath to Sunday is on topic, as is the false Authority of the Papacy in making the Changes, on topic. The fact that you tried to limit the evidence to the last 100 years, and then only official Papal documents, on a SDA forum makes you a comedian.
<<Dave you are a skilled apologist, so skilled has apologetics become there should be a place for it in the Olympic Games; tuning a lie into a perceived truth, neutralising the truth by confusion; for the last ten years I have been watching politicians do this. What the Catholic teaches seems to variy from person to person and from time to time.
Interesting. I am "apologist" for the Catholic Church? Since when?
I will submit that to TRUE catholics Winsome and Catholica: When have I ever spoken on behalf of or been an apologist for the RCC?>>
I humbly apologise; from the rest of my post you should have realised that I was referring to winsome/lose some.
The clearest and incontrovertible evidence that the Roman Catholic church has successfully changed the Sabbath from the Sabbath to Sunday is the billions of CORRUPTED TEXT New Testaments in people's possession today.
The Bible is the best selling, least read book in the world.
<<I'm pointing out that if you want to know what the Catholic Church actually teaches then you should be using official/authoritative sources. Quoting from some random non authoritative source is not evidence of that the Catholic Church actually teaches.>>
I'm pointing out that if you want to know what the Catholic Church actually teaches then you should be using 'Bible versions' of the last 100 years. Quoting from the random non authoritative source is not evidence of what the Catholic Church actually teaches.
: johnm Thu Jan 30, 2014 - 19:15:17
<<[ Added: I was thinking here of relatively recent documents (say last 100 years). Older official documents such as the decrees of past Ecumenical Councils (e.g. Trent) and Papal decrees will not be on the Vatican web site]>>
This seems to me to be an admission of guilt; it is amazing the way things get twisted around. You have missed the whole point; it is the authority of the Catholic Church that is accused and primarily Catholic documents older than 100 years are acceptable as evidence.
<<An admission of guilt of what?
And why do you think it is an admission of guilt?>>
<<I'm pointing out that if you want to know what the Catholic Church actually teaches then you should be using official/authoritative sources. Quoting from some random non authoritative source is not evidence of that the Catholic Church actually teaches.>>
Now it is you who is off topic; what the Catholic Church teaches has never been on topic; changing the Sabbath to Sunday is on topic, as is the false Authority of the Papacy in making the Changes, on topic. The fact that you tried to limit the evidence to the last 100 years, and then only official Papal documents, on a SDA forum makes you a comedian.
Yes changing the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday is on topic. Many of the other things you said were not.
I'm not trying to limit quotes from documents less than 100 years old. Please stop lying about what I said.
To go back to my earlier post
I raised four points and as far as I am concerned we are discussing those. We can move to other points when we have finished with those four.
1.
The Catholic Church have not changed the order of the commandments, or left one out.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
2.
The Catholic Church has not moved the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday. The Sabbath remains Saturday.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
3.
When you give what you think is Catholic teaching can you quote from official Catholic sources.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
4.
Legally the Ten Commandments, along with the whole of the Jewish Law:
a) was never applicable to Gentiles
b) was legally abrogated by Christ's death on the cross.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
I also said
If you want to discuss any of these points I am happy to do that if you:
a) use official Catholic sources (where available)
b) leave off the negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church.
If you are going to continue making negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church then I see no point in continuing a discussion with you.
It's up to you. Do you want a sensible and reasoned discussion, or are you just here for Catholic bashing?
Yes changing the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday is on topic. Many of the other things you said were not.
I'm not trying to limit quotes from documents less than 100 years old. Please stop lying about what I said.
To go back to my earlier post
I raised four points and as far as I am concerned we are discussing those. We can move to other points when we have finished with those four.
1.The Catholic Church have not changed the order of the commandments, or left one out.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
Exo 20:1 ¶ And God spake all these words, saying, 2 I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: 5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; 6 And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.
7 Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.
8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:
10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: 11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
12 ¶ Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.
13 Thou shalt not kill.
14 Thou shalt not commit adultery.
15 Thou shalt not steal.
16 Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.
17 Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.
The above is the scriptural account of what God Himself spoke to Israel as the ten commandments. The following is from the Catechism found at the Vatican's web site.
Catechism of the Catholic Church
1 - I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them or serve them.
2 - You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.
3 - Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work; but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God; in it you shall not do any work.
4 - Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land which the Lord your God gives you.
5 - You shall not kill.
6 -You shall not commit adultery.
7 - You shall not steal.
8 - You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
9 - You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant, or his maidservant, or his ox, or his ass, or anything that is your neighbor's.
10 - You shall not covet ... anything that is your neighbor's....
As is obvious, they are not the same.
2.The Catholic Church has not moved the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday. The Sabbath remains Saturday.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
Catechism of the Catholic Church(Emphasis mine)
The day of the Resurrection: the new creation
2174 Jesus rose from the dead "on the first day of the week."104 Because it is the "first day," the day of Christ's Resurrection recalls the first creation. Because it is the "eighth day" following the sabbath,105 it symbolizes the new creation ushered in by Christ's Resurrection.
For Christians it has become the first of all days, the first of all feasts, the Lord's Day (he kuriake hemera, dies dominica)—Sunday: (638, 349)
We all gather on the day of the sun, for it is the first day
[after the Jewish sabbath, but also the first day] when God, separating matter from darkness, made the world; and on this same day Jesus Christ our Savior rose from the dead.106
Sunday—fulfillment of the sabbath
2175 Sunday is expressly distinguished from the sabbath which it follows chronologically every week;
for Christians its ceremonial observance replaces that of the sabbath. In Christ's Passover,
Sunday fulfills the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath and announces man's eternal rest in God. For worship under the Law prepared for the mystery of Christ, and what was done there prefigured some aspects of Christ:107 (1166)
Those who lived according to the old order of things have come to a new hope,
no longer keeping the sabbath, but the Lord's Day, in which our life is blessed by him and by his death.108
2176 The celebration of Sunday observes the moral commandment inscribed by nature in the human heart to render to God an outward, visible, public, and regular worship "as a sign of his universal beneficence to all."109
Sunday worship fulfills the moral command of the Old Covenant, taking up its rhythm and spirit in the weekly celebration of the Creator and Redeemer of his people.
A day of grace and rest from work
2184
Just as God "rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done,"121 human life has a rhythm of work and rest.
The institution of the Lord's Day helps everyone enjoy adequate rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives.122 (2172)
2185 On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are to refrain from engaging in work or activities that hinder the worship owed to God, the joy proper to the Lord's Day, the performance of the works of mercy, and the appropriate relaxation of mind and body.123 Family needs or important social service can legitimately excuse from the obligation of Sunday rest. The faithful should see to it that legitimate excuses do not lead to habits prejudicial to religion, family life, and health. (2428)
The charity of truth seeks holy leisure; the necessity of charity accepts just work.124
2186 Those Christians who have leisure should be mindful of their brethren who have the same needs and the same rights, yet cannot rest from work because of poverty and misery. Sunday is traditionally consecrated by Christian piety to good works and humble service of the sick, the infirm, and the elderly.
Christians will also sanctify Sunday by devoting time and care to their families and relatives, often difficult to do on other days of the week. Sunday is a time for reflection, silence, cultivation of the mind, and meditation which furthers the growth of the Christian interior life. (2447)
2187
Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic constraints,
public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees. (2289)
2188 In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all,
Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."125 (2105)
IN BRIEF
2189 "Observe the sabbath day, to keep it holy" (Deut 5:12). "The seventh day is a sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord" (Ex 31:15).
2190
The sabbath, which represented the completion of the first creation, has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ.
2191 The Church celebrates the day of Christ's Resurrection on the "eighth day," Sunday, which is rightly called the Lord's Day (cf. SC 106).
2192 "
Sunday... is to be observed as the foremost holy day of obligation in the universal Church" (CIC, can. 1246 § 1). "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass" (CIC, can. 1247).
2193 "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound...
to abstain from those labors and business concerns which impede the worship to be rendered to God, the joy which is proper to the Lord's Day, or the proper relaxation of mind and body" (CIC, can. 1247).
2194 The institution of Sunday helps all "to be allowed sufficient rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives" (GS 67 § 3).
2195
Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day
The following quotes are from the APOSTOLIC LETTER DIES DOMINI by John Paul II
14.
In the first place, therefore, Sunday is the day of rest because it is the day "blessed" by God and "made holy" by him, set apart from the other days to be, among all of them, "the Lord's Day".18.................In the light of this mystery, the meaning of the Old Testament precept concerning the Lord's Day is recovered, perfected and fully revealed in the glory which shines on the face of the Risen Christ (cf. 2 Cor 4:6).
We move from the "Sabbath" to the "first day after the Sabbath", from the seventh day to the first day: the dies Domini becomes the dies Christi!Chap.4
59.......................
More than a "replacement" for the Sabbath, therefore, Sunday is its fulfilment, and in a certain sense its extension and full expression in the ordered unfolding of the history of salvation, which reaches its culmination in Christ.
62. It is the duty of Christians therefore to remember that,
although the practices of the Jewish Sabbath are gone, surpassed as they are by the "fulfilment" which Sunday brings, the underlying reasons for keeping "the Lord's Day" holy — inscribed solemnly in the Ten Commandments — remain valid, though they need to be reinterpreted in the light of the theology and spirituality of Sunday: "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days you shall labour, and do all your work; but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. Then you shall do no work, you, or your son, or your daughter, or your servant, or your maid, or your ox, or your ass, or any of your beasts, or the foreigner within your gates, that your servant and maid may rest as well as you. You shall remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded that you keep the Sabbath day" (Dt 5:12-15). Here the Sabbath observance is closely linked with the liberation which God accomplished for his people.
63. Christ came to accomplish a new "exodus", to restore freedom to the oppressed. He performed many healings on the Sabbath (cf. Mt 12:9-14 and parallels), certainly not to violate the Lord's Day, but to reveal its full meaning: "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mk 2:27). Opposing the excessively legalistic interpretation of some of his contemporaries, and developing the true meaning of the biblical Sabbath, Jesus, as "Lord of the Sabbath" (Mk 2:28), restores to the Sabbath observance its liberating character, carefully safeguarding the rights of God and the rights of man. This is why Christians, called as they are to proclaim the liberation won by the blood of Christ,
felt that they had the authority to transfer the meaning of the Sabbath to the day of the Resurrection. The Passover of Christ has in fact liberated man from a slavery more radical than any weighing upon an oppressed people — the slavery of sin, which alienates man from God, and alienates man from himself and from others, constantly sowing within history the seeds of evil and violence.
Sorry Winsome, what you say and what the above says seem to be two very different things. If Sunday replaces the seventh day, if the meaning of the Sabbath has been transferred to Sunday, if the practices and observance of the seventh day are gone, being surpassed and fulfilled in Sunday observance, If Sunday is more than a replacement for Sabbath but the fulfillment of it, if it is the day now sanctified by God rather than the seventh day, which by the way scripture says nowhere, then all who believe such have obviously changed the day in their hearts, minds, and thus actions.
All these things are taught by the Catholic church in many more places than just the few examples I have provided above. Your denial is highly suggestive of an institution speaking out of both sides of it's mouth. If the Sabbath remains, then it is to be observed by all who profess to worship the God of the bible. If not, then it should be easy enough to show from scripture that it's meaning and purpose has been transferred to Sunday from the scriptures themselves. We all know that this cannot be done though.
No one can sanctify Sunday by deciding to keep it as a day of rest. No one can sanctify anything, but God alone. He has sanctified the seventh day, and only He can un-sanctify it, and make another day holy. Neither the Pope or any other human being can do such, without scriptural authority backing them up. It is the man of sin alone that would claim authority to change the commandments of God, spoken by His own mouth to humanity, and written with His own finger in tables of stone for the same. This man of sin has set himself up in the temple of God, the church, as though he is God, claiming authority to abolish and establish commandments of God.
Of course it will not be good enough for this man of sin that people should make their own choice either about this issue, no but he calls for civil legislation supporting his commandment for humanity, meant to replace God's. All should be forced to acknowledge it by human law. As it always has been, which is the exact topic of this thread.
3.When you give what you think is Catholic teaching can you quote from official Catholic sources.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
I quote from official Catholic sources all the time, just as I have above. The quotes are either ignored, or denied to mean exactly what they are saying. Apart from this, why should all sources other than Catholic, be denied as having any truth? The Catholic church has been found to pass off lies as the truth in the past, has literally murdered countless people in the past that spoke of her as she did not approve regardless of the truth, and burned or otherwise destroyed the writings of many for the same reason. She is not content to allow any to examine evidence and the claims of her opponents for themselves, that they might make up their own minds. Thus she is continually about the work of removing all of the same from public view by whatever means, and trashing the reputation of those who testify against her as nothing but Catholic bashing bigots.
4.Legally the Ten Commandments, along with the whole of the Jewish Law:
a) was never applicable to Gentiles
b) was legally abrogated by Christ's death on the cross.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
Of course we do not accept this. Because it is not biblical at all. It is only propagated by those who twist and mutilate the scriptures to their own destruction. The ten commandments are held up as the standard from one end of scripture to the other. Thank you though for more clearly revealing the intentions of the institution of the man of sin. Which is obviously to abrogate the law of God, while exalting their own laws through human legislative process to be forced upon all. So now according to you and your institution the law of God has no authority over humanity other than the Jews, but your day of worship exalted by the man of sin should have authority over and be enforced upon all.
2 Th 2:2 That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. 3 ¶ Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; 4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.
What more could be done to set one's self up on the temple of God as though they were God than to trash the law of God and replace it with your own through the force of human legislation? Which as is obvious, is the exact intention of the church of Rome.
I also said
If you want to discuss any of these points I am happy to do that if you:
a) use official Catholic sources (where available)
b) leave off the negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church.
If you are going to continue making negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church then I see no point in continuing a discussion with you.
It's up to you. Do you want a sensible and reasoned discussion, or are you just here for Catholic bashing?
The problem with the above of course, is who determines what is simply negative irrelevant Catholic bashing, and what is actually pertinent. Obviously there is a great deal of difference of opinion regarding the same. Though I know you were not specifically addressing me in this post, we are all addressing each other on these web sites.
: Amo Sat Feb 01, 2014 - 12:45:20
Yes changing the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday is on topic. Many of the other things you said were not.
I'm not trying to limit quotes from documents less than 100 years old. Please stop lying about what I said.
To go back to my earlier post
I raised four points and as far as I am concerned we are discussing those. We can move to other points when we have finished with those four.
1.The Catholic Church have not changed the order of the commandments, or left one out.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
Exo 20:1 ¶ And God spake all these words, saying, 2 I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: 5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; 6 And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.
7 Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.
8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:
10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: 11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
12 ¶ Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.
13 Thou shalt not kill.
14 Thou shalt not commit adultery.
15 Thou shalt not steal.
16 Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.
17 Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.
The above is the scriptural account of what God Himself spoke to Israel as the ten commandments. The following is from the Catechism found at the Vatican's web site.
Catechism of the Catholic Church
1 - I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them or serve them.
2 - You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.
3 - Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work; but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God; in it you shall not do any work.
4 - Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land which the Lord your God gives you.
5 - You shall not kill.
6 -You shall not commit adultery.
7 - You shall not steal.
8 - You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
9 - You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant, or his maidservant, or his ox, or his ass, or anything that is your neighbor's.
10 - You shall not covet ... anything that is your neighbor's....
As is obvious, they are not the same.
2.The Catholic Church has not moved the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday. The Sabbath remains Saturday.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
Catechism of the Catholic Church(Emphasis mine)
The day of the Resurrection: the new creation
2174 Jesus rose from the dead "on the first day of the week."104 Because it is the "first day," the day of Christ's Resurrection recalls the first creation. Because it is the "eighth day" following the sabbath,105 it symbolizes the new creation ushered in by Christ's Resurrection. For Christians it has become the first of all days, the first of all feasts, the Lord's Day (he kuriake hemera, dies dominica)—Sunday: (638, 349)
We all gather on the day of the sun, for it is the first day [after the Jewish sabbath, but also the first day] when God, separating matter from darkness, made the world; and on this same day Jesus Christ our Savior rose from the dead.106
Sunday—fulfillment of the sabbath
2175 Sunday is expressly distinguished from the sabbath which it follows chronologically every week; for Christians its ceremonial observance replaces that of the sabbath. In Christ's Passover, Sunday fulfills the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath and announces man's eternal rest in God. For worship under the Law prepared for the mystery of Christ, and what was done there prefigured some aspects of Christ:107 (1166)
Those who lived according to the old order of things have come to a new hope, no longer keeping the sabbath, but the Lord's Day, in which our life is blessed by him and by his death.108
2176 The celebration of Sunday observes the moral commandment inscribed by nature in the human heart to render to God an outward, visible, public, and regular worship "as a sign of his universal beneficence to all."109 Sunday worship fulfills the moral command of the Old Covenant, taking up its rhythm and spirit in the weekly celebration of the Creator and Redeemer of his people.
A day of grace and rest from work
2184 Just as God "rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done,"121 human life has a rhythm of work and rest. The institution of the Lord's Day helps everyone enjoy adequate rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives.122 (2172)
2185 On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are to refrain from engaging in work or activities that hinder the worship owed to God, the joy proper to the Lord's Day, the performance of the works of mercy, and the appropriate relaxation of mind and body.123 Family needs or important social service can legitimately excuse from the obligation of Sunday rest. The faithful should see to it that legitimate excuses do not lead to habits prejudicial to religion, family life, and health. (2428)
The charity of truth seeks holy leisure; the necessity of charity accepts just work.124
2186 Those Christians who have leisure should be mindful of their brethren who have the same needs and the same rights, yet cannot rest from work because of poverty and misery. Sunday is traditionally consecrated by Christian piety to good works and humble service of the sick, the infirm, and the elderly. Christians will also sanctify Sunday by devoting time and care to their families and relatives, often difficult to do on other days of the week. Sunday is a time for reflection, silence, cultivation of the mind, and meditation which furthers the growth of the Christian interior life. (2447)
2187 Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees. (2289)
2188 In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."125 (2105)
IN BRIEF
2189 "Observe the sabbath day, to keep it holy" (Deut 5:12). "The seventh day is a sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord" (Ex 31:15).
2190 The sabbath, which represented the completion of the first creation, has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ.
2191 The Church celebrates the day of Christ's Resurrection on the "eighth day," Sunday, which is rightly called the Lord's Day (cf. SC 106).
2192 "Sunday... is to be observed as the foremost holy day of obligation in the universal Church" (CIC, can. 1246 § 1). "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass" (CIC, can. 1247).
2193 "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound... to abstain from those labors and business concerns which impede the worship to be rendered to God, the joy which is proper to the Lord's Day, or the proper relaxation of mind and body" (CIC, can. 1247).
2194 The institution of Sunday helps all "to be allowed sufficient rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives" (GS 67 § 3).
2195 Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day
The following quotes are from the APOSTOLIC LETTER DIES DOMINI by John Paul II
14. In the first place, therefore, Sunday is the day of rest because it is the day "blessed" by God and "made holy" by him, set apart from the other days to be, among all of them, "the Lord's Day".
18.................In the light of this mystery, the meaning of the Old Testament precept concerning the Lord's Day is recovered, perfected and fully revealed in the glory which shines on the face of the Risen Christ (cf. 2 Cor 4:6). We move from the "Sabbath" to the "first day after the Sabbath", from the seventh day to the first day: the dies Domini becomes the dies Christi!
Chap.4
59.......................More than a "replacement" for the Sabbath, therefore, Sunday is its fulfilment, and in a certain sense its extension and full expression in the ordered unfolding of the history of salvation, which reaches its culmination in Christ.
62. It is the duty of Christians therefore to remember that, although the practices of the Jewish Sabbath are gone, surpassed as they are by the "fulfilment" which Sunday brings, the underlying reasons for keeping "the Lord's Day" holy — inscribed solemnly in the Ten Commandments — remain valid, though they need to be reinterpreted in the light of the theology and spirituality of Sunday: "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days you shall labour, and do all your work; but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. Then you shall do no work, you, or your son, or your daughter, or your servant, or your maid, or your ox, or your ass, or any of your beasts, or the foreigner within your gates, that your servant and maid may rest as well as you. You shall remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded that you keep the Sabbath day" (Dt 5:12-15). Here the Sabbath observance is closely linked with the liberation which God accomplished for his people.
63. Christ came to accomplish a new "exodus", to restore freedom to the oppressed. He performed many healings on the Sabbath (cf. Mt 12:9-14 and parallels), certainly not to violate the Lord's Day, but to reveal its full meaning: "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mk 2:27). Opposing the excessively legalistic interpretation of some of his contemporaries, and developing the true meaning of the biblical Sabbath, Jesus, as "Lord of the Sabbath" (Mk 2:28), restores to the Sabbath observance its liberating character, carefully safeguarding the rights of God and the rights of man. This is why Christians, called as they are to proclaim the liberation won by the blood of Christ, felt that they had the authority to transfer the meaning of the Sabbath to the day of the Resurrection. The Passover of Christ has in fact liberated man from a slavery more radical than any weighing upon an oppressed people — the slavery of sin, which alienates man from God, and alienates man from himself and from others, constantly sowing within history the seeds of evil and violence.
Sorry Winsome, what you say and what the above says seem to be two very different things. If Sunday replaces the seventh day, if the meaning of the Sabbath has been transferred to Sunday, if the practices and observance of the seventh day are gone, being surpassed and fulfilled in Sunday observance, If Sunday is more than a replacement for Sabbath but the fulfillment of it, if it is the day now sanctified by God rather than the seventh day, which by the way scripture says nowhere, then all who believe such have obviously changed the day in their hearts, minds, and thus actions.
All these things are taught by the Catholic church in many more places than just the few examples I have provided above. Your denial is highly suggestive of an institution speaking out of both sides of it's mouth. If the Sabbath remains, then it is to be observed by all who profess to worship the God of the bible. If not, then it should be easy enough to show from scripture that it's meaning and purpose has been transferred to Sunday from the scriptures themselves. We all know that this cannot be done though.
No one can sanctify Sunday by deciding to keep it as a day of rest. No one can sanctify anything, but God alone. He has sanctified the seventh day, and only He can un-sanctify it, and make another day holy. Neither the Pope or any other human being can do such, without scriptural authority backing them up. It is the man of sin alone that would claim authority to change the commandments of God, spoken by His own mouth to humanity, and written with His own finger in tables of stone for the same. This man of sin has set himself up in the temple of God, the church, as though he is God, claiming authority to abolish and establish commandments of God.
Of course it will not be good enough for this man of sin that people should make their own choice either about this issue, no but he calls for civil legislation supporting his commandment for humanity, meant to replace God's. All should be forced to acknowledge it by human law. As it always has been, which is the exact topic of this thread.
3.When you give what you think is Catholic teaching can you quote from official Catholic sources.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
I quote from official Catholic sources all the time, just as I have above. The quotes are either ignored, or denied to mean exactly what they are saying. Apart from this, why should all sources other than Catholic, be denied as having any truth? The Catholic church has been found to pass off lies as the truth in the past, has literally murdered countless people in the past that spoke of her as she did not approve regardless of the truth, and burned or otherwise destroyed the writings of many for the same reason. She is not content to allow any to examine evidence and the claims of her opponents for themselves, that they might make up their own minds. Thus she is continually about the work of removing all of the same from public view by whatever means, and trashing the reputation of those who testify against her as nothing but Catholic bashing bigots.
4.Legally the Ten Commandments, along with the whole of the Jewish Law:
a) was never applicable to Gentiles
b) was legally abrogated by Christ's death on the cross.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
Of course we do not accept this. Because it is not biblical at all. It is only propagated by those who twist and mutilate the scriptures to their own destruction. The ten commandments are held up as the standard from one end of scripture to the other. Thank you though for more clearly revealing the intentions of the institution of the man of sin. Which is obviously to abrogate the law of God, while exalting their own laws through human legislative process to be forced upon all. So now according to you and your institution the law of God has no authority over humanity other than the Jews, but your day of worship exalted by the man of sin should have authority over and be enforced upon all.
2 Th 2:2 That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. 3 ¶ Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; 4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.
What more could be done to set one's self up on the temple of God as though they were God than to trash the law of God and replace it with your own through the force of human legislation? Which as is obvious, is the exact intention of the church of Rome.
I also said
If you want to discuss any of these points I am happy to do that if you:
a) use official Catholic sources (where available)
b) leave off the negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church.
If you are going to continue making negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church then I see no point in continuing a discussion with you.
It's up to you. Do you want a sensible and reasoned discussion, or are you just here for Catholic bashing?
The problem with the above of course, is who determines what is simply negative irrelevant Catholic bashing, and what is actually pertinent. Obviously there is a great deal of difference of opinion regarding the same. Though I know you were not specifically addressing me in this post, we are all addressing each other on these web sites.
One of my conditions to continue the dialogue with johnm was:
leave off the negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church.
If you are going to continue making negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church then I see no point in continuing a discussion with you.
It's up to you. Do you want a sensible and reasoned discussion, or are you just here for Catholic bashing?
I see that you prefer Catholic bashing to a reasoned discussion
: winsome Fri Jan 31, 2014 - 04:08:33
2187 Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees.[/color] (2289)
2188 In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."125 (2105)
IN BRIEF
I only wish such interdict could be delivered upon my neighbour with that pestilence of a barking all day long dog of his!
LOOK what the Roman Catholics have done to my Protestant Afrikaans Bible in Colossians 2:16,
"Let no one prescribe to you to keep the Sabbath!"
You think that is gross? Or perhaps cute?
Look what they have done to "nourishment being ministered" in verse 19, "..........." sweet blow NOTHING! THERE'S NOTHING man!!
So?
So, the Lord's Supper in Colossians 2:16 to 19 is being WIPED OUT!
The Lord's supper in Colossians 2 ---HAHAHAHA you must be joking!
Joking?
Read this!
My Afrikaans Bible omits altogether any idea contained in verse 19, "Nourishment being ministered".
The component words making up the Greek term 'epichorehgoumenon' are recognisable in the English, e.g., a 'gourmet meal'. In context of Colossians 2:16-19, "The Lord's Supper".
Follet's Greek Dictionary mentions Horace's 'canis a corio nunquam absterrebitur uncto' from the Doric proverb, 'tis bad to let the dog TASTE LEATHER' ['eat for FOOD, leather' GE] -- 'chalepon CHORIOH kuna geusai'.
'Chorion', 'embrionic sac' like an egg filled with food or 'supply'.
'Chortádzoh' – 'fatten'
'Choreúoh' – 'to feast in honour of the gods'
'Chórtos' – 'eating place'
'Chorós' – 'ring' – 'gathering'
'Choreography' from the 'choréhgos' – some rich person / 'chorón dédohka' – 'leader' / 'chorodidáskalos' – 'teacher' – who paid for FOOD and other needs of 'the train or band' of dancers. Everybody had to dance to the 'choréhgos' step and sing to his tune – hence, 'chorus'.
In Colossians 2:19 Christ is
"the Head ['choréhgos', 'Supplier']
"from whom supplement / gourmet / food / substance ['epichoregóúmenon']
"is being supplied / fed to the Body the Church ['chorus']".
"by joints and bands ['haphóhn kai sundésmohn' // 'chordáí' – 'chords' binding together]
In Colossians 2, verses 16,17 and 18,19 pair in the chiasm, AB-AB
A: "Do not let judge you anyone in eating and drinking of Christ the SUBSTANCE"
B: "Spectre of things coming" [16-17]
A: "Do not let beguile you anyone of your REWARD (Christ the) NOURISHMENT being ministered"
B: "Will grow The Body with the growth of God" [18-19]
If that does not prove to you the Roman Catholics and Pentecostal -- modern day 'protestants' aka Roman Catholics -- CHANGED AND CORRUPTED "the day The Seventh Day SABBATH OF THE LORD GOD" INTO SATAN'S DAY and raised Sunday from the pit of the old snake into 'the day of the lord SUN', nothing will, whether you are SDA or SDA foe.
: winsome Sun Feb 02, 2014 - 05:43:44
: Amo Sat Feb 01, 2014 - 12:45:20
Yes changing the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday is on topic. Many of the other things you said were not.
I'm not trying to limit quotes from documents less than 100 years old. Please stop lying about what I said.
To go back to my earlier post
I raised four points and as far as I am concerned we are discussing those. We can move to other points when we have finished with those four.
1.The Catholic Church have not changed the order of the commandments, or left one out.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
Exo 20:1 ¶ And God spake all these words, saying, 2 I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: 5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; 6 And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.
7 Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.
8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:
10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: 11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
12 ¶ Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.
13 Thou shalt not kill.
14 Thou shalt not commit adultery.
15 Thou shalt not steal.
16 Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.
17 Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.
The above is the scriptural account of what God Himself spoke to Israel as the ten commandments. The following is from the Catechism found at the Vatican's web site.
Catechism of the Catholic Church
1 - I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them or serve them.
2 - You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.
3 - Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work; but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God; in it you shall not do any work.
4 - Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land which the Lord your God gives you.
5 - You shall not kill.
6 -You shall not commit adultery.
7 - You shall not steal.
8 - You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
9 - You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant, or his maidservant, or his ox, or his ass, or anything that is your neighbor's.
10 - You shall not covet ... anything that is your neighbor's....
As is obvious, they are not the same.
2.The Catholic Church has not moved the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday. The Sabbath remains Saturday.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
Catechism of the Catholic Church(Emphasis mine)
The day of the Resurrection: the new creation
2174 Jesus rose from the dead "on the first day of the week."104 Because it is the "first day," the day of Christ's Resurrection recalls the first creation. Because it is the "eighth day" following the sabbath,105 it symbolizes the new creation ushered in by Christ's Resurrection. For Christians it has become the first of all days, the first of all feasts, the Lord's Day (he kuriake hemera, dies dominica)—Sunday: (638, 349)
We all gather on the day of the sun, for it is the first day [after the Jewish sabbath, but also the first day] when God, separating matter from darkness, made the world; and on this same day Jesus Christ our Savior rose from the dead.106
Sunday—fulfillment of the sabbath
2175 Sunday is expressly distinguished from the sabbath which it follows chronologically every week; for Christians its ceremonial observance replaces that of the sabbath. In Christ's Passover, Sunday fulfills the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath and announces man's eternal rest in God. For worship under the Law prepared for the mystery of Christ, and what was done there prefigured some aspects of Christ:107 (1166)
Those who lived according to the old order of things have come to a new hope, no longer keeping the sabbath, but the Lord's Day, in which our life is blessed by him and by his death.108
2176 The celebration of Sunday observes the moral commandment inscribed by nature in the human heart to render to God an outward, visible, public, and regular worship "as a sign of his universal beneficence to all."109 Sunday worship fulfills the moral command of the Old Covenant, taking up its rhythm and spirit in the weekly celebration of the Creator and Redeemer of his people.
A day of grace and rest from work
2184 Just as God "rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done,"121 human life has a rhythm of work and rest. The institution of the Lord's Day helps everyone enjoy adequate rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives.122 (2172)
2185 On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are to refrain from engaging in work or activities that hinder the worship owed to God, the joy proper to the Lord's Day, the performance of the works of mercy, and the appropriate relaxation of mind and body.123 Family needs or important social service can legitimately excuse from the obligation of Sunday rest. The faithful should see to it that legitimate excuses do not lead to habits prejudicial to religion, family life, and health. (2428)
The charity of truth seeks holy leisure; the necessity of charity accepts just work.124
2186 Those Christians who have leisure should be mindful of their brethren who have the same needs and the same rights, yet cannot rest from work because of poverty and misery. Sunday is traditionally consecrated by Christian piety to good works and humble service of the sick, the infirm, and the elderly. Christians will also sanctify Sunday by devoting time and care to their families and relatives, often difficult to do on other days of the week. Sunday is a time for reflection, silence, cultivation of the mind, and meditation which furthers the growth of the Christian interior life. (2447)
2187 Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees. (2289)
2188 In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."125 (2105)
IN BRIEF
2189 "Observe the sabbath day, to keep it holy" (Deut 5:12). "The seventh day is a sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord" (Ex 31:15).
2190 The sabbath, which represented the completion of the first creation, has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ.
2191 The Church celebrates the day of Christ's Resurrection on the "eighth day," Sunday, which is rightly called the Lord's Day (cf. SC 106).
2192 "Sunday... is to be observed as the foremost holy day of obligation in the universal Church" (CIC, can. 1246 § 1). "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass" (CIC, can. 1247).
2193 "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound... to abstain from those labors and business concerns which impede the worship to be rendered to God, the joy which is proper to the Lord's Day, or the proper relaxation of mind and body" (CIC, can. 1247).
2194 The institution of Sunday helps all "to be allowed sufficient rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives" (GS 67 § 3).
2195 Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day
The following quotes are from the APOSTOLIC LETTER DIES DOMINI by John Paul II
14. In the first place, therefore, Sunday is the day of rest because it is the day "blessed" by God and "made holy" by him, set apart from the other days to be, among all of them, "the Lord's Day".
18.................In the light of this mystery, the meaning of the Old Testament precept concerning the Lord's Day is recovered, perfected and fully revealed in the glory which shines on the face of the Risen Christ (cf. 2 Cor 4:6). We move from the "Sabbath" to the "first day after the Sabbath", from the seventh day to the first day: the dies Domini becomes the dies Christi!
Chap.4
59.......................More than a "replacement" for the Sabbath, therefore, Sunday is its fulfilment, and in a certain sense its extension and full expression in the ordered unfolding of the history of salvation, which reaches its culmination in Christ.
62. It is the duty of Christians therefore to remember that, although the practices of the Jewish Sabbath are gone, surpassed as they are by the "fulfilment" which Sunday brings, the underlying reasons for keeping "the Lord's Day" holy — inscribed solemnly in the Ten Commandments — remain valid, though they need to be reinterpreted in the light of the theology and spirituality of Sunday: "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days you shall labour, and do all your work; but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. Then you shall do no work, you, or your son, or your daughter, or your servant, or your maid, or your ox, or your ass, or any of your beasts, or the foreigner within your gates, that your servant and maid may rest as well as you. You shall remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded that you keep the Sabbath day" (Dt 5:12-15). Here the Sabbath observance is closely linked with the liberation which God accomplished for his people.
63. Christ came to accomplish a new "exodus", to restore freedom to the oppressed. He performed many healings on the Sabbath (cf. Mt 12:9-14 and parallels), certainly not to violate the Lord's Day, but to reveal its full meaning: "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mk 2:27). Opposing the excessively legalistic interpretation of some of his contemporaries, and developing the true meaning of the biblical Sabbath, Jesus, as "Lord of the Sabbath" (Mk 2:28), restores to the Sabbath observance its liberating character, carefully safeguarding the rights of God and the rights of man. This is why Christians, called as they are to proclaim the liberation won by the blood of Christ, felt that they had the authority to transfer the meaning of the Sabbath to the day of the Resurrection. The Passover of Christ has in fact liberated man from a slavery more radical than any weighing upon an oppressed people — the slavery of sin, which alienates man from God, and alienates man from himself and from others, constantly sowing within history the seeds of evil and violence.
Sorry Winsome, what you say and what the above says seem to be two very different things. If Sunday replaces the seventh day, if the meaning of the Sabbath has been transferred to Sunday, if the practices and observance of the seventh day are gone, being surpassed and fulfilled in Sunday observance, If Sunday is more than a replacement for Sabbath but the fulfillment of it, if it is the day now sanctified by God rather than the seventh day, which by the way scripture says nowhere, then all who believe such have obviously changed the day in their hearts, minds, and thus actions.
All these things are taught by the Catholic church in many more places than just the few examples I have provided above. Your denial is highly suggestive of an institution speaking out of both sides of it's mouth. If the Sabbath remains, then it is to be observed by all who profess to worship the God of the bible. If not, then it should be easy enough to show from scripture that it's meaning and purpose has been transferred to Sunday from the scriptures themselves. We all know that this cannot be done though.
No one can sanctify Sunday by deciding to keep it as a day of rest. No one can sanctify anything, but God alone. He has sanctified the seventh day, and only He can un-sanctify it, and make another day holy. Neither the Pope or any other human being can do such, without scriptural authority backing them up. It is the man of sin alone that would claim authority to change the commandments of God, spoken by His own mouth to humanity, and written with His own finger in tables of stone for the same. This man of sin has set himself up in the temple of God, the church, as though he is God, claiming authority to abolish and establish commandments of God.
Of course it will not be good enough for this man of sin that people should make their own choice either about this issue, no but he calls for civil legislation supporting his commandment for humanity, meant to replace God's. All should be forced to acknowledge it by human law. As it always has been, which is the exact topic of this thread.
3.When you give what you think is Catholic teaching can you quote from official Catholic sources.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
I quote from official Catholic sources all the time, just as I have above. The quotes are either ignored, or denied to mean exactly what they are saying. Apart from this, why should all sources other than Catholic, be denied as having any truth? The Catholic church has been found to pass off lies as the truth in the past, has literally murdered countless people in the past that spoke of her as she did not approve regardless of the truth, and burned or otherwise destroyed the writings of many for the same reason. She is not content to allow any to examine evidence and the claims of her opponents for themselves, that they might make up their own minds. Thus she is continually about the work of removing all of the same from public view by whatever means, and trashing the reputation of those who testify against her as nothing but Catholic bashing bigots.
4.Legally the Ten Commandments, along with the whole of the Jewish Law:
a) was never applicable to Gentiles
b) was legally abrogated by Christ's death on the cross.
Do you accept this or not?
If not why not?
Of course we do not accept this. Because it is not biblical at all. It is only propagated by those who twist and mutilate the scriptures to their own destruction. The ten commandments are held up as the standard from one end of scripture to the other. Thank you though for more clearly revealing the intentions of the institution of the man of sin. Which is obviously to abrogate the law of God, while exalting their own laws through human legislative process to be forced upon all. So now according to you and your institution the law of God has no authority over humanity other than the Jews, but your day of worship exalted by the man of sin should have authority over and be enforced upon all.
2 Th 2:2 That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. 3 ¶ Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; 4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.
What more could be done to set one's self up on the temple of God as though they were God than to trash the law of God and replace it with your own through the force of human legislation? Which as is obvious, is the exact intention of the church of Rome.
I also said
If you want to discuss any of these points I am happy to do that if you:
a) use official Catholic sources (where available)
b) leave off the negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church.
If you are going to continue making negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church then I see no point in continuing a discussion with you.
It's up to you. Do you want a sensible and reasoned discussion, or are you just here for Catholic bashing?
The problem with the above of course, is who determines what is simply negative irrelevant Catholic bashing, and what is actually pertinent. Obviously there is a great deal of difference of opinion regarding the same. Though I know you were not specifically addressing me in this post, we are all addressing each other on these web sites.
One of my conditions to continue the dialogue with johnm was:
leave off the negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church.
If you are going to continue making negative and irrelevant side comments about the Catholic Church then I see no point in continuing a discussion with you.
It's up to you. Do you want a sensible and reasoned discussion, or are you just here for Catholic bashing?
I see that you prefer Catholic bashing to a reasoned discussion
A reasoned discussion requires discussion. Ignoring everything someone says and all the official Roman Catholic material they quote relevant to the same, with the one sentence answer of you are Catholic bashing, is not discussing anything. You are the one who will not have a discussion unless the said discussion is controlled and monitored by the parameters of your own design. Not to worry, you and yours are developing the proper political and legislative atmosphere to once again have such control, at least by the support of government and human law, though not by the individual conscience. I really do wish you and yours would reconsider, the end of such things will not be well. They were not well the first time around, and they will end unimaginably more horribly the second time around.
Let the gospel do it's work, and leave the political and legislative processes of this world alone. You cannot cleanse them. They will, have, and only will continue to corrupt you. You cannot be a friend of this world in any other way than sharing the gospel with it, without becoming the enemy of God.
Jas 4:1 ¶ From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members? 2 Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not. 3 Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts. 4 Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.
The end does not justify the means. Using the means of this world corrupts all who participate in the same. Making them the enemy of God. We must choose which kingdom we are of, and proceed as citizens of the same.
Joh 18:36 Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence.
If we are Christ's, then we do not use the methods of this world. Enlisting the aid of human legislation to force what we deem to be Christ's upon all, is not from above but from beneath. Christ could have easily established such. He did not, nor did He command His followers to do so either. These are the methods of the prince of the powers of this earth, not God's.
Eph 6:12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world,
against spiritual wickedness in high places.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Sun Feb 02, 2014 - 07:35:08
If that does not prove to you the Roman Catholics and Pentecostal -- modern day 'protestants' aka Roman Catholics -- CHANGED AND CORRUPTED "the day The Seventh Day SABBATH OF THE LORD GOD" INTO SATAN'S DAY and raised Sunday from the pit of the old snake into 'the day of the lord SUN', nothing will, whether you are SDA or SDA foe.
You do realize that Rev Miller and even the young Ms White were Sunday keepers prior to her vision, right?
: johnm Thu Jan 30, 2014 - 19:34:58
Dave you are a skilled apologist, so skilled has apologetics become there should be a place for it in the Olympic Games; tuning a lie into a perceived truth, neutralising the truth by confusion; for the last ten years I have been watching politicians do this. What the Catholic teaches seems to variy from person to person and from time to time.
Interesting. I am "apologist" for the Catholic Church? Since when?
I will submit that to TRUE catholics Winsome and Catholica: When have I ever spoken on behalf of or been an apologist for the RCC?
I humbly apologise; from the rest of my post you should have realised that I was referring to winsome/lose some.
Apology accepted. And since you were saying that I was an apologist, I was not sure on the rest if it was addressed to me or not. [my bad]
But to be honest, I do find myself at times arguing FOR the Catholic point of view. (but not too often) Something I was not thinking about when I wrote that. [again, my bad]
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Fri Jan 31, 2014 - 01:08:04The clearest and incontrovertible evidence that the Roman Catholic church has successfully changed the Sabbath from the Sabbath to Sunday is the billions of CORRUPTED TEXT New Testaments in people's possession today.
Um - today's NT translations come from manuscripts that predate the RCC. That organization did not exist before 1050 ad.
I think you mean the Greek Orthodox Church. They predated the RCC.
: DaveW Mon Feb 03, 2014 - 07:53:51
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Fri Jan 31, 2014 - 01:08:04The clearest and incontrovertible evidence that the Roman Catholic church has successfully changed the Sabbath from the Sabbath to Sunday is the billions of CORRUPTED TEXT New Testaments in people's possession today.
Um - today's NT translations come from manuscripts that predate the RCC. That organization did not exist before 1050 ad.
I think you mean the Greek Orthodox Church. They predated the RCC.
Catholics and Orthodox both go back to the apostles.
: DaveW Mon Feb 03, 2014 - 07:44:42You do realize that Rev Miller and even the young Ms White were Sunday keepers prior to her vision, right?
What has that to do with me?
I am no SDA nor am I RC;
I am a Calvinist --- one who does not believe in Sunday; for I am a Calvinist who do not worship Calvin but respect him as he should be respected for not having been a Sunday believer like the Protestants around him.
I am -- humble thanks to God -- of 'Sabbaths' Feast of Christ Home Assemblies Reformed Protestant Faith'.
O come let us adore Him!
... or better say nothing.
: DaveW Mon Feb 03, 2014 - 07:44:42
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Sun Feb 02, 2014 - 07:35:08
If that does not prove to you the Roman Catholics and Pentecostal -- modern day 'protestants' aka Roman Catholics -- CHANGED AND CORRUPTED "the day The Seventh Day SABBATH OF THE LORD GOD" INTO SATAN'S DAY and raised Sunday from the pit of the old snake into 'the day of the lord SUN', nothing will, whether you are SDA or SDA foe.
You do realize that Rev Miller and even the young Ms White were Sunday keepers prior to her vision, right?
If you are speaking William Miller who gave the 1844 return of Christ message, he never was an SDA, nor do I believe a proponent of keeping the seventh day Sabbath. I'll have to look into it, but I believe the Whites began keeping the seventh day Sabbath before she ever had a vision pertaining to it. As many others of the time also did according to the testimony of those who shared this biblical truth with them.
: Amo Thu Feb 06, 2014 - 05:01:21
If you are speaking William Miller who gave the 1844 return of Christ message, he never was an SDA, nor do I believe a proponent of keeping the seventh day Sabbath. I'll have to look into it, but I believe the Whites began keeping the seventh day Sabbath before she ever had a vision pertaining to it. As many others of the time also did according to the testimony of those who shared this biblical truth with them.
The Whites were avid "Millerites;" the followers of W. Miller who was a Methodist Episcopal evangelist of the Wesleyan Holiness movement. So no - they were NOT SDA proper. It was Ellen White's distress following Miller's 2nd failed date (Miller slipped into a profound depression) that she had the vision. The SDA broke away from the Methodist church following those events.
My dad (ordained in the Wesleyan Methodist denom) did a lot of study of their history in the official archives at Andrews University - a major SDA seminary. His research did not show any interest in Saturday sabbath keeping before her vision.
<<If you are speaking William Miller who gave the 1844 return of Christ message, he never was an SDA, nor do I believe a proponent of keeping the seventh day Sabbath. I'll have to look into it, but I believe the Whites began keeping the seventh day Sabbath before she ever had a vision pertaining to it. As many others of the time also did according to the testimony of those who shared this biblical truth with them.>>
I haven't heard of Ellen White having a vision before; the account that I have heard of after 1844, Miller started his own church and these were referred to as Millerites, Ellen White and her friends, most were mostly Methodists and there were a few Puritans, started a Sunday church the name of which required two or three lines to write. Later Ellen White read a book written by a lady from the Seventh Day Baptists and after White and her friends studied the Seventh day, they adopted it and changed their name to SDA.
: Amo Thu Feb 06, 2014 - 05:01:21
If you are speaking William Miller who gave the 1844 return of Christ message, he never was an SDA, nor do I believe a proponent of keeping the seventh day Sabbath. I'll have to look into it, but I believe the Whites began keeping the seventh day Sabbath before she ever had a vision pertaining to it. As many others of the time also did according to the testimony of those who shared this biblical truth with them.
What do you mean by <<this biblical truth>>?
<<1844>>?
Amazing ....
: johnm Thu Feb 06, 2014 - 16:10:49
I haven't heard of Ellen White having a vision before; the account that I have heard of after 1844, Miller started his own church and these were referred to as Millerites,
The Millerites were Rev Miller's followers prior to 1844. He had set a day for the Lord's return. That day in 1844 came and went. So Miller went back to his calculations and decided he was off by 1 year. So the day in 1845 came and went. Miller became extremely confused and depressed. Ms White who was an avid follower and some counts say a personal friend started praying and fasting for an answer from God on what had happened.
Then she had a vision, the first of several. In it she saw that Miller's original date was correct but it was not the Lord's return to earth but his moving from the heavenly throne room (at the Father's right hand) to the inner sanctuary with the ark of the covenant. She saw the top lifted off and the stone tablets of Moses lifted out, and a spotlight fell on the 4th command - to keep the Sabbath holy. (all from my dad's research)
My SDA friends who are more familiar with Ms White's writings than I am can give the proper reference in her writings.
: DaveW Thu Feb 06, 2014 - 06:37:18
: Amo Thu Feb 06, 2014 - 05:01:21
If you are speaking William Miller who gave the 1844 return of Christ message, he never was an SDA, nor do I believe a proponent of keeping the seventh day Sabbath. I'll have to look into it, but I believe the Whites began keeping the seventh day Sabbath before she ever had a vision pertaining to it. As many others of the time also did according to the testimony of those who shared this biblical truth with them.
The Whites were avid "Millerites;" the followers of W. Miller who was a Methodist Episcopal evangelist of the Wesleyan Holiness movement. So no - they were NOT SDA proper. It was Ellen White's distress following Miller's 2nd failed date (Miller slipped into a profound depression) that she had the vision. The SDA broke away from the Methodist church following those events.
My dad (ordained in the Wesleyan Methodist denom) did a lot of study of their history in the official archives at Andrews University - a major SDA seminary. His research did not show any interest in Saturday sabbath keeping before her vision.
The following can be viewed at - http://www.whiteestate.org/pathways/wmiller.asp (http://www.whiteestate.org/pathways/wmiller.asp)
William Miller
1782 - 1849Miller was a farmer, justice of the peace, sheriff, and Baptist preacher, who, from 1831 to 1844, preached the immanent return of Christ. He was born in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. His mother was a deeply religious person, and his father a soldier. Probably as a result, there was tension in his early life between patriotism and religious belief. He was largely self-educated, attending school only for three months each winter between ages 9 and 14.
As a young man, Miller was influenced by reading and association to become a deist. This is a belief that God made the world and then abandoned it to run according to certain natural laws. Miller volunteered for service in the War of 1812, and while in service saw evidences that there was a God, after all, who intervenes in human affairs. After the war he was converted and began a systematic study of the Bible to find answers to his former questions. In the process he discovered the prophecies of Daniel and Revelation, especially Daniel 8, which seemed to predict that Christ would soon return to earth. He finally established through the process of applying the Bible principle of a day for a year in prophecy, that Jesus would come a second time "about the year 1843."
Miller began preaching in small towns at first, and then, with the help of Joshua Himes, moved to the larger cities, bringing his second advent message to many thousands. Hundreds of ministers and laymen joined in preaching the message. By the expected time for Christ's return, Miller had between 50,000 to 100,000 followers, commonly known as Millerites. He did not set a specific date for the second advent. At first he said only that it would be "about 1843." He finally set an ultimate time in the spring of 1844. Others picked the more precise date of October 22, 1844, which Miller and many of the leaders of the first movement accepted shortly before the date arrived.
Many clergymen joined Miller in his preaching. At the same time, he was greatly opposed by others. So much so, that in the final months, most churches were closed to the second advent preaching, and many of those who accepted the message were put out of their churches.
Ellen White has written positively about Miller in The Great Controversy and elsewhere. She heard him preach, and accepted his teachings, going through the disappointment at age 16. She believed that his preaching fulfilled the prophecies of Scripture, and saw him being guided by the Lord.
Miller never accepted advancing understanding of the disappointment. Ellen White wrote: "I saw that William Miller erred as he was soon to enter the heavenly Canaan, in suffering his influence to go against the truth. Others led him to this; others must account for it. But angels watch the precious dust of this servant of God, and he will come forth at the sound of the last trump."--Early Writings, p. 258.
After the disappointment of October 22, he wrote: "Although I have been twice disappointed, I am not yet cast down or discouraged. . . . I have fixed my mind upon another time, and here I mean to stand until God gives me more light,--and that is Today, TODAY, and TODAY, until He comes, and I see Him for whom my soul yearns."--The Midnight Cry, Dec. 5, 1844, pp. 179, 180.
The following concerning Ellen Whites acceptance of the seventh day Sabbath can be viewed at - http://text.egwwritings.org/publication.php?pubtype=Book&bookCode=1BIO&lang=en&collection=2§ion=all&pagenumber=116 (http://text.egwwritings.org/publication.php?pubtype=Book&bookCode=1BIO&lang=en&collection=2§ion=all&pagenumber=116) QUERY=introduced+the+Sabbath&resultId=6
Ellen G. White: Volume 1—The Early Years: 1827-1862, By Arthur L. White, Page 116&17For a few weeks prior to this trip to Massachusetts, James and Ellen had been observing the seventh day of the week as the Sabbath. Of this she wrote:
In the autumn of 1846 we began to observe the Bible Sabbath, and to teach and defend it.—Testimonies for the Church, 1:75.
Reference has been made to her negative reaction when earlier in the year, Joseph Bates introduced the Sabbath to her. Bates had taken his stand in 1845, having had his attention called to it through an article in The Hope of Israel, written by T. M. Preble. A man of conviction and action, Bates in turn prepared a forty-eight-page pamphlet, which he published in August, 1846, under the title The Seventh-day Sabbath a Perpetual Sign From the Beginning to the Entering Into the Gates of the Holy City According to the Commandment. James White took a copy home with him after the funeral service he conducted at Falmouth. As he and Ellen studied the Biblical evidences for the sacredness of the seventh day, they took their stand and began to teach it as they met with their fellow Adventists. At this time there were about fifty Sabbathkeepers in New England and New York State (Ibid., 1:77). Years later Ellen White recalled what taking this step meant:
The light upon the fourth commandment, which was new and unpopular and generally rejected by our Adventist brethren and sisters, we had accepted. If we had trials and difficulties before this in accepting the message that the Lord would soon come the second time to our world with power and great glory, we found that accepting new and advanced truth brought us into positions of still greater difficulty. It brought down upon us not only the opposition of the Christian world who refused to believe in the Lord's soon coming, but opposition unexpectedly came upon us from those with whom we had been united in the faith and glorious hope of the second advent of our Saviour. In the place of closely investigating the Scriptures as did the noble Bereans to see if these things were so, there were those with whom we had taken sweet counsel together who denounced the third angel's message as heresy.—Manuscript 76, 1886.
As James and Ellen White made their trip to Massachusetts they undoubtedly spent time with Bates, reviewing their experience and the sound basis for the step they had so recently taken.
The Whites accepted the Sabbath truth, based upon biblical studies, before ever having any vision pertaining to it.
: DaveW Fri Feb 07, 2014 - 05:22:30
: johnm Thu Feb 06, 2014 - 16:10:49
I haven't heard of Ellen White having a vision before; the account that I have heard of after 1844, Miller started his own church and these were referred to as Millerites,
The Millerites were Rev Miller's followers prior to 1844. He had set a day for the Lord's return. That day in 1844 came and went. So Miller went back to his calculations and decided he was off by 1 year. So the day in 1845 came and went. Miller became extremely confused and depressed. Ms White who was an avid follower and some counts say a personal friend started praying and fasting for an answer from God on what had happened.
Then she had a vision, the first of several. In it she saw that Miller's original date was correct but it was not the Lord's return to earth but his moving from the heavenly throne room (at the Father's right hand) to the inner sanctuary with the ark of the covenant. She saw the top lifted off and the stone tablets of Moses lifted out, and a spotlight fell on the 4th command - to keep the Sabbath holy. (all from my dad's research)
My SDA friends who are more familiar with Ms White's writings than I am can give the proper reference in her writings.
It was actually a man by the name of Hiram Edson that first received a revelation concerning the true meaning of the cleansing of the sanctuary. Miller assumed the sanctuary to represent the earth, and the cleansing of it to be the cleansing of this earth by fire at the second coming of Christ. Thus the 1844 prediction of Christ's return. After the prediction failed, many still sought the true meaning of the prophecy concerning the cleansing of the sanctuary found in the book of Daniel. Hiram Edson claimed to receive an answer from God, while contemplating the same. Millers mistake was assuming the sanctuary represented the earth, Hiram Edson was directed to the heavenly sanctuary for the correct answer and interpretation regarding the prophecy. Ellen White later had visions regarding the same, but she did not introduce this truth.
As already examined also, The Whites were keeping the seventh day Sabbath by way of conviction concerning the scriptures before she ever had a vision pertaining to it also. While many presume that Ellen White introduced most of the more unique aspects of the Seventh Day Adventist church, the truth is, she introduced very little if anything that was not already believed by others before her. Her gift was more of a confirming testimony, than an original testimony of doctrine or belief. Most of what SDA's believe was and has been believed by countless Christians before us.
"His Name is The Most Holy Place" : Jesus Christ "being rested up again" from his DEATH'S FAST, that is, Jesus Christ RAISED UP "from the dead, from death, and from the grave and the darkness of it.
That - "this Jesus whom God raised Christ and Lord" - is the Sanctuary and the Truth of the Sanctuary : CLEANSED!
He is in heaven now : OUR SANCTUARY, our PLACE OF REFUGE, communing, interceding, with God our Father on the SAINTS behalf.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Fri Feb 07, 2014 - 10:08:37
"His Name is The Most Holy Place" : Jesus Christ "being rested up again" from his DEATH'S FAST, that is, Jesus Christ RAISED UP "from the dead, from death, and from the grave and the darkness of it.
That - "this Jesus whom God raised Christ and Lord" - is the Sanctuary and the Truth of the Sanctuary : CLEANSED!
He is in heaven now : OUR SANCTUARY, our PLACE OF REFUGE, communing, interceding, with God our Father on the SAINTS behalf.
That Christ is the epicenter of all the sanctuary entails and represents, does not negate the scriptural testimony that there is a heavenly sanctuary, where the cleansing of sin is officiated. Christ does not, nor has He ever needed cleansing. We do. This is what Christ and His sanctuary are all about. Christ and His followers are the sanctuary or temple of God on earth, bringing the gospel and therefore salvation to the same. This process involves the cleansing of those giving the gospel to the world, and those receiving the same.
Eph 2:19 Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God; 20 And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; 21 In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: 22 In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.
The sanctuary or temple of God is in heaven where Christ ever liveth to intercede for His own, and on earth where Christ dwells within the believer to draw all humanity unto Himself. The things of heaven need no cleansing, it is us, the followers of Christ that need His cleansing and transforming power continually. This is to say just a little about a very very deep subject.
: Amo Fri Feb 07, 2014 - 09:31:47
It was actually a man by the name of Hiram Edson that first received a revelation concerning the true meaning of the cleansing of the sanctuary. Miller assumed the sanctuary to represent the earth, and the cleansing of it to be the cleansing of this earth by fire at the second coming of Christ. Thus the 1844 prediction of Christ's return. After the prediction failed, many still sought the true meaning of the prophecy concerning the cleansing of the sanctuary found in the book of Daniel. Hiram Edson claimed to receive an answer from God, while contemplating the same. Millers mistake was assuming the sanctuary represented the earth, Hiram Edson was directed to the heavenly sanctuary for the correct answer and interpretation regarding the prophecy. Ellen White later had visions regarding the same, but she did not introduce this truth.
As already examined also, The Whites were keeping the seventh day Sabbath by way of conviction concerning the scriptures before she ever had a vision pertaining to it also. While many presume that Ellen White introduced most of the more unique aspects of the Seventh Day Adventist church, the truth is, she introduced very little if anything that was not already believed by others before her. Her gift was more of a confirming testimony, than an original testimony of doctrine or belief. Most of what SDA's believe was and has been believed by countless Christians before us.
Very interesting. Thanks Amo!
I am very aware that many of the SDA unique positions were those of the Sect of the Nazarenes (Messianic Jews) of the 3rd and 4th centuries, and that church historian Eusubius (writing circa ad300) declared them heretics along with the Ebionites (who actually WERE heretics) and hence the Nazarenes were not invited to the first Nicean council of 325.
: DaveW Fri Feb 07, 2014 - 10:48:56
: Amo Fri Feb 07, 2014 - 09:31:47
It was actually a man by the name of Hiram Edson that first received a revelation concerning the true meaning of the cleansing of the sanctuary. Miller assumed the sanctuary to represent the earth, and the cleansing of it to be the cleansing of this earth by fire at the second coming of Christ. Thus the 1844 prediction of Christ's return. After the prediction failed, many still sought the true meaning of the prophecy concerning the cleansing of the sanctuary found in the book of Daniel. Hiram Edson claimed to receive an answer from God, while contemplating the same. Millers mistake was assuming the sanctuary represented the earth, Hiram Edson was directed to the heavenly sanctuary for the correct answer and interpretation regarding the prophecy. Ellen White later had visions regarding the same, but she did not introduce this truth.
As already examined also, The Whites were keeping the seventh day Sabbath by way of conviction concerning the scriptures before she ever had a vision pertaining to it also. While many presume that Ellen White introduced most of the more unique aspects of the Seventh Day Adventist church, the truth is, she introduced very little if anything that was not already believed by others before her. Her gift was more of a confirming testimony, than an original testimony of doctrine or belief. Most of what SDA's believe was and has been believed by countless Christians before us.
Very interesting. Thanks Amo!Do you know
I am very aware that many of the SDA unique positions were those of the Sect of the Nazarenes (Messianic Jews) of the 3rd and 4th centuries, and that church historian Eusubius (writing circa ad300) declared them heretics along with the Ebionites (who actually WERE heretics) and hence the Nazarenes were not invited to the first Nicean council of 325.
Your welcome. Never heard the above about the Nazarenes. Thanks for that interesting tidbit. Where can one read up on their beliefs apart from Eusubius' condemnation of them. I'm sure they were better off for not being at the council and part of where it and all the councils of the "official" church lead.
Actually Eusubius is a good source. Before he lumps them in with the Ebionites and condemns both groups; he makes some very positive comments about the Nazarenes. His ONLY criticism of them (and apparently the big deal breaker) was that they still worshiped on Saturday and did not eat pork and visibly looked and acted like Jews. (an unforgivable sin apparently....) Of course they WERE Jews, but apparently that only made things worse.
For JEWS to believe in the trinity, to take communion, to accept the death and resurrection of the Lord for salvation, to baptize their new believers and to preach the gospel was just WRONG in his opinion.
Of course that excluded them from fellowship from the church world. As believers in Yeshua/Jesus they were not welcome in traditional Jewish society either. They died out toward the end of the 4th century.
Beyond that, I would suggest contacting one of the Messianic groups' theological boards. I know the Union of Messianic Jewish Congregations (UMJC.org) and the Messianic Jewish Alliance (MJAA.org) both have them. Or you can contact the Messianic Jewish Theological Institute.
Rabbi Dan Juster headed up the UMJC theo board for several years and has said that the decision to exclude us from the Nicean council resulted in the wording of the doctrine of the trinity that seems engineered to repel Jews that may have been curious.
<<The Millerites were Rev Miller's followers prior to 1844. He had set a day for the Lord's return. That day in 1844 came and went. So Miller went back to his calculations and decided he was off by 1 year. So the day in 1845 came and went. Miller became extremely confused and depressed. Ms White who was an avid follower and some counts say a personal friend started praying and fasting for an answer from God on what had happened>>
My info from SDA sources 25 years ago was that the Millerites were almost extinct but still had one congregation active; a vague memory tells me it may have bee a seminary.
: DaveW Fri Feb 07, 2014 - 11:36:49
Actually Eusubius is a good source. Before he lumps them in with the Ebionites and condemns both groups; he makes some very positive comments about the Nazarenes. His ONLY criticism of them (and apparently the big deal breaker) was that they still worshiped on Saturday and did not eat pork and visibly looked and acted like Jews. (an unforgivable sin apparently....) Of course they WERE Jews, but apparently that only made things worse.
For JEWS to believe in the trinity, to take communion, to accept the death and resurrection of the Lord for salvation, to baptize their new believers and to preach the gospel was just WRONG in his opinion.
Of course that excluded them from fellowship from the church world. As believers in Yeshua/Jesus they were not welcome in traditional Jewish society either. They died out toward the end of the 4th century.
Beyond that, I would suggest contacting one of the Messianic groups' theological boards. I know the Union of Messianic Jewish Congregations (UMJC.org) and the Messianic Jewish Alliance (MJAA.org) both have them. Or you can contact the Messianic Jewish Theological Institute.
Rabbi Dan Juster headed up the UMJC theo board for several years and has said that the decision to exclude us from the Nicean council resulted in the wording of the doctrine of the trinity that seems engineered to repel Jews that may have been curious.
Thanks.
: johnm Fri Feb 07, 2014 - 16:46:16
<<The Millerites were Rev Miller's followers prior to 1844. He had set a day for the Lord's return. That day in 1844 came and went. So Miller went back to his calculations and decided he was off by 1 year. So the day in 1845 came and went. Miller became extremely confused and depressed. Ms White who was an avid follower and some counts say a personal friend started praying and fasting for an answer from God on what had happened>>
My info from SDA sources 25 years ago was that the Millerites were almost extinct but still had one congregation active; a vague memory tells me it may have bee a seminary.
I thought all Millerites were gone long ago.
<<I thought all Millerites were gone long ago.>>
I only knew a small group of SDAs and I only remember a conversation but not who provided the information. Shopping around the internet I found the following on an Atheist Site, I can only guess how accurate it is:
"The Millerite movement began splintering into sects as the debate raged, and soon had all but run out of steam. Miller himself died in 1849, insisting to the end that the Second Coming was imminent.
Following such a catastrophic failure, one might expect that the Millerite movement would fade away entirely. But that is not what happened. Although the fragmented Millerites languished for some time, and though many did abandon the movement, several of the competing splinter groups would ultimately gain new life. Hiram Edson's sect, the one which claimed Jesus' return was heavenly rather than earthly, developed into a denomination that still exists – the Seventh-Day Adventists, who today number as many as 15 million members worldwide. The Adventists claim that Jesus' 1844 entry into the "heavenly sanctuary" was the beginning of a still-ongoing process of "investigative judgment" of the souls of believers. They continue to claim that the literal Second Coming is imminent, though they no longer attempt to set dates.
The Advent Christian Church, another modern denomination, arose from a different Millerite splinter group. Another former Millerite, Charles Taze Russell, would carry forward his Miller-inspired beliefs about the imminent end-times into a new sect that he founded: the Watchtower (named after their monthly magazine), known today as the Jehovah's Witnesses. And last but not least, a small splinter group of fundamentalist Adventists led by a preacher named Victor Houteff split from the main church in 1934, and relocated to Waco, Texas, where they formed a community. They would later rename themselves the Davidian Seventh-day Adventists, and then the Branch Davidians... and when a charismatic preacher calling himself David Koresh gained control of the group, the rest is history."
: johnm Fri Feb 07, 2014 - 19:34:16
<<I thought all Millerites were gone long ago.>>
I only knew a small group of SDAs and I only remember a conversation but not who provided the information. Shopping around the internet I found the following on an Atheist Site, I can only guess how accurate it is:
"The Millerite movement began splintering into sects as the debate raged, and soon had all but run out of steam. Miller himself died in 1849, insisting to the end that the Second Coming was imminent.
Following such a catastrophic failure, one might expect that the Millerite movement would fade away entirely. But that is not what happened. Although the fragmented Millerites languished for some time, and though many did abandon the movement, several of the competing splinter groups would ultimately gain new life. Hiram Edson's sect, the one which claimed Jesus' return was heavenly rather than earthly, developed into a denomination that still exists – the Seventh-Day Adventists, who today number as many as 15 million members worldwide. The Adventists claim that Jesus' 1844 entry into the "heavenly sanctuary" was the beginning of a still-ongoing process of "investigative judgment" of the souls of believers. They continue to claim that the literal Second Coming is imminent, though they no longer attempt to set dates.
The Advent Christian Church, another modern denomination, arose from a different Millerite splinter group. Another former Millerite, Charles Taze Russell, would carry forward his Miller-inspired beliefs about the imminent end-times into a new sect that he founded: the Watchtower (named after their monthly magazine), known today as the Jehovah's Witnesses. And last but not least, a small splinter group of fundamentalist Adventists led by a preacher named Victor Houteff split from the main church in 1934, and relocated to Waco, Texas, where they formed a community. They would later rename themselves the Davidian Seventh-day Adventists, and then the Branch Davidians... and when a charismatic preacher calling himself David Koresh gained control of the group, the rest is history."
Interesting. I met David Koresh. He was definitely a cult leader. After some back and forth at a meeting he was having at an SDA church,which he lied to the pastor about concerning what he would be discussing, I narrowed things down and asked him some revealing questions. I asked him if he was saying we needed to forget everything we thought we knew or had learned from studying the scriptures and listen only to him, surprisingly, he admitted the truth and said yes. He would not answer my next question though, even after asking it three times. I asked him if he was saying he wad the Lord Jesus Christ. After asking him three times without getting an answer, I stood up to leave and advised all others to do the same since the man speaking would not say that he was not the Lord Jesus Christ. Some left with me, others stayed. One of them perished in the fire at Koresh's compound. A sad day.
We seem to be wondering quite a bit from the original topic. Here is another site concerning recent developments about the topic of this thread.
http://www.uniglobalunion.org/news/european-sunday-alliance-calls-meps-promote-a-work-free-sunday-and-decent-work-eu-legislation (http://www.uniglobalunion.org/news/european-sunday-alliance-calls-meps-promote-a-work-free-sunday-and-decent-work-eu-legislation)
: johnm Fri Feb 07, 2014 - 19:34:16The Advent Christian Church, another modern denomination, arose from a different Millerite splinter group. Another former Millerite, Charles Taze Russell, would carry forward his Miller-inspired beliefs about the imminent end-times into a new sect that he founded: the Watchtower (named after their monthly magazine), known today as the Jehovah's Witnesses.
I was surprised to hear on 'Classic FM' a radio station in South Africa, in its daily early quiz for listeners, 'The Watchtower Magazine', is the 'periodical' most copies are cycled of in the world --- more than any news paper or whatever.
I heard another story that its founder was no 'believer', but thought he would make money with his 'magazine'. Although the magazine is not sold, it seems its founder had the right idea.
My experience with Jehovah Witnesses is they really believe they are good Christians and I feel confident that their righteousness is greater than that of the Pharisees but their righteousness may not be the righteousness of God.
To get back on topic they do not keep any specific day Holy.
: johnm Sat Feb 08, 2014 - 21:15:22
My experience with Jehovah Witnesses is they really believe they are good Christians and I feel confident that their righteousness is greater than that of the Pharisees but their righteousness may not be the righteousness of God.
To get back on topic they do not keep any specific day Holy.
No man can keep any day holy or make it holy in the eyes of God.
But that the JWs as the rest of Christiandom except for a few freaks like myself 'keep Sunday', is a fact. And that they view Sunday as 'The Lords Day' is just as indisputable. And that they 'observe Sunday' for congregational worship and the Lord's Supper, is just as true.
I do not know them that well that I could say for sure if they observe the Lord's Supper, however.
It doesn't matter, the JWs just like [the rest of] Christianity DEFEND SUNDAY AGAINST the Seventh Day Sabbath just as vehemently.
For someone from Mars, the JWs will be NO different than all Christians, set he foot on earth on a Sunday.
No different, no difference.
<<No man can keep any day holy or make it holy in the eyes of God.
But that the JWs as the rest of Christiandom except for a few freaks like myself 'keep Sunday', is a fact. And that they view Sunday as 'The Lords Day' is just as indisputable. And that they 'observe Sunday' for congregational worship and the Lord's Supper, is just as true.
I do not know them that well that I could say for sure if they observe the Lord's Supper, however.
It doesn't matter, the JWs just like [the rest of] Christianity DEFEND SUNDAY AGAINST the Seventh Day Sabbath just as vehemently.
For someone from Mars, the JWs will be NO different than all Christians, set he foot on earth on a Sunday.
No different, no difference.>>
This time I understand you. God does not command His people to do something that cannot be done; all fall short some of the time; but to keep that made holy by God, holy, probably means to respect it and not profane it; not difficult.
"Christianity DEFEND SUNDAY AGAINST the Seventh Day Sabbath just as vehemently." I am amazed that you oppose God so strongly and not realise it.
John 12:48 (KJV)
48 He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.
Mark 7:9 (KJV)
9 And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition.
Colossians 2:16 (KJV)
16 Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days:
If Paul is saying don't keep the Sabbath then he is also saying don't eat, don't drink and don't have holidays; what Paul is actually talking about is explained in Colossians 2:8.
Colossians 2:8 (KJV)
8 Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.
So even Paul says follow Christ, not men. Paul has not said, "Do not keep the Commandments" but rather, "Beware of those who would have you keep commandment of men".
: johnm Mon Feb 10, 2014 - 04:37:15"Christianity DEFEND SUNDAY AGAINST the Seventh Day Sabbath just as vehemently." I am amazed that you oppose God so strongly and not realise it.
What you do not realize is that I oppose not God but Christianity in its opposition against the Sabbath in favour of Sunday.
: johnm Mon Feb 10, 2014 - 04:37:15
<<No man can keep any day holy or make it holy in the eyes of God.
But that the JWs as the rest of Christiandom except for a few freaks like myself 'keep Sunday', is a fact. And that they view Sunday as 'The Lords Day' is just as indisputable. And that they 'observe Sunday' for congregational worship and the Lord's Supper, is just as true.
I do not know them that well that I could say for sure if they observe the Lord's Supper, however.
It doesn't matter, the JWs just like [the rest of] Christianity DEFEND SUNDAY AGAINST the Seventh Day Sabbath just as vehemently.
For someone from Mars, the JWs will be NO different than all Christians, set he foot on earth on a Sunday.
No different, no difference.>>
This time I understand you. God does not command His people to do something that cannot be done; all fall short some of the time; but to keep that made holy by God, holy, probably means to respect it and not profane it; not difficult.
"Christianity DEFEND SUNDAY AGAINST the Seventh Day Sabbath just as vehemently." I am amazed that you oppose God so strongly and not realise it.
John 12:48 (KJV)
48 He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.
Mark 7:9 (KJV)
9 And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition.
Colossians 2:16 (KJV)
16 Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days:
If Paul is saying don't keep the Sabbath then he is also saying don't eat, don't drink and don't have holidays; what Paul is actually talking about is explained in Colossians 2:8.
Colossians 2:8 (KJV)
8 Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.
So even Paul says follow Christ, not men. Paul has not said, "Do not keep the Commandments" but rather, "Beware of those who would have you keep commandment of men".
I like this post of yours, especially your views on Colossians 2:18.
God bless you
Johnm I suppose will respond about his Colossians 2:8 and my verse 18. Let's wait and see.
A little more about the Atheists Sunday Assembly
http://sundayassembly.com/ (http://sundayassembly.com/)
http://sundayassembly.com/public-charter-for-the-sunday-assembly/ (http://sundayassembly.com/public-charter-for-the-sunday-assembly/)
http://www.tennessean.com/article/20140208/NEWS06/302080036/Atheist-congregation-Sunday-Assembly-grows-Nashville (http://www.tennessean.com/article/20140208/NEWS06/302080036/Atheist-congregation-Sunday-Assembly-grows-Nashville)
http://www.comece.org/site/en/activities/europeansundayalliance (http://www.comece.org/site/en/activities/europeansundayalliance)
Notice the Jesuit European Office in the list of supporters on the below site.
http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/whoweare/article/65.html (http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/whoweare/article/65.html)
More of the same found about half way down the following page.
http://www.sjweb.info/news/ensPDF.cfm?PubNumID=92&DownLang=1 (http://www.sjweb.info/news/ensPDF.cfm?PubNumID=92&DownLang=1)
More from the Jesuits.
http://www.comece.eu/europeinfos/en/archive/issue139/article/3959.html (http://www.comece.eu/europeinfos/en/archive/issue139/article/3959.html)
http://religiousliberty.tv/european-sunday-weekly-rest-day-legislation-remains-unlawful.html (http://religiousliberty.tv/european-sunday-weekly-rest-day-legislation-remains-unlawful.html)
Sunday and Islam. Interesting info.
http://www.islamicedfoundation.com/sunday.htm (http://www.islamicedfoundation.com/sunday.htm)
http://www.infoimagination.org/islamnm/downloads/CurriculumKG.pdf (http://www.infoimagination.org/islamnm/downloads/CurriculumKG.pdf)
http://www.berlinmosque.org/2014/02/sunday-school-registration-begins-march-16th/ (http://www.berlinmosque.org/2014/02/sunday-school-registration-begins-march-16th/)
http://www.mcnjsundayschool.com/ (http://www.mcnjsundayschool.com/)
If Sunday sacredness is to become the worship day of this world by law, as the SDA church has been predicting for over a century and a half now, it would have to make inroads to the Islamic religion. Since it is now has more members I believe, than any other single religion or denomination of Christianity. In line with this progression of thought, the following sites are about Muslim gatherings and events on Sundays. Some of these gathering are interfaith, and include Catholics, Protestants, and Muslims. Please do add any pertinent information along these lines is you know or discover the same.
http://www.dewsburynewmuslims.com/2013/06/new-muslim-convert-social-gathering-for.html (http://www.dewsburynewmuslims.com/2013/06/new-muslim-convert-social-gathering-for.html)
http://www.muslimcoalitionct.org/gatherings-in-support-of-the-newtown-ct-community.html (http://www.muslimcoalitionct.org/gatherings-in-support-of-the-newtown-ct-community.html)
http://shaykh.wordpress.com/2014/03/03/annual-sisters-gathering/ (http://shaykh.wordpress.com/2014/03/03/annual-sisters-gathering/)
http://www.kare11.com/news/article/982380/396/Christian-and-Muslim-interfaith-gathering-to-be-held-in-Saint-Anthony- (http://www.kare11.com/news/article/982380/396/Christian-and-Muslim-interfaith-gathering-to-be-held-in-Saint-Anthony-)
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jul/03/muslim-convention-reaches-out-to-christians-and-je/ (http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jul/03/muslim-convention-reaches-out-to-christians-and-je/)
http://www.ricbaltimore.org/activities/ (http://www.ricbaltimore.org/activities/)
http://news.ca.msn.com/ontario/guelph/islamic-society-of-guelph-plans-gathering-to-better-bring-the-community-together (http://news.ca.msn.com/ontario/guelph/islamic-society-of-guelph-plans-gathering-to-better-bring-the-community-together)
http://www.sacredlearning.org/weekly-dhikr/ (http://www.sacredlearning.org/weekly-dhikr/)
http://forums.islamicawakening.com/f21/special-dar-al-arqam-iftar-gathering-sunday-27811/ (http://forums.islamicawakening.com/f21/special-dar-al-arqam-iftar-gathering-sunday-27811/)
http://www.iqou-moa.org/inter-faith/interfaith1.htm (http://www.iqou-moa.org/inter-faith/interfaith1.htm)
http://www.sunniforum.com/forum/showthread.php?108032-Sisters-only-gathering-sunday-16th-june-birmingham (http://www.sunniforum.com/forum/showthread.php?108032-Sisters-only-gathering-sunday-16th-june-birmingham)
http://icoconline.org/islamic-activities/ (http://icoconline.org/islamic-activities/)
http://blogs.windsorstar.com/2013/12/15/mosque-hosts-monthly-christian-muslim-events/ (http://blogs.windsorstar.com/2013/12/15/mosque-hosts-monthly-christian-muslim-events/)
http://www.naharnet.com/stories/en/102042 (http://www.naharnet.com/stories/en/102042)
http://www.iccleveland.org/ (http://www.iccleveland.org/)
http://www.springfieldmosque.com/?page_id=633 (http://www.springfieldmosque.com/?page_id=633)
http://www.hadeemosque.info/# (http://www.hadeemosque.info/#)!worship-services
http://www.mcnyonline.org/ (http://www.mcnyonline.org/)
http://www.mcnjonline.com/ (http://www.mcnjonline.com/)
http://noidc.org/ (http://noidc.org/)
http://masjidma.com/category/general/sunday-school/ (http://masjidma.com/category/general/sunday-school/)
http://www.istulsa.org/hoursanddirections.html (http://www.istulsa.org/hoursanddirections.html)
http://www.canterburymosque.com/ (http://www.canterburymosque.com/)
http://sundayassembly.com/ (http://sundayassembly.com/)
A couple of more interesting sites -
http://ndcatholic.org/editorials/column0711/ (http://ndcatholic.org/editorials/column0711/)
https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXX/Chapter136/Section1 (https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXX/Chapter136/Section1)
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-07-05/israeli-proposal-to-make-sunday-day-of-rest-may-benefit-retail.html (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-07-05/israeli-proposal-to-make-sunday-day-of-rest-may-benefit-retail.html)
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/04/14/358477/greek-police-clash-with-protesters/ (http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/04/14/358477/greek-police-clash-with-protesters/)
http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nuevodiarioweb.com.ar%2Fnota%2Flabanda%2F519175%2Fcentro-comercio-e-industria-se-adhiere-al-domingo-no-laborable.html (http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nuevodiarioweb.com.ar%2Fnota%2Flabanda%2F519175%2Fcentro-comercio-e-industria-se-adhiere-al-domingo-no-laborable.html)
http://petition.etuc.org/IMG/pdf/A_TT_secteur_com_EN.pdf (http://petition.etuc.org/IMG/pdf/A_TT_secteur_com_EN.pdf)
http://connexionfrance.com/sunday-opening-diy-stores-bricolage-law-france-15462-view-article.html (http://connexionfrance.com/sunday-opening-diy-stores-bricolage-law-france-15462-view-article.html)
A couple of interesting clips on you tube from the BBC debating the subject -
Part1 Dr. Michael Schluter CBE, Keep Sunday Special Founder on BBC One The Big Questions 28 02 2010 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tN6KjM67vrk#)
Part2 Dr. Michael Schluter CBE, Keep Sunday Special Founder on BBC One The Big Questions 28 02 2010 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rred0PZQrdA#)
http://www.infoans.org/1.asp?Lingua=2&sez=1&doc=10210 (http://www.infoans.org/1.asp?Lingua=2&sez=1&doc=10210)
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p3s2c1a3.htm (http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p3s2c1a3.htm)
http://www.sbclife.net/Articles/2012/06/sla12 (http://www.sbclife.net/Articles/2012/06/sla12)
http://jemartisby.com/2014/04/28/what-ever-happened-to-a-sabbath-days-rest/ (http://jemartisby.com/2014/04/28/what-ever-happened-to-a-sabbath-days-rest/)
http://cvcomment.org/2014/01/15/the-question-before-mlords-are-sunday-rest-days-core-to-christian-belief/ (http://cvcomment.org/2014/01/15/the-question-before-mlords-are-sunday-rest-days-core-to-christian-belief/)
I wish there was a thumbs up button on here! ::amen!::
: Sister_barista Thu May 15, 2014 - 23:19:45
I wish there was a thumbs up button on here! ::amen!::
Hello Sister_barista, welcome to the Grace Centered forums. I assume you are a Sabbath keeper. Happy Sabbath.
A few more internet sites regarding Sunday services and the role they will play in the false unity of this worlds religions, and as already demonstrated non religious in rebellion against God's fourth commandment. Notice the variety of religions, statements of unity form many of them, and of course the day they choose for their services. This day of the sun which will be the rallying point for a world in rebellion against God, under the guiding hand of the Church of Rome.
http://www.ananda.org/video/sunday-services (http://www.ananda.org/video/sunday-services)
http://www.yogananda-srf.org/Sunday_Services.aspx#.U3egKCg9A2U (http://www.yogananda-srf.org/Sunday_Services.aspx#.U3egKCg9A2U)
http://www.uufr.org/worship-and-music/sunday-services (http://www.uufr.org/worship-and-music/sunday-services)
http://firstuustlouis.org/about-us/first-unitarian-church-of-st-louis (http://firstuustlouis.org/about-us/first-unitarian-church-of-st-louis)
http://www.scientology.org/what-is-scientology/scientology-religious-ceremonies/scientology-sunday-service.html (http://www.scientology.org/what-is-scientology/scientology-religious-ceremonies/scientology-sunday-service.html)
http://seattlebetsuin.org/index.php/sunday-services/ (http://seattlebetsuin.org/index.php/sunday-services/)
http://cslcs.org/services/ (http://cslcs.org/services/)
http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-features/tp-metroplus/sunday-service/article1412973.ece (http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-features/tp-metroplus/sunday-service/article1412973.ece)
http://mccsf.org/sunday-services/ (http://mccsf.org/sunday-services/)
http://unitydallas.org/about/unity-movement/ (http://unitydallas.org/about/unity-movement/)
http://www.unityofbellevue.org/sunday-celebration-services-1 (http://www.unityofbellevue.org/sunday-celebration-services-1)
http://lizbethsgarden.wordpress.com/2011/05/01/sunday-service-beltane/ (http://lizbethsgarden.wordpress.com/2011/05/01/sunday-service-beltane/)
http://allsoulskc.org/category/sunday-services/ (http://allsoulskc.org/category/sunday-services/)
http://www.unitypaloalto.org/beliefs (http://www.unitypaloalto.org/beliefs)
http://joyfulgathering.org/sunday-services-at-joyful-gatherings-spritual-center/ (http://joyfulgathering.org/sunday-services-at-joyful-gatherings-spritual-center/)
http://www.sacredcauldron.ca/sunday-circle.html (http://www.sacredcauldron.ca/sunday-circle.html)
http://www.zenbuddhisttemple.org/service.html (http://www.zenbuddhisttemple.org/service.html)
http://manitobabuddhistchurch.org/traditions/sundayservice.html (http://manitobabuddhistchurch.org/traditions/sundayservice.html)
http://portlandspiritualistchurch.org/sunday-services/ (http://portlandspiritualistchurch.org/sunday-services/)
http://www.spiritualistassociation.org.uk/Sunday_Services/sunday_services.html (http://www.spiritualistassociation.org.uk/Sunday_Services/sunday_services.html)
Is there nothing in the Bible about the Sabbath that could be discussed instead?
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Sat May 24, 2014 - 15:18:26
Is there nothing in the Bible about the Sabbath that could be discussed instead?
Yea, we hardly ever talk about the Sabbath around here.
<<Is there nothing in the Bible about the Sabbath that could be discussed instead?>>
Jesus would never say "Sunday"; the word would have been an abomination, let alone what it meant. Whereas the seventh day and Sabbath are mentioned and are too numerous to count. The first day is mentioned with its function and never interchangeable with the seventh day.
Genesis 2:3 (KJV)
3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
The question is: has God blessed any other day, has He sanctified any other day and deemed it Holy, and Has God rested on any other day?
The whole issue of the Sabbath verses Sunday is: does one reject the whole counsel of God and accept an alternative authority.
: johnm Tue May 27, 2014 - 19:48:11
The whole issue of the Sabbath verses Sunday is: does one reject the whole counsel of God and accept an alternative authority.
And that WHOLE COUNSEL includes the fact that the Sabbath is a covenantal sign between God and natural Israel - the Jews. It is NEVER mentioned as a sign between God and any gentiles.
Exodus 31:16 Therefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant.
17 It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.
<<Quote from: johnm on Yesterday at 06:48:11 PM
The whole issue of the Sabbath verses Sunday is: does one reject the whole counsel of God and accept an alternative authority.>>
<<<And that WHOLE COUNSEL includes the fact that the Sabbath is a covenantal sign between God and natural Israel - the Jews. It is NEVER mentioned as a sign between God and any gentiles.
Exodus 31:16 Therefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant.
17 It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.>>>
Dave I don't express myself well; even though I used the words "whole counsel of God" the point that I was trying to make was that the issue is authority; the authority of God and His day verses the authority of gentile men and their day.
As far as I am aware God has never counselled gentiles; had He done so He may well have mentioned His day of rest; technically Abraham, Adam and Noah may have been gentiles, I don't know. What I know is since Mosses the whole counsel of God up to and including the Gospels was directed at Israel not gentiles; although in more than one place in the OT God has said the Law and the covenant would go to the gentiles. Everything was given to Israel first and extended unchanged to the gentiles at Pentecost.
You're Dispensational paradigm and the Roman Catholic paradigm depends on the covenant also known as the Law being abrogated at the cross. I have always considered myself to be a lost sheep not a gentile, so I use the Biblical paradigm.
JohnM, I do understand what you say but it is OK to be a gentile. I am one. (albeit one called to live in the Messianic Jewish community).
I am not of a dispensational bent at all. I do not take the entirety of the "Law" [an incomplete translation of Torah] to be abrogated at all. Some parts like the Yom Kippur and sin/guilt offerings - yes. But more in the sense of superseded and made meaningless. Other parts - not at all.
But I am also aware that the Torah (teaching, instruction) is ongoing to the Jewish people.
GOD BLESS ::tippinghat::
: johnm Wed May 28, 2014 - 08:16:57
<<Quote from: johnm on Yesterday at 06:48:11 PM
The whole issue of the Sabbath verses Sunday is: does one reject the whole counsel of God and accept an alternative authority.>>
<<<And that WHOLE COUNSEL includes the fact that the Sabbath is a covenantal sign between God and natural Israel - the Jews. It is NEVER mentioned as a sign between God and any gentiles.
Exodus 31:16 Therefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant.
17 It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.>>>
Dave I don't express myself well; even though I used the words "whole counsel of God" the point that I was trying to make was that the issue is authority; the authority of God and His day verses the authority of gentile men and their day.
As far as I am aware God has never counselled gentiles; had He done so He may well have mentioned His day of rest; technically Abraham, Adam and Noah may have been gentiles, I don't know. What I know is since Mosses the whole counsel of God up to and including the Gospels was directed at Israel not gentiles; although in more than one place in the OT God has said the Law and the covenant would go to the gentiles. Everything was given to Israel first and extended unchanged to the gentiles at Pentecost.
You're Dispensational paradigm and the Roman Catholic paradigm depends on the covenant also known as the Law being abrogated at the cross. I have always considered myself to be a lost sheep not a gentile, so I use the Biblical paradigm.
Dave will never come to grips with the reality that converted Gentiles, are no longer Gentiles. That they have been graft into the vine. That Jew and Gentile are both made one in Christ. That converted Gentiles are children of Abraham and thus privy to the covenant God made with him and thus the Jews also. He wishes to maintain a separation between that which Christ came to unite. Thus he must maintain a Gentile church separate from Israel with different standards and method of salvation.
Eph 2:10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. 11 ¶ Wherefore remember,
that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands; 12 That at that time ye were without Christ,
being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world: 13 But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. 14 ¶
For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; 15 Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace; 16
And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby: 17 And came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh. 18 For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father. 19 Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners,
but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God; 20 And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; 21 In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: 22 In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.
The above situation described by Paul does not exist for Dave. He rejects the same. Correct me if I am wrong Dave. Or at least, please explain the above verses according to your understanding, that I might better understand where you are coming from. Thanks.
<<<... the Torah (teaching, instruction) is ongoing to the Jewish people.>>>
The Jews have NOTHING of the Word of God <<<ongoing>>> for them. God finished with the Jews AS A NATION : He REJECTED them forever. The Torah is ongoing to the CHRISTIAN People of God for <teaching and instruction>; NO MORE FOR THE LAW—WHICH NOW IS CHRIST.
It is because "JESUS gave them rest that a keeping of the SABBATH REMAINS : FOR THE PEOPLE OF GOD" --- not for the unbelievers!
Holy Writ :
"For Moses from generations ancient has in the Churches on EVERY SABBATH been read
... with all the Chosen
... becoming of ONE MIND
... offering their lives up on behalf of the NAME OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST"—
... as most recently in Acts 13 in Pisidia in Antioch,
"... on the Coming-Together-Sabbath-FOR-TO-HEAR-the-Word-of-God
... all the city
... Gentiles and some Jews
... were assembled."
Ongoing issues related to Sunday legalism -
http://www.gov.je/News/2014/Pages/SundayTradingConsultation.aspx (http://www.gov.je/News/2014/Pages/SundayTradingConsultation.aspx)
http://union-news.co.uk/2014/05/sunday-trading-law-lobbyists-warpath-union-warns/ (http://union-news.co.uk/2014/05/sunday-trading-law-lobbyists-warpath-union-warns/)
http://jerseyeveningpost.com/news/2014/05/18/constable-scrap-sunday-trading-trial/ (http://jerseyeveningpost.com/news/2014/05/18/constable-scrap-sunday-trading-trial/)
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/sunday.trading.give.us.a.break/30718.htm (http://www.christiantoday.com/article/sunday.trading.give.us.a.break/30718.htm)
https://www.gov.uk/trading-hours-for-retailers-the-law (https://www.gov.uk/trading-hours-for-retailers-the-law)
http://wn.com/sunday_trading (http://wn.com/sunday_trading)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunday_Trading_Act_1994 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunday_Trading_Act_1994)
http://www.gov.gg/sundaytrading (http://www.gov.gg/sundaytrading)
https://www.derrypayments.com/licences/Sunday-Trading.aspx (https://www.derrypayments.com/licences/Sunday-Trading.aspx)
http://www.smallbusiness.wa.gov.au/sunday-trading/ (http://www.smallbusiness.wa.gov.au/sunday-trading/)
http://www.compasscayman.com/caycompass/2014/04/17/Online-poll---Sunday-trading-up-to-market/ (http://www.compasscayman.com/caycompass/2014/04/17/Online-poll---Sunday-trading-up-to-market/)
https://www.facebook.com/SundayTradingPerth (https://www.facebook.com/SundayTradingPerth)
https://au.news.yahoo.com/a/18555574/extra-sunday-trade-may-cost-family-life/ (https://au.news.yahoo.com/a/18555574/extra-sunday-trade-may-cost-family-life/)
http://europeanlawblog.eu/?tag=sunday-trading (http://europeanlawblog.eu/?tag=sunday-trading)
http://www.christian.org.uk/news/sunday-trading-longer-hours-will-put-pressure-on-workers/ (http://www.christian.org.uk/news/sunday-trading-longer-hours-will-put-pressure-on-workers/)
http://www.cityam.com/article/1395633782/sunday-trading-laws-are-outdated-we-must-extend-opening-hours (http://www.cityam.com/article/1395633782/sunday-trading-laws-are-outdated-we-must-extend-opening-hours)
: Amo Sat May 31, 2014 - 09:25:51
Dave will never come to grips with the reality that converted Gentiles, are no longer Gentiles. That they have been graft into the vine. That Jew and Gentile are both made one in Christ.
Au Contraire. I have come to understand that quite well. Do you not know that if a branch from an orange tree is grafted into a lemon tree or grapefruit tree it will still bear ORANGES? It is still an orange. (but one tree)
Similarly, the wild olive branch (gentiles) when grafted into the cultivated tree of Israel will still bear its original variety of olives? (i.e. still a gentile) Note: still only one tree but 2 different fruits.
There are no "2 methods of salvation." It is all by placing faith in the completed work of the cross; our Lord's death and resurrection.
But that does NOT mean that different people groups have differing walks (AFTER salvation) laid out for them by the Lord.
: DaveW Mon Jun 09, 2014 - 07:40:44
: Amo Sat May 31, 2014 - 09:25:51
Dave will never come to grips with the reality that converted Gentiles, are no longer Gentiles. That they have been graft into the vine. That Jew and Gentile are both made one in Christ.
Au Contraire. I have come to understand that quite well. Do you not know that if a branch from an orange tree is grafted into a lemon tree or grapefruit tree it will still bear ORANGES? It is still an orange. (but one tree)
Similarly, the wild olive branch (gentiles) when grafted into the cultivated tree of Israel will still bear its original variety of olives? (i.e. still a gentile) Note: still only one tree but 2 different fruits.
There are no "2 methods of salvation." It is all by placing faith in the completed work of the cross; our Lord's death and resurrection.
But that does NOT mean that different people groups have differing walks (AFTER salvation) laid out for them by the Lord.
Now show us that from the scriptures please. Show us how both being made one in Christ, really means both separate in Christ, from scripture please.
<<Quote from: Amo on May 31, 2014, 08:25:51 AM
Dave will never come to grips with the reality that converted Gentiles, are no longer Gentiles. That they have been graft into the vine. That Jew and Gentile are both made one in Christ.>>
}}Au Contraire. I have come to understand that quite well. Do you not know that if a branch from an orange tree is grafted into a lemon tree or grapefruit tree it will still bear ORANGES? It is still an orange. (but one tree)
Similarly, the wild olive branch (gentiles) when grafted into the cultivated tree of Israel will still bear its original variety of olives? (i.e. still a gentile) Note: still only one tree but 2 different fruits.
There are no "2 methods of salvation." It is all by placing faith in the completed work of the cross; our Lord's death and resurrection.
But that does NOT mean that different people groups have differing walks (AFTER salvation) laid out for them by the Lord.{{
<<<Now show us that from the scriptures please. Show us how both being made one in Christ, really means both separate in Christ, from scripture please.>>>
Seriously Amo oranges and lemons are not in the Bible and I am not able to find "the wild olive branch in my Bibles either; but in the midst of not knowing anything about fruit trees Dave has unwittingly made a profound statement. Dave made a fundamental error; when one grafts an orange tree onto a lemon three the lemon tree continues to produce lemons and the grafted orange tree produces oranges, it is never the lemon tree producing oranges; Dave's analogy of grafting Pagan onto Israel has two problems; first the Israel to which Dave refers are not necessarily overcomers or descendants of Jacob and second grafting Pagan onto any base produces only Pagan fruit.
I really would like to say something useful; there is only one way to salvation and that is via the covenant which most people abrogate or nail to the cross. Christ's finished work on the cross was the signature on the covenant, the covenant itself is the fine print (also the blood and flesh of Christ, in all the scriptures) that is also the bread of life and the eating of and growing into something is the way of God. Should an overcomer use his intelligence? Of course, the mistake most make is instead of following God they try to lead God by the nose. The road to life is narrow and few find it, the road to destruction is broad and most go that way.
: Amo Mon Jun 09, 2014 - 17:43:30
Now show us that from the scriptures please. Show us how both being made one in Christ, really means both separate in Christ, from scripture please.
Gen 2.22 The Lord God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man.
23 The man said,
"This is now bone of my bones,
And flesh of my flesh;
She shall be called Woman,
Because she was taken out of Man."
24 For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become
one flesh.
One flesh. One body. Did both become of the same gender? Or did 2 different style bodies still exist AFTER being made one?
John 17.20 "I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word;
21 that they
may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me.
Does that mean that there is only one person? One body?
1 Corinthians 12.13 For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.
14 For the body is not one member, but many.
15 If the foot says, "Because I am not a hand, I am not a part of the body," it is not for this reason any the less a part of the body.
16 And if the ear says, "Because I am not an eye, I am not a part of the body," it is not for this reason any the less a part of the body.
17
If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? 18 But now God has placed the members, each one of them, in the body, just as He desired.
19 If they were all one member, where would the body be?
20 But now there are many members, but one body.
So Paul tells us we are all one body but each part of that body has individual functions and uses. It is not all uniform.
Jew and Gentile is only one of the divisions of labor within the body.
: DaveW Wed May 28, 2014 - 05:52:44
: johnm Tue May 27, 2014 - 19:48:11
The whole issue of the Sabbath verses Sunday is: does one reject the whole counsel of God and accept an alternative authority.
And that WHOLE COUNSEL includes the fact that the Sabbath is a covenantal sign between God and natural Israel - the Jews. It is NEVER mentioned as a sign between God and any gentiles.
Exodus 31:16 Therefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant.
17 It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.
<<<The whole issue of the Sabbath verses Sunday is: does one reject the whole counsel of God and accept an alternative authority.>>>
Exactly TRUE! Here you are giving the very 'TEST' you should --- yourself --- apply to your own predisposition, namely,
<<<The whole issue of the Sabbath verses Sunday is: does one reject the whole counsel of God and accept an alternative authority>>> WHICH IS WHOLLY CONTRADICTORY with what you claim, namely, that
<<<that WHOLE COUNSEL includes the fact that the Sabbath is a covenantal sign between God and natural Israel - the Jews. It is NEVER mentioned as a sign between God and any gentiles.>>>
You falsely inserts <<natural>>, and <<the Jews>> and false ly asserts << the Sabbath is NEVER mentioned as a sign between God and any gentiles.>>>
In fact nothing of what you arrogate is <in fact> true or just simply correct. You are the first person who should take heed that the WHOLE COUNSEL of God includes that the Sabbath has been a Covenantal sign between God and Christ in the first place and next between God and SPIRITUAL Israel - the Christians. In fact, the Sabbath whenever mentioned, is being mentioned as a sign and tool in the hand of God in his working out throughout the HISTORY OF SALVATION of the <<WHOLE COUNSEL of God>> which CULMINATED IN CHRIST JESUS.
It is so easy to make authoritative statements with great bravado but meantime everything about it is a farce.
: johnm Tue Jun 10, 2014 - 01:15:36
Christ's finished work on the cross ....
What did Jesus resurrect for then?
Christ's work --- as GOD'S <work> --- was not finished <<on the cross>>, but "when God raised Him from the dead and exalted Him far above every name and seated – rested Him on his own right hand in heavenly Glory and Majesty. THAT was "the all-EXCEEDING greatness of God's POWER which He WORKED : RAISING Christ from the dead."
THAT WAS THE WHOLE REASON FOR AND MANNER IN WHICH "GOD FROM ALL HIS WORKS : RESTED" and "JESUS GAVE THE PEOPLE OF GOD REST wherefore there for them remains a Sabbath's-rest valid."
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Thu Jun 12, 2014 - 00:47:47
In fact nothing of what you arrogate is <in fact> true or just simply correct. You are the first person who should take heed that the WHOLE COUNSEL of God includes that the Sabbath has been a Covenantal sign between God and Christ in the first place and next between God and SPIRITUAL Israel - the Christians.
WRONG. There is no such animal as a "spiritual Israel." That is a concept invented with replacement theology.
In fact, the Sabbath whenever mentioned, is being mentioned as a sign and tool in the hand of God in his working out throughout the HISTORY OF SALVATION of the <<WHOLE COUNSEL of God>> which CULMINATED IN CHRIST JESUS.
The Sabbath is never mentioned as applicable to gentiles with the exception of those who live in the Jewish community - "the stranger [Heb = ger] who dwells AMONG you."
By buying into that "spiritual Israel" lie, your entire understanding of the covenantal sign of the Sabbath is seriously distorted.
<<WRONG. There is no such animal as a "spiritual Israel." That is a concept invented with replacement theology.>>
Dave you are confusing me; we are not talking about animals, "spiritual Israel" is an appropriate name for the Children of God, those who are in a living relationship with Him and this is the opposite of Israel in the flesh: those who have not entered into the covenant even though they may keep some form of commandments. You may know something I don't; I do not use jargon or keywords which are a form of mind control, but I can imagine that some have taken these words and built a doctrine of men around them.
Replacement Theology is a name one calls someone one does not like; like homo or homophobic.
<<The Sabbath is never mentioned as applicable to gentiles with the exception of those who live in the Jewish community - "the stranger [Heb = ger] who dwells AMONG you."
By buying into that "spiritual Israel" lie, your entire understanding of the covenantal sign of the Sabbath is seriously distorted.>>
If one was a literalist or a legalist one could say the Sabbath has not been specifically directed at Pagans/Gentiles and rightly so; among other things the Sabbath is a sign of entering into the covenant/Law; gentiles cannot do this; what I mean is when a gentile/ Pagan enters into the covenant/Law he has to pass through a conversion after which he is no longer a gentile/Pagan. I am able to call such a person spiritual Israel, you cannot because of some concocted theological jargon that you subscribe to or subscribe against.
<<<The whole issue of the Sabbath verses Sunday is: does one reject the whole counsel of God and accept an alternative authority.>>>
{{{Exactly TRUE! Here you are giving the very 'TEST' you should --- yourself --- apply to your own predisposition, namely,
<<<The whole issue of the Sabbath verses Sunday is: does one reject the whole counsel of God and accept an alternative authority>>> WHICH IS WHOLLY CONTRADICTORY with what you claim, namely, that
<<<that WHOLE COUNSEL includes the fact that the Sabbath is a covenantal sign between God and natural Israel - the Jews. It is NEVER mentioned as a sign between God and any gentiles.>>>
You falsely inserts <<natural>>, and <<the Jews>> and false ly asserts << the Sabbath is NEVER mentioned as a sign between God and any gentiles.>>>
In fact nothing of what you arrogate is <in fact> true or just simply correct. You are the first person who should take heed that the WHOLE COUNSEL of God includes that the Sabbath has been a Covenantal sign between God and Christ in the first place and next between God and SPIRITUAL Israel - the Christians. In fact, the Sabbath whenever mentioned, is being mentioned as a sign and tool in the hand of God in his working out throughout the HISTORY OF SALVATION of the <<WHOLE COUNSEL of God>> which CULMINATED IN CHRIST JESUS.
It is so easy to make authoritative statements with great bravado but meantime everything about it is a farce.{{{
As I sit here stunned trying to work out who I am disagreeing with and am I really disagreeing or misunderstanding, I pray; God help Dave and Gerhard Ebersöhn to understand nothing is culminated, the counsel of God and the covenant is still active and will never end.
Why do most subscribe to the non-Biblical notion that the Law/covenant was abrogated at or nailed to the cross? The prophesies of old told of the Law/covenant going to the Gentiles; did prophesy fail, if the Law/covenant was abrogated, what went to the gentiles three and a half years later? From the Bible please not concocted nonsense. Regardless of what men say the covenant is still available for anyone to enter into but it is not easy; it requires that the person sees the need to do so and it requires God's approval and participation; it is easy so a little old lady can do it and hard such that an Olympic athlete would fail. It is also possible that many have entered into the covenant yet deny it because they have themselves so tricked up with words and concepts.
...Pagans/Gentiles...
Those are NOT the same thing. Yet you seem to be using them interchangeably.
Cornelius was certainly a gentile but as a God-fearer he was certainly NOT a pagan. Christians who do not come from a Jewish/Israelite family (either naturally or by conversion) are STILL gentiles but are NOT pagans.
If you want a name to call them/us I would suggest "Commonwealth of Israel." That at least has some scriptural basis. Ephesians 2:12
You falsely inserts <<natural>>, and <<the Jews>> and falsely asserts << the Sabbath is NEVER mentioned as a sign between God and any gentiles.>>>
If you can find me a verse that says it is a sign between God and gentiles, please post it here. I want to see it.
...Pagans/Gentiles...
<<Those are NOT the same thing. Yet you seem to be using them interchangeably.
We have had this discussion before; let me reiterate. A dictionary gives the most common usage of words and by definition the least common usages are omitted but are still valid if they achieve their purpose. Beyond this the dictionary is not an authority. If one allows a dictionary to be an authority it will control one's mind; it will control what one thinks and can say; when such a one reads the Bible it will be a dictionary speaking not God and the Holy Spirit will be on the dole.
Yes, I used Pagan/gentile as an indivisible aggregation; I cannot imagine a gentile not being a Pagan. How I see the difference between Pagan and Gentile is: anyone (person) not of the Jewish faith is a Pagan, anyone not of the Jewish race is a gentile. So anyone not of the Jewish race will be pagan and anyone not of the Jewish faith will be gentile. Even before Christ any Pagan/gentile who converted to the Jewish faith became a Jew, no longer gentile. You may think God is a racist; If God is not a racist today then He never was, God does not change.
<< Cornelius was certainly a gentile but as a God-fearer he was certainly NOT a pagan. Christians who do not come from a Jewish/Israelite family (either naturally or by conversion) are STILL gentiles but are NOT pagans. >>
This is not the Bible talking, it is your statement and it is an oxymoron. The kingdom of God is a single family it is not many families; it is the house of Israel, not by race but by overcoming; I don't expect any flesh to be there.
<< If you want a name to call them/us I would suggest "Commonwealth of Israel." That at least has some scriptural basis. Ephesians 2:12>>
Spiritual Israel doesn't bother me; the difference between spiritual Israel and Commonwealth of Israel is the same difference as Jews in the spirit and Jews in the flesh. Paul spoke a lot about spiritual; your brand of literalism/legalism cannot handle the fact that Paul didn't place the words "spiritual" and "Israel" side by side in the same sentence. Commonwealth appears once in the KJV and the word Paul used on one occasion could mean citizenship or community.
The word "spiritual" demonstrates the danger of depending to strongly on dictionary meanings; Hos 9:7 "The spiritual man is mad". There is a big difference between spiritualism and the spiritual nature of the God of Israel and His kingdom.
Quote
You falsely inserts <<natural>>, and <<the Jews>> and falsely asserts << the Sabbath is NEVER mentioned as a sign between God and any gentiles.>>>
{{{If you can find me a verse that says it is a sign between God and gentiles, please post it here. I want to see it. }}}
One needs to understand the significance of there not being a sign between God and gentiles, there is a communication with them through NT Israel and any sign are contingent on conversion and entering into the covenant.
: DaveW Thu Jun 12, 2014 - 05:57:39
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Thu Jun 12, 2014 - 00:47:47
In fact nothing of what you arrogate is <in fact> true or just simply correct. You are the first person who should take heed that the WHOLE COUNSEL of God includes that the Sabbath has been a Covenantal sign between God and Christ in the first place and next between God and SPIRITUAL Israel - the Christians.
WRONG. There is no such animal as a "spiritual Israel." That is a concept invented with replacement theology.
In fact, the Sabbath whenever mentioned, is being mentioned as a sign and tool in the hand of God in his working out throughout the HISTORY OF SALVATION of the <<WHOLE COUNSEL of God>> which CULMINATED IN CHRIST JESUS.
The Sabbath is never mentioned as applicable to gentiles with the exception of those who live in the Jewish community - "the stranger [Heb = ger] who dwells AMONG you."
By buying into that "spiritual Israel" lie, your entire understanding of the covenantal sign of the Sabbath is seriously distorted.
Your right, the Sabbath is and never was for Gentiles. It is for those only who accept the authority of the God of the Jews and are of Israel by choice, not by birth. There most certainly is a spiritual Israel and always has been, or are you of the understanding that anyone has ever been saved of their flesh? Is or was there ever a people of God according to the flesh? No, even Israel was built and established according to the promises of God, and they only who had faith in those promises and acted accordingly were of the true Israel of God.
Ac 9:11 And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the street which is called Straight, and enquire in the house of Judas for one called Saul, of Tarsus: for, behold, he prayeth, 12 And hath seen in a vision a man named Ananias coming in, and putting his hand on him, that he might receive his sight. 13 Then Ananias answered, Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he hath done to thy saints at Jerusalem: 14 And here he hath authority from the chief priests to bind all that call on thy name. 15 But the Lord said unto him, Go thy way:
for he is a chosen vessel unto me,to bear my name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel:The Apostle Paul was a chosen vessel of God, to bear His name before the Gentiles, Kings, and the children of Israel. The authority of his teachings was from God to all of the above. So what did he teach concerning the Gentiles and Israel? What did the Apostles establish concerning the same?
Ac 15:3 And being brought on their way by the church, they passed through Phenice and Samaria, declaring the conversion of the Gentiles: and they caused great joy unto all the brethren. 4 And when they were come to Jerusalem, they were received of the church, and of the apostles and elders, and they declared all things that God had done with them. 5 But there rose up certain of the sect of the Pharisees which believed, saying, That it was needful to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses. 6 ¶ And the apostles and elders came together for to consider of this matter. 7 And when there had been much disputing, Peter rose up, and said unto them, Men and brethren, ye know how that a good while ago God made choice among us,
that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the word of the gospel, and believe. 8 And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us; 9 And put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. 10 Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? 11 But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they.When the message went out to the Gentiles, God put no difference between them and the believing Jews. Peter summed it up in verse eleven above by stating that both Jew and Gentile were saved by grace in Jesus Christ. Certain of the Pharisees demanded that the new converts must keep the law of Moses, but the Apostles decided against this, since God made no difference between Jew or Gentile regarding the same concerning salvation and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. Thus the new covenant church was to be composed of Jews and converted Gentiles between whom, God made no difference. Though men themselves still did.
Ro 3:19 ¶ Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law:[
that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. 20 Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin. 21 But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; 22
Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference: 23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; 24 Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: 25 Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; 26 To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. 27 Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith. 28 Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. 29
Is he the God of the Jews only? is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also: 30 Seeing it is one God, which shall justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith. 31 Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.In the above we have the statement of no difference between Jew and Gentile again. Both and all are guilty before the law, and are saved by faith in Christ alone. Of course the law spoken of above cannot be the civil, ceremonial, or dietary laws written by the hand of Moses, for we already know the church determined that converted Gentiles need not keep the same. This they professed while admitting that neither their fathers nor they were ever able to do so either. Thus it is obvious that it is the moral laws of the ten commandments of God written with His own finger, that makes all the world guilty and in need of salvation through Christ. Nor does this make the law of God void, but rather establishes it.
The fact that all the world is guilty before God for breaking it, and needs salvation in Christ to get out from under the condemnation of the law, proves the extent of its authority and power. All need salvation from its condemnation for there is no difference in relation to all concerning its authority. Thus is there no difference between Jew and Gentile who are all one in Christ, acknowledging the authority of God's law by their confession of faith in Christ to save them from its condemnation.
Ro 10:9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. 10 For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. 11 For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. 12 ¶
For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him. 13 For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.There is no difference, no difference, no difference. Here we have it the third times now, those in Christ are made one, not two. The only Jews who remain separate from the converted Gentiles, are those who rejected and reject Christ. Those who are in Christ have become one with those of all other nations and peoples who are also. Jews or anyone else that wants to continue to keep the laws of Moses may do so, but they cannot demand that any other must in order to be saved. All however must confess their faith in Christ to save them from the condemnation of the law of God, which faith does not make the law of God void, but rather establishes the same.
So who is it that maintains the difference between Jew and Gentile? It is either the Jews who rejected Christ, or those who consider themselves "Gentile Christians" who reject the teaching of the Apostles and scriptures we have examined thus far. This begs the question of who the real Israel is now. Is it the Jews who rejected and still reject Christ, or is it the Jews and converted Gentiles that accept Christ as the promised Messiah. What do the scriptures say, and what did Paul teach?
Ac 13:44 And the next sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God. 45 But when the Jews saw the multitudes, they were filled with envy, and spake against those things which were spoken by Paul, contradicting and blaspheming. 46 Then Paul and Barnabas waxed bold, and said, It was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you: but seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles. 47 For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that thou shouldest be for salvation unto the ends of the earth. 48 And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord: and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed. 49 And the word of the Lord was published throughout all the region. 50 But the Jews stirred up the devout and honourable women, and the chief men of the city, and raised persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them out of their coasts. 51 But they shook off the dust of their feet against them, and came unto Iconium.
The above is just one example of the division of the Jewish nation between those who accepted their Messiah, and those who did not. So who is and was the true Israel of God during this division and today as it continues? Was it the Apostles who were all Jews themselves, and those who accepted the gospel of Jesus Christ whether Jew or Gentile, or was it the Jews who rejected the same? Or are there now two separate peoples of God on earth as many suggest? What do the scriptures say, what did Paul teach?
Ro 2:9 Tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil, of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile; 10 But glory, honour, and peace, to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile: 11
For there is no respect of persons with God. 12 For as many as have sinned without law shall also perish without law: and as many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law; 13
(For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified. 14 For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: 15 Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another;) 16 In the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my gospel.According to Paul, God is no respecter of persons. Those who show respect to the law of God show the work of the law written upon their hearts, whether Jew or Gentile, whether they have knowledge of the same or not. This is because it is the work of the Holy Spirit of God to convict and convert in relation to the law of God. This again has to be referring to the ten commandments of God, for we already know from scripture that converted Gentiles are not required to keep the law of Moses, save those practices to confounded with the worship of false god's in violation of the first two commandments. This is all according to Paul's gospel of Jesus Christ. There is no difference. It is the same, to the Jew first, and then the Gentile.
Ro 9:1 ¶ I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost, 2 That I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart. 3 For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh: 4 Who are Israelites; to whom pertaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises; 5
Whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen. 6 ¶ Not as though the word of God hath taken none effect. For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel: 7 Neither, because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children: but, In Isaac shall thy seed be called. 8 That is, They which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God: but the children of the promise are counted for the seed.We see from Paul's above words that not all who are from Israel, are Israel. It is not because one is of the literal seed of Abraham that makes them a true Israelite, but rather the one who accepts the promise of Christ who are counted for the seed. Those Jews who are the seed of Abraham according to the flesh, but do not accept the promise of Christ, are not of Israel. It is those who have accepted the promise of Christ that are the real Israel of God, the Jew first, and also the Gentile. The Gentile who accepts the promise is no longer a Gentile but of the family of Abraham by faith and of the true Israel of God. Israel existed for the purpose of bringing forth Christ through the lineage chosen by God Himself. Those of Israel according to the flesh only now, are no longer the Israel of God, and quite frankly none ever were. What more does Paul have to say about the matter?
Ga 6:11 ¶ Ye see how large a letter I have written unto you with mine own hand. 12 As many as desire to make a fair shew in the flesh, they constrain you to be circumcised; only lest they should suffer persecution for the cross of Christ. 13 For neither they themselves who are circumcised keep the law; but desire to have you circumcised, that they may glory in your flesh. 14 But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world. 15
For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. 16 And as many as walk according to this rule, peace be on them, and mercy, and upon the Israel of God.Who are the Israel of God but those who understand that being circumcised or not according to the law of Moses, means nothing apart from becoming a new creature in Christ Jesus. Those who understand this whether Jew or Gentile receive commendation from Paul as the Israel of God. How say some that there is no spiritual Israel of God composed of all believers of the same? Does Paul have anything else to say about the matter?
Eph 3:8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 9 Not of works, lest any man should boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. 11 ¶ Wherefore remember,
that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands; 12 That at that time ye were without Christ,
being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world: 13 But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. 14 ¶ For he is our peace,
who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; 15 Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace; 16 And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby: 17 And came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh. 18 For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father. 19
Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God; 20 And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; 21 In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: It doesn't get any clearer than the above. Gentiles in Christ are no longer Gentiles but of the very household of God, fellow citizens with the saints, of the commonwealth of Israel. They themselves being built upon the teachings of the apostles, prophets, and Jesus Christ himself. Because of this they are citizens of the Israel of God. All those who reject the teachings of the apostles, prophets, or Jesus Christ are no longer of the Israel of God, whether Jew or Gentile. This is Paul's teaching. Is this all he has to say?
Ga 3:6 ¶ Even as Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness. 7
Know ye therefore that they which are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham. 8 And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed. 9 So then they which be of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham......................................................................................
Who are the seed of Abraham, but the nation of Israel?
13 Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: 14
That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. 15 Brethren, I speak after the manner of men; Though it be but a man's covenant, yet if it be confirmed, no man disannulleth, or addeth thereto. 16 Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ..................................
The promise was made to Abraham and his seed. All are his seed who accept the promise of Christ through His gospel.
26 For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.27 For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. 28
There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise. How could it be made any clearer by the Apostle Paul? Converted Gentiles are no longer Gentiles but the seed of Abraham, the Israel of God, of the commonwealth of Israel, fellow citizens with the same, and children of Abraham, of the household of God, who have been made one with Israel. What more could Paul say to convince us that those in Christ, the church, are the Israel of God?
Depending on what we mean by "spiritual Israel," maybe there is, and maybe there isn't.
The phrase need not be understood as a Replacement Theology rubric, but based on Paul's discussion in the first few chapters of Romans where he clearly says that neither the Law nor circumcision amount to much without trusting YHWH. He will clearly assert that not all those of Israel are Israel, but that the Gentiles who kept the principles of the Law actually kept it even though they had not received it.
Paul says this in his rhetorical attempt to first, bring all peoples together as having sinned, but also then to allow all peoples to come to God through trusting Him (in the person of Jesus for Paul's immediate point). Those who have had their hearts, not primarily their flesh circumcised are Israel whether they are Jewish or Gentile.
It is in this sense, this very clear Pauline sense, that the phrase "spiritual Israel" can be appropriately used. It is based on trust in YHWH (before the Law, before circumcision), and keeping the principles of the Law even if you didn't have the Law (Gentiles). "Spiritual Israel" is opposed to fleshly Israel and is the whole people of God together. There no longer remains Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female when it comes to being accepted by God through trust.
And, as Paul makes abundantly clear, it has never been any other way.
: HRoberson Sun Jun 15, 2014 - 18:15:18
Depending on what we mean by "spiritual Israel," maybe there is, and maybe there isn't.
The phrase need not be understood as a Replacement Theology rubric, but based on Paul's discussion in the first few chapters of Romans where he clearly says that neither the Law nor circumcision amount to much without trusting YHWH. He will clearly assert that not all those of Israel are Israel, but that the Gentiles who kept the principles of the Law actually kept it even though they had not received it.
Paul says this in his rhetorical attempt to first, bring all peoples together as having sinned, but also then to allow all peoples to come to God through trusting Him (in the person of Jesus for Paul's immediate point). Those who have had their hearts, not primarily their flesh circumcised are Israel whether they are Jewish or Gentile.
It is in this sense, this very clear Pauline sense, that the phrase "spiritual Israel" can be appropriately used. It is based on trust in YHWH (before the Law, before circumcision), and keeping the principles of the Law even if you didn't have the Law (Gentiles). "Spiritual Israel" is opposed to fleshly Israel and is the whole people of God together. There no longer remains Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female when it comes to being accepted by God through trust.
And, as Paul makes abundantly clear, it has never been any other way.
Who would have thought it, we agree. Its what keeps things interesting around here.
: Amo Sat Jun 14, 2014 - 11:24:32
: DaveW Thu Jun 12, 2014 - 05:57:39
The Sabbath is never mentioned as applicable to gentiles with the exception of those who live in the Jewish community - "the stranger [Heb = ger] who dwells AMONG you."
By buying into that "spiritual Israel" lie, your entire understanding of the covenantal sign of the Sabbath is seriously distorted.
Your right, the Sabbath is and never was for Gentiles.
How do you define "Gentile?" The Hebrew word "
goy" means Nation. Our word gentile comes from the Latin word for nation:
gens, gentis F.
It is for those only who accept the authority of the God of the Jews and are of Israel by choice, not by birth.
You cannot be "Israel by choice" unless you formally convert to Judaism.
There most certainly is a spiritual Israel and always has been, or are you of the understanding that anyone has ever been saved of their flesh? Is or was there ever a people of God according to the flesh?
Yes, there has been a people of God in the flesh. That was how both the Abrahamic covenant and Mosaic covenant worked. Salvation is by covenant and you were physically born into those covenants by lineage. Of course if you went off and did not follow the covenant you ended up cutting yourself off from it.
No, even Israel was built and established according to the promises of God, and they only who had faith in those promises and acted accordingly were of the true Israel of God.
As I said, you can cut your self off of the covenant (no longer Israel) and Paul says that can happen even in the New Covenant:
Rom 11.19 You will say then, "Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in."
20 Quite right, they were broken off for their unbelief, but you stand by your faith. Do not be conceited, but fear;
21 for if God did not spare the natural branches, He will not spare you, either.
Paul says the gentiles who come to faith are grafted into Israel (Rom 11.17) and become part of the "Commonwealth of Israel" or the "Israel of God." But that is not to be confused with Israel proper. Do not confuse the grafted in branches with the natural branches. Their fruit is different.
Why? Because "the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. " Rom 11.29. That means the ancient callings and responsibilities given to the physical descendants (and their proselytes) of Jacob are still in effect. They are NOT in effect for gentile believers in the Lord. However, they have their own unique callings and ministries - primary of which is to make traditional (non messianic) Jews jealous of their relationship with the God of Abraham. Romans 11.11
: DaveW Fri Jun 20, 2014 - 09:00:54
: Amo Sat Jun 14, 2014 - 11:24:32
: DaveW Thu Jun 12, 2014 - 05:57:39
The Sabbath is never mentioned as applicable to gentiles with the exception of those who live in the Jewish community - "the stranger [Heb = ger] who dwells AMONG you."
By buying into that "spiritual Israel" lie, your entire understanding of the covenantal sign of the Sabbath is seriously distorted.
Your right, the Sabbath is and never was for Gentiles.
How do you define "Gentile?" The Hebrew word "goy" means Nation. Our word gentile comes from the Latin word for nation: gens, gentis F.
It is for those only who accept the authority of the God of the Jews and are of Israel by choice, not by birth.
You cannot be "Israel by choice" unless you formally convert to Judaism.
There most certainly is a spiritual Israel and always has been, or are you of the understanding that anyone has ever been saved of their flesh? Is or was there ever a people of God according to the flesh?
Yes, there has been a people of God in the flesh. That was how both the Abrahamic covenant and Mosaic covenant worked. Salvation is by covenant and you were physically born into those covenants by lineage. Of course if you went off and did not follow the covenant you ended up cutting yourself off from it.
No, even Israel was built and established according to the promises of God, and they only who had faith in those promises and acted accordingly were of the true Israel of God.
As I said, you can cut your self off of the covenant (no longer Israel) and Paul says that can happen even in the New Covenant:
Rom 11.19 You will say then, "Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in."
20 Quite right, they were broken off for their unbelief, but you stand by your faith. Do not be conceited, but fear;
21 for if God did not spare the natural branches, He will not spare you, either.
Paul says the gentiles who come to faith are grafted into Israel (Rom 11.17) and become part of the "Commonwealth of Israel" or the "Israel of God." But that is not to be confused with Israel proper. Do not confuse the grafted in branches with the natural branches. Their fruit is different.
Why? Because "the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. " Rom 11.29. That means the ancient callings and responsibilities given to the physical descendants (and their proselytes) of Jacob are still in effect. They are NOT in effect for gentile believers in the Lord. However, they have their own unique callings and ministries - primary of which is to make traditional (non messianic) Jews jealous of their relationship with the God of Abraham. Romans 11.11
Since we seem to be getting side tracked from the issues on this thread, lets direct our traffic concerning Israel to the following thread, created for the same.
http://www.gracecentered.com/christian_forums/seventh-day-adventist-forum-%28sda%29/god%27s-nation-on-earth/ (http://www.gracecentered.com/christian_forums/seventh-day-adventist-forum-%28sda%29/god%27s-nation-on-earth/)
A few more articles of interest, or not, concerning Sunday rest.
http://www.jewishpress.com/news/israel-adopts-sundays-off/2013/02/23/ (http://www.jewishpress.com/news/israel-adopts-sundays-off/2013/02/23/)
http://www2.gnb.ca/content/gnb/en/departments/elg/local_government/content/governance/content/days_of_rest_act.html (http://www2.gnb.ca/content/gnb/en/departments/elg/local_government/content/governance/content/days_of_rest_act.html)
http://www.legis.state.la.us/lss/lss.asp?doc=74097 (http://www.legis.state.la.us/lss/lss.asp?doc=74097)
http://www.cantondailyledger.com/article/20140420/NEWS/304209995/10113/LIFESTYLE (http://www.cantondailyledger.com/article/20140420/NEWS/304209995/10113/LIFESTYLE)
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/27/us/pope-francis-has-a-few-words-in-support-of-leisure.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/27/us/pope-francis-has-a-few-words-in-support-of-leisure.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0)
http://www.atg.wa.gov/AGOOpinions/Opinion.aspx?section=archive&id=7488#.U680n7Efyb4 (http://www.atg.wa.gov/AGOOpinions/Opinion.aspx?section=archive&id=7488#.U680n7Efyb4)
http://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=187530.0 (http://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=187530.0)
http://intunemusiconline.com/2006/08/02/taking-back-sunday-whats-in-a-name/ (http://intunemusiconline.com/2006/08/02/taking-back-sunday-whats-in-a-name/)
What is <<<... Sunday rest.>>?
Never read a word <<<... concerning Sunday rest>>> to be honest.
Have read a LOT OT and NT ... concerning SABBATH rest, yea!
God bless his Holy Day
What is <<<... Sunday rest.>>>
If you do an internet search you will find the term common.
http://amazingdiscoveries.org/S-deception-unity_Sunday_legislation_global_law (http://amazingdiscoveries.org/S-deception-unity_Sunday_legislation_global_law)
Here are a couple of interesting and informational sites regarding the issue of this thread -
http://www.bible-sabbath.com/Sabbath-Sunday/NationalSundayLaw-Jones.pdf (http://www.bible-sabbath.com/Sabbath-Sunday/NationalSundayLaw-Jones.pdf)
http://www.specialtyinterests.net/lords_day_history.html#tfsl (http://www.specialtyinterests.net/lords_day_history.html#tfsl)
Here is a real whopper, concerning the subject at hand -
http://www.trueletterofoursavior.com/ (http://www.trueletterofoursavior.com/)
Here are several other sites regarding the supposed Letter of Jesus Christ concerning Sunday sacredness. I had no idea it was so popular and believed by so many to this day.
http://www.catholictradition.org/Christ/true-letter.htm (http://www.catholictradition.org/Christ/true-letter.htm)
http://catholicdevotionsapostolate.blogspot.com/2010/07/true-letter-of-our-savior-jesus-christ.html (http://catholicdevotionsapostolate.blogspot.com/2010/07/true-letter-of-our-savior-jesus-christ.html)
http://www.fatima.org/crusader/cr48/cr48pg31.asp (http://www.fatima.org/crusader/cr48/cr48pg31.asp)
http://www.ignitumtoday.com/2012/12/01/the-true-letter-of-our-lord-jesus-christ-2/ (http://www.ignitumtoday.com/2012/12/01/the-true-letter-of-our-lord-jesus-christ-2/)
http://www.ewtn.com/vexperts/showmessage.asp?number=401653 (http://www.ewtn.com/vexperts/showmessage.asp?number=401653)
http://healwithgrace.blogspot.com/2010/03/true-letter-of-our-savior-jesus-christ.html (http://healwithgrace.blogspot.com/2010/03/true-letter-of-our-savior-jesus-christ.html)
http://internationaltridentinemass.blogspot.com/2014/06/a-true-letter-of-our-savior-jesus-christ.html (http://internationaltridentinemass.blogspot.com/2014/06/a-true-letter-of-our-savior-jesus-christ.html)
Another article of interest concerning Pope Francis and Sunday rest -
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/kathyschiffer/2014/07/pope-asks-is-working-on-sunday-true-freedom/ (http://www.patheos.com/blogs/kathyschiffer/2014/07/pope-asks-is-working-on-sunday-true-freedom/)
Here it goes, socialist labor union takes company to court and wins.
http://www.retaildetail.eu/en/eur-europe/eur-furniture/item/16471-ikea-france-convicted-for-illegal-sunday-opening (http://www.retaildetail.eu/en/eur-europe/eur-furniture/item/16471-ikea-france-convicted-for-illegal-sunday-opening)
More of interest.
http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/emire/FRANCE/WEEKLYRESTDAY-FR.htm (http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/emire/FRANCE/WEEKLYRESTDAY-FR.htm)
https://www.gov.uk/trading-hours-for-retailers-the-law (https://www.gov.uk/trading-hours-for-retailers-the-law)
http://www.nwitimes.com/business/local/magnetics-to-pay-to-settle-religious-discrimination-suit/article_f9e437bb-9396-5d50-94b1-fd1e1199c42f.html (http://www.nwitimes.com/business/local/magnetics-to-pay-to-settle-religious-discrimination-suit/article_f9e437bb-9396-5d50-94b1-fd1e1199c42f.html)
http://utopiathecollapse.com/2014/07/11/pope-francis-initiates-vatican-push-for-global-work-free-sunday/ (http://utopiathecollapse.com/2014/07/11/pope-francis-initiates-vatican-push-for-global-work-free-sunday/)
http://national.deseretnews.com/article/1862/working-this-sunday-heres-your-newest-reason-to-take-the-day-off.html (http://national.deseretnews.com/article/1862/working-this-sunday-heres-your-newest-reason-to-take-the-day-off.html)
http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/euelections2014thepledge (http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/euelections2014thepledge)
http://www.free-sunday.eu/en (http://www.free-sunday.eu/en)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2597931/Let-stay-open-longer-Sunday-Big-stores-plea-scrap-ridiculous-rules.html (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2597931/Let-stay-open-longer-Sunday-Big-stores-plea-scrap-ridiculous-rules.html)
https://www.gov.uk/trading-hours-for-retailers-the-law (https://www.gov.uk/trading-hours-for-retailers-the-law)
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-28111501 (http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-28111501)
http://www.bbc.com/news/business-28237440 (http://www.bbc.com/news/business-28237440)
http://www.cityam.com/article/1395633782/sunday-trading-laws-are-outdated-we-must-extend-opening-hours (http://www.cityam.com/article/1395633782/sunday-trading-laws-are-outdated-we-must-extend-opening-hours)
http://europeanlawblog.eu/?p=2372 (http://europeanlawblog.eu/?p=2372)
http://www.labor.state.ny.us/formsdocs/wp/LS611.pdf (http://www.labor.state.ny.us/formsdocs/wp/LS611.pdf)
https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXX/Chapter136/Section5 (https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXX/Chapter136/Section5)
http://webserver.rilin.state.ri.us/Statutes/TITLE25/25-3/25-3-3.HTM (http://webserver.rilin.state.ri.us/Statutes/TITLE25/25-3/25-3-3.HTM)
http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&file_id=9057 (http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&file_id=9057)
http://www.lrc.ky.gov/Statutes/statute.aspx?id=18985 (http://www.lrc.ky.gov/Statutes/statute.aspx?id=18985)
http://ecode360.com/8544550 (http://ecode360.com/8544550)
http://wn.com/sunday,_law (http://wn.com/sunday,_law)
http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/whoweare/article/75.html (http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/whoweare/article/75.html)
http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/whoweare/article/63.html (http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/whoweare/article/63.html)
http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/whoweare/article/64.html (http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/whoweare/article/64.html)
http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/whoweare/article/65.html (http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/whoweare/article/65.html)
Start Quote
Re: Sabbath, Sunday, and Legalism
<<WRONG. There is no such animal as a "spiritual Israel." That is a concept invented with replacement theology.>>
Dave you are confusing me; we are not talking about animals, "spiritual Israel" is an appropriate name for the Children of God, those who are in a living relationship with Him and this is the opposite of Israel in the flesh: those who have not entered into the covenant even though they may keep some form of commandments. You may know something I don't; I do not use jargon or keywords which are a form of mind control, but I can imagine that some have taken these words and built a doctrine of men around them.
Replacement Theology is a name one calls someone one does not like; like homo or homophobic.
<<The Sabbath is never mentioned as applicable to gentiles with the exception of those who live in the Jewish community - "the stranger [Heb = ger] who dwells AMONG you."
By buying into that "spiritual Israel" lie, your entire understanding of the covenantal sign of the Sabbath is seriously distorted.>>
If one was a literalist or a legalist one could say the Sabbath has not been specifically directed at Pagans/Gentiles and rightly so; among other things the Sabbath is a sign of entering into the covenant/Law; gentiles cannot do this; what I mean is when a gentile/ Pagan enters into the covenant/Law he has to pass through a conversion after which he is no longer a gentile/Pagan. I am able to call such a person spiritual Israel, you cannot because of some concocted theological jargon that you subscribe to or subscribe against.
<<<The whole issue of the Sabbath verses Sunday is: does one reject the whole counsel of God and accept an alternative authority.>>>
{{{Exactly TRUE! Here you are giving the very 'TEST' you should --- yourself --- apply to your own predisposition, namely,
<<<The whole issue of the Sabbath verses Sunday is: does one reject the whole counsel of God and accept an alternative authority>>> WHICH IS WHOLLY CONTRADICTORY with what you claim, namely, that
<<<that WHOLE COUNSEL includes the fact that the Sabbath is a covenantal sign between God and natural Israel - the Jews. It is NEVER mentioned as a sign between God and any gentiles.>>>
You falsely inserts <<natural>>, and <<the Jews>> and false ly asserts << the Sabbath is NEVER mentioned as a sign between God and any gentiles.>>>
In fact nothing of what you arrogate is <in fact> true or just simply correct. You are the first person who should take heed that the WHOLE COUNSEL of God includes that the Sabbath has been a Covenantal sign between God and Christ in the first place and next between God and SPIRITUAL Israel - the Christians. In fact, the Sabbath whenever mentioned, is being mentioned as a sign and tool in the hand of God in his working out throughout the HISTORY OF SALVATION of the <<WHOLE COUNSEL of God>> which CULMINATED IN CHRIST JESUS.
It is so easy to make authoritative statements with great bravado but meantime everything about it is a farce.{{{
As I sit here stunned trying to work out who I am disagreeing with and am I really disagreeing or misunderstanding, I pray; God help Dave and Gerhard Ebersöhn to understand nothing is culminated, the counsel of God and the covenant is still active and will never end.
Why do most subscribe to the non-Biblical notion that the Law/covenant was abrogated at or nailed to the cross? The prophesies of old told of the Law/covenant going to the Gentiles; did prophesy fail, if the Law/covenant was abrogated, what went to the gentiles three and a half years later? From the Bible please not concocted nonsense. Regardless of what men say the covenant is still available for anyone to enter into but it is not easy; it requires that the person sees the need to do so and it requires God's approval and participation; it is easy so a little old lady can do it and hard such that an Olympic athlete would fail. It is also possible that many have entered into the covenant yet deny it because they have themselves so tricked up with words and concepts.
End quote
A very good post.
But you don't need worry about me, Gerhard Ebersöhn, because I have done with the Law and contentions about the Law. Christ abolished the Law in his flesh.
Christ in his flesh rose from the dead the Law on the Sabbath.
The 'Sabbath / Sunday issue' is no issue none whatsoever; IT IS ALL ABOUT THE DAY JESUS ROSE FROM THE DEAD ON.
It is an issue the legalist-Sundayists have won with flying colours but the poor Sabbatharians have always thought they had won. The latter having handed over to the real legalists the only valid reason for being of the Seventh Day Sabbath OF THE LORD GOD.
Christ abolished the Law in his flesh. In Himself nailed to the cross, He took it out of the way and triumphed in it.
Christ The Word of God came from the dead God's Law in his flesh, and made the Sabbath, the Lord's Day of Sabbaths' Feast of Christ its Substance.
But you don't need worry about me, Gerhard Ebersöhn, because I have done with the Law and contentions about the Law. Christ abolished the Law in his flesh.
Christ in his flesh rose from the dead the Law on the Sabbath.
The 'Sabbath / Sunday issue' is no issue none whatsoever; IT IS ALL ABOUT THE DAY JESUS ROSE FROM THE DEAD ON.
The bible says nowhere that Christ abolished the law in His flesh. This is a fairy tale for the deceived. He did not come to abolish the law at all, but to the contrary to establish it, just as the scriptures testify. He came to condemn sin in the flesh, not the law of God.
Mt 5:17 ¶ Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
Rom 3:28 Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. 29 Is he the God of the Jews only? is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also: 30 Seeing it is one God, which shall justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith. 31
Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.Rom 8:1 ¶ There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh,
God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: 4 That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 5 For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. 6 For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7
Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.
You cannot abolish and establish something at the same time.
Eph 2:14 ¶ For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; 15
Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace; 16 And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross,
having slain the enmity thereby:
Christ abolished the enmity between the law of God and sinners, not the law of God. He did this in His flesh, which was our flesh. He did this by keeping the law of God perfectly in our flesh, thus condemning sin in the flesh. After which or more accurately the final action of which led Him to the cross where all sinners who will be saved were crucified with and in Him. Thus He has abolished the condemnation of the law over the sinner who accepts salvation in Christ. Abolishing the enmity between the saved and the law, not the law. We are the ones who change, not God's law. If it could have been changed, our salvation would not have been necessary.
Rom 6:3
Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? 4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: 6 Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. 7 For he that is dead is freed from sin. 8 Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him: 9 Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him. 10 For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. 11 Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. 12 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. 13 Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. 14 For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace. 15 What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid. 16 Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness? 17 But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you. 18 Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness.
He who is dead is freed from sin, and thus the penalty of the law also, which is death. The enmity is gone.
Mt 10:38 And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. 39 He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.
Mt 16:24 ¶ Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. 25 For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.
Rom 12:1 ¶ I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. 2 And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.
http://www.ewtn.com/expert/answers/sunday_mass.htm (http://www.ewtn.com/expert/answers/sunday_mass.htm)
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20140928/letters/Keep-Sunday-as-a-day-of-rest-for-society.537515 (http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20140928/letters/Keep-Sunday-as-a-day-of-rest-for-society.537515)
http://www.timesofisrael.com/sunday-a-day-off-in-israel-tel-aviv-brokers-hope-so/ (http://www.timesofisrael.com/sunday-a-day-off-in-israel-tel-aviv-brokers-hope-so/)
http://www.ldausa.org/lda/reflections/ (http://www.ldausa.org/lda/reflections/)
Amo:
Q~The bible says nowhere that Christ abolished the law in His flesh. This is a fairy tale for the deceived. He did not come to abolish the law at all, but to the contrary to establish it, just as the scriptures testify. He came to condemn sin in the flesh, not the law of God. ~Q
GE:
Well, I never.
Now what did Jesus actually avail?
This is the GOSPEL Amo, which you are here denying.
This is the Law of God: Jesus Christ crucified and nailed to the cross; Jesus Christ the Word of God taken "out of the way" and "abolished"
SO THAT HE COULD "MAGNIFY THY LAW O GOD" when "LIFTED HIGH from the earth", "upon the mount a LAMB as SLAIN" -- indeed as "SLAIN from before the foundation of the world".
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Sun Oct 26, 2014 - 02:45:52
Amo:
Q~The bible says nowhere that Christ abolished the law in His flesh. This is a fairy tale for the deceived. He did not come to abolish the law at all, but to the contrary to establish it, just as the scriptures testify. He came to condemn sin in the flesh, not the law of God. ~Q
GE:
Well, I never.
Now what did Jesus actually avail?
This is the GOSPEL Amo, which you are here denying.
This is the Law of God: Jesus Christ crucified and nailed to the cross; Jesus Christ the Word of God taken "out of the way" and "abolished"
SO THAT HE COULD "MAGNIFY THY LAW O GOD" when "LIFTED HIGH from the earth", "upon the mount a LAMB as SLAIN" -- indeed as "SLAIN from before the foundation of the world".
Perhaps a little context would help.
Col 2:12 Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead. 13 ¶ And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses; 14
Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross; 15 And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it. 16 ¶ Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: 17 Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ. 18 Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels, intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, 19 And not holding the Head, from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God. 20
Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances, 21 (Touch not; taste not; handle not; 22 Which all are to perish with the using;) after the commandments and doctrines of men?Since when is the law of God considered commandments and doctrines of men? When was it ever referred to as rudiments of this world? Nevertheless, even if the above were referring to God's law, the obvious meaning is as always concerning the removal of the condemnation of the law, not the law itself. This is what the forgiveness above is about. The removal of the condemnation of the law by way of forgiveness, not the law itself. If the law of God itself has been removed, then there is no condemnation which would require forgiveness. No law, no transgression, no need for forgiveness or atonement, no need for the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Exactly --- ~since when is the Law of God considered commandments and doctrines of men?~!
The WHOLE context would certainly help!
But since you "JUDGE" <The Law of GOD> in verses 12-19 as <the commandments and doctrines of men> in verses 20-23, you beguile the Body of Christ's Own of their Reward, and judge and condemn them for holding to <the commandments and doctrines of men> instead of to their Head which is Christ the Substance of their Sabbaths' Feast Assemblies— beguiling them of and denying them their Nourishment being ministered by joints and bands [of faith 2:12 Hosea 11:4; peace Ephesians 4:3; and charity Colossians 3:14], by which they— knit together (in love 2:2), as the Body of Christ's Own grow with the growth of God."
http://www.traditionalcatholicpriest.com/2014/05/12/no-work-on-sunday-the-warning-of-the-virgin-mary-at-la-salette/ (http://www.traditionalcatholicpriest.com/2014/05/12/no-work-on-sunday-the-warning-of-the-virgin-mary-at-la-salette/)
Mary, who is dead, has warned people that God is offended by those who don't keep Sunday holy. Never mind that God forbade and forbids communication with the dead.
http://www.free-sunday.eu/en/content/objective (http://www.free-sunday.eu/en/content/objective)
http://www.comece.org/site/en/activities/europeansundayalliance (http://www.comece.org/site/en/activities/europeansundayalliance)
MEPS talk about EU, A work free Sunday (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovoqXiyf_DI#ws)
http://www.indcatholicnews.com/news.php?viewStory=24011 (http://www.indcatholicnews.com/news.php?viewStory=24011)
http://www.allianz-fuer-den-freien-sonntag.de/131129_programme (http://www.allianz-fuer-den-freien-sonntag.de/131129_programme)
Never mind that God forbade and forbids communication with the dead.
Indeed. That has always bothered me.
: DaveW Fri Nov 07, 2014 - 13:48:27
Never mind that God forbade and forbids communication with the dead.
Indeed. That has always bothered me.
I don't understand how some trust communications from the dead, when God has forbidden the same.
I don't understand how some trust communications from the dead, when God has forbidden the same.
Well, if you throw out the Torah and its commands, there is no command to not listen to the dead. So one does not see God as having forbidden it.
: DaveW Mon Nov 10, 2014 - 07:55:57
I don't understand how some trust communications from the dead, when God has forbidden the same.
Well, if you throw out the Torah and its commands, there is no command to not listen to the dead. So one does not see God as having forbidden it.
Good point. Add to this the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, and you have the potential for major deception from the one who first promoted this lie.
Gen 3:4 And the serpent said unto the woman,
Ye shall not surely die: 5 For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.
CONFERENCE on Work free Sundays and Decent Work 21/ 1/ 14 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jLZBoUcuzfM#ws)
http://ndcatholic.org/editorials/column0711/ (http://ndcatholic.org/editorials/column0711/)
https://catholicsensibility.wordpress.com/2014/05/23/dies-domini-64-the-day-of-rest/ (https://catholicsensibility.wordpress.com/2014/05/23/dies-domini-64-the-day-of-rest/)
http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc/p3s2c1a3.htm (http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc/p3s2c1a3.htm)
http://www.cgg.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Audio.details/ID/3545/Secular-Day-Rest-Law.htm (http://www.cgg.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Audio.details/ID/3545/Secular-Day-Rest-Law.htm)
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/13/greek-shopkeepers-strike-sunday-trading (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/13/greek-shopkeepers-strike-sunday-trading)
http://www.euronews.com/2013/11/03/greece-small-businesses-protest-against-new-laws-allowing-sunday-trading/ (http://www.euronews.com/2013/11/03/greece-small-businesses-protest-against-new-laws-allowing-sunday-trading/)
http://www.thetrumpet.com/article/9828.20701.0.0/religion/roman-catholicism/is-the-eu-about-to-enforce-sunday-worship-in-greece?preview (http://www.thetrumpet.com/article/9828.20701.0.0/religion/roman-catholicism/is-the-eu-about-to-enforce-sunday-worship-in-greece?preview)
http://rt.com/news/greece-protests-streets-riots-260/ (http://rt.com/news/greece-protests-streets-riots-260/)
http://www.grreporter.info/en/terrorists_blew_newspaper_office/11929 (http://www.grreporter.info/en/terrorists_blew_newspaper_office/11929)
Ah yes, good "Christian" protests, riots, and bombings to protect or establish their Sunday rest.
http://godourlight.info/?p=747 (http://godourlight.info/?p=747)
http://strangeside.com/sunday-rest-laws/ (http://strangeside.com/sunday-rest-laws/)
http://en.idi.org.il/analysis/articles/should-sunday-be-a-day-of-rest-in-israel-an-interview-with-dr-arye-carmon (http://en.idi.org.il/analysis/articles/should-sunday-be-a-day-of-rest-in-israel-an-interview-with-dr-arye-carmon)
Interesting Jewish perspective of the matter at hand.
http://www.poandpo.com/politics/hungarian-lawmakers-to-vote-on-sunday-shopping-ban-7-11-2014/ (http://www.poandpo.com/politics/hungarian-lawmakers-to-vote-on-sunday-shopping-ban-7-11-2014/)
http://dailynewshungary.com/christian-democrats-govt-supports-restrictions-on-sunday-opening-times/ (http://dailynewshungary.com/christian-democrats-govt-supports-restrictions-on-sunday-opening-times/)
More recent developments concerning the issue at hand.
https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fmilano.repubblica.it%2Fcronaca%2F2014%2F12%2F04%2Fnews%2Fscola_bacchetta_i_commercianti_il_riposo_domenicale_sacro_non_cediamo_al_consumismo-102131390%2F&edit-text=&act=url (https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fmilano.repubblica.it%2Fcronaca%2F2014%2F12%2F04%2Fnews%2Fscola_bacchetta_i_commercianti_il_riposo_domenicale_sacro_non_cediamo_al_consumismo-102131390%2F&edit-text=&act=url)
https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?hl=en&sl=es&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.sinmordaza.com%2Fnoticia%2F276102-la-ley-de-descanso-dominical-fue-promulgada.html (https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?hl=en&sl=es&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.sinmordaza.com%2Fnoticia%2F276102-la-ley-de-descanso-dominical-fue-promulgada.html)
The Pope and the EU -
http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2014/11/24/eu_diplomat_to_holy_see_pope_francis_is_a_respected_voice/1112225?utm_source=KTF+Insider&utm_campaign=3eda55b4b3-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_79e2854feb-3eda55b4b3-49835953 (http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2014/11/24/eu_diplomat_to_holy_see_pope_francis_is_a_respected_voice/1112225?utm_source=KTF+Insider&utm_campaign=3eda55b4b3-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_79e2854feb-3eda55b4b3-49835953)
Amo- Thank you very much for these weekly updates. I look forward to them and use them as reminders of the fulfillment of prophecy. "Get ready, get ready, get ready".
Your welcome. It doesn't usually take more than a little time spent on a search engine using a handful of key words. Please do add any pertinent info. or articles you might come by. Happy Sabbath.
http://in.reuters.com/article/2014/12/10/hungary-retail-idUSL6N0TH1SM20141210 (http://in.reuters.com/article/2014/12/10/hungary-retail-idUSL6N0TH1SM20141210)
https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fmilano.repubblica.it%2Fcronaca%2F2014%2F12%2F04%2Fnews%2Fscola_bacchetta_i_commercianti_il_riposo_domenicale_sacro_non_cediamo_al_consumismo-102131390%2F&edit-text=&act=url (https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fmilano.repubblica.it%2Fcronaca%2F2014%2F12%2F04%2Fnews%2Fscola_bacchetta_i_commercianti_il_riposo_domenicale_sacro_non_cediamo_al_consumismo-102131390%2F&edit-text=&act=url)
According to the second article above, I guess all those who appose or would not submit to Rome's Sunday rest, are narcissistic individualists. Is this not Rome claiming the position of God Himself? What is sin but the breaking of God's commandments by selfish sinners who believe themselves to be above God and thus decide against His laws? So also are all those who would appose Rome's self appointed day of rest.
2Th 3 ¶ Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; 4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.
Seventh Day churches and sunday christian churches in Tonga and Samoa all go to church on sunday .
Because of the international date line it is impossible to know for sure what day it is.
Seventh Day churches and sunday christian churches in Tonga and Samoa all go to church on sunday .
Because of the international date line it is impossible to know for sure what day it is.
How do they know it's Sunday?
: grahame Tue May 12, 2015 - 22:37:34
Seventh Day churches and sunday christian churches in Tonga and Samoa all go to church on sunday .
Because of the international date line it is impossible to know for sure what day it is.
If they know when sunrise and sunset take place, then they can know which day is the seventh day.
Excerpts from
ENCYCLICAL LETTER
LAUDATO SI'
OF THE HOLY FATHER
FRANCIS
ON CARE FOR OUR COMMON HOME
237. On Sunday, our participation in the Eucharist has special importance. Sunday, like the Jewish Sabbath, is meant to be a day which heals our relationships with God, with ourselves, with others and with the world. Sunday is the day of the Resurrection, the "first day" of the new creation, whose first fruits are the Lord's risen humanity, the pledge of the final transfiguration of all created reality. It also proclaims "man's eternal rest in God".[168] In this way, Christian spirituality incorporates the value of relaxation and festivity. We tend to demean contemplative rest as something unproductive and unnecessary, but this is to do away with the very thing which is most important about work: its meaning. We are called to include in our work a dimension of receptivity and gratuity, which is quite different from mere inactivity. Rather, it is another way of working, which forms part of our very essence. It protects human action from becoming empty activism; it also prevents that unfettered greed and sense of isolation which make us seek personal gain to the detriment of all else. The law of weekly rest forbade work on the seventh day, "so that your ox and your donkey may have rest, and the son of your maidservant, and the stranger, may be refreshed" (Ex 23:12). Rest opens our eyes to the larger picture and gives us renewed sensitivity to the rights of others. And so the day of rest, centred on the Eucharist, sheds it light on the whole week, and motivates us to greater concern for nature and the poor.
VIII. QUEEN OF ALL CREATION
241. Mary, the Mother who cared for Jesus, now cares with maternal affection and pain for this wounded world. Just as her pierced heart mourned the death of Jesus, so now she grieves for the sufferings of the crucified poor and for the creatures of this world laid waste by human power. Completely transfigured, she now lives with Jesus, and all creatures sing of her fairness. She is the Woman, "clothed in the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars" (Rev 12:1). Carried up into heaven, she is the Mother and Queen of all creation. In her glorified body, together with the Risen Christ, part of creation has reached the fullness of its beauty. She treasures the entire life of Jesus in her heart (cf. Lk 2:19,51), and now understands the meaning of all things. Hence, we can ask her to enable us to look at this world with eyes of wisdom.
242. At her side in the Holy Family of Nazareth, stands the figure of Saint Joseph. Through his work and generous presence, he cared for and defended Mary and Jesus, delivering them from the violence of the unjust by bringing them to Egypt. The Gospel presents Joseph as a just man, hard-working and strong. But he also shows great tenderness, which is not a mark of the weak but of those who are genuinely strong, fully aware of reality and ready to love and serve in humility. That is why he was proclaimed custodian of the universal Church. He too can teach us how to show care; he can inspire us to work with generosity and tenderness in protecting this world which God has entrusted to us.
The Great Controversy 1888, Page 587-589
It is one of Satan's devices to combine with falsehood just enough truth to give it plausibility. The leaders of the Sunday movement may advocate reforms which the people need, principles which are in harmony with the Bible, yet while there is with these a requirement which is contrary to God's law, his servants cannot unite with them. Nothing can justify them in setting aside the commandments of God for the precepts of men.
Through the two great errors, the immortality of the soul, and Sunday sacredness, Satan will bring the people under his deceptions. While the former lays the foundation of Spiritualism, the latter creates a bond of sympathy with Rome. The Protestants of the United States will be foremost in stretching their hands across the gulf to grasp the hand of Spiritualism; they will reach over the abyss to clasp hands with the Roman power; and under the influence of this threefold union, this country will follow in the steps of Rome in trampling on the rights of conscience.
As Spiritualism more closely imitates the nominal Christianity of the day, it has greater power to deceive and ensnare. Satan himself is converted, after the modern order of things. He will appear in the character of an angel of light. Through the agency of Spiritualism, miracles will be wrought, the sick will be healed, and many undeniable wonders will be performed. And as the spirits will profess faith in the Bible, and manifest respect for the institutions of the church, their work will be accepted as a manifestation of divine power.
The line of distinction between professed Christians and the ungodly is now hardly distinguishable. Church-members love what the world loves, and are ready to join with them; and Satan determines to unite them in one body, and thus strengthen his cause by sweeping all into the ranks of Spiritualism. Papists, who boast of miracles as a certain sign of the true church, will be readily deceived by this wonder-working power; and Protestants, having cast away the shield of truth, will also be deluded. Papists, Protestants, and worldlings will alike accept the form of godliness without the power, and they will see in this union a grand movement for the conversion of the world, and the ushering in of the long-expected millennium.
Excerpts from
ENCYCLICAL LETTER
CARITAS IN VERITATE
OF THE SUPREME PONTIFF
BENEDICT XVI
TO THE BISHOPS
PRIESTS AND DEACONS
MEN AND WOMEN RELIGIOUS
THE LAY FAITHFUL
AND ALL PEOPLE OF GOOD WILL
ON INTEGRAL HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
IN CHARITY AND TRUTH
Man's earthly activity, when inspired and sustained by charity, contributes to
the building of the universal city of God, which is the goal of the history of the human family. In an increasingly globalized society,
the common good and the effort to obtain it cannot fail to assume
the dimensions of the whole human family, that is to say, the community of peoples and nations, in such a way as to shape
the earthly city in unity and peace, rendering it to some degree an anticipation and a prefiguration of the undivided city of God.His was certainly a social teaching of great importance: he underlined the indispensable importance of the Gospel for building a society according to freedom and justice, in the ideal and historical perspective of a civilization animated by love. Paul VI clearly understood that the social question had become
worldwide and he grasped the interconnection between the impetus towards the unification of humanity and the Christian ideal of a single family of peoples in solidarity and fraternity. , but only on Christ, to whom every authentic vocation to integral human development must be directed. The Gospel is fundamental for development, because in the Gospel, Christ, "in the very revelation of the mystery of the Father and of his love, fully reveals humanity to itself". Taught by her Lord, the Church examines the signs of the times and interprets them, offering the world "what she possesses as her characteristic attribute:
a global vision of man and of the human race"
Jesus kept the Sabbath, warned about Sabbath breaking in the future, paul kept the Sabbath, jesus said the law would not pass away until heaven and earth has. God said remember the Sabbath and it was the one day we forget. Sunday keeping is no where supported in scripture(the worlds sunday, Monday Tuesday etc, are actually all pagan, the calendar was only numbered and you will not find any one of these names in the bible, you'd be surprised by how much stuff is pagan in origin) and Christian theology has taken Jesus is our rest to mean we must not keep the Sabbath anymore and since Jesus rose on a sunday, were supposed to changed the day of rest to sunday. That's nowhere supported in scripture though and had Jesus changed the day he surely would have said something and paul and the apostles wouldn't have still been keeping the Sabbath.
: TruthBeTold Sat Aug 08, 2015 - 12:37:16
Jesus kept the Sabbath, warned about Sabbath breaking in the future, paul kept the Sabbath, jesus said the law would not pass away until heaven and earth has. God said remember the Sabbath and it was the one day we forget. Sunday keeping is no where supported in scripture(the worlds sunday, Monday Tuesday etc, are actually all pagan, the calendar was only numbered and you will not find any one of these names in the bible, you'd be surprised by how much stuff is pagan in origin) and Christian theology has taken Jesus is our rest to mean we must not keep the Sabbath anymore and since Jesus rose on a sunday, were supposed to changed the day of rest to sunday. That's nowhere supported in scripture though and had Jesus changed the day he surely would have said something and paul and the apostles wouldn't have still been keeping the Sabbath.
Paul was a jew.
: chosenone Mon Aug 10, 2015 - 11:11:30
: TruthBeTold Sat Aug 08, 2015 - 12:37:16
Jesus kept the Sabbath, warned about Sabbath breaking in the future, paul kept the Sabbath, jesus said the law would not pass away until heaven and earth has. God said remember the Sabbath and it was the one day we forget. Sunday keeping is no where supported in scripture(the worlds sunday, Monday Tuesday etc, are actually all pagan, the calendar was only numbered and you will not find any one of these names in the bible, you'd be surprised by how much stuff is pagan in origin) and Christian theology has taken Jesus is our rest to mean we must not keep the Sabbath anymore and since Jesus rose on a sunday, were supposed to changed the day of rest to sunday. That's nowhere supported in scripture though and had Jesus changed the day he surely would have said something and paul and the apostles wouldn't have still been keeping the Sabbath.
Paul was a jew.
what does that have to do with everything i stated?
Jesus kept the sabbath too? He was a jew as well? whats your point?
I wrote all that and the response is paul was a jew...
Jesus warned about the abomination of desolation(sabbath breaking)
told people to pray that their flight not be on the sabbath day(was talking about future event)
Jesus kept the sabbath-we are supposed to walk as he did
Jesus said that not one part of the law would pass till heaven and earth did...
God said remember the sabbath-its the day we forget.
Sunday keeping never supported-supported by mans assumption that God wanted us to gather on 1st day instead of 7th because jesus rose on first day.
Paul kept the sabbath-
the patience of the saints-those who keep the commandments of God, faith in Jesus Christ.
People don't realize that by saying the law is done away with, that they are calling themselves sinless.... Sin is the trangression of the law. if the law is done away with there is no sin..
This is all i'm going to say about this though, as i think me and you have been over this before
blessings.
: TruthBeTold Mon Aug 10, 2015 - 17:02:40
: chosenone Mon Aug 10, 2015 - 11:11:30
: TruthBeTold Sat Aug 08, 2015 - 12:37:16
Jesus kept the Sabbath, warned about Sabbath breaking in the future, paul kept the Sabbath, jesus said the law would not pass away until heaven and earth has. God said remember the Sabbath and it was the one day we forget. Sunday keeping is no where supported in scripture(the worlds sunday, Monday Tuesday etc, are actually all pagan, the calendar was only numbered and you will not find any one of these names in the bible, you'd be surprised by how much stuff is pagan in origin) and Christian theology has taken Jesus is our rest to mean we must not keep the Sabbath anymore and since Jesus rose on a sunday, were supposed to changed the day of rest to sunday. That's nowhere supported in scripture though and had Jesus changed the day he surely would have said something and paul and the apostles wouldn't have still been keeping the Sabbath.
Paul was a jew.
what does that have to do with everything i stated?
Jesus kept the sabbath too? He was a jew as well? whats your point?
I wrote all that and the response is paul was a jew...
Jesus warned about the abomination of desolation(sabbath breaking)
told people to pray that their flight not be on the sabbath day(was talking about future event)
Jesus kept the sabbath-we are supposed to walk as he did
Jesus said that not one part of the law would pass till heaven and earth did...
God said remember the sabbath-its the day we forget.
Sunday keeping never supported-supported by mans assumption that God wanted us to gather on 1st day instead of 7th because jesus rose on first day.
Paul kept the sabbath-
the patience of the saints-those who keep the commandments of God, faith in Jesus Christ.
People don't realize that by saying the law is done away with, that they are calling themselves sinless.... Sin is the trangression of the law. if the law is done away with there is no sin..
This is all i'm going to say about this though, as i think me and you have been over this before
blessings.
You said that Paul at that time kept the sabbath and I said he was a Jew.
Now under the new covenant we have Jesus as our sabbath rest as in 'Come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest'
: Amo Sun Aug 02, 2015 - 10:46:47
: grahame Tue May 12, 2015 - 22:37:34
Seventh Day churches and sunday christian churches in Tonga and Samoa all go to church on sunday .
Because of the international date line it is impossible to know for sure what day it is.
If they know when sunrise and sunset take place, then they can know which day is the seventh day.
Not really. You have to have a common start point for that to work. Since the date line is a man made idea, generally located on the opposite side of the world from the Greenwich Meridian, (only an hour or 2 from Jerusalem) what day it is over there depends on which way around the globe you go.
So the date line is a political entity that zigzags all over the place. And it moves on the whims of each jurisdiction. Like Western Samoa changing sides while American Samoa stays put. When this change took effect, it put islands in the same chain and virtually the same longitude being in different days. So when it is Saturday in American Samoa, it is Sunday in Western Samoa.
(http://america101.us/states/samoa_dateline_map.jpg)
And on a wider view, you can see the Kiribati Islands are all west of the Date Line, while the east end of the chain is farther east than the big island of Hawaii. So while Hawaii is in Saturday, the Kiribati Islands are in Sunday.
(http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/files/2013/01/113-BLOG-DATE-LINE1-600x720.jpg)
: chosenone Tue Aug 11, 2015 - 03:44:57
: TruthBeTold Mon Aug 10, 2015 - 17:02:40
: chosenone Mon Aug 10, 2015 - 11:11:30
: TruthBeTold Sat Aug 08, 2015 - 12:37:16
Jesus kept the Sabbath, warned about Sabbath breaking in the future, paul kept the Sabbath, jesus said the law would not pass away until heaven and earth has. God said remember the Sabbath and it was the one day we forget. Sunday keeping is no where supported in scripture(the worlds sunday, Monday Tuesday etc, are actually all pagan, the calendar was only numbered and you will not find any one of these names in the bible, you'd be surprised by how much stuff is pagan in origin) and Christian theology has taken Jesus is our rest to mean we must not keep the Sabbath anymore and since Jesus rose on a sunday, were supposed to changed the day of rest to sunday. That's nowhere supported in scripture though and had Jesus changed the day he surely would have said something and paul and the apostles wouldn't have still been keeping the Sabbath.
Paul was a jew.
what does that have to do with everything i stated?
Jesus kept the sabbath too? He was a jew as well? whats your point?
I wrote all that and the response is paul was a jew...
Jesus warned about the abomination of desolation(sabbath breaking)
told people to pray that their flight not be on the sabbath day(was talking about future event)
Jesus kept the sabbath-we are supposed to walk as he did
Jesus said that not one part of the law would pass till heaven and earth did...
God said remember the sabbath-its the day we forget.
Sunday keeping never supported-supported by mans assumption that God wanted us to gather on 1st day instead of 7th because jesus rose on first day.
Paul kept the sabbath-
the patience of the saints-those who keep the commandments of God, faith in Jesus Christ.
People don't realize that by saying the law is done away with, that they are calling themselves sinless.... Sin is the trangression of the law. if the law is done away with there is no sin..
This is all i'm going to say about this though, as i think me and you have been over this before
blessings.
You said that Paul at that time kept the sabbath and I said he was a Jew.
Now under the new covenant we have Jesus as our sabbath rest as in 'Come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest'
I don't understand what the point of mentioning that paul was a jew is. Jesus was a jew too, what does that have to do with anything?
I really didn't want to debate anymore....but I once made a whole document on the Jesus is our Sabbath rest confusion.
To start off, Jesus said come to me all who labor and I will give you rest.....It never said jesus is our Sabbath rest.
Now, Jesus is also our husband....yet people still marry don't they. But i'll go into this even a little further..
the Sabbath was both literal and spiritual . so if one takes that (jesus as our rest as literal) one also have to take this as literal.
John 7:37King James Version (KJV)
37 In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.
its the exact same wording and concept.
Matthew 11:28King James Version (KJV)
28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
as well as this
2 Corinthians 11:2King James Version (KJV)
2 For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.
and
John 6:35King James Version (KJV)
35 And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.
Now if Jesus is our rest is meant to be taken as Sabbath rest(that was no where implied anyway), then we have to take the other verses to be literal as well. We eat, but we don't need to eat anymore, we thrist but we will not need to drink anymore all in jesus. We can't be married(jesus as our husband), etc.
Jesus wasn't the only spiritual rest either. But spiritual rerst was converted from God only, to God in Jesus Christ. Examples of this in the old testament:
Psalm 62:5New International Version (NIV)
5 Yes, my soul, find rest in God; my hope comes from him.
Psalm 116:7New International Version (NIV)
7 Return to your rest, my soul, for the Lord has been good to you.
Exodus 33:14New International Version (NIV)
14 The Lord replied, "My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest."
Hebrews 4:9-11
9 There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; 10 for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. 11 Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience.
1st day worship is nowhere supported in scripture.
: TruthBeTold Tue Aug 11, 2015 - 10:58:45
: chosenone Tue Aug 11, 2015 - 03:44:57
: TruthBeTold Mon Aug 10, 2015 - 17:02:40
: chosenone Mon Aug 10, 2015 - 11:11:30
: TruthBeTold Sat Aug 08, 2015 - 12:37:16
Jesus kept the Sabbath, warned about Sabbath breaking in the future, paul kept the Sabbath, jesus said the law would not pass away until heaven and earth has. God said remember the Sabbath and it was the one day we forget. Sunday keeping is no where supported in scripture(the worlds sunday, Monday Tuesday etc, are actually all pagan, the calendar was only numbered and you will not find any one of these names in the bible, you'd be surprised by how much stuff is pagan in origin) and Christian theology has taken Jesus is our rest to mean we must not keep the Sabbath anymore and since Jesus rose on a sunday, were supposed to changed the day of rest to sunday. That's nowhere supported in scripture though and had Jesus changed the day he surely would have said something and paul and the apostles wouldn't have still been keeping the Sabbath.
Paul was a jew.
what does that have to do with everything i stated?
Jesus kept the sabbath too? He was a jew as well? whats your point?
I wrote all that and the response is paul was a jew...
Jesus warned about the abomination of desolation(sabbath breaking)
told people to pray that their flight not be on the sabbath day(was talking about future event)
Jesus kept the sabbath-we are supposed to walk as he did
Jesus said that not one part of the law would pass till heaven and earth did...
God said remember the sabbath-its the day we forget.
Sunday keeping never supported-supported by mans assumption that God wanted us to gather on 1st day instead of 7th because jesus rose on first day.
Paul kept the sabbath-
the patience of the saints-those who keep the commandments of God, faith in Jesus Christ.
People don't realize that by saying the law is done away with, that they are calling themselves sinless.... Sin is the trangression of the law. if the law is done away with there is no sin..
This is all i'm going to say about this though, as i think me and you have been over this before
blessings.
You said that Paul at that time kept the sabbath and I said he was a Jew.
Now under the new covenant we have Jesus as our sabbath rest as in 'Come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest'
I don't understand what the point of mentioning that paul was a jew is. Jesus was a jew too, what does that have to do with anything?
I really didn't want to debate anymore....but I once made a whole document on the Jesus is our Sabbath rest confusion.
To start off, Jesus said come to me all who labor and I will give you rest.....It never said jesus is our Sabbath rest.
Now, Jesus is also our husband....yet people still marry don't they. But i'll go into this even a little further..
the Sabbath was both literal and spiritual . so if one takes that (jesus as our rest as literal) one also have to take this as literal.
John 7:37King James Version (KJV)
37 In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.
its the exact same wording and concept.
Matthew 11:28King James Version (KJV)
28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
as well as this
2 Corinthians 11:2King James Version (KJV)
2 For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.
and
John 6:35King James Version (KJV)
35 And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.
Now if Jesus is our rest is meant to be taken as Sabbath rest(that was no where implied anyway), then we have to take the other verses to be literal as well. We eat, but we don't need to eat anymore, we thrist but we will not need to drink anymore all in jesus. We can't be married(jesus as our husband), etc.
Jesus wasn't the only spiritual rest either. But spiritual rerst was converted from God only, to God in Jesus Christ. Examples of this in the old testament:
Psalm 62:5New International Version (NIV)
5 Yes, my soul, find rest in God; my hope comes from him.
Psalm 116:7New International Version (NIV)
7 Return to your rest, my soul, for the Lord has been good to you.
Exodus 33:14New International Version (NIV)
14 The Lord replied, "My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest."
Hebrews 4:9-11
9 There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; 10 for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. 11 Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience.
1st day worship is nowhere supported in scripture.
Paul kept the sabbath because that's what Jews did they were told to. I dont keep any day as the sabbath because I am not Jewish and I have Jesus as my sabbath rest.
: chosenone Tue Aug 11, 2015 - 14:12:18
: TruthBeTold Tue Aug 11, 2015 - 10:58:45
: chosenone Tue Aug 11, 2015 - 03:44:57
: TruthBeTold Mon Aug 10, 2015 - 17:02:40
: chosenone Mon Aug 10, 2015 - 11:11:30
: TruthBeTold Sat Aug 08, 2015 - 12:37:16
Jesus kept the Sabbath, warned about Sabbath breaking in the future, paul kept the Sabbath, jesus said the law would not pass away until heaven and earth has. God said remember the Sabbath and it was the one day we forget. Sunday keeping is no where supported in scripture(the worlds sunday, Monday Tuesday etc, are actually all pagan, the calendar was only numbered and you will not find any one of these names in the bible, you'd be surprised by how much stuff is pagan in origin) and Christian theology has taken Jesus is our rest to mean we must not keep the Sabbath anymore and since Jesus rose on a sunday, were supposed to changed the day of rest to sunday. That's nowhere supported in scripture though and had Jesus changed the day he surely would have said something and paul and the apostles wouldn't have still been keeping the Sabbath.
Paul was a jew.
what does that have to do with everything i stated?
Jesus kept the sabbath too? He was a jew as well? whats your point?
I wrote all that and the response is paul was a jew...
Jesus warned about the abomination of desolation(sabbath breaking)
told people to pray that their flight not be on the sabbath day(was talking about future event)
Jesus kept the sabbath-we are supposed to walk as he did
Jesus said that not one part of the law would pass till heaven and earth did...
God said remember the sabbath-its the day we forget.
Sunday keeping never supported-supported by mans assumption that God wanted us to gather on 1st day instead of 7th because jesus rose on first day.
Paul kept the sabbath-
the patience of the saints-those who keep the commandments of God, faith in Jesus Christ.
People don't realize that by saying the law is done away with, that they are calling themselves sinless.... Sin is the trangression of the law. if the law is done away with there is no sin..
This is all i'm going to say about this though, as i think me and you have been over this before
blessings.
You said that Paul at that time kept the sabbath and I said he was a Jew.
Now under the new covenant we have Jesus as our sabbath rest as in 'Come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest'
I don't understand what the point of mentioning that paul was a jew is. Jesus was a jew too, what does that have to do with anything?
I really didn't want to debate anymore....but I once made a whole document on the Jesus is our Sabbath rest confusion.
To start off, Jesus said come to me all who labor and I will give you rest.....It never said jesus is our Sabbath rest.
Now, Jesus is also our husband....yet people still marry don't they. But i'll go into this even a little further..
the Sabbath was both literal and spiritual . so if one takes that (jesus as our rest as literal) one also have to take this as literal.
John 7:37King James Version (KJV)
37 In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.
its the exact same wording and concept.
Matthew 11:28King James Version (KJV)
28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
as well as this
2 Corinthians 11:2King James Version (KJV)
2 For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.
and
John 6:35King James Version (KJV)
35 And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.
Now if Jesus is our rest is meant to be taken as Sabbath rest(that was no where implied anyway), then we have to take the other verses to be literal as well. We eat, but we don't need to eat anymore, we thrist but we will not need to drink anymore all in jesus. We can't be married(jesus as our husband), etc.
Jesus wasn't the only spiritual rest either. But spiritual rerst was converted from God only, to God in Jesus Christ. Examples of this in the old testament:
Psalm 62:5New International Version (NIV)
5 Yes, my soul, find rest in God; my hope comes from him.
Psalm 116:7New International Version (NIV)
7 Return to your rest, my soul, for the Lord has been good to you.
Exodus 33:14New International Version (NIV)
14 The Lord replied, "My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest."
Hebrews 4:9-11
9 There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; 10 for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. 11 Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience.
1st day worship is nowhere supported in scripture.
Paul kept the sabbath because that's what Jews did they were told to. I dont keep any day as the sabbath because I am not Jewish and I have Jesus as my sabbath rest.
Are you sure you should be speaking for the Apostle Paul in such a manner? Isn't he the one who said there is neither Jew nor Greek, but all are one in Christ? Why will you rebuild and maintain the wall Christ came to tear down?
: DaveW Tue Aug 11, 2015 - 05:22:29
: Amo Sun Aug 02, 2015 - 10:46:47
: grahame Tue May 12, 2015 - 22:37:34
Seventh Day churches and sunday christian churches in Tonga and Samoa all go to church on sunday .
Because of the international date line it is impossible to know for sure what day it is.
If they know when sunrise and sunset take place, then they can know which day is the seventh day.
Not really. You have to have a common start point for that to work. Since the date line is a man made idea, generally located on the opposite side of the world from the Greenwich Meridian, (only an hour or 2 from Jerusalem) what day it is over there depends on which way around the globe you go.
So the date line is a political entity that zigzags all over the place. And it moves on the whims of each jurisdiction. Like Western Samoa changing sides while American Samoa stays put. When this change took effect, it put islands in the same chain and virtually the same longitude being in different days. So when it is Saturday in American Samoa, it is Sunday in Western Samoa.
(http://america101.us/states/samoa_dateline_map.jpg)
And on a wider view, you can see the Kiribati Islands are all west of the Date Line, while the east end of the chain is farther east than the big island of Hawaii. So while Hawaii is in Saturday, the Kiribati Islands are in Sunday.
(http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/files/2013/01/113-BLOG-DATE-LINE1-600x720.jpg)
As you stated, you are addressing man made problems, not problems God made. Do you think God did not know that the world was round when He established the seventh day Sabbath? Did He intend that this would be a point of confusion?
: chosenone Mon Aug 10, 2015 - 11:11:30
: TruthBeTold Sat Aug 08, 2015 - 12:37:16
Jesus kept the Sabbath, warned about Sabbath breaking in the future, paul kept the Sabbath, jesus said the law would not pass away until heaven and earth has. God said remember the Sabbath and it was the one day we forget. Sunday keeping is no where supported in scripture(the worlds sunday, Monday Tuesday etc, are actually all pagan, the calendar was only numbered and you will not find any one of these names in the bible, you'd be surprised by how much stuff is pagan in origin) and Christian theology has taken Jesus is our rest to mean we must not keep the Sabbath anymore and since Jesus rose on a sunday, were supposed to changed the day of rest to sunday. That's nowhere supported in scripture though and had Jesus changed the day he surely would have said something and paul and the apostles wouldn't have still been keeping the Sabbath.
Paul was a jew.
There is neither Jew nor Gentile in Christ Jesus.
Traditional christians love to keep that difference alive....still keeping up the wall of partition. ::frustrated::
: Beta Wed Aug 12, 2015 - 14:54:52
: chosenone Mon Aug 10, 2015 - 11:11:30
: TruthBeTold Sat Aug 08, 2015 - 12:37:16
Jesus kept the Sabbath, warned about Sabbath breaking in the future, paul kept the Sabbath, jesus said the law would not pass away until heaven and earth has. God said remember the Sabbath and it was the one day we forget. Sunday keeping is no where supported in scripture(the worlds sunday, Monday Tuesday etc, are actually all pagan, the calendar was only numbered and you will not find any one of these names in the bible, you'd be surprised by how much stuff is pagan in origin) and Christian theology has taken Jesus is our rest to mean we must not keep the Sabbath anymore and since Jesus rose on a sunday, were supposed to changed the day of rest to sunday. That's nowhere supported in scripture though and had Jesus changed the day he surely would have said something and paul and the apostles wouldn't have still been keeping the Sabbath.
Paul was a jew.
There is neither Jew nor Gentile in Christ Jesus.
Traditional christians love to keep that difference alive....still keeping up the wall of partition. ::frustrated::
how does being a jew have anything to do with keeping the sabbath though? the sabbath is NEVER referred to in the bible as the jewish sabbath, isrealites sabbath etc...It is called the sabbath of the lord thy God. Its like saying someone kept the first second third commandment etc because they were a jew? i just don't get what hes saying.
: TruthBeTold Wed Aug 12, 2015 - 21:59:11
: Beta Wed Aug 12, 2015 - 14:54:52
: chosenone Mon Aug 10, 2015 - 11:11:30
: TruthBeTold Sat Aug 08, 2015 - 12:37:16
Jesus kept the Sabbath, warned about Sabbath breaking in the future, paul kept the Sabbath, jesus said the law would not pass away until heaven and earth has. God said remember the Sabbath and it was the one day we forget. Sunday keeping is no where supported in scripture(the worlds sunday, Monday Tuesday etc, are actually all pagan, the calendar was only numbered and you will not find any one of these names in the bible, you'd be surprised by how much stuff is pagan in origin) and Christian theology has taken Jesus is our rest to mean we must not keep the Sabbath anymore and since Jesus rose on a sunday, were supposed to changed the day of rest to sunday. That's nowhere supported in scripture though and had Jesus changed the day he surely would have said something and paul and the apostles wouldn't have still been keeping the Sabbath.
Paul was a jew.
There is neither Jew nor Gentile in Christ Jesus.
Traditional christians love to keep that difference alive....still keeping up the wall of partition. ::frustrated::
how does being a jew have anything to do with keeping the sabbath though? the sabbath is NEVER referred to in the bible as the jewish sabbath, isrealites sabbath etc...It is called the sabbath of the lord thy God. Its like saying someone kept the first second third commandment etc because they were a jew? i just don't get what hes saying.
Of course you are right....it is not nor ever has been the 'jewish sabbath, but that is what people (who don't know better) believe and base their understanding on....in spite of God telling us not to do that.
And not satisfied with that wrong assumption they then insist that Paul tells us to choose our own sabbath day.
When one is on the slippery slope of error it does not take long to be on the road to destruction...as they will find out to their cost unless they repent.
http://wwrn.org/articles/45005/?&place=europe (http://wwrn.org/articles/45005/?&place=europe)
The following links to articles relating to Sunday laws were found at - http://www.markofbeast.net/page3.htm (http://www.markofbeast.net/page3.htm)
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-11/uom-std111915.php (http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-11/uom-std111915.php)
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2015/11/10/sunday-trading-david-burrowes-snp-conservatives_n_8519622.html (http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2015/11/10/sunday-trading-david-burrowes-snp-conservatives_n_8519622.html)
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/if-you-have-the-right-to-work-you-have-the-right-to-rest-pope-says-61287/ (http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/if-you-have-the-right-to-work-you-have-the-right-to-rest-pope-says-61287/)
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/200490#.VfVEV9JVikp (http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/200490#.VfVEV9JVikp)
http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/europeaninterestgroupwork (http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/europeaninterestgroupwork)
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/oct/26/sainsburys-chief-attacks-sunday-trading-law-change (http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/oct/26/sainsburys-chief-attacks-sunday-trading-law-change)
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/nov/10/plan-relax-sunday-trading-rules-shelved-snp (http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/nov/10/plan-relax-sunday-trading-rules-shelved-snp)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/11986982/David-Cameron-pulls-vote-on-relaxing-Sunday-Trading-hours-in-face-of-unholy-alliance-of-20-Tory-SNP-and-Labour-MPs.html (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/11986982/David-Cameron-pulls-vote-on-relaxing-Sunday-Trading-hours-in-face-of-unholy-alliance-of-20-Tory-SNP-and-Labour-MPs.html)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/shopping-and-consumer-news/11938454/Church-anger-at-longer-Sunday-shopping-hours.html (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/shopping-and-consumer-news/11938454/Church-anger-at-longer-Sunday-shopping-hours.html)
http://wncn.com/2015/12/01/church-leader-wants-christians-to-curb-sunday-shopping/ (http://wncn.com/2015/12/01/church-leader-wants-christians-to-curb-sunday-shopping/)
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/longer-sunday-shopping-hours-churchs-argument-against-them-isnt-about-religion-1528274 (http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/longer-sunday-shopping-hours-churchs-argument-against-them-isnt-about-religion-1528274)
Amo - how do you square your belief that the Roman church will start enforcing Sunday sabbath laws while the current pope has put forth this statement:
http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2015/12/10/vatican_issues_new_document_on_christian-jewish_dialogue_/1193274 (http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2015/12/10/vatican_issues_new_document_on_christian-jewish_dialogue_/1193274)
It says in part:
Since each of the two readings serves the purpose of rightly understanding God's will and word, it becomes evident how important is the awareness that the Christian faith is rooted in the faith of Abraham. That raises the further question of how the Old and the New Covenant stand in relation to one another. For the Christian faith it is axiomatic that there can only be one single covenant history of God with humanity. The covenant with Abraham, with circumcision as its sign (cf. Gen 17), and the covenant with Moses restricted to Israel regarding obedience to the law (cf. Ex 19:5; 24:7-8) and in particular the observance of the Sabbath (cf. Ex 31:16-17) had been extended in the covenant with Noah, with the rainbow as its sign (cf. "Verbum Domini", 117), to the whole of creation (cf. Gen 9:9 ff). Through the prophets God in turn promises a new and eternal covenant (cf. Is 55:3; 61:8; Jer 31:31-34; Ez 36:22-28). Each of these covenants incorporates the previous covenant and interprets it in a new way. That is also true for the New Covenant which for Christians is the final eternal covenant and therefore the definitive interpretation of what was promised by the prophets of the Old Covenant, or as Paul expresses it, the "Yes" and "Amen" to "all that God has promised" (2 Cor 1:20). The Church as the renewed people of God has been elected by God without conditions. The Church is the definitive and unsurpassable locus of the salvific action of God. This however does not mean that Israel as the people of God has been repudiated or has lost its mission (cf. "Nostra aetate", No.4). The New Covenant for Christians is therefore neither the annulment nor the replacement, but the fulfilment of the promises of the Old Covenant.
: DaveW Mon Jan 04, 2016 - 05:11:39Since each of the two readings serves the purpose of rightly understanding God's will and word, it becomes evident how important is the awareness that the Christian faith is rooted in the faith of Abraham. That raises the further question of how the Old and the New Covenant stand in relation to one another. For the Christian faith it is axiomatic that there can only be one single covenant history of God with humanity. The covenant with Abraham, with circumcision as its sign (cf. Gen 17), and the covenant with Moses restricted to Israel regarding obedience to the law (cf. Ex 19:5; 24:7-8) and in particular the observance of the Sabbath (cf. Ex 31:16-17) had been extended in the covenant with Noah, with the rainbow as its sign (cf. "Verbum Domini", 117), to the whole of creation (cf. Gen 9:9 ff). Through the prophets God in turn promises a new and eternal covenant (cf. Is 55:3; 61:8; Jer 31:31-34; Ez 36:22-28). Each of these covenants incorporates the previous covenant and interprets it in a new way. That is also true for the New Covenant which for Christians is the final eternal covenant and therefore the definitive interpretation of what was promised by the prophets of the Old Covenant, or as Paul expresses it, the "Yes" and "Amen" to "all that God has promised" (2 Cor 1:20). The Church as the renewed people of God has been elected by God without conditions. The Church is the definitive and unsurpassable locus of the salvific action of God. This however does not mean that Israel as the people of God has been repudiated or has lost its mission (cf. "Nostra aetate", No.4). The New Covenant for Christians is therefore neither the annulment nor the replacement, but the fulfilment of the promises of the Old Covenant.
I do not think he even believes in what I highlighted above.
: DaveW Mon Jan 04, 2016 - 05:11:39
Amo - how do you square your belief that the Roman church will start enforcing Sunday sabbath laws while the current pope has put forth this statement:
http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2015/12/10/vatican_issues_new_document_on_christian-jewish_dialogue_/1193274 (http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2015/12/10/vatican_issues_new_document_on_christian-jewish_dialogue_/1193274)
It says in part:
Since each of the two readings serves the purpose of rightly understanding God's will and word, it becomes evident how important is the awareness that the Christian faith is rooted in the faith of Abraham. That raises the further question of how the Old and the New Covenant stand in relation to one another. For the Christian faith it is axiomatic that there can only be one single covenant history of God with humanity. The covenant with Abraham, with circumcision as its sign (cf. Gen 17), and the covenant with Moses restricted to Israel regarding obedience to the law (cf. Ex 19:5; 24:7-8) and in particular the observance of the Sabbath (cf. Ex 31:16-17) had been extended in the covenant with Noah, with the rainbow as its sign (cf. "Verbum Domini", 117), to the whole of creation (cf. Gen 9:9 ff). Through the prophets God in turn promises a new and eternal covenant (cf. Is 55:3; 61:8; Jer 31:31-34; Ez 36:22-28). Each of these covenants incorporates the previous covenant and interprets it in a new way. That is also true for the New Covenant which for Christians is the final eternal covenant and therefore the definitive interpretation of what was promised by the prophets of the Old Covenant, or as Paul expresses it, the "Yes" and "Amen" to "all that God has promised" (2 Cor 1:20). The Church as the renewed people of God has been elected by God without conditions. The Church is the definitive and unsurpassable locus of the salvific action of God. This however does not mean that Israel as the people of God has been repudiated or has lost its mission (cf. "Nostra aetate", No.4). The New Covenant for Christians is therefore neither the annulment nor the replacement, but the fulfilment of the promises of the Old Covenant.
Not sure of the point your making. Perhaps you could expound somewhat. The Roman Church believes in civil legislation which backs up there teachings. They do not believe in separation of church and state. They support Sunday legislation. They have in the past, they do now, and they admonish it for the future. They plainly teach that the old covenant sabbath has been replaced by Sunday, and that all christians should seek legislative acknowledgment of the day. They don't want to demand it themselves, they want to convince enough people to do it for them. This is how they work. If you need quotes to prove all of the above just ask, though so very many have already been given on these boards. "Christian" Sunday laws came into being concurrent to, and aided by the rise of the papacy. They have been here ever since the church of Rome has, and will only end when she does also.
: DaveW Mon Jan 04, 2016 - 05:11:39
Amo - how do you square your belief that the Roman church will start enforcing Sunday sabbath laws while the current pope has put forth this statement:
http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2015/12/10/vatican_issues_new_document_on_christian-jewish_dialogue_/1193274 (http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2015/12/10/vatican_issues_new_document_on_christian-jewish_dialogue_/1193274)
It says in part:
Since each of the two readings serves the purpose of rightly understanding God's will and word, it becomes evident how important is the awareness that the Christian faith is rooted in the faith of Abraham. That raises the further question of how the Old and the New Covenant stand in relation to one another. For the Christian faith it is axiomatic that there can only be one single covenant history of God with humanity. The covenant with Abraham, with circumcision as its sign (cf. Gen 17), and the covenant with Moses restricted to Israel regarding obedience to the law (cf. Ex 19:5; 24:7-8) and in particular the observance of the Sabbath (cf. Ex 31:16-17) had been extended in the covenant with Noah, with the rainbow as its sign (cf. "Verbum Domini", 117), to the whole of creation (cf. Gen 9:9 ff). Through the prophets God in turn promises a new and eternal covenant (cf. Is 55:3; 61:8; Jer 31:31-34; Ez 36:22-28). Each of these covenants incorporates the previous covenant and interprets it in a new way. That is also true for the New Covenant which for Christians is the final eternal covenant and therefore the definitive interpretation of what was promised by the prophets of the Old Covenant, or as Paul expresses it, the "Yes" and "Amen" to "all that God has promised" (2 Cor 1:20). The Church as the renewed people of God has been elected by God without conditions. The Church is the definitive and unsurpassable locus of the salvific action of God. This however does not mean that Israel as the people of God has been repudiated or has lost its mission (cf. "Nostra aetate", No.4). The New Covenant for Christians is therefore neither the annulment nor the replacement, but the fulfilment of the promises of the Old Covenant.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/200490 (http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/200490)
http://www.maozisrael.org/site/News2?id=8726 (http://www.maozisrael.org/site/News2?id=8726)
http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/business/.premium-1.532386 (http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/business/.premium-1.532386)
http://www.jewishpress.com/news/israel-adopts-sundays-off/2013/02/23/ (http://www.jewishpress.com/news/israel-adopts-sundays-off/2013/02/23/)
http://www.timesofisrael.com/sunday-a-day-off-in-israel-tel-aviv-brokers-hope-so/ (http://www.timesofisrael.com/sunday-a-day-off-in-israel-tel-aviv-brokers-hope-so/)
http://remnant-online.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=88&Itemid=17 (http://remnant-online.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=88&Itemid=17)
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/07/world/middleeast/07israel.html?_r=0 (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/07/world/middleeast/07israel.html?_r=0)
http://www.israeltoday.co.il/NewsItem/tabid/178/nid/22858/Default.aspx (http://www.israeltoday.co.il/NewsItem/tabid/178/nid/22858/Default.aspx)
http://www.ldausa.org/lda/sunday-as-a-mark/ (http://www.ldausa.org/lda/sunday-as-a-mark/)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97PMsn9ij_k (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97PMsn9ij_k)
http://www.traditionalcatholicpriest.com/2014/05/12/no-work-on-sunday-the-warning-of-the-virgin-mary-at-la-salette/ (http://www.traditionalcatholicpriest.com/2014/05/12/no-work-on-sunday-the-warning-of-the-virgin-mary-at-la-salette/)
http://www.marypages.com/LaSaletteEng.htm (http://www.marypages.com/LaSaletteEng.htm)
http://www.returntoorder.org/2015/04/sunday-is-a-day-of-rest-isnt-it/ (http://www.returntoorder.org/2015/04/sunday-is-a-day-of-rest-isnt-it/)
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/cif-green/2009/sep/17/low-carbon-sunday (http://www.theguardian.com/environment/cif-green/2009/sep/17/low-carbon-sunday)
http://www.piercedhearts.org/magisterium_church/splendor_truth/ten_commandments/third_commandment.htm (http://www.piercedhearts.org/magisterium_church/splendor_truth/ten_commandments/third_commandment.htm)
http://www.religioustolerance.org/sabbath.htm (http://www.religioustolerance.org/sabbath.htm)
http://www.sacredcalendar.info/Week.html (http://www.sacredcalendar.info/Week.html)
http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/home/article/196.html?SWS=dcf9cd7c121c90615f5bfad5b30fe376 (http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/home/article/196.html?SWS=dcf9cd7c121c90615f5bfad5b30fe376)
http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/home/article/193.html (http://www.europeansundayalliance.eu/site/home/article/193.html)
https://fellowshipoftheminds.com/2015/01/25/7-reasons-why-we-should-rest-on-sundays/ (https://fellowshipoftheminds.com/2015/01/25/7-reasons-why-we-should-rest-on-sundays/)
http://nationalreport.net/ted-cruz-adds-mandatory-church-platform-inspiring-words-sylvia-allen/ (http://nationalreport.net/ted-cruz-adds-mandatory-church-platform-inspiring-words-sylvia-allen/)
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/cif-green/2009/sep/17/low-carbon-sunday (http://www.theguardian.com/environment/cif-green/2009/sep/17/low-carbon-sunday)
http://rebrn.com/re/the-simple-solution-to-global-warming-using-sunday-as-a-day-of-r-2202723/ (http://rebrn.com/re/the-simple-solution-to-global-warming-using-sunday-as-a-day-of-r-2202723/)
: Amo Tue Jan 05, 2016 - 22:01:21
Not sure of the point your making. Perhaps you could expound somewhat. The Roman Church believes in civil legislation which backs up there teachings. They do not believe in separation of church and state. They support Sunday legislation.
My point is that
this pope recognizes and supports a Saturday Sabbath, at least for the Jews and Messianics. In fact, he was in a meeting with South American Messianic leaders and Marty Waldman from the Toward Jerusalem Council II when he was called to the concave. He did not leave without asking their prayers over him for wisdom.
From Catholic theologian Fr Peter Hocken:
This year I was with this same Messianic Jewish leader in Buenos Aires. We went to meet Cardinal Bergoglio, who had asked for this meeting to know more about Messianic Jews. We had a very moving meeting with the Cardinal for about 80 minutes. My Messianic brother shared about his coming to faith in Jesus, and about the vision he carried for the bringing together of Jewish and Gentile believers in Christ as is presented in Ephesians 2 and 3, in Romans 11 and 15, etc. At the end Cardinal Bergoglio just said, "This is from God", a new thing of the Holy Spirit. There was no discussion. He invited us to pray for him, he was leaving for the conclave the next week, and the Messianic brother prayed all that was on his heart for the new pope, that he would be fully open to this full vision of reconciliation. On our way to the lift, the Cardinal kept saying to my friend: "Pray for me, pray for me, pray for me."
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=5&ved=0ahUKEwi01c__3N7MAhXSDj4KHWymBSwQFgg7MAQ&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.peterhocken.org%2Fmc%2Fhome.nsf%2F0%2F4A9808588BB783E7C1257DBA007B236D%2F%24FILE%2FPart0.docx&usg=AFQjCNF0x7B_US7FEUZR80U7odv2Me2WDQ&cad=rja (https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=5&ved=0ahUKEwi01c__3N7MAhXSDj4KHWymBSwQFgg7MAQ&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.peterhocken.org%2Fmc%2Fhome.nsf%2F0%2F4A9808588BB783E7C1257DBA007B236D%2F%24FILE%2FPart0.docx&usg=AFQjCNF0x7B_US7FEUZR80U7odv2Me2WDQ&cad=rja)
How does any of that, change the fact that the papacy has, does, and will continue to pursue and support Sunday laws? It is no surprise to me that the papacy supports the false teaching of a still separate people of Israel, and would allow for them a separate Sabbath and other laws which are not applicable to the supposed Gentile church. As though there ever was such a thing. There is not an Israel of God, and a separate church of Christ in this new covenant era. This is deception. The middle wall of partition has been broken down in Christ. Those who will rebuild that wall are none His. Rome seeks to accept and unify all of humanity and all of the religions of the same under her guiding influence and leadership. While exalting the pagan day of the sun above the Sabbath established by Jesus Christ Himself at creation. The Jews may have no problem with this, it won't be the first time they have supported such, but God's true church must sound a warning against this abomination. The final abomination practiced by the Jews in Ezekiel chapter eight before the Lord sent forth His destroying servants was turning their backs on the temple and worshipping the sun. The final abomination of spiritual Israel will be exalting the day of the sun above the Sabbath of God by human laws, after which God will release the seven last plagues upon rebellious humanity(Rev 16).
Revelation 18
1 And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. 2 And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. 3 For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies. 4 And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. 5 For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities.
Amo - lose the replacement theology.
There is nothing to lose Dave. We've been through this before. I'm not the one replacing something, you are. You wish to make two again, out of that which Jesus came to make one.
Eph 2:11 Wherefore remember, that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands; 12 That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world: 13 But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. 14 For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; 15 Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace; 16 And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby: 17 And came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh. 18 For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father. 19 Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God; 20 And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; 21 In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: 22 In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.
Why do you wish to replace the above truth, with a separated Israel and Gentile church, as though there were two separate peoples of God through Jesus Christ in this new covenant era?
237. On Sunday, our participation in the Eucharist has special importance. Sunday, like the Jewish Sabbath, is meant to be a day which heals our relationships with God, with ourselves, with others and with the world. Sunday is the day of the Resurrection, the "first day" of the new creation, whose first fruits are the Lord's risen humanity, the pledge of the final transfiguration of all created reality. It also proclaims "man's eternal rest in God".[168] In this way, Christian spirituality incorporates the value of relaxation and festivity. We tend to demean contemplative rest as something unproductive and unnecessary, but this is to do away with the very thing which is most important about work: its meaning. We are called to include in our work a dimension of receptivity and gratuity, which is quite different from mere inactivity. Rather, it is another way of working, which forms part of our very essence. It protects human action from becoming empty activism; it also prevents that unfettered greed and sense of isolation which make us seek personal gain to the detriment of all else. The law of weekly rest forbade work on the seventh day, "so that your ox and your donkey may have rest, and the son of your maidservant, and the stranger, may be refreshed" (Ex 23:12). Rest opens our eyes to the larger picture and gives us renewed sensitivity to the rights of others. And so the day of rest, centred on the Eucharist, sheds it light on the whole week, and motivates us to greater concern for nature and the poor. (ENCYCLICAL LETTER
LAUDATO SI'
OF THE HOLY FATHER
FRANCIS
ON CARE FOR OUR COMMON HOME)
Sounds so very nice. Of course, the seventh day Sabbath is not Jewish, being instituted 2000 years before there ever was a Jew for all of humanity (Gen 2:1-3). A blessing was pronounced upon all who would keep it even when the Jews themselves were the chosen of God (Isa 56:1-8). It will also be kept by all the saved in the new heaven and new earth (Isa 66:22 & 23). The problem of the above quote of course then, is that the seventh day Sabbath was never meant to be replaced by another day. The Holy scriptures never declare any such thing.
The Sunday rest was and is declared and established by the will of man alone, for the purpose of placing man himself in the place or even above God. Its inculcation is of purely human design, not only apart from God, but in direct contradiction to the will of God. It is a direct manifestation of the man of sin, and all sinners who will place themselves and their own works above those of God. Its observance by force on a global scale will be a fit representation by all who submit to the same, of their defiance and rebellion against God's authority, in favor of the leadership and guidance of fallen humanity itself controlled and manipulated by the evil one himself. Entering into God's rest, includes submitting to His rightful authority. The choice to be made in the end will be simple as pie. Either submit to the authority of God's word, or submit to the usurped authority of fallen humanity under the direct influence of the one who first refused God's benevolent authority.
http://law.justia.com/constitution/us/amendment-01/07-sunday-closing-laws.html (http://law.justia.com/constitution/us/amendment-01/07-sunday-closing-laws.html)
The following quote is from the above internet site, where it may be viewed in its entirety. It reveals how "Christians", will get their day of rest established by law with the aid of secularists. The Church of Rome will welcome this alliance with operands of course, since her own social teachings require her day of worship be supported by civil legislation where ever possible. Many other "Christians" will be duped into supporting this as well in the future no doubt.
The Court acknowledged that historically the laws had a religious motivation and were designed to effectuate concepts of Christian theology. However, "n light of the evolution of our Sunday Closing Laws through the centuries, and of their more or less recent emphasis upon secular considerations, it is not difficult to discern that as presently written and administered, most of them, at least, are of a secular rather than of a religious character, and that presently they bear no relationship to establishment of religion...."193 "[T]he fact that this [prescribed day of rest] is Sunday, a day of particular significance for the dominant Christian sects, does not bar the State from achieving its secular goals. To say that the States cannot prescribe Sunday as a day of rest for these purposes solely because centuries ago such laws had their genesis in religion would give a constitutional interpretation of hostility to the public welfare rather than one of mere separation of church and State."194 The choice of Sunday as the day of rest, while originally religious, now reflected simple legislative inertia or recognition that Sunday was a traditional day for the choice.195 Valid secular reasons existed for not simply requiring one day of rest and leaving to each individual to choose the day, reasons of ease of enforcement and of assuring a common day in the community for rest and leisure.196 More recently, a state statute mandating that employers honor the Sabbath day of the employee's choice was held invalid as having the primary effect of promoting religion by weighing the employee's Sabbath choice over all other interests.
The following are other sites of interest concerning the same issue.
http://www.cgg.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Audio.details/ID/3545/Secular-Day-Rest-Law.htm (http://www.cgg.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Audio.details/ID/3545/Secular-Day-Rest-Law.htm)
http://www.catholicgentleman.net/2014/12/thou-shalt-take-easy-7-reasons-embrace-sunday-rest/ (http://www.catholicgentleman.net/2014/12/thou-shalt-take-easy-7-reasons-embrace-sunday-rest/)
http://uni-europa.org/2016/09/05/half-million-signatures-support-polish-draft-law-limitation-commerce-sundays/ (http://uni-europa.org/2016/09/05/half-million-signatures-support-polish-draft-law-limitation-commerce-sundays/)
More than half a million signatures in support of Polish draft law on limitation of commerce on Sundays
Monday 5 September 2016
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-07-04/tongan-bakeries-banned-from-opening-on-sundays/7568104 (http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-07-04/tongan-bakeries-banned-from-opening-on-sundays/7568104)
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tv/news/hindi/Second-Sunday-will-be-rest-day-for-TV-industry/articleshow/51311157.cms (http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tv/news/hindi/Second-Sunday-will-be-rest-day-for-TV-industry/articleshow/51311157.cms)
https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.lavie.fr%2Freligion%2Fprotestantisme%2Fen-suisse-les-eglises-defendent-le-repos-dominical-23-02-2016-70849_18.php&edit-text=&act=url (https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.lavie.fr%2Freligion%2Fprotestantisme%2Fen-suisse-les-eglises-defendent-le-repos-dominical-23-02-2016-70849_18.php&edit-text=&act=url)
http://www.thebostonpilot.com/article.asp?ID=177677 (http://www.thebostonpilot.com/article.asp?ID=177677)
https://www.total-croatia-news.com/business/17053-catholic-church-wants-to-ban-working-on-sunday (https://www.total-croatia-news.com/business/17053-catholic-church-wants-to-ban-working-on-sunday)
http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.vecernji.hr%2Fhrvatska%2Fhbk-ponovno-pokrece-inicijativu-za-zabranu-rada-nedjeljom-1152977&edit-text=&act=url (http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.vecernji.hr%2Fhrvatska%2Fhbk-ponovno-pokrece-inicijativu-za-zabranu-rada-nedjeljom-1152977&edit-text=&act=url)
Meanwhile, Seventh-day Adventists get Sabbath laws passed while ignoring those who worship their Saviour on Sunday.
http://www.adventistreview.org/church-news/story4896-brazil-adventist-students-celebrate-national-exam-day-change (http://www.adventistreview.org/church-news/story4896-brazil-adventist-students-celebrate-national-exam-day-change)
: current occupant Mon Mar 20, 2017 - 18:39:20
Meanwhile, Seventh-day Adventists get Sabbath laws passed while ignoring those who worship their Saviour on Sunday.
http://www.adventistreview.org/church-news/story4896-brazil-adventist-students-celebrate-national-exam-day-change (http://www.adventistreview.org/church-news/story4896-brazil-adventist-students-celebrate-national-exam-day-change)
Moving high school exam days to Sunday instead of Saturday due to popular consensus hardly qualifies as Sabbath legislation. Of course Sabbath keepers would be happy about such a change. If SDA's ever push for Sabbath closing laws, I'll be the first one to condemn such and fight against it. Here is another article about the change.
http://www.jta.org/2017/03/13/news-opinion/israel-middle-east/brazils-national-high-school-exam-moved-from-shabbat-after-jewish-lobbying (http://www.jta.org/2017/03/13/news-opinion/israel-middle-east/brazils-national-high-school-exam-moved-from-shabbat-after-jewish-lobbying)
Maybe the following has something to do with the public support for moving the exam day.
http://www.sdadefend.com/WolvesinFleeces/Brazil%20Explosion.htm (http://www.sdadefend.com/WolvesinFleeces/Brazil%20Explosion.htm)
: Amo Tue Mar 21, 2017 - 19:26:03
: current occupant Mon Mar 20, 2017 - 18:39:20
Meanwhile, Seventh-day Adventists get Sabbath laws passed while ignoring those who worship their Saviour on Sunday.
http://www.adventistreview.org/church-news/story4896-brazil-adventist-students-celebrate-national-exam-day-change (http://www.adventistreview.org/church-news/story4896-brazil-adventist-students-celebrate-national-exam-day-change)
Moving high school exam days to Sunday instead of Saturday due to popular consensus hardly qualifies as Sabbath legislation. Of course Sabbath keepers would be happy about such a change. If SDA's ever push for Sabbath closing laws, I'll be the first one to condemn such and fight against it. Here is another article about the change.
http://www.jta.org/2017/03/13/news-opinion/israel-middle-east/brazils-national-high-school-exam-moved-from-shabbat-after-jewish-lobbying (http://www.jta.org/2017/03/13/news-opinion/israel-middle-east/brazils-national-high-school-exam-moved-from-shabbat-after-jewish-lobbying)
Maybe the following has something to do with the public support for moving the exam day.
http://www.sdadefend.com/WolvesinFleeces/Brazil%20Explosion.htm (http://www.sdadefend.com/WolvesinFleeces/Brazil%20Explosion.htm)
This was a "Sabbath closing law". ::announcment::
They decided to close the exams on the sda "Sabbath".
SDA's did push for this Sabbath closing law.
Where is your condemnation of the change that continues to and increases the impact those who wish to worship on sunday by now putting the exam schedule on TWO SUNDAYS?
How many SDA's are there in Brazil? ::bowing::
::announcment:: SDA's are known for mobilizing writing and polling campaigns to influence the political will in government. ::announcment::
only ~60% of those 600K were in in favor of the change - obviously mostly SDA's ::tippinghat::
This was a "Sabbath closing law".
They decided to close the exams on the sda "Sabbath".
SDA's did push for this Sabbath closing law.
Where is your condemnation of the change that continues to and increases the impact those who wish to worship on sunday by now putting the exam schedule on TWO SUNDAYS?
How many SDA's are there in Brazil?
SDA's are known for mobilizing writing and polling campaigns to influence the political will in government.
only ~60% of those 600K were in in favor of the change - obviously mostly SDA's
Whatever floats your boat, or fuels your fire. Make of it what you wish, it is no civil Sabbath closing or rest law. Are you now saying that Sunday is the new covenant rest day and Sabbath? If so, please do show such from scripture. If not, then what is the big deal of taking a test on Sunday. Go to church in the morning, and take the test in the afternoon.
I don't know how many SDA's there are in Brazil. If the government polled 600,000 citizens and 60% of them were SDA's, then either the government purposely tried to poll SDA's, or there are a majority of SDA's in Brazil. If it is the former, then that is wrong. If it is the latter, then why would you think the majority of a people should have to take exams on a day they consider the Sabbath, to please a minority who do not? To the contrary, exceptions should be made for either or regardless of the day observed by either or.
As far as your statement,
SDA's are known for mobilizing writing and polling campaigns to influence the political will in government
, please do supply evidence of the same. I will immediately attack all such as anti-Christ. Such would simply be one more sign that the SDA church is falling away from the truth.
: Amo Sat Mar 25, 2017 - 13:06:55
This was a "Sabbath closing law".
They decided to close the exams on the sda "Sabbath".
SDA's did push for this Sabbath closing law.
Where is your condemnation of the change that continues to and increases the impact those who wish to worship on sunday by now putting the exam schedule on TWO SUNDAYS?
How many SDA's are there in Brazil?
SDA's are known for mobilizing writing and polling campaigns to influence the political will in government.
only ~60% of those 600K were in in favor of the change - obviously mostly SDA's
Whatever floats your boat, or fuels your fire. Make of it what you wish, it is no civil Sabbath closing or rest law. Are you now saying that Sunday is the new covenant rest day and Sabbath? If so, please do show such from scripture. If not, then what is the big deal of taking a test on Sunday. Go to church in the morning, and take the test in the afternoon.
I don't know how many SDA's there are in Brazil. If the government polled 600,000 citizens and 60% of them were SDA's, then either the government purposely tried to poll SDA's, or there are a majority of SDA's in Brazil. If it is the former, then that is wrong. If it is the latter, then why would you think the majority of a people should have to take exams on a day they consider the Sabbath, to please a minority who do not? To the contrary, exceptions should be made for either or regardless of the day observed by either or.
As far as your statement, SDA's are known for mobilizing writing and polling campaigns to influence the political will in government
, please do supply evidence of the same. I will immediately attack all such as anti-Christ. Such would simply be one more sign that the SDA church is falling away from the truth.
It is a "civil sabbath closing law" simply because it is mandated by government to close the testing of students on the sda saturday/sabbath.
For someone claiming to not be making a big deal out of this sabbath closing law - you sure have blown it into an issue of sabbath vs sunday ...
Personal experience in multiple sda churches has shown that sda's organize writing and polling vendettas against or for what ever issues their leaders promote from the pulpit. I have seen it multiple times -
Your statement that all 60% of the 600000 being sda's is not one that I ever mentioned. To arrive at that statement, you conflated what I actually said with what you wanted to have happen..
You are too late to be the first to attack the sda church as a cult/anti-Christ but go right ahead and have at it......
It is a "civil sabbath closing law" simply because it is mandated by government to close the testing of students on the sda saturday/sabbath.
For someone claiming to not be making a big deal out of this sabbath closing law - you sure have blown it into an issue of sabbath vs sunday ...
Personal experience in multiple sda churches has shown that sda's organize writing and polling vendettas against or for what ever issues their leaders promote from the pulpit. I have seen it multiple times -
Your statement that all 60% of the 600000 being sda's is not one that I ever mentioned. To arrive at that statement, you conflated what I actually said with what you wanted to have happen..
You are too late to be the first to attack the sda church as a cult/anti-Christ but go right ahead and have at it......
According to your own understanding then, when they used to have the tests on Saturday instead of Sunday, that was a Sunday closing law right? Why was that OK, and if it wasn't a Sunday closing law, then neither is this a Sabbath closing law. Which is it?
Your the one who brought this issue to this thread, not me.
Please do provide evidence for your following claim -
Personal experience in multiple sda churches has shown that sda's organize writing and polling vendettas against or for what ever issues their leaders promote from the pulpit. I have seen it multiple times
- where did you see it multiple times? In what churches, and what were you doing there?
The poll information is what it is. If the government polled 600,000 thousand people as they say they did, and it was SDA's who were responsible for the large numbers supporting the decision, then the government must have polled more SDA's than anyone else. Or are you claiming the article is a lie, and it was not a government poll that brought about the changes?
I am not attacking the SDA church as a cult or anti-christ, I am pointing out that fewer and fewer of them are doing the work they are supposed to be doing. There you go bearing false witness again.
AMO, if you actually read about the situation as it existed previous to the saturday closing law you would find that the exams that are now on two consecutive Sundays were held on the saturday and sunday of one weekend.
There was no sunday closing law in the previous exam arrangement
All you have proven is your own aversion to reading what would negate your erroneous position.
: current occupant2 Thu Mar 30, 2017 - 00:21:28
AMO, if you actually read about the situation as it existed previous to the saturday closing law you would find that the exams that are now on two consecutive Sundays were held on the saturday and sunday of one weekend.
There was no sunday closing law in the previous exam arrangement
All you have proven is your own aversion to reading what would negate your erroneous position.
Well, thanks so much for educating me then. So, your problem then I guess, is that SDA's did something about having to take exams on their Sabbath, and Sunday keepers didn't. Is that it?
My bad, I thought your whole argument was that SDA's were now making Sunday keepers take the test on Sunday instead of Saturday. What exactly is your point again? Your mad that SDA's succeeded in not having to take a test on their Sabbath. It can't be that they were make Sunday keepers take it on Sunday, if they were already doing so. ?
https://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=30022 (https://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=30022)
http://ktfnews.com/comece-calls-sunday-rest-laws-europe/ (http://ktfnews.com/comece-calls-sunday-rest-laws-europe/)
http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.paz-online.de%2FNachrichten%2FWirtschaft%2FUebersicht%2FDGB-Chef-Hoffmann-wirbt-fuer-Sonntagsruhe&edit-text=&act=url (http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.paz-online.de%2FNachrichten%2FWirtschaft%2FUebersicht%2FDGB-Chef-Hoffmann-wirbt-fuer-Sonntagsruhe&edit-text=&act=url)
http://amazingdiscoveries.org/S-deception-Sabbath_Sunday_Catholic_Church (http://amazingdiscoveries.org/S-deception-Sabbath_Sunday_Catholic_Church)
It is sad how the sda and their like will take the word of the Catholic Church on this topic but call them liars on almost every other aspect of christian doctrine.
: current occupant2 Sat May 06, 2017 - 15:56:06
It is sad how the sda and their like will take the word of the Catholic Church on this topic but call them liars on almost every other aspect of christian doctrine.
It's pretty simple actually. There is a major difference between doctrine, and history. The establishment of the Roman Catholic Church state is well documented history. Sunday sacredness is a false doctrine associated with the denomination, which was intricately tied to it's establishment as the state sponsored and enforced religion. The Sunday law established by Constantine was directly influenced by his and apostate "Christian" leaders desire to bring all religions and therefore peoples to a settled state of uniformity, which could be more easily subjugated and controlled by them. Thus the amalgamation of apostate "Christianity" and paganism leading to the eventuality of the Roman Catholic Church state, or Holy Roman Empire if you will.
What is sad is the inability of those who choose to believe a lie, to see the truth. Resulting in the false accusations as that which yoiu leveled above.
: AmoThe Sunday law established by Constantine was directly influenced by his and apostate "Christian" leaders desire to bring all religions and therefore peoples to a settled state of uniformity, which could be more easily subjugated and controlled by them. Thus the amalgamation of apostate "Christianity" and paganism leading to the eventuality of the Roman Catholic Church state, or Holy Roman Empire if you will.
The ancient Roman pagans didn't worship weekly like the Jews and Christians. Theirs was a monthly calendar of observances. As such, Sunday was not considered or observed as a weekly festival or sacred day by the Romans. Therefore, your assertion that St. Constantine the Great's Sunday law was directed at uniting pagan and Christian peoples with a common day of worship is patently false.
: AmoWhat is sad is the inability of those who choose to believe a lie, to see the truth. Resulting in the false accusations as that which yoiu leveled above.
Oh, the irony of it all ::frown::
: DMA Mon May 08, 2017 - 09:52:32
: AmoThe Sunday law established by Constantine was directly influenced by his and apostate "Christian" leaders desire to bring all religions and therefore peoples to a settled state of uniformity, which could be more easily subjugated and controlled by them. Thus the amalgamation of apostate "Christianity" and paganism leading to the eventuality of the Roman Catholic Church state, or Holy Roman Empire if you will.
The ancient Roman pagans didn't worship weekly like the Jews and Christians. Theirs was a monthly calendar of observances. As such, Sunday was not considered or observed as a weekly festival or sacred day by the Romans. Therefore, your assertion that St. Constantine the Great's Sunday law was directed at uniting pagan and Christian peoples with a common day of worship is patently false.
: AmoWhat is sad is the inability of those who choose to believe a lie, to see the truth. Resulting in the false accusations as that which yoiu leveled above.
Oh, the irony of it all ::frown::
Ignoring and denying all evidence to the contrary which has been and could continue to be supplied, doesn't change the facts but in your own mind. I suppose when I find the time I will supply yet another lengthy list of quotes from the many who have and still do disagree with your unbalanced perception or conclusion concerning all the evidence there is. So you can ignore and deny it again. Or perhaps this time you can go a step further and proclaim those who made the quotes to all be liars. Those who worshiped the sun may not have put quite as mush emphasis upon a weekly observance of a day of worship as the "Christians", but when pagans flooded the church by the decree of emperors it was the natural result of the amalgamation of the two.
: AmoIgnoring and denying all evidence to the contrary which has been and could continue to be supplied, doesn't change the facts but in your own mind. I suppose when I find the time I will supply yet another lengthy list of quotes from the many who have and still do disagree with your unbalanced perception or conclusion concerning all the evidence there is. So you can ignore and deny it again. Or perhaps this time you can go a step further and proclaim those who made the quotes to all be liars. Those who worshiped the sun may not have put quite as mush emphasis upon a weekly observance of a day of worship as the "Christians", but when pagans flooded the church by the decree of emperors it was the natural result of the amalgamation of the two.
Well, before you give your list of quotes, I thought I'd give a list of my own. But first, let's just consider one thing at the outset. If Sunday was indeed observed by the ancient Roman pagans weekly as a holy day, then why is it that
the very first law to make Sunday a day of rest by the Roman state happened under St. Constantine the Great during the Christian era, some 1,074 years after Rome's founding? If Sunday was such an important holy day for the Romans, then why wait so long to make it an actual day of rest?
The following are some relevant quotes regarding the ancient Roman holy days and festivals:
: WikipediaFestivals in ancient Rome were an important part of Roman religious life during both the Republican and Imperial eras, and one of the primary features of the Roman calendar. Feriae ("holidays" in the sense of "holy days"; singular also feriae or dies ferialis) were either public (publicae) or private (privatae). State holidays were celebrated by the Roman people and received public funding. Games (ludi), such as the Ludi Apollinares, were not technically feriae, but the days on which they were celebrated were dies festi, holidays in the modern sense of days off work. Although feriae were paid for by the state, ludi were often funded by wealthy individuals. Feriae privatae were holidays celebrated in honor of private individuals or by families...Varro defined feriae as "days instituted for the sake of the gods." Religious rites were performed on the feriae, and public business was suspended. Even slaves were supposed to be given some form of rest. Cicero says specifically that people who were free should not engage in lawsuits and quarrels, and slaves should get a break from their labors. Agricultural writers recognized that some jobs on a farm might still need to be performed, and specified what these were. Some agricultural tasks not otherwise permitted could be carried out if an expiation were made in advance (piaculum), usually the sacrifice of a puppy. Within the city of Rome, the flamens and the priest known as the Rex sacrorum were not allowed even to see work done.
On a practical level, those who "inadvertently" worked could pay a fine or offer up a piaculum, usually a pig. Work considered vital either to the gods or preserving human life was excusable, according to some experts on religious law. Although Romans were required not to work, they were not required to take any religious action unless they were priests or had family rites (sacra gentilicia) to maintain.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_festivals (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_festivals)
Notice that there is no mention of Sunday being a "feriae" of rest in the ancient Roman Empire. This is because the ancient Romans didn't observe a weekend like we do today. Here is another quote about the ancient Roman holy days with a fairly complete list of Roman religious festivals included. Notice there isn't a mention of a weekly Sunday observance:
: UNRV HistoryRepublican era State festivals
These were festivals where religious officials employed by the State conducted public rites. Citizens were required to suspend business on such dates, but they were not required to attend religious ceremonies (many did so, however, as sacrificial meat was often given in such festivals). Because the ancient Romans did not observe a "weekend" as moderns do, these festivals would have constituted the days of rest for the populace.
By the late Republic, many of the ancient festivals listed below had fallen into disuse, with the meaning of the festival and/or the deitiy to whom it was dedicated obscured.
January
1. Festival of Janus, the two faced god of beginnings. Exchanging of lamps to furnish light for the coming year
3-5. Compitalia. Observance day could be moved by order of the praetor urbanis. Celebrated the lares, or local guardian spirits, of the crossroads. Shrines were set up where crossroads met. Marked the end of the agricultural year.
5. Birthday of the shrine of Vica Pota, ancient goddess of victory.
9. Agonalia. Sacrifice of ram by rex sacrorum to uncertain god, possibly Janus.
11. Juturnalia. Festival of Juturna, river nymph and goddess of healing.
15. Carmentalia. Festival to honor Carementis, river nymph and goddess of prophecy.
24-26. Sementivae. Offerings to Tellus and Cerus (agricultural goddesses) to protect the spring sowing.
27. Festival of Castor and Pollux, Greek demigods who were patrons of cavalry, athletes and sailors
February
1. Festival of Juno Sospita
5-17. Fornacalia. Celebration of grain ovens.
13. Festival to honor Faunus the rustic god.
13-21. Parentalia. Private and public ceremonies for the spirits of the familial dead. The 21st was the Feralia, when food was carried to tombs of the dead.
15. Lupercalia. Purification and fertility festival. Romans not certain to which god holiday was dedicated. Citizens gathered before the cave where Romulus and Remus were suckled by the she-wolf. A goat and dog was sacrificed. Two noble youths were smeared with the blood and ran through the streets. They whipped passers-by with strips of goat skin, imparting fertility.
17. Quirinalia. Festival of the ancient god Quirinius, a sabine war god.
22. Carista. Renewal of family ties, offerings to familial lares.
23. Terminalia. Honoring the boundary god Terminus.
25. Regifugium. Celebrated in honor of expulsion of the last king and founding of the Republic.
27. Equirria. Horse racing in honor of Mars.
March
1. Festival of Mars
7. Festival of Vediovis, an underworld version of Jupiter.
9. Sacred shield of Mars carried by his priests, the salii.
14. Equirria. Another horse racing festival to Mars. Also the Mamuralia, which was a seperate festival in honor of the sacred shields of Mars.
15. Festival to Anna Perenna, goddess of the new year.
17. Liberalia, festival to Liber Pater, a god sometimes identified with the Greek Bacchus
19. Quinquatra. Five day festival in honor of Mars and Minerva. On 23 March the trumpets of Mars were purified.
31. Festival of Luna, goddess of the moon.
April
1. Veneralia,festival of Venus Verticordia
4-10. Megalesia. Games held in honor of Cybele, the Phyrgian mother earth goddess whose cult was brought to Rome during the 2nd Punic War.
5. Festival of Fortuna Publica, "luck of the people."
12-19. Ceriala. In honor of Ceres.
13. Festival to Jupiter of Victory and Jupiter of Liberty.
15. Fordicida. Pregnant cow sacrificed to Tellus to promote fertility.
21. Parilia. Purification of sheep for fertility.
23. Vinalia Priora. Festival of wine production in honor of Jupiter
25. Robigalia. Rust colored dog sacrificed to appease the god of grain rust.
28 April - 3 May. Floralia. Flower festival connected with Spring fertility.
May
1. Festival of Lares.
9. Lemuria. Festival to appease the spirits of the wandering household dead.
11. Sacrifice to Mania, a goddess of death.
14. Festival to Mars Invictus.
15. Festival to Jupiter and Mercury.
21. Agonalia. Sacrifice of ram by rex sacrorum to uncertain god, possibly Janus.
23. Festival to Vulcan.
25. Festival to Fortuna.
29. Ambarvalia. Sacrifices offered to agricultural deities to purify crops.
June
1. Festival of Juno and Mars
3. Festival of Bellona, the war goddess.
4, Festival of Hercules.
5. Festival of Dius Fidius, Roman god of oaths sometimes identified with Jupiter.
8. Festival of Mens, personification of mental activity.
9. Vestalia, festival of Vesta.
11. Matralia. Festival of Mater Matuta, goddess of growth and childbirth.
13. Festival of Jupiter Invictus.
19. Festival of Minerva.
20. Festival of Summanus, a god of thunderbolts associated with Jupiter.
24. Festival of Fors Fortuna, bringer of providence.
25. Turian games held every four years to underworld gods.
27. Festival to lares and Jupiter.
July
1. Festival of Juno.
5. Poplifugia. Flight of the People. Meaning now lost.
6-13. Games to honor Apollo
7. Festival of Pales. Juno worshipped on this day in honor of serving women.
17. Festivals of Honos (honor), Virtus (physical and moral excellence) and Victoria (victory)
19. Lucaria. Festival in a sacred grovde near the Tiber. Meaning lost.
20. Games held to honor victories of Caesar and goddess Victoria.
22. Festival of Concordia, goddess of concord.
23. Neptunalia. Festival for Neptune
25. Festival for Furrina, goddess of springs.
30. Festival to Fortuna
August
1. Festivals of Spes (Hope) and Victoria.
5. festivals of Salus, goddess of health
9. Festival of Sol, god of the sun.
12. Festival to Hercules and Venus
13. Festivals to Diana, Hercules, Castor and Pollux.
17. Portunalia. Festival to Portunus, god of doors and harbors. Involved a ritual connected with keys.
19. Vinalia Rustica. Another wine production festival
21. Festival to Consus , an agricultural god also associated with horses.
23. Festival to Vulcan
24. Festival to Luna
25. Festival to Ops, goddess of abundance and partner to Saturn.
27. Festival of Volturnus, an Etruscan river god.
28. Festival of Sol and Luna
September
1. Festival to Jupiter and Juno
5. Festival to Jupiter
5-19. Games for Jupiter Optimus Maximus.
13. Festival of Capitoline Triad (Jupiter, Juno and Minerva)
23. Festival to Apollo
26. Festival of Venus Genetrix, Venus as mother of Roman people
October
1. Festival to Fides (fidelity) and Juno
4. Fast day for Ceres
7. Festival of Jupiter and Juno
9. Festival to the public genius, Faunus and Venus.
10. Festival to Juno
11. Meditrinalia. Another wine festival to Jupiter
13. Fontinalia. In honor the god of springs
14. Festival of the Penates, domestic patron gods
15. Capitoline games in honor of Jupiter
19. Armilustrium. Festival of purification of arms in honor of Mars.
26 October -1 November. Sulla's Victory Games in honor of Victoria.
November
4-17. Plebian games in honor of Jupiter. The 13th was the great festival day and highpoint of the games
December
1. Festivals of Neptune and Pietas (Piety).
3. Festival of Bona Dea, the women's goddess. Celebrated only by women and Vestal Virgins in the house of a Consul or Praetor
5. Festival of Faunus held in countryside.
8. Festival of Tiberinius, personification of Tiber river.
11. Agonalia. Sacrifice of ram by rex sacrorum to uncertain god, possibly Janus.
12. Festival of Consus
13. Festival of Tellus.
15. 2nd festival to Consus.
17-23. Saturnalia. Merry making festival ot Saturn, the rustic god of seed sowing, later identified with the Greek Chronus. Sacrifice at the temple of Saturn followed by public feast and gift giving. Public gambling allowed. Holiday costumes and caps adorned. Candles lit. Slaves were temporarily absolved of duties. Master may have switched roles with slaves.
18. Festival of Epona, a Gallic horse goddess.
19. Festival to Ops
21. Festival to honor Diva Angeronae, goddess of secrecy.
22. Festival of the Lares
23. Larentalia, A funeral festival to an obscure goddess by name of Acca Larentia.
25. Midwinter solstice. Became prominent only in the third century when Aurelian consecrated his temple to Sol Invictus on this date.
Source: http://www.unrv.com/culture/roman-festivals.php (http://www.unrv.com/culture/roman-festivals.php)
As the above quote shows, the Roman's religious observances were monthly in nature and not weekly as SDA's assert. Therefore, they didn't observe a weekly day of rest on Sunday in honor of the sun. The following is from the so-called "
Witchipedia", stating about itself, "
the online encyclopedia of witchcraft, paganism and the occult". This is clearly not a Christian source, and yet it agrees with the previous source that the Romans didn't have weekends:
: WitchipediaThe ancient Romans celebrated many holy days; probably more than is practical for we modern Pagans to attempt to emulate. They didn't have weekends so these feast days were their only days off from work, though Sunday was declared a day of rest by Constantine in the 4th century BCE. Feast days allowed Romans to come together to share what their labor wrought and spend time with their neighbors, as well as take in state sponsored entertainment, and of course serve their Gods. Festivals often included a sacrifice and a communal meal which meant that the poorest people of the city had the opportunity to eat well once in awhile.
Source: http://www.witchipedia.com/main:roman-feast-days (http://www.witchipedia.com/main:roman-feast-days)
And here are a few more quotes from various sources regarding the ancient Roman religious observances. Notice the glaring omission of any weekly Sunday observance:
: Encyclopædia BritannicaFeriae, ancient Roman festival days during which the gods were honoured and all business, especially lawsuits, was suspended. Feriae were of two types: feriae privatae and feriae publicae. The feriae privatae, usually celebrated only by families or individuals, commemorated an event of personal or ancestral importance. Included in this group were the feriae denicales, or 10 days of mourning observed by a family after the death of one of its members.
The holidays observed by all Romans, the feriae publicae, were of three different types: feriae stativae, held annually on a fixed date; feriae conceptivae, movable festivals celebrated annually on days appointed by priests or magistrates; and feriae imperativae, held at official command during extreme emergencies and after great victories.
All feriae publicae were generally observed by prayers, sacrifices, and visits to temples; in addition, the feriae stativae and feriae conceptivae usually included feasts. After the official recognition of Christianity, Christian holidays were substituted for the old system of feriae.
Source: https://www.britannica.com/topic/feriae (https://www.britannica.com/topic/feriae)
: Crystal LinksRoman calendars show roughly forty annual religious festivals. Some lasted several days, others a single day or less: sacred days (dies fasti) outnumbered "non-sacred" days (dies nefasti). A comparison of surviving Roman religious calendars suggests that official festivals were organized according to broad seasonal groups that allowed for different local traditions. Some of the most ancient and popular festivals incorporated ludi ("games," such as chariot races and theatrical performances), with examples including those held at Palestrina in honour of Fortuna Primigenia during Compitalia, and the Ludi Romani in honor of Liber. Other festivals may have required only the presence and rites of their priests and acolytes, or particular groups, such as women at the Bona Dea rites.
Other public festivals were not required by the calendar, but occasioned by events. The triumph of a Roman general was celebrated as the fulfillment of religious vows, though these tended to be overshadowed by the political and social significance of the event. During the late Republic, the political elite competed to outdo each other in public display, and the ludi attendant on a triumph were expanded to include gladiator contests. Under the Principate, all such spectacular displays came under Imperial control: the most lavish were subsidized by emperors, and lesser events were provided by magistrates as a sacred duty and privilege of office. Additional festivals and games celebrated Imperial accessions and anniversaries. Others, such as the traditional Republican Secular Games to mark a new era (saeculum), became imperially funded to maintain traditional values and a common Roman identity. That the spectacles retained something of their sacral aura even in late antiquity is indicated by the admonitions of the Church Fathers that Christians should not take part.
The meaning and origin of many archaic festivals baffled even Rome's intellectual elite, but the more obscure they were, the greater the opportunity for reinvention and reinterpretation - a fact lost neither on Augustus in his program of religious reform, which often cloaked autocratic innovation, nor on his only rival as mythmaker of the era, Ovid.
In his Fasti, a long-form poem covering Roman holidays from January to June, Ovid presents a unique look at Roman antiquarian lore, popular customs, and religious practice that is by turns imaginative, entertaining, high-minded, and scurrilous; not a priestly account, despite the speaker's pose as a vates or inspired poet-prophet, but a work of description, imagination and poetic etymology that reflects the broad humor and burlesque spirit of such venerable festivals as the Saturnalia, Consualia, and feast of Anna Perenna on the Ides of March, where Ovid treats the assassination of the newly deified Julius Caesar as utterly incidental to the festivities among the Roman people.
But official calendars preserved from different times and places also show a flexibility in omitting or expanding events, indicating that there was no single static and authoritative calendar of required observances. In the later Empire under Christian rule, the new Christian festivals were incorporated into the existing framework of the Roman calendar, alongside at least some of the traditional festivals.
Source: http://www.crystalinks.com/romereligion.html (http://www.crystalinks.com/romereligion.html)
: www.roman-empire.netThere was not a month in the Roman calendar which did not have its religious festivals.
And the very earliest festivals of the Roman state were already celebrated with games.
The consualia (celebrating the festival of Consus and the famous 'rape of the Sabine women'), which was held on 21 August, also was the main event of the chariot racing year. It can hence hardly be a coincidence that the underground granary and shrine of Consus, where the opening ceremonies of the festival were held, was accessed from the very center isle of the Circus Maximus.
But apart from the consualia August, the sixth month of the old calendar, also had festivals in honour of the gods Hercules, Portunus, Vulcan, Volturnus and Diana.
Festivals could be somber, dignified occasions, as well as joyful events.
The parentilia in February was a period of nine days in which the families would worship their dead ancestors. During this time, no official business was conducted, all temples were closed and marriages were outlawed.
But also in February was the lupercalia, a festival of fertility, most likely connected with the god Faunus. Its ancient ritual went back to the more mythical times of Roman origin. Ceremonies began in the cave in which the legendary twins Romulus and Remus were believed to have been suckled by the wolf. In that cave a number of goats and a dog were sacrificed and their blood was daubed onto the faces of two young boys of patrician families. Dressed in goatskins and carrying strips of leather in their hands, the boys would then run a traditional course. Anyone along the way would be whipped with the leather strips. However, these lashings were said to increase fertility. Therefore women who sought to get pregnant would wait along the course, to be whipped by the boys as they passed.
The festival of Mars lasted from 1 to 19 March. Two separate teams of a dozen men would dress up in armour and helmet of ancient design and would then jump, leap and bound through the streets, beating their shields with their swords, shouting and chanting. The men were known as the salii, the 'jumpers'. Apart from their noisy parade through the streets, they would spend every evening feasting in a different house in the city.
The festival of Vesta took place in June and, lasting for a week, it was an altogether calmer affair. No official business took place and the temple of Vesta was opened to married women who could make sacrifices of food to the goddess. As a more bizarre part of this festival, all mill-donkeys were given a day of rest on 9 June, as well as being decorated with garlands and loaves of bread.
On 15 June the temple would be closed again, but for the vestal virgins and the Roman state would go about its normal affairs again.
Source: http://www.roman-empire.net/religion/religion.html (http://www.roman-empire.net/religion/religion.html)
What the above quotes, all taken from various and different unrelated sources, show is that the ancient Romans didn't consider Sunday to be a holy day for weekly worship and rest. On the contrary, the ancient Roman's religious observances were undoubtedly monthly in character, not weekly as Seventh-day Adventists would have us believe. The fact is, St. Constantine's Sunday law was the first of its kind in Roman history. This effectively disproves the Adventist assertion that Sunday was a holy day for the Roman pagans, and that this was the reason why St. Constantine made his decree, to unite pagans and Christians together.
Here is a quote from
Handbook to Life in Ancient Rome also confirming that the ancient Romans didn't have weekends, and that only the Jews observed a "rest day":
: Handbook to Life in Ancient RomeFeriae (or dies ferialis) were holidays or festivals for visiting temples and making sacrifices to gods. The same term was used for public festivals and for private occasion, such as celebrating a birthday. Festivals were days when the Romans renewed their relationships with particular gods, usually involving additional rituals to what was normally practiced. Failure either to celebrate a festival or to celebrate it absolutely correctly would cause the gods to cease being benevolent. There were, therefore, important public ceremonies conducted by state officials as well as private prayers and sacrifices. The public rite took place in the temple of the god being honored by the festival. Prayers, rituals and sacrifices were conducted by the priests outside the temple. Citizens might attend the ceremonies, but only as observers and not as participants.
There were many festivals during the year, but not all were public festivals recognized by the state and celebrated by state priests. On public holidays work and business (legal and political) were stopped to avoid polluting the sacred day. Some work was permitted (decided by the pontiff), but it is likely that much work went on regardless, and only the pious visited temples, while others took a holiday. Roman citizens were legally required to observe the rules about working, but they were not obligated to perform acts of worship. The large number of festivals obviously reduced the number of working days in the year, but only the Jews (who did not observe the festivals) had a regular "rest day" by observing the sabbath, others did not have a "weekend" and so the number of working days lost through observance of festivals was not great.
Source: https://tinyurl.com/lb2huqk (https://tinyurl.com/lb2huqk)
: DMA Tue May 09, 2017 - 12:38:15
: AmoIgnoring and denying all evidence to the contrary which has been and could continue to be supplied, doesn't change the facts but in your own mind. I suppose when I find the time I will supply yet another lengthy list of quotes from the many who have and still do disagree with your unbalanced perception or conclusion concerning all the evidence there is. So you can ignore and deny it again. Or perhaps this time you can go a step further and proclaim those who made the quotes to all be liars. Those who worshiped the sun may not have put quite as mush emphasis upon a weekly observance of a day of worship as the "Christians", but when pagans flooded the church by the decree of emperors it was the natural result of the amalgamation of the two.
Well, before you give your list of quotes, I thought I'd give a list of my own. But first, let's just consider one thing at the outset. If Sunday was indeed observed by the ancient Roman pagans weekly as a holy day, then why is it that the very first law to make Sunday a day of rest by the Roman state happened under St. Constantine the Great during the Christian era, some 1,074 years after Rome's founding? If Sunday was such an important holy day for the Romans, then why wait so long to make it an actual day of rest?
The following are some relevant quotes regarding the ancient Roman holy days and festivals:
: WikipediaFestivals in ancient Rome were an important part of Roman religious life during both the Republican and Imperial eras, and one of the primary features of the Roman calendar. Feriae ("holidays" in the sense of "holy days"; singular also feriae or dies ferialis) were either public (publicae) or private (privatae). State holidays were celebrated by the Roman people and received public funding. Games (ludi), such as the Ludi Apollinares, were not technically feriae, but the days on which they were celebrated were dies festi, holidays in the modern sense of days off work. Although feriae were paid for by the state, ludi were often funded by wealthy individuals. Feriae privatae were holidays celebrated in honor of private individuals or by families...Varro defined feriae as "days instituted for the sake of the gods." Religious rites were performed on the feriae, and public business was suspended. Even slaves were supposed to be given some form of rest. Cicero says specifically that people who were free should not engage in lawsuits and quarrels, and slaves should get a break from their labors. Agricultural writers recognized that some jobs on a farm might still need to be performed, and specified what these were. Some agricultural tasks not otherwise permitted could be carried out if an expiation were made in advance (piaculum), usually the sacrifice of a puppy. Within the city of Rome, the flamens and the priest known as the Rex sacrorum were not allowed even to see work done.
On a practical level, those who "inadvertently" worked could pay a fine or offer up a piaculum, usually a pig. Work considered vital either to the gods or preserving human life was excusable, according to some experts on religious law. Although Romans were required not to work, they were not required to take any religious action unless they were priests or had family rites (sacra gentilicia) to maintain.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_festivals (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_festivals)
Notice that there is no mention of Sunday being a "feriae" of rest in the ancient Roman Empire. This is because the ancient Romans didn't observe a weekend like we do today. Here is another quote about the ancient Roman holy days with a fairly complete list of Roman religious festivals included. Notice there isn't a mention of a weekly Sunday observance:
: UNRV HistoryRepublican era State festivals
These were festivals where religious officials employed by the State conducted public rites. Citizens were required to suspend business on such dates, but they were not required to attend religious ceremonies (many did so, however, as sacrificial meat was often given in such festivals). Because the ancient Romans did not observe a "weekend" as moderns do, these festivals would have constituted the days of rest for the populace.
By the late Republic, many of the ancient festivals listed below had fallen into disuse, with the meaning of the festival and/or the deitiy to whom it was dedicated obscured.
January
1. Festival of Janus, the two faced god of beginnings. Exchanging of lamps to furnish light for the coming year
3-5. Compitalia. Observance day could be moved by order of the praetor urbanis. Celebrated the lares, or local guardian spirits, of the crossroads. Shrines were set up where crossroads met. Marked the end of the agricultural year.
5. Birthday of the shrine of Vica Pota, ancient goddess of victory.
9. Agonalia. Sacrifice of ram by rex sacrorum to uncertain god, possibly Janus.
11. Juturnalia. Festival of Juturna, river nymph and goddess of healing.
15. Carmentalia. Festival to honor Carementis, river nymph and goddess of prophecy.
24-26. Sementivae. Offerings to Tellus and Cerus (agricultural goddesses) to protect the spring sowing.
27. Festival of Castor and Pollux, Greek demigods who were patrons of cavalry, athletes and sailors
February
1. Festival of Juno Sospita
5-17. Fornacalia. Celebration of grain ovens.
13. Festival to honor Faunus the rustic god.
13-21. Parentalia. Private and public ceremonies for the spirits of the familial dead. The 21st was the Feralia, when food was carried to tombs of the dead.
15. Lupercalia. Purification and fertility festival. Romans not certain to which god holiday was dedicated. Citizens gathered before the cave where Romulus and Remus were suckled by the she-wolf. A goat and dog was sacrificed. Two noble youths were smeared with the blood and ran through the streets. They whipped passers-by with strips of goat skin, imparting fertility.
17. Quirinalia. Festival of the ancient god Quirinius, a sabine war god.
22. Carista. Renewal of family ties, offerings to familial lares.
23. Terminalia. Honoring the boundary god Terminus.
25. Regifugium. Celebrated in honor of expulsion of the last king and founding of the Republic.
27. Equirria. Horse racing in honor of Mars.
March
1. Festival of Mars
7. Festival of Vediovis, an underworld version of Jupiter.
9. Sacred shield of Mars carried by his priests, the salii.
14. Equirria. Another horse racing festival to Mars. Also the Mamuralia, which was a seperate festival in honor of the sacred shields of Mars.
15. Festival to Anna Perenna, goddess of the new year.
17. Liberalia, festival to Liber Pater, a god sometimes identified with the Greek Bacchus
19. Quinquatra. Five day festival in honor of Mars and Minerva. On 23 March the trumpets of Mars were purified.
31. Festival of Luna, goddess of the moon.
April
1. Veneralia,festival of Venus Verticordia
4-10. Megalesia. Games held in honor of Cybele, the Phyrgian mother earth goddess whose cult was brought to Rome during the 2nd Punic War.
5. Festival of Fortuna Publica, "luck of the people."
12-19. Ceriala. In honor of Ceres.
13. Festival to Jupiter of Victory and Jupiter of Liberty.
15. Fordicida. Pregnant cow sacrificed to Tellus to promote fertility.
21. Parilia. Purification of sheep for fertility.
23. Vinalia Priora. Festival of wine production in honor of Jupiter
25. Robigalia. Rust colored dog sacrificed to appease the god of grain rust.
28 April - 3 May. Floralia. Flower festival connected with Spring fertility.
May
1. Festival of Lares.
9. Lemuria. Festival to appease the spirits of the wandering household dead.
11. Sacrifice to Mania, a goddess of death.
14. Festival to Mars Invictus.
15. Festival to Jupiter and Mercury.
21. Agonalia. Sacrifice of ram by rex sacrorum to uncertain god, possibly Janus.
23. Festival to Vulcan.
25. Festival to Fortuna.
29. Ambarvalia. Sacrifices offered to agricultural deities to purify crops.
June
1. Festival of Juno and Mars
3. Festival of Bellona, the war goddess.
4, Festival of Hercules.
5. Festival of Dius Fidius, Roman god of oaths sometimes identified with Jupiter.
8. Festival of Mens, personification of mental activity.
9. Vestalia, festival of Vesta.
11. Matralia. Festival of Mater Matuta, goddess of growth and childbirth.
13. Festival of Jupiter Invictus.
19. Festival of Minerva.
20. Festival of Summanus, a god of thunderbolts associated with Jupiter.
24. Festival of Fors Fortuna, bringer of providence.
25. Turian games held every four years to underworld gods.
27. Festival to lares and Jupiter.
July
1. Festival of Juno.
5. Poplifugia. Flight of the People. Meaning now lost.
6-13. Games to honor Apollo
7. Festival of Pales. Juno worshipped on this day in honor of serving women.
17. Festivals of Honos (honor), Virtus (physical and moral excellence) and Victoria (victory)
19. Lucaria. Festival in a sacred grovde near the Tiber. Meaning lost.
20. Games held to honor victories of Caesar and goddess Victoria.
22. Festival of Concordia, goddess of concord.
23. Neptunalia. Festival for Neptune
25. Festival for Furrina, goddess of springs.
30. Festival to Fortuna
August
1. Festivals of Spes (Hope) and Victoria.
5. festivals of Salus, goddess of health
9. Festival of Sol, god of the sun.
12. Festival to Hercules and Venus
13. Festivals to Diana, Hercules, Castor and Pollux.
17. Portunalia. Festival to Portunus, god of doors and harbors. Involved a ritual connected with keys.
19. Vinalia Rustica. Another wine production festival
21. Festival to Consus , an agricultural god also associated with horses.
23. Festival to Vulcan
24. Festival to Luna
25. Festival to Ops, goddess of abundance and partner to Saturn.
27. Festival of Volturnus, an Etruscan river god.
28. Festival of Sol and Luna
September
1. Festival to Jupiter and Juno
5. Festival to Jupiter
5-19. Games for Jupiter Optimus Maximus.
13. Festival of Capitoline Triad (Jupiter, Juno and Minerva)
23. Festival to Apollo
26. Festival of Venus Genetrix, Venus as mother of Roman people
October
1. Festival to Fides (fidelity) and Juno
4. Fast day for Ceres
7. Festival of Jupiter and Juno
9. Festival to the public genius, Faunus and Venus.
10. Festival to Juno
11. Meditrinalia. Another wine festival to Jupiter
13. Fontinalia. In honor the god of springs
14. Festival of the Penates, domestic patron gods
15. Capitoline games in honor of Jupiter
19. Armilustrium. Festival of purification of arms in honor of Mars.
26 October -1 November. Sulla's Victory Games in honor of Victoria.
November
4-17. Plebian games in honor of Jupiter. The 13th was the great festival day and highpoint of the games
December
1. Festivals of Neptune and Pietas (Piety).
3. Festival of Bona Dea, the women's goddess. Celebrated only by women and Vestal Virgins in the house of a Consul or Praetor
5. Festival of Faunus held in countryside.
8. Festival of Tiberinius, personification of Tiber river.
11. Agonalia. Sacrifice of ram by rex sacrorum to uncertain god, possibly Janus.
12. Festival of Consus
13. Festival of Tellus.
15. 2nd festival to Consus.
17-23. Saturnalia. Merry making festival ot Saturn, the rustic god of seed sowing, later identified with the Greek Chronus. Sacrifice at the temple of Saturn followed by public feast and gift giving. Public gambling allowed. Holiday costumes and caps adorned. Candles lit. Slaves were temporarily absolved of duties. Master may have switched roles with slaves.
18. Festival of Epona, a Gallic horse goddess.
19. Festival to Ops
21. Festival to honor Diva Angeronae, goddess of secrecy.
22. Festival of the Lares
23. Larentalia, A funeral festival to an obscure goddess by name of Acca Larentia.
25. Midwinter solstice. Became prominent only in the third century when Aurelian consecrated his temple to Sol Invictus on this date.
Source: http://www.unrv.com/culture/roman-festivals.php (http://www.unrv.com/culture/roman-festivals.php)
As the above quote shows, the Roman's religious observances were monthly in nature and not weekly as SDA's assert. Therefore, they didn't observe a weekly day of rest on Sunday in honor of the sun. The following is from the so-called "Witchipedia", stating about itself, "the online encyclopedia of witchcraft, paganism and the occult". This is clearly not a Christian source, and yet it agrees with the previous source that the Romans didn't have weekends:
: WitchipediaThe ancient Romans celebrated many holy days; probably more than is practical for we modern Pagans to attempt to emulate. They didn't have weekends so these feast days were their only days off from work, though Sunday was declared a day of rest by Constantine in the 4th century BCE. Feast days allowed Romans to come together to share what their labor wrought and spend time with their neighbors, as well as take in state sponsored entertainment, and of course serve their Gods. Festivals often included a sacrifice and a communal meal which meant that the poorest people of the city had the opportunity to eat well once in awhile.
Source: http://www.witchipedia.com/main:roman-feast-days (http://www.witchipedia.com/main:roman-feast-days)
And here are a few more quotes from various sources regarding the ancient Roman religious observances. Notice the glaring omission of any weekly Sunday observance:
: Encyclopædia BritannicaFeriae, ancient Roman festival days during which the gods were honoured and all business, especially lawsuits, was suspended. Feriae were of two types: feriae privatae and feriae publicae. The feriae privatae, usually celebrated only by families or individuals, commemorated an event of personal or ancestral importance. Included in this group were the feriae denicales, or 10 days of mourning observed by a family after the death of one of its members.
The holidays observed by all Romans, the feriae publicae, were of three different types: feriae stativae, held annually on a fixed date; feriae conceptivae, movable festivals celebrated annually on days appointed by priests or magistrates; and feriae imperativae, held at official command during extreme emergencies and after great victories.
All feriae publicae were generally observed by prayers, sacrifices, and visits to temples; in addition, the feriae stativae and feriae conceptivae usually included feasts. After the official recognition of Christianity, Christian holidays were substituted for the old system of feriae.
Source: https://www.britannica.com/topic/feriae (https://www.britannica.com/topic/feriae)
: Crystal LinksRoman calendars show roughly forty annual religious festivals. Some lasted several days, others a single day or less: sacred days (dies fasti) outnumbered "non-sacred" days (dies nefasti). A comparison of surviving Roman religious calendars suggests that official festivals were organized according to broad seasonal groups that allowed for different local traditions. Some of the most ancient and popular festivals incorporated ludi ("games," such as chariot races and theatrical performances), with examples including those held at Palestrina in honour of Fortuna Primigenia during Compitalia, and the Ludi Romani in honor of Liber. Other festivals may have required only the presence and rites of their priests and acolytes, or particular groups, such as women at the Bona Dea rites.
Other public festivals were not required by the calendar, but occasioned by events. The triumph of a Roman general was celebrated as the fulfillment of religious vows, though these tended to be overshadowed by the political and social significance of the event. During the late Republic, the political elite competed to outdo each other in public display, and the ludi attendant on a triumph were expanded to include gladiator contests. Under the Principate, all such spectacular displays came under Imperial control: the most lavish were subsidized by emperors, and lesser events were provided by magistrates as a sacred duty and privilege of office. Additional festivals and games celebrated Imperial accessions and anniversaries. Others, such as the traditional Republican Secular Games to mark a new era (saeculum), became imperially funded to maintain traditional values and a common Roman identity. That the spectacles retained something of their sacral aura even in late antiquity is indicated by the admonitions of the Church Fathers that Christians should not take part.
The meaning and origin of many archaic festivals baffled even Rome's intellectual elite, but the more obscure they were, the greater the opportunity for reinvention and reinterpretation - a fact lost neither on Augustus in his program of religious reform, which often cloaked autocratic innovation, nor on his only rival as mythmaker of the era, Ovid.
In his Fasti, a long-form poem covering Roman holidays from January to June, Ovid presents a unique look at Roman antiquarian lore, popular customs, and religious practice that is by turns imaginative, entertaining, high-minded, and scurrilous; not a priestly account, despite the speaker's pose as a vates or inspired poet-prophet, but a work of description, imagination and poetic etymology that reflects the broad humor and burlesque spirit of such venerable festivals as the Saturnalia, Consualia, and feast of Anna Perenna on the Ides of March, where Ovid treats the assassination of the newly deified Julius Caesar as utterly incidental to the festivities among the Roman people.
But official calendars preserved from different times and places also show a flexibility in omitting or expanding events, indicating that there was no single static and authoritative calendar of required observances. In the later Empire under Christian rule, the new Christian festivals were incorporated into the existing framework of the Roman calendar, alongside at least some of the traditional festivals.
Source: http://www.crystalinks.com/romereligion.html (http://www.crystalinks.com/romereligion.html)
: www.roman-empire.netThere was not a month in the Roman calendar which did not have its religious festivals.
And the very earliest festivals of the Roman state were already celebrated with games.
The consualia (celebrating the festival of Consus and the famous 'rape of the Sabine women'), which was held on 21 August, also was the main event of the chariot racing year. It can hence hardly be a coincidence that the underground granary and shrine of Consus, where the opening ceremonies of the festival were held, was accessed from the very center isle of the Circus Maximus.
But apart from the consualia August, the sixth month of the old calendar, also had festivals in honour of the gods Hercules, Portunus, Vulcan, Volturnus and Diana.
Festivals could be somber, dignified occasions, as well as joyful events.
The parentilia in February was a period of nine days in which the families would worship their dead ancestors. During this time, no official business was conducted, all temples were closed and marriages were outlawed.
But also in February was the lupercalia, a festival of fertility, most likely connected with the god Faunus. Its ancient ritual went back to the more mythical times of Roman origin. Ceremonies began in the cave in which the legendary twins Romulus and Remus were believed to have been suckled by the wolf. In that cave a number of goats and a dog were sacrificed and their blood was daubed onto the faces of two young boys of patrician families. Dressed in goatskins and carrying strips of leather in their hands, the boys would then run a traditional course. Anyone along the way would be whipped with the leather strips. However, these lashings were said to increase fertility. Therefore women who sought to get pregnant would wait along the course, to be whipped by the boys as they passed.
The festival of Mars lasted from 1 to 19 March. Two separate teams of a dozen men would dress up in armour and helmet of ancient design and would then jump, leap and bound through the streets, beating their shields with their swords, shouting and chanting. The men were known as the salii, the 'jumpers'. Apart from their noisy parade through the streets, they would spend every evening feasting in a different house in the city.
The festival of Vesta took place in June and, lasting for a week, it was an altogether calmer affair. No official business took place and the temple of Vesta was opened to married women who could make sacrifices of food to the goddess. As a more bizarre part of this festival, all mill-donkeys were given a day of rest on 9 June, as well as being decorated with garlands and loaves of bread.
On 15 June the temple would be closed again, but for the vestal virgins and the Roman state would go about its normal affairs again.
Source: http://www.roman-empire.net/religion/religion.html (http://www.roman-empire.net/religion/religion.html)
What the above quotes, all taken from various and different unrelated sources, show is that the ancient Romans didn't consider Sunday to be a holy day for weekly worship and rest. On the contrary, the ancient Roman's religious observances were undoubtedly monthly in character, not weekly as Seventh-day Adventists would have us believe. The fact is, St. Constantine's Sunday law was the first of its kind in Roman history. This effectively disproves the Adventist assertion that Sunday was a holy day for the Roman pagans, and that this was the reason why St. Constantine made his decree, to unite pagans and Christians together.
I already know they didn't do this like Christians or Jews for that matter, as already stated in my previous post. The weekly observance is what Jewish influenced apostate "Christianity" brought to the table, in the amalgamation of apostate "Christianity" with paganism. Predominantly sun worshiping paganism, brought the day of the sun in to replace God's sabbath. These are the exact sins Israel was guilty of during the old covenant when it incorporated and amalgamated the religious practices and customs of the heathen around them while sliding into apostasy. The final abomination which brought God's judgement upon Israel, the destruction of the temple, and the dispersion of the nation was the act of the elders turning their backs to the temple to face the sun and worship.
Eze 8:15 Then said he unto me, Hast thou seen this, O son of man? turn thee yet again,
and thou shalt see greater abominations than these. 16 And he brought me into the inner court of the Lord's house, and, behold, at the door of the temple of the Lord, between the porch and the altar, were about five and twenty men, with their backs toward the temple of the Lord, and their faces toward the east; and they worshipped the sun toward the east. 17 Then he said unto me, Hast thou seen this, O son of man? Is it a light thing to the house of Judah
that they commit the abominations which they commit here? for they have filled the land with violence, and have returned to provoke me to anger: and, lo, they put the branch to their nose. 18 Therefore will I also deal in fury: mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity: and though they cry in mine ears with a loud voice, yet will I not hear them.
9:1 He cried also in mine ears with a loud voice, saying, Cause them that have charge over the city to draw near, even every man with his destroying weapon in his hand. 2 And, behold, six men came from the way of the higher gate, which lieth toward the north, and every man a slaughter weapon in his hand; and one man among them was clothed with linen, with a writer's inkhorn by his side: and they went in, and stood beside the brasen altar. 3 And the glory of the God of Israel was gone up from the cherub, whereupon he was, to the threshold of the house. And he called to the man clothed with linen, which had the writer's inkhorn by his side; 4 And the Lord said unto him, Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof. 5 And to the others he said in mine hearing,
Go ye after him through the city, and smite: let not your eye spare, neither have ye pity: 6 Slay utterly old and young, both maids, and little children, and women: but come not near any man upon whom is the mark; and begin at my sanctuary. Then they began at the ancient men which were before the house. 7 And he said unto them, Defile the house, and fill the courts with the slain: go ye forth. And they went forth, and slew in the city.God sent the Babylonians of the north to fulfill the above judgements upon Israel. The final abomination, the abomination of desolation was the establishment of sun worship within Israel even in the temple.
North African half-heathen Christians who led out in Christian worship on Sunday, were also the first to call Jesus Christ the true Sun-god, and to direct their prayers toward the east--the rising sun--to rise early in the morning that they pray facing the sun as it arose. Clement of Alexandria (c. 150-215 AD.) frequently called Christ the true Sun, and he urged the pagans to accept Him as such. Origen (c. 185-254) said, "Christ is the Sun of Justice; if the moon is united, which is the Church, it will be filled with His light." Cyprian (d. 258), Bishop of Carthage told believers "to pray at sunrise to commemorate the resurrection . . . and to pray at the setting of the sun . . . for the advent of Christ." "They took a much easier view of certain pagan customs, conventions and images and saw no objection, after ridding them of their pagan content, to adapting them to Christian thought."
--J. Danielou, Bible and Liturgy, p. 299.
When Christianity went down the same road of apostasy as Israel in amalgamating sun worship with the true worship of God through Christ, God sent the barbarians of the north who caused destruction and desolation everywhere they went. By the time Sunday sacredness had almost completely replaced God's seventh day Sabbath, the western Roman empire collapsed under the weight of continual invasions by the barbarians of the north. They spread destruction and desolation everywhere they went and sacked Rome itself several times. God's judgement comes from the north. When the abomination of desolation is set up again by law in place of God's Sabbath by the last beast of biblical prophesy, God Himself will bring judgement upon this earth.
When the canon of Scripture was closed, and the last of the apostles was dead, the first century was gone; and within twenty years of that time the perversion of the truth of Christ had become wide-spread. In the history of this century and of this subject the record is, —
"It is certain that to religious worship, both public and private, many rites were added, without necessity, and to the offense of sober and good men." ( Mosheim - "Ecclesiastical History," Murdock's translation, century 2, part 2, chap. iv, par. 1. )
And the reason of this is stated to be that —
"The Christians were pronounced atheists, because they were destitute of temples, altars, victims, priests, and all that pomp in which the vulgar suppose the essence of religion to consist. For unenlightened persons are prone to estimate religion by what meets
their eyes. To silence this accusation, the Christian doctors thought it necessary to introduce some external rites, which would strike the senses of the people, so that they could maintain themselves really to possess all those things of which Christians were charged with being destitute, though under different forms." ( Mosheim - Id., par. 3. )
This was at once to accommodate the Christian worship and its forms to that of the heathen, and was almost at one step to heathenize Christianity. No heathen element or form can be connected with Christianity or its worship, and Christianity remain pure.
Of all the ceremonies of the heathen, the mysteries were the most sacred and most universally practised. Some mysteries were in honor of Bacchus, some of Cybele, but the greatest of all, those considered the most sacred of all and the most widely practised, were the Eleusinian, so called because celebrated at Eleusis in Greece. But whatever was the mystery that was celebrated, there was always in it, as an essential part of it, the elements of abomination that characterized sun-worship everywhere, because the mysteries were simply forms of the wide-spread and multiform worship of the sun.
Among the first of the perversions of the Christian worship was to give to its forms the title and air of the mysteries. For says the record: —
"Among the Greeks and the people of the East, nothing was held more sacred than what were called the mysteries. This circumstance led the Christians, in order to impart dignity to their religion, to say that they also had similar mysteries, or certain holy rites concealed from the vulgar; and they not only applied the terms used in the pagan mysteries to Christian institutions, particularly baptism and the Lord's Supper, but they gradually introduced also the rites which were designated by these terms." ( Mosheim - Id., par. 5. )
It was to accommodate the Christian worship to the minds of a people who practised these things that the bishops gave to the Christian ordinances the name of mysteries. The Lord's Supper was made the greater mystery, baptism the lesser and the initiatory rite to the celebration of the former. After the heathen manner also a white garment was used as the initiatory robe, and the candidate, having been baptized, and thus initiated into the lesser mysteries, was admitted into what was called in the church the order of catechumens, in which order they remained a certain length of time, as in the heathen celebration, before they were admitted to the celebration of the Lord's Supper, the greater mystery.
"This practice originated in the Eastern provinces, and then after the time of Hadrian (who first introduced the pagan mysteries among the Latins) it spread among the Christians of the West." The reign of Hadrian was from 117-138. Therefore, before the second century was half gone, before the last of the apostles had been dead forty years, this apostasy, this working of the mystery of iniquity, had so largely spread over both the East and the West, that it is literally true that "a large part, therefore, of the Christian observances and institutions, even in this century, had the aspect of the pagan mysteries." ( Mosheim - "Ecclesiastical History," century 2, part 2, chap. 4, par. 5. ) ( The Great Empires of Prophecy, A. T. Jones )
"A law of the year 321 ordered tribunals, shops, and workshops to be closed on the day of the sun, and he [Constantine] sent to the legions, to be recited upon that day, a form of prayer which could have been employed by a worshiper of Mithra, of Serapis, or of Apollo, quite as well as by a Christian believer. This was the official sanction of the old custom of addressing a prayer to the rising sun. IN DETERMINING WHAT DAYS SHOULD BE REGARDED AS HOLY, and in the composition of a prayer for national use, CONSTANTINE EXERCISED ONE OF THE RIGHTS BELONGING TO HIM AS PONTIFEX MAXIMUS; and it caused no surprise that he should do this." ( Duruy - "History of Rome," chap. 102, part 1:par. 4 from end. )
The text of Constantine's Sunday Law of 321 A.D. is :
"One the venerable day of the Sun let the magistrates and people residing in cities rest, and let all workshops be closed. In the country however persons engaged in agriculture may freely and lawfully continue their pursuits because it often happens that another day is not suitable for gain-sowing or vine planting; lest by neglecting the proper moment for such operations the bounty of heaven should be lost. (Given the 7th day of March, Crispus and Constantine being consuls each of them the second time." Codex Justinianus, lib. 3, tit. 12, 3; translated in History of the Christian Church, Philip Schaff, D.D., (7-vol.ed.) Vol. III, p.380. New York, 1884
Dr. A.Chr. Bang says regarding this Law :
"This Sunday law constituted no real favoratism to Christianity..... It is evident from all his statuatory provisions that the Emperor during the time 313-323 with full consciousness has sought the realisation of his religeous aim: the amalgamation of heathenism and Christianity." Kirken og Romerstaten (The Church and the Roman State) p.256. Christiania, 1879
J. Westbury-Jones, an English writer, speaks thus: " How such a law would further the designs of Constantine it is not difficult to discover. It would confer a special honor upon the festival of the Christian church, and it would grant a slight boon to the pagans themselves. In fact there is nothing in this edict which might not have been written by a pagan. The law does honor to the pagan deity whom Constantine had adopted as his special patron god, Apollo or the sun [Constantine retained the motto "Soli Invicto" to the end of his life]. The very name of the day lent itself to this ambiguity. The term Sunday (dies Solis) was in use among Christians as well as heathen." (Roman and Christian Imperialism, p. 210)
The retention of the old pagan name of "dies Solis" or "Sunday", for the weekly Christian festival, is in great measure owing to the union of pagan and Christian sentiment with which the first day of the week was recommended by Constantine to his subjects, pagan and Christian alike, as the "venerable day of the sun". His decree regulating it's observance has been justly called a new era in the history of the Lord's day. It was his mode of harmonizing the discordant religions of the empire under one common institution. (A. P. Stanely, History of the Eastern Church, p. 184)
In A.D. 321, to please the bishops of the Catholic Church, he issued an edict commanding judges, townspeople, and mechanics to rest on Sunday. Yet in this also his paganism was still manifest, as the edict required rest on "the venerable day of the sun," and "enjoined the observance, or rather forbade the public desecration, of Sunday, not under the name of Sabbatum, or Dies Domini, but under its old astrological and heathen title, Dies Solis , familiar to all his subjects, so that the law was as applicable to the worshipers of Hercules, Apollo, and Mithras, as to the Christians." (History of the Christian Church, Vol. 3, sec. 75, par. 5.-Schaff.) ( The Great Empires of Prophecy by Alonzo Jones page 391 )
Then came Constantine, the best imperial representative of the new paganism, and the most devout worshiper of the sun as the supreme and universal deity, with the avowed purpose, as expressed in his own words, "First to bring the diverse judgments formed by all nations respecting the Deity to a condition, as it were, of settled uniformity." In Constantine the new paganism met its ideal, and the New Platonism - the apostate, paganized, sun-worshiping form of Christianity - met its long-wished-for instrument. In him the two streams met. In him the aspiration of Elagabalus, the hope of Ammonius Saccas and Clement, of Plotinus and Origen, and the ambition of the perverse-minded, self-exalted bishops, were all realized and accomplished - a new, imperial, and universal religion was created.
Therefore, "the reign of Constantine the Great forms one of the epochs in the history of the world. It is the era of the dissolution of the Roman Empire; the commencement, or rather consolidation, of a kind of Eastern despotism, with a new capital, a new patriciate, a new constitution, a new financial system, a new, though as yet imperfect, jurisprudence, and, finally, a new religion." ( Milman - History of Christianity, book 3, chap. 1, par. 1 )
"Aurelian ... created a new cult of the 'Invincible Son.' Worshipped in a splendid temple, served by pontiffs who were raised to the level of the ancient pontiffs of Rome .... On establishing this new cult, Aurelian in reality proclaimed the dethronement of the old Roman idolatry and the accession of Semitic Sun-Worship." Franz Cumont, "Astrology and Religion Among the Greeks and Romans," p. 55, 56.
"The two opposed creeds [Christianity and Mithraism] moved in the same intellectual and moral sphere, and one could actually pass from one to the other without shock or interruption." Cumont, ibid. p. 210.
"Our observance of Sunday as the Lord's day is apparently derived from Mithraism. The argument that has sometimes been used against this claim, namely, that Sunday was chosen because of the resurrection on that day, is not well supported." Gordon J. Laing, "Survivals of Roman Religion," p. 148.
"As a solar festival, Sunday was the sacred day of Mithra; and it is interesting to notice that since Mithra was addressed as Dominus, 'Lord,' Sunday must have been the 'Lord's Day' long before the Christian times." A. Weigall, "The Paganism in Our Christianity," p. 145.
"Cults of the sun, as we know from many sources, had attained great vogue during the second, third, and fourth centuries. Sun-worshipers indeed formed one of the big groups in that religious world in which Christianity was fighting for a place. Many of them became converts to Christianity . . . Worshipers in St. Peter's turned away from the altar and faced the door so that they could adore the rising sun."--Gordon J. Laing, Survivals of Roman Religion, p. 192. [Dr. Laing(1869-1945) was a Canadian-born university professor and later dean at the University of Chicago].
It was the Roman Imperial plan on several occasions, to unite all religions of the Empire into one religion--sun-worship: "The Jewish, the Samaritan, even the Christian, were to be fused and recast into one great system, of which the sun was to be the central object of adoration."--Henry Hart Milman, The History of Christianity, bk. 2, chap. 8 (Vol. II, p. 175). [Dr. Milman (1791-1868) was an important historian of England and dean of St. Paul's Cathedral in London].
"Others, with greater regard to good manners, it must be confessed, suppose that the sun is the god of the Christians, because it is a well-known fact that we pray toward the east, or because we make Sunday a day of festivity. What then? Do you do less than this? Do not many among you, with an affectation of sometimes worshiping the heavenly bodies, likewise move your lips in the direction of the sunrise? It is you, at all events, who have admitted the sun into the calendar of the week; and you have selected its day, in preference to the preceding day, as the most suitable in the week for either an entire abstinence from the bath, or for its postponement until the evening, or for taking rest and banqueting." — Tertullian "Ad Nationes," book 1, chap. 13.
While this effort was being made on the side of philosophy to unite all religions, there was at the same time a like effort on the side of politics. It was the ambition of Elagabalus (A.D. 218-222) to make the worship of the sun supersede all other worship in Rome. It is further related of him that a more ambitious scheme even than this was in the emperor's mind; which was nothing less than the blending of all religions into one, of which "the sun was to be the central object of adoration." — Milman "History of Christianity" book 2, chap. 8, par. 22. But the elements were not yet fully prepared for such a fusion. Also the shortness of the reign of Elagabalus prevented any decided advancement toward success.
"The Church made a sacred day of Sunday . . . largely because it was the weekly festival of the sun;--for it was a definite Christian policy to take over the pagan festivals endeared to the people by tradition, and to give them a Christian significance."-- Arthur Weigall, "The Paganism in Our Christianity," 1928, p. 145.
"Remains of the struggle [between the religion of Christianity and the religion of Mithraism] are found in two institutions adopted from its rival by Christianity in the fourth century, the two Mithraic sacred days: December 25, 'dies natalis solis' [birthday of the sun], as the birthday of Jesus,--and Sunday, 'the venerable day of the Sun,' as Constantine called it in his edict of 321."--Walter Woodburn Hyde, "Paganism to Christianity in the Roman Empire," p. 60.
"Constantine labored at this time untiringly to unite the worshipers of the old and the new into one religion. All his laws and contrivances are aimed at promoting this amalgamation of religions. He would by all lawful and peaceable means melt together a purified heathenism and a moderated Christianity . . . Of all his blending and melting together of Christianity and heathenism, none is more easy to see through than this making of his Sunday law: The Christians worshiped their Christ, the heathen their Sun-god. . . [so they should now be combined."--H.G. Heggtveit, "illustreret Kirkehistorie," 1895, p. 202.
"These Gentile Christians of Rome and Alexandria began calling the first day of the week 'the Lord's day.' This was not difficult for the pagans of the Roman Empire who were steeped in sun worship to accept, because they [the pagans] referred to their sun-god as their 'Lord.' "--EM. Chalmers, "How Sunday Came Into the Christian Church," p. 3.
"The early Christians had at first adopted the Jewish seven-day week with its numbered week days, but by the close of the third century A.D. this began to give way to the planetary week; and in the fourth and fifth centuries the pagan designations became generally accepted in the western half of Christendom. The use of the planetary names by Christians attests the growing influence of astrological speculations introduced by converts from paganism . . . During these same centuries the spread of Oriental solar [sun] worships, especially that of Mithra [Persian sun worship], in the Roman world, had already led to the substitution by pagans of dies Solis for dies Saturni, as the first day of the planetary week. Thus gradually a pagan institution was engrafted on Christianity."--Hutton Webster, Rest Days, pp. 220-221. [Webster (1875-?), was an author, historian, and professor at the University of Nebraska].
"Our observance of Sunday as the Lord's day is apparently derived from Mithraism. The argument that has sometimes been used against this claim, namely, that Sunday was chosen because of the resurrection on that day, is not well supported." Gordon J. Laing, "Survivals of Roman Religion," p. 148.
: AmoThe weekly observance is what Jewish influenced apostate "Christianity" brought to the table, in the amalgamation of apostate "Christianity" with paganism.
Let me get this straight: You're saying that the weekly worship of Christians is due to an influence from the Jewish religion, which I'd agree with, and that this weekly worship that Christianity inherited from the Jewish faith led to an amalgamation between it and paganism? How does that even make sense?? The Roman pagans didn't observe a weekly worship on any day, including Sunday. So how in the world would the weekly worship of Christians possibly lead to a supposed amalgamation between them and those who didn't worship weekly? Why would the pagans even care? Amo, you're not making any sense here.
: AmoPredominantly sun worshiping paganism, brought the day of the sun in to replace God's sabbath.
The ancient Romans worshipped many gods, Amo, Sol, the sun god, being one of them. And while they may have worshipped Sol, they certainly didn't worship him weekly on Sunday. The quotes I provided show that clearly. No where does it say that the ancient Romans worshipped Sol on Sunday. And yet Christians have been meeting together on Sunday weekly since the start in celebration of the resurrection of Christ on that day (cf. St. Justin Martyr's
First Apology, Chp 67). Your reasoning is nonsensical.
: Amo quoting from J. Danielou, Bible and Liturgy, p. 299.North African half-heathen Christians
Half-heathen Christians? Really Amo? You're quoting from someone who refers to other Christians as "half-heathen"?? I guess birds of a feather and all that.
: Amo quoting from J. Danielou, Bible and Liturgy, p. 299.were also the first to call Jesus Christ the true Sun-god,
Notice no quote or reference is given.
: Amo quoting from J. Danielou, Bible and Liturgy, p. 299.Clement of Alexandria (c. 150-215 AD.) frequently called Christ the true Sun, and he urged the pagans to accept Him as such. Origen (c. 185-254) said, "Christ is the Sun of Justice; if the moon is united, which is the Church, it will be filled with His light."
Yeah, because scripture would never ever liken Christ to the sun, let alone with the epithet "the Sun of Righteousness" (Malachi 4:2), because that would be a nod to paganism, right Amo? Thankfully, we can be assured that no prophet of scripture would ever refer to the Lord in that way ::frown::. I mean, what were these Church fathers thinking anyways? ::shrug::
: AmoWhen Christianity went down the same road of apostasy as Israel in amalgamating sun worship with the true worship of God through Christ, God sent the barbarians of the north who caused destruction and desolation everywhere they went. By the time Sunday sacredness had almost completely replaced God's seventh day Sabbath, the western Roman empire collapsed under the weight of continual invasions by the barbarians of the north. They spread destruction and desolation everywhere they went and sacked Rome itself several times. God's judgement comes from the north. When the abomination of desolation is set up again by law in place of God's Sabbath by the last beast of biblical prophesy, God Himself will bring judgement upon this earth.
I see that you have many thoughts in your head Amo. Wrong thoughts for sure, but many nonetheless.
My quotes and replies in blue.
The weekly observance is what Jewish influenced apostate "Christianity" brought to the table, in the amalgamation of apostate "Christianity" with paganism.
Let me get this straight: You're saying that the weekly worship of Christians is due to an influence from the Jewish religion, which I'd agree with, and that this weekly worship that Christianity inherited from the Jewish faith led to an amalgamation between it and paganism? How does that even make sense?? The Roman pagans didn't observe a weekly worship on any day, including Sunday. So how in the world would the weekly worship of Christians possibly lead to a supposed amalgamation between them and those who didn't worship weekly? Why would the pagans even care? Amo, you're not making any sense here.
What I say of course, will not make sense to those ignorant of the history involved, or those simply ignoring that history because they do not like where the examination of such leads. You, I would guess belong to the latter group, since more than just a little of that history has already been shared with you right here.
Some pagan sun worshipers did honor Sunday such as those of Mithraism. There is no denying the history of interplay between sun worshiping pagans and Christianity during its early development. Christianity grew and spread among, in conflict with, and ever increasingly influenced by, predominantly sun worshiping pagans. The development of which reached a climactic point when their Emperor began supporting and eventually claimed to have become a Christian.
Constantine had a vision of a cross, went to battle and conquered his enemies under that sign, established Christianity as a legal religion of the empire, demanded that all properties lost during their persecutions be returned to them, that is to the Catholic church, then demanded that all Christians basically be Catholic, and also instituted a Sunday law applicable to pagans and Christians alike. Will you pretend these things went without notice by the pagans? Or that there were not developments along these very lines leading up to these climactic events?
Pagan's had no choice but to care. A new religion developed and rapidly spread among them. Its numbers increased rapidly. Then its power and influence increased also as more prominent members of society began joining its ranks. During which time also, pagan influences began entering the church through all of the same. This continued until pagan influenced "Christianity" grew to large and had to many powerful members including the emperor, to be held down any longer. It eventually took over, commanding all to become Catholic "Christians" and itself persecuting pagans or Christians that would not submit. These events would be pretty hard to ignore. Sunday sacredness and Sunday law both played intricate parts in the development of the Catholic state church which would plague humanity for many centuries to come. Choosing to ignore these historical facts cannot and will not change them.
The ancient Romans worshipped many gods, Amo, Sol, the sun god, being one of them. And while they may have worshipped Sol, they certainly didn't worship him weekly on Sunday. The quotes I provided show that clearly. No where does it say that the ancient Romans worshipped Sol on Sunday. And yet Christians have been meeting together on Sunday weekly since the start in celebration of the resurrection of Christ on that day (cf. St. Justin Martyr's First Apology, Chp 67). Your reasoning is nonsensical.
It is nonsensical to those willing to deny or ignore history in order to maintain their beliefs. Let's see, Sun-day, or the day of the Sun. If sun worshipers were going to have a special day of worship, gee I don't know, what day do you think that would be? What day do you suppose compromising "Christians" could choose to worship, that would not offend their pagan sun worshiping contemporaries, gee I don't know, maybe Sun-day?
Christians did not begin Sunday observance from the start. Your reference to Justin Martyr's First Apology proves nothing regarding the same. The man was a perfect example of what I have already stated. He was a converted pagan and Greek philosopher. You look to him for proof of Sunday sacredness because you cannot look to the scriptures for the same. The scriptures speak nothing of it, because it developed later in time, and without any support from Christ or the apostles.
You may not be Catholic, but your contention is the same as theirs. You believe some who called themselves the church, had the authority to do away with the seventh day Sabbath, and institute another day of worship in its place. All of this with no scriptural authority. You ignore the fact that a great many Christians who also considered themselves the church, continued to keep the seventh day Sabbath, and simply argue that the early church did away with it, and established Sunday sacredness. Who do you say the Sabbath keepers were? Or do you just deny their existence altogether?
Half-heathen Christians? Really Amo? You're quoting from someone who refers to other Christians as "half-heathen"?? I guess birds of a feather and all that.
Quote from: Amo quoting from J. Danielou, Bible and Liturgy, p. 299.
were also the first to call Jesus Christ the true Sun-god,
Notice no quote or reference is given.
Quote from: Amo quoting from J. Danielou, Bible and Liturgy, p. 299.
Clement of Alexandria (c. 150-215 AD.) frequently called Christ the true Sun, and he urged the pagans to accept Him as such. Origen (c. 185-254) said, "Christ is the Sun of Justice; if the moon is united, which is the Church, it will be filled with His light."
http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Clement_of_Alexandria (http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Clement_of_Alexandria)
Clement of AlexandriaClement of Alexandria (c. 150 – 215) (Titus Flavius Clemens) was an early Christian philosopher and one of the most distinguished teachers of the Church of Alexandria. He is known for his attempt to unite Greek philosophy with Christian teachings and drew a large number of educated pagans to the Church. His passion for philosophy, especially for the teachings of Plato, contributed to the "hellenization" of Christianity.
Clement of Alexandria was, and still is, a highly unorthodox and controversial figure in Church history.
Perhaps the following quotes had something to do with from J. Danielou accusations. All emphasis mine.
Clement of Alexandria
THE STROMATA,
OR MISCELLANIES
BOOK 7
CHAPTER 7
WHAT SORT OF PRAYER THE GNOSTIC EMPLOYS, AND HOW IT IS HEARD BY GOD
And since the dawn is an image of the day of birth, and from that point the light which has shone forth at first from the darkness increases, there has also dawned on those involved in darkness a day of the knowledge of truth.
In correspondence with the manner of the sun's rising, prayers are made looking towards the sunrise in the east. Whence also the most ancient temples looked towards the west, that people might be taught to turn to the east when facing the images. "Let my prayer be directed before Thee as incense, the uplifting of my hands as the evening sacrifice," say the Psalms.
EXHORTATION TO THE HEATHEN
CHAPTER 6- BY DIVINE INSPIRATION PHILOSOPHERS SOMETIMES HIT ON THE TRUTH
For the sun never could show me the true God;
but that healthful Word, that is the Sun of the soul, by whom alone, when He arises in the depths of the soul, the eye of the soul itself is irradiated. Whence accordingly, Democritus, not without reason, says, "that a few of the men of intellect, raising their hands upwards to what we Greeks now call the air (ajh>r), called the whole expanse Zeus, or God: He, too, knows all things, gives and takes away, and He is King of all.
CHAPTER 8
THE TRUE DOCTRINE IS TO BE SOUGHT IN THE PROPHETS
It is now time, as we have dispatched in order the other points, to go to the prophetic Scriptures; for the oracles present us with the appliances necessary for the attainment of piety, and so establish the truth. The divine Scriptures and institutions of wisdom form the short road to salvation. Devoid of embellishment, of outward beauty of diction, of wordiness and seductiveness, they raise up humanity strangled by wickedness, teaching men to despise the casualties of life; and with one and the same voice remedying many evils, they at once dissuade us from pernicious deceit, and clearly exhort us to the attainment of the salvation set before us. Let the Sibyl prophetess, then, be the first to sing to us the song of salvation: —
"So He is all sure and unerring:
Come, follow no longer darkness and gloom;
See, the sun's sweet-glancing light shines gloriously.Know, and lay up wisdom in your hearts:
There is one God, who sends rains, and winds, and earthquakes,
Thunderbolts, famines, plagues, and dismal sorrows,
And snows and ice. But why detail particulars?
He reigns over heaven, He rules earth, He truly is;" —
where, in remarkable accordance with inspiration she compares delusion to darkness,
and the knowledge of God to the sun and light, and subjecting both to comparison, shows the choice we ought to make. For falsehood is not dissipated by the bare presentation of the truth, but by the practical improvement of the truth it is ejected and put to flight.
CHAP. IX.--"THAT THOSE GRIEVOUSLY SIN WHO DESPISE OR NEGLECT GOD'S GRACIOUS CALLING."
Wherefore the blessed apostle says: "I testify in the Lord, that ye walk no longer as the Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind; having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart: who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness and concupiscence." After the accusation of such a witness, and his invocation of God, what else remains for the unbelieving than judgment and condemnation? And the Lord, with ceaseless assiduity, exhorts, terrifies, urges, rouses, admonishes; He awakes from the sleep of darkness, and raises up those who have wandered in error. "Awake," He says, "thou that sleepest,
and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light," --Christ, the Sun of the Resurrection, He "who was born before the morning star," and with His beams bestows life.CHAPTER 10
ANSWER TO THE OBJECTION OF THE HEATHEN, THAT IT WAS NOT RIGHT TO ABANDON THE CUSTOMS OF THEIR FATHERS
His Son, and the Word was in God, not disbelieved in by all when He was first preached, nor altogether unknown when, assuming the character of man, and fashioning Himself in flesh, He enacted the drama of human salvation: for He was a true champion and a fellow-champion with the creature. And being communicated most speedily to men,
having dawned from His Father's counsel quicker than the sun, with the most perfect ease He made God shine on us. Whence He was and what He was, He showed by what He taught and exhibited, manifesting Himself as the Herald of the Covenant, the Reconciler, our Savior, the Word, the Fount of life, the Giver of peace, diffused over the whole face of the earth; by whom, so to speak, the universe has already become an ocean of blessings.
CHAP. XI.--HOW GREAT ARE THE BENEFITS CONFERRED ON MAN THROUGH THE ADVENT OF
For how can it be other than desirable, since it has filled with light the mind which had been buried in darkness, and given keenness to the "light-bringing eyes" of the soul?
For just as, had the sun not been in existence, night would have brooded over the universe notwithstanding the other luminaries of heaven; so, had we nor known the Word, and been illuminated by Him; we should have been nowise different from fowls that are being fed, fattened in darkness, and nourished for death. Let us then admit the light, that we may admit God; let us admit the light, and become disciples to the Lord. This, too, He has been promised to the Father: "I will declare Thy name to my brethren; in the midst of the Church will I praise Thee."
CHAP. XI.--HOW GREAT ARE THE BENEFITS CONFERRED ON MAN THROUGH THE ADVENT OF
Hail, O light! For in us, buried in darkness, shut up in the shadow of death, light has shone forth from heaven, purer than the sun, sweeter than life here below. That light is eternal life; and whatever partakes of it lives. But night fears the light, and hiding itself in terror, gives place to the day of the Lord. Sleepless light is now over all, and the west has given credence to the east.
For this was the end of the new creation. For "the Sun of Righteousness," who drives His chariot over all, pervades equally all humanity, like "His Father, who makes His sun to rise on all men," and distils on them the dew of the truth. He hath changed sunset into sunrise, and through the cross brought death to life; and having wrenched man from destruction, He hath raised him to the skies, transplanting mortality into immortality, and translating earth to heaven--He, the husbandman of God,
THE INSTRUCTOR
[PAEDAGOGUS]
BOOK 1
CHAPTER 9
THAT IT IS THE PREROGATIVE OF THE SAME POWER TO BE BENEFICENT AND TO PUNISH JUSTLY. ALSO THE MANNER OF THE INSTRUCTION OF THE LOGOS
So God is good on His own account, and just also on ours, and He is just because He is good. And His justice is shown to us by His own Word from there from above, whence the Father was. For before He became Creator He was God; He was good. And therefore He wished to be Creator and Father.
And the nature of all that love was the source of righteousness — the cause, too, of His lighting up His sun, and sending down His own Son. And He first announced the good righteousness that is from heaven, when He said, "No man knoweth the Son, but the Father; nor the Father, but the Son."
THE STROMATA,
OR MISCELLANIES
BOOK 5
CHAPTER 6
THE MYSTIC MEANING OF THE TABERNACLE AND ITS FURNITURE
Now the Lord, having come alone into the intellectual world, enters by His sufferings, introduced into the knowledge of the Ineffable, ascending above every name which is known by sound. The lamp, too, was placed to the south of the altar of incense; and by it were shown the motions of the seven planets, that perform their revolutions towards the south.
For three branches rose on either side of the tamp, and lights on them; since also the sun, like the lamp, set in the midst of all the planets, dispenses with a kind of divine music the light to those above and to those below. The golden lamp conveys another enigma as a symbol of Christ, not in respect of form alone, but in his casting light, "at sundry times and divers manners," on those who believe on Him and hope, and who see by means of the ministry of the First-born. And they say that the seven eyes of the Lord "are the seven spirits resting on the rod that springs from the root of Jesse."
BOOK 6
CHAPTER 17
PHILOSOPHY CONVEYS ONLY AN IMPERFECT KNOWLEDGE OF GOD
For it is not that we may seem good that we believe in Christ, as it is not alone for the purpose of being seen, while in the sun, that we pass into the sun. But in the one case for the purpose of being warmed; and in the other, we are compelled to be Christians in order to be excellent and good. For the kingdom belongs pre-eminently to the violent, who, from investigation, and study, and discipline, reap this fruit, that they become kings.
BOOK 7
CHAPTER 3
THE GNOSTIC AIMS AT THE NEAREST LIKENESS POSSIBLE TO GOD AND HIS SON
For, just as the sun not only illumines heaven and the whole world, shining over land and sea, but also through windows and small chinks sends his beams into the innermost recesses of houses, so the Word diffused everywhere casts His eye-glance on the minutest circumstances of the actions of life.FRAGMENTS OF
CLEMENS ALEXANDRINUS
[TRANSLATED BY REV. WILLIAM WILSON, M.A.]
FRAGMENTS
3. — COMMENTS ON THE FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN.
There was; then, a Word importing an unbeginning eternity; as also the Word itself, that is, the Son of God, who being, by equality of substance, one with the Father, is eternal and uncreate. That He was always the Word, is signified by saying, "In the beginning was the Word." But by the expression, "we have seen with our eyes," he signifies the Lord's presence in the flesh, "and our hands have handled," he says, "of the Word of life."
He means not only His flesh, but the virtues of the Son, like the sunbeam which penetrates to the lowest places, — this sunbeam coming in the flesh became palpable to the disciples. It is accordingly related in traditions, that John, touching the outward body itself, sent his hand deep down into it, and that the solidity of the flesh offered no obstacle, but gave way to the hand of the disciple.
Yeah, because scripture would never ever liken Christ to the sun, let alone with the epithet "the Sun of Righteousness" (Malachi 4:2), because that would be a nod to paganism, right Amo? Thankfully, we can be assured that no prophet of scripture would ever refer to the Lord in that way . I mean, what were these Church fathers thinking anyways?
That term appears in scripture once. It is in reference to the fact that although God's appearance will bring destruction and fire upon the wicked, it will be as the healing rays of the sun upon the saved.
Mal 4:1 For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the LORD of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch. 2 But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall.
A Jewish prophet speaking the above to the Jews, is a far cry from a Greek philosopher speaking such to pagans or newly converted pagans. One may be appropriate, the other certainly not.
When Christianity went down the same road of apostasy as Israel in amalgamating sun worship with the true worship of God through Christ, God sent the barbarians of the north who caused destruction and desolation everywhere they went. By the time Sunday sacredness had almost completely replaced God's seventh day Sabbath, the western Roman empire collapsed under the weight of continual invasions by the barbarians of the north. They spread destruction and desolation everywhere they went and sacked Rome itself several times. God's judgement comes from the north. When the abomination of desolation is set up again by law in place of God's Sabbath by the last beast of biblical prophesy, God Himself will bring judgement upon this earth.
I see that you have many thoughts in your head Amo. Wrong thoughts for sure, but many nonetheless.
God will be the judge of that, not you. You are certainly entitled to your opinion. One of us no doubt will have some serious explaining to do, when we stand before the judge of all.
: AmoWhat I say of course, will not make sense to those ignorant of the history involved, or those simply ignoring that history because they do not like where the examination of such leads. You, I would guess belong to the latter group, since more than just a little of that history has already been shared with you right here.
Same for you too Amo! After all, the quotes I provided show no indication whatsoever that Sunday was considered a holy day or a day of rest or even a holiday by the ancient Romans. And my quotes are coming from various sources which are all contemporary with links provided, unlike yours. Also, unlike yours, my sources aren't biased and prejudiced against the historic Church and its people.
: AmoSome pagan sun worshipers did honor Sunday such as those of Mithraism. There is no denying the history of interplay between sun worshiping pagans and Christianity during its early development. Christianity grew and spread among, in conflict with, and ever increasingly influenced by, predominantly sun worshiping pagans. The development of which reached a climactic point when their Emperor began supporting and eventually claimed to have become a Christian.
Mithrasim began in the Roman Empire around the same time Christianity was beginning to take off in the 1st century AD. It survived until the 4th century AD when Christianity finally overtook it as the dominate faith. Since its rise was in such close proximity with the rise of the Christian faith, it is believed that the adherents of Mithraism "borrowed" elements of their worship and faith from the Christians who were a very prominent sect in the empire. The following is from the Catholic Encyclopedia regarding the apparent borrowing of Mithraism from Christianity, and while you may not like the source of the quote I find its reasoning to be quite compelling in this regard:
: Catholic EncyclopediaRelation to Christianity
A similarity between Mithra and Christ struck even early observers, such as Justin, Tertullian, and other Fathers, and in recent times has been urged to prove that Christianity is but an adaptation of Mithraism, or at most the outcome of the same religious ideas and aspirations (e.g. Robertson, "Pagan Christs", 1903). Against this erroneous and unscientific procedure, which is not endorsed by the greatest living authority on Mithraism, the following considerations must be brought forward.
(1) Our knowledge regarding Mithraism is very imperfect; some 600 brief inscriptions, mostly dedicatory, some 300 often fragmentary, exiguous, almost identical monuments, a few casual references in the Fathers or Acts of the Martyrs, and a brief polemic against Mithraism which the Armenian Eznig about 450 probably copied from Theodore of Mopsuestia (d. 428) who lived when Mithraism was almost a thing of the past — these are our only sources, unless we include the Avesta in which Mithra is indeed mentioned, but which cannot be an authority for Roman Mithraism with which Christianity is compared. Our knowledge is mostly ingenious guess-work; of the real inner working of Mithraism and the sense in which it was understood by those who professed it at the advent of Christianity, we know nothing.
(2) Some apparent similarities exist; but in a number of details it is quite probable that Mithraism was the borrower from Christianity. Tertullian about 200 could say: "hesterni sumus et omnia vestra implevimus" ("we are but of yesterday, yet your whole world is full of us"). It is not unnatural to suppose that a religion which filled the whole world, should have been copied at least in some details by another religion which was quite popular during the third century. Moreover the resemblances pointed out are superficial and external. Similarity in words and names is nothing; it is the sense that matters. During these centuries Christianity was coining its own technical terms, and naturally took names, terms, and expressions current in that day; and so did Mithraism. But under identical terms each system thought its own thoughts. Mithra is called a mediator; and so is Christ; but Mithra originally only in a cosmogonic or astronomical sense; Christ, being God and man, is by nature the Mediator between God and man. And so in similar instances. Mithraism had a Eucharist, but the idea of a sacred banquet is as old as the human race and existed at all ages and amongst all peoples. Mithra saved the world by sacrificing a bull; Christ by sacrificing Himself. It is hardly possible to conceive a more radical difference than that between Mithra taurochtonos and Christ crucified. Christ was born of a Virgin; there is nothing to prove that the same was believed of Mithra born from the rock. Christ was born in a cave; and Mithraists worshipped in a cave, but Mithra was born under a tree near a river. Much as been made of the presence of adoring shepherds; but their existence on sculptures has not been proven, and considering that man had not yet appeared, it is an anachronism to suppose their presence.
(3) Christ was an historical personage, recently born in a well-known town of Judea, and crucified under a Roman governor, whose name figured in the ordinary official lists. Mithra was an abstraction, a personification not even of the sun but of the diffused daylight; his incarnation, if such it may be called, was supposed to have happened before the creation of the human race, before all history. The small Mithraic congregations were like masonic lodges for a few and for men only and even those mostly of one class, the military; a religion that excludes the half of the human race bears no comparison to the religion of Christ. Mithraism was all comprehensive and tolerant of every other cult, the Pater Patrum himself was an adept in a number of other religions; Christianity was essential exclusive, condemning every other religion in the world, alone and unique in its majesty.
Source: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10402a.htm (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10402a.htm)
The early Christian apologists like Tertullian and St. Justin spoke about the appropriations of Mithraism from the Christian faith. Hear what they say about it:
: St. Justin the Martyr, Dialogue With Trypho The Jew, Chapter 70And when those who record the mysteries of Mithras say that he was begotten of a rock, and call the place where those who believe in him are initiated a cave, do I not perceive here that the utterance of Daniel, that a stone without hands was cut out of a great mountain, has been imitated by them, and that they have attempted likewise to imitate the whole of Isaiah's words?
Source: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/01286.htm (http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/01286.htm)
: St. Justin the Martyr, First Apology, Chapter 66And this food is called among us Εὐχαριστία [the Eucharist], of which no one is allowed to partake but the man who believes that the things which we teach are true, and who has been washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins, and unto regeneration, and who is so living as Christ has enjoined. For not as common bread and common drink do we receive these; but in like manner as Jesus Christ our Saviour, having been made flesh by the Word of God, had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so likewise have we been taught that the food which is blessed by the prayer of His word, and from which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished, is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh. For the apostles, in the memoirs composed by them, which are called Gospels, have thus delivered unto us what was enjoined upon them; that Jesus took bread, and when He had given thanks, said, This do in remembrance of Me, Luke 22:19 this is My body; and that, after the same manner, having taken the cup and given thanks, He said, This is My blood; and gave it to them alone. Which the wicked devils have imitated in the mysteries of Mithras, commanding the same thing to be done. For, that bread and a cup of water are placed with certain incantations in the mystic rites of one who is being initiated, you either know or can learn.
Source: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0126.htm (http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0126.htm)
: Tertullian, Prescription Against Heretics, Chapter 40The question will arise, By whom is to be interpreted the sense of the passages which make for heresies? By the devil, of course, to whom pertain those wiles which pervert the truth, and who, by the mystic rites of his idols, vies even with the essential portions of the sacraments of God. He, too, baptizes some— that is, his own believers and faithful followers; he promises the putting away of sins by a laver (of his own); and if my memory still serves me, Mithra there, (in the kingdom of Satan,) sets his marks on the foreheads of his soldiers; celebrates also the oblation of bread, and introduces an image of a resurrection , and before a sword wreathes a crown. What also must we say to (Satan's) limiting his chief priest to a single marriage? He, too, has his virgins; he, too, has his proficients in continence. Suppose now we revolve in our minds the superstitions of Numa Pompilius, and consider his priestly offices and badges and privileges, his sacrificial services, too, and the instruments and vessels of the sacrifices themselves, and the curious rites of his expiations and vows: is it not clear to us that the devil imitated the well-known moroseness of the Jewish law? Since, therefore he has shown such emulation in his great aim of expressing, in the concerns of his idolatry, those very things of which consists the administration of Christ's sacraments, it follows, of course, that the same being, possessing still the same genius, both set his heart upon, and succeeded in, adapting to his profane and rival creed the very documents of divine things and of the Christian saints — his interpretation from their interpretations, his words from their words, his parables from their parables. For this reason, then, no one ought to doubt, either that spiritual wickednesses, from which also heresies come, have been introduced by the devil, or that there is any real difference between heresies and idolatry, seeing that they appertain both to the same author and the same work that idolatry does.
Source: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0311.htm (http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0311.htm)
The early Christians knew all to well about the various heretical and pagan teachings that were floating around during their time. They didn't shrink away from confronting them, but addressed them head on in their writings, often being martyred for their witness to the Truth. Mithraism was just another pagan religion which appeared to "borrow" some of its rites and rituals from the Christian faith. No doubt the weekly Christian worship on Sunday, something that wasn't practiced by the other pagan Romans, was also influential on the adherents of Mithraism as well. So, far from the early Christians getting their teachings and practices from Mithraism, it would appear that it was the other way around. After all, the counterfeit
always follows the genuine.
: AmoConstantine had a vision of a cross, went to battle and conquered his enemies under that sign, established Christianity as a legal religion of the empire, demanded that all properties lost during their persecutions be returned to them, that is to the Catholic church, then demanded that all Christians basically be Catholic, and also instituted a Sunday law applicable to pagans and Christians alike. Will you pretend these things went without notice by the pagans? Or that there were not developments along these very lines leading up to these climactic events?
Pagan's had no choice but to care. A new religion developed and rapidly spread among them. Its numbers increased rapidly.
Amo, by St. Constantine's time Christianity had been around in the Roman empire for over 300 years! Do you consider the Methodist church, which was established in 1735 (282 years ago) to be a "new" denomination? Or how about the Baptist church, which was established in 1609 (408 years ago) to be a "new" denomination? Or how about your own Seventh-day Adventist church, established in 1863 (just 154 years ago), to be a "new" denomination? Of course you don't. And neither was Christianity "new" at the time of St. Constantine. For the pagans, Christianity was as normal and well known as any of the denominations I listed are known in the U.S. today. In other words, Christianity wasn't new to them.
And another thing, you never did answer my question from before: If Sunday was considered such a holy and sacred day by the Roman pagans, notwithstanding the beliefs of the adherents of Mithraism, why do you suppose then that St. Constantine's Sunday law was the very first one enacted in the entire history of the Roman empire up to his time which was some 1,074 years from Rome's founding? I'd be interested to hear some twisted reasoning from you about how Sunday was always regarded as holy and sacred by the Romans but somehow was never venerated as such by them. Good luck with that one!
: AmoIt is nonsensical to those willing to deny or ignore history in order to maintain their beliefs. Let's see, Sun-day, or the day of the Sun. If sun worshipers were going to have a special day of worship, gee I don't know, what day do you think that would be? What day do you suppose compromising "Christians" could choose to worship, that would not offend their pagan sun worshiping contemporaries, gee I don't know, maybe Sun-day?
So, according to your reasoning, the early Christians chose to worship together on Sunday, not because of their love for Christ and His resurrection testified to by St. Justin the Martyr (because apparently that was a dastardly lie), but because the Christians wanted to get in the good graces of a start up sun-worshipping cult that met in caves underground?? Yeah, sure they did, Amo, sure they did. ::frown::
If the early Christians didn't want to offend their pagan contemporaries, as you suggest, then why did they speak out so strongly against the various heresies and paganism of their day, including Mithraism, denouncing them as from demons? I mean, if they weren't trying to offend them, then they certainly wouldn't have spoken out against them the way did, would they?
: AmoChristians did not begin Sunday observance from the start.
Correction: Christians have never "observed" Sunday. They "observe" the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. And what better day to observe Easter/Pascha than on the day He rose from the dead? That's why Christians gather together to worship on Sundays, because of the Lord's resurrection. After all, scripture says that He rose from the dead on the first day of the week (i.e. Sunday). You have to understand Amo, that the resurrection of Christ is the meaning and purpose of the Christian, without which there would be no Christianity. Therefore, Christ's resurrection on Sunday takes precedence over everything else. It is most holy, not the day, but the event that occurred on the day. And it is that event that is "observed" and celebrated every Sunday in the historic Church.
: AmoYour reference to Justin Martyr's First Apology proves nothing regarding the same. The man was a perfect example of what I have already stated. He was a converted pagan and Greek philosopher. You look to him for proof of Sunday sacredness because you cannot look to the scriptures for the same. The scriptures speak nothing of it, because it developed later in time, and without any support from Christ or the apostles.
You're right, he was a converted Greek philosopher, but he was no pagan since he didn't worship the deities of the Greeks and Romans. You'd know this if you bothered to actually read his writings. And I don't look to him for "proof" of Sunday sacredness. I simply employ him as an eyewitness to what Christians were, for a long time, believing and doing in his day. He was merely relating what he was taught when he came into the Church. After all, he wasn't inventing the practice of Baptism or the Eucharist or the prayers or the readings from the Prophets and Apostles that the Church did every time it worshipped was he? Of course not. And neither was he inventing for the first time the practice of Christians meeting together on Sunday for worship. He was simply stating what was a fact among Christians in his day so soon after the Apostles' time. That is all.
It seems to me that the Seventh-day Adventist ire over an eyewitness' testimony that doesn't agree with their imaginary theories is most unreasonable. St. Justin has no axe to grind in our discussion, Amo, and he certainly had no knowledge of a Seventh-day Adventist church whose doctrines he knew nothing about. When he related what the Christians practiced he was speaking to the ancient Roman government (see chapter 1 of his
First Apology), not to Jews or Seventh-day Adventists that he was trying to convert. His goal in his writing was simply an attempt to persuade pagan Rome to stop killing Christians for merely being Christians. His testimony is what it is, and I take it for what it is, an honest assessment of Christians in his day. That's why his testimony is so valuable to us today, because it gives us a snap-shot ::takingphoto:: of the Church from antiquity.
: AmoYou may not be Catholic, but your contention is the same as theirs.
I never said that I wasn't Catholic Amo. Just that I wasn't
Roman Catholic. ::cool::
: AmoYou believe some who called themselves the church, had the authority to do away with the seventh day Sabbath, and institute another day of worship in its place. All of this with no scriptural authority.
No one did away with the seventh-day sabbath Amo. Classical Christianity simply understands it differently from the Jews, Seventh-day Adventists, and you. And besides, didn't you tell me over on the other thread entitled "
Worshipping God on Sunday" that it isn't wrong for Christians to worship corporately together on any day of the week including Sunday? Now you're saying there has to be scriptural authority showing that it's okay for Christians to worship corporately together on Sunday?? It seems to me that you're not too clear on what you believe Amo.
: AmoYou ignore the fact that a great many Christians who also considered themselves the church, continued to keep the seventh day Sabbath, and simply argue that the early church did away with it, and established Sunday sacredness. Who do you say the Sabbath keepers were? Or do you just deny their existence altogether?
A great many Christians continued to keep the seventh-day sabbath? Really Amo? Who were these "great many Christians" and what exactly do you mean that they
kept the seventh-day sabbath?
As for your question regarding who the sabbath keepers were, the answer is everyone who becomes a Christian in baptism and turns from their evil ways. The following is addressed to you, Amo, and everyone else with a similar mindset to yours:
: St. Justin the Martyr, Dialogue With Trypho The Jew, Chapter 12-13This same law you have despised, and His new holy covenant you have slighted; and now you neither receive it, nor repent of your evil deeds. For your ears are closed, your eyes are blinded, and the heart is hardened, Jeremiah has cried; yet not even then do you listen. The Lawgiver is present, yet you do not see Him; to the poor the Gospel is preached, the blind see, yet you do not understand. You have now need of a second circumcision, though you glory greatly in the flesh. The new law requires you to keep perpetual sabbath, and you, because you are idle for one day, suppose you are pious, not discerning why this has been commanded you: and if you eat unleavened bread, you say the will of God has been fulfilled. The Lord our God does not take pleasure in such observances: if there is any perjured person or a thief among you, let him cease to be so; if any adulterer, let him repent; then he has kept the sweet and true sabbaths of God. If any one has impure hands, let him wash and be pure.
For Isaiah did not send you to a bath, there to wash away murder and other sins, which not even all the water of the sea were sufficient to purge; but, as might have been expected, this was that saving bath of the olden time which followed those who repented, and who no longer were purified by the blood of goats and of sheep, or by the ashes of an heifer, or by the offerings of fine flour, but by faith through the blood of Christ, and through His death, who died for this very reason,
Source: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/01282.htm (http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/01282.htm)
: AmoClement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (c. 150 – 215) (Titus Flavius Clemens) was an early Christian philosopher and one of the most distinguished teachers of the Church of Alexandria. He is known for his attempt to unite Greek philosophy with Christian teachings and drew a large number of educated pagans to the Church. His passion for philosophy, especially for the teachings of Plato, contributed to the "hellenization" of Christianity.
Clement of Alexandria was, and still is, a highly unorthodox and controversial figure in Church history.
Perhaps the following quotes had something to do with from J. Danielou accusations. All emphasis mine.
Clement of Alexandria
THE STROMATA,
OR MISCELLANIES
BOOK 7
CHAPTER 7
WHAT SORT OF PRAYER THE GNOSTIC EMPLOYS, AND HOW IT IS HEARD BY GOD
And since the dawn is an image of the day of birth, and from that point the light which has shone forth at first from the darkness increases, there has also dawned on those involved in darkness a day of the knowledge of truth. In correspondence with the manner of the sun's rising, prayers are made looking towards the sunrise in the east. Whence also the most ancient temples looked towards the west, that people might be taught to turn to the east when facing the images. "Let my prayer be directed before Thee as incense, the uplifting of my hands as the evening sacrifice," say the Psalms.
EXHORTATION TO THE HEATHEN
CHAPTER 6- BY DIVINE INSPIRATION PHILOSOPHERS SOMETIMES HIT ON THE TRUTH
For the sun never could show me the true God; but that healthful Word, that is the Sun of the soul, by whom alone, when He arises in the depths of the soul, the eye of the soul itself is irradiated. Whence accordingly, Democritus, not without reason, says, "that a few of the men of intellect, raising their hands upwards to what we Greeks now call the air (ajh>r), called the whole expanse Zeus, or God: He, too, knows all things, gives and takes away, and He is King of all.
CHAPTER 8
THE TRUE DOCTRINE IS TO BE SOUGHT IN THE PROPHETS
It is now time, as we have dispatched in order the other points, to go to the prophetic Scriptures; for the oracles present us with the appliances necessary for the attainment of piety, and so establish the truth. The divine Scriptures and institutions of wisdom form the short road to salvation. Devoid of embellishment, of outward beauty of diction, of wordiness and seductiveness, they raise up humanity strangled by wickedness, teaching men to despise the casualties of life; and with one and the same voice remedying many evils, they at once dissuade us from pernicious deceit, and clearly exhort us to the attainment of the salvation set before us. Let the Sibyl prophetess, then, be the first to sing to us the song of salvation: —
"So He is all sure and unerring:
Come, follow no longer darkness and gloom;
See, the sun's sweet-glancing light shines gloriously.
Know, and lay up wisdom in your hearts:
There is one God, who sends rains, and winds, and earthquakes,
Thunderbolts, famines, plagues, and dismal sorrows,
And snows and ice. But why detail particulars?
He reigns over heaven, He rules earth, He truly is;" —
where, in remarkable accordance with inspiration she compares delusion to darkness, and the knowledge of God to the sun and light, and subjecting both to comparison, shows the choice we ought to make. For falsehood is not dissipated by the bare presentation of the truth, but by the practical improvement of the truth it is ejected and put to flight.
CHAP. IX.--"THAT THOSE GRIEVOUSLY SIN WHO DESPISE OR NEGLECT GOD'S GRACIOUS CALLING."
Wherefore the blessed apostle says: "I testify in the Lord, that ye walk no longer as the Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind; having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart: who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness and concupiscence." After the accusation of such a witness, and his invocation of God, what else remains for the unbelieving than judgment and condemnation? And the Lord, with ceaseless assiduity, exhorts, terrifies, urges, rouses, admonishes; He awakes from the sleep of darkness, and raises up those who have wandered in error. "Awake," He says, "thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light," --Christ, the Sun of the Resurrection, He "who was born before the morning star," and with His beams bestows life.
CHAPTER 10
ANSWER TO THE OBJECTION OF THE HEATHEN, THAT IT WAS NOT RIGHT TO ABANDON THE CUSTOMS OF THEIR FATHERS
His Son, and the Word was in God, not disbelieved in by all when He was first preached, nor altogether unknown when, assuming the character of man, and fashioning Himself in flesh, He enacted the drama of human salvation: for He was a true champion and a fellow-champion with the creature. And being communicated most speedily to men, having dawned from His Father's counsel quicker than the sun, with the most perfect ease He made God shine on us. Whence He was and what He was, He showed by what He taught and exhibited, manifesting Himself as the Herald of the Covenant, the Reconciler, our Savior, the Word, the Fount of life, the Giver of peace, diffused over the whole face of the earth; by whom, so to speak, the universe has already become an ocean of blessings.
CHAP. XI.--HOW GREAT ARE THE BENEFITS CONFERRED ON MAN THROUGH THE ADVENT OF
For how can it be other than desirable, since it has filled with light the mind which had been buried in darkness, and given keenness to the "light-bringing eyes" of the soul? For just as, had the sun not been in existence, night would have brooded over the universe notwithstanding the other luminaries of heaven; so, had we nor known the Word, and been illuminated by Him; we should have been nowise different from fowls that are being fed, fattened in darkness, and nourished for death. Let us then admit the light, that we may admit God; let us admit the light, and become disciples to the Lord. This, too, He has been promised to the Father: "I will declare Thy name to my brethren; in the midst of the Church will I praise Thee."
CHAP. XI.--HOW GREAT ARE THE BENEFITS CONFERRED ON MAN THROUGH THE ADVENT OF
Hail, O light! For in us, buried in darkness, shut up in the shadow of death, light has shone forth from heaven, purer than the sun, sweeter than life here below. That light is eternal life; and whatever partakes of it lives. But night fears the light, and hiding itself in terror, gives place to the day of the Lord. Sleepless light is now over all, and the west has given credence to the east. For this was the end of the new creation. For "the Sun of Righteousness," who drives His chariot over all, pervades equally all humanity, like "His Father, who makes His sun to rise on all men," and distils on them the dew of the truth. He hath changed sunset into sunrise, and through the cross brought death to life; and having wrenched man from destruction, He hath raised him to the skies, transplanting mortality into immortality, and translating earth to heaven--He, the husbandman of God,
THE INSTRUCTOR
[PAEDAGOGUS]
BOOK 1
CHAPTER 9
THAT IT IS THE PREROGATIVE OF THE SAME POWER TO BE BENEFICENT AND TO PUNISH JUSTLY. ALSO THE MANNER OF THE INSTRUCTION OF THE LOGOS
So God is good on His own account, and just also on ours, and He is just because He is good. And His justice is shown to us by His own Word from there from above, whence the Father was. For before He became Creator He was God; He was good. And therefore He wished to be Creator and Father. And the nature of all that love was the source of righteousness — the cause, too, of His lighting up His sun, and sending down His own Son. And He first announced the good righteousness that is from heaven, when He said, "No man knoweth the Son, but the Father; nor the Father, but the Son."
THE STROMATA,
OR MISCELLANIES
BOOK 5
CHAPTER 6
THE MYSTIC MEANING OF THE TABERNACLE AND ITS FURNITURE
Now the Lord, having come alone into the intellectual world, enters by His sufferings, introduced into the knowledge of the Ineffable, ascending above every name which is known by sound. The lamp, too, was placed to the south of the altar of incense; and by it were shown the motions of the seven planets, that perform their revolutions towards the south. For three branches rose on either side of the tamp, and lights on them; since also the sun, like the lamp, set in the midst of all the planets, dispenses with a kind of divine music the light to those above and to those below. The golden lamp conveys another enigma as a symbol of Christ, not in respect of form alone, but in his casting light, "at sundry times and divers manners," on those who believe on Him and hope, and who see by means of the ministry of the First-born. And they say that the seven eyes of the Lord "are the seven spirits resting on the rod that springs from the root of Jesse."
BOOK 6
CHAPTER 17
PHILOSOPHY CONVEYS ONLY AN IMPERFECT KNOWLEDGE OF GOD
For it is not that we may seem good that we believe in Christ, as it is not alone for the purpose of being seen, while in the sun, that we pass into the sun. But in the one case for the purpose of being warmed; and in the other, we are compelled to be Christians in order to be excellent and good. For the kingdom belongs pre-eminently to the violent, who, from investigation, and study, and discipline, reap this fruit, that they become kings.
BOOK 7
CHAPTER 3
THE GNOSTIC AIMS AT THE NEAREST LIKENESS POSSIBLE TO GOD AND HIS SON
For, just as the sun not only illumines heaven and the whole world, shining over land and sea, but also through windows and small chinks sends his beams into the innermost recesses of houses, so the Word diffused everywhere casts His eye-glance on the minutest circumstances of the actions of life.
FRAGMENTS OF
CLEMENS ALEXANDRINUS
[TRANSLATED BY REV. WILLIAM WILSON, M.A.]
FRAGMENTS
3. — COMMENTS ON THE FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN.
There was; then, a Word importing an unbeginning eternity; as also the Word itself, that is, the Son of God, who being, by equality of substance, one with the Father, is eternal and uncreate. That He was always the Word, is signified by saying, "In the beginning was the Word." But by the expression, "we have seen with our eyes," he signifies the Lord's presence in the flesh, "and our hands have handled," he says, "of the Word of life." He means not only His flesh, but the virtues of the Son, like the sunbeam which penetrates to the lowest places, — this sunbeam coming in the flesh became palpable to the disciples. It is accordingly related in traditions, that John, touching the outward body itself, sent his hand deep down into it, and that the solidity of the flesh offered no obstacle, but gave way to the hand of the disciple.
There might be some controversy surrounding Clement of Alexandria, but the quotes you listed don't appear to be the source of it. In fact, I find his teaching, in the quotes provided, to be very good and Christian. But if you believe he has spoken evil in any of the quotes you listed, as you certainly believe he has, then bear witness to the evil, because as it is, I don't see how they teach anything contrary to the faith of Christ. In fact, some of them are quite beautiful in their poetic nature. So thanks for that! ::thumbsup::
: AmoThat term (Sun of Righteousness) appears in scripture once. It is in reference to the fact that although God's appearance will bring destruction and fire upon the wicked, it will be as the healing rays of the sun upon the saved.
Mal 4:1 For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the LORD of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch. 2 But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall.
A Jewish prophet speaking the above to the Jews, is a far cry from a Greek philosopher speaking such to pagans or newly converted pagans. One may be appropriate, the other certainly not.
So it's okay for the prophet Malachi to liken Christ to the sun with the epithet "Sun of Righteousness", but it's not okay for a Christian you disagree with to use a similar tactic for teaching? Got it Amo! No bias or prejudice coming from your direction I see ::frown::
By the way, I'd like to address your contention that worship and prayer toward the east is always somehow linked with worshipping the sun. While sun-worshipers no doubt worshipped toward the east to the rising of the sun, this in no way prohibits anyone else from facing east to worship and pray as though they are doing it for the same reason. Just as in the committing of a crime, even so in the practice of faith motive is important.
Christians worshipping and praying toward the east is not indicative of sun worship in Christianity. Christians believe that God's glory comes from the east. Hear what scripture says regarding this:
: Ezekiel 43:1-4Afterward he brought me to the gate, the gate that faces toward the east. And behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east. His voice was like the sound of many waters; and the earth shone with His glory. It was like the appearance of the vision which I saw—like the vision which I saw when I came to destroy the city. The visions were like the vision which I saw by the River Chebar; and I fell on my face. And the glory of the Lord came into the temple by way of the gate which faces toward the east.
Christians also hear what the Psalmist says about singing to God toward the east:
: Psalm 68:32-33 (LXX)Sing to God, ye kingdoms of the earth; sing psalms to the Lord. Pause.
Sing to God that rides on the heaven of heaven, eastward: lo, he will utter a mighty sound with his voice.
And Christians believe Christ's coming will be from the east:
: Matthew 24:27For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.
In fact, on this last note about His second coming, even your prophetess Ellen White said that Christ would come from the east. Hear what she says:
: Ellen White, The Great Controversy, Page 640Soon there appears in the east a small black cloud, about half the size of a man's hand. It is the cloud which surrounds the Saviour and which seems in the distance to be shrouded in darkness. The people of God know this to be the sign of the Son of man. In solemn silence they gaze upon it as it draws nearer the earth, becoming lighter and more glorious, until it is a great white cloud, its base a glory like consuming fire, and above it the rainbow of the covenant. Jesus rides forth as a mighty conqueror. Not now a "Man of Sorrows," to drink the bitter cup of shame and woe, He comes, victor in heaven and earth, to judge the living and the dead. "Faithful and True," "in righteousness He judges and makes war." And "the armies in heaven" (Revelation 19:11, 14) follow Him. With anthems of celestial melody the holy angels, a vast, unnumbered throng, attend Him on His way. The firmament seems filled with radiant forms—"ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands." Revelation 5:11. No human pen can portray the scene; no mortal mind is adequate to conceive its splendor. "His glory covered the heavens, and the earth was full of His praise. His brightness was like the light." Habakkuk 3:3, 4. As the living cloud comes still nearer, every eye beholds the Prince of life. No crown of thorns now mars that sacred head; but a diadem of glory rests on His holy brow. His countenance outshines the dazzling brightness of the noonday sun. "And He has on His robe and on His thigh a name written: King of kings and Lord of lords." Revelation 19:16.
Source: https://tinyurl.com/mxomo4v (https://tinyurl.com/mxomo4v)
Amo, just because someone does something that's similar to what some pagans did a long time ago doesn't mean they're doing it for the same reason. Also, and just as true, something isn't automatically ruined for Christians simply because pagans did something similar. The reasons why Christians worship and pray toward the east are entirely different from the ancient pagans. The similarities are surface and that is all. Christians don't worship the sun, they worship the Sun of Righteousness! Judge with righteous judgment, Amo, and not according to outward appearance.
: Amo Sat May 13, 2017 - 14:42:15
When Christianity went down the same road of apostasy as Israel in amalgamating sun worship with the true worship of God through Christ, God sent the barbarians of the north who caused destruction and desolation everywhere they went. By the time Sunday sacredness had almost completely replaced God's seventh day Sabbath, the western Roman empire collapsed under the weight of continual invasions by the barbarians of the north. They spread destruction and desolation everywhere they went and sacked Rome itself several times. God's judgement comes from the north. When the abomination of desolation is set up again by law in place of God's Sabbath by the last beast of biblical prophesy, God Himself will bring judgement upon this earth.
I see that you have many thoughts in your head Amo. Wrong thoughts for sure, but many nonetheless.
God will be the judge of that, not you. You are certainly entitled to your opinion. One of us no doubt will have some serious explaining to do, when we stand before the judge of all.
Give the drama a rest Amo. We're just having a discussion here. Besides, you obviously think the exact same about me. You've certainly said as much.
Same for you too Amo! After all, the quotes I provided show no indication whatsoever that Sunday was considered a holy day or a day of rest or even a holiday by the ancient Romans. And my quotes are coming from various sources which are all contemporary with links provided, unlike yours. Also, unlike yours, my sources aren't biased and prejudiced against the historic Church and its people.
To the contrary, your entire argument and stance on the matter is completely biased. It serves the purpose of excluding all Christians who continued seventh day Sabbath observance before Sunday observance was even a thought, from what you term the historic church. Christ's church observed the seventh day Sabbath. The historic church you refer to, is that which developed later and over time, as a result of continued and increasing pagan and political influences. I do not deny the development of your historic church, this would be to deny history. I deny its authenticity as the true church of Christ. Why do you deny the history of Sabbath keeping Christians? Is it not because they testify against your claims that Christ and scripture did away with the observance of a seventh day Sabbath? If not, please do expound.
Apart from this you are arguing against a point I never made. When did I ever state that the pagans had a Sunday "Sabbath" or weekly observance that they carried over into apostate Christianity? I did not. As I already stated, the weekly observance is fully supported from the Judeo-Christian influence upon the new religion. The day of the sun was adapted as suited to both pagan and Christian sentiment capable of being highly regarded by both, though for differing reasons. The prominence of the sun to pagans, and the resurrection of Christ to the Christians. These considerations though were political and unifying in nature, not biblical or Holy Spirit inspired. The Roman Empire absorbed many religions from around the world and made them her own. The Roman Catholic Church being the last of these, which persecuted and outlawed all others.
The following quotes are taken from either the links you provided, or sub links provided from those links, continuing the historical account provided by the same. Which information is far more in line with my projections of the situation under examination, than your own.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_ancient_Rome#Holidays_and_festivals (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_ancient_Rome#Holidays_and_festivals)
Military settlement within the empire and at its borders broadened the context of Romanitas. Rome's citizen-soldiers set up altars to multiple deities, including their traditional gods, the Imperial genius and local deities – sometimes with the usefully open-ended dedication to the diis deabusque omnibus (all the gods and goddesses). They also brought Roman "domestic" deities and cult practices with them.[165] By the same token, the later granting of citizenship to provincials and their conscription into the legions brought their new cults into the Roman military.[166]
Traders, legions and other travellers brought home cults originating from Egypt, Greece, Iberia, India and Persia. The cults of Cybele, Isis, Mithras, and Sol Invictus were particularly important. Some of those were initiatory religions of intense personal significance, similar to Christianity in those respects.
Emperor Constantine and Christianity
The conversion of Constantine I ended the Christian persecutions. Constantine successfully balanced his own role as an instrument of the pax deorum with the power of the Christian priesthoods in determining what was (in traditional Roman terms) auspicious - or in Christian terms, what was orthodox. The edict of Milan (313) redefined Imperial ideology as one of mutual toleration. Constantine had triumphed under the signum (sign) of the Christ: Christianity was therefore officially embraced along with traditional religions and from his new Eastern capital, Constantine could be seen to embody both Christian and Hellenic religious interests. He passed laws to protect Christians from persecution;[194] he also funded the building of churches, including Saint Peter's basilica. He may have officially ended – or attempted to end – blood sacrifices to the genius of living emperors, though his Imperial iconography and court ceremonial outstripped Diocletian's in their supra-human elevation of the Imperial hierarch.[195]
Constantine promoted orthodoxy in Christian doctrine, so that Christianity might become a unitary force, rather than divisive. He summoned Christian bishops to a meeting, later known as the First Council of Nicaea, at which some 318 bishops (mostly easterners) debated and decided what was orthodox, and what was heresy. The meeting reached consensus on the Nicene Creed.[196][197] At Constantine's death, he was honored as a Christian and as an Imperial "divus".[198] Later, Philostorgius would criticiize those Christians who offered sacrifice at statues of the divus Constantine.[199]
In 380, under Theodosius I, Nicene Christianity became the official state religion of the Roman Empire. Christian heretics as well as non-Christians were subject to exclusion from public life or persecution, though Rome's original religious hierarchy and many aspects of its ritual influenced Christian forms,[206] and many pre-Christian beliefs and practices survived in Christian festivals and local traditions.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constantine_the_Great (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constantine_the_Great)
Apparently Constantine did not patronize Christianity alone. After gaining victory in the Battle of the Milvian Bridge (312), a triumphal arch—the Arch of Constantine—was built (315) to celebrate his triumph. The arch is decorated with images of the goddess Victoria. At the time of its dedication, sacrifices to gods like Apollo, Diana, and Hercules were made. Absent from the Arch are any depictions of Christian symbolism. However, as the Arch was commissioned by the Senate, the absence of Christian symbols may reflect the role of the Curia at the time as a pagan redoubt.[223]
In 321, he legislated that the venerable day of the sun should be a day of rest for all citizens.[224] In the year 323, he issued a decree banning Christians from participating in state sacrifices[225] Furthermore, Constantine's coinage continued to carry the symbols of the sun.
http://www.unrv.com/culture/roman-religion.php (http://www.unrv.com/culture/roman-religion.php)
Most of the Roman gods and goddesses were a blend of several religious influences. Many of these were introduced via the Greek colonies of southern Italy and others had their roots in the Etruscan or Latin tribes of the region. In some cases the Etruscan or Latin names survived throughout the cultural existence of Rome, but many were adopted so completely that they maintained their names from other cultures. In the east, the Greek names remained the choice of the people and the major gods of the system therefore, were known by both.
The gods of the Roman pantheon began taking on the forms known today during the dynasty of the Etruscan kings in the 6th century BC. These gods, Jupiter (Zeus), Juno (Hera), and Minerva (Athena), were worshiped at the grand temple on the Capitoline Hill. As Rome's power grew and expanded throughout the known world, the Roman Empire came into contact with the cultures and religious beliefs of many cultures. The Romans, happy to absorb and assimilate any culture they encountered thereby reaping the benefits of both its wealth and religious influence, were a mosaic of belief systems.
Foreign gods and customs not only played major roles but were also given temples and priesthoods within Rome itself. The goddess Cybele, a Phoenician god was adopted during the Second Punic War to counteract any benefit that Hannibal may have gained. Even after his defeat, Cybele remained an integral part of the Roman system. Another very popular foreign god was the Persian god Mithra. Overwhelmingly supported in the Legions, this deity offered eternal salvation for the immortal soul and its popularity helped pave the way for the later Christian cult whose similarities made its adoption less difficult.
With the passing of the Roman Republic into that of an Imperial system, the nature of Roman religion expanded again to include the Emperors themselves. Julius Caesar, having claimed to be a direct descendent of Aeneas, the son of Venus, was among the first to deify himself in such a manner. At first, such a system of human divinity was largely rejected by the masses, but the popularity of Caesar helped pave the way for future leaders.
As the Imperial system gained hold, it was common practice for the Emperors to accept divine honors before their deaths. These living gods, in some cases, required sacrificial rituals as signs of loyalty and ingrained themselves with the older more traditional pagan gods. The requirement of a sacrifice to the emperor, as well as the forced belief in the complete pantheon became a significant source of conflict with early Christians. As Christians refused to worship the emperor as a god, persecution of the Christians and conflict with the cult was a constant source of strife.
Emperor worship would continue until late in the western Empire until the reign of Constantine. In the early 4th century AD, Constantine either converted to Christianity or made it an acceptable part of Roman religion, eliminating the emperor deification altogether. Later Emperors such as Julian attempted to revive the old ways, but the deeply rooted Mithraism, and Christian cults combined were firmly set within Roman society. By 392 AD, Emperor Theodosius I banned the practice of pagan religions in Rome altogether and Christianity was, without question, the official religion of the state.
http://www.unrv.com/culture/pontifex-maximus.php (http://www.unrv.com/culture/pontifex-maximus.php)
Pontifex Maximus
The head priest of the Roman state religion was the Pontifex Maximus, or the greatest of the college of pontifices. While an obviously important and prominent position within the ranks of the Roman system, the Pontifex Maximus was not considered a magistrate comparable to a Consul, Praetor, etc.
During the Republic, the Pontifex was elected by the Comitia Tributa and served for life, while during the Empire, the position was generally held by the Emperor himself.
Originally, the Ponifices were Patrician only, but the social conditions and changes during the late Republic allowed for Plebeian election as well. These men were responsible for the oversight of the state religious cult as a whole and didn't really oversee particular godly cults, though they could if necessary.
By the Imperial period there were 16 pontifices under the high priest, 15 flamines, who were special priests of the main deities, and the Rex Sacrorum (king of the sacrifices) who performed the religious acts that the king had usually done. Perhaps most importantly, he was he was also responsible for the 18 Vestal Virgins.
The main duty of the pontifices was to provide the pax deorum, or the 'peace with the gods'. Interpreting omens, sometimes through augures, controlling and keeping the official calendar, and the oversight of funerals all fell under the domain of the Pontifex Maximus.
He was responsible for an enormous collection of omens (annales maximi); that would be recorded and collected on a nearly constant basis. These heavenly signs would be written down along with accompanying events, and used to determine the divine favor of the gods. Doing so allowed following generations of priests and magistrates to understand the historic will of the gods and interpret future events against past patterns.
Today, the head of the Roman Catholic Church, the Pope, is still called the Pontifex Maximus. It's a political or governing office that has been in existence and in perpetual use for nearly 3,000 years.
http://www.unrv.com/culture/vestal-virgins.php (http://www.unrv.com/culture/vestal-virgins.php)
While the Pontifex Maximus continues to the present day as an office of the higher order in the Catholic Church, the order of the vestals was disbanded in 394 AD, when non-Christian cults were banned by Theodosius. The Church, wisely trying to keep the general population with a sense of familiarity, readily adopted the use of convents and position of nuns that held many of the same rules and customs as the Vestals.
http://www.unrv.com/culture/christian-persecution.php (http://www.unrv.com/culture/christian-persecution.php)
Some viewed the concept of 'martyrdom' as any Christian who had been killed for any reason. Others defined it more conservatively as only those that were executed in defense of their religion. Regardless, by 337 AD and the ascension of Constantine as sole Emperor, the population of the Christian world continued to surge forward. As many as 25 to 30% of the population of the Roman Empire (15 to 20 of 60 million people) has been estimated as being Christian. Together with other similar monotheistic cults, like those of Mithras and Sol Invictus, the old Pagan traditions were slowly becoming a thing of the past. The church too, would do everything in its power to be sure of its continued path to dominance, and the tables would be completely turned on both traditional Pagans and dissenting 'heretics'.
http://www.unrv.com/culture/spread-christianity.php (http://www.unrv.com/culture/spread-christianity.php)
Christianity had many similarities to other cults that had already gained widespread acceptance. Mithraism, derived from eastern Zoroastrism was a belief in the son of the sun who also came to earth to rescue mankind from itself. The similarities in the stories of Jesus and Mithras cannot be overlooked as an aid in Christian growth. Mithras was extremely popular in the Legions, and as the army traveled throughout the empire, the acceptance of the monotheistic concept (and the story of the son of god coming to earth to save humanity) traveled with it. The cult of Dionysus, one of the old gods of both Greeks and Romans, also had enough similarities to aid a slow conversion to Christianity. Perhaps even the Imperial cult (emperor worship) played its own part. Augustus himself was considered the son of a god (Julius Caesar) and transcended his human existence to become a divine being after his death. The Roman people had certainly been exposed to enough religious ideas bearing similarities to Christ to make the possibility of the Son of God and Savior of humanity a believable and relatively easy concept to adopt.
The idea was not so pronounced in the early empire and the foundation of the faith, however. Evidence of early Christian behavior and practices is limited, but its known that Christians weren't always of like mind and beliefs either. Several various sects with widely divergent schools of thought developed as the concept of Christ spread. Though most of the pronounced deviations from the Catholic norm, (ie. Donatism, Montanism, Gnosticism, Arianism, Pelagianism, among many others) were fairly late developments, it is evidence of widely varying views and practices regarding Christianity throughout its rise. Eventually, the Orthodox Church would gain supreme hold of the eastern empire, while Catholicism would reign in the west. The Catholic Church brought uniformity to the faith and established it as a public institution rather than small communities of individual followers. The Church not only established strict laws and religious doctrine but it wiped out 'heretic' and divergent thoughts. Sometimes through violence as severe as the persecutions against the early Christians and other times through subtle adoption of pre-existing religious concepts, the Catholic church virtually destroyed these other sects and Paganism along with it.
Early Christians, facing scorn at best and persecution at worst, depending on Emperor and the era, were forced to blend in with their Pagan counterparts. In order to celebrate the 'holidays' of their religion, the Christians used pre-existing holidays and festivals to blend in. Christmas, for example, was originally part of the great festival of the Winter Solstice, or the Saturnalia. By adopting this grand event as the celebration of Christ's birth, Christian revelry was allowed to take place, largely unnoticed. The Church too manipulated customs and traditions of the Pagan Empire to make their faith more adaptable. One of the more difficult challenges was simply getting people to believe in a single god, and give up all the others that they were accustomed to. In overcoming this obstacle, the Church began to adopt Patron Saints of various daily life functions, to allow an easier conversion. Though these Saints weren't gods in the Pagan sense, having multiple choices for the population to look to for guidance helped ease the transition. The idea of the holy trinity too, harkens to a time where people needed separate entities to spread their prayer. Even the office of the Pope as the head of the faith began to replace the Emperor in the eyes of the people as the living incarnation of God on earth.
By the fall of the western Empire (476 AD), Christianity was not only the official religion of the Roman world, but it had supreme authority in matters of morality and human behavior. Censorship played a large role as well. Historical documents of an incalculable number were destroyed or edited in order to prevent anti-Christian, or perceived anti-Christian thought. It is hard to imagine how much written history, and evidence of the ancient world, was lost forever due to this manipulation, but on the contrary, humanity must also recognize the great contribution of the Church to historical preservation.
http://www.unrv.com/culture/christianity.php (http://www.unrv.com/culture/christianity.php)
Constantine, though previously a worshipper of Sol Invictus, the Sun God, took on support of Christianity with some zeal. He declared that his victory was owed to the god of the Christians and set about adopting an imperial policy to advance its cause. Some claims have been made that Constantine 'converted to Christianity simply for political means, and that justifiably may have played a part. Arguments have been made that Constantine was baptized years after the fact, just before his death, as a political tool to aid the accession of his sons, but it was often the custom of the early Christians to be 'cleansed' just prior to death rather than at birth. Despite these arguments, Constantine's policies and actions as emperor would indicate some considerable devotion to the Church.
Christian Bishops under Constantine functioned in an official capacity as Imperial advisors. Tax exemptions were granted to Christian priests and money was granted from the Imperial treasury to provide for new and rebuilt churches. At a meeting of Bishops in Milan (313 AD) an edict (of Milan) was passed which essentially granted complete tolerance to all religions, but Christianity would benefit the most. Previous victims of various persecutions were also granted compensation directly from the Roman treasury. Still, however, Constantine left a confusing trail for his personal religious thoughts. Association with Sol Invictus is still cited for several more years, at least until the complete unification of the Empire. The emperor in the east, Licinius maintained an adversarial relationship with Constantine for many years, which included two short wars for Imperial dominance. Licinius seems to have maintained more support for traditional pagan customs and Constantine may have resisted complete Christian conversion in order to maintain the approval of the non-Christian majority population. Perhaps in order to lure Constantine into a final battle, Licinius began inciting Pagans against Constantine's edict which favored Christianity and championed a Pagan cause. By 324 AD, the conflict and rivalry came to a head. Constantine defeated Licinius in battles at Adrianople and Chrysopolis, which ended in Licinius' capture and execution.
The final death knell of the Pagan faith came only a generation later, under the rule of Theodosius. An ardent Christian, and recognizing the amazing growth of the still relatively young faith, Theodosius and his western counterpart Gratian, recognized Christianity as the official religion of the Empire in 380 AD. Gratian too, likely at the partial behest of Theodosius refused the title of Pontifex Maximus (head priest) and it was bestowed instead on the Catholic Pope in Rome. Severe punishments for Pagan, and especially 'heretic' Arianism were enforced and the established Churched prospered. In 390 AD, a massacre ordered by the Emperor of 7,000 people who revolted in Thessalonica resulted in his own 8 month penance. By the beginning of the 5th century, after just 400 years, the Church grew from a fledgling mystery cult into a power on nearly equal terms with the Roman Emperor himself. Though there would still be much work to be done, especially among Germanic tribes and in places such as Britain, Christianity would slowly come to dominate the entire western world.
It seems that a more in depth examination of the links you provided to prove your point, ends up proving my own even better when all the facts provided are taken into account. The interplay, interaction, blending, amalgamation, and eventual political victory of apostate Christianity over paganism, other Christian entities, and even authentic Christianity, is what has been recorded in history. You simply choose to ignore such history, to protect your cherished beliefs. Sunday sacredness came about and arose during all of the above transformation of the Church of Christ from the Lamb to the dragon. It did not originate with Christ or the Apostles, and is not addressed at all by scripture. Ignoring the facts, and repeating lies to yourself will not change the facts, but only leave you deceived. This by your own choice.
Some pagan sun worshipers did honor Sunday such as those of Mithraism. There is no denying the history of interplay between sun worshiping pagans and Christianity during its early development. Christianity grew and spread among, in conflict with, and ever increasingly influenced by, predominantly sun worshiping pagans. The development of which reached a climactic point when their Emperor began supporting and eventually claimed to have become a Christian.
Mithrasim began in the Roman Empire around the same time Christianity was beginning to take off in the 1st century AD. It survived until the 4th century AD when Christianity finally overtook it as the dominate faith. Since its rise was in such close proximity with the rise of the Christian faith, it is believed that the adherents of Mithraism "borrowed" elements of their worship and faith from the Christians who were a very prominent sect in the empire. The following is from the Catholic Encyclopedia regarding the apparent borrowing of Mithraism from Christianity, and while you may not like the source of the quote I find its reasoning to be quite compelling in this regard:
Your right of course, concerning my opinion of your source. The Church of Rome is infamous for being very loose and manipulative with the facts of history. The original "Christian" version of historical revisionists as far as I am concerned. It is no surprise that you lean upon the denials of the apostate "Christian" entity most heavily influenced by sun worshiping paganism than any other, to defend your position, though you claim you're not Roman Catholic.
Mithraism was around long before it became prevalent within the Roman Empire. It was just one of the very many religions incorporated and absorbed into the empire, as their habit was. It morphed into the Roman version. Much like apostate Christianity when it was finally accepted, then legalized, and then forced upon all of the Roman Empire. The similarities between Mithraism and authentic Christianity are not necessarily due to their influence upon each other contemporarily, though that must be considered, but upon the foresight and deception of the evil one. A student of scripture himself, with the exact purpose of counterfeiting the true faith throughout history until his and its end. Nothing suits his purposes better, than for his minions to be able to claim that the true faith, was and is based upon his false religions which serve the exact purpose of undermining the same.
The problem of course, with the Church of Rome's claim and your agreement with it, is all the evidence to the contrary. Just look at the Church of Rome itself, and you have proof of the effects of sun worship upon it, rather than "Christianity's" effect upon sun worship.
http://romancatholicbeliefs.org/the-popes-cardinals-bishops-and-priests-of-rome-are-worshipers-of-the-babylon-sun-god-tammuz/ (http://romancatholicbeliefs.org/the-popes-cardinals-bishops-and-priests-of-rome-are-worshipers-of-the-babylon-sun-god-tammuz/)
http://www.buzzardhut.net/index/htm/SunWorship.pdf (http://www.buzzardhut.net/index/htm/SunWorship.pdf)
http://amazingdiscoveries.org/S-deception_paganism_Catholic_symbol_St-Peter (http://amazingdiscoveries.org/S-deception_paganism_Catholic_symbol_St-Peter)
http://biblelight.net/wheel.htm (http://biblelight.net/wheel.htm)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgN4xm8f_FU (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgN4xm8f_FU)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6ejBO6NOoQ (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6ejBO6NOoQ)
Constantine had a vision of a cross, went to battle and conquered his enemies under that sign, established Christianity as a legal religion of the empire, demanded that all properties lost during their persecutions be returned to them, that is to the Catholic church, then demanded that all Christians basically be Catholic, and also instituted a Sunday law applicable to pagans and Christians alike. Will you pretend these things went without notice by the pagans? Or that there were not developments along these very lines leading up to these climactic events?
Pagan's had no choice but to care. A new religion developed and rapidly spread among them. Its numbers increased rapidly.
Amo, by St. Constantine's time Christianity had been around in the Roman empire for over 300 years! Do you consider the Methodist church, which was established in 1735 (282 years ago) to be a "new" denomination? Or how about the Baptist church, which was established in 1609 (408 years ago) to be a "new" denomination? Or how about your own Seventh-day Adventist church, established in 1863 (just 154 years ago), to be a "new" denomination? Of course you don't. And neither was Christianity "new" at the time of St. Constantine. For the pagans, Christianity was as normal and well known as any of the denominations I listed are known in the U.S. today. In other words, Christianity wasn't new to them.[/quote]
Poor comparison, apples and oranges. All of the denominations mentioned above arising among and within Christianity itself already existing for over a thousand years. Christianity came forth from Judaism, which rejected it, as did all the prevalent pagan religions of the day. Which pagan religions had the support of their government against Christianity, to persecute the same. The rise of Christianity however, as history has proved, meant the death of paganism. This is true in the case of authentic Christianity which dispels paganism through the revelation of truth, and apostate "Christianity" which expelled paganism with the sword. Having adapted the latter through apostasy itself. Thereby attempting to expel all rival forms or variations of Christianity itself also.
And another thing, you never did answer my question from before: If Sunday was considered such a holy and sacred day by the Roman pagans, notwithstanding the beliefs of the adherents of Mithraism, why do you suppose then that St. Constantine's Sunday law was the very first one enacted in the entire history of the Roman empire up to his time which was some 1,074 years from Rome's founding? I'd be interested to hear some twisted reasoning from you about how Sunday was always regarded as holy and sacred by the Romans but somehow was never venerated as such by them. Good luck with that one!
This is from your own twisted mind, not mine. I've already addressed this. Whether Sunday was of importance to pagan sun worshipers or not, it would not be offensive to them to be commanded to rest on the day of the sun. Which is why a sun worshiping emperor politically toying with apostate "Christianity" introduced a Sunday law that would be acceptable to both parties. Pagan sun worshipers, and compromising "Christianity" alike which had already begun to exalt the day of the sun themselves.
The text of Constantine's Sunday Law of 321 A.D. is :
"One the venerable day of the Sun let the magistrates and people residing in cities rest, and let all workshops be closed. In the country however persons engaged in agriculture may freely and lawfully continue their pursuits because it often happens that another day is not suitable for gain-sowing or vine planting; lest by neglecting the proper moment for such operations the bounty of heaven should be lost. (Given the 7th day of March, Crispus and Constantine being consuls each of them the second time." Codex Justinianus, lib. 3, tit. 12, 3; translated in History of the Christian Church, Philip Schaff, D.D., (7-vol.ed.) Vol. III, p.380. New York, 1884
Dr. A.Chr. Bang says regarding this Law :
"This Sunday law constituted no real favoratism to Christianity..... It is evident from all his statuatory provisions that the Emperor during the time 313-323 with full consciousness has sought the realisation of his religeous aim:
the amalgamation of heathenism and Christianity." Kirken og Romerstaten (The Church and the Roman State) p.256. Christiania, 1879
In A.D. 321,
to please the bishops of the Catholic Church, he issued an edict commanding judges, townspeople, and mechanics to rest on Sunday. Yet in this also his paganism was still manifest, as the edict required rest on
"the venerable day of the sun," and "enjoined the observance, or rather forbade the public desecration, of Sunday, not under the name of Sabbatum, or Dies Domini, but under its old astrological and heathen title, Dies Solis , familiar to all his subjects,
so that the law was as applicable to the worshipers of Hercules, Apollo, and Mithras, as to the Christians." (History of the Christian Church, Vol. 3, sec. 75, par. 5.-Schaff.) ( The Great Empires of Prophecy by Alonzo Jones page 391 )
Of course in all of this again, your own bias has you completely ignoring historic Christianity concerning the many who continued to keep the seventh day Sabbath during all this time. Their existence testifies against your argument and claims, thus you ignore them.
It is nonsensical to those willing to deny or ignore history in order to maintain their beliefs. Let's see, Sun-day, or the day of the Sun. If sun worshipers were going to have a special day of worship, gee I don't know, what day do you think that would be? What day do you suppose compromising "Christians" could choose to worship, that would not offend their pagan sun worshiping contemporaries, gee I don't know, maybe Sun-day?
So, according to your reasoning, the early Christians chose to worship together on Sunday, not because of their love for Christ and His resurrection testified to by St. Justin the Martyr (because apparently that was a dastardly lie), but because the Christians wanted to get in the good graces of a start up sun-worshipping cult that met in caves underground?? Yeah, sure they did, Amo, sure they did.
Again, that is your own twisted reasoning concerning what I believe, not what I actually believe. Sunday worship developed over time involving varying reasons and circumstance. None of which were biblical. Without question, Constantine's influence and Sunday law were a big boost for the same. None of which was based upon biblical teaching. Without question also, commanding all people of an empire to become Christian, polluted the church with countless unconverted souls, who themselves heavily contributed to even more rapid apostasy. These are undeniable facts of history. Again and again though, you are ignoring the many Christians who continued to keep the seventh day Sabbath during this time, who again testify that not all "Christianity" went down this same road that you have accepted.
If the early Christians didn't want to offend their pagan contemporaries, as you suggest, then why did they speak out so strongly against the various heresies and paganism of their day, including Mithraism, denouncing them as from demons? I mean, if they weren't trying to offend them, then they certainly wouldn't have spoken out against them the way did, would they?
To the contrary, as their apostasy increased, and their power along with it, they became more abusive than the pagans themselves. Eventually they apostatized to the point of accepting the power of the state or Caesar over that of the Holy Spirit of God as their defender and promulgator. Outlawing paganism, demanding their immediate conversion by law, destroying and or taking over their temples for their own use or profit, destroying countless volumes of literature, and God only knows what else. They went from being the persecuted to being the persecutors. All of this they did to other Christians as well, who would not bow to their apostate and usurped authority. Yet here you are denying any corruption in the Christian church during this time of transformation from lamb to dragon. I am not the one attempting to revise history here. You are in order to protect your coveted belief. The historic church which you ignore and deny kept the seventh day Sabbath and maintained bible teaching. The historic church which you defend as authentic, turned into a state supported monster and persecuting power bringing untold misery upon humanity for over a thousand years.
Christians did not begin Sunday observance from the start.
Correction: Christians have never "observed" Sunday. They "observe" the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. And what better day to observe Easter/Pascha than on the day He rose from the dead? That's why Christians gather together to worship on Sundays, because of the Lord's resurrection. After all, scripture says that He rose from the dead on the first day of the week (i.e. Sunday). You have to understand Amo, that the resurrection of Christ is the meaning and purpose of the Christian, without which there would be no Christianity. Therefore, Christ's resurrection on Sunday takes precedence over everything else. It is most holy, not the day, but the event that occurred on the day. And it is that event that is "observed" and celebrated every Sunday in the historic Church.
You can say that as many times as you want, but it will never make it true. You can ignore all the Christians that kept the seventh day Sabbath for centuries after Christ if you want, but that will not make the facts go away. The NT scriptures say absolutely nothing of what you said above and you cannot add it to them. It was not taught by the apostles because the teaching and practice did not exist in their day. It developed later into practice by tradition, not scriptural authority. It was not accepted by all Christians, but was forced upon all later when apostate "Christianity" forced itself upon an entire empire by a politically motivated Emperor. Countless millions of professing Christians throughout history have believed completely different than you do regarding it, and still do today. Believing it is the "Christian" Sabbath replacing the seventh day Sabbath. Which they have forced upon all they could through civil legislation all throughout history and even today. Deny it all if you wish, that will change nothing.
Your reference to Justin Martyr's First Apology proves nothing regarding the same. The man was a perfect example of what I have already stated. He was a converted pagan and Greek philosopher. You look to him for proof of Sunday sacredness because you cannot look to the scriptures for the same. The scriptures speak nothing of it, because it developed later in time, and without any support from Christ or the apostles.
You're right, he was a converted Greek philosopher, but he was no pagan since he didn't worship the deities of the Greeks and Romans. You'd know this if you bothered to actually read his writings. And I don't look to him for "proof" of Sunday sacredness. I simply employ him as an eyewitness to what Christians were, for a long time, believing and doing in his day. He was merely relating what he was taught when he came into the Church. After all, he wasn't inventing the practice of Baptism or the Eucharist or the prayers or the readings from the Prophets and Apostles that the Church did every time it worshipped was he? Of course not. And neither was he inventing for the first time the practice of Christians meeting together on Sunday for worship. He was simply stating what was a fact among Christians in his day so soon after the Apostles' time. That is all.
I have, and have read his writings, which changes nothing. I consider his writings and those of the supposed church fathers to be evidence of the apostasy which eventually became the Church of Rome. You, as the Church of Rome, consider them to be the development of authentic Christianity. I look to the scriptures for authenticity, not the writings of those "Christians" existing during the change of posture in the church from that of a lamb and blessing to the world, to that of a dragon and curse upon the world.
It seems to me that the Seventh-day Adventist ire over an eyewitness' testimony that doesn't agree with their imaginary theories is most unreasonable. St. Justin has no axe to grind in our discussion, Amo, and he certainly had no knowledge of a Seventh-day Adventist church whose doctrines he knew nothing about. When he related what the Christians practiced he was speaking to the ancient Roman government (see chapter 1 of his First Apology), not to Jews or Seventh-day Adventists that he was trying to convert. His goal in his writing was simply an attempt to persuade pagan Rome to stop killing Christians for merely being Christians. His testimony is what it is, and I take it for what it is, an honest assessment of Christians in his day. That's why his testimony is so valuable to us today, because it gives us a snap-shot of the Church from antiquity.
It gives us a snap shot of the views of one of the contending "Christian" entities of the day. Some of which were much more biblically based than others. The fact that it survived means that it was either approved by the apostate Roman church which ordered all others to comply with its own teachings and destroyed all the writings of all who taught otherwise, accidentally went unnoticed by the apostate Roman church, or was in fact produced at a later date than claimed. The fact that the Roman church accepts and makes use of the writings as well to defend her own unbiblical practices and doctrines, is proof enough that the only reason they exist today is because she either approved of them early on, or created them herself. I think both are true and or acceptable. Again, I consider that they document the spread of apostasy, and the influence of pagans and politics upon the early church. You consider them to reveal the development of authentic Christianity. I find authentic Christianity in the scriptures, not the supposed church fathers.
You may not be Catholic, but your contention is the same as theirs.
I never said that I wasn't Catholic Amo. Just that I wasn't Roman Catholic.
Good for you, your Catholic but not Roman Catholic.
You believe some who called themselves the church, had the authority to do away with the seventh day Sabbath, and institute another day of worship in its place. All of this with no scriptural authority.
No one did away with the seventh-day sabbath Amo. Classical Christianity simply understands it differently from the Jews, Seventh-day Adventists, and you. And besides, didn't you tell me over on the other thread entitled "Worshipping God on Sunday" that it isn't wrong for Christians to worship corporately together on any day of the week including Sunday? Now you're saying there has to be scriptural authority showing that it's okay for Christians to worship corporately together on Sunday?? It seems to me that you're not too clear on what you believe Amo.
Twisting my words to your own ends will not change their meaning, nor allow you to see clearly what I believe. This is your own doing though, not mine. It is of course fine for Christians to worship God on any day. It is not fine for them to think they have the authority to change or do away with one of His commandments. Those who no longer keep the seventh day Sabbath accept that someone other than God, somewhere, some time, had the authority to change one of God's commandments. They were and are wrong.
You ignore the fact that a great many Christians who also considered themselves the church, continued to keep the seventh day Sabbath, and simply argue that the early church did away with it, and established Sunday sacredness. Who do you say the Sabbath keepers were? Or do you just deny their existence altogether?
A great many Christians continued to keep the seventh-day sabbath? Really Amo? Who were these "great many Christians" and what exactly do you mean that they kept the seventh-day sabbath?
http://christsassembly.com/2015/05/honoring-of-the-sabbath-in-the-historic-orthodox-church/ (http://christsassembly.com/2015/05/honoring-of-the-sabbath-in-the-historic-orthodox-church/)
http://www.cogwriter.com/sabbath.htm (http://www.cogwriter.com/sabbath.htm)
http://www.celticorthodoxchurch.com/index2.html (http://www.celticorthodoxchurch.com/index2.html)
http://www.the-ten-commandments.org/sabbathkeepingchurches.html (http://www.the-ten-commandments.org/sabbathkeepingchurches.html)
"The primitive Christians did keep the Sabbath of the Jews;..therefore the Christians for a long time together, did keep their conventions on the Sabbath, in which some portion of the Law were read: and this continued till the time of the Laodicean council." The Whole Works of Jeremey Taylor, Vol. IX, p416 (R. Heber's Edition, Vol.XII, p.416)
"The gentile Christians observed also the Sabbath." Gieseler's Church History, Vol.1,ch.2, par.30, p.93.
"The primitive Christians had a great veneration for the Sabbath, and did spend the day in devotion and sermons. And it is not to be doubted but they derived this practice from the Apostles themselves, as appears by several scriptures to that purpose." Dialogues on the Lord's Day. p.189. London: 1701. By Dr. T. H. Morer.(church of England divine)
"The Sabbath was a strong tie which united them with the life of the whole people, and by keeping the Sabbath holy they followed not only the example but the command of Jesus." Geschichte des Sonntags, pp.13,14.
"It is certain that the ancient Sabbath did remain and was observed (together with the celebration of the Lord's day by the Christians of the East Church) three hundred year after the Saviour's death." A learned Treatise of the Sabbath, p.77.
"The seventh-day Sabbath was.. solemnised by Christ, the Apostles, and primitive Christians, till the Laodicean Council did in a manner quite abolish the observation of it." Dissertation on the Lord's Day, pp.33,34,44.
"As early as A.D.225 their existed large bishoprics or conferences of the church of the East (Sabbath-keeping) stretching from Palestine to India." Mingana, Early Spread of
Christianity. Vol.10, p.460.
"Thou shalt observe the Sabbath, on account of Him who ceased from His work of creation, but ceased not from His work of providence: it is a rest for meditation of the Law, not for idleness of the hands." The Anti-Nicene Fathers, Vol.7, p 413, From Constitutions of the Holy Apostles, A document of the 3rd and 4th centuries.
"After the festival of the unceasing sacrifice [the crucifixion] is put the second festival of the Sabbath, and is fitting for whoever is righteous among the saints to keep also the festival of the Sabbath. There remaineth therefore a Sabbatismus, that is a keeping of the Sabbath, to the people of God [Heb 4:9]" Homily on Numbers 23, par.4, in Migne, Patrologia Greaca, Vol. 12, cols.749,750.
"It was the practice generally of the Easterne Churches; and some churches of the west..For in the church of Millaine [Milan];.. it seemes the Saturday was held in farre esteeme ..Not that the Easterne churches, or any of the rest which observed that day, were inclined to Iudaisme [Judaism]; but that they came together on the Sabbath day, to worship Iesus [Jesus] Christ the Lord of the Sabbath." History of the Sabbath (original Spelling retained) Part 2, par. 5, pp. 73,74, London: 1636, Dr. Heylyn.
"The ancient Christians were very careful in the observation of Saturday, or the seventh day. It is plain that all the Oriental churches, and the greatest part of the world observed the Sabbath as a festival..Athanasius likewise tells us that they held religious assemblies on the Sabbath, not because they were infected with Judaism, but to worship Jesus, the Lord of the Sabbath, Epiphanius says the same." Antiquities of the Christian Church, Vol. II, Book XX, chap. 3, Sec. 1, 66.1137, 1138
"From the apostles' time until the council of Laodicea, which was about the year 364, the holy observation of the Jew's Sabbath continued, as may be proved out of many authors: yea, notwithstanding the decree of the council against it. Sunday a Sabbath,John Ley, p.163 London 1640.
"Ambrose, the celebrated bishop of Milan, said that when he was in Milan he observed Saturday, but when in Rome observed Sunday. This gave rise to the proverb 'When you are in Rome, do as Rome does,' " Heylyn, The History of the Sabbath, 1613
"Down even to the fifth century the observance of the Jewish Sabbath was continued in the Christian church." Ancient Christianity Exemplified, Lyman Coleman, Ch.26, sec. 2, p.527.
"For although almost all Churches throught the world celebrate the sacred mysteries [the Lord's Supper] on the Sabbath of every week, yet the Christians of Alexandria and at Rome, on account of some ancient tradition, refuse to do this." The footnote which accompanies the foregoing quotation explains the use of the word "Sabbath" It says : "That is, upon the Saturday. It should be observed, that Sunday is never called 'the Sabbath' by the ancient Fathers and historians." Sacrates, Ecclesiastical History, Book 5, chap. 22, p. 289.
As for your question regarding who the sabbath keepers were, the answer is everyone who becomes a Christian in baptism and turns from their evil ways. The following is addressed to you, Amo, and everyone else with a similar mindset to yours:
Quote from: St. Justin the Martyr, Dialogue With Trypho The Jew, Chapter 12-13
This same law you have despised, and His new holy covenant you have slighted; and now you neither receive it, nor repent of your evil deeds. For your ears are closed, your eyes are blinded, and the heart is hardened, Jeremiah has cried; yet not even then do you listen. The Lawgiver is present, yet you do not see Him; to the poor the Gospel is preached, the blind see, yet you do not understand. You have now need of a second circumcision, though you glory greatly in the flesh. The new law requires you to keep perpetual sabbath, and you, because you are idle for one day, suppose you are pious, not discerning why this has been commanded you: and if you eat unleavened bread, you say the will of God has been fulfilled. The Lord our God does not take pleasure in such observances: if there is any perjured person or a thief among you, let him cease to be so; if any adulterer, let him repent; then he has kept the sweet and true sabbaths of God. If any one has impure hands, let him wash and be pure.
For Isaiah did not send you to a bath, there to wash away murder and other sins, which not even all the water of the sea were sufficient to purge; but, as might have been expected, this was that saving bath of the olden time which followed those who repented, and who no longer were purified by the blood of goats and of sheep, or by the ashes of an heifer, or by the offerings of fine flour, but by faith through the blood of Christ, and through His death, who died for this very reason,
Source: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/01282.htm (http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/01282.htm)
No, it is not for me, I am not Jewish or following the literal Jews who deny Jesus as their Messiah. I am a spiritual Jew, who has accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as my personal Savior. Here is a message for you from my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ –
Rev 22:13 I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. 14 Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.15 For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.16 I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star. Go to, follow your teacher and lord Justin. I will follow my Lord, my Savior, and teacher by way of living example, Jesus Christ. No one has to abandon the observance of the fourth commandment of God to understand, accept, and be saved by and through the gospel of Jesus Christ. To the contrary, the saved want to keep the law of God. Only apostate Christianity demands that the seventh day Sabbath no longer be observed. Your man Justin was a forerunner of the man of sin and his church. He is your church father, not mine.
There might be some controversy surrounding Clement of Alexandria, but the quotes you listed don't appear to be the source of it. In fact, I find his teaching, in the quotes provided, to be very good and Christian. But if you believe he has spoken evil in any of the quotes you listed, as you certainly believe he has, then bear witness to the evil, because as it is, I don't see how they teach anything contrary to the faith of Christ. In fact, some of them are quite beautiful in their poetic nature. So thanks for that!
Yes, I understand that as a child of the church fathers of apostasy defending the exaltation of the day of the sun over the Sabbath of God, you would not see any problem with the above quotes. The man is one of your chosen church fathers, why would you have a problem with his teachings or methods? The problem is far more obvious though, to those willing to admit the major influence and unbiblical changes brought about in the "Church" through association and adaption of pagan thought and practice. The Roman Catholic church itself being a prime example of this association and adaption, which is unsupported and condemned by scripture.
That term (Sun of Righteousness) appears in scripture once. It is in reference to the fact that although God's appearance will bring destruction and fire upon the wicked, it will be as the healing rays of the sun upon the saved.
Mal 4:1 For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the LORD of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch. 2 But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall.
A Jewish prophet speaking the above to the Jews, is a far cry from a Greek philosopher speaking such to pagans or newly converted pagans. One may be appropriate, the other certainly not.
So it's okay for the prophet Malachi to liken Christ to the sun with the epithet "Sun of Righteousness", but it's not okay for a Christian you disagree with to use a similar tactic for teaching? Got it Amo! No bias or prejudice coming from your direction I see
Some people just have poor judgment, and can't see problems right in front of their faces, because those problems are not convenient to them. Time, place, and context are important factors to consider. You deny pagan sun worshiping influence upon the early church, therefore you deny any problem with Justin's repeated references to the sun in relation to the Son of God, or His teachings and influence. I admit and testify of that influence, therefore I make the obvious observation of that influence upon Justin himself, and those he addressed. It is no surprise that one of your "church fathers" who contributed to the exaltation of the day of the sun over and above the Sabbath of God, should also closely associate Christ, the word of God, and there influence to the sun, sun beams, and the like. Go to, continue to exalt the sun-day, and teach people to break the commandments of God.
By the way, I'd like to address your contention that worship and prayer toward the east is always somehow linked with worshipping the sun. While sun-worshipers no doubt worshipped toward the east to the rising of the sun, this in no way prohibits anyone else from facing east to worship and pray as though they are doing it for the same reason. Just as in the committing of a crime, even so in the practice of faith motive is important.
Christians worshipping and praying toward the east is not indicative of sun worship in Christianity. Christians believe that God's glory comes from the east. Hear what scripture says regarding this:
Quote from: Ezekiel 43:1-4
Afterward he brought me to the gate, the gate that faces toward the east. And behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east. His voice was like the sound of many waters; and the earth shone with His glory. It was like the appearance of the vision which I saw—like the vision which I saw when I came to destroy the city. The visions were like the vision which I saw by the River Chebar; and I fell on my face. And the glory of the Lord came into the temple by way of the gate which faces toward the east.
Christians also hear what the Psalmist says about singing to God toward the east:
Quote from: Psalm 68:32-33 (LXX)
Sing to God, ye kingdoms of the earth; sing psalms to the Lord. Pause.
Sing to God that rides on the heaven of heaven, eastward: lo, he will utter a mighty sound with his voice.
And Christians believe Christ's coming will be from the east:
Quote from: Matthew 24:27
For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.
In fact, on this last note about His second coming, even your prophetess Ellen White said that Christ would come from the east. Hear what she says:
Quote from: Ellen White, The Great Controversy, Page 640
Soon there appears in the east a small black cloud, about half the size of a man's hand. It is the cloud which surrounds the Saviour and which seems in the distance to be shrouded in darkness. The people of God know this to be the sign of the Son of man. In solemn silence they gaze upon it as it draws nearer the earth, becoming lighter and more glorious, until it is a great white cloud, its base a glory like consuming fire, and above it the rainbow of the covenant. Jesus rides forth as a mighty conqueror. Not now a "Man of Sorrows," to drink the bitter cup of shame and woe, He comes, victor in heaven and earth, to judge the living and the dead. "Faithful and True," "in righteousness He judges and makes war." And "the armies in heaven" (Revelation 19:11, 14) follow Him. With anthems of celestial melody the holy angels, a vast, unnumbered throng, attend Him on His way. The firmament seems filled with radiant forms—"ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands." Revelation 5:11. No human pen can portray the scene; no mortal mind is adequate to conceive its splendor. "His glory covered the heavens, and the earth was full of His praise. His brightness was like the light." Habakkuk 3:3, 4. As the living cloud comes still nearer, every eye beholds the Prince of life. No crown of thorns now mars that sacred head; but a diadem of glory rests on His holy brow. His countenance outshines the dazzling brightness of the noonday sun. "And He has on His robe and on His thigh a name written: King of kings and Lord of lords." Revelation 19:16.
Source: https://tinyurl.com/mxomo4v
Amo, just because someone does something that's similar to what some pagans did a long time ago doesn't mean they're doing it for the same reason. Also, and just as true, something isn't automatically ruined for Christians simply because pagans did something similar. The reasons why Christians worship and pray toward the east are entirely different from the ancient pagans. The similarities are surface and that is all. Christians don't worship the sun, they worship the Sun of Righteousness! Judge with righteous judgment, Amo, and not according to outward appearance.
Yes motive is important. God will judge between you, and those who have stated the purpose of facing the east was pagan influence. Nevertheless, this practice is again unbiblical. Scripture says nowhere to face the east in prayer because God will return from the east. To the contrary, the one reference we have from scripture regarding those who did bow down and pray to the east at the rising sun, was that it was an abomination to God. Not just an abomination, but the worst of a list of abominations pointed out by God. Yet here you are defending the practice, while defending breaking the fourth commandment, while defending Sunday sacredness. None of which scripture sanctions, all of which scripture condemns. All because you follow your "church fathers" above scripture.
North African half-heathen Christians who led out in Christian worship on Sunday, were also the first to call Jesus Christ the true Sun-god, and to direct their prayers toward the east--the rising sun--to rise early in the morning that they pray facing the sun as it arose. Clement of Alexandria (c. 150-215 AD.) frequently called Christ the true Sun, and he urged the pagans to accept Him as such. Origen (c. 185-254) said, "Christ is the Sun of Justice; if the moon is united, which is the Church, it will be filled with His light." Cyprian (d. 258), Bishop of Carthage told believers "to pray at sunrise to commemorate the resurrection . . . and to pray at the setting of the sun . . . for the advent of Christ." "They took a much easier view of certain pagan customs, conventions and images and saw no objection, after ridding them of their pagan content, to adapting them to Christian thought."--J. Danielou, Bible and Liturgy, p. 299.
When Christianity went down the same road of apostasy as Israel in amalgamating sun worship with the true worship of God through Christ, God sent the barbarians of the north who caused destruction and desolation everywhere they went. By the time Sunday sacredness had almost completely replaced God's seventh day Sabbath, the western Roman empire collapsed under the weight of continual invasions by the barbarians of the north. They spread destruction and desolation everywhere they went and sacked Rome itself several times. God's judgement comes from the north. When the abomination of desolation is set up again by law in place of God's Sabbath by the last beast of biblical prophesy, God Himself will bring judgement upon this earth.[/color=blue]
I see that you have many thoughts in your head Amo. Wrong thoughts for sure, but many nonetheless.
God will be the judge of that, not you. You are certainly entitled to your opinion. One of us no doubt will have some serious explaining to do, when we stand before the judge of all.[/color=blue]
Give the drama a rest Amo. We're just having a discussion here. Besides, you obviously think the exact same about me. You've certainly said as much.
Here is some more drama for you.
Mt 12:36 But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. 37 For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.We are discussing the word of God, which is not to be trifled with. There is no drama in the very real warning, that those who choose to handle the word of God, will most certainly be judged according to the way they handle it. One of us is lying, and liars will not go unpunished. Especially those who lie about the word of God.
2 Th 2:7 For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. 8 And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: 9 Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs
and lying wonders, 10 And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish;
because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11 And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion,
that they should believe a lie: 12 That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
Revelation 21:7-9King James Version (KJV)
7 He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. 8 But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters,
and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.I believe that what you teach is part of the mystery of iniquity and deception. If I am right, it will not be well for you in the judgment. If I am wrong and you are right, it will not be well for me in the judgment. Considering what awaits which ever of us is wrong, we haven't really displayed near enough drama. We are living in and through one of the greatest dramas of all time. The parts we choose to play will have eternal consequences.
Jn 12:44 Jesus cried and said,
He that believeth on me, believeth not on me, but on him that sent me. 45 And he that seeth me seeth him that sent me. 46 I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on me should not abide in darkness. 47 And if any man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. 48 He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.You and I will both be judged by the words of the Lord Jesus Christ, King of kings, and Lord of lords.
Mt 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.All who deny the above testimony of Jesus Christ, will be judged by the same.
Amo,
You are using Matthew 5:17,18,19 to reinforce your point here on this sabbath thread, but I don't think those verses lead where you want them to.
I believe that Jesus fulfilled the law, but let me ask you, when Jesus is talking about the law and the prophets in those verses, is he talking about ALL the law of Israel and the prophets, or just the 10 commandments?
I believe in those verses he is talking about ALL the law and the prophets, not just the 10 commandments.
I don't see any way that anyone can try to say Jesus is not talking about ALL the law and the prophets in those verses, so those particular verses would be bad ones for the SDA to make any stand on for trying to make people just keep SOME of the law. In the end, these verses help dissolve SDA theology, not help it.
: trevans1977 Sat May 27, 2017 - 23:43:59
Amo,
You are using Matthew 5:17,18,19 to reinforce your point here on this sabbath thread, but I don't think those verses lead where you want them to.
I believe that Jesus fulfilled the law, but let me ask you, when Jesus is talking about the law and the prophets in those verses, is he talking about ALL the law of Israel and the prophets, or just the 10 commandments?
I believe in those verses he is talking about ALL the law and the prophets, not just the 10 commandments.
I don't see any way that anyone can try to say Jesus is not talking about ALL the law and the prophets in those verses, so those particular verses would be bad ones for the SDA to make any stand on for trying to make people just keep SOME of the law. In the end, these verses help dissolve SDA theology, not help it.
WRONG!, and right. He was talking about the law, the prophets, and the commandments. The law and the prophets are the entire OT. Jesus Christ certainly fulfilled many of the prophecies of the OT, but certify not all of them yet either. He also certainly fulfilled many of the laws concerning the sanctuary and what they pointed to, but not all of them either. The temple is no more, and Jesus taught exactly why. He was the sacrifice that all the temple sacrifices pointed to, it would be an affront to God to go back to those sacrifices concerning the law which have been fulfilled. The church and the saved individual are now the temple of God through the indwelling of His Holy Spirit. These truths are clearly taught in NT scripture. The laws pertaining to such have been fulfilled in Christ, and are now to be fulfilled in Christ's followers. Christ was the for-runner, and all who are in Him are now also the sacrifice in Him alone who could be the perfect sacrifice for sin.
Ro 12:1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God,
that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. 2 And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. 3 For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith. 4 For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office: 5 So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another.
Ga 2:19
For I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God. 20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. 21
I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain.The law demands the death of the sinner. In Christ Jesus the sinner is crucified with His Lord by faith. Through the demands of the law, in Christ we become dead to the law, fulfilling its demand. This is by the grace of Jesus Christ and Him crucified, and our entering into that experience by faith in Him. This is not in order to continue to break the law, but rather in order that it might be fulfilled within us as it was is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. This is why Jesus after saying He came to fulfill the law, then says the following in relation to the commandments of God -
Mt 5:19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.After saying the above he expounds upon the commandment not to kill, and then the commandment to not commit adultery. He is referring to the ten commandments in verse 19. He then continues on into explaining that love is the fulfillment of the law, as it always has been. No commandment is or can be fulfilled by ignoring the details or specifications of the commandment itself. To the contrary, our Lord and Savior magnified the commandments in the very verses we are considering and others as well, giving them deeper meaning and application. This without doing away with any part of the commands themselves, as He testified. The apostle Paul teaches the same thing for those who do not twist and manipulate his words to their own ends.
Rom 6:1 What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? 2 God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein? 3
Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? 4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: 6 Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. 7 For he that is dead is freed from sin. 8 Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him:9 Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him.10 For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God.11 Likewise
reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.12
Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. 13 Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. 14
For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace. 15 What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid. 16 Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness? 17 But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you. 18 Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness.
We do not die in Christ Jesus according to the law, in order to be freed from the law itself which Paul testifies is good and spiritual, but from the condemnation of the law. This, in order to be freed from sin, which is the breaking of the commandments of God. The commandments are to be fulfilled within us, written upon our hearts, not done away with. This is what apostate Christianity demands though, concerning the fourth commandment of God. Preaching that its fulfillment no longer includes the observance of the day, which scripture says nowhere. According to them, its fulfillment and magnification by Christ, includes and demands that the day no longer be observed. This in direct contradiction to the testimony of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. No law or commandment is fulfilled in anyone by ignoring the details and or specifications within it. Apart from which we have the living example of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ concerning the magnification of the law and or commandments of God which also testify against the false teaching of no Sabbath, or Sunday replacement of the Sabbath. Paul gives more testimony regarding the same as well.
Rom8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus
hath made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: 4
That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 5 For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. 6 For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7
Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. 9 But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. 10
And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.
It is sin that causes death, not the law. The law is good and spiritual, leading the sinner to Christ. This in order to stop sinning, not stop keeping God's law. We want to die to sin, the death which the law demands, we do not want to die to the law by way of not keeping it. Such is a false gospel.
1 Corinthians 7:18-20Amplified Bible (AMP)
18 Was anyone at the time of his calling [from God already] circumcised? He is not to [a]become uncircumcised. Has anyone been called while uncircumcised?
He is not to be circumcised. 19 Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but what matters is keeping the commandments of God. 20 Each one should remain in the condition in which he was [when he was] called.
Amo,
That is a long response.
I can see you are trying to make it seem like Jesus isn't still talking about all the law in verse 19, but that is just plain wrong considering the context of verses 17 and 18. Yes he does expound on some of the 10 commandments after that, but he also expounds on some of the laws that aren't part of the 10 commandments after that as well, like the law about swearing and the law regarding eye for an eye.
And besides verse 19, verse 18 makes it clear not one jot or tittle shall pass from the law till all be fulfilled. Are you picking and choosing what law he is talking about in verse 18? Are you choosing what jots and tittles apply for you to fulfill and which ones he fulfilled?
I think the point I made in my previous post stands strong. In the end, he is talking about all the law in Matt 5:17, 18, and 19, but you are trying to use those verses to tell use we have to keep SOME of the law.
In the end, I believe the point I made in my previous post stands strong and I think you are painting yourself in a corner regarding your use for those verses.
: trevans1977 Sun May 28, 2017 - 15:36:49
Amo,
That is a long response.
I can see you are trying to make it seem like Jesus isn't still talking about all the law in verse 19, but that is just plain wrong considering the context of verses 17 and 18. Yes he does expound on some of the 10 commandments after that, but he also expounds on some of the laws that aren't part of the 10 commandments after that as well, like the law about swearing and the law regarding eye for an eye.
And besides verse 19, verse 18 makes it clear not one jot or tittle shall pass from the law till all be fulfilled. Are you picking and choosing what law he is talking about in verse 18? Are you choosing what jots and tittles apply for you to fulfill and which ones he fulfilled?
I think the point I made in my previous post stands strong. In the end, he is talking about all the law in Matt 5:17, 18, and 19, but you are trying to use those verses to tell use we have to keep SOME of the law.
In the end, I believe the point I made in my previous post stands strong and I think you are painting yourself in a corner regarding your use for those verses.
You are of course free to believe whatever you wish. If all of Christ's words we are discussing were in relation to all the law and prophets as you suggest, can you tell me when all was fulfilled, which alone would allow for changes in the law? When did heaven and earth pass, which also must take place before any of the law would change? If what you are saying is true, and all has not been fulfilled, nor has heaven and earth passed, then we should all be keeping all of the OT laws, correct? This is what Jesus said, is it not?
Jesus did fulfill all of the law, including the ten commandments. That fulfillment established the law of God. All of it. The NT writings explain the changes brought about by that fulfillment. They also admonish all to keep the commandments of God right up to the last book and chapter. Obviously, the fulfillment of the law does not include changing the commandments of God. Nevertheless, we know that the NT does address many changes effected by that fulfillment in many of the other laws pertaining to Israel. How do you work these inconsistencies out in your beliefs?
I don't think I have inconsistency in my beliefs.
I came to Jesus, he gave me his Holy Spirit. I talk with him daily. He guides me and helps me repent when I fall short. My relationship with him isn't based on me trying to keep all the OT laws. Jesus writes his laws on my heart, I am led by his Spirit, more and more as I learn to abide in him, though I do fall short often.
I see clearly that in Matthew 5:17,18, and 19 that Jesus is talking about all the OT laws.
I also know clearly that my relationship with Jesus doesn't require me to keep all the OT laws.
I'm not trying to come to Jesus or maintain my relationship with him based on the rules of the old covenant, my relationship with Jesus started when he gave me his Holy Spirit based on my faith in him.
Does my relationship with Jesus depend upon me not being an immoral person? Absolutely. Communion with him will be hindered immediately by immoral behavior. I don't keep the OT Sabbath, does that hinder my daily communion with God? Not to my knowledge.
I don't think God is convicting me to keep the OT Sabbath. I do think a lot of SDA are trying to convict me to keep the OT Sabbath.
I don't think I have inconsistency in my beliefs.
I came to Jesus, he gave me his Holy Spirit. I talk with him daily. He guides me and helps me repent when I fall short. My relationship with him isn't based on me trying to keep all the OT laws. Jesus writes his laws on my heart, I am led by his Spirit, more and more as I learn to abide in him, though I do fall short often.
I see clearly that in Matthew 5:17,18, and 19 that Jesus is talking about all the OT laws.
I also know clearly that my relationship with Jesus doesn't require me to keep all the OT laws.
I'm not trying to come to Jesus or maintain my relationship with him based on the rules of the old covenant, my relationship with Jesus started when he gave me his Holy Spirit based on my faith in him.
Does my relationship with Jesus depend upon me not being an immoral person? Absolutely. Communion with him will be hindered immediately by immoral behavior. I don't keep the OT Sabbath, does that hinder my daily communion with God? Not to my knowledge.
I don't think God is convicting me to keep the OT Sabbath. I do think a lot of SDA are trying to convict me to keep the OT Sabbath.
As already stated, you are certainly free to believe and practice whatever you wish. SDA's do not believe everyone needs to keep all the OT laws, this is your own belief about them, not theirs. The Sabbath predates the OT laws given to Abraham or Israel, it was kept by the early church, and will be kept by the saved in the new heaven and new earth. If you choose to believe that the Holy Spirit leads you to ignore this commandment of God, so be it. SDA's feel it is their responsibility to warn you of the danger of this belief, so they do. As we see it, the Holy Spirit does not convict people to ignore or contradict the Holy Spirit inspired words of scripture. Which scriptures teach us to obey the commandments of God right up to the last book and chapter. We will try to convince you of truth as we see it, but we will never attempt to force God's Sabbath upon you, as Sunday keepers have and do. While they accuse Sabbath keepers of being the ones who seek salvation though the keeping of the law, they themselves are the ones who would and do force their own beliefs upon others by law. Thus revealing their true nature and sentiments. Unfortunately, there are many who profess Christ, whom He never knew.
Mt 7:21 Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. 22 Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? 23 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.
: Amoit was kept by the early church,
No it wasn't. The early Church didn't rest from work on the seventh-day of the week like Seventh-day Adventists do. None of the sources we have from those early centuries show that they did. In fact, what we have available to us in those early sources show unequivocally that what Seventh-day Adventists believe about the sabbath was condemned, even though they knew nothing of the SDA church. Was the sabbath honored among Christians? Certainly it was, and still is by the Churches of the east. But it has never been part of the Church's teaching that Christians must abstain from work on the seventh-day or else they sin against God! That is a Seventh-day Adventist teaching which is wrong.
: AmoIf you choose to believe that the Holy Spirit leads you to ignore this commandment of God, so be it. SDA's feel it is their responsibility to warn you of the danger of this belief, so they do. As we see it, the Holy Spirit does not convict people to ignore or contradict the Holy Spirit inspired words of scripture.
The Holy Spirit doesn't convict people to ignore or contradict scripture, but it does convict people to ignore and contradict the Seventh-day Adventist interpretation of said scripture. And that's exactly what is going on here. The Seventh-day Adventist interpretation and spin on scripture that you're espousing here Amo is what is being rejected, not the scriptures themselves. Too bad you can't see the difference.
: AmoWhile they accuse Sabbath keepers of being the ones who seek salvation though the keeping of the law
You try keep the sabbath by not working on a day of the week in order to not sin against God. Sounds kind of like salvation through keeping the law to me, something the New Testament certainly condemns (see Galatians 3:1-14). Try as you might, Amo, but every time you try to convict others to keep the sabbath commandment, pointing out the "danger" of not doing so, you are preaching salvation by the works of the law!
: DMA Mon Jun 05, 2017 - 08:27:56
: Amoit was kept by the early church,
No it wasn't. The early Church didn't rest from work on the seventh-day of the week like Seventh-day Adventists do. None of the sources we have from those early centuries show that they did. In fact, what we have available to us in those early sources show unequivocally that what Seventh-day Adventists believe about the sabbath was condemned, even though they knew nothing of the SDA church. Was the sabbath honored among Christians? Certainly it was, and still is by the Churches of the east. But it has never been part of the Church's teaching that Christians must abstain from work on the seventh-day or else they sin against God! That is a Seventh-day Adventist teaching which is wrong.
: AmoIf you choose to believe that the Holy Spirit leads you to ignore this commandment of God, so be it. SDA's feel it is their responsibility to warn you of the danger of this belief, so they do. As we see it, the Holy Spirit does not convict people to ignore or contradict the Holy Spirit inspired words of scripture.
The Holy Spirit doesn't convict people to ignore or contradict scripture, but it does convict people to ignore and contradict the Seventh-day Adventist interpretation of said scripture. And that's exactly what is going on here. The Seventh-day Adventist interpretation and spin on scripture that you're espousing here Amo is what is being rejected, not the scriptures themselves. Too bad you can't see the difference.
: AmoWhile they accuse Sabbath keepers of being the ones who seek salvation though the keeping of the law
You try keep the sabbath by not working on a day of the week in order to not sin against God. Sounds kind of like salvation through keeping the law to me, something the New Testament certainly condemns (see Galatians 3:1-14). Try as you might, Amo, but every time you try to convict others to keep the sabbath commandment, pointing out the "danger" of not doing so, you are preaching salvation by the works of the law!
Exo 20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: 10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: 11 For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
There is the commandment. It's not about interpretation, it's about whether we should still keep the commandments or not. I believe and teach that we should, you don't. God will settle this and all matters when He returns.
Early Christian did keep the Sabbath. A great many of them were Jews who accepted their Messiah Jesus Christ. Do you think they just abruptly stopped obeying the fourth commandment? Do you believe they were part of Christ's church? Do you believe they are today? Or do you maintain the wall of separation which Christ came to tare down? Are they the church of Christ, or do you maintain a separation between those who Christ made one?
Will those who show partiality against the royal law as you define it be lost for doing so? Do they then not have to obey the royal law of not showing partiality if they want to be saved? If so, then aren't you teaching salvation by the works of your royal law? If not, then isn't everyone saved since there is no standard for anyone to meet? Or is everyone now reliant upon your definition of the new standards according to your church I suppose, rather than scripture?
Romans 3:18-20King James Version (KJV)
18 There is no fear of God before their eyes.19 Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.20 Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin.
All the world is guilty before God being condemned by the unchangeable standard of the law. Their salvation from that condemnation is in Christ alone. They are not saved in order to remain law breakers, but as new creatures in Christ Jesus to become law obeyers as their Lord and Savior Jesus Christ was. Those who are saved in Christ can still sin, because the law still stands. Though they may obtain forgiveness and renewal through Christ alone.
1 Jn 1:8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.
We can still sin, because the law is still the standard. that has not gone away, and it will not. Not before heaven and earth pass, as our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ testified.
Mt 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-news-from-elsewhere-41025700
Polish bishops for total ban on Sunday shopping
Poland's leading Catholic bishop has spoken out in favour of an almost complete ban on shops opening on Sunday, amid growing public controversy over the proposal.
"Free Sundays are what all Catholics, non-Catholics and non-believers need," Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki told Polish Radio ahead of a meeting of the Bishops Conference on Friday, which is expected to support the ban.................
I don't think I have inconsistency in my beliefs.
I came to Jesus, he gave me his Holy Spirit. I talk with him daily. He guides me and helps me repent when I fall short. My relationship with him isn't based on me trying to keep all the OT laws. Jesus writes his laws on my heart, I am led by his Spirit, more and more as I learn to abide in him, though I do fall short often.
I see clearly that in Matthew 5:17,18, and 19 that Jesus is talking about all the OT laws.
I also know clearly that my relationship with Jesus doesn't require me to keep all the OT laws.
I'm not trying to come to Jesus or maintain my relationship with him based on the rules of the old covenant, my relationship with Jesus started when he gave me his Holy Spirit based on my faith in him.
Does my relationship with Jesus depend upon me not being an immoral person? Absolutely. Communion with him will be hindered immediately by immoral behavior. I don't keep the OT Sabbath, does that hinder my daily communion with God? Not to my knowledge.
I don't think God is convicting me to keep the OT Sabbath. I do think a lot of SDA are trying to convict me to keep the OT Sabbath.
You convince me fully that you believe every word you say about yourself. It wasn't difficult in the least.
I don't think I have inconsistency in my beliefs.
I came to Jesus, he gave me his Holy Spirit.
My relationship with Jesus started when he gave me his Holy Spirit based on my faith in him.
Does my relationship with Jesus depend upon me not being an immoral person? Absolutely.
Four living first principles of 'the old covenant' in all its glory...
http://dedication.www3.50megs.com/sundaylaw.html
The following quotes are from the above link.
Poland Considers Ban on Sunday Shopping
THE WARSAW VOICE
December, 1999 "Solidarity Election Action (AWS), the co-ruling party in Poland, seeks to ban trade on Sundays. In practice such a ban would hit supermarkets, a form of mass retailing unknown to Poles before the collapse of communism. When polled, 60 percent of respondents said they wanted to do their shopping on Sunday. ...The AWS pressure for this unpopular legislation is a result of its ideological profile. It is dominated by Catholic leaders, many of whom originated from the trade union movement, allergic to the expansion of the Western lifestyle in the homeland of the pope. They use arguments of a religious nature (remember the Sabbath to keep it holy) as well as socioeconomic....In fact they are pressing for a fundamentalist solution to the problem stemming from a literary interpretation of the third commandment."
WARSAW (CWNews.com) -
Polish lawmakers proposed a draft bill on Thursday (Oct. 2001) that would require stores to remain closed on Sunday in order to protect people forced to work on Sunday, a day of rest for Christians.
The bill, sponsored by 21 deputies, has the support of the Polish bishop's conference, citing Pope John Paul II's recent remarks that Poles are too often converging on so-called hypermarkets on Sundays when they should instead be attending Mass and spending time in spiritual pursuits. More than 90 percent of Poles are Catholic.
Jerzy Gwizdz, one of the authors of the draft, acknowledged that respect for Sunday as a Christian holiday was one of the reasons behind the proposal. But the measure also aims at "protecting a big number of people who are forced to work on Sundays."
Warsaw Voice
Trade Limitation, Remember the Sabbath Day Labor code introducing new regulations permitting only small stores-with five employees, or less-to operate on Sundays and holidays, the president has made his intentions clear in vetoing this bill. (Sept. 30, 2001)
Polish church leaders criticize veto of Sunday shopping ban
By Jonathan Luxmoore
Catholic News Service
WARSAW, Poland (CNS) --
October, 2001
"Polish church leaders criticized President Aleksander Kwasniewski for vetoing legislation that would have prohibited shopping on Sundays.
"This veto contradicts the Ten Commandments and our nation's centuries-old tradition," said Jesuit Father Adam Szulc, spokesman for the Polish bishops' conference.
"It will not help Catholics, especially those employed in supermarkets, to observe Sunday's sacred character. Instead, it will force them to work."
"The Jesuit priest reacted to the president's Oct. 11 veto of a Labor Code amendment, which would have restricted Sunday shopping to small essential-service outlets only.
"Father Szulc said the veto violated norms in the European Union, and he dismissed claims that the ban would have worsened Poland's state budget deficit and driven up unemployment.
"However, Kwasniewski's office said Oct. 11 that the president had exercised his veto after being advised the measure could cause 16,000 job losses.
"With rising unemployment and falling economic growth in our country, a ban on activities by large trade establishments and service enterprises on Sundays and holidays would have caused economic hardships," the statement added.
"Such a ban would have inflicted additional burdens on the state budget in unemployment allowances and insurance, as well as a cut in turnover in important sectors of the economy," it said.
"In an Oct. 4 letter to Kwasniewski, the bishops' conference said Sunday shop opening violated religious freedom and caused a "serious conflict of conscience" for Catholics.
"It added that the legally guaranteed celebration of Sunday was a "lasting, universal element of Europe's spiritual heritage," and its neglect would "lead to a slackening of family bonds and (to) pathologies."
WHO WAS BEHIND THIS BILL?
We just read that it was the Polish Catholic Bishop's conference, citing Pope John Paul II's recent remarks that Poles are too often converging on so-called hypermarkets on Sundays when they should instead be attending Mass and spending time in spiritual pursuits." It's the Catholic dominated AWS that's pushing Sunday laws, for religious reasons.
The battle continues in Poland.
The above was NEWS about the Polish Catholic Bishop's Conference, and their attempts to pass Sunday legislation. (Oct. 2001)
The US also has a United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
See the link here.
Because the Pope's Sunday Letter "Dies Domini", says:
"Therefore, also in the particular circumstances of our own time, Christians will naturally strive to ensure that civil legislation respects their duty to keep Sunday holy." (#67)
They have changed the Catechism of the Catholic Church to read:
"In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."(#2188)
https://www.thebostonpilot.com/article.asp?ID=180902
Warsaw, Poland, Nov 27, 2017 CNA/EWTN News.- Poland could gradually end Sunday shopping in the next three years, if lawmakers approve a bill under consideration in the national legislature.
Backers of the legislation want to make it possible for workers to spend more time with their families, the British magazine The Catholic Herald reports. The bill was initially supported by trade unions, then received support from the Law and Justice Party, Poland's ruling party.
Poland's lower house, the Sejm, passed the bill by a vote of 254 to 156. It still requires approval from the Senate and President Andzrej Duda.
The bill would allow Sunday shopping only on the first and last Sunday of each month through the end of 2018, then allow shopping only on the last Sunday of the month in 2019, then ban all Sunday shopping in 2020. There would still be exemptions for some bakeries and online stores. Sundays before holidays like Christmas will also be exempt from the ban
The bishops' conference of Poland said that the bill did not go far enough, arguing that everyone should have the freedom from Sunday work.
http://wjla.com/news/nation-world/poland-to-phase-out-sunday-shopping-by-2020-11-24-2017
WARSAW, Poland (AP) —
Poland's lawmakers on Friday approved a law that will phase out Sunday shopping by the year 2020 despite criticism that it may eliminate thousands of jobs.
Proposed by trade unions that want shop workers to spend more time with their families, the bill got support from the ruling party that adheres to Catholic values. Critics say it would negatively affect Poland's economy, eliminating tens of thousands of jobs, and hurt supermarket chains, which are mostly western.
http://www.markofbeast.net/page3.htm
Two years after Pope Francis launched Laudato Si, the Vatican's plea to 'save the Earth', People of all faiths are unified globally to beat climate change (June 2017)
"Two years after the release of Laudato Si-and long after its intense global attention has faded-it's worth asking: is the uncompromising and unprecedented Catholic teaching document fulfilling Vatican expectations by uniting leaders of all faiths, along with their billions of congregants, to take decisive climate action 'in care for our common home'? The answer is a qualified 'yes'."
It is well known that in his climate encyclical, pope Francis linked Sunday rest with 'caring for the planet'. So the Vatican's plan to enforce the Sunday law has taken on a very clever tactic. And that is to convince the world that we need urgent action to 'save the planet'. And what better way to help the environment, than to shut down one day a week? And guess which day that will be? Yes, Sunday! And what has this climate movement spearheaded by the Vatican done? It has UNITED the world, the churches and religions in one 'common cause'. Very clever indeed! But God's true people will not be fooled, as our lives are rooted upon the Word of God. And we know that the 7th day (our Saturday) is the only day in which God blessed as the Sabbath day, NOT Sunday. So we will never join with Babylon in this so called 'common cause'.
Link provided from above link - https://psmag.com/social-justice/growing-concern-over-climate-change-is-creating-interfaith-dialogue
Two years after Pope Francis launched Laudato Si, the Vatican's plea to 'save the Earth', People of all faiths are unified globally to beat climate change (June 2017)
"Two years after the release of Laudato Si-and long after its intense global attention has faded-it's worth asking: is the uncompromising and unprecedented Catholic teaching document fulfilling Vatican expectations by uniting leaders of all faiths, along with their billions of congregants, to take decisive climate action 'in care for our common home'? The answer is a qualified 'yes'."
It is well known that in his climate encyclical, pope Francis linked Sunday rest with 'caring for the planet'. So the Vatican's plan to enforce the Sunday law has taken on a very clever tactic. And that is to convince the world that we need urgent action to 'save the planet'. And what better way to help the environment, than to shut down one day a week? And guess which day that will be? Yes, Sunday! And what has this climate movement spearheaded by the Vatican done? It has UNITED the world, the churches and religions in one 'common cause'. Very clever indeed! But God's true people will not be fooled, as our lives are rooted upon the Word of God. And we know that the 7th day (our Saturday) is the only day in which God blessed as the Sabbath day, NOT Sunday. So we will never join with Babylon in this so called 'common cause'.
You have joined with Babylon in its 'Everyone's Bible' in which the papacy has UNITED the world, the churches and religions in one 'common cause' warned against in Galatians 4:10.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Sun Dec 03, 2017 - 15:58:25
You have joined with Babylon in its 'Everyone's Bible' in which the papacy has UNITED the world, the churches and religions in one 'common cause' warned against in Galatians 4:10.
If you are speaking to me, your are delusional.
The legalism of Saturday keeping is well documented from the Seventh-Day Adventist denomination.
The legalism of Saturday keeping is well documented from the Seventh-Day Adventist denomination.
And no less the legalism of Sunday worshipping from papal and protestant denominations including the Seventh-Day Adventist denomination. ALL 'christianity' ACTS anti-Christ; everybody SEES it except 'christianity'.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Sat Dec 09, 2017 - 17:05:54
And no less the legalism of Sunday worshipping from papal and protestant denominations including the Seventh-Day Adventist denomination. ALL 'christianity' ACTS anti-Christ; everybody SEES it except 'christianity'.
Who does that, and who exactly are you pointing your finger at?
: current occupant2 Sat Dec 09, 2017 - 15:17:23
The legalism of Saturday keeping is well documented from the Seventh-Day Adventist denomination.
Your one sentence statement, certainly is not any reliable documentation. Please do share the same.
: Alan Sat Dec 09, 2017 - 18:17:49
Who does that, and who exactly are you pointing your finger at?
He believes SDA's are really Sunday keepers and exalters in disguise because EGW taught that Christ rose on Sunday instead of the Sabbath.
: Amo Sun Dec 10, 2017 - 12:37:50
Your one sentence statement, certainly is not any reliable documentation. Please do share the same.
Thankyou for asking nicely.
We will start with the sabbath keeping guidelines supplied on the main website of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
https://www.adventist.org/en/information/official-statements/documents/article/go/-/sabbath-observance/
These "guidelines are loosely based on the close to 500 instructions on sabbath keeping from the sda prophet that can be researched in the Index to the writings of Ellen White.
They don't even come close to the instructions that God gave the Children of Jacob when He gave THEM sabbath as described in Nehemiah 9:14
.
Amo:237. On Sunday, our participation in the Eucharist has special importance. Sunday, like the Jewish Sabbath, is meant to be a day which heals our relationships with God, with ourselves, with others and with the world. Sunday is the day of the Resurrection, the "first day" of the new creation, whose first fruits are the Lord's risen humanity, the pledge of the final transfiguration of all created reality. It also proclaims "man's eternal rest in God".[168] In this way, Christian spirituality incorporates the value of relaxation and festivity. We tend to demean contemplative rest as something unproductive and unnecessary, but this is to do away with the very thing which is most important about work: its meaning. We are called to include in our work a dimension of receptivity and gratuity, which is quite different from mere inactivity. Rather, it is another way of working, which forms part of our very essence. It protects human action from becoming empty activism; it also prevents that unfettered greed and sense of isolation which make us seek personal gain to the detriment of all else. The law of weekly rest forbade work on the seventh day, "so that your ox and your donkey may have rest, and the son of your maidservant, and the stranger, may be refreshed" (Ex 23:12). Rest opens our eyes to the larger picture and gives us renewed sensitivity to the rights of others. And so the day of rest, centred on the Eucharist, sheds it light on the whole week, and motivates us to greater concern for nature and the poor. (ENCYCLICAL LETTER
LAUDATO SI'
OF THE HOLY FATHER
FRANCIS
ON CARE FOR OUR COMMON HOME)
Sounds so very nice. Of course, the seventh day Sabbath is not Jewish, being instituted 2000 years before there ever was a Jew for all of humanity (Gen 2:1-3). A blessing was pronounced upon all who would keep it even when the Jews themselves were the chosen of God (Isa 56:1-8). It will also be kept by all the saved in the new heaven and new earth (Isa 66:22 & 23). The problem of the above quote of course then, is that the seventh day Sabbath was never meant to be replaced by another day. The Holy scriptures never declare any such thing.
The Sunday rest was and is declared and established by the will of man alone, for the purpose of placing man himself in the place or even above God. Its inculcation is of purely human design, not only apart from God, but in direct contradiction to the will of God. It is a direct manifestation of the man of sin, and all sinners who will place themselves and their own works above those of God. Its observance by force on a global scale will be a fit representation by all who submit to the same, of their defiance and rebellion against God's authority, in favor of the leadership and guidance of fallen humanity itself controlled and manipulated by the evil one himself. Entering into God's rest, includes submitting to His rightful authority. The choice to be made in the end will be simple as pie. Either submit to the authority of God's word, or submit to the usurped authority of fallen humanity under the direct influence of the one who first refused God's benevolent authority.
GE:Amo the Seventh day Adventist, you are o so completely blind, deaf and insensitive to your o so perfect oneness and identity with papal Catholicism!
It's impossible to tell, reading, which is the pope and which the SDA speaking, writing, preaching, proclaiming, authoritatively CLAIMING and DEMANDING!
It is to get sick of.
But I have to do my job. I hope for not too long to come. Then the SDAs will be able to relax and again go on lekker ploetering in their muddy pig sty.
Yes, I could have used a better word than 'muddy'. But we all have our healthy imagination.
I hope to get intolerably offensive; it may shorten my term of employment, and I at last may retire.
Amo:He believes SDA's are really Sunday keepers and exalters in disguise because EGW taught that Christ rose on Sunday instead of the Sabbath.
GE:She taught more than that, and you know it full well! She taught about Sunday being the day to remember and joy over in heaven and on earth forevermore! Which, so far as I know, she NOT ONCE wrote about or of the Seventh Day Sabbath!
Hypocrite, why don't you tell everything?!
Amo:If you are speaking to me, your are delusional.
GE:The delusional are those who reject the correct, past translations, and except and accept the universally orchestrated, FRAUDULENT translations since of the 20th century, particularly and with greatest impact on the passages having to do with the days and times on those days and dates in Christ's Last Passover of Yahweh Suffering---more than three dozen passages ADULTERATED to fit and serve Sunday reverence.
In which delusion the SDA are conspirators and collaborators.
https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/2017/november/poland-reclaims-day-of-rest-by-slowly-phasing-out-sunday-shopping
Returning to the Bible, Poland Reclaims Sunday as a Day of Rest
Strange title for the article linked. The bible says absolutely nothing about Sunday rest.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Sun Dec 10, 2017 - 16:49:35
Amo:
GE:
She taught more than that, and you know it full well! She taught about Sunday being the day to remember and joy over in heaven and on earth forevermore! Which, so far as I know, she NOT ONCE wrote about or of the Seventh Day Sabbath!
Hypocrite, why don't you tell everything?!
Stop twisting the words of others and the truth of the matter. The day of Christ's resurrection was a joyous day in heaven and on earth. That day regardless of what day, was not, is not, and never will be meant to replace God's seventh day Sabbath. Your are as wrong as Sunday keepers for thinking or suggesting that Christ had to rise on the Sabbath for it to maintain it's significance and importance as one of the Ten Commandments of God.
https://www.thenewamerican.com/culture/faith-and-morals/item/27489-poland-s-parliament-votes-to-return-sunday-to-day-of-rest
Poland's Parliament Votes to Return Sunday to Day of Resthttp://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-news-from-elsewhere-41025700
Polish bishops for total ban on Sunday shoppingPoland's leading Catholic bishop has spoken out in favour of an almost complete ban on shops opening on Sunday, amid growing public controversy over the proposal.
"Free Sundays are what all Catholics, non-Catholics and non-believers need," Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki told Polish Radio ahead of a meeting of the Bishops Conference on Friday, which is expected to support the ban.
http://www.dw.com/en/berliners-peeved-at-sunday-ban-on-convenience-stores/a-18591737
Berliners peeved at Sunday ban on convenience storeshttps://edgeofthearctic.wordpress.com/2013/01/06/its-against-the-law-to-grocery-shop-on-a-sunday/
It's against the law to shop on a Sundayhttps://www.rferl.org/a/1098491.html
Slovakia: Church Opens Debate About Closing Shops On Sundayshttp://www.visitingvienna.com/shopping/opening-hours/
I exaggerate, but if you're used to 24/7 convenience, then you might have to ratchet down your expectations. In general, shops are not allowed to open before 6 am or after 9 pm (weekdays) or after 6 pm (Saturdays), or total more than 72 hours of operation per week. Shops must also close on Sundays and public holidays.
http://www.france24.com/en/20130928-french-france-labour-law-sunday-shopping-castorama-sephora/
But Sunday has been legally protected as a day of rest since 1906, though there are exceptions for fishmongers, florists and other types of commerce, including those in designated tourist areas like Paris's Montmartre.
Businesses that violate the law by operating on Sunday without authorisation face fines of up to 6,000 euros ($8,000).
Those who defend the notion of Sunday as largely commerce-free – including unions that have fought to keep France's 35-hour work week, as well as Catholic churches – argue that it is important to uphold the tradition of one day a week devoted to rest and relaxation.
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-42012169
A minister said a request was made to a businesswoman to close her shop on Sundays in a bid to encourage people to "enjoy the peace of the Sabbath".
Leona Rawlinson, who runs Tweed Tastic on Lewis, was sent a bible and a letter from The Lord's Day Observance Society, Lewis and Harris branch.
The Rev Greg MacDonald, a branch committee member, said the group had concerns about changes to tradition.
Ms Rawlinson has refused the group's request.
The Rev Greg, a Free Church of Scotland (Continuing) minister, told BBC Radio Scotland's Kaye Adams Programme that the shop owner should be recognised for her good use and promotion of locally-woven Harris Tweed.
But he said that, while people were free to do as they chose, he would discourage anyone who would listen to him from visiting businesses when they were open on a Sunday.
The minister said: "I would want everyone to enjoy the peace of the Sabbath.
He added: "We don't police people's private life. Our group is concerned about changes to the traditional day of the Lord's Day.
"The Lord's Day is a day of peace. It is not a day of profit and trading."
http://libertymagazine.org/article/sunday-laws-in-america
"Every man and woman shall repair in the morning to the divine service and sermons preached upon the Sabbath day, and in the afternoon to divine service, and catechising, upon pain for the first fault to lose their provision and the allowance for the whole week following; for the second, to lose the said allowance and also be whipt; and for the third to suffer death."
https://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=30022
Catholic World News
EU bishops back Pillar of Social Rights, call for recognition of Sunday rest
In recent comments on the draft document, COMECE called for a recognition of Sunday rest.
"As in times of digitalization of the economy, the boundaries between private and work-life become increasingly blurred, COMECE proposes to incorporate decent working hours and the right to a common weekly day of rest," the bishops' commission stated. "This day should be in principal the Sunday, which is recognized by tradition and custom in most of the member states or regions."
The bishops added:
The economic and financial crisis has shaken the firm belief of Europe growing together. It has showed that without cooperation and dialogue at EU and global level, the nation state alone is no longer able to address the pressing social and economic challenges of our societies. In a globalized economy, COMECE therefore hopes that the European Pillar of Social Rights will renew social convergence in Europe and contribute to the creation of a culture that "drives globalization towards the humanizing goal of solidarity.
Yes, Sunday sacredness and rest by law is part of Rome's globalist agenda. Denial does not change the facts.
https://www.oneplace.com/ministries/watchman-radio-hour/read/articles/forgetting-the-christian-sabbath-12264.html
The above is an interesting link. It applies many points which have been addressed on these boards in relation to the Sabbath, in defense of God's seventh day Sabbath and it's continued significance. It dismisses many of the arguments by Sunday keepers on these boards and particularly this thread to the effect that the Sabbath was only for the Jews and did not exist as a command before the ten commandments were given to Israel. It then of course wrongly applies the command to Sunday instead of Sabbath, claiming Christ changed the day. As is obvious there are some very different perspectives among Sunday keepers. You don't hear the argument of this link very often, or at least I have not. Perhaps it is more prevalent than I know. Just haven't run into it hear that I can recall.
https://www.ewtn.com/expert/answers/sunday_mass.htm
Sunday Mass and Holy Day Obligation
It is both a precept of the Church and Church law that Catholics must worship God on Sunday and Holy Days of Obligation by participating in the Holy Mass. This follows from the fact that in the Mass it is Christ Himself who worships the Father, joining our worship to His. In no other way is it possible to adequately give thanks (eucharistia) to God for the blessings of creation, redemption and our sanctification than by uniting our offerings to that of Jesus Christ Himself. Following the example of the Old Covenant the Church does this weekly, on the day of the Lord's Resurrection.
Canon 1247
On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass; they are also to abstain from those labors and business concerns which impede the worship to be rendered to God, the joy which is proper to the Lord's Day, or the proper relaxation of mind and body.
Canon 1248
1. The precept of participating in the Mass is satisfied by assistance at a Mass which is celebrated anywhere in a Catholic rite either on the holy day or on the evening of the preceding day.
2. If because of lack of a sacred minister or for other grave cause participation in the celebration of the Eucharist is impossible, it is specially recommended that the faithful take part in the liturgy of the word if it is celebrated in the parish church or in another sacred place according to the prescriptions of the diocesan bishop, or engage in prayer for an appropriate amount of time personally or in a family or, as occasion offers, in groups of families.
Since a "grave cause" is needed to excuse one from this obligation it would be a serious or mortal sin to willfully skip Mass on Sunday or a Holy Day of Obligation, as the Church has always taught. Reasons such as the necessity to work to support one's family, child care, personal sickness or the care of the sick, necessary travel etc. would excuse a person on a particular occasions. Those who have continuing reason to be excused should consult their pastor.
If a priest is not available in an area and only a Liturgy of the Word or a Communion Service is offered the Mass obligation does not "transfer" to such services. As canon 1248 notes, participation is recommended for the spiritual value, especially if Communion is distributed.
The proper way to celebrate Sunday is spoken of at length in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
2182 Participation in the communal celebration of the Sunday Eucharist is a testimony of belonging and of being faithful to Christ and to his Church. The faithful give witness by this to their communion in faith and charity. Together they testify to God's holiness and their hope of salvation. They strengthen one another under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
2183 "If because of lack of a sacred minister or for other grave cause participation in the celebration of the Eucharist is impossible, it is specially recommended that the faithful take part in the Liturgy of the Word if it is celebrated in the parish church or in another sacred place according to the prescriptions of the diocesan bishop, or engage in prayer for an appropriate amount of time personally or in a family or, as occasion offers, in groups of families."
A day of grace and rest from work
2184 Just as God "rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done," human life has a rhythm of work and rest. The institution of the Lord's Day helps everyone enjoy adequate rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives.
2185 On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are to refrain from engaging in work or activities that hinder the worship owed to God, the joy proper to the Lord's Day, the performance of the works of mercy, and the appropriate relaxation of mind and body. Family needs or important social service can legitimately excuse from the obligation of Sunday rest. The faithful should see to it that legitimate excuses do not lead to habits prejudicial to religion, family life, and health.
The charity of truth seeks holy leisure- the necessity of charity accepts just work.
2186 Those Christians who have leisure should be mindful of their brethren who have the same needs and the same rights, yet cannot rest from work because of poverty and misery. Sunday is traditionally consecrated by Christian piety to good works and humble service of the sick, the infirm, and the elderly. Christians will also sanctify Sunday by devoting time and care to their families and relatives, often difficult to do on other days of the week. Sunday is a time for reflection, silence, cultivation of the mind, and meditation which furthers the growth of the Christian interior life.
2187 Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees.
2188 In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days.
https://www.christianpost.com/news/pope-francis-accuses-world-leaders-of-fomenting-fear-of-refugees-in-pro-migration-message-207857/
Pope Francis Accuses World Leaders of Fomenting Fear of Refugees in Pro-Migration Message
VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis on Friday excoriated politicians who foment fear of migrants, saying they were sowing violence and racism, and urged them to "practice the virtue of prudence" to help them integrate.
oops, wrong topic.
Amo:
Stop twisting the words of others and the truth of the matter. The day of Christ's resurrection was a joyous day in heaven and on earth. That day regardless of what day, was not, is not, and never will be meant to replace God's seventh day Sabbath. Your are as wrong as Sunday keepers for thinking or suggesting that Christ had to rise on the Sabbath for it to maintain it's significance and importance as one of the Ten Commandments of God.
'
twisting the words of others'? '
twisting the truth of the matter'?
Amo:'
The day of Christ's resurrection was a joyous day in heaven and on earth. That day regardless of what day'
'
The day of Christ's resurrection ... regardless of what day'?! It is a contradiction in terms, an oxymoron!
'
Regardless' --for Amo-- is it, "the angel EXPLAINED", and "explained" '
Christ's resurrection' "IN THE SABBATH'S FULLNESS IN THE MID-AFTERNOON AS DAYLIGHT began declining / inclining towards / against / unto / before the First Day of the week..."?!
Amo is the one who '
TWISTS' this Scripture, as is it '
meant to replace God's seventh day Sabbath'-- ignoring, '
twisting', Scripture meant to identify THIS VERY Sabbath Day as "the Seventh Day GOD thus concerning did SPEAK: And God THE DAY the Seventh Day from ALL, HIS, WORKS, RESTED" : "JESUS INDEED HAVING GIVEN THEM REST, WHEREFORE, for the People of God SABBATH DAYS'-REST REMAINS" inviting, persuading, impelling, "because GOD having RAISED CHRIST FROM THE DEAD", "ON IT" and "IN IT, TRIUMPHED".
If that did not CHANGE the Sabbath Day from a dead-letter-sabbath day of the Law to the '
joyous day in heaven and on earth' of God's Sabbath-Rest which He Spoke about "by the SON",
the People of God through Jesus Christ and through his Resurrection from the dead have not gained, but have LOST God's Holy Sabbath Rest Day (to make my own word,) irrestitutibly.
Ramble on.
If the fact "Jesus gave them Rest" did not CHANGE the Sabbath Day from a dead-letter-sabbath day of the Law of 'thou shall's' to the 'joyous day in heaven and on earth' of God's Sabbath-Rest which He Spoke about "by the SON", "the People of God" through Jesus Christ and through his Resurrection from the dead have not gained, but have lost God's Holy Sabbath Rest Day irredeemably, and "The Son of Man" never, would have become or been, "LORD OF THE SABBATH", and the Sabbath never, would have become or been, "Sabbath of OF THE LORD GOD"!
God always "spoke about" the Sabbath "by the SON ... in times past through the prophets ... in these last days", "by the all-exceeding greatness of His Power WHEN He raised Him from the dead", that is, on the very day "having raised Christ from the dead".
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3806.htm
Synod of Laodicea (4th Century)
The Canons of the Synod Held in the City of Laodicea, in Phrygia Pacatiana, in which Many Blessed Fathers from Divers Provinces of Asia Were Gathered Together.
The holy synod which assembled at Laodicea in Phrygia Pacatiana, from various regions of Asia; set forth the ecclesiastical definitions which are hereunder annexed.
Canon 29
Christians must not judaize by resting on the Sabbath, but must work on that day, rather honouring the Lord's Day; and, if they can, resting then as Christians. But if any shall be found to be judaizers, let them be anathema from Christ.
https://www.anglican.net/doctrines/1604-canon-law/
Constitutions and Canons ECCLESIASTICAL .
Of the Church of ENGLAND.
Of Divine Service, and Administration
of the Sacraments.XIII.Due Celebration of Sundays and Holy-days.
ALL manner of Persons within the Church of England, shall from henceforth celebrate and keep the Lord's Day, commonly called Sunday, and other Holy-days according to God's holy Will and Pleasure, and the Orders of the Church of England, prescribed in that behalf; that is, in hearing the Word of God read and taught in private and publick Prayers, in acknowledging their Offences to God and amendment of the same, in reconciling themselves charitably to their Neighbours where Displeasures have been, in oftentimes receiving the Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ, in visiting of the Poor and Sick, using all godly and sober Conversation.
https://www.episcopalarchives.org/e-archives/canons/CandC_FINAL_11.29.2006.pdf
Constitution & Canons
Together with the Rules of Order
For the government of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America
Otherwise Known as
The Episcopal Church
TITLE II WORSHIP
CANON 1: Of the Due Celebration of Sundays
All persons within this Church shall celebrate and keep the Lord's Day, commonly called Sunday, by regular participation in the public worship of the Church, by hearing the Word of God read and taught, and by other acts of devotion and works of charity, using all godly and sober conversation.[/size]
https://sites.google.com/site/canonsoc/home/canons-of-the-apostles
The Canons of the Eastern Orthodox Church
The Canons of the Holy Apostles
Canon LXVI.
If any of the clergy be found fasting on the Lord's day [i.e. Sunday], or on the Sabbath [i.e. Saturday], excepting the one only [i.e. Holy Saturday], let him be deposed. If a layman, let him be excommunicated.
Notice in the above, that early on both the Sabbath and Sunday were kept and considered the Lord's day.
https://sites.google.com/site/canonsoc/home/canons-of-the-ecumenical-councils/ii-nicaeanum-787
The Canons of the Eastern Orthodox Church
II Nicaeanum (787)
Canon VIII.
That Hebrews ought not to be received unless they have been converted in sincerity of heart.
Since certain, erring in the superstitions of the Hebrews, have thought to mock at Christ our God, and feigning to be converted to the religion of Christ do deny him, and in private and secretly keep the Sabbath and observe other Jewish customs, we decree that such persons be not received to communion, nor to prayers, nor into the Church; but let them be openly Hebrews according to their religion, and let them not bring their children to baptism, nor purchase or possess a slave. But if any of them, out of a sincere heart and in faith, is converted and makes profession with his whole heart, setting at naught their customs and observances, and so that others may be convinced and converted, such an one is to be received and baptized, and his children likewise; and let them be taught to take care to hold aloof from the ordinances of the Hebrews. But if they will not do this, let them in no wise be received.
http://abvmcalgary.com/abvmcalgary/index.php/our-faith-practise/18-history
The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary Ukrainian catholic Parish
The History of Sunday Observance
Conclusion
It is evident that the celebration of Sunday is the oldest and a very sacred Christian tradition, which originated with the Apostles themselves. Consequently, participation in the Divine Liturgy and the observance of Sunday rest should be for us a natural practice of evident spiritual value. We must not forget that obligation to keep Sunday holy is not only a Church law, but basically also a divine law from which no dispensation can be given. Even if for grave reasons we cannot be present in Church for Sunday services, nevertheless, we are obliged to keep Sunday holy in our own way. We can do this, for example, by frequent remembrance of God, longer prayers, spiritual reading, and guarded speech and conduct.
Though the conclusion above and the rest of the page linked assert the apostles began this tradition, scripture is silent upon the matter, and therefore also no apostles are or can be quoted as establishing or promoting anything of the matter.
Everyone knows that Sunday is now the Sabbath. In the book of Acts, Chapter 20, verse 7, we even see an example of the disciples meeting on the first day (Sunday).
Posted by: Texas Conservative
« on: Yesterday at 17:05:09 » Insert Quote
Everyone knows that Sunday is now the Sabbath. In the book of Acts, Chapter 20, verse 7, we even see an example of the disciples meeting on the first day (Sunday).
Instead, the TRUTH...
Acts 20:7 does in fact imply, the Lord's Supper, with what is called the
Infinitive of Noun Force. But the sentence uses no Indicative finite verb that says, "They assembled for Holy Communion" like one would have done on any normal Day of Christian Worship. No, it uses a
Perfect Participle which actually means its very literal and precise rendering with, "
After having had assembled for Holy Communion, we, on the First Day of the week (Saturday evening) having-been-assembled-still, Paul discussed matters with them.""
Luke says, "synehgmenohn"— "
Because they before had had been assembling and on the First Day of the week were being gathering together still, Paul addressed them",
Delete cancel
3 Peter (aka Lively Stone
IUD)
: « Reply #29 on: Tue Oct 30, 2012 »
Jesus is the Sabbath and we rest in Him, free from keeping any particular day as separate. If anyone desires to keep the Sabbath, they are free to, but no one is commanded to.
: Texas Conservative Sat Jan 20, 2018 - 17:05:09
Everyone knows that Sunday is now the Sabbath. In the book of Acts, Chapter 20, verse 7, we even see an example of the disciples meeting on the first day (Sunday).
Keep stirring the pot bro.
https://sites.google.com/site/canonsoc/home/canons-of-the-apostles
(All emphasis mine)
Council at Sardica (343)
Canon 11. Whenever a Bishop goes from one city to another city, or from one province to another province, for the sake of vaunt with a view to having eulogies bestowed upon him, or to appearing to be devoted to the religion, and desires to stay there too long a time, and the Bishop of that city is not an experienced teacher, we decree that he shall not treat the latter scornfully, and deliver sermons too continuously, and thereby endeavor to bring disgrace and ignominy upon the Bishop of that place. For this excuse has been wont to cause trouble, and such cunning rascality shows that he is endeavoring to court and to usurp the other's benefice, and will not hesitate to abandon the church assigned to him and to step over into the other one. The time, therefore, for this must be fixed (since it has been deemed to be nothing short of inhuman and rude not to welcome a visiting Bishop]. Remember that in time past our fathers judged that if any layman staying in a city three Sundays should fail to attend church for three weeks in succession, he should be denied communion. If, therefore, this has been made a law as respects laymen, no Bishop must or ought or can without disadvantage stay away from his own church for any great length of time, and grieve the laity entrusted to him, unless he be under some grave necessity or in some difficult situation.
(Ap. cc. XXXV, LVIII; c. VIII of the 3rd; cc. XIX, XX, LXXX of the 6th; c. XVI of the lst-&-2nd; cc. LXXIX, LXXXII, LXXXIII, CXXXI, CXXXII, CXXXIII of Carthage; cc. V, XX, XXI of Gangra; cc. Ill, XII of Sardica; c. VI of Nyssa; c. X of Peter; cc. XIII, XXII of Antioch.).
Dear Amo, you have done an extraordinary GREAT JOB historically wise. But in Christ's name I beg you, do not be so dishonest and hypocritical when it comes to your and your church's heretical and embarrassingly inept or rather extremely clever miss-interpretation and falsification of the Scriptures!
At least you still have the guts to tell me to 'ramble on' and so on where your fellow SDA don't dare answer me a word.
God --Jesus Christ-- is the True Witness between us. When you refute me, do it with the Written Word of God, not with instilled FEAR for your church authorities for the hearing of unadulterated Scripture. I have been saying for decades the SDA and RCC are no different. You once again are proving what I said.
In case you're again going to ignore and discard what I say to you ... read again...
Dear Amo, you have done an extraordinary GREAT JOB historically wise. But in Christ's name I beg you, do not be so dishonest and hypocritical when it comes to your and your church's heretical and embarrassingly inept or rather extremely clever miss-interpretation and falsification of the Scriptures!
At least you still have the guts to tell me to 'ramble on' and so on where your fellow SDA don't dare answer me a word.
God --Jesus Christ-- is the True Witness between us. When you refute me, do it with the Written Word of God, not with instilled FEAR for your church authorities for the hearing of unadulterated Scripture. I have been saying for decades the SDA and RCC are no different. You once again are proving what I said.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Sun Feb 11, 2018 - 05:05:29
Dear Amo, you have done an extraordinary GREAT JOB historically wise. But in Christ's name I beg you, do not be so dishonest and hypocritical when it comes to your and your church's heretical and embarrassingly inept or rather extremely clever miss-interpretation and falsification of the Scriptures!
At least you still have the guts to tell me to 'ramble on' and so on where your fellow SDA don't dare answer me a word.
God --Jesus Christ-- is the True Witness between us. When you refute me, do it with the Written Word of God, not with instilled FEAR for your church authorities for the hearing of unadulterated Scripture. I have been saying for decades the SDA and RCC are no different. You once again are proving what I said.
In case you're again going to ignore and discard what I say to you ... read again...
Dear Amo, you have done an extraordinary GREAT JOB historically wise. But in Christ's name I beg you, do not be so dishonest and hypocritical when it comes to your and your church's heretical and embarrassingly inept or rather extremely clever miss-interpretation and falsification of the Scriptures!
At least you still have the guts to tell me to 'ramble on' and so on where your fellow SDA don't dare answer me a word.
God --Jesus Christ-- is the True Witness between us. When you refute me, do it with the Written Word of God, not with instilled FEAR for your church authorities for the hearing of unadulterated Scripture. I have been saying for decades the SDA and RCC are no different. You once again are proving what I said.
I'm not ignoring you, and I have no instilled fear of mine or any other church authorities, I just won't continue to beat a dead dog with a stick. I just do not see what you are demanding is there. If Christ rose on the sabbath it would not bother me, or effect what I already believe at all. Nor does Him rising on Sunday change what I believe at all, or in any way shape or form make that day the new Sabbath of God without scriptural testimony conclusively stating that this is so. To the contrary, my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ conclusively stated that God's law could not and would not change until all be fulfilled. Christ rested from His work of salvation and restitution on the seventh day in the sleep of death after completing that which establishes the new creation, as He rested also in the beginning after He created heaven and earth and all that is in them. After which He arose as the High Priest of the new covenant unto salvation for all who will rest in Him.
If Christ rose from the dead on the sabbath, scripture would make this abundantly clear, and even expounded upon such through His Apostles to establish this truth. To the contrary, not only did He do neither, but instead allowed for the establishment of a spurious day of rest and worship to be established in place of that which He has commanded. This for the express purpose of establishing two separate and distinct signs each representing the ultimate choice of humanity in relation to God. One representing complete submission to God through Jesus Christ by faith in the word of God itself, and the other representing all other forms of satanically inspired man made methods and traditions of self salvation. One representing the offering of Abel, the other representing the offering of Cain. One representing the Mystery of Godliness, the other representing the mystery of iniquity. That all may choose between the two in one generation when God sees fit to bring an end to all save His own. Sunday sacredness is the deception of God's own choosing, allowed for this very purpose.
Isa 66:1 Thus saith the Lord, The heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool: where is the house that ye build unto me? and where is the place of my rest? 2 For all those things hath mine hand made, and all those things have been, saith the Lord:
but to this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word. 3 He that killeth an ox is as if he slew a man; he that sacrificeth a lamb, as if he cut off a dog's neck; he that offereth an oblation, as if he offered swine's blood; he that burneth incense, as if he blessed an idol.
Yea, they have chosen their own ways, and their soul delighteth in their abominations. 4 I also will choose their delusions, and will bring their fears upon them; because when I called, none did answer; when I spake, they did not hear: but they did evil before mine eyes, and chose that in which I delighted not. 5 Hear the word of the Lord, ye that tremble at his word; Your brethren that hated you, that cast you out for my name's sake, said, Let the Lord be glorified: but he shall appear to your joy, and they shall be ashamed.
Isa 58:1
Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and shew my people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins. 2 Yet they seek me daily, and delight to know my ways, as a nation that did righteousness, and forsook not the ordinance of their God: they ask of me the ordinances of justice; they take delight in approaching to God. 3 Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours. 4 Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of wickedness: ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be heard on high. 5 Is it such a fast that I have chosen? a day for a man to afflict his soul? is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the Lord?
6 Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? 7 Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh? 8 Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the Lord shall be thy reward. 9 Then shalt thou call, and the Lord shall answer; thou shalt cry, and he shall say, Here I am. If thou take away from the midst of thee the yoke, the putting forth of the finger, and speaking vanity; 10 And if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul; then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noon day: 11 And the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make fat thy bones: and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not. 12 And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places: thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in. 13 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 Lord, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: 14 Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.God Himself has chosen the delusion and abomination the lost will choose over that which the word of the Lord has established. They do not call the seventh day Sabbath of the Lord a delight, but rather a burden to be kept only by those who seek salvation through their own works without faith in God. This they do while they create their own works and traditions to replace one of the commandments of God, placing their faith in these rather than the word of God. They have turned true faith in action into dead works, and dead works of human tradition into supposed true faith, saying "let us do evil, that good may come". The Lord calls His Sabbath a delight and claims His own do also, but they call it a burden and all who keep it deceived. Jesus created, sustained, and kept the Sabbath, they will not. Jesus said He did not come to change the law, and that the law cannot be changed. They say the law has changed and that Jesus Himself changed it. Our Lord and Saviors testimony is clear and concise. They reject the same in favor of the delusion God Himself has ordained as the abomination they will choose above submission and obedience to His trust worthy, unchangeable, and self fulfilling word. They exalt their day through human laws, above the law of God and have and will persecute those who will not submit to their abominable laws. In the end though, they will be ashamed, and those who have honored God's law above mans law will be vindicated by the God both claimed to worship.
Cain and Abel both worshiped God, one did so according to God's instruction and was accepted, the other brought an offering of his own making which was rejected.
Mark 7:6 He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. 7 Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. 8 For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do. 9 And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition.
Amo:continue to beat a dead dog with a stick. I just do not see what you are demanding is there. If Christ rose on the sabbath it would not bother me, or effect what I already believe at all.
GE:All right, You are calling the for truth presupposed fact that '
Christ rose on the sabbath', '
beat(ing) a dead dog with a stick' which '
would not bother (you) at all... or effect what (you) already believe'.
Well, you have explained fully where the flaw in your 'belief system' lies, namely, with your below zero-line devaluation of "THE POWER OF HIS RESURRECTION...WHEREBY THE MORE BY FAR WE ARE SAVED".
That, Amo, has been the SDA official defence for as long as they existed. Continuing defending what they love to hear defended like you are doing, makes you stay popular with your church, for sure. But, will make you very unpopular if you stopped. Still you reckon there is no fear factor to worry about?
Amo:
Nor does Him rising on Sunday change what I believe at all, or in any way shape or form make that day the new Sabbath of God without scriptural testimony conclusively stating that this is so. Nor does Him rising on Sunday change what I believe at all'
GE:
... even though it is the
most infamous lie which in every way shaped, yea, created Christianity as we know it for what it is for real!? And despite every time that you object against the for truth presupposed fact that 'Christ rose on the sabbath', you object '
without scriptural testimony...at all'!?
You just
take for granted, then
pretend, the fact that '
Christ rose on the sabbath (is) without conclusive scriptural testimony stating that this is so'.
Just saying does not prove just saying. Just saying '
without conclusive scriptural testimony' is no Scriptural testimony—it is
yours!Again it is the way FEAR reacts to incontestible, solely Scriptural, testimony-- with a flood of words saying nothing at all and meaning, even less. The worst way of defence for sooth is to attack with blind vehemence.
Amo:
To the contrary, my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ conclusively stated that God's law could not and would not change until all be fulfilled.
'
To the contrary'?! 'To the contrary' of what?! Where is your 'conclusive Scriptural evidence' Christ's Resurrectection from the dead is, was, or ever could be, 'contrary...that God's law could not and would not change until all be fulfilled'? What is Christ's Resurrection but the fulfilment of God's Law, specifically and more than any of God's Laws, the Sabbath Law of the Fourth Commandment and the creation Scriptures?
Amo:
Christ rested from His work of salvation and restitution on the seventh day in the sleep of death after completing that which establishes the new creation, as He rested also in the beginning after He created heaven and earth and all that is in them. After which He arose
GE:
Christ's 'rest in the sleep of death' was no rest 'from His work of salvation'. Christ's 'rest in the sleep of death' was as much THE work of his Salvation and "Triumph in it" as was his Suffering, Sacrifice, Death, and, Resurrection—the 'Restitution on the Seventh Day'.
"For God the day The Seventh Day finished ('established') ALL, HIS, WORKS" (Hebrews 4:4 et al), viz., finished 'established the New Creation' raising Christ from the dead "on the Sabbath".
"God rested"..."having RAISED CHRIST FROM THE DEAD BY THE EXCEEDING GREATNESS OF HIS MIGHTY POWER WHICH HE WORKED exalting and RESTING / SEATING / CROWNING Him AT HIS OWN RIGHT HAND: HIS HEAVENLY MAJESTY!" (Ephesians 1:19,20 et al). For which completion, blessing, hallowing and RESTING, "God energised / exerted / used / worked, his FAR-EXCEEDING GREATER MIGHTY POWER" than when "God Almighty Elohim in the beginning energised / worked", to "create heaven and earth and all that is in them"—which in any case, God worked and accomplished and finished, "very good" through Christ Jesus, "The Beginning and The End of the creation of God"!
[*Not 'after' God's FAR-EXCEEDING GREATER MIGHTY POWER" '...He arose', but BY 'which', Christ arose!]
Amo:
If Christ rose from the dead on the sabbath, scripture would make this abundantly clear, and even expounded upon such through His Apostles to establish this truth. To the contrary, not only did He do neither, but instead allowed for the establishment of a spurious day of rest and worship to be established in place of that which He has commanded.
GE:It's high time Amo, you start to think for yourself and write your own thing; not parrot Samuele Bacchiocchi. As Bacchiocchi would say, one might 'capatalise on the fact'. But the Jew is the Italian one furlong ahead... always. He capatalised with paying the capital price for to OBTAIN THE BETTER PROMISE OF HIS LIFE—, his Resurrection from the dead! ...
AND: so PREVENTED 'instead the establishment of a spurious day of rest and worship to be established in place of that which He has commanded' and paid for and WON BACK with his LIFE!If you can't see how abundant and abundantly clear the Scriptures make it and establish and expound the fact and Truth that Christ rose from the dead on the Sabbath and HAD TO rise from the dead on the Sabbath "according to all the Scriptures and the prophets beginning at Moses, and the Psalms"—even Jesus' own prophetic pronouncements as well as his apostles' witness—, '
this truth', to your own loss for ever must escape you.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Mon Feb 12, 2018 - 12:05:48
Amo:
GE:
All right, You are calling the for truth presupposed fact that 'Christ rose on the sabbath', 'beat(ing) a dead dog with a stick' which 'would not bother (you) at all... or effect what (you) already believe'.
Well, you have explained fully where the flaw in your 'belief system' lies, namely, with your below zero-line devaluation of "THE POWER OF HIS RESURRECTION...WHEREBY THE MORE BY FAR WE ARE SAVED".
That, Amo, has been the SDA official defence for as long as they existed. Continuing defending what they love to hear defended like you are doing, makes you stay popular with your church, for sure. But, will make you very unpopular if you stopped. Still you reckon there is no fear factor to worry about?
Yea, that's me, always trying to stay popular with the church. Your such a good judge of character. I haven't been to church in many years, no doubt this has made me more popular than I was when I used to attend. They through a party when I stopped going.
Your petty judgments are just that, petty and without substance. You don't have a clue why I do what I do. Perhaps you should stick to what we all have the responsibility of judging for ourselves, what is truth and what is not, and avoid judging that which we have not been given the responsibility of judging. There is a reason were not supposed to judge others hearts or motives, were not very good it, as your have just demonstrated.
I don't give a fat rats rear end about defending a denomination. You wouldn't ever hear much at all if anything about the things on this thread in the church I used to attend or most other SDA churches anymore for that matter. Which is why I haven't attended church for such a long time. For the most part I can go to the nearest Sunday church down the road to hear what is preached in most SDA churches on Sabbaths anymore. Major prophetic events occur without even a mention from the pulpits of SDA churches. The congregations are being lulled to sleep and subtly redirected upon paths God never intended them to travel. I'm not heading in that direction.
I belong to a denomination for now, but I care nothing for defending a denomination, save defending the truth ends up also defending that denomination. I have not devalued the power of the resurrection. Nor is the power of the resurrection dependent upon which day it took place, save in your apparently confused mind. You are free of course to show me from scripture where they point out the resurrections dependents upon what day it took place, if you wish. Just don't do it on this thread, quit hijacking this one, and start another one.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Mon Feb 12, 2018 - 13:17:31
GE:
... even though it is the most infamous lie which in every way shaped, yea, created Christianity as we know it for what it is for real!? And despite every time that you object against the for truth presupposed fact that 'Christ rose on the sabbath', you object 'without scriptural testimony...at all'!?
You just take for granted, then pretend, the fact that 'Christ rose on the sabbath (is) without conclusive scriptural testimony stating that this is so'.
Just saying does not prove just saying. Just saying 'without conclusive scriptural testimony' is no Scriptural testimony—it is yours!
Again it is the way FEAR reacts to incontestible, solely Scriptural, testimony-- with a flood of words saying nothing at all and meaning, even less. The worst way of defence for sooth is to attack with blind vehemence.
Bla bla bla. More rambling on. We've addressed quite a bit of scripture concerning this topic by the way. Quit hijacking this thread and start another one regarding which day christ rose upon please.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Mon Feb 12, 2018 - 13:39:04
'To the contrary'?! 'To the contrary' of what?! Where is your 'conclusive Scriptural evidence' Christ's Resurrectection from the dead is, was, or ever could be, 'contrary...that God's law could not and would not change until all be fulfilled'? What is Christ's Resurrection but the fulfilment of God's Law, specifically and more than any of God's Laws, the Sabbath Law of the Fourth Commandment and the creation Scriptures?
Take a chill pill Gerhard. All has not been fulfilled. Nor has heaven and earth passed. Nor should you keep hijacking this thread. Start another one.
Matt 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Mon Feb 12, 2018 - 15:54:45
GE:
It's high time Amo, you start to think for yourself and write your own thing; not parrot Samuele Bacchiocchi. As Bacchiocchi would say, one might 'capatalise on the fact'. But the Jew is the Italian one furlong ahead... always. He capatalised with paying the capital price for to OBTAIN THE BETTER PROMISE OF HIS LIFE—, his Resurrection from the dead! ...AND: so PREVENTED 'instead the establishment of a spurious day of rest and worship to be established in place of that which He has commanded' and paid for and WON BACK with his LIFE!
If you can't see how abundant and abundantly clear the Scriptures make it and establish and expound the fact and Truth that Christ rose from the dead on the Sabbath and HAD TO rise from the dead on the Sabbath "according to all the Scriptures and the prophets beginning at Moses, and the Psalms"—even Jesus' own prophetic pronouncements as well as his apostles' witness—, 'this truth', to your own loss for ever must escape you.
I'm not parroting anyone. Tried to read one of Bacchiocchi's books once, didn't capture my attention. Same dead dog topic I'm not going though with you again. Quit hijacking this thread and start another one. If anyone is interested enough they can argue this same point over and over again with you if they wish.
I'm not parroting anyone. Tried to read one of Bacchiocchi's books once, didn't capture my attention. Same dead dog topic I'm not going though with you again. Quit hijacking this thread and start another one. If anyone is interested enough they can argue this same point over and over again with you if they wish.
You have freely gone your way, many times and in many places. Not once have you encountered your real dilemma and never have you even attempted, to answer it, what succeeded...NOT ONCE OR EVER any of these three things: ENCOUNTERED, COUNTERED, SUCCEEDED!
This may be your thread, but what have your started it for if no one can question or criticise? I was the one you were grateful to for the support and encouragement I gave you when you began with these postings. Was there anyone else? I cannot recall. Now it's nice to be buddies, but here's a little sugar-sachet advice for you: 'Cherish the friend who tells you a harsh truth, wanting ten times more to tell you a loving lie.' Robert Brault.
I am, God willing, going to continue rip you and your post(s) apart, like the very good exegetical physician I am.
TBC, you just hang on...
Amo:
Nor is the power of the resurrection dependent upon which day it took place, save in your apparently confused mind.
GE:Sounds pretty good after
Amo:
Your petty judgments are just that, petty and without substance. You don't have a clue why I do what I do. Perhaps you should stick to what we all have the responsibility of judging for ourselves, what is truth and what is not, and avoid judging that which we have not been given the responsibility of judging. There is a reason were not supposed to judge others hearts or motives, were not very good it, as your have just demonstrated.
GE:I take it to heart; I love it. It shows you do hear me. But that's not what I'm here for. I'm here because of this you are saying,
Amo:
Nor is the power of the resurrection dependent upon which day it took place,
GE:Dear Amo, This is perfect example of what 'twisting' another's words, means.
Watch, What I say, is, The day (of worship, the Sabbath) being the day upon which Christ rose from the dead, '
is dependent upon the resurrection' and the Power of his Resurrection, to be the "Day of Sabbath's-rest for the People of God". Hebrews 4:9.
But you, fraudulently, make me say and mean the very opposite, that '
the power of the resurrection (is) dependent upon which day it took place'
!And now, For as long as you deny the Sabbath the honour and dignity which the fact of the Resurrection of Christ Jesus "ON" and "IN" it --an honour and dignity it before did not have--, invests in it, in
VAIN do you rave over and shout foul against the myriads of historic, social and political crimes for the sake of Sunday sacredness which for two thousand years have been rampant in the world and in the church alike-- crimes which have indelibly marred both Christianity and history!
The Scripture is marvelous; who cannot see Jesus Christ in his Resurrection from the dead, in this written word of God's!?
"Is it such a fast that I have chosen? a day for a Man to afflict his soul? Is it such a day I have chosen for a Man to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Wilt Thou call this a Fast—Acceptable Day to the Lord? 6 Is not this the Fast that I have chosen, the Day to Loose the bands of wickedness, to Undo the heavy burdens, and to Let the oppressed GO FREE, that Ye, Break every yoke?" Isaiah 58:5,6.
The LORD chose such fast as that which Jesus Christ fasted, "three days thick darkness" impenetrable indistinguishable "three days and three nights-of-Darkness", "a day for a Man to afflict his soul... to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him"— "this, that Day, that Fast, to be solemnly observed The Selfsame Whole Day BONE-Day"—Day in Suffering, of Substance, One—"the Selfsame Day", "the selfsame", "Pains of death"— by "agony and anguish of soul unto death", of "the Son of Man".
God chose Jesus' Fast; He chose Jesus' Fast "as That Day for the Son of Man to LOOSE the bands of wickedness" in, and "loose the pains of death" upon, and "UNDO the heavy burdens", and "REST-up-again" The Sufferer, of Death's "Sleep" in; to "Revive" Him from Death's "fast" and "pains" and "power" and "LET GO FREE THE OPPRESSED"! Therefore "BREAK He every yoke", "every seal" of death and the power of death, "and cast He the stone" and "burden" "from the tomb"— cast He DEATH, AWAY! "BY THE POWER OF HIS RESURRECTION" from DEATH'S Grave!
Amo:
I belong to a denomination for now, but I care nothing for defending a denomination, save defending the truth ends up also defending that denomination.
GE:As Christian I care nothing for belonging to or defending any denomination. But I care, so help me God, deeply, for the Resurrection and the Power of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead— the consummate Truth "wherefore the LORD GOD the day The Seventh Day from all his works, RESTED", and "there THEREFORE for the People of God remains eating and drinking of Sabbaths' Feast of Christ the Substance"... "IF JESUS GAVE THEM REST"!
Amo:
...the express purpose of establishing two separate and distinct signs each representing the ultimate choice of humanity in relation to God. One representing complete submission to God through Jesus Christ by faith in the word of God itself, and the other representing all other forms of satanically inspired man made methods and traditions of self salvation.
GE:...not surprising in the light of '
the ultimate choice of humanity in relation to God' which Adam and Eve made, not to God's choice or will, but quite literally by the '
satanically inspired man made...choice of humanity' for '
self salvation'— according to the Genesis '
tradition in the word of God itself', right from day one of their creation.
Amo:
Christ ... allowed for the establishment of a spurious day of rest and worship to be established in place of that which He has commanded. ... One (that which He has commanded) representing the offering of Abel, the other (spurious day of rest and worship) representing the offering of Cain. One representing the Mystery of Godliness, the other representing the mystery of iniquity. That all (of humanity) may choose between the two (day(s) of rest and worship) in one generation when God sees fit to bring an end to all save His own. Sunday sacredness is the deception of God's own choosing, allowed for this very purpose.
GE:The '
representations' from Cain and Abel and '
the Mystery of Godliness' and '
the mystery of iniquity' which you are here trying to bundle with Sabbath and Sunday observance from Cain and Abel to the present in the Scriptures, not at all strange, is nowhere to be seen in or deduced from any, Scripture, frankly. And your calling '
Sunday sacredness...the deception of God's own choosing' yells against all Scripture and the doctrine of Christ. It is such bad logic one cannot even call it twisting of Scripture.
There is much that could be said in response to the twisted thoughts you posted, but this would only encourage you to continue to Babyl-on. This thread is about Sabbath and Sunday and the implied legalism of seventh day Sabbath keeping by legalistic Sunday keepers. It is not about which day our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ rose upon, though you are obsessed with making it so. I will no longer respond regarding this issue you won't stop bringing up here. Babyl-on, what you will. If you start another thread to present your case, perhaps you may get some response, though not many are responding to much here anymore.
https://onepeterfive.com/poland-sunday-rest/
All emphasis in the following quote from the link provided above is mine. My comments in blue.
Poland Leads the Way in Bringing Back the Day of Rest
It was A.D. 321, and the Emperor Constantine decreed that the venerable "Day of the Sun" ought to be dedicated to rest. As we read in his imperial edict: "The magistrates and inhabitants of the cities shall rest on the venerable Day of the Sun, and all the stores will remain closed." But it was Emperor Theodosius I in 383 who converted the "dies Solis" into the "dies Dominica," or "day of the Lord." The Lord's Day is the day of Christianity par excellence, in which the key words are tradition and family.
And now, amazingly, in a strange coincidence just a few days before Christmas 2017, family unity, traditions, and rest have returned to the center of public attention, if not so much to the attention of the media, since the Polish Sejm (the lower house of parliament) voted in late November to return Sunday to being the Lord's Day for everyone and thus also for shop-owners. By 2020, all purchases on Sunday will be made illegal.
So no one can buy or sell on Sunday.
At the heart of the purpose of this law is the express desire to allow the people of Poland to have more time to spend with their families and less time shopping on Sundays. With 254 votes in favor, 156 against, and 23 abstentions, the legislation introduced a year ago by "Solidarnosc" – an originally Catholic and anti-communist movement that with the fall of communism became one of the leading trade unions of the nation – is now in the hands of the Senate, and it will be presented to President Andzrej Duda for his definitive approval. Under the law, beginning in March 2018, stores will be allowed to remain open only on the first and last Sunday of the month. Then, beginning in 2019, only the last Sunday of the month is allowed, and finally, in 2020, the ban will be almost total. In fact, Sunday shopping will be permitted only on seven Sundays of the year, including the two Sundays before Christmas and the Sunday before Easter. Foreign chains with wide distribution will have to conform to the new arrangement, but not small shops like bakeries.
I'm sure all those poor people who were forced to shop on Sunday, are now so happy that they don't have to anymore and have been delivered unto rest by the combined forces of Roman Catholicism, Unions, and the government. All those poor people have finally been delivered from evil Sunday shopping.
On the heels of the "rosary on the borders" (of October 2017), this is now the second time that Poland is taking a striking position to affirm, and reaffirm, to the world its Christian roots and identity. It is a gesture that is much more than symbolic if one remembers the history of a nation like Poland, whose memory cannot whitewash its "red past": the torments of the communist regime that tried to change Poland's identity precisely by beginning with an attack on the concept of the Lord's Day.
The "new man" of communism was in fact supposed to be the protagonist of a society without classes, and the sign of his "novelty" was the tendency to be always busy, never idle. Idleness, understood as mere inactivity, not sloth in the communist and socialist moral code, was the disease from which to free the soul. Idleness was the vice that damaged the diligent construction of the communist utopia and was not only harmful to oneself, but also considered a distraction for everyone else. And so the idea of the Lord's Day, which was in its essence heretical to the communist, was soon eradicated by the same members of the Communist Party who concerned themselves with giving a "good" example by working on the the seventh day of the week and compelling everyone else to do the same.
Apparently, the writer of this article does not know that Saturday is the seventh day of the week, and Sunday is the first day of the week.
Endless work conquered everyone and everything. The communists sought to annihilate Christianity by way of attacking Sunday, which, in postmodern society, led to checkmate. Communism chained the workers to itself, and everyone's horizon shrank, deprived as they were of seeing the "sky" of Sunday. Sundays without rest or reverence have been attempted in Europe's past as well as in its present, now ever less Christian, depriving it of its soul. But Poland, which evidently is still holding onto its soul, has decided to free itself from every trace of its red past and to facilitate the sanctification of Sunday for everyone.
CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.
2186 Those Christians who have leisure should be mindful of their brethren who have the same needs and the same rights, yet cannot rest from work because of poverty and misery. Sunday is traditionally consecrated by Christian piety to good works and humble service of the sick, the infirm, and the elderly. Christians will also sanctify Sunday by devoting time and care to their families and relatives, often difficult to do on other days of the week. Sunday is a time for reflection, silence, cultivation of the mind, and meditation which furthers the growth of the Christian interior life.
2187 Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees.
2188 In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."[125]
We know that the evolution of social-economic conditions has led to the profound modification of collective behavior and consequently of the appearance of Sunday. As St. John Paul II wrote:
The custom of the 'weekend' has become more widespread, a weekly period of respite, spent perhaps far from home and often involving participation in cultural, political or sporting activities which are usually held on free days. This social and cultural phenomenon is by no means without its positive aspects if, while respecting true values, it can contribute to people's development and to the advancement of the life of society as a whole. All of this responds not only to the need for rest, but also to the need for celebration which is inherent in our humanity. Unfortunately, when Sunday loses its fundamental meaning it is man who becomes incapable of celebration.
Poland wants to restore this understanding to its people, giving less opportunity for grazing in alienating shopping centers just for the perverse sake of doing it, but without falling into the dull banality of not realizing that "the sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath."
Sunday is not the Sabbath and never was. The Roman Catholic government of Poland has determined for its people what they will believe and do according to the dictates of the Roman Catholic church. This is the dark ages all over again. The Catholic Church used our nation, the United States of America, to help them overthrow communism in order to reestablish their own dominion over the same. That is all this country or any other is to the Roman Catholic Church. All nations are used by her as stepping stones manipulated unto her own exaltation, thus does she continually commit fornication with the kings and governments of this world.
And if – as someone were to object, "This solidarity between church and state is becoming disturbing, the PiS [Law and Justice party] has changed everything in less than two years: the legislation, the press, and the society. Every aspect of our liberty is at risk"[/b[ – the government has no intention of eating from the hand of the latest sociologist. Also, in the meantime, the prime minister-designate of Poland, Mateusz Morwiecki, who took office on December 11, in his first speech spoke of "dreaming of a Europe which returns to being Christian." With the nomination of Morwiecki, Poland seems to have certified his ambitions. The 49-year-old Catholic, father of four Catholic children, has declared that he is profoundly saddened by the fact that "the churches are empty and are being transfomed into museums and you never hear true songs in them any more."
In conclusion, Poland has begun its counter-revolution, and it does not seem to fear the threats of the politically correct. The first step appears to be modifying Sunday – not in order to introduce changes of an economic nature, but to restore harmony to reality. For Poles, in fact, the day of rest represents "opposition to the exclusivism of the ideal of work" – a break that is actually part of the deeper work of watering the Christian roots that give life and moving ever away from the specter of communism.
Translated by Giuseppe Pellegrino.
This is exactly what the Roman Catholic church will establish everywhere as soon as she attains the power to do so. The evangelicals and once "Protestants" of this nation that are now joining hands with her again, are part of her same plan of domination in this country. These apostate "Protestants" will aid her efforts to establish Sunday sacredness by law, if not do it for her altogether. At which time Sunday sacredness and worship will become the mark of the beast predicted in the book of Revelation as proclaimed by the SDA church of the past and by some still at present for over 150 years now. The continued Romanizing of our nation through legal and illegal immigration is also part of this over all plan conducted by Rome's Catholic minion politicians thwarting every effort to prevent the same within.
http://europeansundayalliance.eu/site/newsevents/goodnews/article/226.html?SWS=48da8006b127ada123afd7b47b2acc49
Legal victory for the protection of a work-free Sunday
The German alliance for a Free Sunday (which includes the ver.di trade union and the Catholic Employees Movement, KAB) has sued the city of Frankfurt, which had approved three Sunday sales. The courts confirmed the view of those in favour of a work-free Sunday and the sales were forbidden.
For more information, please click here for the full press release.
Follow the story at your convenience... https://www.facebook.com/christiaan.ebersohn
http://www.sdadefend.com/MINDEX-S/Sunday%20Laws%20in%20Europe.pdf
An interesting link regarding the topic of this thread.
https://www.total-croatia-news.com/business/17053-catholic-church-wants-to-ban-working-on-sunday
Catholic Church Wants to Ban Working on Sunday
http://bismarcktribune.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/in-reversal-north-dakota-house-votes-to-repeal-blue-law/article_43b42bf5-9751-59f3-977e-405995f695f3.html
In reversal, North Dakota House votes to repeal blue law for Sunday opening
The North Dakota House voted by the thinnest of margins Tuesday, Jan. 31, to allow retailers to open on Sunday mornings.
The 48-46 vote was a reversal of the House's decision Monday, when it rejected a repeal of North Dakota's Sunday closing law. That statute makes it a Class B misdemeanor to operate a business that's open to the public before noon Sunday, although exceptions exist for restaurants, hotels, hospitals and other businesses....................
"We should let this be up to individuals," Kempenich said...................
"Simply put, government shouldn't tell private businesses when they can and cannot open their doors," she said in a statement. "Many people have limited time to get their errands and shopping done over the weekend, and allowing retailers to open for business before noon on Sundays is an important step to strengthen North Dakota's retail sector and overall economy.".......................
Rep. Mike Nathe, R-Bismarck, agreed.
"I own my business and if I decide to have it open for two more hours on Sunday, that's my decision as a business owner, not the government's," he said on the House floor Tuesday.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEQBU99Itwo
Very potent video, not for the easily offended.
https://www.eurofound.europa.eu/observatories/eurwork/articles/working-conditions-law-and-regulation/whats-happening-with-sunday-work-in-europe
What's happening with Sunday work in Europe?
...................................
Hungarian ban over Sunday's opening revoked
In December 2014, the Hungarian Parliament passed a law forcing (most) shops to close on Sundays from 15 March 2015, the main rationale being to prevent people having to work on Sundays. The bill was opposed by the National Association of Entrepreneurs and Employers (VOSZ), the Hungarian Council of Shopping Centers (MBSZ), as well as the Hungarian Trade Association (OKSZ). It had been initially supported by the Trade Union of Commercial Employees (KASZ), but after consultation, KASZ found that 90% of its members opposed the idea because they felt it would cut their wages and increase their already excessive workload. A public opinion poll showed that 80% of respondents were also against the Sunday ban. However, the law was shrouded in controversy and, on the government's initiative, Parliament revoked the Sunday ban in April 2016 meaning that the legislation was in force for only one year.
Restriction of store opening hours in the Czech Republic
After a long legislative process (the bill was approved by the Senate in June 2014), the Czech Parliament approved a bill on 28 June 2016 restricting the opening hours of stores during public holidays. The act, which applies to shops with a floor space greater than 200 square metres, bans sales during seven specified public holidays. The exceptions are petrol stations, pharmacies or shops at airports, railway stations and bus stations.
The Czech Chamber of Commerce (HK ČR) and the Czech Confederation of Commerce and Tourism (SOCR ČR) strongly opposed the bill. They are currently preparing an appeal to the constitutional court, as they deem the new legislation to discriminate against entrepreneurs with large stores and against the commerce sector. HK ČR and SOCR ČR consider the act to be a bureaucratic intervention in market mechanisms that goes against European trends. They further argue that such regulation will result in a drop in sales and VAT revenue, and job losses for those employees who have difficulties in the labour market and who are often among those working on bank holidays. In contrast, the Trade Union of Workers in Commerce (OSPO) supported the proposal, arguing that it would help employees reconcile their professional and family lives.
As is obvious, many people, even the majority at times, do not agree with government control of business operating hours and personal decisions regarding rest from the same. So, who are these people that continually seek to force their will regarding Sunday rest upon all through legislation? As is obvious, they have been identified on these threads. As is obvious as well then, the Church of Rome and many other professed "Christians" today, have no problem combining church and state to force their own wills upon all.
wasted time, effort, energy, and perhaps even intelligence and talent makes me feel like crying.
https://www.usatoday.com/videos/news/world/2018/03/11/stores-closed-poland-phases-out-sunday-shopping/32833909/
https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/closed-sunday-shopping-ban-takes-effect-in-poland-1.3838000
Interesting, in this article the opening statement suggests that under communist rule stores were closed on Sundays. Only after communism fell, could people shop on Sundays. Now, dominant Catholics shut down Sunday shopping again, apparently as comfortable with this level of control as the communists were.
http://mpchristianity.com/closed-sunday-policy-good-business.html
Chick-Fil-A demonstrates true conviction in action. It seeks no aid from the state in following through with its convictions regarding Sunday rest. The business is booming because of the same. It provides a good example of faith in action, which faith never needs to be aided or enforced by the state. To the contrary, all faith which requires or employs the aid and arm of the state is a false faith. Leaning on temporal power over the power of the God they are supposed to believe in.
http://digitalcommons.law.umaryland.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2430&context=mlr
The following quote is from the article of the above link. It is no surprise of course that
Maryland or other states or counties with a heavy Catholic population support temporal enforcement of their religious beliefs.
To evaluate properly the validity of challenges to blue laws, and the constitutionality of state enforcement approaches, it is necessary to review briefly the history and purpose of Sunday closing legislation.
I. HISTORY AND PURPOSE
Sunday legislation has been in existence since 321 A.D. "when Constantine the Great passed an edict commanding all judges and inhabitants of cities to rest on the venerable day of the sun.",2 1 Although secular work on Sunday was not violative of English common law, statutes were enacted beginning in 1676 prohibiting work on Sunday.22 The initial English law, which became the basis for virtually all of the Sunday closing legislation in the United States, read as follows:
For the better observation and keeping holy the Lord's day. . all . . . persons. . shall on every Lord's day apply themselves to the observation of the same, by exercising . . the duties of piety and true religion, publicly and privately . . and . . . no tradesman, artificer, workman, labourer, or other person whatsoever, shall do or exercise any worldly labour, business or work of their ordinary callings, upon the Lord's day, or any part thereof (work of necessity and charity only excepted: . . .).23
Despite the clearly religious origins of Sunday closing laws, in McGowan v. Maryland2 4 the United States Supreme Court found blue laws to have secular purposes of "provid[ing] a day of rest for working persons and an atmosphere of tranquility in which to enjoy it,"'25 "provid[ing] a day of rest for all citizens (presumably encompassing both
working and non-working), 26 and "set[ting] one day apart from all others as a day of rest, repose, recreation and tranquility - a day which all members of the family and community have the opportunity to spend and enjoy together."27 These purposes "have become part and parcel of this great governmental concern wholly apart from their original [religious] purposes or connotations."28 Although Sunday closing laws arguably are unnecessary in light of other federal and state constitu- tional and statutory provisions which prevent forced labor in violation of an individual worker's rights,29 many legislatures have found it necessary to enact such laws.
http://www.freedomparty.on.ca/sundayshopping/
The above link provides excellent information and even an documentary concerning the history of the Sunday rest issue in Canada. This issue is far from over as the church of Rome's influence continues to rise on a global level.
National Sunday laws already established in Taiwan. All emphasis in the following quotes from links provided is mine.
http://www.scmp.com/news/china/policies-politics/article/2095029/looking-back-tumultuous-first-year-taiwans-president
Looking back on a tumultuous first year for Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen
.................................................................
Her shiny economic scorecard aside, on Friday, the eve of her first anniversary in office, Tsai also touted her achievements in various domestic reforms, including transforming Taiwan's economic structure and improving the social security network, upholding social justice and fairness and promoting the island's foreign relations.
In a conference with journalists from overseas-based Chinese-language media, Tsai said she has not only promoted so-called "five plus two" innovative industries and a NT$890 billion "forward-looking" infrastructure development plan, but also launched pension reform and long-term care for senior citizens, promoted transitional justice for indigenous people and pushed for judicial reform.
She stopped short of mentioning labour reform, a controversial topic which most opinion polls show is a major reason for Tsai's approval ratings tumbling since she took office in May from a high of 56 per cent to a low of 18.4 per cent, notwithstanding the sharply improved economic figures, analysts said.
Recent surveys put her public approval ratings at between 28 per cent and 36 per cent. An online poll by the Taiwan Democracy Watch civic platform gave her an approval rating of only 18.4 per cent, versus 76.4 per cent disapproval.
"Her five-day workweek or the so-called 'one fixed day off and one flexible day off' policy greatly disappoints workers who have to pay the price because of her wavering, after a backlash from management," said Chien Hsi-kai, convener of the Anti-Poverty League.
As a result of the new rule, most employers who had to pay employees overtime now ask employees to take hourly compensation leave instead, thereby reducing opportunities for employees to earn extra income to cover already-low salaries – some still sitting at NT$22,000 a month, their wages unchanged for years.
"I used to get around NT$15,000 in addition to my original NT$32,000 a month because of the overtime pay, but because of the five-day work week measure, I am forced to take the weekend and Sunday off,"said Johnson Lee, a 30-year old hair stylist, who took part in a May 1 labour protest aimed at the Tsai government.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2016/10/05/2003656547
KMT slams Tsai's workweek directive
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus yesterday said that President Tsai Ing-wen's (蔡英文) directive to the legislature to "ram" through a proposed five-day workweek with "one fixed day off and one flexible rest day" (一例一休) was a betrayal of workers.
Tsai on Monday instructed the Executive Yuan and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus at the first weekly High-Level Policy Coordination Meeting to push through a draft amendment to introduce a five-day workweek with two days off before the end of the year.
The KMT caucus said that Tsai's changing of the phrase "one fixed day off and one flexible rest day" to "two days off weekly" (周休二日) was an attempt to obfuscate the policy's goals, as it still does not meet workers' demands for "two fixed days off."................................
Article 36 of the Labor Standards Act (勞動基準法) stipulates that "a worker shall have at least one regular [fixed] day off every seven days."..........................................
SDP convener Chen Shang-chih (陳尚志) slammed the president's call to "unify all public holidays and establish a uniform system size=14pt]applicable to every person in the nation"[/size] as "extremely unconvincing."
https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=77aca7b2-40d3-4578-a41c-4f392507a45e
Summary of the Amendments to the Taiwan Labor Standards Act
..............................................................
The key points of the amendments are: implementation of a five-day work week; a sharp increase of wage for working on a rest day; reduction of national holidays; increase of days of annual leave; method of arranging annual leave and payment for unused annual leave; rest time between shifts; employers' obligation to provide information on wage calculation; protection of whistleblowers'/workers' right to file complaints; and raising fines for violations of the LSA. The amendments have significant impact on employers' cost and arrangement of human resources. Employers must take such amendments into careful consideration.
An explanation of these amendments is as follows:
I. The implementation of a five-day work week (i.e. two days off per week) with one fixed day off and one rest day (Paragraph 1 & 2, Article 36 of the LSA)
1. A worker shall have two days off (one fixed day off and a rest day) in every seven days. The actual day of the fixed day off and that of the rest day shall be decided by the employers and the workers. The common arrangement is to set Sundays as the fixed days off and Saturdays as the rest days.
2. The main difference between a fixed day off and a rest day: Employers shall not ask workers to work on fixed days off unless in the event of a natural disaster, accident or emergency. While employers may ask workers to work on rest days, the wage for working on a rest day has been significantly increased (See Sections 2 and 3 below for details).
http://www.cesi.org/protect-the-work-free-sunday/
The European Sunday Alliance is convinced that working on Sundays endangers the health and safety of workers as well as the social cohesion in our societies. The challenge of reconciling increasingly flexibilised working schedules with social and civic commitments had just been discussed at the last breakfast meeting of the Interest Group Work-Life Balance in the European Parliament on 22 February 2018. Only a well-protected common work-free day per week enables citizens to enjoy full participation in cultural, sports, social and religious life and allows for reconciliation. That is why the European Sunday Alliance commits itself to safeguarding a work-free Sunday.
The European Sunday Alliance calls on all its members and on all citizens to take action on 3 March 2018 as the European Day for a work-free Sunday with special activities, Church services and information points in order to raise awareness about the unique value of Sunday for the European society and the importance of common free time in a digitalised society.
The European Sunday Alliance is a network of national Sunday Alliances, trade unions, employers' organisations, civil society organisations, churches and religious communities committed to raise awareness of the unique value of synchronised free time for our European societies. CESI has been a member of the Alliance since 2017.
http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/taking-sunday-seriously-poland-leads-the-way
Taking Sunday Seriously — Poland Leads the Way
The European nation's new law sharply restricting Sunday shopping provides an opportunity to take a closer look at American habits.
Nicholas Wolfram Smith
Sunday has just become a little less busy in Poland, thanks to a new law banning most commercial shopping that took effect in March.
And Poland's move, which bucks the prevailing trend in secularized countries toward an ever-more commercialized Sunday, could provide a constructive example for the United States, where the network of state "blue laws" that once restricted Sunday business activities has been substantially reduced...........................
Yes, the Catholic church will most certainly bring Sunday laws to the US as soon as possible.
: Amo Sat Apr 21, 2018 - 19:19:25
http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/taking-sunday-seriously-poland-leads-the-way (http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/taking-sunday-seriously-poland-leads-the-way)
Yes, the Catholic church will most certainly bring Sunday laws to the US as soon as possible.
Only the church has little power in the US over the secular society that answers to business and money.
Sunday law (or blue laws) will never come back to the US and A. Too much cash money to stop business on Sundays.
: Alan Mon Apr 23, 2018 - 07:52:10
Only the church has little power in the US over the secular society that answers to business and money.
Right, the US Congress invited the Pope of Rome to come and politically advise all of them and the rest of the
federal government, but the church has no influence over the same. More Catholics are presently serving in our Congress and other branches of the Federal government than ever before, and they have all been instructed by the Vatican to bring about Catholic social teaching and doctrine within our country and all others in which they reside through legislation, but the Church has no influence in or over our government. DENIAL!
: Texas Conservative Mon Apr 23, 2018 - 07:55:25
Sunday law (or blue laws) will never come back to the US and A. Too much cash money to stop business on Sundays.
Little late to claim that such could not happen. It has already repeatedly happened all over the world and in this country many times over. This is not to mention the delusional element that God will allow to come upon all of humanity before the end.
2 Thess 2:3 Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; 4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God. 5 Remember ye not, that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things? 6 And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time. 7 For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. 8 And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: 9 Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, 10 And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11
And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: 12 That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
https://www.total-croatia-news.com/business/17053-catholic-church-wants-to-ban-working-on-sunday
https://newlyceum.org/blog/2018/3/22/spirit-of-the-laws-sunday-laws-further-considered
http://www.ancientpages.com/2017/03/07/on-this-day-in-history-emperor-constantine-i-passes-his-famous-national-sunday-law/
http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/issues/may-25th-2018/how-europeans-are-fighting-back-against-sunday-trading/
All emphasis in the following quoted article from the above provided link is mine.
CATHOLIC HERALD
How Europeans are fighting back against Sunday trading
For the past year, the Castel Romano Designer Outlet 12 miles south of Rome has been the site of a battle over the Sabbath. Its owner, the McArthur Glen Group, operates outlet malls in nine nations and prides itself on its "long-established heritage of drawing inspiration from regional architecture, building materials and traditions" – which explains why the mall looks like a pasteboard Italian village. There is a grandiose cheapness to the place, as if Italy itself were being sold at 70 per cent off an inflated price.
Valeria Ferrara had asked her boss at the Calvin Klein outlet for an occasional Sunday off to spend with her husband and two-year-old son. Rather than grant her request, the company transferred her to a location 30 miles away. Ferrara protested against the decision by chaining herself outside the store. Earlier this month, faced with negative publicity and pressure from a local union, Calvin Klein abandoned its plan to tear mother from son.
We should be cheered by Valeria's triumph and sobered by how rare it is. Once conceived as a universal right, Sabbath rest is increasingly the privilege of the wealthy few. According to the European Observatory of Working Life, labour on Sunday is becoming more common, with 30 per cent of Europeans working at least one Sunday a month. People in the poorer nations of the European periphery (Greece, Italy, etc) are much likelier to work several Sundays a month than those in wealthier countries. Germans work fewer Sundays than anyone else – even as their political and financial leaders press Sunday labour on other nations.
Ferrara's case only occurred because Italy liberalised Sunday labour in 2011 at the urging of Prime Minister Mario Monti, a technocrat installed to please German bankers. Monti's premiership showed how thoroughly the European Union now embodies that principle attributed to Emperor Joseph II of Austria: "Everything for the people, nothing by the people." One of the things instituted for but not by the Italian people was a provision that compelled 4.7 million of them to work on Sunday.
Populist movements across Europe have begun to push back. Earlier this year, Poland restricted almost all Sunday shopping with a law backed by the Catholic Church and the Solidarity trade union. Hungary banned Sunday shopping in 2015 but repealed the measure a year later, while retaining 12 public holidays and the right of workers to take Sundays off.
The Five Star Movement and the League, which have just formed a joint government in Italy, both campaigned against Monti's reform. As Alessandra Bocchi has reported, in 2013 Five Star introduced a law that would bring back Sunday closing. "Let's once again put the person at the centre of public policy, not these unsuccessful market theories," said Luigi di Maio, Five Star's leader. His party's proposal was denounced by the Council of Europe.
Campaigning against Sunday shopping allows populists to combine an economic message with a cultural one, standing in defence simultaneously of workers' rights and a Christian command. It is no coincidence that the two are connected. Only by recognising the authority of God can we be freed from the worldly powers that enslave and oppress us – including those found in the market.
In the case of sabbath laws, refusal to acknowledge Christ's reign has directly led to the economisation of everyday life. The EU's 1993 Working Time Directive stated that the minimum weekly rest period "shall, in principle, include Sunday."
But in 1996, the European Court of Justice annulled this rule, saying that "the Council has failed to explain why Sunday, as a weekly rest day, is more closely connected with the health and safety of workers than any other day of the week." In the name of a shallow secularism, the Court opened the door to the exploitation of millions of Valeria Ferraras.
Only those who recognise that the common good concerns a man's soul can explain why we should legislate rest on Sunday: to honour the God who on that day rose. This is why we call Sunday the Lord's Day – domenica, domingo, dimanche.
We first hear the term in the Book of Revelation, where John reports that it was "on the Lord's Day" that he had his great vision. Ever since it has been the day on which we glimpse paradise, enjoying freedom in communion with God. As Benedict XVI put it, "On the Sabbath there are no masters and no servants; there is only the freedom of all the children of God ... For this reason the Sabbath is the heart of all social legislation."
Christians down the centuries have defended the day we now neglect. When the 4th-century Martyrs of Abitinae were asked why they had defied Diocletian's decree forbidding Sunday worship, they said, "Sine dominico non possumus", which means "We cannot live without Sunday. We cannot give up this thing of the Lord."
It is striking how many Catholics have given up this thing of the Lord. Even those who can afford Sunday rest do nothing to guarantee it for others. As Benedict XVI saw, Christian politics begins with the Sabbath. Our task is to secure it in law – not as a privilege for the powerful, but as a right enjoyed by all.
Matthew Schmitz is senior editor at First Things
There is no command anywhere in the bible to rest on the first day of the week as a Christian duty. If as the above article falsely claims, Sunday rest used to be understood as a universal right, then why were so very many Sunday laws enacted and enforced upon apparently so many offenders. Since when is a persons right to do something, grounds for forcing everyone else to do it also. Rights are exactly protections against being forced to do something, not the underlying principle of forcing everyone to do something. To the contrary, this is what the Catholic Church refers to as an inalienable ethical demand. Not surprising of course, that the Catholic church in cahoots with unions backed up the Sunday laws in Poland. Which they will no doubt do as well where ever and when ever possible.
"Christian" Sunday laws come to us via the Roman Emperor Constantine, not the bible or any command from Jesus Christ or His apostles. They have been supported and continue to be supported to this day by the Pontifex Maximus of the Roman Empire, the Pope.
http://www.markofbeast.net/vatican-sunday-law.html
The above link has several quotes from the Catholic Church regarding Sunday sacredness.
https://atlanta.eater.com/2018/5/8/17331478/georgia-governor-signs-sunday-brunch-bill
Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal signed Senate Bill 17—the "Sunday Brunch Bill" or "mimosa mandate"—making it the law of the land and thrusting the state into the 21st century. Residents in each city and county throughout Georgia can now decide whether to allow the sale of alcohol at restaurants in their communities on Sundays beginning at 11 a.m. via a local referendum.
Deal inked his signature on the measure Tuesday morning—the last possible day to sign legislation passed this year by the state's General Assembly.
While Senate Bill 17 (SB 17) allows restaurants to serve alcohol on Sundays starting at 11 a.m. rather than 12:30 p.m., it seems the new law does not permit Georgia consumers to purchase alcohol before 12:30 p.m. from grocery or liquor stores.
Full article may be viewed at link provided above.
http://www.sdadefend.com/MINDEX-S/Sunday%20Laws%20in%20Europe.pdf
A lot of interesting info at the link above relating to the subject of this thread.
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-italy-sunday/new-italian-government-plans-to-curb-sunday-shopping-di-maio-idUKKCN1LP0HG
New Italian government plans to curb Sunday shopping - Di Maio
ROME (Reuters) - The new Italian government will introduce a ban on Sunday shopping in large commercial centres before the end of the year as it seeks to defend family traditions, Deputy Prime Minister Luigi Di Maio said on Sunday.
In a bid to spur economic growth, the then Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti liberalised Sunday trading in 2012, despite pressure from the Roman Catholic Church and unions who said the country needed to keep its traditional day of rest.
"This liberalisation is in fact destroying Italian families," said Di Maio, who is head of the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement. "We need to start limiting opening and closing times again," he told reporters.
Earlier this year, Poland restricted Sunday shopping as the conservative government in Warsaw pushed ahead with what it said was a return to Roman Catholic values.
The Italian and Polish initiatives run against a slow liberalisation of Sunday shopping hours throughout Europe, where retailers face pressure from a boom in online shopping.
Small shopkeepers in Italy have long sought to overturn Monti's reform, saying their businesses face unfair competition from the big malls.
Di Maio said that larger stores would also have to close on national holidays.
https://onepeterfive.com/poland-sunday-rest/
Interesting article. Strange, the article seems to indicate that the people want this in order to leave communism behind, while at the same time admitting that the churches are empty, and everyone seems to be at the malls. Poor people, they obviously do not really know what they want, so the heavily Catholic influenced government is going to make their decision for them. As usual, unions are involved, as predicted.
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-italy-sunday/new-italian-government-plans-to-curb-sunday-shopping-di-maio-idUKKCN1LP0HG
I see this news item as a refutation of Ellen White's revelatory experience and also the resulting long-time Seventh-day Adventist expectation that Sunday laws would begin in the United States first and then spread to other nations.
: Shubee Sat Sep 15, 2018 - 13:11:40
I see this news item as a refutation of Ellen White's revelatory experience and also the resulting long-time Seventh-day Adventist expectation that Sunday laws would begin in the United States first and then spread to other nations.
I never understood that Sunday laws had to start here first and then spread to other nations. As I understand it, when they are established on a national level in this nation built upon Protestant and biblical principles of freedom and liberty maintained by a separation of church and state, nothing will be left to stand in the way of the final beast of biblical prophecy. The image of the first beast of Rev. 13 will have been established leading to global enforcement of the papacy once again.
Sunday laws have been on the books in many nations now for a long long time. Some never got rid of them. This makes it impossible that they would start in the US. Please do share where EGW said they would start here first and then spread abroad. I don't recall such, though she did specifically address US Sunday laws as a sign that persecution would soon begin and the judgments be poured out upon those who worship the beast.
Sunday laws have been on the books in many nations now for a long long time. Some never got rid of them. This makes it impossible that they would start in the US. Please do share where EGW said they would start here first and then spread abroad.
History will be repeated. False religion will be exalted. The first day of the week, a common working day, possessing no sanctity whatever, will be set up as was the image of Babylon. All nations and tongues and peoples will be commanded to worship this spurious sabbath. . . . The decree enforcing the worship of this day is to go forth to all the world.--7BC 976 (1897). {LDE 134.5}
As America, the land of religious liberty, shall unite with the papacy in forcing the conscience and compelling men to honor the false sabbath, the people of every country on the globe will be led to follow her example.--6T 18 (1900). {LDE 135.1}
Foreign nations will follow the example of the United States. Though she leads out, yet the same crisis will come upon our people in all parts of the world.--6T 395 (1900). {LDE 135.3}
: Shubee Sat Sep 15, 2018 - 20:15:01
History will be repeated. False religion will be exalted. The first day of the week, a common working day, possessing no sanctity whatever, will be set up as was the image of Babylon. All nations and tongues and peoples will be commanded to worship this spurious sabbath. . . . The decree enforcing the worship of this day is to go forth to all the world.--7BC 976 (1897). {LDE 134.5}
As America, the land of religious liberty, shall unite with the papacy in forcing the conscience and compelling men to honor the false sabbath, the people of every country on the globe will be led to follow her example.--6T 18 (1900). {LDE 135.1}
Foreign nations will follow the example of the United States. Though she leads out, yet the same crisis will come upon our people in all parts of the world.--6T 395 (1900). {LDE 135.3}
Your taking lead out to mean the very first, which is not possible. Your first quote plainly states that history will repeat itself, the US helps create an image to the beast that was before it, which beast exalted the day of the sun by law. She leads out by way of example, as the undisputed leader of the free world especially pertaining to freedom of religion. When she abandons this, other nations will no doubt follow her example. This does not mean she is the first to ever do it.
There were Sunday laws being enforced in this nation during her day, and many still in place and being enforced in other nations as well. Her points were regarding a national Sunday law in this once Protestant nation of religious liberty that will set the stage or lead out if you will in the establishment of a global law. When we submit as one of the prime leaders of the free world and religious liberty, there will be little to nothing standing in the way of a global law. Others who have not yet done so will no doubt speedily follow our example.
Catholic countries passing laws that are supportive of Catholic traditions never was an issue for Ellen G. White. For Sister White, the expected crisis will be the United States, a Protestant country, passing laws that favor Catholic delusions and falsehoods.
When our nation shall so abjure the principles of its government as to enact a Sunday law, Protestantism will in this act join hands with popery.--5T 712 (1889). {LDE 128.2}
Protestants will throw their whole influence and strength on the side of the papacy. By a national act enforcing the false sabbath they will give life and vigor to the corrupt faith of Rome, reviving her tyranny and oppression of conscience.--Mar 179 (1893). {LDE 128.3}
The prophecy of Revelation 13 declares that the power represented by the beast with lamblike horns shall cause "the earth and them which dwell therein" to worship the papacy--there symbolized by the beast "like unto a leopard." . . . This prophecy will be fulfilled when the United States shall enforce Sunday observance, which Rome claims as the special acknowledgment of her supremacy. . . . {LDE 129.2}
Political corruption is destroying love of justice and regard for truth, and even in free America rulers and legislators, in order to secure public favor, will yield to the popular demand for a law enforcing Sunday observance.--GC 578, 579, 592 (1911). {LDE 129.3}
Protestantism shall give the hand of fellowship to the Roman power. Then there will be a law against the Sabbath of God's creation, and then it is that God will do His "strange work" in the earth.--7BC 910 (1886). {LDE 130.1}
The professed Protestant world will form a confederacy with the man of sin, and the church and the world will be in corrupt harmony.--7BC 975 (1891). {LDE 130.3}
Romanism in the Old World, and apostate Protestantism in the New, will pursue a similar course toward those who honor all the divine precepts.--GC 616 (1911).
When the leading churches of the United States, uniting upon such points of doctrine as are held by them in common, shall influence the state to enforce their decrees and to sustain their institutions, then Protestant America will have formed an image of the Roman hierarchy, and the infliction of civil penalties upon dissenters will inevitably result. . . . {LDE 131.1}
The enforcement of Sundaykeeping on the part of Protestant churches is an enforcement of the worship of the papacy. . . . {LDE 131.2}
In the very act of enforcing a religious duty by secular power, the churches would themselves form an image to the beast; hence the enforcement of Sundaykeeping in the United States would be an enforcement of the worship of the beast and his image.--GC 445, 448, 449 (1911). {LDE 131.3}
When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near.--5T 451 (1885). {LDE 131.4}
In light of the fact, that Sunday keepers have repeatedly throughout history appealed to the civil authorities to enforce their day of worship upon all, how is it that those who keep the fourth commandment by faith in the word of God, are the ones always accused of being legalistic?
You misunderstand what legalism is. For a good understanding of the legalistic mindset, please consider what Ellen G. White wrote about legalistic Seventh-day Adventists: http://everythingimportant.org/gospel/7faces.htm
True faith does not make void the law of God, but rather establishes the same.
Then you need to address fellow church members whose bold and open sins are causing great injury to the cause of truth., i.e., Those Sanctimonious Enablers of Genocide (http://everythingimportant.org/Laodicea/).
: Shubee Sun Sep 16, 2018 - 16:18:22
You misunderstand what legalism is. For a good understanding of the legalistic mindset, please consider what Ellen G. White wrote about legalistic Seventh-day Adventists: http://everythingimportant.org/gospel/7faces.htm
1. My statement you quoted was not in relation at all to legalistic SDA's.
2. You have no idea what I understand or not, concerning legalism.
3. The observation of, and belief in Sunday sacredness can be nothing but legalism, it cannot have anything to do with faith in God's word or observance by faith or conviction of the Holy spirit of God. Thus it relies upon fallen humanities legal systems to support and sustain itself.
: Shubee Sun Sep 16, 2018 - 19:21:05
Then you need to address fellow church members whose bold and open sins are causing great injury to the cause of truth., i.e., Those Sanctimonious Enablers of Genocide (http://everythingimportant.org/Laodicea/).
Your need not presume, what I need to do. I am not you, never have been you, and never was meant to be you. It is the body of Christ, not the body of Shubee. You are a member of the body, not the body. As such you have a distinct purpose that is part of the whole, others may be involved in the same, but they are not subject to you or your leading regarding the same.
I have not attended Church but a handful of times in many years. I voiced my concerns for many years while attending, regarding the issues at hand which I was convicted needed to be addressed. Few shared my concerns. Eventually I decided not to subject myself to indoctrination any longer by helping fill the pews. There are a whole lot more problems in the denomination than some SDA's supporting abortion if that is your main beef. Nevertheless, please do expose and confront the same as you are convicted to do so. May God bless your specific functions as a part of Christ's body.
There are a whole lot more problems in the denomination than some SDA's supporting abortion if that is your main beef.
Let me explain. I'm exalting two incredibly simple truths. "People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones." Also: Christians are morally obligated to reform themselves first, their own family second and then their church before they begin to preach to their neighbors. Jesus would agree. He said: "You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye." Matthew 7:5.
: Shubee Sat Sep 22, 2018 - 14:05:31
Let me explain. I'm exalting two incredibly simple truths. "People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones." Also: Christians are morally obligated to reform themselves first, their own family second and then their church before they begin to preach to their neighbors. Jesus would agree. He said: "You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye." Matthew 7:5.
"Judge ye not lest ye be judged the same."
Your list is in proper order, but your confusing preaching and judging. Preaching the truth is not judging, though all will be judged by truth. If we all wait until we personally, our families, and our churches are perfect before we preach, then no one in the know will ever preach. If we preach the truth with the desire to save the deceived, we are not condemning, but attempting to save from deception at the very least. No one can avoid preaching. Our lives even completely apart from what we preach or speak, are a witness to truth or error.
If we preach the truth with the desire to save the deceived, we are not condemning, but attempting to save from deception at the very least.
According to Ellen G. White, the Seventh-day Adventist prophetess, Seventh-day Adventists are deceived to a staggering degree. "Yea, they have chosen their own ways, and their soul delighteth in their abominations." So why aren't you trying to save them? http://everythingimportant.org/Laodicea/
: Shubee Sat Sep 22, 2018 - 19:30:07
According to Ellen G. White, the Seventh-day Adventist prophetess, Seventh-day Adventists are deceived to a staggering degree. "Yea, they have chosen their own ways, and their soul delighteth in their abominations." So why aren't you trying to save them? http://everythingimportant.org/Laodicea/
If you would like, I will quote from EGW concerning SDA's responsibility to the world and countless souls around them as well. Then I can ask you why you aren't trying to save them instead of spending so much time on SDA's who all have the truth right in front of them but refuse to examine and incorporate it. This I could do of course as though what I do and am convicted of was the standard for you and all others. As though the church was the body of Amo, rather than the body of Christ.
I brought my concerns to the church, they had no interest, I decided the best statement I could make was to stop attending. They can and have asked why, but have no interest in in any depth concerning the same. Having been family to a Pastor and witnessing many major divisions caused within churches by those wishing to impose or force there own views or concerns upon all, I opted out of such. I chose a more silent and less divisive form of testimony. There are countless billions living in deception to share truth with outside the church, a work that must be done. I am not you, nor was I ever meant to be. Please do follow your own convictions and work for and in the church. May God bless your efforts according to His will.
There are countless billions living in deception to share truth with outside the church, a work that must be done.
Your obsession with typical SDA paranoia about Sunday laws in the United States fulfilling the mark of the beast prophecy while you blindly dismiss real crises going on now is the deception that you have chosen for yourself.
If you would like, I will quote from EGW concerning SDA's responsibility to the world and countless souls around them as well. Then I can ask you why you aren't trying to save them instead of spending so much time on SDA's who all have the truth right in front of them but refuse to examine and incorporate it.
My fellowship is proclaiming the truest and fullest understanding of the three angel's messages (http://truthinverity.org/three-angels-messages/). Nevertheless, it takes no time at all to ask SDAs how they feel about being sanctimonious enablers of genocide (http://everythingimportant.org/Laodicea/).
: Shubee Sun Sep 23, 2018 - 17:42:23
Your obsession with typical SDA paranoia about Sunday laws in the United States fulfilling the mark of the beast prophecy while you blindly dismiss real crises going on now is the deception that you have chosen for yourself.
Of course it is, we should all be following Shubee's perfect example of what everyone should be doing.
Testimonies for the Church Volume 6, Page 60-62The third angel's message is to be given with power. The power of the proclamation of the first and second messages is to be intensified in the third. In the Revelation John says of the heavenly messenger who unites with the third angel: "I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. And he cried mightily with a strong voice." Revelation 18:1, 2.
We are in danger of giving the third angel's message in so indefinite a manner that it does not impress the people. So many other interests are brought in that the very message which should be proclaimed with power becomes tame and voiceless. At our camp meetings a mistake has been made. The Sabbath question has been touched upon,
but has not been presented as the great test for this time. While the churches profess to believe in Christ, they are violating the law which Christ Himself proclaimed from Sinai. The Lord bids us: "Show My people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins." Isaiah 58:1. The trumpet is to give a certain sound.
When you have a congregation before you for only two weeks, do not defer the presentation of the Sabbath question until everything else is presented, supposing that you thus pave the way for it.
Lift up the standard—the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus. Make this the important theme. Then, by your strong arguments, make it of still greater force. Dwell more on the Revelation. Read, explain, and enforce its teaching.
Our warfare is aggressive. Tremendous issues are before us, yea, and right upon us. Let our prayers ascend to God that the four angels may still hold the four winds, that they may not blow to injure or destroy until the last warning has been given to the world. Then let us work in harmony with our prayers.
Let nothing lessen the force of the truth for this time. The present truth is to be our burden. The third angel's message must do its work of separating from the churches a people who will take their stand on the platform of eternal truth.Our message is a life-and-death message, and we must let it appear as it is, the great power of God.
We are to present it in all its telling force. Then the Lord will make it effectual. It is our privilege to expect large things, even the demonstration of the Spirit of God. This is the power that will convict and convert the soul.
The perils of the last days are upon us, and in our work we are to warn the people of the danger they are in. Let not the solemn scenes which prophecy has revealed be left untouched.
If our people were half awake, if they realized the nearness of the events portrayed in the Revelation, a reformation would be wrought in our churches, and many more would believe the message. We have no time to lose; God calls upon us to watch for souls as they that must give an account. Advance new principles, and crowd in the clear-cut truth. It will be as a sword cutting both ways. But be not too ready to take a controversial attitude. There will be times when we must stand still and see the salvation of God. Let Daniel speak, let the Revelation speak, and tell what is truth. But whatever phase of the subject is presented, uplift Jesus as the center of all hope, "the Root and the Offspring of David, and the bright and morning Star." Revelation 22:16.
Testimonies for the Church Volume 6, Page 241Medical missionary work is in no case to be divorced from the gospel ministry. The Lord has specified that the two shall be as closely connected as the arm is with the body. Without this union neither part of the work is complete. The medical missionary work is the gospel in illustration.
But God did not design that the medical missionary work should eclipse the work of the third angel's message. The arm is not to become the body.
The third angel's message is the gospel message for these last days, and in no case is it to be overshadowed by other interests and made to appear an unessential consideration. When in our institutions anything is placed above the third angel's message, the gospel is not there the great leading power.Counsels to Writers and Editors, Page 26 & 27The Three Angels' Messages—The proclamation of the first, second, and third angels' messages has been located by the word of Inspiration. Not a peg or pin is to be removed. No human authority has any more right to change the location of these messages than to substitute the New Testament for the Old. The Old Testament is the gospel in figures and symbols. The New Testament is the substance. One is as essential as the other. The Old Testament presents lessons from the lips of Christ, and these lessons have not lost their force in any particular. The first and second messages were given in 1843 and 1844, and we are now under the proclamation of the third;
but all three of the messages are still to be proclaimed. It is just as essential now as ever before that they shall be repeated to those who are seeking for the truth. By pen and voice we are to sound the proclamation, showing their order, and the application of the prophecies that bring us to the third angel's message. There cannot be a third without the first and second. These messages we are to give to the world in publications, in discourses, showing in the line of prophetic history the things that have been, and the things that will be.—Manuscript 32, 1896.
Counsels to Writers and Editors, Page 177
Chapter 25—Literature in the Closing WorkThe End of All Things at Hand—The great and wonderful work of the last gospel message is to be carried on now as it has never been before. The world is to receive the light of truth through an evangelizing ministry of the Word in our books and periodicals. Our publications are to show that the end of all things is at hand.
I am bidden to say to our publishing houses: "Lift up the standard; lift it up higher. Proclaim the third angel's message, that it may be heard by all the world. Let it be seen that 'here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.' Revelation 14:12. Let our literature give the message as a witness to all the world."Our workers should now be encouraged to give their first attention to books that deal with the evidences of our faith,—books that teach the doctrines of the Bible, and that will prepare a people to stand in the trying times before us.—Testimonies for the Church 9:61 (1909).
The Colporteur Evangelist, Page 100Books and Periodicals
The great and wonderful work of the last gospel message is to be carried on now as it has never been before. The world is to receive the light of truth through an evangelizing ministry of the word in our books and periodicals.
Our publications are to show that the end of all things is at hand. I am bidden to say to our publishing houses: "Lift up the standard; lift it up higher. Proclaim the third angel's message, that it may be heard by all the world. Let it be seen that 'here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.' Revelation 14:12. Let our literature give the message as a witness to all the world."
: Shubee Sun Sep 23, 2018 - 19:29:15
My fellowship is proclaiming the truest and fullest understanding of the three angel's messages (http://truthinverity.org/three-angels-messages/). Nevertheless, it takes no time at all to ask SDAs how they feel about being sanctimonious enablers of genocide (http://everythingimportant.org/Laodicea/).
Good for you. Go to, do your work. You are wasting your time telling me it is what I have to do.
It takes no time at all to ask SDAs how they feel about being sanctimonious enablers of genocide (http://everythingimportant.org/Laodicea/).
So Amo, how do you feel about being a sanctimonious enabler of genocide (http://everythingimportant.org/Laodicea/)?
: Shubee Fri Sep 28, 2018 - 11:49:32
So Amo, how do you feel about being a sanctimonious enabler of genocide (http://everythingimportant.org/Laodicea/)?
Not really very concerned about your petty judgments of the why's and wherefores of my actions, or intents.
Not really very concerned about your petty judgments of the why's and wherefores of my actions, or intents.
What is petty about your confession of shamefully transparent obsession with typical SDA paranoia about Sunday laws in the United States fulfilling the mark of the beast prophecy while blindly dismissing real crises going on now?
What is a Shubertarian?
Genocide pushed by SDA's and it isn't about their attitude towards abortion?
: Shubee Sat Sep 29, 2018 - 11:45:59
What is petty about your confession of shamefully transparent obsession with typical SDA paranoia about Sunday laws in the United States fulfilling the mark of the beast prophecy while blindly dismissing real crises going on now?
There are countless real live crisis going on all over the world at this very moment. I am not subject to address this particular one regardless of your opinion otherwise. SDA's supporting abortion as an acceptable from of birth control is certainly wrong. Please do continue to address it as you are convicted to do so. I simply am not subject to the dictates of your conscience, concerning what I should address. Your attempts to manipulate or impose a guilt trip upon me for not joining you are a waste of time. Nevertheless, you are of course free to do as you wish.
Genocide pushed by SDA's and it isn't about their attitude towards abortion?
The record shows that genocide is both sanctioned and orchestrated by SDAs and that includes SDAs in good standing performing abortions in SDA hospitals. Unquestionably, tolerance of many indisputable evils persists in the SDA church because of sanctimonious enablers of genocide. http://everythingimportant.org/Laodicea/
http://www1.salvationarmy.org/IHQ/www_ihq_isjc.nsf/vw-sublinks/442678BFBEEB1E72802578F80009CE61
A Call for Climate Justice - Release 7What WE, the church, can do
Beyond our lives as individuals, we the church are also called to communal action for climate justice. Here are some ways
Confess: The fact is that all of us as human beings have demonstrated attitudes and lifestyles that devalue creation. We have all abused that which we were given to steward. This may have been a wrong that we were not even aware of. Still, we are called to humbly confess it, and resolve to make a change.
Engage: Begin biblically based conversations within your local congregation about creation care. Leading a small group bible study or hosting a special event is a good way of initiating discussion.
Learn: Take advantage of ISJC and other online resources to begin a social justice conversation at your home church. We would recommend the Jesus and Justice as a useful, free bible study resource.
Pray: Remember in prayer those most vulnerable to climate change consequences and those who are unable to cope.
Inform: Invite informed speakers, ministers or authors to your church to help raise awareness of Climate Change and encourage response.
Keep the Sabbath: It could be the most radical thing a church can do for environmental stewardship—to commit to keeping the Sabbath. The scriptures make constant reference to rest and care for the land as well as for people on the Sabbath. Spending time with family and friends and enjoying the free outdoors is an act of resistance to the pressures of materialism and consumerism.
Do a Church Energy and Waste Audit: This can be an excellent way to encourage energy consciousness within the church while reducing your carbon footprint and utilities bill. This activity provides a good opportunity for youth involvement. Get started here.
The Sabbath referred to above is of course the man made Sunday Sabbath, not the Sabbath of scripture. It seems that Sunday sacredness in an intricate part of course, of the papacies war against materialism or consumerism, or shall we say Capitalism.
https://www.indcatholicnews.com/news.php?viewStory=32245
A Sabbath for the Earth and the Poor: The Challenge of Pope Francis"Sunday, like the Jewish Sabbath, is meant to be a day which heals our relationships with God, with ourselves, with others and with the world." (Laudato Si' para 237)
We live in a world where people and nature are more often valued according to their economic capacity or usefulness to humans, rather than their intrinsic value as God's creation. In order to be liberated from this commodification, consumerism and utilitarianism, the Sabbath reminds us to rediscover a sense of awe and wonder, and to see the beauty in creation and also in relationships, especially with the poor and marginalised. The conference will seek to: help us understand current realities; find ways to live out and advocate a different value system; and provide a space for creativity, celebration and contemplation.
God gave the seventh day Sabbath to the world 2000 years before there ever was a Jew. He calls it His Sabbath all throughout scripture, not the Jewish Sabbath. What does it mean when humanity replaces His Sabbath for the world, with their own Sabbath for the world? What has it meant, does it mean, and will it mean again in the future when they enforce such by law? All of course to combat evil consumerism and or Capitalism.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/mercynotsacrifice/2015/09/07/capitalisms-war-on-the-sabbath/
Capitalism's war on the SabbathOne of the most important events in labor history happened in Exodus 20:10 when God commanded the Israelite people to rest every seventh day: "The seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God; you shall not do any work – you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns." The concept of resting every seven days is one of the most important legacies of the Judeo-Christian tradition. And modern capitalism has declared war on this idea of Sabbath.
When I was a kid, it was still taboo in the South to work or do secular activities on Sundays (at least for middle-class people). As a kid, I never made the connection that the people behind the counter at Luby's Cafeteria where we went every Sunday after church couldn't go to church themselves because they had to make our food ready for us to eat it after church. We could eat out on Sundays, but the one thing we would not do was go shopping on Sundays, because Sunday was supposed to be a day for God and family (if you're not working in the service industry). For much of my life, honoring the Sabbath was a sort of moralistic duty to God. It never occurred to me that God created this concept as a means for people to enjoy life.
Reading Abraham Heschel's The Sabbath in my first semester of seminary was a huge turning point for me. Heschel argues that all of God's laws should be cherished as gifts, and that God's command to keep the Sabbath is the greatest gift of all. Growing up evangelical Christian, I had often filtered everything in the Bible through the oversimplified lens of law and grace. Keeping the Sabbath belonged to the law of the old covenant, which Jesus had
supposedly flouted with his Sabbath healing. But Heschel showed me my immaturity. When Jesus said, "The Sabbath was made for humanity, not humanity for the Sabbath," he was in perfect agreement with what Heschel wrote. God does not make arbitrary rules for the sake of his honor and glory; God's commands are for the sake of our flourishing, including commands related to spending time with him.
What many privileged Christians refuse to recognize is that our economic system has a direct impact on peoples' abilities to spend time with God. Whenever we roll our eyes about living wage campaigns or say that the market should decide what people earn, what we're saying is that we don't care whether these people have time for daily quiet time devotionals or small group Bible studies or even going to church at all. To be able to do any of those things requires a minimal level of economic stability. Studies are showing that one of the biggest unchurched demographics in our culture right now are working class people. Why? Because when you're paid minimum wage, you have to work more than one job to pay your rent. And that means you don't have time to be plugged into a faith community.
Of course, it's not just among the working class where capitalism is destroying the possibility of Sabbath. Middle-upper class people find plenty of ways to keep ourselves frenetically busy when we don't have to be because we have bought into the religion of meritocracy and competition over the religion of grace that Jesus came to give us. Grace is the concept of Sabbath applied to every facet of life. It's not just taking a day off, but refusing to throw ourselves into the rat race with everybody else because we believe that we are accepted and loved unconditionally by God. The enemy of grace is meritocracy, but many middle-upper class American Christians choose meritocracy over grace for the sake of our own self-justification.
When we choose meritocracy over grace, we are choosing the religion of capitalism over the religion of Christianity. I really believe that the clash between capitalism and Christianity will define the 21st century as much as the clash between capitalism and communism defined the 20th century. My hope is that somehow the courage of Christians who believe in God's grace will be able to withstand the furious race towards greater efficiency, productivity, and profit. I want for my sons to become adults in a world that is less addicted to its own anxiety and more open to the beauty of the Sabbath.
There you have it. Big bad Communism is defeated as Christians enemies, now big bad Capitalism must be defeated in order to be able to keep this worlds Sabbath. Rome's plan to a T. The establishment of their man created holy day by law will help defeat evil Capitalism which is keeping us from keeping the same. Capitalism = forced shopping and or working upon all. Sunday laws would alleviate the burden of this great evil. BALONEY!
Sanctimonious enablers of genocide are not prophets. Even Sister White was wrong in her predictions on the sequence of events to unfold beyond her day. http://everythingimportant.org/EllenGWhite/
: Shubee Tue Oct 02, 2018 - 07:25:26
Sanctimonious enablers of genocide are not prophets. Even Sister White was wrong in her predictions on the sequence of events to unfold beyond her day. http://everythingimportant.org/EllenGWhite/
Why don't you stop trying to hijack the topic of this thread, and start another one about the sanctimonious enablers of genocide? Then bring your accusations to that thread, instead of sending us somewhere else to read about said accusations.
Why don't you stop trying to hijack the topic of this thread, and start another one about the sanctimonious enablers of genocide?
I believe that I'm on topic. Recall the opening post. I assert that legalistic minds live for fanatical ideas, that having nothing to do but to exalt outdated eschatology is fanaticism, and that legalists and sanctimonious enablers of genocide have no right to talk.
What is this Shubertarian nonsense?
Shubee, do you believe you are an anointed prophet?
Shubee, do you believe you are an anointed prophet?
I am a Seventh-day Millerite and believe that I'm a divinely ordained prophet-trainee.
: Shubee Sat Oct 06, 2018 - 14:23:08
I am a Seventh-day Millerite and believe that I'm a divinely ordained prophet-trainee.
In other words, you are a nutjob.
I won't get into the 7th day thing.
However, history has shown that Millerism is a farce. And you being a prophet? Or Prophet trainee? rofl
In other words, you are a nutjob.
Your repudiation of Seventh-day Millerite beliefs (http://everythingimportant.org/Millerites) is nuttier.
If someone is a Millerite, they are by definition "Not For Prophet".
History has shown that Millerism is a farce.
The same can be said of Christ's eschatology. http://everythingimportant.org/parousia
: Shubee Sat Oct 06, 2018 - 15:23:38
The same can be said of Christ's eschatology. http://everythingimportant.org/parousia
Your response is a link to a "Shubertarian" message board?
You are about as stable as TLIG.
Your response is a link to a "Shubertarian" message board?
I thought I responded by quoting God's word.
You are about as stable as TLIG.
Unlike you, I understand that you're off topic.
You had to bring up TLIG.
: Amo Mon Feb 13, 2012 - 18:18:58
I never said anything about anyone forcing me right now to keep Sunday. That must just be in your brainwashed mind.
Brainwashing is a terrible thing to do to another and I find it in poor taste to use against someone. What happened in the past is past. Man's inhumanity to man has existed since Adam. Ignorance, too, has existed since Adam. This is evident in the topic of blue laws, Sunday and Sabbath keeping. The Sabbath was given to Israel and Israel only. Trying to make it part of Christian duty is just as ignorant as imposing Sunday laws on humanity.
I only referred to the fact that all through history, Sunday keepers have passed laws trying to force everyone to observe their day. Since you mentioned it though, there are certainly many blue laws in effect in many places today, which do not allow stores to open or certain activities to take place on Sundays until certain times, if at all on that day. There are also countless blue laws on the books all over the place, which have never been removed and could be enforced at any time.
I am not saying that SDAs force the observance of Sabbath on others, but they will tell us that we won't be saved unless we observe it. The only ground you have to stand on in doing so is from your prophet who has been proven to be wrong in many cases.
I cannot use the bible alone to address the issue of Sunday sacredness,
I cannot either.
because the issue is found nowhere at all in the entirety of the scriptures. Therefore it's reasoning, observation, and enforcement must be discussed extra biblically.
True
Perhaps you can explain to me why Sunday keepers have appealed to civil legislation so very many times throughout history, and still do today, and yet claim they are not legalistic. While at the same time claiming that all who would keep the fourth commandment by faith in the word of God are legalistic for doing so.
Please do not but all who worship our Lord on Sunday in one boat. Most who worship on Sunday care less about legislating laws. On the other hand there are communities of SDAs who have legislated laws that prohibit others from freedom on their holy day. Both are wrong.
Sabbath was never in all of history given to any Gentile nation. Only Israel was asked to observe it. There is absolutely no law that would require Christians to observe any day.
Sabbath was never in all of history given to any Gentile nation. Only Israel was asked to observe it. There is absolutely no law that would require Christians to observe any day.
You know your rhymes well. From your church bulletin?
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Mon Oct 29, 2018 - 11:42:49
You know your rhymes well. From your church bulletin?
Hello Gerhard, too bad you cannot deny my statement and can only respond with cynical responses. ::playingguitar:: ::cool::
Beam:
Hello Gerhard, too bad you cannot deny my statement and can only respond with cynical responses.
I cannot deny statements that are just that, your '
statements' as empty as '
is absolutely no law that would require Christians to observe any day'.
Your '
statements' don't exist, chum. How can they exist if there is absolutely nothing that they '
state' or might state if what they are supposed to '
state' does not exist, '
absolutely is not'?
Therefore I must inform you about which you cannot inform me one bit, and that is, that you're talking, saying, writing, stating, nothing than YOUR IGNORANCE, your ignorance which is simply a single flagrant LIE, the lie not of true ignorance, but of cynical denial of reality and truth.
PS
Typical cynical denial from parsons and pastors of charismatic bent superiority, against whom Paul warned, "Let no man not holding to the Head [but] puffed up by his fleshly mind, who conceitedly meddles in what he knows nothing about, with his pretentious humility and angelic worship beguile you (with enticing words 2:4)."
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Mon Oct 29, 2018 - 16:27:38
I cannot deny statements that are just that, your 'statements' as empty as 'is absolutely no law that would require Christians to observe any day'.
Your 'statements' don't exist, chum. How can they exist if there is absolutely nothing that they 'state' or might state if what they are supposed to 'state' does not exist, 'absolutely is not'?
Therefore I must inform you about which you cannot inform me one bit, and that is, that you're talking, saying, writing, stating, nothing than YOUR IGNORANCE, your ignorance which is simply a single flagrant LIE, the lie not of true ignorance, but of cynical denial of reality and truth.
PS
Typical cynical denial of parsons and pastors of charismatic bent superiority, against whom Paul warned, "Let no man not holding to the Head [but] puffed up by his fleshly mind, who conceitedly meddles in what he knows nothing about, with his pretentious humility and angelic worship beguile you (with enticing words 2:4)."
How about some history to disprove my claim. Name some laws of requirement either today or in Biblical history.
Your sarcasms do not do well for your character. Too bad.
How about some history to disprove my claim. Name some laws of requirement either today or in Biblical history.
Your sarcasms do not do well for your character. Too bad.
How about you stop your pretentious, false, cynical, laughable, stupid, attempts at denial?
All '
requirement' to '
disprove' your '
claim', would be for YOU - not for me who haven't got your problem - to forget about '
Biblical history' and for a change read the Bible with a teachable spirit.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Mon Oct 29, 2018 - 17:08:29
How about you stop your pretentious, false, cynical, laughable, stupid, attempts at denial?
All 'requirement' to 'disprove' your 'claim', would be for YOU - not for me who haven't got your problem - to forget about 'Biblical history' and for a change read the Bible with a teachable spirit.
Anger and hurtful words really only hurts the one who spews it. I can only feel sorry for you. I hope and pray you have better days ahead. I gave you every opportunity to prove me wrong al all you are able to do is attempting to intimidate me. Not a nice way to live brother.
Anger and hurtful words really only hurts the one who spews it. I can only feel sorry for you. I hope and pray you have better days ahead. I gave you every opportunity to prove me wrong al all you are able to do is attempting to intimidate me. Not a nice way to live brother.
And what do you think your posts are? Anger, hurt and intimidation sugar coated opportunist words which do not and from their very nature cannot prove anything positive and or real or true. Pray for yourself and don't feel sorry for me. And I am not your brother; are you able to swallow that?
The following link and quotes were found at - http://www.markofbeast.net/page3.htm
All emphasis mine.
https://ceoworld.biz/2018/01/29/a-modest-proposal-for-a-day-of-rest/
.............................
Dr. Smadja's daring plan calls for an international day of rest (about 53 days per year) plus approximately 15 "holidays" where cumulatively there would be a cessation of all productive activity for approximately 70 days, or about 20% of the year. These days of "non-activity" would help achieve the shared goal outlined in the Paris Climate Conference (COP21) of a 20% reduction of pollution globally by 2050, with the aim of keeping global warming below 2°C.
Smadja brings together social, economic, ecological and theological principles to address the serious issue of climate change.............................
This suggests that the time may be right for Dr. Smadja's proposal. "This frantic race to go faster and faster makes us forget essential things, such as loving ourselves, others and also our earth," says Smadja, "the result is a global disaster, whose ecological impact is more and more obvious. A Sabbath for ourselves, our industry and our environment is a corrective to these failures. It is a transcendence of spiritual over material will lead to a better sharing of wealth and a measurable improvement to the climate crisis that can bring together populists, progressives and conservatives toward a common cause."
God has already given us His Sabbath for these very purposes and more. Humanities international or corporate rejection of His Sabbath in favor of their own, will represent its final rejection of His authority in favor of their own. This will cause the final division and dilemma between those who worship God, and those who worship self. The national and international law itself creating the final division fully maturing the harvests of the earth which the Son Fo God will shortly thereafter reap.
Rev 14:6 And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, 7 Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters. 8 And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. 9 And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, 10 The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: 11 And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name. 12 Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus. 13 And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them. 14 And I looked, and behold a white cloud, and upon the cloud one sat like unto the Son of man, having on his head a golden crown, and in his hand a sharp sickle. 15 And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in thy sickle, and reap: for the time is come for thee to reap; for the harvest of the earth is ripe. 16 And he that sat on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the earth; and the earth was reaped. 17 And another angel came out of the temple which is in heaven, he also having a sharp sickle. 18 And another angel came out from the altar, which had power over fire; and cried with a loud cry to him that had the sharp sickle, saying, Thrust in thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth; for her grapes are fully ripe. 19 And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. 20 And the winepress was trodden without the city, and blood came out of the winepress, even unto the horse bridles, by the space of a thousand and six hundred furlongs.
The following link and article was also found at http://www.markofbeast.net/page3.htm
https://www.dutchnews.nl/news/2018/11/zeeland-churches-protest-about-rainbow-flag-and-sunday-shopping/
Zeeland churches protest about rainbow flag and Sunday shopping
Two thirds of the Protestant churches in the Zeeland municipality of Tholen have launched a campaign against the use of the rainbow flag to support gay rights and about shops opening on Sunday.
In total, 22 of the 33 churches on the two former islands which make up Tholen have taken out a page-size advert in the local paper, saying 'Christian norms and values are being shoved to one side.'
Last month Tholen's council agreed to raise the rainbow flag on the national Coming Out Day and to allow shops in some tourist areas to open seven days a week.
In the advert, the churches say they are 'very concerned' about the way Christian values are being moved to one side.
Support for homosexuality, they say, 'contravenes the Biblical order of creation' while allowing shops to open on Sunday goes against the fourth commandment which calls for a day of rest.
Tholen has a population of some 25,000. The biggest group on the town council is the fundamentalist Protestant SGP, which has six councillors.
Clever tactics employed above, mixing some truth with a lie. The bible does condemn homosexuality, but neither the fourth commandment or anything else anywhere in scripture addresses or promotes Sunday sacredness in any way shape or form. The legalistic Sunday keepers are mad at the homosexual community for ignoring God's word concerning their actions and agenda, while they and many others seek to impose their own chosen day of worship upon all through law, over the day God Himself established in His law. One persuasion of fallen humanity defying God's law, against another persuasion of fallen humanity defying God's law. No doubt they will eventually be able to compromise, but God's word and law do no such thing. God's law and authority stand immovable. Those who will not accept deliverance and salvation from its condemnation in Christ Jesus our Lord will suffer the consequences foretold.
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Tue Oct 30, 2018 - 02:34:46
And what do you think your posts are? Anger, hurt and intimidation sugar coated opportunist words which do not and from their very nature cannot prove anything positive and or real or true. Pray for yourself and don't feel sorry for me. And I am not your brother; are you able to swallow that?
The old adage "sticks and stones may break my bone, but (your) words will never hurt me" is quite appropo here. I am glad to be at your service as your whipping target. I hope your negative venting helps you to have a good day. I pray that life is treating you better than what you write.
More from the same link provided in the two previous posts. All emphasis mine.
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-italy-sunday/new-italian-government-plans-to-curb-sunday-shopping-di-maio-idUKKCN1LP0HG
New Italian government plans to curb Sunday shopping - Di Maio
ROME (Reuters) - The new Italian government will introduce a ban on Sunday shopping in large commercial centres before the end of the year as it seeks to defend family traditions, Deputy Prime Minister Luigi Di Maio said on Sunday.
In a bid to spur economic growth, the then Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti liberalised Sunday trading in 2012, despite pressure from the Roman Catholic Church and unions who said the country needed to keep its traditional day of rest.
"This liberalisation is in fact destroying Italian families," said Di Maio, who is head of the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement. "We need to start limiting opening and closing times again," he told reporters.
Earlier this year, Poland restricted Sunday shopping as the conservative government in Warsaw pushed ahead with what it said was a return to Roman Catholic values.
The Italian and Polish initiatives run against a slow liberalisation of Sunday shopping hours throughout Europe, where retailers face pressure from a boom in online shopping.
Small shopkeepers in Italy have long sought to overturn Monti's reform, saying their businesses face unfair competition from the big malls.
Di Maio said that larger stores would also have to close on national holidays.
https://www.ourladyoflourdes.info/sunday-rest/
What kind of work can I perform on a Sunday without violating the Sunday rest?
The Church commands all Catholics to keep Sunday holy—not merely to attend Mass. Thus, the first precept of the Church reads: to keep the Sundays and Holy Days of obligation holy, by hearing Mass and resting from servile work. In another place She says to abstain from "those labors and business concerns which impede the worship to be rendered to God... or the proper relaxation of mind and body" (Code of Canon Law no. 1247). By servile work we mean, in general, that sort of work which requires more of the body than the mind. Traditionally, the motive (e.g., to make money or recreation) is not the main factor in determining whether a particular work is servile or not. Thus, in order to maintain objectivity, not only the nature of the work must be taken into account but also the way it is done and how it is commonly regarded in the tradition of the Church.
The following are generally considered to be servile works: plowing, sowing, harvesting, etc.; sewing, lawn mowing, cobbling, tailoring, printing, masonry work, etc.; all work in mines and factories, etc. In most places custom justifies knitting, crocheting, etc.
On the other hand, it is permitted to go walking, riding, driving, rowing, taking journeys or pilgrimages, even though these may be fatiguing. Literary and artistic works such as studying, teaching, drawing or painting, playing musical instruments, writing, delicate sculpturing, embroidering, taking photographs are all lawful on Sundays and Holy Days, even if done for remuneration.
Two to three hours of servile work would be considered grave matter for sin. The following causes, however, would excuse from the observance of the law forbidding servile work. In general, any work is allowed that left undone would cause grave loss to oneself or another (i.e., "the ox is in the ditch"); an employer requires one to work on Sunday; works of charity to those in need; or those of necessity, public or private, such as all indispensable housework (dishes, cooking, etc.); any work in case of fire, flood, or other disasters. Let us strive to keep the Lord's DAY holy rather than an hour on Sunday.
Can I go shopping on a Sunday?
No, we should not shop on Sundays. In general, all commercial activity should stop on Sundays if for no other reason than to give all employees a chance to worship God and rest on the Lord's Day as He commands. Thus, commercial stores should be closed and they actually were for many years. Only in the last several decades have they been allowed to remain open for business on Sundays. An exception to the rule is often made to businesses that supply necessary items like food and gasoline. Thus, such businesses as convenience stores, restaurants, and gas stations are allowed to be open on Sundays. Let us strive not to defer to a festival what should have been taken care of during the week, thereby distracting our attention from things of God.
http://www.catholicsun.org/2012/06/06/sundays-must-be-a-day-of-rest-dedicated-to-god-family-pope-says/
Sundays must be a day of rest dedicated to God, family, pope says
VATICAN CITY (CNS) — The demands of work can't bully people out of needed time off, Pope Benedict XVI said.
Sunday must be a day of rest for everyone, so people can be free to be with their families and with God, the pope said.
"By defending Sunday, one defends human freedom," he said during his weekly general audience in St. Peter's Square June 6............................
The pope said he wanted to come to the defense of free time, which is "threatened by a kind 'bullying' by the demands of work."
"Sunday is the day of the Lord and of man, a day which everyone must be able to be free — free for the family and free for God."
Family, work, rest and celebration are gifts from God and important aspects of human life that must find a "harmonious balance" in order to build a more humane world, he said.
He said the World Meeting of Families was a way to send a message to the whole world that "it is possible and joyful, even if it takes work, to live love faithfully forever and be open to life" and that it's also possible for the whole family to take part in the mission of the church and help create a better world.
The bible says nowhere that Sunday is the day of the Lord, these are the words of the Pope, not God or scripture. The Pope is correct though in testifying that Sunday is the day of man. It is a man made day which can neither be made holy by man, or kept holy by man. Only God can make anything holy. God's true Sabbath represents this truth, that God alone can make anything holy, a day, or man. Sunday sacredness is humanities defiance against this truth in claiming to do just that with the day of the sun. Go to, set up the abomination of desolation in the place of God's holy Sabbath. So be it, come Lord Jesus.
Amo:
Go to, set up the abomination of desolation in the place of God's holy Sabbath.
Dear Amo, as discussed before between the two of us, it is my duty to tell you that the Sabbath Seventh day Adventists regard holy is identically the one which Jews claim that they keep holy in memory of their redemption from Egypt ON IT. But the Jews' resurrection as it were from the dead through the Red Sea do not have the POWER Jesus Christ's Resurrection has for Christians.
SDAs do not know the Power of his Resurrection unto the "Fellowship in his Suffering" of "The Body of Christ's Own". "And if Christ be not raised, your faith is in vain; ye are yet in your sins. ... But now, being raised from the dead, is Christ become the Firstfruits" of "Sabbaths' Feast of Christ" Assemblies and "Cornerstone" of "The Household of God".
Rose Christ not "on the Sabbath", the Sabbath would be for True Believers as much worth as the unbelieving Jews' Sabbath for them, NOTHING; in fact, a mill-stone around their neck!
: Gerhard Ebersöhn Fri Dec 21, 2018 - 15:00:22
Dear Amo, as discussed before between the two of us, it is my duty to tell you that the Sabbath Seventh day Adventists regard holy is identically the one which Jews claim that they keep holy in memory of their redemption from Egypt ON IT. But the Jews' resurrection as it were from the dead through the Red Sea do not have the POWER Jesus Christ's Resurrection has for Christians.
SDAs do not know the Power of his Resurrection unto the "Fellowship in his Suffering" of "The Body of Christ's Own". "And if Christ be not raised, your faith is in vain; ye are yet in your sins. ... But now, being raised from the dead, is Christ become the Firstfruits" of "Sabbaths' Feast of Christ" Assemblies and "Cornerstone" of "The Household of God".
Rose Christ not "on the Sabbath", the Sabbath would be for True Believers as much worth as the unbelieving Jews' Sabbath for them, NOTHING; in fact, a mill-stone around their neck!
Why do so many tread where no man should go. There are millions of SDA's brother, and your have no idea where each of them stands in relation to the power of the resurrection. God Himself is judging all regarding the same in Christ Jesus our Lord. Do not assume the position of anti-christ in taking upon yourself prerogatives which belong only to God. Such is a very dangerous position to occupy. The power of the resurrection is the power of creation, creating new creatures in Christ Jesus our Lord. The Sabbath rest is in contemplation and commemoration of the same. First comes the creation, then the Sabbath rest. The first is concerning existence, the latter concerning proper relationship and development of that existence. The two go hand in hand, but they are not the same.
The Sabbath is not the creation, it is an integral part of the contemplation, commemoration, celebration, development, and nurturing of the same. Creation comes first, then the Sabbath rest.
http://thechurchinmalta.org/en/posts/11507/everyones-right-for-a-day-of-rest-on-sundayil-hadd-dritt-ta%25e2%2580%2599-mistrieh-ghal-kulhadd
The following article may be viewed at the above link. All bold and underlined emphasis in the following is mine.
EVERYONE'S RIGHT FOR A DAY OF REST ON SUNDAY
Introduction
Every employee is entitled to a day of rest, and this right is safeguarded by means of the appropriate legislation which prescribes employees' working conditions. In Malta, it is also the norm that Sunday is reserved as a day of rest, and this norm was affirmed during the British rule. The British statute, based upon Canon and Roman Laws, forbade work and commercial activities on Sundays. These laws regulating Sundays (prohibiting work and commerce on Sunday) can be traced back to the time of Emperor Constantine (321), when only certain humanitarian work was exempted. In this respect, there has always been an exception with regard to philantropic activities whose real purpose is not commercial but rather an act of solidarity with those who are in need.
It is worth mentioning the argument brought forward by 'The Trades and Labour Congress' in 1950 which states that 'It is the opinion of the congress that it is not a necessity to work on Sundays. It is a right and not a privilege for an employee to be free from work on a Sunday, which is intended for mankind. Hence we strive and maintain that Sunday should remain a day which is free from work. On reflection, it would transpire that if six persons work seven days, they would be performing the work of seven persons who work for six days. This means that six persons working on Sunday would be jeopardizing the livelihood of the seventh person. This is not even viable to the employer since the seventh day, being a Sunday would entail a higher rate of pay. Furthermore fatigue would reduce efficiency of the employee.
In its convention held in 1921, the World Organization for work, states that every employee must avail himself of 24 consecutive hours of rest weekly and where possible this is awarded to all employees concurrently in accordance with the customs and traditions of the workers.
Sunday is also a Social Day
Sunday must be a day of rest and not another ordinary day of work. Man needs to take a break in order to benefit from a healthy lifestyle and this should be a crucial element of his well-being. During his time of rest, man ought to be able to reflect upon his life, setting aside the problems and stresses related to his work. When a person is accustomed to rest, then he is able to perceive better the demands of his work, He becomes more aware of who he is and he no longer feels that he must exercise his control over everything. He feels better and more relaxed and ready to tackle another week of other work.
The Day of the Lord in the Teaching of the Church
Today more than ever, due to our busy lifestyle we are overlooking the vital need to rest, and the Church continuously reminds us of this necessity. Catholic Social teaching states that rest is a right (Gaudium et Spes). God rested on the seventh day (Gen. 2.2) after working for six days and so even mankind who was created in the image of God is entitled to enjoy a well-deserved rest, have free time to take care of his family, and to participate in cultural, social and religious activities (Gaudium et Spes). This was the main reason behind choosing Sunday as a day of rest (Catechism of the Church)
On Sundays and other holy days, Christians are to refrain from performing work or other similar activities that hinder them from giving due praise to God on such days, or which may restrain them from having compassion for the less fortunate, as well as from relieving both their mind and body. (Catechism of the Church)
We ought to keep Sunday holy by performing good deeds and also by dedicating time to our family and relatives, in particular the sick and elderly. Sunday is a useful day for reflection, study, and silent meditation.. The Catechism also reminds us that on this day we must not forget our brethren who share the same needs and rights as us, but who cannot observe the Sunday rest due to poverty and misery.
Nowadays we tend to neglect our need for spiritual renewal, and while on Sunday importance must be accorded to the family and the poor, nonetheless we need to allocate some time to meet God in silence.
The public authorities are duty bound to safeguard the citizens' right to enjoy days of repose and to offer praise to God even at the expense of any economic activity. This is specially relevant where employers are concerned. (Rerum Novarum)
In line with their religious beliefs and for the common good, Christians must strive so that Sundays and other holy days practised by the Church be acknowledged as public holidays. "Christians must lead by example through their prayers and evident joy during these days, and defend their traditions by contributing towards the creation of a spiritual society (Catechism of the Church) The Catechism of the Church urges Christians to work so that our society may retain both religious and spiritual beliefs.
Sunday is a day of rest but due to social needs, there remain certain sectors with the labour market such as health, tourism, public transport and security, where workers have to perform work also on Sundays.
In this regard the Catechism of the Church number 2187 states that "Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing Sunday, the Day of the Lord's. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees."
Everyone is in Need of Rest
Health does not only imply physical health but as explained by the commission for mental health and well being, it goes hand in hand with mental health. The World Health Organization defines mental health as: "a state of sound living whereby one recognises one's own capabilities, is able to cope with the stress encountered in the daily life, is able to work and donate his own contribution to society'. Recent studies conducted by the Director General of Health and Consumers state that mental health is affected by policies that concern family life, mental health also includes the capablilty to participate in social life, and generates the ability for one to grow spiritually. This study fits in well with the argument that Sunday as a day which is free from work is vital for the overall health of workers.
Sunday is the day of the family. More than any other day, it is so when one takes into account that schools and governement departments are closed on Sundays, enabling the family to be more united. According to the Directives of the European Council Article 10 (22nd June 1994) Sunday is a day of rest for both children and youth. But if the father's day of rest on a Monday, and that of the mother falls on a Wednesday, how can the family be united when at the same time it is stated that Sunday should be a day of rest for children. Sunday is a social day for the worker a day in which he can participate in social, cultural, sports activities. If Europe, and with particular reference to our country, desires to strengthen social life, it must observe and protect Sunday.
Nowadays, Europe should act as the social model, leading by example and demonstrating to all other States the way in which Sunday should be respected. Its own officials and those responsible for decision making, together with all other institutions within the European Union do not work on Sunday and it is not forseen that they will do so in the near future. This practice should be acknowledged by all of Europe and should serve as an example to all the other European Member States to retain this European social model and observe Sunday as a day of rest.
For most Europeans, not only Christians, Sunday serves as an opportunity to pause and reflect on fundamental questions of life: Who am I? Where am I heading? What are my goals? Man is in need of time which cannot be calculated or defined or expressed in economic terms.
Eurofound has conducted a study on both those who work and those do not work on Sunday, and found that the former are more prone to avail themselves of sick leave and to absent themselves from work.
Sunday is precious both for Europe and Malta alike and we all are obliged to recognise this religious and cultural tradition that was passed on from our ancestors. We must endeavour to nurture it both for the good of the employee and also for the beneifit the country's economy.
I cannot fathom why so many think the SDA claim that Sunday sacredness will be established by law on a global or near global scale is untenable. The article quoted above summarizes the facts involved throughout history very well, which many of this posts on this thread have and do corroborate and expand upon. Sunday sacredness has been forced upon nation after nation throughout history since Constantine. His laws pertaining to the same and others in connection with it were crucial elements of the establishment of the religio-political entity which is the Roman Catholic Church. That entity has over a billion members imbedded by the millions in nations all over this earth, and its leaders entertain ambassadors from virtually all nations of the earth. It's adherents are commanded by their leaders to help legally establish Sunday rest laws in their perspective nations. Beyond this though, their leaders call upon all "Christians" to do the same. They have had great success throughout history regarding this issue, are having success today with it in various nations, and as a globalist institution most obviously intend a global application of the same in the near future or whenever possible. These are the plain and simple facts.
So why do so many act like it is silly to consider that such could ever transpire? Go figure.
People come to these boards all the time attacking SDA's for believing those who worship God should still keep His Sabbath as commanded by Him, by faith in His word. Yet they apparently have no problem with the church of Rome and other "Christians" believing that the rest commanded by God concerning the seventh day has now been transferred to the first day by the power and authority of the former, and should be forced upon all by human legislation. What a twisted condition. Those who willfully reject the truth, cannot any longer see it, when it is right in front of their faces. So be it, as God's word has prophesied.
2 These 2:7 For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. 8 And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: 9 Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, 10 And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish;
because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11 And for this cause
God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: 12 That they all might be damned
who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
Soon, God will allow for strong delusion in support of the Sunday sacredness lie. This issue is not going anywhere. It will only grow more intense as time continues. All nations will become drunk with the wine of Babylon.
I already posted the below link and quote on another thread, but it certainly belongs on this thread as well if not more so.
http://www.sundaylaw.net/books/other/standish/liberty/litb19.htm
The History of Sunday Legislation
PERHAPS the most persistent form of religious coercion and the amalgamation of church and state, is seen in the history of the development of Sunday legislation. We are indebted largely to material provided by Doctor A. H. Lewis, Critical History of Sunday Legislation from 321 to 1888, New York, D. Appleton & Company, 1888, as summarized in William Blakely, American State Papers Bearing on Sunday Legislation, 1891.
The first Sunday legislation to be introduced into the Christian Church was a product of the pagan conception, fully developed by the Romans, which made religion a department of the state. This enactment was diametrically opposed to the principles of true Christianity as enunciated in the New Testament by Christ and the Apostles. Such a situation could never have pertained in a pure and faithful church. Indeed, it did not find favor in most of the Christian church until Christianity had been deeply corrupted through the influence of gnosticism and other pagan errors. While it is proclaimed that the Emperor Constantine had accepted Christianity, the truth of which is doubted by many, at least there is no question that his thinking was still that of the pagan.
Constantine issued the first Sunday legislation by virtue of his power as Pontifex Maximus—the Supreme Pontiff (see chapter 11 entitled "The Development of Christian Persecution"). The concept of Pontifex Maximus can be traced back to ancient Babylon, but in Roman times it has its origin during the reign of Caesar Augustus from 23 b.c. to a.d. 14. This emperor was the Caesar of the incarnation of Jesus. During his long reign, he strengthened very greatly the power of the Roman Empire, and maintained a high level of peace. The Senate, in its desire to honor him, bestowed upon him the title of Pontifex Maximus. Thereafter, each Caesar and emperor of Rome, no matter how strong or weak his reign, took the title, until the reign of Emperor Justinian in the sixth century.
In the dying embers of the Roman Empire, Emperor Justinian invested the title of Pontifex Maximus upon the Bishop of Rome (the Pope), John II in 533. However, it was not until the overthrow of the Ostrogoths, three popes later, that Pope Vigilius in 538 was able to exercise the civil power invested in the title Pontifex Maximus. Thus Vigilius became the first pope to hold not only ecclesiastical power but also to exercise political power. Thus while Constantine inaugurated state-church union in the Christian world, the Bishop of Rome was able to reverse this order and establish church-state authority, with the emphasis upon the power of the church authority dominant over the state, rather than the state authority dominant over the church. Now returning to Constantine's Sunday Law, the pagan nature of the law is clearly noted in the fact that Constantine placed no Christian appellation upon the worship on the first day of the week, rather referring it to the "venerable day of the sun."
Let all judges and all city people and all tradesmen rest upon the venerable day of the sun. But let those dwelling in the country freely and with full liberty attend to the culture of their field; since it frequently happens that no other day is so fit for the sowing of grain or the planting of vines; hence, the favorable time should not be allowed to pass, lest the provisions of heaven be lost. Quoted in Blakely, p. 269
This was a difficult law for Christians, most of whom at that time were still seventh-day Sabbath keepers. It was difficult because Constantine had ended the terrible decade of persecution of Christians that had begun under Emperor Diocletian in the year 303. The Christians were greatly indebted to Constantine for their liberty, and when he confessed to have embraced Christianity their joys were even greater. Now they were in a particularly difficult situation. Constantine had one goal, and that was to unite the empire that was now split strongly between pagans and Christians. He believed that a unified day of worship would go a long way toward reducing the tension between pagans and Christians.
Thus it was that many Christians, in order to honor the emperor and hopefully not to violate their conscience as Sabbath- keepers, entered into the practice of keeping holy two days of the week, the seventh and the first. Commonly, one day was chosen as a feast day and the other one as a fast day. But this practice was one of compromise. It is a principle of faith that when a false doctrine is given equal validity with one that is true, inevitably it is the error which prevails, for truth can never abide with error, while error happily associates with truth, for it makes the error all the more deceptive. Thus it was predictable that the Sunday worship of paganism would eventually supplant Sabbath keeping enjoined by Scripture. History amply testifies to this result, a result which persists to our day. Soon Rome became the seat of those who advocated Sunday worship, proposing that it be the commemoration of the resurrection of Jesus. However, much of the rest of the western world advocated the seventh-day Sabbath as the primary day of worship, honoring the Creation of God as established in the words of Scripture. After the power of secular authority passed from the Roman Empire to Papal Rome there was a rapid increase in the enforcement of Sunday sacredness, to the disregard of Sabbath sacredness.
During the fourth to the sixth century, not only was the observance of Sunday, the pagan day of worship, incorporated into Christianity, but many other holidays, mostly pagan festivals, were "sanctified" with new names slightly modified and claiming to be Christian celebrations. Thus, in the seventh century, Spanish Christians accepted Sunday sacredness, as did also the English Christians except for a small minority who still believed in the biblical Sabbath. It was not until the twelfth century that the Welsh and the Scots were forced into Sunday observance.
In the thirteenth century, Marco Polo recorded Sabbath keeping among the large group of Chinese Christians in the western regions of China. The Syrian Christians of India upheld Sabbath-keeping until the sixteenth century Portuguese Inquisition stamped it out. The Christians of Ethiopia continued their Sabbath-keeping into the seventeenth century. (B. G. Wilkinson, Truth Triumphant, Pacific Press, 1944)
During the Middle Ages, Sunday legislation took on a more judaistic direction, claiming that, with analogy to the Jewish legislation in biblical times, civil authorities had the right to legislate in religious matters after the manner of the Jewish Theocracy. Thus, severe penalties were imposed on those who were not regular attenders at church on Sunday, including, in some circumstances, the death penalty.
The advent of the Reformation brought little change in civil legislation concerning Sunday sacredness and worship. For example, the English Reformation introduced a new theory and developed a distinct type of legislation. It was during this period that for the first time, the doctrine of the transfer of the fourth commandment to the first day of the week led consequently to legislation consistent with this theory. Thus, extensive theological treatises were written that were consistent with civil enactments.
The Sunday laws during the Colonial days in North America are the direct outgrowth of the Puritan legislation, notably of those laws that arose during the time of the Commonwealth in England under Oliver Cromwell. Thus, colonies such as Massachusetts and Virginia enforced very severe penalties upon those who failed to worship regularly in church on Sundays. After the Declaration of Independence and the establishment of the new nation of the United States, the laws of colonial times were greatly modified. The whole tendency has been to set forth laws of a totally different character through the decisions of the courts.
In the Sunday law legislation of the Roman Empire, the religious element were wholly subordinate to that of the civil power. In the Middle Ages, and also under Cromwell as Lord Protector of England (1649–1658), and during the colonial period of American history, the church was supreme. After the amendments to the United States Constitution of the Bill of Rights in 1791, any form of Sunday law began to be challenged. Thus increasingly, claims were made that Sunday legislation is not based on religious grounds. Such argumentation was devised to maintain Sunday legislation by the power of the State without appearing to violate the First Amendment of the American Constitution. Some legislators and jurists were willing to accept such fragile arguments. However, other, more perceptive legislators and jurists strongly opposed such interpretations and recognized that any attempt to legislate a rest day for the first day of the week was indeed an effort to uphold a religious institution, something which was invalid in law based upon the Bill of Rights.
These claims for Sunday rest, based upon so-called secular reasoning, are clearly contradicted by the fact that for centuries every Sunday law sprang from a religious sentiment. Under Constantine's legislation, the day was to be "venerated" as a religious duty owed to the god of the sun. As the resurrection festival concept was gradually combined with the pagan practice, religious regard for the day was also demanded in honor of Christ's resurrection. In the Middle Ages, sacredness was claimed for Sunday because the Sabbath had been sacred under the legislation of the Jewish Theocracy. Sunday was held supremely sacred by the Puritans under the plea that the obligations imposed by the fourth commandment were transferred from the seventh-day Sabbath to the first-day, though no scriptural authority was found to sustain the change.
All these Sunday statutes enacted in the United States prohibited "worldly labor," and permitted only works of necessity and mercy on Sundays. There can be no valid meaning except as they are based upon religious foundations. Surely there can be no "worldly business" unless it is stated in contrast with religious obligation. Thus every Sunday law that has been enacted within the United States, and for that matter other countries of the world, is based upon the idea that it is wrong to do on Sunday the things prohibited in the fourth commandment. It must be acknowledged, then, that the theories men invent for the observance of Sunday on non-religious grounds have no logical value, unless it is understood that there is a covert religious motivation.
To claim that the present Sunday laws do not designate a day as a religious institution, is to deny every fact in the history relevant to such legislation. Any claim otherwise is surely a shallow subterfuge. If this were not so, advocates of a rest day would not focus exclusively upon Sunday. They might decide to offer Friday, the sacred day of the Muslims, as their proposed rest day. Or indeed they might choose a day that is sacred to no religion, such as Tuesday or Wednesday, to provide respite from labor in the middle of the week.
Religious observance legislation could not spring from Apostolic Christianity. Every element of New Testament Christianity forbade interference by the state in personal religious matters. Thus all basis for legislating religious practice has its roots in pagan practice. This is equally true for the observance of other religious days such as Christmas and Easter. We have cited the pagan character of the first Sunday legislation because in that legislation, Sunday is mentioned only by its pagan name, "the venerable day of the sun."
In that legislation enacted by Constantine, there is no inference that the legislation has anything whatsoever to do with Christianity. There is no trace of the resurrection idea in the legislation. No reference is made to the fourth commandment of the Decalogue nor anything connected with it. The law was made for all the empire. It applied to every subject alike, Christian or pagan or nonbeliever.
The pagan mentality of Constantine can be deduced from the fact that on the day following the publication of the edict concerning Sunday observance, another edict was issued ordering that the haruspices (soothsayers who especially use the entrails of slain victims to deduce the will of the gods) be consulted in cases of public calamity. Surely this practice demonstrates the thoroughly pagan mentality of Constantine and the attitude the emperor still retained, together with the influences which controlled him.
According to Doctor Lewis, all Sunday legislation is the product of pagan Rome. The Saxon laws were the product of the Middle Age legislation of the "Holy Roman Empire." The English laws are an expansion of the Saxon, and the American are a transcript of the English laws. (As quoted in Blakely, p. 270)
Lewis correctly points out that the Sunday law issued under King Charles II of England in 1676 was the law of the American colonies up to the time of the Revolution, and so became the basis of the American Sunday laws. Charles II's law forbade any work whatsoever by tradesmen, laborers, and business men on the "Lord's Day" (Sunday). The penalty for those over the age of fourteen breaching the law was a fine of five shillings. The law also provided for the confiscation of any goods that a merchant was offering for sale on Sunday. Anyone who could not meet the financial penalties was to be set in public stocks for the space of two hours.
Let it be understood, notwithstanding the enactment of the First Amendment to the American Constitution, the concept of Sunday law and the effort to regard Sunday sacredness was so ingrained in the history of the American people that it seemed almost impossible for them to understand that such legislation should cease to be enacted or to be enforced in the new nation. Thus it was that the nineteenth century became a battleground for and against Sunday legislation.
Do you actually believe anyone is reading all your slanted cut and paste posts?
: beam Thu Feb 21, 2019 - 22:41:33
Do you actually believe anyone is reading all your slanted cut and paste posts?
Far too much wind for most people here ::crackup::
: beam Thu Feb 21, 2019 - 22:41:33
Do you actually believe anyone is reading all your slanted cut and paste posts?
The information is there for any interested, making any be interested enough to read it is not my responsibility. Providing truth to those who may not know is the responsibility of all who know truth. Making others listen to, read, and or have any interest in it, is not. If the info provided is slanted, much of that slant would of course come from those quoted, not the one supplying the quotes. Then there is of course the issue of the posted 21927 views, which may indicate of course that some people do view the info supplied.
Certain facts are of course not slants. Sunday laws have been issued and put in place by "Christians" since the time of Constantine, they exist and are still supported by millions today, and they reveal that the accusations against Sabbath keepers as legalists are as easily attributed to Sunday keepers as well. To the contrary, even more so, since they call for civil legislation to force their day upon all. Sabbath keepers call all to observance of the same by faith in God's word alone. I and many others would immediately attack the proposition of any Sabbath keeper resorting to civil legislation regarding he same. A view apparently not shared by the many Sunday keepers crying legalism among Sabbath keepers, including yourself it would seem. Please do correct me if I am wrong and express your views against legislated "Christianity" through Sunday legislation.
Hi Amo, First of all, you need to be able to verify that SDAs around the World are actually worshipping on the Sabbath given at Sinai. The same goes for those you call Sunday keepers. There is no such thing as a Sunday keeper. Where in scripture is there any rules for keeping Sunday? Likewise where in the New Covenant are there any rules for keeping the Sabbath which you cannot prove is the actual day set aside for only Israel?
: beam Sat Feb 23, 2019 - 07:56:31
Hi Amo, First of all, you need to be able to verify that SDAs around the World are actually worshipping on the Sabbath given at Sinai. The same goes for those you call Sunday keepers. There is no such thing as a Sunday keeper. Where in scripture is there any rules for keeping Sunday? Likewise where in the New Covenant are there any rules for keeping the Sabbath which you cannot prove is the actual day set aside for only Israel?
I don't need to do anything for you beam. You can deny God's sabbath established by scripture, and the man made Sunday rest laws that have existed for many centuries now if you wish. The scriptures and the historical facts are there, do what you will with them. I'll only waste so much time debating someone consistently denying that which has been placed right in front of their face.
https://www.wahpetondailynews.com/news_monitor/house-passes-repealing-blue-law/article_69da35a6-1e59-11e9-88dd-03814059bdfd.html
House passes repealing blue law
Ertelt opposes legislation to allow Sunday morning shopping — lawmakers are not above 'God's law'
by JOHN HAGEMAN Forum News Service Jan 22, 2019
BISMARCK — A renewed effort to repeal North Dakota's ban on Sunday morning shopping cleared its first major hurdle Thursday, Jan. 17, as House lawmakers agreed to ditch what some called an outdated and unfair law.......................................................
Several opponents leaned heavily on religious arguments Thursday. Rep. Sebastian Ertelt, R-Lisbon, said laws passed by the state Legislature are not above "God's law," which he said policy makers already recognize by prohibiting "wholesale murder."
Rep. Kathy Skroch, R-Lidgerwood, argued people need time for rest and relaxation and blamed the Legislature for "undermining" Sunday restrictions.
"For the good of our families and our state, we must not strip the last remnants of the North Dakota Sunday closing laws," she said.
Christopher Dodson, executive director of the North Dakota Catholic Conference, said in a statement that the bill's passage "reflects the growing tendency in our culture to put convenience and profit over families and workers" and called on the Senate to reject the bill...................................................
https://www.nraila.org/articles/20190205/pennsylvania-senate-committee-passes-sunday-hunting-ban-repeal
Pennsylvania: Senate Committee Passes Sunday Hunting Ban Repeal
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2019
Today, the Senate Game and Fisheries Committee passed pro-hunting legislation, Senate Bill 147, by an 8 to 3 vote. SB 147 now heads to the Senate floor for further consideration. Please contact your state Senator and strongly urge them to SUPPORT Senate Bill 147 when it comes up for a vote.
Senate Bill 147, sponsored by Senator Daniel Laughlin, would expand hunting opportunities for Pennsylvania hunters by eliminating the prohibition against hunting on Sundays. Prohibitions on Sunday hunting are old blue laws left on the books in just a few states. They deny hunters access one day per week despite the fact that each year, hunters pump millions of dollars into habitat restoration and conservation through Pittman-Robertson funds................................
https://nypost.com/2018/07/16/small-town-tosses-footloose-law-barring-dancing-on-sundays/
Small town tosses 'Footloose' law barring dancing on Sundays
By Associated Press July 16, 2018
FORT SMITH, Ark. — Officials in a western Arkansas city say residents can finally kick off their Sunday shoes.
Fort Smith city directors recently repealed a 1953 ordinance that essentially outlawed public dancing on Sundays. Locals who knew about the law called it the "Footloose" ordinance, nicknamed for the 1984 movie starring Kevin Bacon about a town that banned dancing and rock music.
City Director Andre Good introduced the repeal after a resident told him about the antiquated law, which barred the operation of public dance halls or any place with dancing on Sundays. The ordinance came amid a series of blue laws established in Arkansas that banned all sales and most labor on Sundays, according to the Encyclopedia of Arkansas History and Culture. Later laws also banned Sunday activities that included hunting and baseball..........................
https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/passing-brunch-bills-to-repeal-blue-laws-19018/
February 20, 2017
Passing "Brunch Bills" to Repeal Blue Laws
...
A historical perspective
Over the years, North Carolina and its counties, cities, and town have passed and repealed a variety of statutes, regulations, and ordinances restricting Sunday activities. These "blue laws" were intended to "provide a day of rest and to prevent physical and moral debasement from uninterrupted labor," as explained by a federal appeals court as recently as 2000.[3] While almost all remaining blue laws govern alcohol sales, blue laws have historically restricted other menu options. For example, in Asheville in the late 1880s, a blue law provided that "one could not order ice cream on Sunday without first taking a lunch and that lunch could not consist of cake," and the police enforced the law against the Sunday ice-cream eaters through raids of candy shops.[4] However, an enterprising restauranteur began to serve ham sandwiches with his scoops, which allowed his Sunday lunch crowd to enjoy law-abiding ice cream. City-wide blue laws were repealed in Asheville by the city council in 1970.
...
Challenging blue laws in North Carolina
Blue laws have also seen unsuccessful judicial challenges. North Carolina courts have held that regulation by the State of the public peace, safety, welfare, and morals through Sunday ordinances is constitutional and legitimate, so long as the law does not arbitrarily and unreasonably discriminate against a particular class of businesses or establishments.[10] When a particular class of individuals or entities is regulated, the United States and North Carolina Constitutions require that the classification have a reasonable basis and that the law or regulation apply uniformly across all members of the class.[11] The right to sell alcohol is based upon a validly-issued permit, and does not exist as a constitutional right or a property right.[12] The delegation of the power to enact blue laws to counties and municipalities has also been upheld.[13] Over decades of challenges, North Carolina courts have supported Sunday blue laws as generally valid, which is very unlikely to change in the near future.
...
https://www.reviewjournal.com/business/repeal-law-that-bans-sunday-new-car-sales-no-thanks-car-dealers-say/
Repeal law that bans Sunday new-car sales? No thanks, car dealers say
By RICHARD N. VELOTTA LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL
February 14, 2015 - 6:04 pm
The economy is rolling and people have shown a willingness to spend money.
Isn't it about time to repeal that crazy law that prohibits car dealerships from selling new vehicles on Sundays?
No, thank you, say representatives of the car-dealing industry.
If a debate were conducted on the topic, you'd probably find more dealers on the side of keeping the prohibition than fighting to let people kick the tires and sign the paperwork on a new car on Sundays.
Sunday closure ordinances are known as "blue laws," but car dealers are anything but blue about not being allowed to be open.
In a state spoiled by the availability of 24/7 retail, a consumer can't take a dealership test drive on the most appropriate day to take a Sunday drive.
And most dealers are just fine with that.
"We're pretty happy with the way things are," said Wayne Frediani, executive director of the Sparks-based Nevada Franchised Auto Dealers Association. "Long ago, our membership supported the idea that we close on Sundays. I think everybody has gotten used to it to the point that now they like it. I don't see that changing anytime soon."
The county ordinance that prohibits Sunday sales clearly differentiates the sale of new and used cars. It also prescribes a fine or jail time for violating it.
"Motor vehicle dealers licensed pursuant to NRS 482.078 ('New Vehicle Dealer') that are engaged in the sale of new cars or trucks, or both new and used cars or trucks (but only if the new and used vehicles are located at the same business address), shall not be open for business on Sundays," the ordinance says.
"Any violation of the provisions of this chapter is a misdemeanor and may result in a fine not exceeding $1,000, or result in imprisonment in the county jail for a period not to exceed six months, or both such fine and imprisonment. A separate offense shall be deemed committed on each day during or on which a violation occurs or continues."
separating church and business
When Clark County commissioners debated the ordinance in 2000, the arguments fell along the lines of whether it should be the government's responsibility to mandate the closure of a private business.
The dealerships already were pretty much in agreement that they wanted to be closed Sundays. Making the policy a law assured that what began as a handshake agreement couldn't be broken by a new entrant to the market in the future.
It was sold as a plus for neighborhoods near the dealerships because motorists on test drives wouldn't be cruising residential streets when people were home on Sundays.
But longtime dealership executives say the primary reason for wanting to keep dealerships closed on Sundays was so that business obligations wouldn't conflict with Sunday church activities.................................................
: Amo Sat Feb 23, 2019 - 09:48:11
I don't need to do anything for you beam. You can deny God's sabbath established by scripture, and the man made Sunday rest laws that have existed for many centuries now if you wish. The scriptures and the historical facts are there, do what you will with them. I'll only waste so much time debating someone consistently denying that which has been placed right in front of their face.
Oh, but if I were seeking knowledge about the Sabbath because I was interested in observing it and asked you those questions would you deny me. How many lurkers do you suppose read our posts? How many of them are turned off because you refuse to answer the questions we present? Think about it Amo.
I can tell that you are no dummy. You know that when the International Date Line was established to where it is now it threw the calendar off. Instead of the week stating at Sinai, it then began at a point in the Pacific Ocean making the weekly Sabbath start in New Zealand.
By the way, I do recognize that Governments are and have been corrupt. The same goes for churches. Sunday laws were and are an abomination. Anything that takes away our freedoms to worship as we deem right should not ever take place. I will fight for our freedom. Do SDAs feel the same way? Will you engage in battle to keep America free from Sunday laws or any other oppression that others might want to impose? God's special people at His command did.
Oh, but if I were seeking knowledge about the Sabbath because I was interested in observing it and asked you those questions would you deny me. How many lurkers do you suppose read our posts? How many of them are turned off because you refuse to answer the questions we present? Think about it Amo.
Any lurkers seeking truth, would dig deep enough to see that I have answered your questions many times over on these boards. As already stated, you have brought nothing to to them, save perhaps a personal tweak or two.
: Amo Wed Feb 27, 2019 - 13:47:12
Any lurkers seeking truth, would dig deep enough to see that I have answered your questions many times over on these boards. As already stated, you have brought nothing to to them, save perhaps a personal tweak or two.
Hi Amo, it is not true that you have answered my questions many times. I don't believe I ever asked you a question like the following:
"Hi Amo, First of all, you need to be able to verify that SDAs around the World are actually worshipping on the Sabbath given at Sinai. The same goes for those you call Sunday keepers. There is no such thing as a Sunday keeper. Where in scripture is there any rules for keeping Sunday? Likewise where in the New Covenant are there any rules for keeping the Sabbath which you cannot prove is the actual day set aside for only Israel?"Another question that SDAs seem to be ignoring is the Samoa Island issue. If serving God on the Sabbath is so very important that our eternal life depends on worshipping on Saturday just as SDAs do then it would seem like you wouldn't be avoiding answering my or anyone else's questions. When you stand before the judge and He asks you why you didn't answer the questions seekers were asking what will be your answer?
: beam Thu Feb 28, 2019 - 09:57:33
Hi Amo, it is not true that you have answered my questions many times. I don't believe I ever asked you a question like the following: "Hi Amo, First of all, you need to be able to verify that SDAs around the World are actually worshipping on the Sabbath given at Sinai. The same goes for those you call Sunday keepers. There is no such thing as a Sunday keeper. Where in scripture is there any rules for keeping Sunday? Likewise where in the New Covenant are there any rules for keeping the Sabbath which you cannot prove is the actual day set aside for only Israel?"
Another question that SDAs seem to be ignoring is the Samoa Island issue. If serving God on the Sabbath is so very important that our eternal life depends on worshipping on Saturday just as SDAs do then it would seem like you wouldn't be avoiding answering my or anyone else's questions. When you stand before the judge and He asks you why you didn't answer the questions seekers were asking what will be your answer?
I have addressed these issues before from others with perhaps their personal tweaks which may differ from yours. If or when time allows, I will search for them and give u the links.
: Amo Thu Feb 28, 2019 - 10:20:54
I have addressed these issues before from others with perhaps their personal tweaks which may differ from yours. If or when time allows, I will search for them and give u the links.
Wouldn't it be much easier to just answer the questions?
: beam Fri Mar 01, 2019 - 09:40:34
Wouldn't it be much easier to just answer the questions?
No, going beyond simply I say you say, takes time. I don't always have time to do so. Do you? In fact there are may things I should be doing right now, that I am not. Which I should and will now attend to.
https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2019/04/bring-back-the-blue-laws
BRING BACK THE BLUE LAWS
by Fr. Dominic Bouck
4 . 2 . 19
My home state of North Dakota just removed the respirator from a dying vestige of American culture.
On March 25, Governor Doug Burgum signed legislation repealing the state's blue laws. These laws, which made it illegal for retail stores to be open from midnight to noon on Sundays, used to be common throughout the country. But now, only some liquor stores are still subject to such constraints. Sunday rest for retail is a relic of the past.
Puritan theology certainly lurks behind these blue laws. But the principle that the state should ensure we have rest goes much deeper than narrow-minded prissiness. God's rest on the seventh day was of great comfort to the Israelite slaves in Egypt, who knew not rest. The Exodus story implies that the goal of our rest is worship, and the result of worship is rest: "Go to Pharaoh and say to him, 'This is what the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, says: "Let my people go, so that they may worship me"'" (Exodus 8:1). God fights to keep us free from all powers that seek to enslave us. Today's culture of slavery does not involve overlords cracking whips, but rather the irresistible urges of a consumer economy.
The 24-7 retail culture hurts our poor. Those who suffer most from the loss of blue laws are those conscripted into hourly wage jobs: the young, the impoverished, single mothers, and all those who struggle. Are they not allowed to attend Mass? Worship the God of freedom? Blue laws protected the weakest among us by making sure they could attend church on Sundays.
As those who work in retail know, it's not as simple as asking for different hours. During high school I had to work at the grocery store all evening Saturday and all day Sunday. The only time I could attend Mass was during my lunch hour, which meant arriving late to Mass and leaving it early (and no lunch). It was not an option both to keep the job and ask for different hours. One of my high school students recently told me that she had to work at a retail store on Thanksgiving and Black Friday. Her Thanksgiving dinner consisted of a Taco in a Bag (a Midwest recipe). The legal protection of Sunday rest helps the individual worker and preserves the family from the arms race that is our consumer society.
One North Dakota legislator opined that the Catholic Church precipitated the decline of Sunday worship and diluted our case for legal preservation by moving Sunday Mass to Saturday evening. There may be something to this. But what is certain is that our society has eliminated yet another protection for the working man. If proponents of capitalism wish to resist the rise of socialism in our country, a bit of advice: Don't overplay your hand. If the libertarian impulse goes unresisted, it will create a society like the nineteenth-century industrial capitalism that gave birth to its misbegotten child, Marxism. Removing God as chief protector of man's freedom leaves a void to be filled by faux-luminaries like Karl Marx and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Man's meaning is not the sum of his production and consumption. The sins of libertarian omission give rise to the sins of Marxist commission.
As Josef Pieper wrote in Leisure, the Basis of Culture: "Of course the world of work begins to become—threatens to become—our only world, to the exclusion of all else. The demands of the working world grow ever more total, grasping ever more completely the whole of human existence." We are made for more, yet society keeps ensuring us less. Christ said it best: "You cannot serve both God and mammon."
Fr. Dominic Bouck is a priest of the Diocese of Bismarck.
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: Amo Sat Apr 06, 2019 - 17:41:17
https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2019/04/bring-back-the-blue-laws
Time? yo see to have time to read and post junk like that, Why can't you see that Ellen was off her rocker and it just ain't agonna happen the way she had it planned.
: beam Sun Apr 07, 2019 - 06:58:04
Time? yo see to have time to read and post junk like that, Why can't you see that Ellen was off her rocker and it just ain't agonna happen the way she had it planned.
To the contrary, I have read enough of your broken record babbling to know that you are off your rocker. You are denying that something that has been happening throughout the last 16 to 1700 years, is happening right now all around the world, and most certainly will continue to happen in the future, is or will happen. You complain non stop on these boards about those who call all to keep God's seventh day Sabbath by faith in His word, while ignoring those all over the world forcing a man made sabbath upon all through civil legislation.
You are deceived. If what you claim to believe was really sincere, you would be going after those forcing all to observe a sabbath through human legislation, more than those calling all to observe what scripture refers to over and again as God's Sabbath by faith in His word alone. Instead, here you are non stop attacking the position of those who call all to faith but would never force their faith upon anyone. You are waisting your time trying to tell me that what has happened all throughout apostate "Christian" history, and is happening right now around the world, is never going to happen in the future.
https://www.ourladyoflourdes.info/sunday-rest/
The Sunday Rest
What kind of work can I perform on a Sunday without violating the Sunday rest?
The Church commands all Catholics to keep Sunday holy—not merely to attend Mass. Thus, the first precept of the Church reads: to keep the Sundays and Holy Days of obligation holy, by hearing Mass and resting from servile work. In another place She says to abstain from "those labors and business concerns which impede the worship to be rendered to God... or the proper relaxation of mind and body" (Code of Canon Law no. 1247). By servile work we mean, in general, that sort of work which requires more of the body than the mind. Traditionally, the motive (e.g., to make money or recreation) is not the main factor in determining whether a particular work is servile or not. Thus, in order to maintain objectivity, not only the nature of the work must be taken into account but also the way it is done and how it is commonly regarded in the tradition of the Church.
The following are generally considered to be servile works: plowing, sowing, harvesting, etc.; sewing, lawn mowing, cobbling, tailoring, printing, masonry work, etc.; all work in mines and factories, etc. In most places custom justifies knitting, crocheting, etc.
On the other hand, it is permitted to go walking, riding, driving, rowing, taking journeys or pilgrimages, even though these may be fatiguing. Literary and artistic works such as studying, teaching, drawing or painting, playing musical instruments, writing, delicate sculpturing, embroidering, taking photographs are all lawful on Sundays and Holy Days, even if done for remuneration.
Two to three hours of servile work would be considered grave matter for sin. The following causes, however, would excuse from the observance of the law forbidding servile work. In general, any work is allowed that left undone would cause grave loss to oneself or another (i.e., "the ox is in the ditch"); an employer requires one to work on Sunday; works of charity to those in need; or those of necessity, public or private, such as all indispensable housework (dishes, cooking, etc.); any work in case of fire, flood, or other disasters. Let us strive to keep the Lord's DAY holy rather than an hour on Sunday.
Can I go shopping on a Sunday?
No, we should not shop on Sundays. In general, all commercial activity should stop on Sundays if for no other reason than to give all employees a chance to worship God and rest on the Lord's Day as He commands. Thus, commercial stores should be closed and they actually were for many years. Only in the last several decades have they been allowed to remain open for business on Sundays. An exception to the rule is often made to businesses that supply necessary items like food and gasoline. Thus, such businesses as convenience stores, restaurants, and gas stations are allowed to be open on Sundays. Let us strive not to defer to a festival what should have been taken care of during the week, thereby distracting our attention from things of God.
The Land Without a Sunday
By Maria Von Trapp & Family
OUR NEIGHBORS in Austria were a young couple, Baron and Baroness K. They were getting increasingly curious about Russia and what life there was really like. One day they decided to take a six week trip all over Russia in their car. This was in the time when it was still possible to get a visa. Of course, at the border they were received by a special guide who watched their every step and did not leave them for a moment until he deposited them safely again at the border, but they still managed to get a good first-hand impression. Upon their return they wrote a book about their experiences, and when it was finished, they invited their neighbors and friends to their home in order to read some of their work to them. I shall always recall how slowly and solemnly Baron K. read us the title: "The Land Without a Sunday." Of all the things they had seen and observed, one experience had most deeply impressed them: that Russia had done away with Sunday. This had shocked them even more than what they saw of Siberian concentration camps or of the misery and hardship in cities and country. The absence of Sunday seemed to be the root of all the evil.
"Instead of a Sunday,' Baron K. told us, "the Russians have a day off. This happens at certain intervals which vary in different parts of the country. First they had a five‑day week, with the sixth day off, then they had a nine-day work period, with the tenth day off; then again it was an eight day week. What a difference between a day off and a Sunday! The people work in shifts. While one group enjoys its day off, the others continue to work in the factories or on the farms or in the stores, which are always open. As a result the over‑all impression throughout the country was that of incessant work, work, work. The atmosphere was one of constant rush and drive; finally, we confessed to each other that what we were missing most was not a well-cooked meal, or a hot bath, but a quiet, peaceful Sunday with church bells ringing and people resting after prayer."
Source: excerpts of "The Land Without a Sunday", 1955, Emanuel Books.
"And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made: and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done. And he blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made" —Gen 2:2-3.
"Remember that thou keep holy the sabbath day. Six days shalt thou labour, and shalt do all thy works. But on the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: thou shalt do no work on it, thou nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy beast, nor the stranger that is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and the sea, and all things that are in them, and rested on the seventh day: therefore the Lord blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it" —Exodus 20:8-11.
https://www.ewtn.com/expert/answers/sunday_mass.htm
Sunday Mass and Holy Day Obligation
It is both a precept of the Church and Church law that Catholics must worship God on Sunday and Holy Days of Obligation by participating in the Holy Mass. This follows from the fact that in the Mass it is Christ Himself who worships the Father, joining our worship to His. In no other way is it possible to adequately give thanks (eucharistia) to God for the blessings of creation, redemption and our sanctification than by uniting our offerings to that of Jesus Christ Himself. Following the example of the Old Covenant the Church does this weekly, on the day of the Lord's Resurrection.
Canon 1247
On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass; they are also to abstain from those labors and business concerns which impede the worship to be rendered to God, the joy which is proper to the Lord's Day, or the proper relaxation of mind and body.
Canon 1248
1. The precept of participating in the Mass is satisfied by assistance at a Mass which is celebrated anywhere in a Catholic rite either on the holy day or on the evening of the preceding day.
2. If because of lack of a sacred minister or for other grave cause participation in the celebration of the Eucharist is impossible, it is specially recommended that the faithful take part in the liturgy of the word if it is celebrated in the parish church or in another sacred place according to the prescriptions of the diocesan bishop, or engage in prayer for an appropriate amount of time personally or in a family or, as occasion offers, in groups of families.
Since a "grave cause" is needed to excuse one from this obligation it would be a serious or mortal sin to willfully skip Mass on Sunday or a Holy Day of Obligation, as the Church has always taught. Reasons such as the necessity to work to support one's family, child care, personal sickness or the care of the sick, necessary travel etc. would excuse a person on a particular occasions. Those who have continuing reason to be excused should consult their pastor.
If a priest is not available in an area and only a Liturgy of the Word or a Communion Service is offered the Mass obligation does not "transfer" to such services. As canon 1248 notes, participation is recommended for the spiritual value, especially if Communion is distributed.
The proper way to celebrate Sunday is spoken of at length in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
2182 Participation in the communal celebration of the Sunday Eucharist is a testimony of belonging and of being faithful to Christ and to his Church. The faithful give witness by this to their communion in faith and charity. Together they testify to God's holiness and their hope of salvation. They strengthen one another under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
2183 "If because of lack of a sacred minister or for other grave cause participation in the celebration of the Eucharist is impossible, it is specially recommended that the faithful take part in the Liturgy of the Word if it is celebrated in the parish church or in another sacred place according to the prescriptions of the diocesan bishop, or engage in prayer for an appropriate amount of time personally or in a family or, as occasion offers, in groups of families."
A day of grace and rest from work
2184 Just as God "rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done," human life has a rhythm of work and rest. The institution of the Lord's Day helps everyone enjoy adequate rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives.
2185 On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are to refrain from engaging in work or activities that hinder the worship owed to God, the joy proper to the Lord's Day, the performance of the works of mercy, and the appropriate relaxation of mind and body. Family needs or important social service can legitimately excuse from the obligation of Sunday rest. The faithful should see to it that legitimate excuses do not lead to habits prejudicial to religion, family life, and health.
The charity of truth seeks holy leisure- the necessity of charity accepts just work.
2186 Those Christians who have leisure should be mindful of their brethren who have the same needs and the same rights, yet cannot rest from work because of poverty and misery. Sunday is traditionally consecrated by Christian piety to good works and humble service of the sick, the infirm, and the elderly. Christians will also sanctify Sunday by devoting time and care to their families and relatives, often difficult to do on other days of the week. Sunday is a time for reflection, silence, cultivation of the mind, and meditation which furthers the growth of the Christian interior life.
2187 Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees.
2188 In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days.
I wonder beam, do you spend any time addressing the over a billion members of the above denomination concerning their above doctrine and teachings?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulwB7fotv0I
http://www.sdadefend.com/MINDEX-S/Sunday%20Laws%20in%20Europe.pdf
Sunday Laws in Europe
ROME IS URGENTLY TRYING TO GET THE EU
TO ENACT A EUROPE-WIDE NATIONAL SUNDAY LAW
...[/size]
A lot of info about the movement on this link.
Amo: #498
I wonder beam, do you spend any time addressing the over a billion members of the above denomination concerning their above doctrine and teachings?
What about you, Amo, concerning their doctrine and teaching you, have posted above,
'It is both a precept of the Church and Church law that Catholics must worship God on Sunday and Holy Days of Obligation by participating in the Holy Mass. This follows from the fact that in the Mass it is Christ Himself who worships the Father, joining our worship to His. In no other way is it possible to adequately give thanks (eucharistia) to God for the blessings of creation, redemption and our sanctification than by uniting our offerings to that of Jesus Christ Himself. Following the example of the Old Covenant the Church does this weekly, on the day of the Lord's Resurrection.'
Do you also call this, a 'fact'... 'Following the example of the Old Covenant the Church does this weekly,
on the day of the Lord's Resurrection.'
?!
Amo asked:
I wonder beam, do you spend any time addressing the over a billion members of the above denomination concerning their above doctrine and teachings?
Yes Amo, when I was a SDA the topic was ever before me. The SDA church thrives on getting their flock in a frenzy. They use the subject as a scare tactic and an enticement to delve into the "Spirit of Prophesy" books. Of course, SDAs think they have the only true message of the book of Revelation and they flaunt it to every unsuspecting person that allows them to have say.
Individual Catholics don't pay much attention to the hierarchy. They use birth control and keep their families small just like protestants. They shop when they please and operate businesses 7 days a week just like everyone else. The Pope has lost his power and is now just a figurehead. If you are hell-bent on spreading scare tactics like the ones in this thread I would think you would be on the case of a real treat to your church and mine, the Muslim religion. Muslims have for many centuries invaded Christian countries and killed and maimed millions in the name of allah. Here in the USA, they are getting in control more and more all the time. They will not rest until they have conquered every living soul. They have no mercy Amo.
We have another battle blooming and that is socialism. If we do not stand up and defeat these new politicians we stand to lose much of what we have gained. The Pope is a mere drop in the bucket to all the other menaces facing our nation.
Instead of plastering the forum with outdated 18th-century fear why don't you relax, allow the Holy Spirit to guide you and put your trust in Jesus. No matter what happens in this life if we believe and love our fellow man as Jesus loves us we can claim the promises and enjoy this life as we begin our journey towards everlasting life. Thank God for the freedom to worship on the Israelite Sabbath as I do on the first day of the week and every day. If at some time we both have to endure hardship so be it as long as we hold fast to Jesus. He will see us through.
: beam Sun Apr 07, 2019 - 17:21:22
Amo asked:
Yes Amo, when I was a SDA the topic was ever before me. The SDA church thrives on getting their flock in a frenzy. They use the subject as a scare tactic and an enticement to delve into the "Spirit of Prophesy" books. Of course, SDAs think they have the only true message of the book of Revelation and they flaunt it to every unsuspecting person that allows them to have say.
Individual Catholics don't pay much attention to the hierarchy. They use birth control and keep their families small just like protestants. They shop when they please and operate businesses 7 days a week just like everyone else. The Pope has lost his power and is now just a figurehead. If you are hell-bent on spreading scare tactics like the ones in this thread I would think you would be on the case of a real treat to your church and mine, the Muslim religion. Muslims have for many centuries invaded Christian countries and killed and maimed millions in the name of allah. Here in the USA, they are getting in control more and more all the time. They will not rest until they have conquered every living soul. They have no mercy Amo.
We have another battle blooming and that is socialism. If we do not stand up and defeat these new politicians we stand to lose much of what we have gained. The Pope is a mere drop in the bucket to all the other menaces facing our nation.
Instead of plastering the forum with outdated 18th-century fear why don't you relax, allow the Holy Spirit to guide you and put your trust in Jesus. No matter what happens in this life if we believe and love our fellow man as Jesus loves us we can claim the promises and enjoy this life as we begin our journey towards everlasting life. Thank God for the freedom to worship on the Israelite Sabbath as I do on the first day of the week and every day. If at some time we both have to endure hardship so be it as long as we hold fast to Jesus. He will see us through.
Stick your head back in the sand, you are either just plain ignorant, or willingly ignorant. Perhaps a combo fo both. The proof is there for all to see. I have been putting it all over these boards for many years now. Words straight from Popes mouths, Encyclicals, and many other documents. Not to mention news articles and sources from all over. Rave on in ignorants if you wish. Go to, serve your masters well.
https://mysticpost.com/2018/01/three-prophecies-from-the-virgin-mary-that-are-being-fulfilled-in-the-world-right-now/
All emphasis in the following quotes from link above are mine.
THREE PROPHECIES FROM THE VIRGIN MARY THAT ARE BEING FULFILLED IN THE WORLD RIGHT NOW ...# 3 WILL SURPRISE
Three Prophecies unfolding before our eyes
I think it is important to note that Mystic Post is not inventing this idea that certain events are beginning to take place that point to the fulfillment of Fatima and Medjugorje's prophecies.
In fact, Medjugorje Visionary Mirjana has suggested this in her new book, "My Heart Will Triumph". She writes: "Our Lady told me many things that I cannot yet reveal. I can only hint at what the future holds, but I do see indications that the events are already in motion."
Prophecy #1: "In response to a question posed by the visionaries: "What will become of Poland?" "There will be great conflicts, but in the end, the just will take over."
Fast forward to today.
We see two monumental events that point to the fulfillment of this 1981 prophecy that "The just will take over"
Abortion in Poland became illegal on 2O16 except in cases of rape, when the woman's life is in jeopardy, or if the fetus is irreparably damaged. Poland is one of the few countries in the world to outlaw abortion after decades of complete legalisation (during Communist rule)
Honoring God's day of rest On November 24, 2o17 Poland's lawmakers approved a law that will phase out Sunday shopping by the year 2020. No country with a majority Christian population has passed such a law in decades.
............................................................................................
https://www.awaragroup.com/blog/holidays-weekly-breaks-and-vacations/
AWARA RUSSIAN LABOR LAW GUIDE: HOLIDAYS, WEEKLY BREAKS AND VACATIONS (CHAPTERS 11-12)
...........................................................
Sundays and National Holidays
Sunday is a general holiday for all employees in Russia. The other weekly holiday (in a 5-day week) can be set locally in the internal working rules or collective agreement. Both holidays should, as a rule, be granted in a row one after the other (Art 111 Labor Code). The working schedule will have to foresee a weekly break of a minimum uninterrupted duration of 42 hours (Art 110 Labor Code).................................................
Work on Sundays, national holidays and other regular days off is prohibited according to the general rule. In exceptional cases, the employer is entitled to require the employee to work on weekends and public holidays without his consent (for example, to prevent a disaster), or with his consent in the case of having to perform unforeseen work where the future normal operation of the organization depends on its urgent implementation (Art 113 Labor Code).
http://europeansundayalliance.eu/site/home/article/233.html?SWS=971c8282f97457cca29e81e637a916b5
Ahead of EU elections: what is next for work-free Sunday?
Brussels, 18 February 2019
In view of the EU elections, the European Sunday Alliance discussed with Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) and electoral candidates the importance of common work-free time and decent working hours. In a time of digitalisation and a rapidly changing world of work, participants agreed that Sunday is of unique value for the social cohesion of our society and the well-being of the citizens.
After an internal workshop session in the morning, the members and supporters of the European Sunday Alliance presented key challenges of their work, and then incurred into a debate with MEPs and EU elections candidates on possible actions for the next five-year mandate of the European Parliament and the EU Commission.
Markus Blümel, coordinator of the Austrian Sunday Alliance, reported that current changes in national legislation were undermining the network's objective of improving the work-life balance of Austrian citizens. He showed that the new law would allow for a maximum working time of 12 hours and presented how the Austrian Sunday Alliance, together with its member organisations and other like-minded actors, organised demonstrations and public actions to oppose the legal revision.
Representing the Croatian Sunday Alliance, Fr. Boze Vuleta ofm outlined how a network of different civil society organisations and social partners have joined forces in the youngest EU Member State and set up the alliance in 2018.
In the following discussion with MEPs Thomas Mann (EPP), Evelyn Regner (S&D), Marijana Petir (EPP) and the EP elections candidate Gabriele Bischoff (S&D), the participants exchanged on the outcomes of the negotiations of the recently agreed EU work-life balance directive and examined next steps towards EU policies that help citizens to find common rest time for recreation and life in society and family.
http://europeansundayalliance.eu/site/home
Legal victory for the protection of a work-free Sunday
Frankfurt sales forbidden by courts
The German alliance for a Free Sunday (which includes the ver.di trade union and the Catholic Employees Movement, KAB) has sued the city of Frankfurt, which had approved three Sunday sales. The courts confirmed the view of those in favour of a work-free Sunday and the sales were forbidden.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NSNKm6kwikI
The above European commercial about protecting Sunday, is about Sundays laws concerning the same. Did Jesus command the politicians of this world to protect the first day of the week through civil legislation? Did any of the Apostles teach such?
Matthew 18:18 New International Version (NIV)
18 "Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.
Where there is no law there is no sin. There is no law in the new covenant about keeping days. If a country wants to have a day of rest and they vote and choose one it certainly doesn't have to have anything to do with religion. Most Europeans do not attend any church.
SDA Sabbath dogma is built on a false supposition.
Beam: #509
Where there is no law there is no sin.
There's nowhere there's no law and there's nowhere there's no sin. Not even in the bubble you live in.
: beam Mon Apr 29, 2019 - 09:24:46
Matthew 18:18 New International Version (NIV)
18 "Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.
Where there is no law there is no sin. There is no law in the new covenant about keeping days. If a country wants to have a day of rest and they vote and choose one it certainly doesn't have to have anything to do with religion. Most Europeans do not attend any church.
SDA Sabbath dogma is built on a false supposition.
If so, why do Sunday keepers keep trying to ram their own laws down everyone's throats through civil legislation? It appears a great many Sunday keepers do not agree with your theology.
: Amo Wed May 01, 2019 - 09:43:46
If so, why do Sunday keepers keep trying to ram their own laws down everyone's throats through civil legislation? It appears a great many Sunday keepers do not agree with your theology.
NOTHING in any of the 'sunday law' references mandates any religious/spiritual coercion for compliance.
Your assertions are just as stupid as ellen's Assertions on which you base your stupid assumptions.
: current occupant2 Thu May 02, 2019 - 09:43:59
NOTHING in any of the 'sunday law' references mandates any religious/spiritual coercion for compliance.
Your assertions are just as stupid as ellen's Assertions on which you base your stupid assumptions.
A truly ignorant statement. So why pray tell, are spiritual institutions, investing so much time and energy concerning the implementation of totally non spiritual and therefore temporal matters? Why are they trying to force such upon all through legislation? Shall I inundate you with endless quotes regarding the spiritual nature of Sunday rest?
: Amo Thu May 02, 2019 - 11:58:09
A truly ignorant statement. So why pray tell, are spiritual institutions, investing so much time and energy concerning the implementation of totally non spiritual and therefore temporal matters? Why are they trying to force such upon all through legislation? Shall I inundate you with endless quotes regarding the spiritual nature of Sunday rest?
Show us where any of that "legislation" has caused Sabbath observers privileges to be taken away. Are you protesting the fact that you too would have legislation that would allow you to have another recreation day? Is the legislation in Europe demanding people attend church and keep the day holy? Of course not and it doesn't stop anyone from worshipping on any day they choose. That is a far cry from what the SDA church has taught for 150 years. Ellen wrote that when the Sunday laws come SDAs would have to flee to the mountains. Where are there any mountains that are not already inhabited? I have been in Germany and it seems like they use every piece of ground for something. Ellen supposedly got all she wrote from God. Is God nearsighted not to be able to see that there isn't any place SDAs can run? Was Ellen duping her adherents into believing a blatant lie in order to get them to join the fold? Kinda looks that way now doesn't it? What she wrote didn't happen when the mountains were still uninhabited and now it cannot. It just proves we should not put our eggs in her basket. Depending on her advice is the last thing anyone should do.
How can you prove that the Sabbath given at Sinai is the same day you claim to be the Sabbath?
: beam Sat May 04, 2019 - 13:48:53
Show us where any of that "legislation" has caused Sabbath observers privileges to be taken away. Are you protesting the fact that you too would have legislation that would allow you to have another recreation day? Is the legislation in Europe demanding people attend church and keep the day holy? Of course not and it doesn't stop anyone from worshipping on any day they choose. That is a far cry from what the SDA church has taught for 150 years. Ellen wrote that when the Sunday laws come SDAs would have to flee to the mountains. Where are there any mountains that are not already inhabited? I have been in Germany and it seems like they use every piece of ground for something. Ellen supposedly got all she wrote from God. Is God nearsighted not to be able to see that there isn't any place SDAs can run? Was Ellen duping her adherents into believing a blatant lie in order to get them to join the fold? Kinda looks that way now doesn't it? What she wrote didn't happen when the mountains were still uninhabited and now it cannot. It just proves we should not put our eggs in her basket. Depending on her advice is the last thing anyone should do.
How can you prove that the Sabbath given at Sinai is the same day you claim to be the Sabbath?
Non stop twisted garbage. There are plenty of places sparsely populated where God's people should go when the signs are manifested. The purpose of such is to be separated from the masses and be as self sufficient as possible, as it will be the larger cities and populations that have willfully surrendered their independence to their governing authorities, which said government will have to put most of their time and efforts into. This apart from the fact, that cities and heavily populated areas are no good place to be when disaster strikes as it most definitely will in direct judgment from God. SDA's are certainly not the only one's around today that see the obvious wisdom of being prepared for such with a place, provisions, and knowledge pertaining to living and surviving away from the masses.
No true Christian would want any government forcing there their beliefs concerning their personal relationship with God upon non believers, thereby creating a state of dead legalism. Your lack of knowledge concerning this perspective and many others I take for granted among the SDA's I have known, cause me at times to doubt your claim that you actually were an SDA for forty years. I'm not sure you really know or ever knew what the SDA church really teaches or taught. You should know that EGW and others said no one would be forced to attend Sunday services or abandon their beliefs regarding the seventh day when a national Sunday is first passed. This will come with time as the judgments of God are poured out upon humanity for exalting their own day of worship above God's by law. Perhaps you never really did properly understand what SDA's believe. Of course today, and ever increasingly, SDA's as all others are becoming increasingly splintered.
Your warped views and opinions of what was said and what is going to happen are just that. You are now in denial of what is presently happening right in front of your face. Go to, defend your own, defend Sunday sacredness and its establishment by civil legislation. While denying it will happen at the same time. You too, are making your decisions necessary for then end to come.
Joel 3:9 Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles; Prepare war, wake up the mighty men, let all the men of war draw near; let them come up: 10 Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruninghooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong. 11 Assemble yourselves, and come, all ye heathen, and gather yourselves together round about: thither cause thy mighty ones to come down, O LORD. 12 Let the heathen be wakened, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat: for there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about. 13 Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe: come, get you down; for the press is full, the fats overflow; for their wickedness is great. 14
Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision: for the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision. 15 The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining. 16 The LORD also shall roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth shall shake: but the LORD will be the hope of his people, and the strength of the children of Israel. 17 So shall ye know that I am the LORD your God dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain: then shall Jerusalem be holy, and there shall no strangers pass through her any more.
Instead of giving answers to my posts you have chosen the lowest road, that of trying to defame me. Anyone who is reading these posts surely cannot miss this fact Amo. It isn't becoming of you to stoop to that low level and proves you have no defense.
How can you prove that the Sabbath given at Sinai is the same day you claim to be the Sabbath? Sure cannot look to the Jews for guidance. They have kowtowed so many times throughout history that they would be a non-dependable source.
Beam:
« Reply #516 on: Sun May 05, 2019 -
How can you prove that the Sabbath given at Sinai is the same day you claim to be the Sabbath?
1) The LORD GOD whose Sabbath _DAY_ the Sabbath ALWAYS has been, is the Sabbath : Seventh Day of the week's LORD STILL.
2) And the Jews, whose Sabbath the Sabbath OF THE LORD GOD NEVER has been but claimed it their Sabbath Day, claim the Sabbath Day their Sabbath STILL.
3: And the Lord of the Sabbath Jesus Christ who is the same yesterday, today and forever the same, is Lord of the Sabbath Day Seventh Day of the week, STILL,
4) and to this very Sixth Day of the week "the Preparation Day which is the Fore-Sabbath" God "GAVE" the children of Israel in the wilderness already, is Lord of "the Lord's Day" -- "Sabbath of the LORD GOD", STILL.
5) And the CHURCH the Lord Jesus was "given to as Head", made of this very "Seventh Day God thus concerning spake by the Son IN THESE LAST DAYS" the very day and NAME of the day IN THIS WORLD WIDE NEW AND CHRISTIAN ERA, "day-of-the WEEK"!
So where are you coming out from, chappy, from over outer spaces, from foreign stellar constellations? You don't know even the colloquial of your own world and age?
6)
But the supreme PROOF of which Day of the week the Sabbath of the LORD has ALWAYS been the Seventh Day, IS CHRIST WHO ACCORDING TO THE SCRIPTURE ROSE ON "THE THIRD DAY .. IN SABBATH'S FULLNESS being in the very daylight before the First Day of the week"! 7) Now you want to pretend you don't know which day of the week the First Day of the week is!? Foolishness!!
Wise in your own eyes superman....
: beam Sun May 05, 2019 - 07:38:50
Instead of giving answers to my posts you have chosen the lowest road, that of trying to defame me. Anyone who is reading these posts surely cannot miss this fact Amo. It isn't becoming of you to stoop to that low level and proves you have no defense.
How can you prove that the Sabbath given at Sinai is the same day you claim to be the Sabbath? Sure cannot look to the Jews for guidance. They have kowtowed so many times throughout history that they would be a non-dependable source.
This thread is not about proving which day is actually the Sabbath. It is about the legalism or not of either what all Christians and Jews today believe to be God's appointed day of rest, Saturday or Sunday. Please direct your drivel to another thread concerning that topic, or create one for the same.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8D_mOdIqJA
The above video compiles a lot of info regarding what has been and is going on regarding Sunday legislation which so many deny, or refuse to admit could ever lead a national Sunday law. One of the reverse psychologies employed is of course, that a Sunday law forcing all to rest on that day, actually equals freedom for all concerning said day. They try to portray the idea that unless a law is made, no one has a real choice about resting or not on that day. I suppose people who will not choose to worship their own God on a day they believe He appointed for such by faith, certainly will need the rule of human laws to motivate them. This though is dead legalism. It will not only not save them, but to the contrary, will end up condemning them with immediate and eternal consequences.
: Amo Sat May 04, 2019 - 18:34:47
Non stop twisted garbage.
Yep, that is what the SDA church and you have been putting out since it all started in 1845.
There are plenty of places sparsely populated where God's people should go when the signs are manifested. The purpose of such is to be separated from the masses and be as self sufficient as possible,
Pure nonsense. Name us some places here in the USA that is not now populated that could sustain life.
This apart from the fact, that cities and heavily populated areas are no good place to be when disaster strikes as it most definitely will in direct judgment from God. SDA's are certainly not the only one's around today that see the obvious wisdom of being prepared for such with a place, provisions, and knowledge pertaining to living and surviving away from the masses.
If you would put your trust in Jesus instead of Ellen White these things you are so concerned about would vanish and you could enjoy what time you have on this Earth. You think you have all the answers, but what if you don't and have proclaimed a falsehood? All this that you write was supposed to happen a hundred and fifty years ago according to the prophet.
No true Christian would want any government forcing there their beliefs concerning their personal relationship with God upon non believers, thereby creating a state of dead legalism. Your lack of knowledge concerning this perspective and many others I take for granted among the SDA's I have known, cause me at times to doubt your claim that you actually were an SDA for forty years.
Oh I was there alright and drank the koolaid. What makes you able to think you know so much about me? Just because I refute SDA dogma doesn't mean I don't understand it. Of course, before the Lord comes people will cause strife, wars and more persecution will happen. I believe you and SDAs are putting the emphasis on the wrong syllable. It will be the Muslims that will continue to cause Christians and Jews to rise up and fight for freedom. The only way it will stop is when Jesus returns and ends it all.
I'm not sure you really know or ever knew what the SDA church really teaches or taught. You should know that EGW and others said no one would be forced to attend Sunday services or abandon their beliefs regarding the seventh day when a national Sunday is first passed. This will come with time as the judgments of God are poured out upon humanity for exalting their own day of worship above God's by law.
And you believe her nonsense??? Where is it she said that Adventists would not be forced to attend Sunday services or abandon........?
Perhaps you never really did properly understand what SDA's believe. Of course today, and ever increasingly, SDA's as all others are becoming increasingly splintered.
I knew enough to realize, after many years, that the whole system was based on falsehood. All the stuff you write is just parroting unsubstantiated garbage.
Your warped views and opinions of what was said and what is going to happen are just that.
Pot calling the kettle black, I do believe.
You are now in denial of what is presently happening right in front of your face.
I deny the garbage you are writing on this forum Amo.
Go to, defend your own, defend Sunday sacredness and its establishment by civil legislation. While denying it will happen at the same time. You too, are making your decisions necessary for then end to come.
Now you are getting on my nerves, Amo. There is no such agenda by me to make or defend Sunday sacredness. No day is sacred. Again, no day is sacred. I do not ever defend Sunday as any different than any other day. Stop the nonsense.
: beam Fri May 10, 2019 - 14:51:37
Yep, that is what the SDA church and you have been putting out since it all started in 1845.
Pure nonsense. Name us some places here in the USA that is not now populated that could sustain life.
If you would put your trust in Jesus instead of Ellen White these things you are so concerned about would vanish and you could enjoy what time you have on this Earth. You think you have all the answers, but what if you don't and have proclaimed a falsehood? All this that you write was supposed to happen a hundred and fifty years ago according to the prophet.
Oh I was there alright and drank the koolaid. What makes you able to think you know so much about me? Just because I refute SDA dogma doesn't mean I don't understand it. Of course, before the Lord comes people will cause strife, wars and more persecution will happen. I believe you and SDAs are putting the emphasis on the wrong syllable. It will be the Muslims that will continue to cause Christians and Jews to rise up and fight for freedom. The only way it will stop is when Jesus returns and ends it all.
And you believe her nonsense??? Where is it she said that Adventists would not be forced to attend Sunday services or abandon........?
I knew enough to realize, after many years, that the whole system was based on falsehood. All the stuff you write is just parroting unsubstantiated garbage.
Pot calling the kettle black, I do believe.
I deny the garbage you are writing on this forum Amo.
Now you are getting on my nerves, Amo. There is no such agenda by me to make or defend Sunday sacredness. No day is sacred. Again, no day is sacred. I do not ever defend Sunday as any different than any other day. Stop the nonsense.
If you want anymore replies on topics off topic of this thread, start another thread concerning the same.
: Amo Sat May 11, 2019 - 11:22:38
If you want anymore replies on topics off topic of this thread, start another thread concerning the same.
Cop-out! You will do anything to keep from answering questions related to your posts. I am sure the lurkers will find your excuses reason to believe you cannot give an honest answer, You degrade yourself by using insult, and all the other excuses, too bad.
Beam:
Cop-out! You will do anything to keep from answering questions related to your posts. I am sure the lurkers will find your excuses reason to believe you cannot give an honest answer, You degrade yourself by using insult, and all the other excuses, too bad.
Beam about himself.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-05-02/italy-populists-seek-no-shopping-sundays-to-boost-family-values
Italy's Populists Want to Close Stores on Sundays
The idea is to give workers time to spend with their kids and go to church..............................................
Is this about the supposed Sunday law?
: piecrust Fri Jun 14, 2019 - 18:45:07
Is this about the supposed Sunday law?
There is no supposed Sunday law. There are presently many Sunday laws, and there has always been Sunday laws for about 1700 years now.
: Amo Sat Jul 06, 2019 - 10:21:27
There is no supposed Sunday law. There are presently many Sunday laws, and there has always been Sunday laws for about 1700 years now.
How do they affect your freedom to worship when you want to?
: piecrust Sun Jul 07, 2019 - 02:34:27
How do they affect your freedom to worship when you want to?
http://www.archive.org/stream/sundaylegislat00lewi#page/n19/mode/2up
This link was provided in the opening post of this thread. You are welcome to read the book provided there and learns some things. Plenty of people have been adversely effected by Sunday laws throughout history. True Christianity is not about simple self, and how self alone is effected by anything. To the contrary, it is all about concern for the well being and salvation of others. Deception destroys. Any "Christian" anywhere forcing their beliefs upon another through civil legislation is deceived and in danger of losing salvation.
: Amo Sun Jul 07, 2019 - 11:17:59
http://www.archive.org/stream/sundaylegislat00lewi#page/n19/mode/2up
This link was provided in the opening post of this thread. You are welcome to read the book provided there and learns some things. Plenty of people have been adversely effected by Sunday laws throughout history. True Christianity is not about simple self, and how self alone is effected by anything. To the contrary, it is all about concern for the well being and salvation of others. Deception destroys. Any "Christian" anywhere forcing their beliefs upon another through civil legislation is deceived and in danger of losing salvation.
Paranoid, Amo?
Do you watch the Xfiles?
I am not aware of anyone stopping you worshiping when you wish.
: piecrust Sun Jul 07, 2019 - 21:49:35
Paranoid, Amo?
Do you watch the Xfiles?
I am not aware of anyone stopping you worshiping when you wish.
Ignorant scoffer, piecrust?
You are not aware of a lot of things. The does make any of them imaginary. You are ignorant of many realities of history, and of what I and SDA's actually believe in relation to Sunday laws and the why and when of forced worship. Some of this is no doubt willing ignorance. So be it.
: Amo Fri Jul 12, 2019 - 10:13:05
Ignorant scoffer, piecrust?
You are not aware of a lot of things. The does make any of them imaginary. You are ignorant of many realities of history, and of what I and SDA's actually believe in relation to Sunday laws and the why and when of forced worship. Some of this is no doubt willing ignorance. So be it.
I am still not aware of anyone stopping you worship when you wish. Really.
: piecrust Mon Jul 15, 2019 - 22:19:12
I am still not aware of anyone stopping you worship when you wish. Really.
You are not aware of a lot of things. Neither is this thread about people being prevented from worshiping when they wish, though many have tried to prevent the same, many times throughout history. It is about which of the two days of worship among "Christians" more rightly represents legalism, Sabbath, or Sunday.
https://orthodoxchurchfathers.com/fathers/npnf214/npnf2160.htm#P3294_592503
Ancient Epitome of Canon XXIX.
A Christian shall not stop work on the Sabbath, but on the Lords Day.
Balsamon.
Here the Fathers order that no one of the faithful shall stop work on the Sabbath as do the Jews, but that they should honour the Lord's Day; on account of the Lord's resurrection, and that on that day they should abstain from manual labour and go to church. But thus abstaining from work on Sunday they do not lay down as a necessity, but they add, "if they can." For if through need or any other necessity any one worked on the Lord's day this was not reckoned against him.
Amo, which day do YOU go to church? Do you have freedom to do so? If not, who stops you?
: piecrust Sun Jul 21, 2019 - 01:11:38
Amo, which day do YOU go to church? Do you have freedom to do so? If not, who stops you?
Here is the opening post on this thread -
The following internet site contains a book concerning the very numerous Sunday laws throughout history.
http://www.archive.org/stream/sundaylegislat00lewi#page/n3/mode/2up
In light of the fact, that Sunday keepers have repeatedly throughout history appealed to the civil authorities to enforce their day of worship upon all, how is it that those who keep the fourth commandment by faith in the word of God, are the ones always accused of being legalistic?
We appeal to all to obey all the commandments of God by faith in His holy word, which admonishes us to do so from one end of the bible to the other. We appeal to personal conviction and reason alone for this act of faith, and never to civil legislation which Sunday keepers habitually appeal to, and yet we are the ones accused of legalism. This makes no sense at all. How can appealing to others to believe and obey the word of God by faith in that word be considered legalism, while appealing to others to keep a day holy which the scriptures never even address as such, and then making laws to force everyone to do so, be considered faith?
While it is certainly possible to keep the seventh day Sabbath for the wrong reason, i.e. legalistically, it is just as certainly possible to keep the commandment by faith in the word of God, and out of love for the author of the same. The same can not be said though about Sunday observance. There is no command concerning it in the word of God, nor is it even addressed at all as a day of worship in the same. Thus it is impossible to keep it by faith in the word of God, or out of love and respect for the authority of His word. The writer contends that this is exactly why Sunday keepers have appealed to civil legislation to enforce their day upon all throughout history. That is, because there is no command or authority from God and His scriptures to do so. Thus the establishment of Sunday as a sacred day by civil law is in fact verily the establishment of legalism.
Yet it is those of us who keep the seventh day by faith alone in the word of God, that are continually accused of being the legalistic. How unfortunate that child or reverse psychology is so successful among professing adults.
17 So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. Romans 10:17 (KJV)
If what you believe and preach is not to be found in the word of God, then it is not by faith. If it is not by faith, then it is of works. The latter alone is not acceptable to God. The only works that are acceptable to God, are those performed by faith. This is of course because they demonstrate ones willing submission to God, and therefore their faith and trust in His word, and trustworthy authority.
31 Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law. Romans 3:31 (KJV)
True faith does not make void the law of God, but rather establishes the same.
Please do address the issue of this thread if you wish. If you want to start another thread to address your question above, please do. I will gladly address the issue in that thread. I will not continue to address it in this thread and thereby support your hijacking of the same.
Please try to answer the question Amo. I see no point in rereading stuff.
: Amo Sun Jul 21, 2019 - 10:23:2231 Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law. Romans 3:31 (KJV)
Hi Amo, you use the text above to try to prove your point. Yet you refuse to acknowledge all of the many texts that tell us that the old covenant laws are done away. I agree that we are not lawless, but to what law are we subject is the conundrum.
Even the Israelite people (to whom the law was given initially—Deuteronomy 5:1-5) have been released from the Mosaic code. The following list reflects some of the terms used in the New Testament to signify that severance: "fulfilled" (Matthew 5:17), "dead to," (Romans 7:4), "discharged from" (Romans 7:6), "passing away" (2 Corinthians 3:7, 11, 13), "no longer under" (Galatians 3:25), "no longer bondservant" (Galatians 4:7), "set free" (Galatians 5:1), "called for freedom" (Galatians 5:13), "broke down" and "abolished" (Ephesians 2:14-15), "counted as loss" (Philippians 3:7), "taken away; nailed to the cross" (Colossians 2:14), "no longer judged by law" (Colossians 2:16), a "new, better covenant," with "better promises" than bestowed under the "old" covenant (Hebrews 8:6, 13).
Such expressions could be multiplied, but these should be sufficient to show that the Mosaic code, as a law system, is no longer in force. Excerpts from The Meaning of Romans 3:31
By Wayne Jackson
: piecrust Mon Jul 22, 2019 - 03:22:13
Please try to answer the question Amo. I see no point in rereading stuff.
No. Start another thread, stop trying to hijack this one.
: beam Tue Jul 23, 2019 - 06:21:21
Hi Amo, you use the text above to try to prove your point. Yet you refuse to acknowledge all of the many texts that tell us that the old covenant laws are done away. I agree that we are not lawless, but to what law are we subject is the conundrum.
Even the Israelite people (to whom the law was given initially—Deuteronomy 5:1-5) have been released from the Mosaic code. The following list reflects some of the terms used in the New Testament to signify that severance: "fulfilled" (Matthew 5:17), "dead to," (Romans 7:4), "discharged from" (Romans 7:6), "passing away" (2 Corinthians 3:7, 11, 13), "no longer under" (Galatians 3:25), "no longer bondservant" (Galatians 4:7), "set free" (Galatians 5:1), "called for freedom" (Galatians 5:13), "broke down" and "abolished" (Ephesians 2:14-15), "counted as loss" (Philippians 3:7), "taken away; nailed to the cross" (Colossians 2:14), "no longer judged by law" (Colossians 2:16), a "new, better covenant," with "better promises" than bestowed under the "old" covenant (Hebrews 8:6, 13).
Such expressions could be multiplied, but these should be sufficient to show that the Mosaic code, as a law system, is no longer in force. Excerpts from The Meaning of Romans 3:31
By Wayne Jackson
Same issue. Start another thread. We have already discussed the above several times on other threads and even perhaps this one. This thread is about the legalism of either Sunday sacredness or the seventh day Sabbath. The ten commandments are not Mosaic code.
: Amo Fri Jul 26, 2019 - 10:48:27
Same issue. Start another thread. We have already discussed the above several times on other threads and even perhaps this one. This thread is about the legalism of either Sunday sacredness or the seventh-day Sabbath. The ten commandments are not Mosaic code.
On the contrary. Proving that we are not under the laws of the old covenant clears up whether we are subject to the Sabbath of that covenant. There is absolutely nothing about Sunday being sacred. That is a delusion propagated by the SDA church. The 10 commandments certainly were part of the code. They were written in the book of the law.
: beam Fri Jul 26, 2019 - 11:46:09
On the contrary. Proving that we are not under the laws of the old covenant clears up whether we are subject to the Sabbath of that covenant. There is absolutely nothing about Sunday being sacred. That is a delusion propagated by the SDA church. The 10 commandments certainly were part of the code. They were written in the book of the law.
Your prejudice against your former denomination has made your mind so very twisted. Now are you claiming that SDA's invented the idea of Sunday sacredness? Would you like me to bring forth many quotes from professed Christians around long before SDA's ever existed, about Sunday sacredness?
The ten commandments were spoken by the mouth of God to Israel, and written twice with the finger of God for Israel and all humanity. God did not allow Moses to rewrite the ten commandments after he smashed the first tables of stone, but had him traverse the mountain once again that God Himself could write them again. No man but the man Jesus Christ who is also God could ever change or do away with the ten commandments. You do reject the Lord Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior by rejecting His words regarding the law, and making the words of His chosen apostles contradict His own.
Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.Joh 12:44 Jesus cried and said,
He that believeth on me, believeth not on me, but on him that sent me. 45 And he that seeth me seeth him that sent me. 46 I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on me should not abide in darkness 47 And if any man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. 48 He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day. 49 For I have not spoken of myself; but the Father which sent me, he gave me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak. 50 And I know that his commandment is life everlasting: whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said unto me, so I speak.You should concern yourself with lining the words of the apostles up with their own Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, rather than twisting them to contradict the same. Otherwise they might both condemn you at the judgment.
: Amo Fri Jul 26, 2019 - 10:38:23
No. Start another thread, stop trying to hijack this one.
Asking you to answer a question is hijacking the thread?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ihm5VxHFz_Y
CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH
Excerpts from -
DOCTRINAL NOTE
on some questions regarding
The Participation of Catholics in Political Life
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, having received the opinion of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, has decided that it would be appropriate to publish the present Doctrinal Note on some questions regarding the participation of Catholics in political life.
This Note is directed to the Bishops of the Catholic Church and, in a particular way, to Catholic politicians and all lay members of the faithful called to participate in the political life of democratic societies.(Quotes from the above are in black, my comments are in blue. For purposes of clarification, this repost was originally written during the Obama administration. Closing statement is not part of the same.)
I. A constant teaching
1. The commitment of Christians in the world has found a variety of expressions in the course of the past 2000 years. One such expression has been Christian involvement in political life: Christians, as one Early Church writer stated, play their full role as citizen. Among the saints, the Church venerates many men and women who served God through their generous commitment to politics and government.
Among these, Saint Thomas More, who was proclaimed Patron of Statesmen and Politicians, gave witness by his martyrdom to the inalienable dignity of the human conscience. Though subjected to various forms of psychological pressure, Saint Thomas More refused to compromise, never forsaking the constant fidelity to legitimate authority and institutions which distinguished him; he taught by his life and his death that «man cannot be separated from God, nor politics from morality.
Of course, as a Roman Catholic, the fidelity to legitimate authority and institutions spoken of above, would naturally be foremost the Roman Catholic Church itself. "St" Thomas More died defending the supremacy of the Pope over the Church in England. He fought against having the scriptures in English, beginning the process which caused William Tyndale to be burned at the stake for the same, and was responsible for others also being burned at the stake. Yet he is not only a saint of the Roman Catholic Church, but was made the Patron Saint of Politicians by the church, and is set forth at the beginning of this document as a fine, saintly example of Catholic participation in political life. This in and of itself should send up many red flags and danger warnings. It is certainly worthy of note that this man is chosen and set forth as an example of proper "Participation of Catholics in Political Life".
By fulfilling their civic duties, guided by a Christian conscience, in conformity with its values, the lay faithful exercise their proper task of infusing the temporal order with Christian values, all the while respecting the nature and rightful autonomy of that order, and cooperating with other citizens according to their particular competence and responsibility. The consequence of this fundamental teaching of the Second Vatican Council is that the lay faithful
are never to relinquish their participation in 'public life', that is, in the many different economic, social, legislative, administrative and cultural areas, which are intended to promote organically and institutionally the common good. This would include the promotion and defence of goods such as public order and peace, freedom and equality, respect for human life and for the environment, justice and solidarity.
Of course the "Christian values" promoted above, would be Roman Catholic values. The logical conclusion being the lay faithful implementing the political ideology, or social doctrine of the Church in government. The concern for every thinking individual should be, how closely will that scenario align with the actual establishment of the same situation during the dark ages, and more recently the political alignments of the Church of Rome with Nazi Germany and Mussolini in Italy.
The term common good in the above needs to be addressed, since the term is used so very often by the Church of Rome. All political aims and goals should work toward the common good. This sounds great, but just exactly who is determining what the common good is? Who will define what the common good is, that Rome intends the political structures of this world to dole out to the same? She herself is continuously referring to, and defining the same. Even claiming the role of the purifier of reason in relation to the common good.
II. Central points in the current cultural and political debate
The growth in the sense of responsibility towards countries still on the path of development is without doubt an important sign, illustrative of a greater sensitivity to
the common good. At the same time, however, one cannot close one's eyes to the real dangers which certain tendencies in society are promoting through legislation, nor can one ignore the effects this will have on future generations.
A kind of cultural relativism exists today,
evident in the conceptualization and defence of an ethical pluralism, which sanctions the decadence and disintegration of reason and the principles of the natural moral law. Furthermore, it is not unusual to hear the opinion expressed in the public sphere that such ethical pluralism is the very condition for democracy. As a result, citizens claim complete autonomy with regard to their moral choices, and lawmakers maintain that they are respecting this freedom of choice by enacting
laws which ignore the principles of natural ethics and yield to ephemeral cultural and moral trends,
as if every possible outlook on life were of equal value. At the same time, the value of tolerance is disingenuously invoked when a large number of citizens,
Catholics among them, are asked not to base their contribution to society and political life – through the legitimate means available to everyone in a democracy – on their particular understanding of the human person
and the common good. The history of the twentieth century demonstrates that those citizens were right who recognized the falsehood of relativism, and with it, the notion that there is no moral law rooted in the nature of the human person, which must govern our understanding of man,
the common good and the state. What is the above argument, but that the different outlooks upon life, and their political eventualities are not all equal. While one can easily agree upon this point, the real point of the above is of course, that Roman Catholic reason and sense of the common good is superior to all others. This to the point that we should be allowing them to be the main contributor or purifier of reason and the common good. As I have already pointed out in a previous examination of DEUS CARITAS EST, the Catholic church believes "it is the place of the Church to determine more precisely "the just ordering of society", and to purify reason for the state in order for it to properly operate."
While there are many political ideologies with definite amoral leanings to be dealt with, it would be a serious mistake to politically align with, and submit to the church of Rome in combatting the same. No political entity on earth has a longer, bloodier, and disreputable past from which to be warned against the dangers of allowing it once again to gain political power and control over nations and peoples. There is a real danger in it's present course of mobilizing and rekindling the political ambitions of the large numbers of politicians and citizens within democratic societies, under her direct guidance and supervision.
3. Such relativism, of course, has nothing to do with the legitimate freedom of
Catholic citizens to choose among the various political opinions that are compatible with faith and the natural moral law, and to select, according to their own criteria, what best corresponds to the needs of the common good. Political freedom is not – and cannot be – based upon the relativistic idea that all conceptions of the human person's good
have the same value and truth, but rather, on the fact that politics are concerned with very concrete realizations of the true human and
social good in given historical, geographic, economic, technological and cultural contexts.
Of course, as already stated, the church of Rome itself reserves the right to rightly define common good, and purify reason in regards to the same. As the above clearly states, Catholic citizens are to choose and thus also support those political opinions which are compatible with
their faith and natural law, which themselves are defined for them by the church. Once again we are informed that not all "conceptions of the human person's good have the same value and truth". For the Catholic of course, the churches conception of the same, is superior.
The article then refers to politics concern with concrete realizations of the true human and social good in given historical, geographic, economic, technological and cultural contexts. Again, who is defining these concrete realizations? The Catholic church is in complete denial of the true extent of it's totally abusive history when kings and queens and governments of the past actually did submit to it's economic and political thought. Nor do the vast majority of the countless Catholic citizens it is calling into action to re-establish it's authority over the same once again, really know of this history. Being raised with Roman Catholic revisionist history alone, as their teacher. I have been repeatedly confronted by Roman Catholics on these boards that completely deny all historical facts presented to them by sources outside of their own church as false and lies. This is what can be expected by these, who intend to take over democratic societies by their large numbers and vast political influence with the kings and governments of this world.
All of the concrete realities mentioned in the above, would be effected by the same. Nothing is more clearly revealed by history in relation to the Roman Catholic church, that when she has the numbers or sheer political strength to do so, she will completely dominate all areas of life.
It is not the Church's task to set forth specific political solutions – and even less to propose a single solution as the acceptable one – to temporal questions that God has left to the free and responsible judgment of each person. It is, however,
the Church's right and duty to provide a moral judgment on temporal matters when this is required by faith or the moral law. If Christians must recognize the legitimacy of differing points of view about the organization of worldly affairs, they are also called to reject, as injurious to democratic life, a conception of pluralism that reflects moral relativism. Democracy must be based on the true and solid foundation of non-negotiable ethical principles, which are the underpinning of life in society.
Where is this right, duty, or responsibility of the church defined or outlined for us in the Holy scriptures? It is not. Nor is it the right, duty, or moral obligation of Christ's church to purify reason and define the common good for the various political entities of this world, in this day or any other. We have already seen in the pages of history, what this leads to. The churches involvement in the politics of this world does not lead to the purification of the same, but rather to the complete corruption of the church. This is the history that Roman Catholicism denies both in historical content, and present practice. Which very thing itself completely disqualifies her as a purifying and competent reasoning entity upon the politics of this world.
On the level of concrete political action, there can generally be a plurality of political parties in which Catholics may exercise –
especially through legislative assemblies – their right and duty to contribute to the public life of their country.What is the purpose of legislative assemblies, but to create and pass laws? Does the following sound familiar -
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Is it not obvious, that the above admonition from the Pope applies to all the Catholic members of the congress of the United States. There are 156 Catholic members of the US congress. All of whom, have been summoned by the Pope to implement
"the Church's right and duty to provide a moral judgment on temporal matters". This is not to mentioin the six out of nine Cathoilic Supreme Court Justices, and majority vote on any issue. Or the Catholic Vice President, occupying the Executive branch of our government. All have been called to help politically implement the purifying of reason, and establishment of the common good as defined by the church of Rome within this country. Not to mention every other country in the world.
The legitimate plurality of temporal options is at the origin of the commitment of Catholics to politics and relates directly to Christian moral and social teaching. It is in the light of this teaching that lay Catholics must assess their participation in political life
so as to be sure that it is marked by a coherent responsibility for temporal reality. The Church recognizes that while democracy is the best expression of the direct participation of citizens in political choices,
it succeeds only to the extent that it is based on a correct understanding of the human person. Catholic involvement in political life cannot compromise on this principle, for otherwise the witness of the Christian faith in the world, as well as the unity and interior coherence of the faithful, would be non-existent.What a mouthful. Isn't it wonderful how simple and to the point papal documents are? Forgive my sarcasm. Nothing could be more obvious from their documents, it seems to me, that the Popes are far more the politician, than religious leaders that wish to simplify and declare religious truth.
Of course the correct understanding of the human person mentioned above, which dictates a Catholics
"involvement in political life" is defined by the church of Rome. Which of course again, is nothing but to say that Rome is in charge of the political life of its members, and its members should seek to establish that political life in whatever government or nation they find themselves in. Which of course simply means that Rome should be running that government, and all governments in which Catholics are a majority, or simply capable of making such take place. Nothing new here, Rome intends to rule the world through vast numbers or political intrigue.
What is new in the above statement, is the assertion that without Catholic involvement in political life directed by the churches understanding of the human person,
"the unity and interior coherence of the faithful, would be non-existent." Wow! This is basically admitting, that without its involvement in the politics of this world, the Roman Catholic church would not exist. That is very significant, since there is no admonition in new covenant scripture to be involved in the politics of this world. To the contrary, they testify to the exact opposite state of being for the truly faithful.
21 They say unto him, Caesar's. Then saith he unto them,
Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's. Matt 22:21 (KJV)
The two are to be kept separate always. This for the most obvious of reasons. I will simply state the word POLITICIAN, and ask you to think of the first thing that enters your mind, and we will leave it at that.
In this context, it must be noted also that a well-formed Christian conscience does
not permit one to vote for a political program or an individual law which contradicts the fundamental contents of faith and morals. The Christian faith is an integral unity, and thus
it is incoherent to isolate some particular element to the detriment of the whole of Catholic doctrine. A political commitment to a single isolated aspect of the Church's social doctrine does not exhaust one's responsibility towards the common good. Nor can a Catholic think of delegating his Christian responsibility to others; rather,
the Gospel of Jesus Christ gives him this task, so that the truth about man and the world might be proclaimed and put into action.This is actually getting boring. More of the same. Catholics are to support the church fully, without deviating from her proscribed course, concerning political action in democratic societies. They are most certainly to put their faith, that is the mandates of the church into political action.
When political activity comes up against moral principles that do not admit of exception, compromise or derogation, the Catholic commitment becomes more evident and laden with responsibility. In the face of fundamental and inalienable ethical demands, Christians must recognize that what is at stake is the essence of the moral law, which concerns the integral good of the human person.
One must ask, what exactly is an inalienable ethical demand? Is this not an oxymoron? While we all have no doubt heard of inalienable rights, what on earth is an inalienable demand.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,"(The Declaration of Independence)
Inalienable : incapable of being alienated, surrendered, or transferred *inalienable rights*
As pointed out in the beginning of linked video, Catholic politicians have taken it upon themselves to redefine and implement their version of unalienable rights as set forth in The Declaration of Independence of these United States. This they do as minions of the papacy, not by the will or consent of the people being governed as the Declaration points out, but by the dictates of the unelected self appointed ruler of this and all nations, the Pope of Rome. This is the repudiation of the Protestant influenced form of government for the people and by the people established by our founding fathers, to be replaced by Roman Catholic influenced government for the Pope and by the Pope. So Anti-Christ and BABYLON THE GREAT, continue mounting the final beast of biblical prophecy that they may ride it and all who follow straight into the lake of fire. So be it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFzK5LzZwws
The following quote from the Catechism of the Catholic Church may be viewed at the link provided above it.
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P6U.HTM
Catechism of the Catholic Church
IntraText - Text
PART THREE: LIFE IN CHRIST
SECTION ONE MAN'S VOCATION LIFE IN THE SPIRIT
CHAPTER THREE GOD'S SALVATION: LAW AND GRACE
Article 1 THE MORAL LAW
I. The Natural Moral Law
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Click here to show the links to concordance
I. The Natural Moral Law
1954 Man participates in the wisdom and goodness of the Creator who gives him mastery over his acts and the ability to govern himself with a view to the true and the good.
The natural law expresses the original moral sense which enables man to discern by reason the good and the evil, the truth and the lie:
The natural law is written and engraved in the soul of each and every man, because it is human reason ordaining him to do good and forbidding him to sin . . . But this command of human reason would not have the force of law if it were not the voice and interpreter of a higher reason to which our spirit and our freedom must be submitted.5
1955 The "divine and natural" law6 shows man the way to follow so as to practice the good and attain his end. the natural law states the first and essential precepts which govern the moral life. It hinges upon the desire for God and submission to him, who is the source and judge of all that is good, as well as upon the sense that the other is one's equal. Its principal precepts are expressed in the Decalogue. This law is called "natural," not in reference to the nature of irrational beings, but because reason which decrees it properly belongs to human nature:
Where then are these rules written, if not in the book of that light we call the truth? In it is written every just law; from it the law passes into the heart of the man who does justice, not that it migrates into it, but that it places its imprint on it, like a seal on a ring that passes onto wax, without leaving the ring.7
The natural law is nothing other than the light of understanding placed in us by God; through it we know what we must do and what we must avoid. God has given this light or law at the creation.8
1956 The natural law, present in the heart of each man and established by reason, is universal in its precepts and its authority extends to all men. It expresses the dignity of the person and determines the basis for his fundamental rights and duties:
For there is a true law: right reason. It is in conformity with nature, is diffused among all men, and is immutable and eternal; its orders summon to duty; its prohibitions turn away from offense .... To replace it with a contrary law is a sacrilege; failure to apply even one of its provisions is forbidden; no one can abrogate it entirely.9
1957 Application of the natural law varies greatly; it can demand reflection that takes account of various conditions of life according to places, times, and circumstances. Nevertheless, in the diversity of cultures, the natural law remains as a rule that binds men among themselves and imposes on them, beyond the inevitable differences, common principles.
1958 The natural law is immutable and permanent throughout the variations of history;10 it subsists under the flux of ideas and customs and supports their progress. the rules that express it remain substantially valid. Even when it is rejected in its very principles, it cannot be destroyed or removed from the heart of man. It always rises again in the life of individuals and societies:
Theft is surely punished by your law, O Lord, and by the law that is written in the human heart, the law that iniquity itself does not efface.11
1959 The natural law, the Creator's very good work, provides the solid foundation on which man can build the structure of moral rules to guide his choices. It also provides the indispensable moral foundation for building the human community. Finally, it provides the necessary basis for the civil law with which it is connected, whether by a reflection that draws conclusions from its principles, or by additions of a positive and juridical nature.
1960 The precepts of natural law are not perceived by everyone clearly and immediately. In the present situation sinful man needs grace and revelation so moral and religious truths may be known "by everyone with facility, with firm certainty and with no admixture of error."12 The natural law provides revealed law and grace with a foundation prepared by God and in accordance with the work of the Spirit.
The papacy of course defines natural law, while the bible of course defines God's law. Natural law is for all humanity as defined by the Pope and Catholocism, God's law is for those in Christ Jesus alone. Natural law is part of the church of Rome's common good to be enforced upon all for the same. God's law is to be obeyed by faith in Christ Jesus.
THE CHURCH OF ROME,
AND THE COMMON GOOD(All emphasis mine)
Excerpts from -
CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITHDOCTRINAL NOTE
on some questions regarding
The Participation of Catholics in Political Life
Indeed, all can contribute, by voting in elections for lawmakers and government officials, and in other ways as well, to the development of political solutions and legislative choices which, in their opinion,
will benefit the common good.The consequence of this fundamental teaching of the Second Vatican Council is that «the lay faithful are never to relinquish their participation in 'public life', that is, in the many different economic, social, legislative, administrative and cultural areas, which are intended to promote organically and institutionally
the common good2. Civil society today is undergoing a complex cultural process as the end of an era brings with it a time of uncertainty in the face of something new. The great strides made in our time give evidence of humanity's progress in attaining conditions of life which are more in keeping with human dignity. The growth in the sense of responsibility towards countries still on the path of development is without doubt an important sign, illustrative of a greater sensitivity
to the common good.
At the same time, the value of tolerance is disingenuously invoked when a large number of citizens, Catholics among them, are asked not to base their contribution to society and political life – through the legitimate means available to everyone in a democracy – on their particular understanding of the human person and
the common good. The history of the twentieth century demonstrates that those citizens were right who recognized the falsehood of relativism, and with it, the notion that there is no moral law rooted in the nature of the human person,
which must govern our understanding of man, the common good and the state. 3. Such relativism, of course, has nothing to do with the legitimate freedom of Catholic citizens to choose among the various political opinions that are compatible with faith and
the natural moral law, and to select, according to their own criteria, what best corresponds
to the needs of the common good.
In this context, it must be noted also that a well-formed Christian conscience does not permit one to vote for a political program or an individual law which contradicts the fundamental contents of faith and morals. The Christian faith is an integral unity, and thus it is incoherent to isolate some particular element to the detriment of the whole of Catholic doctrine. A political commitment to a single isolated aspect of the Church's social doctrine does not exhaust one's responsibility
towards the common good. Nor can a Catholic think of delegating his Christian responsibility to others; rather, the Gospel of Jesus Christ gives him this task, so that the truth about man and the world might be proclaimed and put into action.
In addition, there is the right to religious freedom and the development of an economy that is at the service of the human person and of
the common good, with respect for
social justice, the principles of human solidarity and subsidiarity, according to which «the rights of all individuals, families, and organizations and their practical implementation must be acknowledged
5. While a plurality of methodologies reflective of different sensibilities and cultures can be legitimate in approaching such questions, no Catholic can appeal to the principle of pluralism or to the autonomy of lay involvement in political life to support policies
affecting the common good which compromise or undermine fundamental ethical requirements. They do not require from those who defend them the profession of the Christian faith, although the Church's teaching confirms and defends them always and everywhere as part of her service to the truth about man and
about the common good of civil society. Moreover, it cannot be denied that politics must refer to principles of absolute value precisely because these are at the service of the dignity of the human person and of true human progress.
6. The appeal often made to «the rightful autonomy of the participation of lay Catholics» in politics needs to be clarified.
Promoting the common good of society, according to one's conscience, has nothing to do with confessionalism or religious intolerance.
Those who, on the basis of respect for individual conscience, would view the moral duty of Christians to act according to their conscience as something that disqualifies them from political life, denying the legitimacy of their political involvement following from their convictions
about the common good, would be guilty of a form of intolerant secularism. Excerpts from -
ENCYCLICAL LETTER
CARITAS IN VERITATE
OF THE SUPREME PONTIFF
BENEDICT XVI
TO THE BISHOPS
PRIESTS AND DEACONS
MEN AND WOMEN RELIGIOUS
THE LAY FAITHFUL
AND ALL PEOPLE OF GOOD WILL
ON INTEGRAL HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
IN CHARITY AND TRUTH6. "Caritas in veritate" is the principle around which the Church's
social doctrine turns, a principle that takes on practical form in the criteria that govern moral action. I would like to consider two of these in particular, of special relevance to the commitment to development in an increasingly globalized society: justice
and the common good.
7. Another important consideration
is the common good. To love someone is to desire that person's good and to take effective steps to secure it. Besides the good of the individual, there is a good that is linked to living in society:
the common good. It is the good of "all of us", made up of individuals, families and intermediate groups who together constitute society[4]. It is a good that is sought not for its own sake, but for the people who belong to the social community and who can only really and effectively pursue their good within it.
To desire the common good and strive towards it is a requirement of justice and charity. To take a stand for the common good is on the one hand to be solicitous for, and on the other hand to avail oneself of, that complex of institutions that give structure to the life of society, juridically, civilly, politically and culturally, making it the pólis, or "city". The more we strive to secure a common good corresponding to the real needs of our neighbours, the more effectively we love them. In an increasingly globalized society,
the common good and the effort to obtain it cannot fail to assume the dimensions of the whole human family, that is to say, the community of peoples and nations[5], in such a way as to shape the earthly city in unity and peace, rendering it to some degree an anticipation and a prefiguration of the undivided city of God.
Once profit becomes the exclusive goal, if it is produced by improper means and without
the common good as its ultimate end, it risks destroying wealth and creating poverty.
36. Economic activity cannot solve all social problems through the simple application of commercial logic. This needs to be directed towards the
pursuit of the common good, for which the political community in particular must also take responsibility. . In the global era, economic activity cannot prescind from gratuitousness, which fosters and disseminates solidarity and responsibility for justice
and the common good among the different economic players.
Duties thereby reinforce rights and call for their defence and promotion as a task to be undertaken in the service
of the common good. Otherwise, if the only basis of human rights is to be found in the deliberations of an assembly of citizens, those rights can be changed at any time, and so the duty to respect and pursue them fades from the
common consciousness.
Religious freedom does not mean religious indifferentism, nor does it imply that all religions are equal[133]. Discernment is needed regarding the contribution of cultures and religions,
especially on the part of those who wield political power, if the social community is to be built up in a spirit of respect for the common good. Globalization certainly requires authority, insofar as it poses the problem
of a global common good that needs to be pursued. 67. In the face of the unrelenting growth of global interdependence, there is a strongly felt need, even in the midst of a global recession, for a reform of the United Nations Organization, and likewise of economic institutions and international finance,
so that the concept of the family of nations can acquire real teeth. One also senses the urgent need to find innovative ways of implementing the principle of the responsibility to protect[146] and of giving poorer nations an effective voice in shared decision-making. This seems necessary in order to arrive at a political, juridical and economic order which can increase and give direction to international cooperation for the development of all peoples in solidarity.
To manage the global economy; to revive economies hit by the crisis; to avoid any deterioration of the present crisis and the greater imbalances that would result; to bring about integral and timely disarmament, food security and peace; to guarantee the protection of the environment and to regulate migration:
for all this, there is urgent need of a true world political authority, as my predecessor Blessed John XXIII indicated some years ago.
Such an authority would need to be regulated by law, to observe consistently the principles of subsidiarity and solidarity, to seek to establish the common good[147], and to make a commitment to securing authentic integral human development inspired by the values of charity in truth.
Furthermore, such an authority would need to be universally recognized and to be vested with the effective power to ensure security for all, regard for justice, and respect for rights[148]. Obviously it would have to have the authority to ensure compliance with its decisions from all parties, and also with the coordinated measures adopted in various international forums. Without this, despite the great progress accomplished in various sectors, international law would risk being conditioned by the balance of power among the strongest nations. The integral development of peoples and international cooperation require the establishment of a greater degree of international ordering, marked by subsidiarity, for the management of globalization[149].
They also require the construction of a social order that at last conforms to the moral order, to the interconnection between moral and social spheres, and to the link between politics and the economic and civil spheres, as envisaged by the Charter of the United Nations.
Development is impossible without upright men and women, without financiers and politicians whose consciences are
finely attuned to the requirements of the common good. Both professional competence and moral consistency are necessary.
Mirroring what is required for an ethical approach to globalization and development, so too the meaning and purpose of the media must be sought within an anthropological perspective. This means that they can have a civilizing effect not only when, thanks to technological development, they increase the possibilities of communicating information,
but above all when they are geared towards a vision of the person and the common good that reflects truly universal values.
CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.2188
In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."[125]
As the above quotes reveal, the church of Rome intends to implement its own natural law and common good universally on a global scale. This will include of course Sunday sacredness laws which are themselves for the common good as defined by the church of Rome. Such will represent nothing less than the universal rejection of God's law by fallen humanity, in favor of man made law, in direct rebellion against the authority of God in Christ Jesus our Savior.
Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
: Amo Sat Aug 03, 2019 - 09:24:12
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ihm5VxHFz_Y
CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH
Excerpts from -
DOCTRINAL NOTE
on some questions regarding
The Participation of Catholics in Political Life
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, having received the opinion of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, has decided that it would be appropriate to publish the present Doctrinal Note on some questions regarding the participation of Catholics in political life. This Note is directed to the Bishops of the Catholic Church and, in a particular way, to Catholic politicians and all lay members of the faithful called to participate in the political life of democratic societies.
(Quotes from the above are in black, my comments are in blue. For purposes of clarification, this repost was originally written during the Obama administration. Closing statement is not part of the same.)
I. A constant teaching
1. The commitment of Christians in the world has found a variety of expressions in the course of the past 2000 years. One such expression has been Christian involvement in political life: Christians, as one Early Church writer stated, play their full role as citizen. Among the saints, the Church venerates many men and women who served God through their generous commitment to politics and government. Among these, Saint Thomas More, who was proclaimed Patron of Statesmen and Politicians, gave witness by his martyrdom to the inalienable dignity of the human conscience. Though subjected to various forms of psychological pressure, Saint Thomas More refused to compromise, never forsaking the constant fidelity to legitimate authority and institutions which distinguished him; he taught by his life and his death that «man cannot be separated from God, nor politics from morality.
Of course, as a Roman Catholic, the fidelity to legitimate authority and institutions spoken of above, would naturally be foremost the Roman Catholic Church itself. "St" Thomas More died defending the supremacy of the Pope over the Church in England. He fought against having the scriptures in English, beginning the process which caused William Tyndale to be burned at the stake for the same, and was responsible for others also being burned at the stake. Yet he is not only a saint of the Roman Catholic Church, but was made the Patron Saint of Politicians by the church, and is set forth at the beginning of this document as a fine, saintly example of Catholic participation in political life. This in and of itself should send up many red flags and danger warnings. It is certainly worthy of note that this man is chosen and set forth as an example of proper "Participation of Catholics in Political Life".
By fulfilling their civic duties, guided by a Christian conscience, in conformity with its values, the lay faithful exercise their proper task of infusing the temporal order with Christian values, all the while respecting the nature and rightful autonomy of that order, and cooperating with other citizens according to their particular competence and responsibility. The consequence of this fundamental teaching of the Second Vatican Council is that the lay faithful are never to relinquish their participation in 'public life', that is, in the many different economic, social, legislative, administrative and cultural areas, which are intended to promote organically and institutionally the common good. This would include the promotion and defence of goods such as public order and peace, freedom and equality, respect for human life and for the environment, justice and solidarity.
Of course the "Christian values" promoted above, would be Roman Catholic values. The logical conclusion being the lay faithful implementing the political ideology, or social doctrine of the Church in government. The concern for every thinking individual should be, how closely will that scenario align with the actual establishment of the same situation during the dark ages, and more recently the political alignments of the Church of Rome with Nazi Germany and Mussolini in Italy.
The term common good in the above needs to be addressed, since the term is used so very often by the Church of Rome. All political aims and goals should work toward the common good. This sounds great, but just exactly who is determining what the common good is? Who will define what the common good is, that Rome intends the political structures of this world to dole out to the same? She herself is continuously referring to, and defining the same. Even claiming the role of the purifier of reason in relation to the common good.
II. Central points in the current cultural and political debate
The growth in the sense of responsibility towards countries still on the path of development is without doubt an important sign, illustrative of a greater sensitivity to the common good. At the same time, however, one cannot close one's eyes to the real dangers which certain tendencies in society are promoting through legislation, nor can one ignore the effects this will have on future generations.
A kind of cultural relativism exists today, evident in the conceptualization and defence of an ethical pluralism, which sanctions the decadence and disintegration of reason and the principles of the natural moral law. Furthermore, it is not unusual to hear the opinion expressed in the public sphere that such ethical pluralism is the very condition for democracy. As a result, citizens claim complete autonomy with regard to their moral choices, and lawmakers maintain that they are respecting this freedom of choice by enacting laws which ignore the principles of natural ethics and yield to ephemeral cultural and moral trends, as if every possible outlook on life were of equal value. At the same time, the value of tolerance is disingenuously invoked when a large number of citizens, Catholics among them, are asked not to base their contribution to society and political life – through the legitimate means available to everyone in a democracy – on their particular understanding of the human person and the common good. The history of the twentieth century demonstrates that those citizens were right who recognized the falsehood of relativism, and with it, the notion that there is no moral law rooted in the nature of the human person, which must govern our understanding of man, the common good and the state.
What is the above argument, but that the different outlooks upon life, and their political eventualities are not all equal. While one can easily agree upon this point, the real point of the above is of course, that Roman Catholic reason and sense of the common good is superior to all others. This to the point that we should be allowing them to be the main contributor or purifier of reason and the common good. As I have already pointed out in a previous examination of DEUS CARITAS EST, the Catholic church believes "it is the place of the Church to determine more precisely "the just ordering of society", and to purify reason for the state in order for it to properly operate."
While there are many political ideologies with definite amoral leanings to be dealt with, it would be a serious mistake to politically align with, and submit to the church of Rome in combatting the same. No political entity on earth has a longer, bloodier, and disreputable past from which to be warned against the dangers of allowing it once again to gain political power and control over nations and peoples. There is a real danger in it's present course of mobilizing and rekindling the political ambitions of the large numbers of politicians and citizens within democratic societies, under her direct guidance and supervision.
3. Such relativism, of course, has nothing to do with the legitimate freedom of Catholic citizens to choose among the various political opinions that are compatible with faith and the natural moral law, and to select, according to their own criteria, what best corresponds to the needs of the common good. Political freedom is not – and cannot be – based upon the relativistic idea that all conceptions of the human person's good have the same value and truth, but rather, on the fact that politics are concerned with very concrete realizations of the true human and social good in given historical, geographic, economic, technological and cultural contexts.
Of course, as already stated, the church of Rome itself reserves the right to rightly define common good, and purify reason in regards to the same. As the above clearly states, Catholic citizens are to choose and thus also support those political opinions which are compatible with their faith and natural law, which themselves are defined for them by the church. Once again we are informed that not all "conceptions of the human person's good have the same value and truth". For the Catholic of course, the churches conception of the same, is superior.
The article then refers to politics concern with concrete realizations of the true human and social good in given historical, geographic, economic, technological and cultural contexts. Again, who is defining these concrete realizations? The Catholic church is in complete denial of the true extent of it's totally abusive history when kings and queens and governments of the past actually did submit to it's economic and political thought. Nor do the vast majority of the countless Catholic citizens it is calling into action to re-establish it's authority over the same once again, really know of this history. Being raised with Roman Catholic revisionist history alone, as their teacher. I have been repeatedly confronted by Roman Catholics on these boards that completely deny all historical facts presented to them by sources outside of their own church as false and lies. This is what can be expected by these, who intend to take over democratic societies by their large numbers and vast political influence with the kings and governments of this world.
All of the concrete realities mentioned in the above, would be effected by the same. Nothing is more clearly revealed by history in relation to the Roman Catholic church, that when she has the numbers or sheer political strength to do so, she will completely dominate all areas of life.
It is not the Church's task to set forth specific political solutions – and even less to propose a single solution as the acceptable one – to temporal questions that God has left to the free and responsible judgment of each person. It is, however, the Church's right and duty to provide a moral judgment on temporal matters when this is required by faith or the moral law. If Christians must recognize the legitimacy of differing points of view about the organization of worldly affairs, they are also called to reject, as injurious to democratic life, a conception of pluralism that reflects moral relativism. Democracy must be based on the true and solid foundation of non-negotiable ethical principles, which are the underpinning of life in society.
Where is this right, duty, or responsibility of the church defined or outlined for us in the Holy scriptures? It is not. Nor is it the right, duty, or moral obligation of Christ's church to purify reason and define the common good for the various political entities of this world, in this day or any other. We have already seen in the pages of history, what this leads to. The churches involvement in the politics of this world does not lead to the purification of the same, but rather to the complete corruption of the church. This is the history that Roman Catholicism denies both in historical content, and present practice. Which very thing itself completely disqualifies her as a purifying and competent reasoning entity upon the politics of this world.
On the level of concrete political action, there can generally be a plurality of political parties in which Catholics may exercise – especially through legislative assemblies – their right and duty to contribute to the public life of their country.
What is the purpose of legislative assemblies, but to create and pass laws? Does the following sound familiar -
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Is it not obvious, that the above admonition from the Pope applies to all the Catholic members of the congress of the United States. There are 156 Catholic members of the US congress. All of whom, have been summoned by the Pope to implement "the Church's right and duty to provide a moral judgment on temporal matters". This is not to mentioin the six out of nine Cathoilic Supreme Court Justices, and majority vote on any issue. Or the Catholic Vice President, occupying the Executive branch of our government. All have been called to help politically implement the purifying of reason, and establishment of the common good as defined by the church of Rome within this country. Not to mention every other country in the world.
The legitimate plurality of temporal options is at the origin of the commitment of Catholics to politics and relates directly to Christian moral and social teaching. It is in the light of this teaching that lay Catholics must assess their participation in political life so as to be sure that it is marked by a coherent responsibility for temporal reality.
The Church recognizes that while democracy is the best expression of the direct participation of citizens in political choices, it succeeds only to the extent that it is based on a correct understanding of the human person. Catholic involvement in political life cannot compromise on this principle, for otherwise the witness of the Christian faith in the world, as well as the unity and interior coherence of the faithful, would be non-existent.
What a mouthful. Isn't it wonderful how simple and to the point papal documents are? Forgive my sarcasm. Nothing could be more obvious from their documents, it seems to me, that the Popes are far more the politician, than religious leaders that wish to simplify and declare religious truth.
Of course the correct understanding of the human person mentioned above, which dictates a Catholics "involvement in political life" is defined by the church of Rome. Which of course again, is nothing but to say that Rome is in charge of the political life of its members, and its members should seek to establish that political life in whatever government or nation they find themselves in. Which of course simply means that Rome should be running that government, and all governments in which Catholics are a majority, or simply capable of making such take place. Nothing new here, Rome intends to rule the world through vast numbers or political intrigue.
What is new in the above statement, is the assertion that without Catholic involvement in political life directed by the churches understanding of the human person, "the unity and interior coherence of the faithful, would be non-existent." Wow! This is basically admitting, that without its involvement in the politics of this world, the Roman Catholic church would not exist. That is very significant, since there is no admonition in new covenant scripture to be involved in the politics of this world. To the contrary, they testify to the exact opposite state of being for the truly faithful.
21 They say unto him, Caesar's. Then saith he unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's. Matt 22:21 (KJV)
The two are to be kept separate always. This for the most obvious of reasons. I will simply state the word POLITICIAN, and ask you to think of the first thing that enters your mind, and we will leave it at that.
In this context, it must be noted also that a well-formed Christian conscience does not permit one to vote for a political program or an individual law which contradicts the fundamental contents of faith and morals. The Christian faith is an integral unity, and thus it is incoherent to isolate some particular element to the detriment of the whole of Catholic doctrine. A political commitment to a single isolated aspect of the Church's social doctrine does not exhaust one's responsibility towards the common good. Nor can a Catholic think of delegating his Christian responsibility to others; rather, the Gospel of Jesus Christ gives him this task, so that the truth about man and the world might be proclaimed and put into action.
This is actually getting boring. More of the same. Catholics are to support the church fully, without deviating from her proscribed course, concerning political action in democratic societies. They are most certainly to put their faith, that is the mandates of the church into political action.
When political activity comes up against moral principles that do not admit of exception, compromise or derogation, the Catholic commitment becomes more evident and laden with responsibility. In the face of fundamental and inalienable ethical demands, Christians must recognize that what is at stake is the essence of the moral law, which concerns the integral good of the human person.
One must ask, what exactly is an inalienable ethical demand? Is this not an oxymoron? While we all have no doubt heard of inalienable rights, what on earth is an inalienable demand.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,"(The Declaration of Independence)
Inalienable : incapable of being alienated, surrendered, or transferred *inalienable rights*
As pointed out in the beginning of linked video, Catholic politicians have taken it upon themselves to redefine and implement their version of unalienable rights as set forth in The Declaration of Independence of these United States. This they do as minions of the papacy, not by the will or consent of the people being governed as the Declaration points out, but by the dictates of the unelected self appointed ruler of this and all nations, the Pope of Rome. This is the repudiation of the Protestant influenced form of government for the people and by the people established by our founding fathers, to be replaced by Roman Catholic influenced government for the Pope and by the Pope. So Anti-Christ and BABYLON THE GREAT, continue mounting the final beast of biblical prophecy that they may ride it and all who follow straight into the lake of fire. So be it.
Do you think for one moment that anyone would read all that garbage? And ditto for your next post. You are free to read all the stuff and then give us a synopsis of it all.
: beam Sun Aug 04, 2019 - 05:50:45
Do you think for one moment that anyone would read all that garbage? And ditto for your next post. You are free to read all the stuff and then give us a synopsis of it all.
Yes I am free to do so for now, but thats for your permission anyway. I feel no responsibility to make anyone read the simple facts of what BABYLON THE GREAT has, is, and continues to be up to. Just to provide the opportunity to those who might wish to know. Go to, find some more accusations against EGW, while BABYLON mounts the final beast of biblical prophecy. You serve her well.
https://codacons.it/making-sunday-sacred-again/
3 Maggio 2019
Making Sunday Sacred Again
fonte: Bloomberg
Chiara Albanese and Jerrold Colten, with Maciej Martewicz Since forming an uncomfortable coalition government a year ago, Italy' s conservative League and anti-establishment Five Star Movement have found themselves at odds on everything from infrastructure and immigration to regulations on prostitution. There' s one thing, though, they agree on: shuttering stores on Sundays. In April, Parliament began debating a law aimed at "returning the weekend to families." Five Star has advocated shutting stores some 45 days a year. The League is proposing a milder version, easing restrictions in the runup to Christmas and other holiday periods. But they both say the laws would reinforce long-standing traditions such as Sunday lunch at home while giving retail workers a needed break and letting would-be shoppers go to Mass. "Town centers are deserted as families spend their day of rest at the mall," says Andrea Dara, a League lawmaker working to find a compromise. The two parties rode to power by tapping into constituencies with little in common: pro-business northerners and young, often unemployed southerners. One thing the two groups share? They' d both be hurt by restrictions on Sunday shopping, according to Istituto Cattaneo, an economic research group in Bologna. The Five Star proposal would shrink gross domestic product by 0.5 percent-9.4 billion ($10.6 billion)-and cost almost 150,000 jobs, the institute said in an April report. That would reduce tax revenue by as much as 2 billion, undercutting government efforts to reboot an economy that' s predicted to see virtually no growth this year, with unemployment stuck at almost 11 percent. "It' s obvious that the plan under discussion isn' t the right way to save commerce," says Carlo Rienzi, chairman of Codacons, a consumer-rights group. "I hope these proposals will be abandoned." Other than in Germany, which requires the bulk of stores to shut their doors on Sunday, most Europeans can shop every day of the week. But blue laws have considerable resonance among the Continent' s new right wing, and two other countries ruled by populists have sought to reinstitute bans. Hungary tried it in 2015 but backed down a year later after consumers balked and an opposition party called for a referendum on the issue. Poland a year ago ordered that stores be shuttered two Sundays a month. Next year the ban is scheduled to be extended to almost every Sunday, but it' s under review after grousing by businesses. Tesco Plc and Biedronka, the country' s biggest retailer, have said they' ve been hurt by the rule. "Keeping shops closed on Sunday is like squeezing toothpaste back into the tube," says Davide Rossi, an attorney in Milan and a director of Aires, a trade group of retailers. The idea "goes against free trade, kills competition, and contradicts constitutional values." Italy long followed the Christian custom of largely shutting down on the Sabbath, but in 2011 the government loosened the rules with a law dubbed Salva Italia (Save Italy) aimed at bolstering retailers in the wake of the financial crisis. Proponents at the time said opening stores on Sunday makes it easier for working people to get their shopping done. But some left-leaning labor groups and far-right conservatives called it a burden on workers and families. "Parents can' t spend even a single day with their kids anymore because they work in a shop all week," Five Star leader Luigi Di Maio said last September when introducing the idea of a ban. "Keeping shops closed on Sunday is like squeezing toothpaste back into the tube" In Rome a parliamentary commission is holding hearings on the issue. The proposal getting the most traction would require stores to close on 26 Sundays a year, plus holidays. But many questions remain: Will the ban apply even to smaller stores? Sunday shopping is likely to be allowed in historic city centers, but should those privileges be extended to malls on the periphery? Will beach destinations be exempted in the summer? Ski resorts in winter? Working out the details is likely to take months, which is fine with opponents-and even the many Italians who remain undecided on the issue. "As an employee, I' d be totally in favor of closures," says Sharon Farina, a clerk in a Rome perfume shop. "But as a consumer, I' m happy to see stores open." THE BOTTOM LINE Most Europeans can shop every day of the week, but blue laws are gaining traction among right-wing parties, with some populist governments reinstituting bans
https://corechristianity.com/resource-library/articles/why-sunday-should-be-a-day-of-rest
Why Sunday Should be a Day of Rest
The fourth commandment teaches us to set aside one day out of seven to rest from our work and to worship God:
Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. (Exod. 20:8–11; cf. Deut. 5:12–15)
We Are Hardwired for One Special Day Every Week
We were created for work, but we were also made to rest. It's interesting that even secular studies have embraced the idea that we need to take a break and relax regularly (see these pieces in the New York Times, The Economist, and Scientific American). Rest is a creational principle—it is embedded in the molecules of our DNA.
We were made not only to rest but also to worship, and what better day to do so than the first day of the week, Sunday—the very day of the week on which Jesus was raised from the dead? God gave us permission to take a break once a week by modeling rest for himself. Take advantage of this special day!
At first, it appears that Jesus was the ultimate Sabbath breaker. The Jewish religious leaders were furious with him for continually healing people on Saturday, which was known to the Jewish people as the "Sabbath" (a sacred or holy day). But if we look closer at the passages where Jesus performed acts of healing on the Sabbath, we'll notice that, far from being a Sabbath breaker, Jesus was a Sabbath keeper. The religious leaders in Jesus' day misunderstood the true purpose of the Sabbath, so they distorted it and added new rules on how to keep it. Jesus exposed the truth: if a man can be circumcised on the Sabbath in order to keep the law of Moses, certainly the healing of a man is acceptable according to the same law (John 7:22–23).
There is one significant difference between the Jewish Sabbath and the Christian Sabbath (or Lord's Day) that is important to note. The Jewish Sabbath mirrors the creation account in Genesis 1–2, where God worked for six days and rested on the seventh. Interestingly though, the Lord's Day reverses this pattern entirely.
According to the Law, we are to work first, and then we are granted rest. Jesus reversed this pattern for us when he perfectly obeyed all of the Ten Commandments and kept the law on our behalf. By living the perfect life, Jesus has met God's perfect standard.
According to the gospel, we are gifted with rest; and then out of gratitude, we actually want to work. Now, we don't have to try to earn God's favor—he is already favorable toward us in his Son. Because of Jesus' work, we start each week with rest—mirroring that eternal Sabbath rest that is already our inheritance in the new creation (Heb. 4:9–10).
Giving thanks to God, we return to our workweek refreshed and thankful for what God has done for us in Christ. Although the day of the week has changed from Saturday to Sunday for Christians, the principle itself remains the same. We are to work for six days and rest for one, according to God's design for us.
The Lord's Day Shows the World We Belong to Him
One of the most popular catechisms of the Reformation was the Heidelberg Catechism, which opens with a beautiful statement: I am not my own, but belong both body and soul to my faithful savior Jesus Christ. Do we view Sunday as our own time, or is it God's time? By attending church on Sunday, we show that we really belong to Christ. The question Christians ask should never be "who am I?" Instead, it should be "whose am I?"
Since we belong to God, our time—and even a portion of the day—is not our own but instead belongs to another (God) and to others (our neighbors). Our culture celebrates Sunday as an extra free day—as "Sunday Fun Day"—but, for Christians, the first day of the week is to be set aside as a day for rest and worship, and for works of necessity and mercy. We may also have the opportunity to tell our neighbors about the gospel or to invite them to come to church with us the next week.
The Lord Blesses His People on the Lord's Day
In the public service each week, God pours out his rich blessings upon us. Through the preached Word, the Lord's Supper, and baptism, God gives to his people generously what we are most in need of receiving. Just as we need physical food in order to be healthy and survive, we also need spiritual food to preserve our souls and nourish ourselves unto eternal life.
We are also encouraged through the fellowship of the saints; and unlike weekdays, we have more time on Sunday to spend opening up our homes to others (hospitality), reading the Word (or other edifying books), and praying. On this special sacred day, the Lord blesses us in ways we are not blessed any other day of the week.
Gen 4:1 And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD. 2 And she again bare his brother Abel. And Abel was a keeper of sheep, but
Cain was a tiller of the ground. 3 And in process of time it came to pass,
that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the LORD. 4 And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof.
And the LORD had respect unto Abel and to his offering: 5 But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell. 6 And the LORD said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen? 7 If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.
Cain and Abel both worshipped God and brought an offering to Him. Cain though, thought he could bring an offering of his own creation, the works of his own hands. His offering was rejected by God because it did not typify the only offering acceptable to Him, the LAMB OF GOD representing Jesus Christ. Sunday sacredness proponents think they can create their own Sabbath day of rest in place of the one created by Christ Jesus Himself, and kept by Him by way of example when here as one of us. His life, His righteousness, and His death, are the only acceptable offering to God the Father. There is no other name in heaven or on earth whereby all must be saved. Abandoning the Sabbath Christ created, kept, and is Lord of, and replacing it with one of humanities own creation which He never kept, created, or even acknowledged, cannot be spiritually healthy.
1Jn 2:1 My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father,
Jesus Christ the righteous: 2 And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world. 3 And hereby we do know that we know him,
if we keep his commandments. 4 He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. 5
But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected: hereby know we that we are in him. 6 He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked.2Jn 1:4 I rejoiced greatly that I found of thy children walking in truth, as we have received a commandment from the Father. 5 And now I beseech thee, lady, not as though I wrote a new commandment unto thee, but that which we had from the beginning, that we love one another. 6 And this is love,
that we walk after his commandments. This is the commandment, That, as ye have heard from the beginning, ye should walk in it. 7 For many deceivers are entered into the world, who confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist. 8 Look to yourselves, that we lose not those things which we have wrought, but that we receive a full reward. 9
Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. 10 If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed: 11 For he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds.
Jesus Christ created this world and the seventh day Sabbath. He gave the seventh day Sabbath to Israel as well when He formed the nation to preserve a knowledge of Himself in this world, speaking the command verbally to the entire nation and writing it with His own finger in tables of stone twice. He kept the seventh day sabbath and taught its proper observance when here on earth as one of us for our salvation. He also declared that He did not come to abolish the commandments but rather to establish them. Those who are His, ought to walk as He walked, and live by His doctrine. Sunday sacredness has nothing to do with either. It replaces that established by God, with that created by fallen humanity. Christians of today would do well not to follow the example of those Jews who rejected Jesus when here as one of us.
Mat 15:3 But he answered and said unto them,
Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition? 4 For God commanded, saying, Honour thy father and mother: and, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death. 5 But ye say, Whosoever shall say to his father or his mother, It is a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; 6 And honour not his father or his mother, he shall be free. Thus have ye made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition. 7 Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying, 8 This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. 9 But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.Mar 7:6 He answered and said unto them,
Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. 7 Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. 8 For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do. 9 And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition. 10 For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother; and, Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death: 11 But ye say, If a man shall say to his father or mother, It is Corban, that is to say, a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; he shall be free. 12 And ye suffer him no more to do ought for his father or his mother; 13 Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye.Should the commandment of God concerning the seventh day Sabbath be played aside, that the tradition of Sunday sacredness might take its place?
https://catholicherald.co.uk/issues/may-25th-2018/how-europeans-are-fighting-back-against-sunday-trading/
All emphasis in following quote from link above is mine.
How Europeans are fighting back against Sunday trading
Matthew Schmitz 24 May, 2018
For the past year, the Castel Romano Designer Outlet 12 miles south of Rome has been the site of a battle over the Sabbath. Its owner, the McArthur Glen Group, operates outlet malls in nine nations and prides itself on its "long-established heritage of drawing inspiration from regional architecture, building materials and traditions" – which explains why the mall looks like a pasteboard Italian village. There is a grandiose cheapness to the place, as if Italy itself were being sold at 70 per cent off an inflated price.
Valeria Ferrara had asked her boss at the Calvin Klein outlet for an occasional Sunday off to spend with her husband and two-year-old son. Rather than grant her request, the company transferred her to a location 30 miles away. Ferrara protested against the decision by chaining herself outside the store. Earlier this month, faced with negative publicity and pressure from a local union, Calvin Klein abandoned its plan to tear mother from son.
We should be cheered by Valeria's triumph and sobered by how rare it is. Once conceived as a universal right, Sabbath rest is increasingly the privilege of the wealthy few. According to the European Observatory of Working Life, labour on Sunday is becoming more common, with 30 per cent of Europeans working at least one Sunday a month. People in the poorer nations of the European periphery (Greece, Italy, etc) are much likelier to work several Sundays a month than those in wealthier countries. Germans work fewer Sundays than anyone else – even as their political and financial leaders press Sunday labour on other nations.
Ferrara's case only occurred because Italy liberalised Sunday labour in 2011 at the urging of Prime Minister Mario Monti, a technocrat installed to please German bankers. Monti's premiership showed how thoroughly the European Union now embodies that principle attributed to Emperor Joseph II of Austria: "Everything for the people, nothing by the people." One of the things instituted for but not by the Italian people was a provision that compelled 4.7 million of them to work on Sunday.
Populist movements across Europe have begun to push back. Earlier this year, Poland restricted almost all Sunday shopping with a law backed by the Catholic Church and the Solidarity trade union. Hungary banned Sunday shopping in 2015 but repealed the measure a year later, while retaining 12 public holidays and the right of workers to take Sundays off.
The Five Star Movement and the League, which have just formed a joint government in Italy, both campaigned against Monti's reform. As Alessandra Bocchi has reported, in 2013 Five Star introduced a law that would bring back Sunday closing. "Let's once again put the person at the centre of public policy, not these unsuccessful market theories," said Luigi di Maio, Five Star's leader. His party's proposal was denounced by the Council of Europe.
Campaigning against Sunday shopping allows populists to combine an economic message with a cultural one, standing in defence simultaneously of workers' rights and a Christian command. It is no coincidence that the two are connected. Only by recognising the authority of God can we be freed from the worldly powers that enslave and oppress us – including those found in the market.
In the case of sabbath laws, refusal to acknowledge Christ's reign has directly led to the economisation of everyday life. The EU's 1993 Working Time Directive stated that the minimum weekly rest period "shall, in principle, include Sunday."
But in 1996, the European Court of Justice annulled this rule, saying that "the Council has failed to explain why Sunday, as a weekly rest day, is more closely connected with the health and safety of workers than any other day of the week." In the name of a shallow secularism, the Court opened the door to the exploitation of millions of Valeria Ferraras.
Only those who recognise that the common good concerns a man's soul can explain why we should legislate rest on Sunday: to honour the God who on that day rose. This is why we call Sunday the Lord's Day – domenica, domingo, dimanche.
We first hear the term in the Book of Revelation, where John reports that it was "on the Lord's Day" that he had his great vision. Ever since it has been the day on which we glimpse paradise, enjoying freedom in communion with God. As Benedict XVI put it, "On the Sabbath there are no masters and no servants; there is only the freedom of all the children of God ... For this reason the Sabbath is the heart of all social legislation."
Christians down the centuries have defended the day we now neglect. When the 4th-century Martyrs of Abitinae were asked why they had defied Diocletian's decree forbidding Sunday worship, they said, "Sine dominico non possumus", which means "We cannot live without Sunday. We cannot give up this thing of the Lord."
It is striking how many Catholics have given up this thing of the Lord. Even those who can afford Sunday rest do nothing to guarantee it for others. As Benedict XVI saw, Christian politics begins with the Sabbath. Our task is to secure it in law – not as a privilege for the powerful, but as a right enjoyed by all.
Matthew Schmitz is senior editor at First Things
God never commanded anything about Sunday rest. No one is forcing people to work on Sundays. I have past up many a job because they wanted me to work on the Sabbath. Why will people continue to reject the notion that Sunday laws will one day be forced upon all, when so much proof exists that millions and powerful religious and political leaders most obviously intend to make it so?
That is only wishful thinking Amo, propaganda started by your false prophet. If you are really concerned about a day you should start worrying about the Muslim's Fridays.
: beam Sun Aug 18, 2019 - 15:41:16
That is only wishful thinking Amo, propaganda started by your false prophet. If you are really concerned about a day you should start worrying about the Muslim's Fridays.
Close your eyes, and stop your ears if you wish. This will not make what is actually transpiring in front of all, go away.
https://scholarship.shu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.bing.com/&httpsredir=1&article=1084&context=shlj
Intersting link with article addressing the Sunday Rest Bill of 1888. Quote below from link above emphasis mine.
THE SUNDAY REST BILL AND THE BATTLE TO KEEP THE CIVIL SABBATH
Both the SDBC and the SDAC continued to oppose the bill in the months following the hearing, particularly in regard to exposing the "frauds" under which the bill was perpetuated.144 The churches were determined to show that the bill was not for the workingmen, but rather only for Christians.145 They wrote numerous articles describing the history of national Sunday laws, beginning with Constantine in 321 A.D. and explaining that every Sunday law since then had a religious basis.146 Therefore, they reasoned Christian lobbyists could not claim that this Sunday law was based on civil motivations, rather than on religious motivations.147 Crafts himself, when speaking to the Knights of Labor in November of 1888, stated, "[a] weekly day of rest has never been secured in any land except on the basis of a religious obligation. Take the religion out and you take the rest out."148
Further, as questioned by SDAC leader E.J. Waggoner, if the workingmen were "clamoring for" the Sunday Rest Bill, why were none of them at the hearing, and why did Crafts believe it was necessary to travel to speak with them?149 Crafts' own recording of his meeting with the Knights of Labor showed that the workingmen needed to be convinced of the benefits of the bill, at least at first, as they were worried about losing a day's worth of pay.150 A local newspaper described another such meeting with the National Council of Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers in October of 1888, a "victory" for Crafts, as if he had convinced the workingmen of his cause, rather than the other way around.151 Additionally, at least some workingmen were not convinced. A labor reform paper titled Ideas of Reform, which was dedicated to the interests of workingmen, advocated against the passage of the Sunday Rest Bill in January of 1889, stating that the bill was "an attempt to unite Church and State," and that, "14 million petitioners should not be allowed to dictate how 60 million [would] worship."152
Besides the "workingmen fraud," E.J. Waggoner also sought to expose the "petition fraud," claiming that the petitions originally submitted to the Senate on behalf of a national Sunday law did not amass fourteen million signatures, but rather only an eighth of that number.153 Many organizations and groups signed on behalf of their members.154 For example, although only around 200 representatives from the Knights of Labor signed the petitions, their signatures were counted as 200,000, or the entire number of the members of the organization.155 Additionally, Christian lobbyists confirmed that the signature of one man––Cardinal James Gibbons––was counted as 7,300,000 or the entire number of Catholics in the nation.156 Thus, Waggoner argued the bill did not have as much widespread support as the Christian lobbyists claimed.157
The very same arguments are put forth today by the Catholic Church and other Christians lobbying for Sunday rest laws abroad. They have been successful in several European nations.
FACTS OF FAITH
by Christian Edwardson
A MESSAGE FOR OUR TIMES
205
We shall here refer to one other similar denial. In the Roman Catholic paper, Shepherd of the Valley, there appeared an article by the editor, in which he stated: "If Catholics ever attain, which they surely will, though at a distant day, the immense numerical majority in the United States, religious liberty, as at present understood, will be at an end." A Protestant lecturer, who made use of this quotation, was bitterly arraigned in a double-column front-page article in the Catholic Standard and Times for his false statements regarding Catholics; for, it pointed out, if he had finished the quotation with the words which followed, "so say our enemies," it would have reversed its meaning. The incident would have passed off at the expense of the Protestant lecturer, had not the Western Watchman of July 24, 1913, continued the quotation still further, declaring:
"The whole quotation should read: 'If Catholics ever attain, which they surely will, though at a distant day, the immense numerical majority in the United States, religious liberty, as at present understood, will be at an end. So say our enemies; so say we.' "- Quoted in "Protestant Magazine," October, 1913, p. 474.
Why those who tried to deny their former statements should leave out the words, "so say we," is very evident. But what can we think of those who publicly deny facts to screen their church from unfavorable public opinions, unless they act from the motive that "the end justifies the means," and that "heretics" have no moral right to facts which they would misuse. (See also pages 64 and 65 of this book.)
Of course if or when other Christians, lefty progressives and or secularists can be convinced to join such efforts, such a majority would no longer be needed. Nevertheless, the papacies policy of continually supporting and even facilitating mass illegal immigration of predominantly Catholic migrants from the failing nations to our south, is a big plus toward this goal.
https://www.total-croatia-news.com/politics/39829-work-free-sunday
President Supports Initiative for Work-Free Sunday
ZAGREB, November 25, 2019 - President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović said on Monday that she supported an initiative to for non-working Sunday, announcing that she would ask the relevant ministry to consider the proposal to adopt legislation that would protect workers and assist families.
After the president receives representatives of the Creation Sunday Alliance in her office, one of the representatives for the alliance and former MEP, Marijana Petir underscored that Sunday was family time.
She presented findings of a survey showing citizens see Sunday as family time which is why they ask for non-working Sundays. The survey conducted earlier this year show that 82 percent of Croatians support the introduction of a work-free Sunday in all stores in Croatia. The survey covered 1,000 respondents.
The biggest problem, she added, was seen in the retail sector where the majority of workers are women who work non-stop and sometimes for several weeks without one day of rest and earn a minimum wage even though most retail chains owned by foreigners are closed on Sundays in their countries of origin.
The alliance president, Friar Božo Vuleta, says that not only do stores that are open on Sundays fail to contribute to the economy, employers themselves have realised that due to the drain of the labour force, staying open on Sundays is not worth it and many of them are hopeful that legislation will be adopted banning work in the retail sector on Sunday. Some have even decided of their own accord not to work on Sundays.
"A new law would just reflect real needs and the will of almost two-thirds of Croatian citizens, Vuleta said.
The leader of the retail segment in the SSSH trade union federation, Zlatica Štulić, confirmed that there was no need for stores to remain open 0 to 24 hours, 365 days of the year because the social damage of that work were far greater than economic benefit with regard to deterioration of workers' health.
https://www.antiguaobserver.com/lower-house-passes-the-public-holiday-amendment-bill-2019/
Lower House passes the Public Holiday (Amendment) Bill 2019
Sunday is one step closer to being concretised as the 12th public holiday recognised by the laws of Antigua and Barbuda.
Yesterday, the Public Holiday (Amendment) Bill 2019 was passed in the Lower House of Parliament at which time the Minister of Legal Affairs Steadroy "Cutie" Benjamin stated that a decision was made to uphold the recommendations made by stakeholders in the recent consultations.
"Antigua is over 80 percent or more Christian and what came through this discussion Mr Speaker, is the fact that we understood the significance of maintaining Sunday as a common law holiday.
"But we went further Mr Speaker, and...this government is very happy to endorse the recommendations of those persons who got together. And we will make Sunday, for the first time in Antigua and Barbuda, a recognised public holiday," he said
Benjamin, however, highlighted that provisions have been made in the Bill to bar individuals from seeking the premium rate for working on a Sunday (150 percent) and from withholding their labour.
The Attorney General said: "Whereas on Good Friday and Christmas Day employees required to work are compensated at the rate set up in the Labour Code, this is not given to employees working on Sundays.
"The law does say that if it's a holiday, nobody can force you to work but that doesn't apply in this case. You see, we must understand that Antigua and Barbuda is a service society. The hotel industry, LIAT, hospital, the police, the pharmacies, the supermarkets, the dry cleaners, the small businesses — they require work on a Sunday."
On the other hand, the amendment was met with slight resistance by some members of government, such as Minister of Health Molwyn Joseph, who questioned the significance of referring to Sunday as a holiday and suggested it be called a rest and worship day.
"We should, as a country, decide that if we accept both Sunday and Saturday as religious rest days for worship, we should so say in the law and it does not attract overtime if anyone works," Joseph remarked.
Prime Minister Gaston Browne then acceded to that recommendation saying: "They are really rest and worship days; that's how it should be reflected. We don't have to continue that archaic tradition of a holiday. Sunday is not a holiday. It is really a rest and worship day and, as you said, we captured both the Adventists and the Sunday worshipers."
However, Minister of Social Transformation, Samantha Marshall stated that the amendment should remain as agreed upon by the stakeholders.
"Based on the Bill that was presented, we had consultations with all the necessary stakeholders and the necessary stakeholders have all agreed to what is presented here. If we want to recognise further an actual worship or rest day, I think that requires us having a more holistic consultation on a number of other aspects.
"So, I believe at this stage, let us not go against what those stakeholders agreed on. Let us proceed with this but agree that this cannot be the end," Marshall said.
The Bill was therefore passed without amendments.
Meanwhile, it was noted that a few other amendments will be made to the law.
The Public Holiday (Amendment) Bill 2019 states that "when Christmas falls on a Saturday or Sunday, the following Monday and Tuesday shall be public holidays" and "when Boxing Day falls on a Sunday, the following Monday and Tuesday shall be public holidays."
https://www.facebook.com/FOX5NY/posts/should-all-stores-close-on-sunday-to-allow-staff-a-day-off-to-recuperate/10158780758051320/
Take the FOX news poll. Should all stores close on Sundays?
https://twitter.com/CamGuthrie/status/1241586949879730176
Mayor suggesting Sunday closings after coronavirus threat ends.
This link was provided in the opening post of this thread. You are welcome to read the book provided there and learns some things. Plenty of people have been adversely effected by Sunday laws throughout history. True Christianity is not about simple self, and how self alone is effected by anything. To the contrary, it is all about concern for the well being and salvation of others. Deception destroys. Any "Christian" anywhere forcing their beliefs upon another through civil legislation is deceived and in danger of losing salvation.
I am amused to see people saying this when they are busily and actively spreading deception themselves. There is nothing about SDA doctrine that is even remotely biblical. SDA's actually ignore large parts of the Bible that don't agree with their theology. Do you think Christ will just give you a pass in the future when you have to give an account and He asks you why you forwarded a doctrine that is easily discerned as completely wrong? I know you
believe that yours is the only one, true church, and I know you
believe that only SDA's will go to heaven, but you couldn't be more wrong. Your works aren't buying you salvation. They are buying you alienation.
: Cobalt1959 Tue Apr 21, 2020 - 05:58:07
I am amused to see people saying this when they are busily and actively spreading deception themselves. There is nothing about SDA doctrine that is even remotely biblical. SDA's actually ignore large parts of the Bible that don't agree with their theology. Do you think Christ will just give you a pass in the future when you have to give an account and He asks you why you forwarded a doctrine that is easily discerned as completely wrong? I know you believe that yours is the only one, true church, and I know you believe that only SDA's will go to heaven, but you couldn't be more wrong. Your works aren't buying you salvation. They are buying you alienation.
AS is obvious from your above statement, you are ignorant about what I believe and why, and what SDA's believe and why. You have a right to be so though, so please do ramble on. You know of course that the historical facts I share on this thread as well as the majority of the articles concerning the issue on hand, are not SDA doctrine or information. You are just denying historical facts, and news articles addressing what is taking place in relation to Sunday sacredness and or laws.
https://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/is-the-coronavirus-pandemic-a-judgment-from-god
Article quoted below from link above, emphasis is mine.
Is the Coronavirus Pandemic a Judgment From God?
COMMENTARY: The key to interpreting rightly the biblical passages on divine chastisement is to read them in light of the distinction between God's positive will and his permissive will.
Mary Healy
Is the coronavirus pandemic a judgment from God? It is a question being debated by many Christians — even bishops and cardinals.
Pope Francis, in the extraordinary prayer service broadcast live from an empty St. Peter's Square on March 27, prayed:
"Lord, you are calling to us, calling us to faith. ... It is not the time of your judgment, but of our judgment: a time to choose what matters and what passes away, a time to separate what is necessary from what is not."
On the other hand, some theologians and ordinary people have noted that many passages in Scripture speak of calamities, including pestilence (deadly infectious disease), as God's judgment on human sin.
God warns his people, for instance, that if they rebel against him, "I will send pestilence among you, and you shall be delivered into the hand of the enemy" (Leviticus 26:25). Even in the New Testament, the Book of Revelation depicts a rider on a pale horse who was "given authority over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword and with famine and with pestilence and by wild beasts of the earth" (Revelation 6:8).
These perspectives are not as contradictory as they may seem. The key to interpreting rightly the biblical passages on divine chastisement is to read them in light of a distinction that has become traditional in Catholic theology: the distinction between God's positive will and his permissive will.
God is infinitely good — "God is light, and in him is no darkness at all" (1 John 1:5) — and therefore he cannot directly will evil. Rather, he permits evil because in his infinite wisdom he is able to bring a greater good out of it.
Thus, where Scripture speaks of God "sending" a calamity, it does not mean that God directly causes it. Rather, out of his great love for us, he allows human beings to experience the consequences of our choices. When society deliberately turns away from God, choosing to worship idols of its own making, as our own global culture has done, it removes itself from God's blessing and protection and therefore exposes itself to various kinds of evil.
God takes our freedom seriously — far more seriously than we do. And his judgment on sin is to allow us to experience the wages of our sin. But that judgment is with a remedial purpose. God's desire is always that his children turn back to him and be healed and restored. "For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Lord God; so turn, and live" (Ezekiel 18:32).
Scripture also makes clear that we are not to judge the culpability of any individual. Because human beings are so interconnected, the innocent often suffer along with the guilty.
Jesus explained this in regard to two disasters of his own time: a political massacre in which some Galilean Jews were killed and a construction accident:
"Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. Or those 18 on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: Do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish" (Luke 13:1-5).
A large-scale disaster is therefore not a warrant to condemn others. It is a call to examine our own lives and get right with God, aware that none of us knows how much time we have left on earth.
Clearly, the virus that causes COVID-19 is evil. It is bringing sickness, death, havoc and destruction — all contrary to God's plan for the fullness of life for the human beings he created in his image. Jesus said, "The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly" (John 10:10). Moreover, the evil one is seeking to exploit this disease to bring further evils: fear and panic, selfishness and greed, tension and division in families, acrimony and blame among government leaders.
So we ought to pray — indeed, to pray and fast fervently, with great confidence in God — for an end to the virus.
One of the mercies of God is that the pandemic took off during Lent. The first reading at Mass on Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent, gives us a clue about how to pray. The reading is from the prophet Joel, who prophesied at a time when Judah was experiencing a natural disaster, a plague of locusts that had destroyed all the crops and was threatening to bring mass starvation (not unlike this year's devastating locust plague in East Africa).
In the face of this calamity, God calls out to his people:
Even now, says the LORD,
return to me with your whole heart,
with fasting, and weeping, and mourning;
Rend your hearts, not your garments,
and return to the LORD, your God.
For gracious and merciful is he. ....
Blow the trumpet in Zion!
Proclaim a fast;
call an assembly;
Gather the people,
notify the congregation. ...
Between the porch and the altar
let the priests, the ministers of the LORD, weep,
And say, "Spare, O LORD, your people,
and make not your heritage a reproach,
with the nations ruling over them!
Why should they say among the peoples,
'Where is their God?'"
The prophet then succinctly records God's merciful response:
Then the LORD was stirred to concern for his land
and took pity on his people (2:12-18).
The Lord restored an abundant food supply, but he did even more than that: He promised an extraordinary outpouring of his Holy Spirit, not only on his own people but on the whole world, bringing salvation and the knowledge of God (Joel 2:28-32).
So today, we are summoned to pray, fast and repent, for our own sake and the sake of the world. The prayer of Daniel during another national calamity provides a great model of such humble, contrite intercessory prayer (Daniel 9).
Here are a few specific ways Catholics might examine our consciences, especially during this Holy Week as we enter into the mystery of Christ's passion.
We've been robbed of the ability to attend Mass and receive the Eucharist. Have we sometimes taken the Eucharist for granted? Have we been lax and lukewarm in our practice of the faith, squeezing in Mass (if at all) around all our other priorities, instead of making the Lord the first priority of our lives?
Just as a time of abstinence for a married couple can deepen their love by spurring them to express their affection in other ways, so this involuntary Eucharistic fast can be an opportunity to renew our intimacy with the Lord, especially through prayer and the reading of Scripture, so that, when we are finally able to receive Holy Communion again, we may partake with greater fervor than ever before.
Half the human race is under some form of lockdown, as if suddenly consigned to an involuntary retreat. Have we sometimes failed to honor the Lord by keeping the Lord's Day? Have we treated Sundays just like any other day, as a time to go shopping, get work done and pursue our own agenda, instead of taking time to deepen our relationship with Jesus and relax with family and friends? In the Old Testament, God decreed that Judah would go into exile for a time corresponding to all the sabbaths they had broken, "until the land has retrieved its lost sabbaths" (2 Chronicles 36:21). So now, perhaps our frenetic society is retrieving its lost sabbaths.
Millions of people are being constrained to spend more time in close quarters with family members than ever before. Have we sometimes taken for granted our spouse, children, siblings or parents? Have we placed them far down on our list of priorities? Have we sometimes dealt with our own sense of helplessness, fear or frustration by taking it out on them?
This week is an opportune time to ask forgiveness not only of God, but also of those closest to us, and to express our love for them. Parents especially can model this for their children.
Sports events and other forms of entertainment have ground to a halt. Have we made an idol of sports or entertainment?
The economy is tanking. Have we made an idol of money and possessions? Have we been trying to worship both God and mammon?
If Christians humble themselves before the Lord in prayer, fasting and repentance, then, and only then, will we be able to credibly call the whole world to repentance and faith in Christ. In this time of crisis, as people come face-to-face with human limitations and the reality of death, we may be given an unprecedented opportunity to bear witness to Christ.
As in the time of Joel, God's plan is for more than simply an end to the calamity: He desires to bring all nations to the saving knowledge of his Son, who is victorious over sin, sickness, Satan and death.
Mary Healy, S.T.D., is professor of Scripture at Sacred Heart Major Seminary in Detroit.
The problem with the above testimony in relation to what the article terms the Lord's day, is of course that scripture never refers to Sunday or the first day of the week as such, or commands or even suggests it as a day of worship. No one will ever be punished by God, or left to suffer the effects of calamities because they sinned against God by not keeping a day holy, that He never said to keep holy. To the contrary, humanity making up their own holy day apart from any instruction from God or His prophets and apostles to do so, is in fact creating one of the idols this article itself addresses. According to the Catholic church, this day is to be exalted by civil legislation apart from the word of God. This idol has been, and is being established by civil legislation as this thread has noted, notes, and will continue to note. Nevertheless, the majority and many on these boards remain in denial. So be it.
https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Tiruchirapalli/total-lockdown/article31339448.ece
Total lockdown on Sundays in Thanjavur district
The district administration has announced that a total lockdown will be imposed in the district on Sundays during the extended lockdown period.
All shops, excluding pharmacies and health-related services, would remain shut on all Sundays.
It has been decided to issue colour cards to each household to regulate movement of people on roads during the extended lockdown period. The cards would be issued in three colours: green card-holders would be allowed to go out for purchase of essentials on Mondays and Thursdays from 6 a.m. to 1 p.m.; blue cardholders on Tuesdays and Fridays and rose cardholders on Wednesdays and Saturdays.....................................
https://www.msn.com/en-in/autos/news/ker-shops-remain-shut-vehicles-off-the-roads-as-total-lockdown-on-sundays-comes-into-force/ar-BB13RxyH
Ker: Shops remain shut, vehicles off the roads as total lockdown on Sundays comes into force
Thiruvananthauram, May 10 () Shops remained shut and vehicles were off the roads in Kerala as the stategovernment's order on total shutdown on Sundays came intoforce since morning as part of the efforts to prevent thespread of COVID-19. The Left government had on Saturday night issued anorder on "total shutdown across the state on Sundays" while exempting shops selling essential items and essentialservices...........................
With a view to prevent the spread of COVID-19, improvethe quality of life, reduce the carbon emissions, protect the environment and greenery of the State, the Standard OperatingProtocols (SOPs) for lockdown would be observed on Sundays across the State, the order by Chief Secretary Tom Jose said.
"Sundays will be observed as total shutdown days untilfurther orders," it said.
"Movement of persons on Sundays are allowed only for health emergencies, government servants on emergency duties and persons engaged in activities connected with COVID-19 containment, persons involved in the activities from exempted in the order, priests and other religious persons responsible for conducting rituals in worship places," the order said.
Movement of persons, if case of any exigencies, willbe allowed only with the travel passes obtained from District Collector or police authorities concerned, the order stated adding certain major roads of Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi and Kozhikode will also remain closed on Sundays.
Covid-19 containment is being used to implement Sunday closing laws in many places. As pointed out in the highlighted areas in article above, the mechanism of implementation is Covid-19, but Green Deal or climate change agenda measures are added to the reasons for doing so. These laws will no doubt continue to be implemented according to climate change regulations after Covid-19 threat ends. This is in accordance with the Pope's suggestion in his last Encyclical, Laudato si'. The end approaches.
: Amo
The problem with the above testimony in relation to what the article terms the Lord's day, is of course that scripture never refers to Sunday or the first day of the week as such, or commands or even suggests it as a day of worship
Scripture actually DOES command it.
Hebrews 10,25Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful that promised;) And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works: Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching. For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversariesSOME Christians were assembling JUST on the Sabbath, in the Synagogue - they
weren't assembling "
THEMSELVES TOGETHER" as the Apostolic command stated. Scripture is explicit that Christians are to assemble THEMSELVES together and this day since Apostolic times has been Sunday.
1Corinthians 16,1Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I have given order to the churches of Galatia, even so do ye. Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come.
It is forbidden to take a collection up on the Sabbath, Jews today don't do it and they didn't do at the time of Jesus or earlier either. Christians were assembling THEMSELVES together on the 1st day of the week just like the Bible (and secular history) affirms. Claiming that some conspiracy happened whereas the Pope or some other element of the Catholic Church supplanted the Sabbath with Sunday is simply a canard for the uneducated in Scripture and history.
https://www.breakingbelizenews.com/2020/04/09/complete-shutdown-announced-for-businesses-in-cayo-on-sunday/
Complete shutdown announced for businesses in Cayo on Sunday
Ву ВВN Ѕtаff: Тhе Gоvеrnmеnt оf Веlіzе'ѕ ѕummаrу оf Ѕtаtutоrу Іnѕtrumеnt 52 оf 2020 іndісаtеѕ thаt оn Ѕundауѕ іn thе Сауо Dіѕtrісt, thеrе muѕt bе а соmрlеtе ѕhutdоwn оf buѕіnеѕѕеѕ (ехсерt еntіtіеѕ dеѕіgnаtеd аѕ 24-hоur аnd ѕеvеn dауѕ а wееk аrе аllоwеd tо ореrаtе. Тhеѕе іnсludе fооd mіllѕ, оіl рrоduсtіоn, ѕugаr, сіtruѕ аnd аррrоvеd fооd fасtоrіеѕ, роrt ореrаtіоnѕ, рublіс utіlіtіеѕ.)
Аnу mоvеmеntѕ оn Ѕundау muѕt bе bу еѕѕеntіаl wоrkеrѕ оnlу оr fоr еmеrgеnсіеѕ оnlу.
Have you been to Jerusalem lately, most of the businesses are closed down there between Friday and Saturday night. It should be no more shocking that a place primarily made up of Christians would slow things down on Sunday than it would for a place primarily made up of Jews would do the same thing for Saturday. There is nothing sinister going on here Amo.
https://www.tiranatimes.com/?p=145065
Albanian gov't tightens restrictive measures amid COVID-19
TIRANA, March 28 - As of Monday, only one person per household will be allowed to go out in order to do grocery shopping or run errands for one hour a day between 5 a.m. and 1 p.m. in Albania. Each person is required to apply online or via text message in order to receive the movement authorization by the Albanian government.
However, the authorization is not required for those who go to work. Moreover, those who surpass the 1-hour permit will not be fined, as this only serves to regulate the movement of people. As of now, no special requirements have been announced for foreigners currently living in Albania.
Citizens may apply for the permit in two ways. One way requires sending a a text message to 55 155, stating the ID card number and the time during which one chooses to run their errands. The authorization will be received within 24 hours.
The second way requires downloading the e-Albania app or going directly to the website, where citizens have to register an account and apply under 'Leje per dalje' (Permit to go out). In this case, the authorization will be received immediately.
In both cases, the police will check if the citizen is authorized to move during the permitted curfew by looking at each person's ID card number, while the elderly will be prohibited from going out at all.
Meanwhile, the Albanian government has restricted all movement from 1 p.m. on Saturday to 5 a.m. on Monday, thus prohibiting all activity and movement on Sunday.
: Cathlodox Fri May 15, 2020 - 09:20:46
Have you been to Jerusalem lately, most of the businesses are closed down there between Friday and Saturday night. It should be no more shocking that a place primarily made up of Christians would slow things down on Sunday than it would for a place primarily made up of Jews would do the same thing for Saturday. There is nothing sinister going on here Amo.
Coming from a member of a denomination which believes and preaches civil legislation should support Sunday closings, the above does not carry much weight. Any government closures supporting any religion or religious observance is sinister. In the last several years, Israel has also been embracing Sunday closures. Yes there is definitely something sinister going on here, as the witness of this thread has continued to testify for several years now.
https://www.chaniapost.eu/2020/03/25/govt-announces-changes-to-supermarket-hours-no-more-sunday-opening/
Gov't announces changes to supermarket hours, no more Sunday opening
The govenrment on Tuesday announced changes to supermarket opening hours, which had been extended to respond to additional demand amid restrictions on movement imposed to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
As of Thursday, supermarkets will be open from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. from Monday to Friday, from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Saturday and will be closed on Sundays.
The opening of supermarkets on Sundays had been broadly denounced by labor groups as an unacceptable burden on supermarket workers.
Labor groups or unions are very active about Sunday closings. The Catholic Church is also very active among them.
https://cyprus-mail.com/2020/04/03/coronavirus-shoppers-and-supermarkets-say-sunday-closing-makes-no-sense/
Coronavirus: Shoppers and supermarkets say Sunday closing makes no sense
Shoppers and supermarkets alike are unhappy with the latest restriction imposed by the government that will see supermarkets closed from this Sunday.
The decision to close supermarkets, grocery shops, bakeries and butcheries on Sundays for the next few weeks is meant to protect shop workers in essential services. Kiosks are allowed to remain open under the decree but can only sell a list of items decreed under previous regulations (listed below).
"For sure it is a mistake to restrict hours even more so more people will be in the supermarkets at the same time," the head of the supermarket association Andreas Hadjiadamou told the Cyprus Mail. "We hope they will have second thoughts on the matter but I don't think it will happen."
He believes the measure is contrary to what common sense dictates, namely that opening up the hours would mean less people thus less crowded places, and thinks those who were against opening the supermarkets on Sundays before a relevant legislation was passed are trying again to have their way.
Those meant to be protected also disagree. "What does it help us?" A supervisor of a big supermarket in Nicosia who didn't want to be named said. "You see there are 20 people waiting outside the place now [on Friday afternoon]. They shouldn't be standing there, these large gatherings are not allowed and are dangerous. Imagine how many there will be on Saturday when they all know the shops will be closed on Sunday."
A cashier shrugged. "I guess we will feel a bit safer, as one day we will not be surrounded by people. But they will all be back on Monday, even those who don't need anything, because people just come and buy a few things to get out of the house."
One of the shoppers queuing outside also commented.
"I hate crowds at all times. Normally I would go shopping first thing in the morning when they open and are empty. Now they already force me to go after 10am, so that leaves the afternoons because I work during the day. I don't understand this decision at all. They are making crazy times even worse."
Only kiosks will remain open on Sundays, and they are allowed to sell the following:
Newspapers and magazines
Cigarettes and other tobacco related products
Batteries and other small items such as extension cables and alarm clocks
Items related to photography and blank computer disks
Telephone cards, prepaid mobile connection packages, mobile phone accessories, fax and photocopier services
Bandages, cotton, first aid kits, condoms, sanitary napkins, baby and adult diapers, toilet paper, napkins, tissue, shaving, deodorants, shampoos, soaps, toiletries, creams, combs, hairbrushes
Stationery and other related items
Christmas and Easter items, balloons, sunglasses, hats, sticks, nail clippers, rosaries, keychains and imitation jewelry
Charcoal, motorcycles, cutlery, glasses, disposable plates and gas cylinders
Gifts and gift-wrapping materials
Packaged dairy products and packaged sausages, eggs, milk, jams, butter, margarine, honey, instant soups, oils in up to one-litre containers
Tea, instant coffee, sugar and sugar substitutes, salt and ground coffee
Carbonated drinks, juices, bottled water, ready-made coffees, beer, bottled drinks with less than 5 per cent alcohol content, ice creams and ice cubes
Chocolates, wafers, biscuits, sugars, crisps, croissants, dried breakfast cereals, packaged nuts
Dog and cat foods
Baby food
Detergents in liquid or solid form, the weight or volume of which does not exceed two kilogrammes or two litres respectively
https://www.exploregov.ky/coronavirus-curfew
Quotes below from link above, emphasis is mine.
What Is The Curfew?
Grand Cayman is currently following a "soft curfew" during the day from Monday to Saturday, 5am to 8pm, followed by a "hard curfew" from 8pm to 5am daily and all day on Sunday, i.e. from 8pm on each Saturday evening through 5am the following Monday morning.
The soft curfew allows the population limited movement to conduct essential tasks and builds on previous meeting bans enacted by Government under the Public Health Law (2002 Revision).
A still ongoing, hard curfew at nighttime and all day Sunday that requires closure of all but essential businesses is enacted under the Police Law (2017 Revision). The order strictly curtailing access to all beaches across Grand Cayman is also enacted under the Police Law....................................................
Penalties
In Grand Cayman, during the "soft curfew", a person who, without lawful authority, remains in a place other than the confines of their own residence or yard space commits an offence and is liable on conviction to a fine of $1,000 and to imprisonment for six months.
Any other breach of the terms of the "soft curfew" is liable to a similar penalty. A new ticketing system will allow persons to choose to pay a smaller fine or appear in court and risk paying the full fine. For more information, see Ticket Offences and Fines below.
Violations of the "hard curfew" fall under the Police Law and persons are liable on conviction to a fine of $3,000 and to imprisonment for twelve months.
Those who break the Sunday laws are subject to 3000 dollar fines or twelve months in prison. No, nothing sinister about that.
And non-Muslims are prohibited from practicing their religion in Saudi Arabia - what about that? How does that fact factoring into where you're going with this?
https://www.cnnphilippines.com/regional/2020/4/4/general-santos-city-covid-19-lockdown.html
Total lockdown in General Santos City every Sunday
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, April 4) — A new rule in General Santos City: now even those with quarantine passes will be forced to stay home every Sunday, as the local government steps up measures to remain coronavirus-free.
A total lockdown will be imposed every Sunday starting April 5, the city government of General Santos announced in its Facebook page Friday night.
"Suspendido ang Home Quarantine Pass tuwing Linggo (Home quarantine passes are suspended every Sunday)," the city government said, except those with emergency and medical needs.
Only the following people will be allowed to leave their homes every Sunday: frontliners in the fight against the COVID-19 outbreak, pharmacy staff, police and military personnel, barangay tanods (village watchmen), government workers under the skeletal workforces, workers involved in offering basic necessities such as food, and church leaders and their assistants who will conduct online service................................
https://www.croatiaweek.com/shops-in-croatia-to-close-on-sundays/
Shops in Croatia to close on Sundays
ZAGREB, April 25 (Hina) – Croatia is about to start the first of its three-phase lifting of lockdown measures. The first phase, starting on Monday, 27 April, will enable the opening of all retail entities apart from those in shopping centres, the exception being those stores that have been operating in shopping centres the entire time since the introduction of restrictions.
There will be a return to normal working hours for shops on Monday. Trading, however, has been banned on Sundays. Only kiosks, bakeries, bread and bakery product shops and shops at gas stations will be allowed to open on Sundays and public holidays until further notice.
The head of the national coronavirus crisis management team, Interior Minister Davor Bozinovic, said on Saturday that the decision banning Sunday work was made based on recommendations by epidemiologists, declining to comment on the speculation that the present situation was being used for political purposes.
"We have regulated shop opening hours as part of our measures. This decision was made based on recommendations by epidemiologists. All decisions are made in accordance with recommendations from professionals. All shops will be working as they worked before, except on Sundays and national holidays," Bozinovic told a regular press conference of the national coronavirus crisis management team.
Asked if he feared that the decision banning Sunday work might be overturned by the Constitutional Court, he reiterated that all the decisions were made based on the recommendations by professionals. He declined to comment on the speculation that the present situation was being used for political purposes.
"Here we discuss only the situation caused by the coronavirus epidemic. As for these questions, you know who you should address them to," Bozinovic said in response to questions from the press.
https://www.total-slovenia-news.com/business/6143-jansa-the-left-call-to-keep-stores-closed-on-sundays?__cf_chl_jschl_tk__=d45f7eae30b2559f9761a0c9f459fdbd581eb502-1589634523-0-AeXNaUXWStYnOFZ0vetODkUybXpZCRrVKmPulJLUvjdR2fOsVQc6ZJ8b6AWbmA8BL9HMySmbl8mDGQ2cZLfrn1foMOF4A91rIFt_D7Wy21ma6Lmu6KyvmHVsoxPEBGqSEploltep5wuvT39z8t0G7MSzzH0Cax7BzcQyjpFg55WaHqTIgFEpKfkKs6FdTZUsEgYxPiA9M0NPHvPMFN7Dui93HYFXsXVyqDmQWMdpWk9OfjjTAs2esQTXUIFupv0jOqPidKlXF_gGNi1YWUeFNQwhJuFNoX_l1J2ZT_-2n6rpSXi7Vshw8xzudhX26kf3nsmRrnUTio-8xqk5Z9veoen6sPvDvpTmRkX6UOkCIgeh
Janša & the Left Call to Keep Stores Closed on Sundays
STA, 30 April - It seems increasingly likely that the closure of stores, including groceries, on Sundays as a result of the coronavirus epidemic will become a permanent arrangement and be extended also to the period after the crisis. A legislative initiative to this effect, announced by the opposition Left, was backed on Thursday by PM Janez Janša.
In announcing the legislative proposal, the Left joined today the Trade Union of Shop Assistants, which argued ahead of Labour Day in favour of keeping stores closed on Sundays and bank holidays also after the epidemic.
The Left pointed out that voters had already decided in a referendum in 2003 that stores should be closed on Sundays, but were ignored later due to pressure from retailers.
Prime Minister Janša responded to the Left's tweet by tweeting "We support". Support was also expressed at the government's coronavirus briefing by Interior Minister Aleš Hojs, who said he had been an advocate of this all along. Hojs said those working in stores should be free at least one day a week and that it did not matter if consumers spent their money in six or seven days.
The Chamber of Commerce responded to the developments by arguing that the trade union and the Left should be aware one working day less would result in redundancies.
"Such a change depends on a change of the collective bargaining agreement that needs to be agreed by social partners, meaning the trade unions and employers," the chamber's president Marija Lah told the STA.
https://www.dlapiper.com/en/us/insights/publications/2020/04/puerto-rico-governor-extends-lockdown-and-curfew-key-deadlines-and-governmental-measures/
Quote below from link above, emphasis is mine.
Puerto Rico: Governor extends lockdown and curfew; key deadlines and governmental measures in response to COVID-19
(This alert contains information which is current as of April 3, 2020. We are actively monitoring activities in this rapidly changing area; please contact the authors of this alert for the most current information.)
On March 12, 2020, the governor of Puerto Rico declared a state of emergency across the island amid the threat of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) global pandemic. On March 15, 2020, the governor issued an Executive Order setting out a nightly curfew for all citizens, a daytime lockdown with limited exceptions (such as grocery and pharmacy visits), and the closure of all private and government operations, except for those related to essential services, until March 30, 2020.
These orders were effectively superseded by Executive Order 2020-029, issued on March 30, 2020, in which the governor has extended the temporary lockdown and curfew and taken additional measures. Until April 12, 2020, the daytime lockdown shall be in effect from 5 am to 7 pm, except for those citizens working in security, health, or food distribution, or for those in specific circumstances (such as those purchasing food or essentials); the curfew shall be in effect from 7 pm to 5 am. Violators may face a six-month jail term or a fine of up to $5,000.
Additional restrictions scheduled to go into effect on April 1, 2020 include:
Limiting traffic. Only certain individuals may travel by car each day according to the last number of their vehicle's license plate. Those with odd numbers may travel by car on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. Those with even numbers and license plates ending in a letter may travel by car on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. No one may use their cars on Sundays except in case of emergencies. Essential service providers are not subject to these traffic limitations during the week.
Increasing business closures on Sundays. Grocery stores must remain closed on Sundays, and pharmacies will only be allowed to sell medicines and personal hygiene products. Gas stations may only sell fuel.......................................................
https://www.philstar.com/nation/2020/05/12/2013340/lockdown-sundays-helps-curb-covid-infections-bacolod
'Lockdown Sundays' helps curb COVID infections in Bacolod
MANILA, Philippines — Life in Bacolod City has stood still in the past four Sundays as people stayed home to prevent the spread of the coronavirus disease 2019 or COVID-19.
Launched when the city went on an enhanced community quarantine (ECQ), the "Lockdown Sundays" is mandated in an executive order signed by Mayor Evelio Leonardia.
"This is our collective bid to halt the spread of the coronavirus," Leonardia said as he appealed to residents to comply with the order.
"At the very least, with this measure, we can say the global foe that is COVID-19 stands still for 24 hours. One cannot underestimate the importance of that, when the virus cannot move for a long time," he added.
The infection rate in Bacolod has been manageable and most of the cases involved people who came from other places.
"The level of infection rate can be attributed to the ECQ, but for sure Lockdown Sundays helped, too," Leonardia said.
He attributed the success of the measure to the unity of the people.
"It shows we can act as one, and we are confident that we will win this war against COVID-19," he said.
https://www.dw.com/en/germany-rejects-sunday-package-deliveries-as-online-shopping-booms-amid-lockdown/a-53212619
Article below from link above, emphasis is mine.
Germany rejects Sunday package deliveries as online shopping booms amid lockdown
Delivery giant DHL is doing a roaring trade during the coronavirus pandemic. It's hiring extra staff, and appealed for special permission to deliver on Sundays — when a lockdown of sorts always applies in Germany.
Germany's Ministry of Labor on Wednesday rejected Deutsche Post's (DHL) request to deliver post on Sundays despite a surge in orders amid the coronavirus lockdown.
The ministry maintained that even during the coronavirus crisis, the supply and delivery of DHL's parcels was not under serious threat, meaning that delivery staff would not be required to meet "further demands" and work on Sundays.
"As the Berlin Administrative Court has already ruled in several proceedings, there is no supply crisis that would make it urgently necessary to supply the population by delivering packages on Sundays," said a spokesperson for Labor Minister Hubertus Heil in Berlin on Wednesday.
Germans' right to rest on Sundays
The spokesperson attributed the recent increase in the volume of postal packages to the Easter holidays, adding that contact restrictions and the closure of numerous shops during the coronavirus outbreak was not a reason to intervene in the originally religious custom of resting on Sundays, something that's also anchored in German law.
"It is also politically incomprehensible why the parcel delivery drivers, who were significantly burdened in the crisis, should be exposed to further impositions," the spokesperson added.
Germany is one of comparatively few remaining countries in the world to shut down almost all non-essential industry and commerce every Sunday. Almost all stores are closed — apart from services like restaurants, cafes and pubs or the absolute essentials like petrol stations and corner stores — while public transport also runs less frequently.
Germany's constitution protects Sunday and public holidays, describing them as "days of rest from work and of spiritual improvement," having borrowed the custom from Christian religions.
Postal boom amid crisis
Eight million packages and small parcels are currently being delivered every day, well above the annual daily average of 5.2 million. Because of the extra demand, as high streets shut down and Germans use online shopping services more and more, the Bonn-based postal company employed more staff and lobbied to have the right to deliver packages on Sundays during the pandemic.
"It would be helpful if we could get another day to deal with the current flood of parcels," DHL Chief Operating Officer Thomas Schneider told the local newspaper Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung earlier this week.
The company emphasized that it was not aiming to secure regular, nationwide deliveries on Sundays, but that due to the current landscape, it hoped it could use Sundays "selectively" after having also coordinated with local work councils, Der Spiegel reported.
However, the German United Services Trade Union (ver.di) had also criticized Deutsche Post's request to authorize Sunday deliveries, with another major union saying it was "extremely skeptical" of the proposal.
The following is from the CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. Emphasis is mine.
Sunday- fulfillment of the sabbath
2175 Sunday is expressly distinguished from the sabbath which it follows chronologically every week; for Christians its ceremonial observance replaces that of the sabbath. In Christ's Passover, Sunday fulfills the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath and announces man's eternal rest in God. For worship under the Law prepared for the mystery of Christ, and what was done there prefigured some aspects of Christ:[107]
Those who lived according to the old order of things have come to a new hope, no longer keeping the sabbath, but the Lord's Day, in which our life is blessed by him and by his death.[108]
2176 The celebration of Sunday observes the moral commandment inscribed by nature in the human heart to render to God an outward, visible, public, and regular worship "as a sign of his universal beneficence to all."[109] Sunday worship fulfills the moral command of the Old Covenant, taking up its rhythm and spirit in the weekly celebration of the Creator and Redeemer of his people.
A day of grace and rest from work
2184 Just as God "rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done,"[121] human life has a rhythm of work and rest. The institution of the Lord's Day helps everyone enjoy adequate rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives.[122]
2185 On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are to refrain from engaging in work or activities that hinder the worship owed to God, the joy proper to the Lord's Day, the performance of the works of mercy, and the appropriate relaxation of mind and body.[123] Family needs or important social service can legitimately excuse from the obligation of Sunday rest. The faithful should see to it that legitimate excuses do not lead to habits prejudicial to religion, family life, and health.
The charity of truth seeks holy leisure- the necessity of charity accepts just work.[124]
2186 Those Christians who have leisure should be mindful of their brethren who have the same needs and the same rights, yet cannot rest from work because of poverty and misery. Sunday is traditionally consecrated by Christian piety to good works and humble service of the sick, the infirm, and the elderly. Christians will also sanctify Sunday by devoting time and care to their families and relatives, often difficult to do on other days of the week. Sunday is a time for reflection, silence, cultivation of the mind, and meditation which furthers the growth of the Christian interior life.
2187 Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees.
2188 In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."[125]
IN BRIEF
2189 "Observe the sabbath day, to keep it holy" (Deut 5:12). "The seventh day is a sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord" (Ex 31:15).
2190 The sabbath, which represented the completion of the first creation, has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ.
2191 The Church celebrates the day of Christ's Resurrection on the "eighth day," Sunday, which is rightly called the Lord's Day (cf. SC 106).
2192 "Sunday . . . is to be observed as the foremost holy day of obligation in the universal Church" (CIC, can. 1246 # 1). "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass" (CIC, can. 1247).
2193 "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound . . . to abstain from those labors and business concerns which impede the worship to be rendered to God, the joy which is proper to the Lord's Day, or the proper relaxation of mind and body" (CIC, can. 1247).
2194 The institution of Sunday helps all "to be allowed sufficient rest and leisure to cultivate their amilial, cultural, social, and religious lives" (GS 67 # 3).
2195 Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day.
Only God sanctifies or makes anything holy. No number of people can make anything holy by observing it. The sabbath of God was pronounced and made holy by Him alone who can make anything holy, before being observed by anyone of this fallen human race. No number of people observing a "tradition" of humanity will ever make anything holy. Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ staunchly chastised those of his day that exalted a tradition of man above a commandment of God. Such is and will continue to be the exact nature of all and every Sunday law ever implemented among men and nations. So be it.
Exo 20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: 10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: 11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.Mat 15:2 Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? for they wash not their hands when they eat bread. 3 But he answered and said unto them,
Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition? 4 For God commanded, saying, Honour thy father and mother: and, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death. 5 But ye say, Whosoever shall say to his father or his mother, It is a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; 6 And honour not his father or his mother, he shall be free. Thus have ye made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition. 7 Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying, 8 This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. 9 But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.
https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Tiruchirapalli/no-total-lockdown-on-sundays-in-thanjavur-ariyalur/article31545239.ece
No total lockdown on Sundays in Thanjavur, Ariyalur
TIRUCHI
Officials of the district administration in Ariyalur and Thanjavur have announced that the total lockdown enforced on Sundays in the district has been lifted.
In Ariyalur, Collector D. Rathna said that the norms would be relaxed in accordance with the instructions given by the State government. All shops, except salons, could be opened, she added.
Shops selling essential commodities will function between 6 a.m. and 5 p.m. Stand alone shops in non-containment zones can function from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Restaurants can function from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. with takeaway service alone is allowed. The Collector urged the public to continue to follow personal distancing and ensure that facemasks are worn at all times when they venture outdoors.
In Thanjavur too, the district administration announced that there will not be a total lockdown in the district on May 10.
However, the shops and business establishments and the general public would have to adhere to the regulations laid down by the State government while announcing the relaxation of lockdown conditions recently, the Collector, M. Govinda Rao said in a press release issued here on Saturday.
One Sunday lockdown ended. Maybe others will follow this example.
Amo,
There are similar law in the Southern part of the United States, even to the point where you can't purchase alcohol on Sunday. This doesn't mean anything more sinister is going on than in Jerusalem or an Islamic Country - it just means the majority of the people in those areas legislated to have more prohibitions for X, Y & Z.
I've noted that generally SDA's don't go out of their way to condemn Islam in how they subjugate minority religions in their area - it's because Islam and SDAism share somewhat of a commonality.
: [bAdventist Review and Sabbath Herald, October 28, 1909[/b]
In the pervious article the chivalrous and romantic story of the birth of the Ottoman empire was traced. In this paper will be shown the rapid and remarkable rise of that people to opulence and power, and also the motive force back of this and all Mohammedan movements.
Perhaps it will be best to take the last feature first. The Turks hold that they are descended from Japheth, the son of Noah. He was the father of three sons. The Turks teach that to his firstborn Aboul-Turk, he gave the sovereignty of Turkestan.
Again: the Turks profess the religion of Mohammed: "The creed of that faith is generally compressed into the well known formula: "There is no god but God, and Mohammed is his prophet." But there is another and longer form which reads as follow: --
"I believe in God and his angels, and his books, and his prophets, and the last day, and the predestination of good and evil by God, and the resurrection after death. I bear witness to that there is no God but God, and I bear witness that Mohammed is his slave and his prophet."
From the above IT MUST BE PERFECTLY CLEAR that Mohammedanism is very far from being a heathan religion, as some are wont to believe. It teaches belief in God, angels, the prophets, the last day, and the resurrection of the dead. MORE THAN THIS ABOUT ONE HALF OF THE KORAN IS A POLEMIC AGAINST POLYTHESIM AND TRINITARIANISM. In fact the word Allah is an abbreviation of Al-iah, which means the ONE, TRUE, ONLY God.
That's pretty direct I'd say.
: Cathlodox Fri May 15, 2020 - 08:49:08
Scripture actually DOES command it.
Hebrews 10,25
Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful that promised;) And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works: Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching. For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries
SOME Christians were assembling JUST on the Sabbath, in the Synagogue - they weren't assembling "THEMSELVES TOGETHER" as the Apostolic command stated. Scripture is explicit that Christians are to assemble THEMSELVES together and this day since Apostolic times has been Sunday.
1Corinthians 16,1
Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I have given order to the churches of Galatia, even so do ye. Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come.
It is forbidden to take a collection up on the Sabbath, Jews today don't do it and they didn't do at the time of Jesus or earlier either. Christians were assembling THEMSELVES together on the 1st day of the week just like the Bible (and secular history) affirms. Claiming that some conspiracy happened whereas the Pope or some other element of the Catholic Church supplanted the Sabbath with Sunday is simply a canard for the uneducated in Scripture and history.
The book of Hebrews does not mention the first day of the week at all, let alone command Christians to gather together on that day. Presumption alone would conclude that Heb. 25 was a command to keep Sundays holy or as a special time of gathering for God's people of the new covenant era. If any day might be suggested in Heb. 25, it would no doubt be the seventh day sabbath which is alluded to in several verses and specifically mentioned in others.
Heb 4:1Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it. 2 For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it. 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. 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. 5 And in this place again, If they shall enter into my rest. 6 Seeing therefore it remaineth that some must enter therein, and they to whom it was first preached entered not in because of unbelief:
God's seventh day sabbath is referred to by the author of Hebrews in chapter 4 as representative of the rest we have by faith in Christ Jesus. As pointed out in the same, the problem of the Jews of old was a lack of faith in God's word. The fourth commandment is a crucial element of maintaining biblical faith in God as our creator and sustainer. It is a weekly reminder of who He is and who we are in relation to Him. No one who maintains faith in the testimony of the fourth commandment especially by the observance of it, can forget this most crucial and basic truth. God created heaven, earth, and us, and He sustains all as well. This basic truth must be acknowledged by those who would maintain a proper salvific relation with God, as the author of Hebrews points out in the following verses.
Heb 11:1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. 2 For by it the elders obtained a good report. 3 Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.
Chapter 11 is all about faith and the faith of our fathers in Christ. The creation account in scripture, and therefore also the fourth commandment of God by extension, are the fundamental basic elements of our faith. If there was to be any day attached to the author of Hebrews admonition to gathering together, it would obviously be on the seventh day at which time God's people had already been gathering together for a couple of millennia, and were at the time as well. Not the first day of the week or Sunday which scripture never admonishes anyone to gather together on, contrary to your false claims.
The verse you quoted supporting this false claim does not call for a gathering at all, but for each individual to lay aside some money themselves for collection, so no gathering for such would be necessary when whoever came to collect it. Nevertheless, even if there had been a call to collect money or what have you on Sunday, this would certainly not equal a command to disregard an existing commandment of God. Such a conclusion is utter nonsense.
Thank you for pointing out that no offerings were taken up on Sabbaths, though I will have to check this out for myself. It is a good explanation of why Paul told the Christians to lay something aside on the first day of the week, he and they were obviously still keeping God's seventh day sabbath, so they wouldn't take up a collection on that day. It seems the verse you chose to prove your point, actually leans toward proving the opposite.
As far as your claim concerning a conspiracy theory about the Catholic Church transferring the sabbath day from the seventh day of the week to the first day of the week, it is a matter of recorded history, and testified to by the Catholic church and some Popes as well. No doubt you already know this but just do not want to go there, nevertheless we will go there.
https://walklikeyeshua.home.blog/2019/03/26/documented-history-of-torah-sabbath-keeping-in-the-church/
http://www.remnantofgod.org/sabhist.htm
The above links testify of the fact that Christians kept the seventh day Sabbath from the beginning of the formation of the church. As a matter of fact, Sunday sacredness developed over time with many observing both days for a time before a major separation between them began. Eventually Sunday keepers whose numbers grew rapidly began to denounce Sabbath keepers, and eventually disfellowshipped or excommunicated them. No doubt Sabbath keepers denounced Sunday keepers as well for abandoning God's Sabbath, we just don't have many records of the same. No doubt the church of Rome, as her habit was, burned all such written records. Nevertheless, the record of Sunday keepers denouncement of Sabbath keepers is proof enough of their existence and the division and controversy which took place between them. The history of which reveals the falsity of your above claim of conspiracy regarding the replacement of seventh day worship with first day worship. Observe -
The Synod of Laodicea - 343-381 A.D. - furnishes a decree which is quoted by many: "Christians shall not Judaize and be idle on Saturday [Sabbatum is always used for the Sabbath and is translated Saturday in the English edition of Hefele], but shall work on that day; but the Lord's-day they shall especially honor, and as being Christians, shall, if possible, do no work on that day. If, however, they are found Judaizing they shall be shut out from Christ. (Canon 29, Hefele, Vol. 2, p. 316.)
There would be no sense in making such a proclamation, if there were not Christians still keeping the seventh day sabbath. Nor of course is there anything in scripture at all of such a radical nature denouncing anyone for keeping God's Sabbath. Yet obviously many "Christians" by the fourth century, did exactly what you have denounced as a false conspiracy theory. They replaced the seventh day sabbath with Sunday sacredness by denouncing all who would keep the seventh day as shut out from Christ, while promoting the honor of the first day of the week. This is a definite departure from scripture.
Pope Gregory I (AD 590-604) said:
" Gregory, bishop by the grace of God to his well-beloved sons, the Roman citizens: It has come to me that certain men of perverse spirit have disseminated among you things depraved and opposed to the holy faith, so that they forbid anything to be done on the day of the Sabbath. What shall I call them except preachers of anti-Christ?."(Epistles of Gregory I, b. 13, epist. 1, found in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers.)
More of the same. There are still Christian sabbath keepers, and they are denounced by Pope Gregory I as preachers of anti-Christ.
The following is from the CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.
Sunday- fulfillment of the sabbath
2175 Sunday is expressly distinguished from the sabbath which it follows chronologically every week; for Christians its ceremonial observance replaces that of the sabbath. In Christ's Passover, Sunday fulfills the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath and announces man's eternal rest in God. For worship under the Law prepared for the mystery of Christ, and what was done there prefigured some aspects of Christ:[107]
Those who lived according to the old order of things have come to a new hope, no longer keeping the sabbath, but the Lord's Day, in which our life is blessed by him and by his death.[108]
2176 The celebration of Sunday observes the moral commandment inscribed by nature in the human heart to render to God an outward, visible, public, and regular worship "as a sign of his universal beneficence to all."[109] Sunday worship fulfills the moral command of the Old Covenant, taking up its rhythm and spirit in the weekly celebration of the Creator and Redeemer of his people.
A day of grace and rest from work
2184 Just as God "rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done,"[121] human life has a rhythm of work and rest. The institution of the Lord's Day helps everyone enjoy adequate rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives.[122]
2185 On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are to refrain from engaging in work or activities that hinder the worship owed to God, the joy proper to the Lord's Day, the performance of the works of mercy, and the appropriate relaxation of mind and body.[123] Family needs or important social service can legitimately excuse from the obligation of Sunday rest. The faithful should see to it that legitimate excuses do not lead to habits prejudicial to religion, family life, and health.
The charity of truth seeks holy leisure- the necessity of charity accepts just work.[124]
2186 Those Christians who have leisure should be mindful of their brethren who have the same needs and the same rights, yet cannot rest from work because of poverty and misery. Sunday is traditionally consecrated by Christian piety to good works and humble service of the sick, the infirm, and the elderly. Christians will also sanctify Sunday by devoting time and care to their families and relatives, often difficult to do on other days of the week. Sunday is a time for reflection, silence, cultivation of the mind, and meditation which furthers the growth of the Christian interior life.
2187 Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees.
2188 In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."[125]
IN BRIEF
2189 "Observe the sabbath day, to keep it holy" (Deut 5:12). "The seventh day is a sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord" (Ex 31:15).
2190 The sabbath, which represented the completion of the first creation, has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ.
2191 The Church celebrates the day of Christ's Resurrection on the "eighth day," Sunday, which is rightly called the Lord's Day (cf. SC 106).
2192 "Sunday . . . is to be observed as the foremost holy day of obligation in the universal Church" (CIC, can. 1246 # 1). "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass" (CIC, can. 1247).
2193 "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound . . . to abstain from those labors and business concerns which impede the worship to be rendered to God, the joy which is proper to the Lord's Day, or the proper relaxation of mind and body" (CIC, can. 1247).
2194 The institution of Sunday helps all "to be allowed sufficient rest and leisure to cultivate their amilial, cultural, social, and religious lives" (GS 67 # 3).
2195 Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day.
The following quotes are from the APOSTOLIC LETTER DIES DOMINI by John Paul II
Chap. 1
8.............The People of God are called to enter into this same rest by persevering in Christ's example of filial obedience (cf. Heb 4:3-16). In order to grasp fully the meaning of Sunday, therefore, we must re-read the great story of creation and deepen our understanding of the theology of the "Sabbath".
13. The Sabbath precept, which in the first Covenant prepares for the Sunday of the new and eternal Covenant, is therefore rooted in the depths of God's plan. This is why, unlike many other precepts, it is set not within the context of strictly cultic stipulations but within the Decalogue, the "ten words" which represent the very pillars of the moral life inscribed on the human heart.
14. In the first place, therefore, Sunday is the day of rest because it is the day "blessed" by God and "made holy" by him, set apart from the other days to be, among all of them, "the Lord's Day".
18..............In the light of this mystery, the meaning of the Old Testament precept concerning the Lord's Day is recovered, perfected and fully revealed in the glory which shines on the face of the Risen Christ (cf. 2 Cor 4:6). We move from the "Sabbath" to the "first day after the Sabbath", from the seventh day to the first day: the dies Domini becomes the dies Christi!
Chap.2
23. It was this newness which the catechesis of the first centuries stressed as it sought to show the prominence of Sunday relative to the Jewish Sabbath. It was on the Sabbath that the Jewish people had to gather in the synagogue and to rest in the way prescribed by the Law. The Apostles, and in particular Saint Paul, continued initially to attend the synagogue so that there they might proclaim Jesus Christ, commenting upon "the words of the prophets which are read every Sabbath" (Acts 13:27). Some communities observed the Sabbath while also celebrating Sunday. Soon, however, the two days began to be distinguished ever more clearly, in reaction chiefly to the insistence of those Christians whose origins in Judaism made them inclined to maintain the obligation of the old Law.
Chap.4
59....................More than a "replacement" for the Sabbath, therefore, Sunday is its fulfilment, and in a certain sense its extension and full expression in the ordered unfolding of the history of salvation, which reaches its culmination in Christ.
62. It is the duty of Christians therefore to remember that, although the practices of the Jewish Sabbath are gone, surpassed as they are by the "fulfilment" which Sunday brings, the underlying reasons for keeping "the Lord's Day" holy — inscribed solemnly in the Ten Commandments — remain valid, though they need to be reinterpreted in the light of the theology and spirituality of Sunday: "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days you shall labour, and do all your work; but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. Then you shall do no work, you, or your son, or your daughter, or your servant, or your maid, or your ox, or your ass, or any of your beasts, or the foreigner within your gates, that your servant and maid may rest as well as you. You shall remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded that you keep the Sabbath day" (Dt 5:12-15). Here the Sabbath observance is closely linked with the liberation which God accomplished for his people.
63. Christ came to accomplish a new "exodus", to restore freedom to the oppressed. He performed many healings on the Sabbath (cf. Mt 12:9-14 and parallels), certainly not to violate the Lord's Day, but to reveal its full meaning: "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mk 2:27). Opposing the excessively legalistic interpretation of some of his contemporaries, and developing the true meaning of the biblical Sabbath, Jesus, as "Lord of the Sabbath" (Mk 2:28), restores to the Sabbath observance its liberating character, carefully safeguarding the rights of God and the rights of man. This is why Christians, called as they are to proclaim the liberation won by the blood of Christ, felt that they had the authority to transfer the meaning of the Sabbath to the day of the Resurrection. The Passover of Christ has in fact liberated man from a slavery more radical than any weighing upon an oppressed people — the slavery of sin, which alienates man from God, and alienates man from himself and from others, constantly sowing within history the seeds of evil and violence.
How about that, Pope John Paul II testifies above that certain "Christians" did exactly what you claim is just a conspiracy theory. Transferred the meaning of the seventh day sabbath to the day of the resurrection or Sunday. Go figure. Let's put just the part of the quotes above claiming to do just that, in a list below.
2175 Sunday is expressly distinguished from the sabbath which it follows chronologically every week; for Christians its ceremonial observance replaces that of the sabbath.
Those who lived according to the old order of things have come to a new hope, no longer keeping the sabbath, but the Lord's Day
2176 Sunday worship fulfills the moral command of the Old Covenant,
2190 The sabbath, which represented the completion of the first creation, has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ.
John Paul II 18..............In the light of this mystery, the meaning of the Old Testament precept concerning the Lord's Day is recovered, perfected and fully revealed in the glory which shines on the face of the Risen Christ (cf. 2 Cor 4:6). We move from the "Sabbath" to the "first day after the Sabbath", from the seventh day to the first day: the dies Domini becomes the dies Christi!
Chap.4
59....................
More than a "replacement" for the Sabbath, therefore, Sunday is its fulfilment, and in a certain sense its extension and full expression in the ordered unfolding of the history of salvation, which reaches its culmination in Christ.
62. It is the duty of Christians therefore to remember that,
although the practices of the Jewish Sabbath are gone, surpassed as they are by the "fulfilment" which Sunday brings, the underlying reasons for keeping "the Lord's Day" holy — inscribed solemnly in the Ten Commandments — remain valid, though they need to be reinterpreted in the light of the theology and spirituality of Sunday: "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days you shall labour, and do all your work; but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. Then you shall do no work, you, or your son, or your daughter, or your servant, or your maid, or your ox, or your ass, or any of your beasts, or the foreigner within your gates, that your servant and maid may rest as well as you. You shall remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded that you keep the Sabbath day" (Dt 5:12-15). Here the Sabbath observance is closely linked with the liberation which God accomplished for his people.
63. This is why Christians, called as they are to proclaim the liberation won by the blood of Christ, felt that they had the authority to transfer the meaning of the Sabbath to the day of the Resurrection.
Why do you deny the testimony of your church, Popes, church fathers, and history Cathlodox?
: Cathlodox Sat May 16, 2020 - 11:56:09
Amo,
There are similar law in the Southern part of the United States, even to the point where you can't purchase alcohol on Sunday. This doesn't mean anything more sinister is going on than in Jerusalem or an Islamic Country - it just means the majority of the people in those areas legislated to have more prohibitions for X, Y & Z.
I've noted that generally SDA's don't go out of their way to condemn Islam in how they subjugate minority religions in their area - it's because Islam and SDAism share somewhat of a commonality.
That's pretty direct I'd say.
Any time the religious dogma's of any religion are enforced by the state, there is something sinister going on. Catholics and Muslims share the sinister trait of combining church or religion and the state. Though at times during the past, Protestants preferred to live under Muslim leadership over Roman Catholic leadership because the former were far more tolerant. It is no surprise that religions outside of Christ abuse their authority. I suppose SDA's see a "Christian" professing entity doing the same as more of a threat because they are supposed to represent the truth in Christ.
A Catholic such as yourself accusing SDA's of having to much in common with Muslims is much like the pot calling the kettle black. Your Pope and church have entered into agreement and compact with them, not ours. Nevertheless, some SDA's have begun following Catholic example concerning such and other things as well. You will not find me denying it, to the contrary, the SDA church is increasingly involved in all kinds of crap it should be avoiding like the plague. Which is why I no longer attend services. The churches close enough for me to attend and I are just no longer on the same page. Apostasy is increasingly prevalent everywhere.
https://www.crisismagazine.com/2020/bring-back-the-blue-laws
Article below from link above.
Crisis Magazine / A Voice for the Faithful Catholic Laity
JUNE 17, 2020
Bring Back the Blue Laws
CASEY CHALK
In the United States on the seventh day of the week, trade and industry seem suspended throughout the nation; all noise ceases. A deep peace, or rather a sort of solemn contemplation, takes its place. The soul regains its own domain and devotes itself to meditation.
Alexis de Tocqueville wrote these words in his 1835 masterpiece of political and social analysis, Democracy in America. During America's finally-abating coronavirus quarantine, our nation, at least outwardly, seemed to have gained a more noiseless, contemplative, revivifying spirit. Now, in the terrible wake of murder, protests turned arsonous riots, and looting, not so much. Nevertheless, Americans in those early quarantine days—after the haze of their Netflix-binge had evaporated—woke up with a surprised appreciation for what earlier generations had considered normal: Sunday laws, otherwise known as blue laws. As America returns to normality, we should consider these laws and their manifold benefits afresh.
Acknowledging the rewards of the Sabbath are not limited only to Christians like Pope Francis, who in a 2018 interview declared: "One day of the week. That's the least! Out of gratitude, to worship God, to spend time with the family, to play, to do all of these things. We are not machines." Jay Lefkowitz, a lawyer in New York City, in a May 7 op-ed for The Washington Post argues that the Jewish Sabbath observance brings healthy separation and balance. He explains:
when Jews sanctify the Sabbath and keep it holy, they are making a conscious act of separation. At its most elementary, Shabbat is about separating the profane from the sacred; the workweek from the Sabbath... Shabbat is about balance or, to use a modern word, mindfulness... We can't recharge ourselves via a USB port.
This aligns with other movements that appreciate the need to "disconnect," such as digital minimalism or "secular monkhood," a phrase coined in a March First Things essay by Andrew Taggert.
More seriously, de Tocqueville identified several benefits to the once-common American inclination to rest. The first is how the worship of God orients man towards the transcendent and its purposes. At church, the American "hears of the need to control his desires, of the subtle pleasures of virtue alone, and the true happiness they bring." When the American returns home,
he does not hurry back to his business ledgers. He opens the Holy Scriptures and discovers the sublime or touching depictions of the greatness and goodness of the Creator, the infinite magnificence of God's handiwork, the lofty destiny reserved for man, his duties, and his claims to everlasting life.
In the worship of God, and recognition of His goodness in creation, man perceives his own created goodness and the goodness of the world he inhabits, including his peculiar nation. This in turn directs him towards his civic duties to love and serve his neighbors in an act of stewardship. He feels "the urgent necessity to instill morality into democracy by means of religion."
The second benefit is the tempering quality of Sabbath observance on an American capitalism that can tend towards exclusively materialist ends that obscure man's inherent dignity.
Thus it is that from time to time the American hides away to some degree from himself and, snatching a momentary respite from those trivial passions which agitate his life and the fleeting concerns which invade his thoughts, he suddenly bursts into an ideal world where all is great, pure, and eternal.
De Tocqueville perceived that democratic capitalism, if untethered from religion, would devolve into a dehumanizing, materialistic wasteland where men manipulate and exploit one another for profitable gain. This is because "democracy encourages the taste for physical pleasures which, if excessive, soon persuades men to believe that nothing but matter exists." And if only matter exists, men are liable to do whatever they want to others (or themselves) to satiate their desires. Sabbath laws, in their implicit (or explicit) endorsement of the transcendent, remind citizens that there are greater, more noble pursuits than "self-actualization" and "self-realization."
Third, in directing citizens towards transcendent ends, Sabbath laws inspire men to pursue societal goods that will endure beyond their own circumscribed lives.
Religious nations have often achieved such lasting results. They discovered the secret to success in this world by concentrating upon the next. Religions instill into men the general habit of conducting themselves with the future in mind and are no less useful to happiness in this life than to bliss in the next.
Citizens aware of their finitude and their spiritual, immaterial natures will work not just for today, but for the future of their children and grandchildren. Notre Dame Cathedral, that splendid manifestation of human skill and ingenuity, took about 180 years, or six generations, to build. Such glorious projects require a character defined by willingness to suffer and sacrifice, fully aware that one's unknown descendants will be the ones who enjoy the fruits of one's labor.
When nations abandon consideration of transcendent ends, their citizens are more inclined to selfishly live for today without consideration for their neighbors or their progeny. "Let's do it tonight, 'cause we may not get tomorrow," the popular 2012 song goes. De Tocqueville warns:
In skeptical times, therefore, there is always the danger that men will surrender themselves endlessly to the casual whims of daily desire and that they will abandon entirely anything which requires long-term effort, thus failing to establish anything noble or calm or lasting.
For this reason, de Tocqueville warns and cajoles Americans to preserve their peculiar religiosity: "Do not seek to snatch from men their ancient religious opinions... lest...the soul finds itself momentarily void of beliefs and the love of physical pleasures spreads to fill it entirely."
Yet this is precisely what America has done, eliminating remnants of once-common blue laws for the sake of the worshipful dollar. There was a time when even the United States Supreme Court favored these ordinances, Justice Stephen Johnson Field writing in Hennington v. Georgia (1896), "the prohibition of secular business on Sunday is advocated on the ground that by it the general welfare is advanced, labor protected, and the moral and physical well-being of society promoted." No less than George Washington was once detained by a tithing-man for violating Connecticut's law forbidding unnecessary Sunday travel. (He was permitted to continue after promising to go only as far as his destination.)
Now, with a few anomalous holdouts, Sundays are more or less indistinguishable from other days. Some counties still prohibit the sale of alcohol on Sunday. Some Florida counties prohibit the sale of sex toys on Sunday. Among other curiosities, horse racing and car dealerships are closed in Illinois.
Many European nations never abandoned Sunday trading restrictions, and their economies have managed just fine. Indeed, keeping stores open on Sunday disproportionately favors big retailers at the expense of mom-and-pop businesses. In Poland, the 2017 Sunday trading ban was "about helping small family stores, but also about letting people who are effectively forced to work on Sundays be free," said President Andrzej Duda. Since the ban's introduction, Duda has noted, more families have engaged in outdoor activities, and the domestic tourism industry has benefited.
America, for the sake of its own emotional and spiritual welfare—for the sake of its own sanity—needs to restore the blue laws.
There was a time, surprising as it may be, when Amazon did not deliver on Sunday, and Americans somehow survived. There was a time when citizens had to do their shopping at the hardware store on a weekday, or early Saturday morning, in order to complete their home projects.
To preempt accusations of "theocracy," I am not advocating mandatory church-going (though it wouldn't be the worst idea), but rather simple restrictions on which businesses remain open on Sunday. Political and cultural leaders could "opt-out" of things like social media: as de Tocqueville rightly notes, leaders who set the standard should "act every day as if they believed in it themselves."
Blue laws may limit "freedom," but only the freedom to limitless consumption. If promulgated in a prudent and focused way, they can cultivate virtue, strengthen neighborliness, and protect small businesses. Most importantly, they can help promote prayer and peace—now, when America needs them most.
Our nation has been and continues to be inundated with Catholic immigrants. There is a Catholic majority in our Supreme court, six out of nine justices are Catholic at this time. A third of our Congress is Catholic, who invited the Pope of Rome to politically address our entire federal government. The last 7 or 8 house speakers have been Catholic. The last three Presidential terms have had a Catholic Vice President and the prior President was mentored by Catholics and Jesuits. Just a few years back as much as 44% of our Governors were Catholic, I'm not sure if that number is higher or lower today. As discussed on these boards many times, Catholics are called to make Sundays legal holidays by their church wherever possible. As most continue to deny the obvious eventual results of all this, here we are examining an article by Catholics calling for our country to reinstate blue laws. At a time when they are far more capable of making such happen than at any other time in history, according to their own professed design as expressed in the past. There are many "Christian" denominations that will likely join in and support this effort. How long will those denying such an agenda remain in denial of what is and has been transpiring right in front of their faces.
Revisionist history is of course employed in the above article starting with referring to Sunday as the seventh day of the week which it never has been. Then following by referring to accepting Sunday sacredness as acknowledging the Sabbath, which Sunday sacredness never has been either. The claim by some to the effect the Sunday sacredness has replaced God's seventh day sabbath as scripture testifies, is found nowhere at all in scripture. This is a change which has no scriptural foundation. Suggesting the Supreme Court once favored blue laws by quoting one member of it from 120 some odd years ago is misleading at best. Blue laws are a part of our history which many or most once supported, which most today have rightly determined are an enforcement of religion by government which denies our nations stance of separation of church and state. Bringing up the Supreme Court is no doubt by way of the power of suggestion, as todays Supreme Court has a Catholic majority on any vote, and could therefore be heavily influenced by the church of Rome in such a decision. Justices would have to decide whom to serve, the Pope of Rome and the church, or the Constitution of the United States.
As Americans are now more ignorant and confused about the real history of this nation by design, which the church of Rome has been directly involved in, they will now use some of their own revisionist history to help bring about their power over all others within this once free nation. [Correction - the Supreme Court has never made a decision regarding a national Sunday law.] This nation though, has already dealt with the issue of a national Sunday law, arguments for which our fiftieth Congress rejected in a bill proposed by Senator Blair concerning the same in the late 1800s.
The separation of church and state which has lead to leaving Sabbath observance up to people by faith in their religion alone, is of course despised by the church of Rome who is ever seeking to be backed up and promoted by government. Now she calls for the forced acceptance and or observance of her chosen day of worship upon all again through the blue laws of former days according to her same agenda. Her calls for a false unity of humanity in supporting her own created day of worship as a form of repentance and reform toward godliness from the exact condition of society she has helped to foster and create, and the false crisis she has helped to create and promulgate toward the same, will bring the judgments of God down upon this world and create authentic global crisis and disaster. This is the truth which the SDA church has proclaimed to this world for over 150 years now.
When this agenda actually succeeds, then will this world face real crisis such as it never has before, but those who reject the truth will not repent. So be it. Come Lord Jesus.
Rev 16:8 And the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun; and power was given unto him to scorch men with fire. 9 And men were scorched with great heat, and blasphemed the name of God, which hath power over these plagues:
and they repented not to give him glory. 10 And the fifth angel poured out his vial upon the seat of the beast; and his kingdom was full of darkness; and they gnawed their tongues for pain, 11 And blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores,
and repented not of their deeds.Rev 14:6 And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, 7 Saying with a loud voice,
Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters. 8 And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. 9 And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, 10 The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: 11 And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.
12 Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.
https://www.vox.com/the-big-idea/2018/10/2/17925828/what-were-blue-laws-labor-unions
Interesting article concerning this thread below, from link above. Emphasis is mine.
Why we need "blue laws," the religious tradition that sanctifies life outside of work
Religious "blue laws" achieve many of the same goals as progressive labor unions.
During a recent cross-country road trip this summer, my wife and I were driving around Little Rock, Arkansas, looking for a place to eat lunch. We had a hard time finding any place that was open. Then we realized it was Sunday.
It's not too surprising that in conservative-leaning Arkansas, certain blue laws — or laws that restrict commerce on Sundays for religious reasons — remain in force in many parts of the state. Arkansas banned most businesses from opening on Sunday until 1982. Until 2009, it banned all Sunday liquor sales, which, in practice, shut down many establishments that served alcohol. Not until July of this year did the town of Fort Smith repeal a law banning dancing on Sundays. Many towns in Arkansas, including more left-leaning college towns, still maintain a wide array of local blue laws, especially regarding liquor.
While I'm not aware of a specific law that led to my difficulty finding a place to eat in Little Rock, the cultural tradition of blue laws was strong enough that restaurants offering Sunday brunch appeared far less common than in more secularized places where I've lived.
And in an era with increasingly fewer protections for workers, progressives and religious conservatives alike should unite to push for more blue laws that protect the sanctity of life outside of of work.
American life is increasingly market-driven. Religious bodies have traditionally provided an antidote.
Over the past 50 years, many institutions that once protected American workers and families from the ravages of unbridled capitalistic excess have been eroded. The most prominent such institution that may come to mind is the labor union: Once powerful bodies that pushed for shorter working days, longer weekends, better pay, and safer working conditions, today, labor unions represent just 10 percent of American workers.
But unions are not the only social institution that once sought to carve out time for Americans away from work. Religious bodies have, since time immemorial, claimed certain days and times for themselves, set apart for worship, prayer, or rest. The Jewish Sabbath is perhaps the most notable example of this practice, but virtually all religions have some sense of times that are set apart, during which many forms of labor or commerce are taboo. These restrictions are known as "blue laws," and in today's climate of economic anxiety, religious conservatives and economic progressives should make common cause to restore them.
While these practices have their origins in various kinds of religious convictions, they are ultimately part of what economic historians would call a "moral economy," or an economic system where the moral or ethical norms of a society are sufficiently strong that, with or without the intervention of the state, certain values are prioritized above the market itself.
Industrialization mostly destroyed this system, but some pieces of it, like abstention from work during churchgoing hours in Christian societies, either remained normative or were enshrined in law. In the United States, "blue laws," so called due to the blue paper on which Puritan leaders printed the Sunday trade restrictions, date back to the 18th century at least. Many forms of commerce were regulated or restricted so that workers should spend time in church or with their families.
Blue laws continue to dwindle across the United States
Today, blue laws are increasingly rare. The last statewide full-day restriction on commerce in North Dakota, was repealed in 1991. The only place in America where general retail remains totally prohibited on Sundays is Bergen County, New Jersey, where the law remains popular: A 2013 push for repeal couldn't even get enough signatures to get on the ballot. I am unaware of polling on this issue to determine what the partisan mix of support for county blue laws may be, but Bergen County's presidential election vote share was about the same as the state of New Jersey on the whole, meaning it went for Hillary Clinton.
Many states and counties around the United States have a wide range of partial restrictions on certain hours or businesses for religious reasons. North Dakota prohibits retail before noon on Sundays, although voters may get a chance to repeal the statewide restriction in a ballot measure in November. A huge number of states and counties restrict the sale of alcohol or cars on Sundays, and many places also, somewhat bizarrely, restrict hunting on Sundays.
But while the very secularly minded may celebrate the end of blue laws, seeing them as a violation of church-state separation, the result of blue law repeals may be distinctly non-progressive. To begin with, the Supreme Court has repeatedly, and fairly recently, ruled that blue laws are constitutional: The state can prohibit commercial activities on certain days, even if the days are selected for apparently religious reasons. The reasoning is that the state may have an interest in people spending social time away from work or commerce in a coordinated way, and it is reasonable for the state to accommodate existing social forms, such as religion.
While this may seem like a back door to the establishment of religion, it's actually a distinctively progressive view of how the law functions. Implicitly, by approving blue laws, the Supreme Court is admitting the view that the state may implement very specific, apparently arbitrary rules to achieve non-economic, general well-being-related goals like "leisure time for workers."
In other words, blue laws are also a way that the state enshrines a special time for citizens to exercise rights to assembly, religious and secular. Assembly requires that people have time off together, so it doesn't work to simply mandate that businesses close for any random 24-hour period, because that doesn't ensure that people have time off together. The state cannot force you to go to church or a community meeting or spend time with loved ones, but it can force your employer to close up shop, raising the odds that you'll invest in social and civic capital instead of paid labor.
This compelling interest in togetherness is vital, as it suggests the state may have a valid legal interest in supporting the formation of strong communities and social bonds outside of taxpaying employment.
Progressives have much to celebrate about blue laws
Conservatives and progressives have already found common ground on this issue: Labor unions have historically supported blue laws. Aside from boosting religious participation and strengthening civic behaviors like voting, blue laws also serve to protect huge swaths of working-class service-sector employees (who, in today's world, often do not have access to union representation) from arbitrary scheduling and seven-day workweeks.
In the absence of robust unions, blue laws are a vital second-best policy for progressives, and probably a more achievable policy given the political success of state right-to-work laws in recent years. Without blue laws, the five-day workweek — and generations of labor activism — is in serious jeopardy.
Even beyond the service sector, more and more white-collar workers are having their time invaded by emails, Slack messages, and other work responsibilities. A generalized law restricting the ability of nonessential businesses from functioning one day a week would go a long way to protect workers from the creeping commodification of every second of their time. Put bluntly, it would make sense to legally interdict the ability of your boss to expect you to respond to an email on Sunday morning.
Blue laws are sometimes opposed on efficiency grounds: The service sector, we are assured, must be open on weekends, so that other workers can obtain those services. It's true that essential services probably must remain open regardless of the day. But brunch is not as essential as the emergency room. Nobody dies if they can't buy a flat-screen TV on Sunday.
More to the point, this logic implies that service-sector workers should be a permanent second class of workers: rather than simply providing services, service workers are defined as existing to serve higher-status workers. Economists call the work "service sector" because it doesn't produce a physical commodity; but increasingly, "service sector" seems to be used to denote social class.
Around the world, blue laws are widely practiced: Most of France until recently was covered by restrictive Sunday laws, but President Emmanuel Macron's neoliberal government has opened up Sunday shopping. Much of Germany is covered by blue laws, most notably in religious Bavaria. Poland recently implemented blue laws to give service workers time off and families time together.
The social choice to protect a single day of the week for society to collectively step back from work and commerce and spend some time together should be endorsed across the political spectrum (except, perhaps, among totalitarians and libertarians; the former due to a distaste for robust private assembly, the latter due to an overzealous desire for the universal commercialization of humanity).
And yet blue laws continue to fall by the wayside. They are inconvenient for a busy society. But their inconvenience is precisely why they must be defended, and defended as a matter of legal requirement. People need to have their rest defended from the constant encroachment of busyness, particularly at the hands of business.
Lyman Stone, a Vox columnist, is a regional population economics researcher who blogs at In a State of Migration. He is also an agricultural economist at USDA. Find him on Twitter @lymanstoneky.
https://www.talanei.com/2020/06/08/samoa-pm-wants-to-ban-sunday-trading/
Samoa PM wants to ban Sunday trading
The Samoa Government is about to permanently ban all commercial activities on Sundays.
Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi said on Radio 2AP last week that he had instructed the Attorney General's office to draft a law to permanently close business activities on Sundays.
Under the current COVID-19 State of Emergency orders, all major supermarkets have been allowed limited opening hours on Sunday evenings except smaller shops who are allowed to open "normal hours"..
Tuilaepa also introduced a ban on beach excursions as well as swimming in public swimming places like rivers and public swimming pools.
He quoted the Bible and referred to the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah after straying into the ways of the devil.
"These are all clear in the Bible but these days other countries have legalized businesses such as prostitution," he said.
He went on to say that currently his government was using the SOE Orders to do away with Sunday trading.
He said that people have been pushing to go back to normal Sunday trading but he said it is not going to happen and that all commercial activities shall cease on Sundays.
"The Attorney General's office has already been told to prepare a law that will continue these Sunday closures," he said.
Ironically the ruling Human Rights Protection Party is responsible for reintroducing Sunday trading in the late 1980s, after complaints from the business community, including Chinese construction companies who wanted to continue working on Sundays.
The Samoa Chamber of Commerce has been advocating the easing of restrictions to commercial trading hours including Sunday trading.
Tuilaepa did not give a timeline for the new law to be tabled in Parliament.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icpgkR0zwfg
Good video addressing Protestants and Catholics coming together, Climate change debate, and Sunday law agenda advancement.
Strange that today, even with the present Pope and papacy continually seeking unity with all of the false religions and politics of this world, and embracing Mother earth paganism, many Protestants are still seeking unity with them. Such is an obvious indication of the level of deception existing within "Protestantism" itself. So much for the scriptures alone.
I appreciated the first hand experience and knowledge of the real cause of the fires in California shared in the video. Trump is right on this one as well. The fires are not the result of climate change, but poor government policy and forest management.
No question but that these climate Sundays, are part of the agenda for Sunday observance by law, which the Church of Rome does always foster and support.
https://emerging-europe.com/news/croatias-work-free-sunday-aims-to-improve-emerging-europes-work-life-balance/
Article quoted below is from link provided above. Emphasis is mine.
Croatia's work-free Sunday aims to improve emerging Europe's work-life balance
September 28, 2020Milana Nikolova
Croatia last week announced a new law that would regulate Sunday work. Government spokesperson Marko Milic said that new legislation would significantly limit the number and type of workplaces allowed to stay open on Sundays, in order to improve the balance between work, spare time, and family obligations for the country's residents. It follows similar legislation in Poland, introduced in 2018 and subsequently expanded since then, most recently earlier this year when the number of Sundays that shops are allowed to stay open each year was halves from 14 to seven.
According to Eurostat data for 2019, Croatians have some of the longest working hours in the European Union. The average employee is shown to spend 39.9 hours a week at work, with only Bulgarians and Romanians pulling longer hours – 40.4 and 40.5 hours per week respectively. These are significantly higher than, for example, the Netherlands where only 29.3 hours per week are spent at work, but in line with much of the rest of emerging Europe. While almost every Western European country falls below the EU average of 36.2 working hours per week, not a single emerging Europe country does. Estonia comes closest with 38 hours per week spent at work.
These numbers are not just statistics but have a genuine impact on people's quality of life, as reflected in some of the most recent EU surveys of work-life satisfaction. The data reveals that Croatia has the largest share of people facing all three work-life balance issues as defined by the survey. Over 80 per cent of Croatians reported being too tired from work to complete household chores, almost 70 per cent describe not having sufficient time to fulfill family duties, and over half struggle to concentrate at work because of family responsibilities at least several times a month.
The new work-free Sunday law aims to address these issues and is in line with the Directive of Work-Life Balance adopted by the European Parliament last year and is expected to be incorporated into the national legislation of EU countries by 2022. The directive seeks to improve the working rights of Europeans by requiring member states to provide more opportunities for flexible work, at least 10 days paternity leave for new fathers and/or non-primary caregiving partners, strengthened rights to longer paid parental leave, and the introduction of the right to five days of carer's leave.
Long working hours and the accompanying inappropriate work-life balance can lead to a significant drop in the well-being of citizens, frequently leading to issues related to poor mental and physical health. While seriously endangering welfare, overworking has been shown to have a negative effect on business and economic growth as well. Lower quality work-performance and inefficiency are some of the business-related problems stemming from long working hours.
In the US, the psychological harm to employees from overworking has been estimated to cost employers up to 190 billion US dollars a year in healthcare spending, reveals the Harvard Business Review. Speaking to the Guardian about Sweden's success in minimising working hours, IT sector business owner Jakob Lagander argues: "There's so much more lazing around, especially in the United States. They put in a lot of work hours, but they're so inefficient."
If emerging Europe is to increase its people's longevity and quality of life, while also creating an environment that fosters innovation and commitment to the workplace, there is a pressing need to address the work-life balance issue in the region. Croatia remains one of the worst-performing EU members in this realm, but the country's commitment to a work-free Sunday law shows promise for an improvement in the coming future.
No mention of the Catholic Church in the above article or any religious significance attached to these Sunday laws of course, even though Sunday rest by law is a stated purpose of Catholicism in its own Catechism. Catholics are to seek to establish Sunday laws in whatever nation they live. You can be sure these laws were supported if not straight up inspired by the Catholic church itself.
The article directly infers that the United States needs these kind of laws more than anyone else. The ever increasing number of Catholics in these United States, and especially in our legislative halls, points forward to similar laws in our near future. With the latest nominee to the Supreme Court being yet again Catholic, which will bring the number of Catholics occupying the court to seven out of nine members, a national Sunday law is almost a given if or when it ever comes before this court. This third Supreme Court justice to be installed by President Trump is also the third Catholic Supreme Court justice to be installed by him. No agenda to see here, move along. Wake up America! The Romanization of our country is the political end of both of the political parties of this nation.
The chaos and drama performed daily by our actor politicians on both sides of the isle and cohort media coverage, are just diversionary tactics employed in the political asymmetrical warfare being executed against our nation and Constitution. Babylon the great has key players on both sides of the isle manipulating the outcome of national emergencies and controversies of her own creation, and others according to Hegelian Dialectic methodology. Our legislative halls being ever increasingly inhabited by her constituents, are poised to put the final touches of her coup detente of our nation and Constitution.
Strange that the main argument of the Sunday law under examination is related to people being over worked, during this plandemic causing so very many people to be out of work altogether. This poor argument at the wrong time in history, reveals another agenda underneath or behind the argument for these Sunday laws which they have been using in the recent past, but just does not make much if any sense at this point in time. People need more work right now, not less. The article also defeats its purpose or claim in declaring Americans to be lazy workers. Lazy workers would of course require less time for rest than hard workers. To the contrary though, there are still a great many Americans who work hard, play hard, and rest hard if they so choose. Which is exactly the point of the personal freedoms and liberties guaranteed by our Constitution. We can choose for ourselves when to work, play, or rest thank you. We do not need or want the government to mandate such things, at the behest of a behind the scenes religio-politcal entity which intends to dominate the entire world, and force its religious dogmas and social justice teachings upon all.
BILL FOR ESTABLISHING RELIGIOUS FREEDOM IN VIRGINIA (1799)
Well aware that Almighty God hath created the mind free; that all attempts to influence it by temporal punishments or burdens, or by civil incapacitations, tend only to beget habits of hypocrisy and meanness, and are a departure from the plan of the Holy Author of our religion, who being Lord both of body and mind, yet chose not to propagate it by coercions on either, as was in his Almighty power to do; that the impious presumption of legislators and rulers, civil as well as ecclesiastical, who, being themselves but fallible and uninspired men have assumed dominion over the faith of others, setting up there own opinions and modes of thinking as the only true and infallible, and as such endeavoring to impose them on others, hath established and maintained false religions over the greatest part of the world, and through all time; that to compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves, is sinful and tryannical; that even the forcing him to support this or that teacher of his own religious persuasion, is depriving him of the comfortable liberty of giving his contributions to the particular pastor whose morals he would make his pattern, and whose powers he feels most persuasive to righteousness, and is withdrawing from the ministry those temporal rewards, which proceeding from an approbation of their personal conduct, are an additional incitement to earnest and unremitting labors for the instruction of mankind; that our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, more than our opinions in physics or geometry; that, therefore, the proscribing any citizen as unworthy the public confidence by laying upon him the incapacity of being called to the offices of trust and emolument, unless he profess or renounce this or that religious opoinion, is depriving him injuriously of those priviledges and advantages to which in common with his fellow citizens he has a natural right; that it tends also to corrupt the principles of that very religion it is meant to encourage, by bribing, with a monopoly of worldly honors and emoluments, those who will externally profess and conform to it; that though indeed these are criminal who do not withstand such temptation, yet neither are those innocent who lay the bait in their way; that to suffer the civil magistrate to intrude his powers into the feild of opoinion and to restrain the profession or propagation of principles, on the supposition of their ill tendency, is a dangerous fallacy, which at once destroys all religious liberty, because he being of course judge of that tendency, will make his opinions the rule of judgment, and approve or condemn the sentiments of others only as they shall square with or differ from his own; that it is time enough for the rightful purposes of civil government, for its offices to interfere when principles break out into overt acts against peace and good order; and finally, that truth is great and will prevail if left to herself, that she is proper and sufficient antagonist to error, and has nothing to fear from the conflict, unless by human interposition disarmed of her natural weapons, free argument and debate, errors ceasing to be dangerous when it is permitted freely to contradict them.
Be it therefore enacted by the General Assembly, That no man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place or ministry whatsoever, nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burthened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief; but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinions in matters of religion, and that the same shall in no wise diminish, enlarge, or affect their civil capacities.
And though we well know this Assembly, elected for the people for the ordinary services of legislation only, have no power to restrain the acts of succeeding assemblies, constituted with the powers equal to our own, and that therefore to declare this act irrevocable, would be of no effect in law, yet we are free to declare, and do declare, that the rights hereby asserted are of the natural rights of mankind, and that if any act shall be hereafter passed to repeal the present or to narrow its operation, such act will be an infringement of natural right.
https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/2017/november/poland-reclaims-day-of-rest-by-slowly-phasing-out-sunday-shopping
Article quoted below from link above. Emphasis is mine. I probably have already posted this article in the past, but as the article itself pints out, the Sunday law referred to became complete this year.
Returning to the Bible, Poland Reclaims Sunday as a Day of Rest
Polish lawmakers voted last week to reclaim Sunday as a day of rest by slowly phasing out Sunday shopping by 2020.
The bill, which was backed by trade unions, passed with a vote of 254 to 156.
The bill is expected to pass the Polish Senate and will be signed into law by the country's president.
Poland is among the last European countries to hold on to its Christian heritage. Abortion and homosexual marriage are still forbidden in the country of 38 million, which is predominately Catholic.
In the Old Testament, the Bible teaches that Sunday is a day of rest since God rested on the seventh day after creating the world. Sunday, the first day of the week, became the Catholic "seventh day" and a day of rest after the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead on Sunday.
According to the new law, from March 1 to December 31, 2018, stores will be open on the first and final Sundays of the month. In 2019, stores will only be open on the last Sunday of the month. Then in 2020, most retail establishments will be closed in the country on all but eight Sundays.
Small businesses staffed by their owners will not be forced to close. Gas stations and railways will remain open on Sundays.
Father Paweł Rytel-Andrianik, the spokesman for the Polish Bishops Conference, said while the law is a "step towards the recovery of Sundays free from work," the bill overall remains "unsatisfactory."
"The bishops underscore the need to restore Sunday to society as a day of rest and time of building family ties as well as strengthening social relationships," he told LifeSiteNews.com. "They point out also that Sunday rest cannot be a luxury for a chosen few but is an integral part of equal treatment for all employees. Therefore, there is an urgent need to make all Sundays free from work, just as is already the case in many European Union countries."
Economists are against the bill, saying it's a disgrace. They argue some people could lose their jobs with the Sunday shutdown.
In 2012, Pope Benedict said that in defending Sunday as a day of rest, one "defends human freedom."
He noted how time for the family is "threatened by a sort of 'dictatorship' of work commitments."
"Sunday is the day of the Lord and of men and women, a day in which everyone must be able to be free, free for the family and free for God. In defending Sunday we defend human freedom!" he said.
The bible of course, never calls for a Sunday rest. This is a man made, or as the article admits, Catholic made tradition. The stance taken by Catholic clergy on Sunday laws throughout Europe is in direct conformance to the Catholic Catechism, and reveals the intentions of the Church of Rome where ever she can dominate the political landscape. These United States are no exception.
The soon to be seventh Catholic Justice on our nine member Supreme court, will all but guarantee the passing of a national Sunday law should such a bill ever come before our Catholic dominated Supreme court. It is certainly not beyond our heavily Catholic influenced Congress which recently invited and gave the Pope of Rome the podium to politically address our entire Federal government, to submit such a bill in our near future. The downward spiral of our national politic, debt, polarization, and general chaos has been in direct concurrence to the ever increasing number of papal influenced Catholics and lefty progressives within our government.
The papacies success within any nation, is almost always the ruin of all other interests save her own. Their debasement is her exaltation. She and her lovers have always ridden upon the backs of those they eventually rule. Global governance under her guidance will equal global ruin, and the return of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. So be it. Come Lord Jesus.
https://www.malaymail.com/news/malaysia/2020/01/11/sunday-should-be-made-rest-with-family-day-says-hannah-yeoh/1827046
MALAYSIA
Sunday should be made 'rest with family' day, says Hannah Yeoh
Saturday, 11 Jan 2020 09:23 PM MYT
KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 11 ― Women, Family and Community Development Deputy Minister Hannah Yeoh has proposed that Sunday be made as a "rest with family" day.
She said the proposal could also serve as part of preventive measures in dealing with work-related stress issues.
" so that those who work would have the time to rest on Sundays. If they don't do so (get rest), they will be physically tired and get stressed to go to work the next day.
"This can indirectly affect their mental and physical health," she told Bernama after officiating the Kiara Green Townhouse Family Day here today.
Yeoh who is also Segambut MP also encouraged all residents' associations to carry out community programmes on a regular basis to foster closer relationships among neighbours.....................
This could have been posted in the Roman politics thread, but since Hungary is one of the nations which has recently passed Sunday laws, and this is about a gathering of religions, I'll put it here.
http://adventmessenger.org/adventists-catholics-and-evangelicals-unite-in-hungary-by-order-of-pope-francis/
Quoted article below from link above.
Adventists, Catholics and Evangelicals Unite in Hungary "By Order of Pope Francis"
On Sunday, January 24, 2021, Roman Catholic Cardinal Peter Erdo organized a service during the last day of the 2021 Ecumenical Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. This final ceremony took place at St. Teresa the Great Catholic Church in Budapest, Hungary and was attended by Catholics, Lutherans, Baptists, Methodists, Jews, Seventh-day Adventists and Pentecostals.
The leaders included: Catholic Cardinal Peter Erdo, Reformed Church Bishop Jozsef Steinbach, Catholic Bishop Abel Szocska, Lutheran Bishop Paul Lackner, President of the Hungarian Baptist Church Janos Papp, President of the Methodist Church in Hungary Laszlo A. Khaled, President of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Hungary Tamas Ocsai, Chief Rabbi Robert Frolich; President of the Hungarian Pentecostal Church Albert Pataky and Secretary General of the Ecumenical Council of Hungarian Churches Pastor Vilmos Fischl. [1]
Roman Catholic Cardinal Peter Erdo welcomed the participants with the following words:
"Dear Brothers and Sisters, Today is the Sunday of the word of God in the Catholic Church by order of Pope Francis. On the last day of the ecumenical week of prayer, this feast reminds us that the Word of God connects the various Christian communities." [1]
In other words, Cardinal Erdo revealed that this group of ecumenical leaders had gathered on Sunday, God's Day, January 24, 2021, in obedience to Pope Francis' "order" to celebrate the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. That is what the Catholic Cardinal said and that is what the local news published along with photos of the different leaders apparently obeying the Pope's call, including Tamas Ocsai, the President of the Hungarian Union Conference of Seventh-day Adventist Churches, the top Adventist in the country.
Notice what else was published about the ecumenical leaders gathered inside the Roman Catholic Church:
"Following the preaching, the representatives of the various Christian denominations thanked the Lord for their coexistence, prayed for the acceptance of one another, for growth in faith and in all life; for those who are persecuted for their faith and for those who help them; so that we can confront all injustice." [1]
The growing prominence of the papacy in political and religious affairs is astonishing. Both political and religious leaders are paying respect and obedience to Pope Francis. The world is basically saying, "Who is like unto beast? Who is able to make war with him? (Revelation 13:4).
This is the same presumptuous power described by inspiration in the following words: "And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies" (Revelation 13:5). Not only does Rome speak "blasphemy" by claiming to have changed God's law by calling Sunday the Lord's Day, but it also blasphemes by claiming that it is infallible and has the power to forgive sin. Are we now receiving orders from this power?
This is the same persecuting power that "was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations" (Revelation 13:7). Have Protestants forgotten their own history? Don't we remember the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre and the Papal Crusades against the Huguenots, the Waldensians, the Albigensians and the Anabaptists? What about the Holy Roman Inquisition and the tens of millions of Protestants who were executed during the long dark period in which Rome ruled both spiritual and temporal power?
Are we now ignoring all of this church history today? Apparently, yes. We have not only forgotten our sacred history, we are repeating it again and we are fulfilling Bible prophecy by honoring the beast: "And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world" (Revelation 13:8).
And yes, this is the same power that everyone seeks to please, including many Seventh-day Adventists, and the same power that we've been warned about in the Third Angel's Message of Revelation 14: "If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God which is poured out without mixture into the cup of His indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence Of the Lamb" (Revelation 14:9).
Church and state are coming together to elevate the Papacy again. This will result in the healing of the deadly wound. Every true student of Bible prophecy and every defender of religious liberty should know what papal supremacy means. This is a power that requires the praise and submission of kings, emperors, religious leaders and all people on the earth.
Is this power greater than Christ? Our Savior stood before Pilate and said, "My kingdom is not of this world" (John 18:36). He also said, "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's" (Mark 12:17). When did Jesus require that every nation send Him ambassadors? When did Jesus usurp the authority of earthly governments? When did Jesus accumulate great wealth, fame or political power?
The Papacy's desire to be recognized worldwide by all people has never been so well organized today. Rome's ambition to be the sole authority in global affairs is causing the world and the Protestant churches to wonder after the beast. As we witness the closing scenes of Bible prophecy being staged, let us proclaim with power the most emphatic message of Revelation. As the world worships the great impostor called the First Beast of Revelation 13, God will send a mighty angel from heaven with the divine call to every nation and people to "Come out of her, my people" (Revelation 18:4).
https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2021/12-march/news/world/german-churches-call-for-protection-of-work-free-sundays
Quoted article below from link above. My comments in blue.
German Churches call for protection of work-free Sundays
Digitisation, online shopping, and growing work-life imbalances compromising rest day
CHURCHES in Germany have urged the protection of work-free Sundays in the face of digitisation, online shopping, and growing work-life imbalances, on the 1700th anniversary of the official designation of Sunday as a day of rest by the Emperor Constantine.
"The coronavirus pandemic has again made us aware of how much people need a time structure: Sunday visits to relatives in nursing homes could not take place, the daughter's football team was not allowed to play, while church services were possible, if at all, only under strict conditions," the joint appeal said.
It was co-signed by the chairman of the Council of the Evangelical Church in Germany, Dr Heinrich Bedford-Strohm; the Bishop of Limburg and president of the German RC Bishops' Conference, the Rt Revd Georg Bätzing; and the Orthodox chairman of Germany's Working Group of Christian Churches, Archpriest Radu Miron.
"We have had to say goodbye to what is familiar, valued, and sometimes necessary, while the important rhythm between work and leisure time is becoming increasingly blurred due to home and mobile working and asynchronous hours. Digital transformation will not only change how we work, it will also change the togetherness and common celebration of Sunday — and possibly us, too."
The appeal, published in Bonn and Hanover, said that Constantine the Great, who ruled from 306 to 337, had established the "dies solis" as a protected holiday on 3 March 321, and Sunday was a legal guarantee enshrined for "rest and spiritual elevation" under Germany's Basic Law.
It was, however, already a normal working day for those maintaining basic services and meeting urgent needs in hospitals, care homes, transport, and power facilities, as well as in food, leisure, and culture, and looked set to be further eroded by advancing technology and changing work-patterns.
"People who are active despite Sunday deserve our appreciation and special compensation," the Churches' appeal said. "Just as the state is called on to protect work-free Sundays and prevent their erosion, so we are all called to ensure that, in striving for supposed freedom, we do not give up our actual freedom."
Calls for the preservation of free Sundays have increased over the past decade across Europe, where family and worker organisations launched a Brussels-based European Sunday Alliance in 2012, with support from the Conference of European Churches and Roman Catholic organisations, as well as the Solidarity union in Poland, Force Ouvrière in France, and other groups.
In a statement accompanying the latest church appeal, Germany's Alliance for Free Sundays said that economic lobby groups had continually pressed for Sunday to be made a "normal working day", and were now using the Covid-19 crisis "as an opportunity to weaken, even demand, the abolition of Sunday protection in retail and other industries".
First and foremost, the plandemic did not shut down societies and cause the above suggested confusion in relation to a 1700 year old Roman emperors edict to "Christians" and pagans alike to observe rest on the day of the sun. Catholic inspired big globalist governments did this. They created the very situation they are now complaining about, not their plandemic, which they also created.
At least they rightly referred to the real power behind the origin of Sunday sacredness and laws, the power of Rome, and not some false claim that such comes from scripture. I guess they could not really harp upon the matter of everyone needing physical rest, since the shutdowns have caused no doubt quite a bit more free time than there was before them. The insidiousness and invasiveness of the Sunday law movements intentions to control the populace is very certainly exposed in this above article and endeavor. They now wish to enter right into everyones homes and personal lives to prevent them from even online shopping and activity on their chosen day of traditional observance. Yes, they wish to force compliance of their own religion upon all through government right into everyone's own homes. This is evil, and exactly what laws erected separating church and state in this world were put in place to prevent. The real intensions of Rome and apostate Protestantism joining hands upon this issue is blatantly evident in the above endeavors. They wish to intrude upon every individuals life, and force the issue of worship according to their own faith upon every living soul. This is exactly what biblical prophecy predicts will happen before the end of this world in relation to the mark of the beast.
If you think our country is safe from such government intrusions, your better think again. Our present Catholic President's best ally is the Pope of Rome. He intends to work closely with the Pope to establish Roman Catholic social doctrine through legislation in this country. Sunday sacredness established by law is Roman Catholic social teaching and doctrine. All three branches of our government are filled with Roman Catholics and seven or eight out of nine of our Supreme Court justices who would make the final decision concerning a national Sunday law or not, are Catholics.
The world and many Christians continue to deny the final warning message the SDA church has been giving them for well over a hundred years now. Nevertheless, the political atmosphere, ever growing power of the papacy in the world, and Sunday law movements around the world, have only been heading steadily straight for what the SDA church has been warning against. Everything is almost in place, and the final events will be rapid ones. No doubt those who consistently deny the truth of what is transpiring right in from of their faces, will continue to deny it until it is fulfilled, and then deny the truth of it even then as well. So be it. Come Lord Jesus.
Rev 13:11 And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon. 12 And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him,
and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. 13 And he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men, 14 And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth,
that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live. 15 And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed. 16 And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: 17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. 18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.
Rev 14:6 And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, 7 Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters. 8 And there followed another angel, saying,
Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. 9 And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice,
If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, 10 The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: 11 And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night,
who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name. 12
Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus. 13 And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them.
http://mtceurope.org/en/our-actions/48-campaigns/free-sundays/296-european-christian-worker-movement-statement-in-the-international-day-of-free-sunday-3rd-march.html
Quoted article below from link above. Emphasis mine. My comments in blue.
European Christian Worker Movement Statement in the International Day of Free Sunday (3rd March)
European Christian Worker Movement (ECWM) expresses its full support to all the initiatives taking place on 3rd March that is the International Day of Free Sunday. ECWM considers very important to keep free Sunday of dispensable work, since it must be a day off from ordinary professional work because it has healthy effects by several reasons. In addition, it is a sacred day for us as Christians.
We consider a work-free Sunday as an occasion to reconcile professional and family life, since it provides adequate time for dedicating to family and the strengthening of good social relations that are essential for living together favourable humanly. In our times, in the age of growing individualism and selfishness, free Sunday can build bridge among people, help them to relate more and be more interested for the others' lives, forgetting themselves and thinking more about people's needs. This fact is particularly important for the healthy development of families whose role in the social development is fundamental.
Historically, free Sunday is a part of structure created by man for thousands of years which has been kept in several cultures and has still its original meaning of providing the person with a normal important rest for a whole development of personality. Free Sunday helps man to reflect deeply about the past and the future, it allows him a more detached vision about himself and the discernment between what is the most and the least important. From the physiologic point of view, free Sunday is an opportunity to recover strength and then to go on working with a renewed motivation.
Finally, work-free Sunday is very important for spiritual life of person, since, in this way, he pays homage to the Creator who has destined this day for resting. Sunday also remembers the Resurrection of God's son that is the supreme reason of joy for Christians and it must be, therefore, considered sacred day.
So, we consider free Sunday as an unique occasion for people, their families and, in short, for the whole society. We invite, therefore, all the people who know how to value well time and do not forget the fundamental thing. We demand to all responsible people (entrepreneurs, politicians, people in public life) that enable an integral human development of people for a greater good of society.
There you have it, plain and simple. Babylon's minions demanding the observance of an admitted man made holy day. Bypassing God's chosen day for all the above stated blessings, they now seek to establish and make something holy by their own observance of it, rather than observe that which God's word has plainly stated He has made holy. They can make nothing holy, as none of us can by creating this or that tradition. God alone makes anything holy, especially in this fallen world.
It does not get any simpler than this folks. Before the end arrives all will make this most basic and simple decision, worship according to fallen humanities word and tradition, or worship according to the plain testimony of God's word. In so choosing all of humanity will be choosing to either worship God or humanity. This decision also will be forced upon all by their own hand in forcing their chosen day upon all. So be it, come Lord Jesus.
https://www.christiantoday.com/article/time.to.recover.the.sabbath.says.new.report/137192.htm
Quoted article below from link above.
Time to recover the sabbath, says new report
Home working, zero hours contracts, the switch to home deliveries and online retailing, and an 'always on' culture - the world of work is changing fast and massively.
The Covid pandemic has accelerated changes and turbo-charged trends that make the old 'nine to five' office-based routines seem a far, distant memory.
Now UK faith-based think tank Theos has come up with key proposals aimed at helping modern-day workers survive and thrive despite both the current changes – and the major challenges coming down the track. One proposal suggests 'recovering the sabbath.'
In a new report, 'Just Work: humanising the labour market in a changing world', Theos identifies three 'great disruptions' facing the world of work. They highlight: the technological - Artificial Intelligence, machine learning, and automation; the ecological - climate change and loss of biodiversity; and human vulnerability, as seen through the pandemic, migration and declining birth rates.
Theos explains, "Any of these would see many jobs eliminated, replaced, or changed. Together they create an unpredictable environment in which work could be dehumanised – or we could seize these disruptions as an opportunity to humanise work and working conditions.
"As the relationship between work, time and place changes, there is a need to rediscover patterns of rest for human beings and for ecosystems."
Even before the pandemic, writers such as John Mark Comer were encouraging Christians to rediscover a slower, simpler way of life. His bestselling 'The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry' advocates a return to spiritual practices such as Sabbath, Silence and Solitude, Simplicity and Slowing, and a rejection of the 'always on' culture promoted by 21st century working practices, social media and communications.
Organisations such as the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity have long emphasised the importance of the world of work – often neglected by church leaders. LICC points out that most Christians spend the vast majority of their waking lives outside of church 'on the frontline' – in shops and schools, in homes and offices and gyms.
LICC is committed to "empowering Christians to make a difference for Christ in their Monday to Saturday lives, helping church leaders equip their church communities to do it, and fuelling a movement to reach and renew the nation."
During the pandemic, increasing numbers of people have shifted to working from home, from in-person shopping to ordering online, having take-aways delivered, and watching streaming services instead of going to the cinema. Multiple lockdowns have propelled many changes in the way society functions.
But people working from home or in the 'gig economy' delivering food or online orders, have discovered they are being watched - and watched closely. Software fitted to home computers or installed in vehicles is monitoring when and how people are working. The move to home working has meant an increased erosion of defined working hours, with 'the boss' able to make demands round-the-clock.
In response, Theos makes three key proposals:
1. First, a focus on a full work, rather than full employment economy. Paid employment is the main – but not the only – form of work, and unpaid labour, such as caring responsibilities and volunteer work, need greater esteem and focus from a policy perspective. Thinking around labour should also acknowledge, create space for, and properly support unpaid but essential forms of work, as well as recognising disparities in paid employment.
2. Recognition of the human person as central to any healthy understanding of work. Investors, and first and foremost church investors, have achieved tangible changes through activism in areas such as climate change and governance. They should add clear requirements on the fair handling of wages, benefits, agency work, outsourcing and employee surveillance to the social criteria they look at within environmental, social and governance investing.
3. Recovery of shared practices of rest to counter our culture of overwork. Dissolving boundaries between employment and leisure – exacerbated during the pandemic – have negatively affected many workers. Overwork is literally killing people. For many, a combination of technology and the pandemic have broken the link between work and particular places and times – leading to an expectation, even if it is only an expectation of ourselves, that we will always be available.
Theos also recommends that the UK should have more public holidays, that we look for ways to eliminate at least some of the vast quantity of unpaid overtime in the economy, and that the Living Hours movement of the Living Wage Foundation be supported by faith groups.
Paul Bickley, one of the report's authors, explains: "The issue is not work itself, but rather what happens when we make work, rather than the people who do it, our focus. We are disconnected from a healthy sense of work, and severing the needed boundaries between work and rest has set us adrift.
"The biblical idea of Sabbath is an ancient answer to modern anxieties. It's time to rediscover it.
"Work is changing rapidly. Churches have a somewhat forgotten heritage of addressing these questions, and a strong intellectual framework from which they can think through many of the emerging issues.
"The pandemic, horrendous crisis though it is, represents a rare opportunity for societies to think about what they value highly."
Rev Peter Crumpler is a Church of England minister in St Albans, Herts, UK and the author of 'Responding to Post-truth'.
There is no recovering the biblical sabbath, by Sunday rest or closures. The bible speaks of no such thing. So whose sabbath is this article really referring too? If not God's, then whose?
Been a while since I have posted on this thread. The following video addresses a good bit of what has been going on in recent years. I'll try to keep this thread a little more up to date.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdoW4p9jL2E
https://www.deseret.com/2022/1/11/22877446/could-sabbath-closure-laws-make-a-comeback-blue-laws-sunday-closing
Quoted article below, from link above. Emphasis is mine.
Could Sabbath closure laws make a comeback?
Here's why some political commentators and legal scholars are tweeting their support for taking a Sabbath
By Kelsey Dallas@kelsey_dallas Jan 11, 2022, 10:00pm MST
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic began, Americans were overworked and tightly wound. In the past two years, the situation's only gotten worse.
Pandemic-related stress and a widespread desire for more time to rest are among the factors fueling the "Great Resignation." They also help explain why some political commentators and legal scholars spent the weekend debating the Sabbath.
The conversation began with a tweet from Adrian Vermeule, a law professor at Harvard University. He highlighted the reinstatement of Sabbath laws as one of several policy goals that unites "post-liberals," a group of conservatives who say they're focused on
promoting the common good.
Sabbath laws, which are also known as blue laws, were once a major part of American life. Although they came in a variety of forms, the policies had a shared purpose: limiting certain commercial activities to six days per week.
In other words, blue laws
forced both business owners and the people they served to take a day of rest. And under past policies, that day was almost always Sunday.
"Until the last few decades, Sabbath laws ... effectively shut down Sunday commerce in much of the country," Joel Mathis noted in a Monday column for The Week.
Blue laws' association with the Christian Sabbath helps explain why part of the debate surrounding Vermeule's tweet centered on religious discrimination. Legal experts pointed out that forced closures on Sunday disproportionately harm some people of faith, including Jews who observe the Sabbath from sundown on Friday to sundown on Saturday.
Similar religious freedom concerns fueled a legal challenge to blue laws that the Supreme Court heard in the early 1960s. Representatives of a discount store in Maryland alleged that the state's Sunday closure policies violated the Constitution's free exercise and establishment clauses.
In May 1961, the Supreme Court ruled 8-1 that Maryland's Sabbath laws didn't violate the First Amendment. The justices acknowledged that the restrictions had their roots in Christian practice, but said they served important secular purposes, including the promotion of public health, Oyez reported.Although the ruling was significant, it did not guard against Sunday laws' demise. Soon after the Supreme Court used secular arguments to rule in favor of blue laws, policymakers across the country began using secular arguments to justify their repeal.
In 2019, officials in North Dakota offered by-then familiar arguments to explain their support for overturning the nation's last statewide ban on Sunday trading. They said the move would promote personal freedom and help business owners by boosting revenue.
"Who but a few scolds could complain?," asked Sohrab Ahmari in a recent Wall Street Journal column about the fall of Sabbath laws. "We are encouraged to pursue lives of constant action and purpose, and we do."
What this looks like in practice is that few Americans prioritize taking time to rest. And that even those who do often fail, whether because of their kids' demanding extracurricular schedules, their smartphones' incessant beeping or countless other obstacles.
"Rest is hard to come by these days," argued Mathis in The Week, noting that pandemic-related developments have deepened this already common problem.
"For many Americans, the pandemic has given rise to remote work that has blurred the divisions between home and labor, while working-class folks are often subject to 'just-in-time' scheduling that makes home life difficult to sustain," he wrote.
Frustration with the status quo fueled engagement with Vermeule's tweet.
People from across the political and religious spectrum generally agreed that Americans could benefit from being forced to take at least one day off each week."If the right and left can agree on anything these days, maybe it's that workers should get a day off now and then," wrote Mathis for The Week.
However, consensus would likely fall apart quickly if conservatives insisted on reinstating blue laws in their old form.
It would be better to mandate rest on a day that doesn't raise religious freedom concerns, tweeted Jeet Heer, a columnist for The Nation.
"Elevator pitch: a secular Sabbath that starts on Thursday evening. This will create a four-day work week and also preserve religious neutrality," he said.
Workers may love this idea, but any sort of one-size-fits-all closure policy would cause problems, as many respondents to Heer's tweet pointed out. For example, Larry Yudelson, the editorial director for a Jewish press, noted that Jews would struggle to prepare for their religious Sabbath if stores were closed during the day on Fridays.
The best solution to burnout,
at least in the short term, might be for individual Americans to find ways to take a rest on their own terms. Some Christian business owners, including the family behind Chick-fil-A, already do this by voluntarily closing up shop on Sundays. Other Americans observe a digital Sabbath by turning off the notifications on their phones.
"Even just leaving your phone behind when you get lunch is a step in the right direction," reported The New York Times in a 2019 article on reducing stress.[/size]
https://noqreport.com/2022/03/19/top-global-agency-calls-for-lockdowns-to-curb-oil-use/
Quoted article below from link above. Emphasis is mine.
Top Global Agency Calls for 'Lockdowns' to Curb Oil Use
As gasoline prices rise to record levels, the International Energy Agency is calling for energy lockdowns, such as banning the use of private cars in cities on Sundays.
Other measures proposed in the agency's "A 10-Point Plan to Cut Oil Use" include reducing speed limits, working from home, cutting business air travel and imposing an SUV "tax," reports Climate Depot, the website run by former Capitol Hill staffer Marc Morano.
"Governments have all the necessary tools at their disposal to put oil demand into decline in the coming years, which would support efforts to both strengthen energy security and achieve vital climate goals," the report states.
Among the proposals: "Reducing highway speed limits by about 6 miles per hour; more working from home; street changes to encourage walking and cycling; car-free Sundays in cities and restrictions on other days; cutting transit fares; policies that encourage more carpooling; cutting business air travel."
Another idea is "restricting private cars' use of roads in large cities to those with even number-plates some weekdays and to those with odd-numbered plates on other weekdays."
Morano, who managed GOP communications for the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Work, called the plan "COVID 2.0."
He said the report "sounds an awful lot like an energy version of COVID lockdowns."
"Instead of opening America back up for domestic energy production, we are told to suffer and do with less and are prescribed the same failed lockdown-style policies we endured for COVID," Morano said.
"It is odd how COVID 'solutions' also allegedly helped the climate and now the same solutions are being touted to deal with Russia's invasion of Ukraine."
Morano observed that the "proposed 'solutions' to climate change, COVID, and now the Russian war are all exactly the same – hammer the poor and middle class with more restrictions on travel, less freedom, and even more surrendering of power to unelected government regulators."
Same people, same plans, same puppet master. More globalist papal puppets enforcing Babylon's will.
http://adventmessenger.org/catholics-are-calling-for-the-eighth-day-sunday-to-be-reclaimed-in-order-to-restore-christian-culture-in-society/
Catholics are calling for the Eighth day, Sunday, to be Reclaimed in order to Restore Christian Culture in Society
April 23, 2022 by Andy Roman
On April 19, 2022, Crisis Magazine, a prominent Catholic conservative website, called for the restoration of Sunday in our "Christian culture." To that end, they're looking at Sunday, the first day of the week, as the "eighth day." This is a reference that is used to try to demonstrate that the Sabbath was changed from Saturday to Sunday.
Here is what Crisis Magazine published on April 19, 2022:
"Reclaiming such ideas like the Eighth Day is no small part in the requisite work for the restoration of Christian culture. To that glorious end, we look to the Eighth Day—a poetic device that, like all true poetry, symbolically breaks the boundaries of the material world and expresses something intangible yet essential. When the Good News of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ spread over the world, it came with a marvelous piece of poetry. Christians referred to Sunday, traditionally considered the first day of the week, as the Eighth Day." [1]
This concept of an "eighth day" is based on Catholic tradition and is not supported by the Bible. We are essentially being asked to reject the Bible, the true Sabbath day, Saturday, and the seven-day week in favor of their interpretation of how Christ instituted a new eight-day week at His resurrection. Crisis Magazine continued:
"In ancient times, the Sabbath Day (Saturday) marked the seventh and last day of creation when the Lord rested from His good work. But after the Resurrection, when the Passover became the Pascha, Christians began referring cryptically to Sunday, the first day of the week and the day Christ rose from the crypt, as the Eighth Day." [1]
"The Eighth Day hailed the Resurrected Christ as the beginning and end of time, and it also symbolized a mystical movement beyond the seven days. God created the world in seven days, and when His Son rose from the dead, a new creation was begun." [1]
They claim that because Jesus was resurrected on Sunday, an "eighth day" was created, and that God's creative work extended beyond the seven-day week in some way, even though nothing new was created. That is their belief. So, for some reason, they teach that Sunday became the new eighth day of God's creation. This is a conclusion based solely on speculation and assumption. There is no biblical evidence that God created something new or that Sunday became the Lord's Day. However, they continue to promote this grave doctrinal error by claiming the following:
"If, however, the day after the Sabbath was the first day of the Jewish week, then the Sabbath must be the last day as well as the first, which introduces a growing understanding, bestowed by time and revelation, between the relation of the Sabbath Day and the Lord's Day and the idea of giving Sunday a double significance." [1]
"It is Jesus Christ, Who declares Himself the Alpha and Omega, Who is the firstborn of every creature, by Whom and for Whom all things were created and in Whom they hold together, Who is truly and preeminently the Eighth Day." [1]
The claim that the "eighth day" is superior to all other days, including Saturday, is unsubstantiated. This is based on the false assumption that somehow there are 8 days in a week, and that God rested on the 8th day from His labor. This is a weak attempt to establish Sunday-keeping based on a convoluted argument that claims that when Jesus was resurrected on Sunday, it ushered in a new creation, making Sunday the eighth day as well as the first day, and thus the most important day of the week. Of course, no biblical evidence is provided.
The truth is that Sunday is not a Sabbath and that a week does not have eight days. These assertions are based on Catholic tradition rather than God's clear teachings in the Bible. Many attempts have been made to argue that the Sabbath has been changed, and that this alteration was made by divine appointment. We agree that the Sabbath was altered, but it was not by divine decree. It was man who did it, not God. If God had made this change, it would have been in accordance with His will, and He would have revealed it in His word:
"Surely the Lord GOD will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets." Amos 3:7.
This call to bring Sunday back into our Christian culture has nothing to do with the gospel and everything to do with politics. When Crisis Magazine calls for Sunday to be reclaimed, it's more about mobilizing political action than anything else. True social reforms cannot be achieved through political action or by enforcing Sunday as a day of rest through state power. Laws can limit people's actions, but they can't change their hearts. And if churches want to impose Sunday by legislation, forcing men to rest, this means that they have abandoned their gospel commission and have become political lobbyists, relying on the state's strong arm to impose church doctrine on society.
Human traditions, church doctrines, men's opinions, and the politicization of the gospel through Sunday rest legislation are all things we emphatically reject. It is our responsibility to cling to pure Bible truth. Only the gospel can bring righteousness. Our hope is that we will all obey God's Word, which is the standard of righteousness by which we will be judged at the end of time. All false doctrine and oppressive dragon-like actions by governments will soon vanish. Our only hope is to rely on God's Word.
The following quoted chapter may be viewed at the link below, post reply #53. It is in relation to the seventh beast which is also said to be an eighth, and the connection to Sunday being the eighth day.
http://www.gracecentered.com/christian_forums/seventh-day-adventist-forum-(sda)/sabbath-sunday-and-the-abomination-of-desolation/msg1054925711/#msg1054925711
23 THE BEAST THAT WAS AND IS NOT BEING AN EIGTH BUT ONE OF THE SEVEN
11 And the beast that was, and is not, even he is the eighth, and is of the seven, and goeth into perdition.
As though it were not already complicated enough, this seventh beast is now also referred to as an eighth, which is one of the seven. How can it be one of the seven, and an eighth also? How could it be a beast or kingdom in and of itself, and also be of the seven other beasts or kingdoms of biblical prophecy? It would have to be very unique indeed to fulfill such specifications. Is there any kingdom that can meet them? Yes, there is.
The Vatican. The Vatican occupies a unique status among the religions and nations of our world. She is both. Like no other nation or religion on earth. Observe the following from the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
"Vatican City, in full State of the Vatican City, Italian Stato della Città del Vaticano , ecclesiastical state, seat of the Roman Catholic church, and an enclave in Rome, situated on the west bank of the Tiber River. Vatican City is the world's smallest fully independent nation-state. Its medieval and Renaissance walls form its boundaries except on the southeast at St. Peter's Square (Piazza San Pietro). Of the six entrances, only three—the piazza, the Arco delle Campane (Arch of the Bells) in the facade of St. Peter's Basilica, and the entrance to the Vatican Museums and Galleries in the north wall—are open to the public. The most imposing building is St. Peter's Basilica, built during the 4th century and rebuilt during the 16th century. Erected over the tomb of St. Peter the Apostle, it is the second largest religious building (after Yamoussoukro Basilica) in Christendom.
The Vatican palace is the residence of the pope within the city walls. The Holy See is the name given to the government of the Roman Catholic church, which is led by the pope as the bishop of Rome. As such, the Holy See's authority extends over Catholics throughout the world. Since 1929 it has resided in Vatican City, which was established as an independent state to enable the pope to exercise his universal authority.
Vatican City has its own telephone system, post office, gardens, astronomical observatory, radio station, banking system, and pharmacy, as well as a contingent of Swiss Guards responsible for the personal safety of the pope since 1506. Almost all supplies—including food, water, electricity, and gas—must be imported. There is no income tax and no restriction on the import or export of funds. As the Holy See, it derives its income from the voluntary contributions of more than one billion Roman Catholics worldwide, as well as interest on investments and the sale of stamps, coins, and publications. Banking operations and expenditures have been reported publicly since the early 1980s.
During the period from the 4th century to 1870, the Vatican gained control of territory around Rome and served as capital of the Papal States. In 1929 Vatican City's independent sovereignty was recognized by the Fascist Italian government in the Lateran Treaty. Sovereignty is exercised by the pope upon his election as the head of the Roman Catholic church. He has absolute executive, legislative, and judicial powers within the city. In 1984 a major reshuffle of offices in the Roman Curia resulted in the delegation of the routine administration of Vatican City to a pontifically appointed commission of five cardinals headed by the Secretariat of State. The inhabitants of Vatican City, the majority of whom are priests and nuns, also include several hundred laypersons engaged in secretarial, domestic, trade, and service occupations.
Special extraterritorial privileges are extended to more than 10 other buildings in Rome and to Castel Gandolfo, the pope's summer residence in the Alban Hills. In addition, Vatican City maintains embassies in numerous foreign nations."
The Vatican has been a recognized nation-state since 1929. Since then it has been more than just another religion of this world, but a nation, country, or kingdom of the same. This is how it can be an eighth while being of the seven at the same time. As already pointed out, the Church of Rome was an intricate part of the first beast of Rev 13, and the second beast of the same which helps reestablish or resurrect the first beast again on a global scale. She was already an intricate part of the seven, through her religious members influencing the same, when she was established in this world as an eighth in 1929. Therefore she is an eighth and at the same time is of the seven.
This special status among the nations of this earth has increased her political influence and effect upon the same. She entertains ambassadors from 176 nations and is caught up on the politics of this entire world. The seventh and final global beast of this world will be a form of global government upon whose back she sits controlling and manipulating the same. Just as she rode the first beast of Rev 13, and ever increasingly does ride the second beast of the same, our nation. Through us she will gain her ultimate goal, world domination.
There is another aspect and significance though, of this eighth beast, which is of the seven. The number eight carries some symbolic significance also, according to many, including the Church of Rome herself. Observe the following from the book THE WOMAN AND THE BEAST IN THE BOOK OF REVELATION, by Louis F. Were.
"The beast of Rev. 12, 13 and 17 has only seven heads, and to look for an actual eighth head betrays a failure to grasp the essential feature of the remarkable prophecy of Rev. 17. There is not to be an eighth head; the seventh head is numbered eighth because of its symbolic meaning....................
Thus by following the principle that Rev. 17 particularly mentions the things of Babylon as they relate to Jesus, we now see that the number eight used in relation to the coming of the beast out of its state of death in a likeness to the resurrection of Jesus,.............................................
As with the number 6, which we find significantly employed throughout many places of Holy Writ, so the number eight is also employed significantly in the scriptures as the symbol of the Lord's resurrection and triumph over His enemies. This fact is well-known to those who have given consideration to the numeric system, which is clearly revealed in the Bible. By knowing that the number eight is the Bible symbol of the Lord's resurrection and triumph over His enemies, we can grasp the meaning of Rev. 17:11, which reads: "And the beast that was, and is not, even he is the eighth, and is one of the seven, and goes into perdition." This beast that received a "death stroke" and whose deadly wound is to be healed and all the world wonder after it, according to Rev. 13, is described in Rev. 17 as having a resurrection: thus imitating the death and resurrection of Jesus. As Jesus triumphed over His enemies and rose in glorious power to use that power to save His people, so this beast will emerge from its place of death to a position of even greater power, which it will seek to employ for the destruction of the people of God." (Chapter 12, page 113&114)
Without a doubt, the first beast of Rev 13 which received a deadly wound to its head, is brought back to life with the help of the second beast of the book of Revelation. For the beast was, is not, and yet is. If this is not an allusion to a resurrection, what is? If in fact, the number eight in some way represents the resurrection or new beginnings, then the above written by Louis Were is certainly tenable. Observe the following from the Catechism of the Catholic Church (emphasis mine) -
"II. The Lord's Day
This is the day which the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.
The day of the Resurrection: the new creation
2174 Jesus rose from the dead "on the first day of the week." Because it is the "first day," the day of Christ's Resurrection recalls the first creation. Because it is the "eighth day" following the sabbath, it symbolizes the new creation ushered in by Christ's Resurrection. For Christians it has become the first of all days, the first of all feasts, the Lord's Day (he kuriake hemera, dies dominica) Sunday:
We all gather on the day of the sun, for it is the first day [after the Jewish sabbath, but also the first day] when God, separating matter from darkness, made the world; and on this same day Jesus Christ our Savior rose from the dead. Sunday - fulfillment of the sabbath
2175 Sunday is expressly distinguished from the sabbath which it follows chronologically every week; for Christians its ceremonial observance replaces that of the sabbath. In Christ's Passover, Sunday fulfills the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath and announces man's eternal rest in God. For worship under the Law prepared for the mystery of Christ, and what was done there prefigured some aspects of Christ:"
The Church of Rome itself connects the number eight with the resurrection. Not only with the resurrection, but with Sunday sacredness itself. This is very significant since the establishment of Sunday sacredness by law is what will bring about the full reestablishment or resurrection of the first beast of Rev 13. It was the establishment of this Roman Catholic institution, existing as a result of the amalgamation of pagan sun worship and apostate "Christianity", which first gave the Papacy the power of the state. Which combination of power, that is of church and state combined, developed into the first beast of Rev 13. Thus a national reestablishment of the Sunday law, would be nothing less than a resurrection of this very same beast power. The Church of Rome then fulfills the details of the scripture under examination both literally and spiritually, like no other nation or religion can.
12 And the ten horns which thou sawest are ten kings, which have received no kingdom as yet; but receive power as kings one hour with the beast.
This event is yet future. The seventh beast, or head, or mountain has not yet fully developed, though it is well on its way. What ever these ten horns turn out to represent, they will end up giving their power to the beast for an apparently short time, as the next verse points out.
13 These have one mind, and shall give their power and strength unto the beast.
They will all agree to give their power and strength to the beast.
14 These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them: for he is Lord of lords, and King of kings: and they that are with him are called, and chosen, and faithful.
This confederation will make open warfare with the Lord Jesus Christ through attacking his people on this earth. This would be those who " keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ" (Rev. 12:17). They are the ones with whom the dragon is at war.
15 And he saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.
This includes all the peoples of this earth, whose names are not written in the book of life (Rev. 17:8). For this is Satan's final worldwide rebellion against the Lamb of God. It is a time in which every decision shall be made for or against the Lamb. Then the end shall come with the voice of the archangel, and the trump of God (1Th.4:16).
Joel 3
14Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision: for the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision. 15The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining.
16The LORD also shall roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth shall shake: but the LORD will be the hope of his people, and the strength of the children of Israel. 17So shall ye know that I am the LORD your God dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain: then shall Jerusalem be holy, and there shall no strangers pass through her any more.
16 And the ten horns which thou sawest upon the beast, these shall hate the whore, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and burn her with fire.
This is a drastic change in the attitude of these ten horns. A few verses earlier they were said to all have one mind, which was to give their power and strength over to the beast. The whore controls the beast, and these ten horns are said to hate her, and basically destroy her. This must be at a point in time when these ten horns realize that they were deceived by the whore, into giving their power unto the beast which she controlled. Though they join her in making war with the Lamb, when they realize that the lamb will overcome them they will turn on her, for as the next verse points out, "God hath put it in their hearts to fulfill his will".
17 For God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled.
Thus the ten horns will give their power and strength unto the beast, until they realize to late I might add, that they have made the wrong choice. After which, they will turn on the whore, and destroy her. This will not save them though, because all of this time God's faithful will have been pointing out the truth of who the beast and the whore really are, but they chose not to listen.
18 And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth.
This is in reference of course to the Vatican. That city which is a nation-state who claims authority above all others. We shall now proceed to the next chapter of Revelation.
From your article:
This concept of an "eighth day" is based on Catholic tradition and is not supported by the Bible. We are essentially being asked to reject the Bible, the true Sabbath day, Saturday, and the seven-day week in favor of their interpretation of how Christ instituted a new eight-day week at His resurrection. Crisis Magazine continued:
Actually there IS an "eighth day" in scripture that goes back to Moses. It is called
Shemini Atzeret. It is an added day to the celebration of Sukkot - feast of Tabernacles.
Leviticus 23:33
Again the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 34 "Speak to the sons of Israel, saying, 'On the fifteenth of this seventh month is the Feast of Booths for seven days to the Lord. 35 On the first day is a holy convocation; you shall do no laborious work of any kind. 36 For seven days you shall present an offering by fire to the Lord. On the
eighth day you shall have a holy convocation and present an offering by fire to the Lord; it is an assembly. You shall do no laborious work.
It is referenced in the Gospels as well:
John 7:37
Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink.
The 8th day does not replace the Sabbath, it is an
additional once a year sabbath.
: DaveW Tue Apr 26, 2022 - 05:40:23
From your article:
Actually there IS an "eighth day" in scripture that goes back to Moses. It is called Shemini Atzeret. It is an added day to the celebration of Sukkot - feast of Tabernacles.
Leviticus 23:33
Again the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 34 "Speak to the sons of Israel, saying, 'On the fifteenth of this seventh month is the Feast of Booths for seven days to the Lord. 35 On the first day is a holy convocation; you shall do no laborious work of any kind. 36 For seven days you shall present an offering by fire to the Lord. On the eighth day you shall have a holy convocation and present an offering by fire to the Lord; it is an assembly. You shall do no laborious work.
It is referenced in the Gospels as well:
John 7:37
Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink.
The 8th day does not replace the Sabbath, it is an additional once a year sabbath.
True dat.
https://openstreetsproject.org
Open Streets is a global movement of projects taking place in communities of all sizes, all over the world. In addition to the sections above we recommend that you check out our interactive Open Streets map where you can learn about active projects from across North America. We've also curated a video gallery to help you see how others have started their own Open Streets program.
https://www.vox.com/2016/10/9/13017282/bogota-ciclovia-open-streets
https://www.sundaystreetssf.com/about/
http://www.sundaystreetsberkeley.org
https://www.eugene-or.gov/1666/About
https://sf.streetsblog.org/2022/03/04/weekend-roundup-return-of-sunday-streets-help-quantify-speeding-rates/
https://www.firstpost.com/india/sunday-streets-mumbai-polices-khaki-studio-entertains-residents-watch-it-here-10570241.html
https://anthology.diatribe.org/programs/cigna-sunday-streets/
https://www.cityofsacramento.org/Public-Works/Transportation/Programs-and-Services/Sunday-Street
https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/transit/2022/04/30/street-closures-sunday-as-five-boro-bike-tour-returns
https://hoodline.com/2020/08/soma-to-get-weekly-sunday-streets-closure-through-october/
https://www.livablecity.org
https://www.freepressjournal.in/mumbai/mumbai-sunday-streets-just-got-bigger-to-be-hosted-at-9-city-locations
https://www.missoulainmotion.com/sunday-streets
https://participate.melbourne.vic.gov.au/sundaystreets
https://www.openstreetsmpls.org
https://www.comece.eu/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/20220303-European-Sunday-Alliance-Joint-statement-on-the-European-Day-for-a-Work-Free-Sunday.pdf
Quoted article below from link above.
Statement of the European Sunday Alliance on the annual European Day for a Work-Free Sunday on March 3 2022
On March 3, the annual European Day for a Work-Free Sunday, the European Sunday Alliance calls on political leaders to put as a priority on the EU social policy agenda the establishment of a European weekly common day of rest.Work-life balance, as well as healthy, safe and well-adapted work environments, are at the heart of the European Pillar of Social Rights, which all EU institutions and Member States governments have committed to implement.
A weekly day of restOne of the major impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic has been the rise of telework and the fragmentation of working time, often detrimental to the work-life balance of workers. In order to prevent a work environment that compromises the health and wellbeing of workers, it is crucial to ensure a right to disconnect, during the week but also during the weekend, with a work free day. A full day of rest per week is indispensable to recover and to ensure both a better wellbeing and a better productivity of workers.
A common day of restHumans are social beings, and for many of them their health requires more than individual time to spend alone. The challenges of the pandemic have highlighted the issue of loneliness in the EU. A common work- free day enables families to spend time together, children with parents and grandparents, who are the first ones to suffer from loneliness. A work free day makes it also possible to pursue volunteer work, civic engagement, joint social, sports or faith-related activities, and, more generally, to strengthen the social cohesion of our communities.
By tradition and custom, most European countries establish the weekly day of rest on Sunday.
The European Sunday Alliance thus calls on European political leaders to put as a priority the establishment of a European weekly common day of rest for workers, by tradition on Sunday, as enshrined in Art. 2 of the European Social Charter.
http://adventmessenger.org/sunday-openings-are-opposed-by-christian-organizations-labor-unions-and-climate-activists-according-to-the-french-secular-media/
Quoted article below from link above.
Sunday Openings are Opposed by Christian Organizations, Labor Unions, and Climate Activists, According to the French Secular Media
In the minds of some in the secular news media, the pieces of the puzzle are coming together. Why can't our people connect the dots? The push for Sunday rest has united religious, political, and social groups in a "common" cause. This is exactly what Pope Francis predicted in his encyclical on climate change, Laudato Si' #23, when he said, "The climate is a common good, belonging to all and meant for all ... Humanity is called to recognize the need for changes." One of those changes is the need for Sunday rest, as described in Laudato Si' #237.
On May 3, 2022, "The Local," a French news media site, published an article about Sunday shopping restrictions in France and named those who were behind the push for Sunday rest. Notice what was published:
"While traditionally it was Christian groups who opposed Sunday opening, these days it's just as likely to be trade unions – who are concerned about the effect on employees' work-life balance and right to time off if Sunday opening becomes the norm. Some supermarkets have attempted to circumvent this by opening on Sundays with automated checkouts only, in order to reduce staffing levels. Increasingly, green groups are also opposing Sunday opening as they focus on reducing consumption in order to save the planet." [1]
Sunday openings are opposed by churches, labor unions, and environmentalists. Not only has the climate movement embraced Sunday rest, but it has also taken up the cause of Sunday closing. This contributes to the Pope's vision of Laudato Si' being implemented throughout society. The Sunday movement is being driven by the climate change crisis and all other man-made disasters. God foretold the following events:
"It will be declared that men are offending God by the violation of the Sunday-sabbath, that this sin has brought calamities which will not cease until Sunday observance shall be strictly enforced, and that those who present the claims of the fourth commandment, thus destroying reverence for Sunday, are troublers of the people, preventing their restoration to divine favor and temporal prosperity." (Great Controversy, p. 590).
Are you aware of the forces at work in the world to bring chaos and disaster? Do you see why certain men are attempting to usher in World War III while also conspiring to create a climate apocalypse? Rome will not let a good crisis go to waste, and they will take advantage of the chaos. These natural disasters, pandemics, and tragedies are being used to aid in the passage of a National Sunday Law.
Pope Francis is fulfilling his prophetic role by encouraging everyone to work together to pass policies that protect people's right to rest on Sunday (Laudato Si' #237), all in the name of environmental sustainability. In these last days, this is one of the methods being used to promote Sunday laws. Climate activists and religious leaders will exert pressure on state officials in all governments around the world to implement Sunday rest through legislation:
"The dignitaries of church and State will unite to bribe, persuade or compel all classes to honor the Sunday. The lack of divine authority will be supplied by oppressive enactments. Political corruption is destroying love of justice and regard for truth; and even in free America, rulers and legislators, in order to secure public favor, will yield to the popular demand for a law enforcing Sunday observance" (Great Controversy, p. 592).
The environmental crisis has become the most widely publicized issue on the planet. The dangers of Sunday laws are slowly but steadily threatening us on all sides. Sunday is being agitated once again through climate policies. These laws are a threat to our religious and civil liberties, as we know from both prophecy and history. Sunday laws are also in direct conflict with God's Word, which commands us to keep Saturday as the seventh-day Sabbath. The Three Angels' Messages place a strong emphasis on the Sabbath of the Decalogue, revealing the close connection between the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.
The central theme of the Everlasting Gospel of Revelation 14:6-12 is the close relationship between obedience and faith. We need to do a lot more to bring God's prophetic messages to light. We must warn the rest of the world about the formation of the image of the beast, the union of church and state, the notorious Sunday laws, and the global shift toward Rome. This is the time to sound the trumpet and warn people about the dangers that are about to take the world by storm.
https://www.catholicherald.com/article/columns/climate-healing-by-doing-less-one-day-a-week/
Article below from link above.
Climate healing by doing less — one day a week
There is a giant step the people of God can take next weekend to benefit the Earth's climate. It's simple, easy, everyone is capable of doing it and, best of all, it involves doing less not more. I'm not a climate scientist but I know this: if 70 million U.S. Catholics embraced Pope Francis' encyclical, "Laudato Si' " (On care of creation) and honored the Lord's Day by following the third commandment, we'd see a dramatic drop in greenhouse gases.
We don't have a lot of time: The Guardian reported that 2021 ocean temperatures were the hottest in history. We all want to do something, but the problem is so big we lose heart. Recycling doesn't stir the soul. And technology will not keep the immense Thwaites Glacier, a glacier the size of England, from breaking away into a warming Antarctic Ocean.
So, what can one person do? Not much, but 70 million U.S. Catholics could make a difference on the Sabbath, greatly reducing carbon in the atmosphere by literally doing less. If you're waiting for God to save us, you're too late. He told us how by writing it with his finger on a stone tablet several thousand years ago.
What would honoring the Sabbath look like?
— Worship and prayer, as usual.
— No shopping. With human lives at stake, is it so difficult to only shop six days?
— No driving. Hedges & Company reports about 1.446 billion vehicles on Earth in 2022 with 19 percent in the United States. Where possible, use public transport. Prohibiting commercial vehicles on Sundays would have a great impact. Is there a good reason we can't walk, bike, bus or share rides to church?
—No work, except essential services. God gave clear instructions:
So, God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested ... Gen 2:3.
—Recreation, spend time with family and friends while reducing car use.
Yes, this would disrupt the economy. So, do we disrupt the economy or destroy our common home? And, yes, we need to look at all human activities that cause damage but let's start by honoring the Sabbath, creating a powerful, inspiring, beginning.
Embracing the Sabbath would help create a real time of rest from this weary world, a time for inward journeying, enabling us to more easily break into music and become joyful.
Something is very wrong and there isn't much one person can do to reduce the threat, but if 70 million Catholics heard Pope Francis' words in "Laudato Si' " and honored the Sabbath, we might all break into music and bring joy to our Mother Earth. And all it requires is that we do less — but do it together one day each week.
Weiss is a parishioner of St. Charles Borromeo Church in Arlington and the author of "Touching The Rainbow Ground: Eight Steps To Hope," a memoir of his 30-year ministry to children in the Americas.
Wow, so much misinformation in such a small article. First, climate change is of course an observable fact throughout the history of the world. The religious and political nature though, of the fear mongering clergy and politicians claims and demands concerning it, continue to be highly contestable. Nevertheless, they march ahead implementing one policy and demand after another globally effecting the religion, politics, livelihood, economics, and financial status of all. Dissolving any semblance of Republican or Democratic government the world over. Governments formed by the will of the people in lengthy, bloody, violent, murderous, and extremely costly war against tyrants much like these new religious and political elitists pushing all of this agenda and more today. The end of all of this, will be exactly the same, only on a much more rapid scale. As divine intervention this time, will soon completely expose these tyrants for who and who they really are, leaving them to the judgments of those they have lorded themselves over, deceived, and abused. Picture the French Revolution on a global scale. Yet this judgment pales in significance to that which will immediately follow such carnage, the appearance and judgment of all humanity by the living God.
Rev 17:12 And the ten horns which thou sawest are ten kings, which have received no kingdom as yet; but receive power as kings one hour with the beast. 13
These have one mind, and shall give their power and strength unto the beast. 14 These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them: for he is Lord of lords, and King of kings: and they that are with him are called, and chosen, and faithful. 15 And he saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues. 16
And the ten horns which thou sawest upon the beast, these shall hate the whore, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and burn her with fire. 17 For God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled. 18 And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth.
Apparently the Catholic I presume, who wrote the article while admitting he is no scientist, seems to think that Pope Francis is. Is this what science has now become? The tool of religious, political, financial, and corporate entities intent upon subjugated the entirety of humanity under their elitist proclaiming thumbs? It appears to be so. Nor is this the first time to date, science has been used by tyrants to justify the implementation of their self aggrandizing and satanically impish lust for ultimate power over everyone. The so called sciences of this world, are of course tools in the hands of the many satanic imps of this world as well, and always have been.
1Ti 6:17 Charge them that are rich in this world, that they be not highminded, nor trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy; 18 That they do good, that they be rich in good works, ready to distribute, willing to communicate; 19 Laying up in store for themselves a good foundation against the time to come, that they may lay hold on eternal life. 20 O
Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called: 21 Which some professing have erred concerning the faith. Grace be with thee. Amen.
Are not the Pope of Rome and his other religious and political minions now erring concerning the faith, using the sciences of this world falsely so called, for huge power grabs over and above all others? Yes they are.
It is fitting then of course, that they suggest the observance of a false man made sabbath as well, in support of their false man made science unto their own personal empowerment over all others. So now, the Pope of Rome, the man of sin and lawlessness, seeks to establish both his own created and or supported sciences and sabbath, as the law over all of humanity. Both of these man made sciences and laws being in direct contradiction of, and rebellion against, God's declared intentions concerning this world and His Sabbath.
The Pope and his minions claim to be the new saviors of the world. If only all will listen and submit to their falsely established so called sciences, and "Lord's" day, which contradict the plain testimony of God's word regarding both of the same. This world will not be saved, but rather destroyed by God Himself in judgment for the continuous crimes committed by its inhabitants against themselves and God since the fall of humanity. Many of which the papacy itself now fully supports and or even helps establish by law. Of course this is also only natural as their leader is the man of sin and or lawlessness. Nevertheless, according as God's word has declared, salvation is not of this world. Salvation is of the person alone, by Christ Jesus alone. The fate of this world has been sealed unto destruction by the word of God. Any and all who turn to Christ Jesus our Lord though, may be saved from the end of this world or their personal lives, which ever might come first. After which, they are privileged to be of the new heaven and new earth promised of God.
Act 4:10 Be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by him doth this man stand here before you whole. 11 This is the stone which was set at nought of you builders, which is become the head of the corner. 12
Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.The man of sin and his minions have always called for all to observe their false sabbath as well. Enforcing the observance of this day by civil legislations all throughout the history of humanity during their existence, and doing so today whenever and wherever possible. Their example being followed and or joined by many misguided Christians of the past and present as well. Now today in this article appealing again to the observance of this false sabbath, in support of their chosen false sciences so called, while preaching their false gospel concerning the salvation of this world rather than the individuals within it. The effect of course is to make the commandment of God of none effect, through the observance of the traditions of men in its place.
Mat 15:1 Then came to Jesus scribes and Pharisees, which were of Jerusalem, saying, 2 Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? for they wash not their hands when they eat bread. 3 But he answered and said unto them,
Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition? 4 For God commanded, saying, Honour thy father and mother: and, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death. 5 But ye say, Whosoever shall say to his father or his mother, It is a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; 6 And honour not his father or his mother, he shall be free.
Thus have ye made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition. 7 Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying, 8 This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. 9 But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. Who are these today making the commandments of God of none effect by their traditions? Are they not the scribes and pharisees of today? Are they not increasingly demanding submission to their false sciences, immorality, and now false sabbath, all of which make the commandments of God of none effect? Yes they are.
The observance of this false sabbath by civil law will be in fact, the culmination of all these false sciences and traditions of humanity intended to make God's law of none effect in this sin sick world. And this under the direct influence and supposed moral rectitude of the man of sin himself, and the day he has created as representative exactly of his power and influence above and beyond the word of God Himself. For this man of sin is nothing short of the son of Satan, and the head of the evil one's counterfeit institution of false salvation, BAYLON THE GREAT. The Sunday sacredness they intend to establish by human legislation the world over is nothing less than the Abomination of Desolation that the evil one and his minions will set up in the place of God's holy Sabbath. And it will bring desolation upon all of humanity who bow down to and honor it, making God's fourth commandment of none effect in doing so.
Exo 20:1 And God spake all these words, saying,.......................................................................
8
Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: 10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: 11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.There it is, straight out of the mouth of God. That which all of the false sciences and religions of this world reject and seek to replace with their own vain imaginings. Seeking to be the creators of their own world and destiny in defiance of the living God. So be it, according as they imagine. Let them create and firmly establish their own vision with fallen human wisdom, understanding, and laws, in direct contradiction of God's. Ending in the destiny they have chosen seeking existence outside of the living God who alone created and can sustain life.
2Pe 3:1 This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you; in both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance: 2 That ye may be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us the apostles of the Lord and Saviour: 3 Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, 4
And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation. 5 For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water: 6 Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished: 7 But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. 8 But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. 9 The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness;
but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. 10 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night;
in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up. 11 Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, 12 Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God,
wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat? 13
Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. Rev 1:7 Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him:
and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, Amen.
Rev 22:
12 And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be. 13 I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. 14
Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city. 15 For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.
16 I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star. 17 And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely. 18 For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: 19 And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book. 20 He which testifieth these things saith,
Surely I come quickly. Amen.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus. 21 The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.
http://adventmessenger.org/in-order-to-secure-sunday-rest-for-workers-the-history-news-network-is-teaching-people-how-to-hide-the-religious-nature-of-these-sunday-laws/
Quoted article below from link above.
In Order to Secure Sunday Rest for Workers, the History News Network is teaching people how to hide the Religious Nature of these Sunday Laws
The History News Network publishes news on current events from prominent historians. On June 12, 2022, the History News Network published an article titled: "Should the USPS Honor the Sabbath, or Amazon?" The article addressed a new conflict that has arisen between the federal government and religious beliefs. The problem is related to mail delivery.
The US Postal Service signed an agreement with Amazon in 2013 to deliver mail on Sundays. They have been doing Sunday deliveries across the country for a while now, and it has been very profitable for the postal service. A Christian postal employee recently filed a lawsuit against Amazon, claiming that he needed Sundays off to attend church and practice his religious beliefs.
The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Pennsylvania sided with Amazon and said that the religious observance of Sunday by some should not exempt postal workers from doing their job or delivering packages. The History News Network came out to express support for Sunday rest and said that postal clerks and carriers need rest due to their work conditions and heavy burdens. Notice what they published:
"The 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals decided that exempting postal carriers from Sunday shifts would burden other workers ... Today, many postal clerks and carriers face high demands, short staffing, and untenable work conditions. On the surface, Amazon helped to mitigate the long-term effects of Congress underfunding USPS from 2006 to 2022, as well as competition with new communication technologies. Package delivery has become more important than ever for the longevity of USPS. However, while Amazon reaps the benefits, postal clerks and carriers literally carry the burden." [1]
The History News Network then explains how people can successfully advocate for Sunday rest. They encourage people to campaign for Sunday not on the grounds of religious discrimination, but because of "labor rights" and the right to rest.
"The 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals' decision proves that powerful corporations like Amazon have surpassed even Christian nationalism in the race to set postal policy. Instead of decrying religious discrimination, activists and people who simply want to enjoy their weekends should campaign for labor rights. This endeavor will require separating Christian morality from labor movements, which have historically been intertwined. Everyone deserves rest regardless of whether the rest is sacred." [1]
Sunday is being promoted as a "right" to rest in order to hide its religious imperatives. That is exactly what is being said here. Don't call it religious, even if the "rest is sacred." Call it a labor problem. They are instructing people on how to implement a Sunday law in a post-modern secular society!
Are we prepared for the impending Sunday law crisis? These news items about the push for Sunday must be more than just a passing interest for us, because everyone is pleading for Sunday rest as the solution to all of our problems. Sunday rest has been endorsed by the Pope, Protestant churches, labor unions, the media, secular groups, environmental groups, and politicians worldwide. And the truth is that they are attempting to conceal the true purpose of these Sunday laws, which is remarkable given that God warned us that they would attempt to do so:
"The Sunday movement is now making its way in darkness. The leaders are concealing the true issue, and many who unite in the movement do not themselves see whither the undercurrent is tending" (Testimonies, Vol. 5, p. 452).
The provisions for Sunday rest are intended to encourage people to attend church on Sunday. Every week, more and more daily newspaper editorials, magazine publications, politicians, and religious leaders call for the reinstatement of the old Sunday laws. When we see the world united to spread Catholic doctrine (Sunday), it will only be a matter of time before we are thrust into Jacob's time of trouble. The walls are closing in on us on every side. We must be extremely active and diligent in getting the truth to as many people as possible before probationary time ends. May God give each of us a burden to do His work right now.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndGOY_3TBNM
Regarding the mark of the beast.
http://adventmessenger.org/uk-shoppers-want-a-sunday-closing-law-after-grocery-supermarkets-closed-early-on-sunday-to-allow-workers-to-watch-the-womens-euro-2022-football-final/
Quoted article below from link above.
UK Shoppers want a Sunday Closing Law after Grocery Supermarkets closed early on Sunday to allow workers to watch the Women's EURO 2022 Football Final
According to news sources, Iceland's huge grocery chain chose to close all of its stores early on Sunday to allow workers to watch the Women's EURO 2022 final, which took place on Sunday, July 31, 2022. [1] England was facing Germany in the 2022 championship game at Wembley Stadium in London, which was sold out. Because the game was scheduled to begin at 5:00 p.m., the grocery stores announced that they would close at 4:00 p.m.
The decision to close the supermarkets early on Sunday generated an unexpected reaction from the community. When "supermarket giant Iceland" announced that it would close early on Sunday, this "sparked demand for a change in the law" as customers called on the supermarket chain to close down every Sunday. The "overwhelming" response from customers also prompted calls to close all food stores on Sunday, including "ASDA, Tesco, Aldi, Lidl, Morrisons, M&S, and Sainsbury's." This reaction from the public came after word of the Sunday "early" closing was posted on social media. [2]
The Manchester Evening News published the following article titled, "Iceland Shoppers Demand Law Change as Supermarket Makes Major Announcement." The article went on to say:
While many praised Iceland for the decision, most people saw it as an opportunity to demand the law change to allow supermarkets to close on Sunday. [2]
Andrea Harris said: "When I was growing up, no supermarkets opened on a Sunday. Sundays should be family days and a day of rest." [2]
Lynn Chilcott asked: "Why do we need stores open on Sundays? They were always closed on a Sunday when I was a child ... day of rest. We always managed." [2]
Angela Jackson said: "Don't open on a Sunday! We used to manage, and I'm sure we'd manage again ... Give staff a day off rest!" [2]
Jean Wright exclaimed: "GOOD !!! SHOULD NOT SHOP ON SUNDAYS YOU HAVE 6 DAYS TO SHOP, REST ON THE 7th, AMEN." [2]
Heather Hall wrote: "Good, close on Sunday, give employees day off." [2]
Pamela Tovey Train commented: "I worked in retail, most of my life. Now is the opportunity to close on Sunday. Give the staff some family time." [2]
Faye Giblin said: "Well it's a start. Would like to see a leader in the move towards Sunday closed. Relieve workers, shoppers and the carbon footprint." [2]
Helena Louise added: "Close all shops on a Sunday!" [2]
Terry Blackley wrote: "Why not close on Sundays and give the workers a day off, customers have only a certain amount of money to spend, if they don't spend on a Sunday they'll spend it another day." [2]
Eddie Power said: "Should all be closed on Sunday." [2]
The public in the United Kingdom is calling for a Sunday closing law, and some leaders have been urged to act. This is exactly how we were told that Sunday laws would be implemented.
"Rulers and legislators, in order to secure public favor, will yield to the popular demand for a law enforcing Sunday observance" (Great Controversy, p. 592).
"But as the question of enforcing Sunday observance is widely agitated, the event so long doubted and disbelieved is seen to be approaching, and the third message will produce an effect which it could not have had before" (Great Controversy, p. 605).
There is no doubt that Sunday rest is being widely agitated in many parts of the world. In the United Kingdom, people are calling for stores to be closed on Sunday for a variety of reasons. Some argue for Sunday closing laws for religious reasons, such as claiming that people have "six days" to shop and that on the "seventh" day, which they call "Sunday," is a time to rest. Others advocate for Sunday closures in order to "relieve workers." Some argue that all businesses should be closed on Sunday in order to reduce our "carbon footprint" (climate change). Others contend that Sunday should be a "family day."
People are calling for the legalization of Sunday rest to help ease social, economic, religious, and environmental concerns. We are being led to believe that resting on Sunday will solve all of the world's problems. We know that Rome is behind this public outcry for Sunday laws. The problem is that these calls for Sunday rest by law are helping to bring about the image of the beast in preparation for the mark of the beast.
God has stated in Revelation 14:6-12 that these efforts to promote Sunday laws will not go unchallenged. God's faithful people will be giving a stirring warning message against the beast, the image, and the mark as predicted in Revelation 14. Praise the Lord! When the apostasy of Revelation 13 is seen to be fulfilled, the truths of Revelation 14 will be proclaimed with power at the same time!
"Shall we wait until God's judgments fall upon the transgressor before we tell him how to avoid them? Where is our faith in the word of God? Must we see things foretold come to pass before we will believe what He has said?" (Testimonies, Vol. 9, p. 20).
http://adventmessenger.org/brazil-sunday-is-family-day/
Quoted article below from link above.
Brazil: "Sunday is Family Day!"
A chain of grocery stores has teamed up with the entertainment industry to promote Sunday as a family day. The Festa do Peão is one of the most famous rodeo events in Brazil and features bull riding, horses, and different shows. During their annual 10-day celebration, the organizers of this event found that Sundays had the lowest attendance numbers. So the organizers joined up with a grocery store company to come up with a "Family Sunday" campaign. The independent newspaper, The Liberal, published the following on June 19, 2022:
"The São Vicente supermarket chain and the Clube dos Cavaleiros de Americana (CCA) signed an innovative partnership that would go down in the history of the Festa do Peão, inspire other similar actions throughout Brazil and bring more than 1 million people to the event in 13 years of existence. Realization. Much more than that, 'Family Sunday' would create the opportunity for people of various social classes to enjoy the event for the first time ... According to Marcos Cavicchiolli, director of São Vicente and one of the creators of the idea, along with the CCA and a few other partners, the action began as an attempt to revive Sundays, which until then were the days with the lowest public at the party." [1]
As a result, a successful effort to promote Sunday as Family Day was launched. They are seeing unprecedented attendance at the Festa do Peo on "Family Sunday" thanks to business sponsorships. The marketing effort essentially promotes the concept that Sunday is family time and that we must spend it with our families.
Do you see their strategy? Families need to rest and spend time together on this day, building relationships. Where did they get this idea that Sunday should be a time for the family? Well, they got it from Rome. Back in 2012, Pope Benedict XVI clearly made the connection between Sunday and families:
"Sunday is the day of the Lord and of man, a day which everyone must be able to be free — free for the family and free for God. Family, work, rest and celebration are gifts from God and important aspects of human life that must find a "harmonious balance" in order to build a more humane world, he said." [2]
We are seeing the justification for Sunday's off as a right for people to spend with their families. "Sunday should be a time for rest, worship, and family" is what is being proposed. All of the arguments in favor of taking Sunday off sound good on the surface – spending time with our families – but we have already been given a special time in the Bible to accomplish this. Did you know that God's true Sabbath day, Saturday, was intended to be kept with our families?
"Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it." Exodus 20:8-11.
In fact, heaven is our extended family, and the true seventh-day Sabbath, Saturday, was a time when the Creator came to commune with His creation in the Garden of Eden. So we were given a day for the family, and it wasn't Sunday. Tragically, God's Sabbath has been abandoned, and today the world is embracing a counterfeit:
"The Christian world is honoring a false sabbath, and we are to show them its true character and foundation. We must make it plain to them that they are honoring a manmade institution in place of that which God himself has sanctified" (Review and Herald, January 31, 1893).
An interesting web site.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/312320
Petitions
UK Government and Parliament
Rejected petition
Make Sunday a special day again
The Covid 19 pandemic, has shown that many families and individuals have had more time together and the majority of people I have spoken to really enjoyed the peace and quiet that was apparent on Sunday. Although it perhaps isn't possible to return to the mid 90's, somethings could be done to assist
More details
Since the mid 90's when the Sunday opening laws were changed, many people's stress levels have been heightened, due to the way we work, shop and do other things at weekend. Families would have more time together, as would individuals too. Whilst I realise that Sunday has become the main shopping day of the week, this has only happened since the mid 90's and would soon be changed again. Shop workers would have more time off, and traffic levels would reduce thus reducing emissions.
This petition was rejected
Why was this petition rejected?
There's already a petition about this issue. We cannot accept a new petition when we already have one about a very similar issue.
You are more likely to get action on this issue if you sign and share a single petition.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/310336
We only reject petitions that don't meet the petition standards.
Date submitted
30 March 2020
https://metrovoicenews.com/push-to-make-sunday-a-sabbath-day-of-rest-gains-support/
Quoted article below from link above.
Push to make Sunday a sabbath day of rest gains support
It's not just nostalgia. Many pandemic-weary souls want to make Sunday a day of rest again.
In a hit song two decades ago, country music group Rascal Flatts offered banjo-tinged commentary on "the world spinning faster than it did in the old days."
"Sunday was a day of rest," the group proclaimed in its ode to a bygone era. "Now, it's one more day for progress."
Some of us are old enough to remember when most businesses — not just Chick-fil-A — closed on Sundays.
It seems quaint now, but I did an Associated Press story in 2003 on Family Christian Stores — then the nation's largest Christian retail chain — deciding to open on Sundays.
But in 2016, I was surprised during a reporting trip to North Dakota when I found an empty parking lot at a Bismarck Walmart — and then at Super Target — while looking to buy a few snacks and supplies before Sunday morning church.
I learned that for more than a century, the state had required most retailers to close from midnight to noon on Sundays. North Dakota finally became the last state to lift that ban in 2019.
I bring up this subject not just for nostalgia but because the day of rest — or the lack of it — is drawing renewed consideration nationally.
In a recent piece, Deseret News religion reporter Kelsey Dallas explains "why some political commentators and legal scholars are tweeting their support for taking a Sabbath":
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic began, Americans were overworked and tightly wound. In the past two years, the situation's only gotten worse.
Pandemic-related stress and a widespread desire for more time to rest are among the factors fueling the "Great Resignation." They also help explain why some political commentators and legal scholars spent the weekend debating the Sabbath. ...
Sabbath laws, which are also known as blue laws, were once a major part of American life. Although they came in a variety of forms, the policies had a shared purpose: limiting certain commercial activities to six days per week.
In other words, blue laws forced both business owners and the people they served to take a day of rest. And under past policies, that day was almost always Sunday.
Dallas' report points to an interesting Wall Street Journal essay by Sohrab Ahmari from last year that explores "what we've lost in rejecting the Sabbath."
A writer for Crisis, an online magazine that describes itself as "America's most trusted source for authentic Catholic perspectives on church and state, arts and culture, science and faith," also supports returning to a quieter Sunday.
Writer Casey Chalk declares, "Americans in those early quarantine days—after the haze of their Netflix-binge had evaporated—woke up with a surprised appreciation for what earlier generations had considered normal: Sunday laws, otherwise known as blue laws. As America returns to normality, we should consider these laws and their manifold benefits afresh."
Chalk also approvingly quotes attorney Jay Lefkowitz, who wrote in The Washington Post about the blessings of the seventh-day Sabbath, known as Shabbat in Hebrew. "Shabbat is also a reminder of other forms of separation that add meaning to our lives—between hard work and play, and between pursuing our own dreams and caring for others," Lefkowitz states. "Shabbat is about balance or, to use a modern word, mindfulness."
Chalk goes on to write: "The writer also references the recent experience of Poland, whose population is overwhelmingly affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church: "In Poland, the 2017 Sunday trading ban was 'about helping small family stores, but also about letting people who are effectively forced to work on Sundays be free,' said President Andrzej Duda. Since the ban's introduction, Duda has noted, more families have engaged in outdoor activities, and the domestic tourism industry has benefited."
But the idea certainly hasn't caught on with everybody.
Christianity Today's Kate Shellnutt has a really fascinating story this week on "Sabbatarian Christians" — that's a new term to me — finding "their observance increasingly countercultural in a 24/7 economy."
Shellnutt writes:
Mailboxes used to go empty on Sundays.
Not anymore. America's biggest retailer, Amazon, ships seven days a week, and as the site expands Sunday delivery across the country, more drivers are losing what would have been a steady day off.
For many, the shift just means their break will fall during the week. But for some Christians on the job, the new delivery option conflicts with Sunday church services and their conviction not to work on the Sabbath.
Amazon's seven-days-a-week schedule has already led to two lawsuits from drivers who were fired for not working on Sundays. Both claimed religious discrimination under Title VII, alleging their employer had not provided "reasonable accommodation" for them to work other days.
On my way to church, I often pass a long line of Amazon trucks headed out to make Sunday deliveries.
I've never thought much about it.
But I will now.
https://www.deseret.com/2022/1/11/22877446/could-sabbath-closure-laws-make-a-comeback-blue-laws-sunday-closing?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=dn-social&utm_campaign=twitter&utm_content=deseretnews
Quoted article below from link above.
Could Sabbath closure laws make a comeback?
Here's why some political commentators and legal scholars are tweeting their support for taking a Sabbath
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic began, Americans were overworked and tightly wound. In the past two years, the situation's only gotten worse.
Pandemic-related stress and a widespread desire for more time to rest are among the factors fueling the "Great Resignation." They also help explain why some political commentators and legal scholars spent the weekend debating the Sabbath.
The conversation began with a tweet from Adrian Vermeule, a law professor at Harvard University. He highlighted the reinstatement of Sabbath laws as one of several policy goals that unites "post-liberals," a group of conservatives who say they're focused on promoting the common good.
Sabbath laws, which are also known as blue laws, were once a major part of American life. Although they came in a variety of forms, the policies had a shared purpose: limiting certain commercial activities to six days per week.
In other words, blue laws forced both business owners and the people they served to take a day of rest. And under past policies, that day was almost always Sunday.
"Until the last few decades, Sabbath laws ... effectively shut down Sunday commerce in much of the country," Joel Mathis noted in a Monday column for The Week.
Blue laws' association with the Christian Sabbath helps explain why part of the debate surrounding Vermeule's tweet centered on religious discrimination. Legal experts pointed out that forced closures on Sunday disproportionately harm some people of faith, including Jews who observe the Sabbath from sundown on Friday to sundown on Saturday.
Similar religious freedom concerns fueled a legal challenge to blue laws that the Supreme Court heard in the early 1960s. Representatives of a discount store in Maryland alleged that the state's Sunday closure policies violated the Constitution's free exercise and establishment clauses.
In May 1961, the Supreme Court ruled 8-1 that Maryland's Sabbath laws didn't violate the First Amendment. The justices acknowledged that the restrictions had their roots in Christian practice, but said they served important secular purposes, including the promotion of public health, Oyez reported.
Although the ruling was significant, it did not guard against Sunday laws' demise. Soon after the Supreme Court used secular arguments to rule in favor of blue laws, policymakers across the country began using secular arguments to justify their repeal.
In 2019, officials in North Dakota offered by-then familiar arguments to explain their support for overturning the nation's last statewide ban on Sunday trading. They said the move would promote personal freedom and help business owners by boosting revenue.
"Who but a few scolds could complain?," asked Sohrab Ahmari in a recent Wall Street Journal column about the fall of Sabbath laws. "We are encouraged to pursue lives of constant action and purpose, and we do."
What this looks like in practice is that few Americans prioritize taking time to rest. And that even those who do often fail, whether because of their kids' demanding extracurricular schedules, their smartphones' incessant beeping or countless other obstacles.
"Rest is hard to come by these days," argued Mathis in The Week, noting that pandemic-related developments have deepened this already common problem.
"For many Americans, the pandemic has given rise to remote work that has blurred the divisions between home and labor, while working-class folks are often subject to 'just-in-time' scheduling that makes home life difficult to sustain," he wrote.
Frustration with the status quo fueled engagement with Vermeule's tweet. People from across the political and religious spectrum generally agreed that Americans could benefit from being forced to take at least one day off each week.
"If the right and left can agree on anything these days, maybe it's that workers should get a day off now and then," wrote Mathis for The Week.
However, consensus would likely fall apart quickly if conservatives insisted on reinstating blue laws in their old form. It would be better to mandate rest on a day that doesn't raise religious freedom concerns, tweeted Jeet Heer, a columnist for The Nation.
"Elevator pitch: a secular Sabbath that starts on Thursday evening. This will create a four-day work week and also preserve religious neutrality," he said.
Workers may love this idea, but any sort of one-size-fits-all closure policy would cause problems, as many respondents to Heer's tweet pointed out. For example, Larry Yudelson, the editorial director for a Jewish press, noted that Jews would struggle to prepare for their religious Sabbath if stores were closed during the day on Fridays.
The best solution to burnout, at least in the short term, might be for individual Americans to find ways to take a rest on their own terms. Some Christian business owners, including the family behind Chick-fil-A, already do this by voluntarily closing up shop on Sundays. Other Americans observe a digital Sabbath by turning off the notifications on their phones.
"Even just leaving your phone behind when you get lunch is a step in the right direction," reported The New York Times in a 2019 article on reducing stress.
http://adventmessenger.org/the-new-york-times-claims-that-the-spirit-of-the-blue-laws-is-needed-more-today-than-ever-before/
Article below from link above.
The New York Times Claims that the Spirit of the Blue Laws is Needed More Today than Ever Before
October 22, 2022 by Andy Roman
The New York Times is one of the most influential international newspapers. On October 16, 2022, the New York Times published an article by Anglican priest Tish Harrison Warren titled: "How to Fight Back Against the Inhumanity of Modern Work." The author of this article offers solutions on how to combat the inhumanity of the modern workplace cycle, which she says has been altered by digital technology.
Tish Harrison Warren describes how the modern worker has become a "limitless, sleepless, unemotional machine" thanks to the pandemic and the digital revolution, which has made it "more difficult to unplug from work." She says that it is time to "reexamine what it means for work to be humane." Pay close attention to the solution that is being proposed in this New York Times article. They are calling us back to a "common cause" found in Sunday rest by law. The article went on to say:
• "In the early labor movement, a broad and diverse base of religious people found common cause around Sabbath laws. These laws (often called blue laws) are now usually seen as examples of antiquated, puritanical, even theocratic impulses: prim religious people running around trying to make sure no one enjoys a beer on a Sunday afternoon. Advocates of Sabbatarianism, however, saw their work as an act of resistance to greed and a fight for the laborer." [1]
• "A key issue in the burgeoning industrialist economy of the North was the preservation of time for worship, rest and family life to preserve the dignity of the worker. They looked to Sabbath laws, in part, to help achieve this." [1]
• "Keeping the Sabbath wasn't merely a religious observance but served a civic function. It was a practical way, through time itself, to treat workers as valuable humans with whole lives to be lived." [1]
• "Sabbath rest" is necessary for both body and soul; that it preserves "health, wealth and the temporal happiness and prosperity of individuals and communities." [1]
• "Take away the Sabbath and you destroy the most humane and democratic institution," which is made particularly for "the man of labor and toil, of poverty and sorrow." [1]
This is what is being advocated in the New York Times. With all this talk about the history of blue laws, the idea of mandating Sunday rest by law is being revived once again. The following appeal was then made in the New York Times to revive the "spirit" of the blue laws:
• "I don't expect us to put blue laws back on the books. I understand that most Americans — including religious Americans — no longer observe a strict day of rest. I also understand, of course, that the Sabbath lands on different days for different religious traditions.Still, with the boundaryless work of the digital age, with consumer pressure for retail stores and e-commerce companies to remain open at all times, and with our unholy worship of productivity and convenience, the spirit of these laws is more needed than ever before." [1]
She might not expect the return of Sunday laws, but Rome does, and inspiration indicates that they will:
"Sooner or later Sunday laws will be passed. But there is much for God's servants to do to warn the people" (Review and Herald, February 16, 1905).
Then the author of the article goes on to explain how she keeps Sunday holy from Saturday night until Sunday night. That's exactly how the blue laws used to work, and that's the example she is giving to the public:
• "At the very least, workers ought to be able to completely shut off from work one day a week or more — no email, no notifications, nothing. My family attempts to avoid all digital devices from Saturday night to Sunday night, some weeks with greater success than others. This aids our goals for our Sabbath day: rest, play, worship and delight. This practice has shaped our family life, our work, our habits and our very bodies." [1]
In spite of all the arguments for workers needing time to rest, this New York Times article is basically saying that our society is not keeping Sunday holy as it ought to be. All these statements and arguments plainly show that the real objective of the whole Sunday-law movement is to get people to attend church on Sunday in order to preserve worship. As you can see, this article makes several references to Sunday in relation to worship. One of the most well-known publications is making the case that in order to save the family, society, and worship; we must prepare to dedicate ourselves to bringing back Sunday laws.
Blue laws are religious legislation, and according to Bible prophecy, they will only result in the loss of our civil and religious liberties. Are we preparing for what is soon to come? The case is being made today that a day of rest is needed for workers so that they can rest, spend time with their families, and get back to worship. We are being told that people need time off work to reconnect with God and family, and the spirit of blue laws is needed today more than ever.
An Anglican priest is making these arguments in the New York Times. Church leaders will soon call on the government to step in and address these problems. They aren't going to stop making these public calls for Sunday rest. This is only the first phase of a campaign that will lead to the civil government formally imposing Sunday rest by law.
We must be opposed to any push toward a union of church and state that will work together to secure Sunday legislation. By pen and voice and by massive evangelism, we must speak out against the dangers of the Sunday movement that seeks to encroach on our freedoms.
The American people are unaware of the false justifications being used to secure Sunday rest. They don't know that the mark of the beast crisis is imminent. And the greatest danger is that the people will not realize it until it is too late.
"The Sabbath is the Lord's test, and no man, be he king, priest, or ruler, is authorized to come between God and man. Those who seek to be conscience for their fellow men, place themselves above God. Those who are under the influence of a false religion, who observe a spurious rest day, will set aside the most positive evidence in regard to the true Sabbath. They will try to compel men to obey the laws of their own creation, laws that are directly opposed to the law of God. Upon those who continue in this course, the wrath of God will fall. Unless they change, they cannot escape the penalty. The law for the observance of the first day of the week is the production of an apostate Christendom. Sunday is a child of the papacy, exalted by the Christian world above the sacred day of God's rest. In no case are God's people to pay it homage" (Testimonies, Vol. 9, pp. 234, 235).
The author of the New York Times article, Anglican priest Tish Harrison Warren, can be reached at the following email address:
HarrisonWarren-newsletter@nytimes.com
Sources
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/16/opinion/work-rest-sabbath.html
http://adventmessenger.org/psychology-today-says-that-we-need-a-weekly-day-of-rest-due-to-wars-hurricanes-floods-fires-homelessness-homicides-and-suicides-or-we-will-perish/
Article below from link above.
Psychology Today Says that we Need a Weekly Day of Rest due to Wars, Hurricanes, Floods, Fires, Homelessness, Homicides, and Suicides, or we will Perish
November 2, 2022 by Andy Roman
Psychology Today is a secular monthly magazine that is dedicated to human psychology and behavior and contains articles written by leading psychologists, psychiatrists, medical doctors, sociologists, and science journalists. On October 6, 2022, Psychology Today published an article written by Dr. David Roger Clawson titled: "Resilience, the Sabbath, and the Planet." In the article, the following question is raised:
• "With so much suffering and so many tragedies in the world today—war, hurricanes, floods, fires, homelessness, homicides, suicides, overdoses— there is much talk of resilience and the need to be resilient. But what does resilience really mean?" [1]
So, what is the solution to our planet's man-made and natural disasters, according to Psychology Today magazine? Their response is to secure a weekly day of rest for humans and the planet, or we will perish. Notice how they proceed to explain the science behind Sabbath rest and saving the world:
• "Ancient tradition, now, unfortunately, largely forgotten in the modern world, may give us some strategies to become more resilient. The ideas of the Sabbath and sabbatical have validity to improve the human condition." [1]
• "A Sabbath or a sabbatical need not have a religious connotation. A secular Sabbath is as valid as a religious one." [1]
• "As we move towards safety and recovery, so too we move into the other, the needs of the other person and the needs of the natural world around us. As we move the world towards safety and recovery, we build our resilience while we also build the resilience of the other—both people and the planet." [1]
• "As we give time to ourselves for a Sabbath and sabbatical to build our resilience, we can also give time to our planet for regeneration, rejuvenation, recovery, and resilience." [1]
• "As humans can tolerate some threat, the planet can also tolerate some threat if provided with periods of safety, but the planet cannot tolerate chronic sustained threat any more than we can." [1]
• "During the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic we saw the amazing resilience of our planet from just one month of near-total shutdown of human activity. The shutting down of nonessential activities had a remarkably restorative effect for the planet. What if we disconnected from our cars and technologies, devoted time to rest, nourishment, and connection to both each other and nature for one day each week?" [1]
• "These concepts of resilience, recovery, safety, and a Sabbath are not based in philosophy or religion but in physiology and biology—the physiology and biology of thriving. The provision of safety to the world leads to resilience and equanimity in the world." [1]
• "We may not, yet, be ready for these concepts, nor the adjustments to make a better reality. But at some point we will tire of our suffering and perhaps open up to them—or perish. Can we create a cultural contagion, a meme, of a respected secular Sabbath?" [1]
Psychology Today has just outlined the "scientific" reasons why we need a weekly day of rest for both humans and the planet. Even if they don't say which day should be the preferred day of universal rest, we can see where this is going. The scientific community's role is to present the science for a day of rest, but it will be the churches that put pressure on the government to decide which day that should be.
"The dignitaries of church and State will unite to bribe, persuade, or compel all classes to honor the Sunday. The lack of divine authority will be supplied by oppressive enactments. Political corruption is destroying love of justice and regard for truth; and even in free America, rulers and legislators, in order to secure public favor, will yield to the popular demand for a law enforcing Sunday observance. Liberty of conscience, which has cost so great a sacrifice, will no longer be respected" (Great Controversy, p. 592).
Politicians, religious leaders, labor unions, economists, social organizations, and the media are calling on the world to keep Sunday holy by making it a day of rest. Historically, Sunday laws prohibited the operation of businesses, shopping centers, and secular activities on Sunday. The first blue laws were enacted in 321 A.D., when the Roman emperor Constantine decreed that all work be suspended on Sunday. Sunday laws in colonial America required citizens to keep the Sunday-Sabbath holy by attending church and also required all work to be stopped. This is precisely what the Sunday movement seeks to reestablish today.
Tragically, with all of the talk about restoring Sabbath rest and making Sunday the preferred day, what is being lost in this discussion is that Sunday, as a holy day, is solely dependent on the authority of the Catholic Church. There is no indication in the Bible that the weekly day of rest has been changed from Saturday to Sunday. Sunday was not honored by Christ, the apostles, or the early apostolic church.
This means that our current society is openly and persistently defying God's commandments and the faith of Jesus, which affirms, "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God" (Exodus 20:10). During this controversy, the conflict between the first day, the Sunday of the Papacy, and the seventh day, the Sabbath of the Lord, is on full display. Unfortunately, with the expectation of the Remnant people of Revelation 12:17, the entire world has joined the side of rebellion against the "Lord of the Sabbath" (Mark 2:28).
http://adventmessenger.org/the-san-bernardino-sun-newspaper-thou-shalt-not-hold-the-rose-parade-on-a-sunday/
Quoted article below, from link above.
The San Bernardino Sun Newspaper: "Thou shalt not hold the Rose Parade on a Sunday"
The San Bernardino Sun is a daily newspaper that services San Bernardino County, Riverside County, and the Inland Empire County in Southern California. On December 12, 2022, The San Bernardino Sun published an article titled "Why the Rose Parade and Rose Bowl are on Jan. 2 in 2023." The Tournament of Roses Parade, one of the most well-known parades in the world, ushers in the new year. This parade always takes place on January 1st, followed by the highly anticipated Rose Bowl Football Game. However, since January 1, 2023, falls on Sunday, the San Bernardino Sun reports that the Tournament of Roses Parade and the scheduled football game will instead be held on Monday, January 2, 2023, in keeping with a long-standing tradition that says these events cannot take place on Sunday, the "Lord's Day."
The San Bernardino Sun reported:
"Thou shalt not hold the Rose Parade on a Sunday." [1]
"Thus spake Tournament of Roses officials in 1893, the first time New Year's Day fell on the Lord's Day. That year, organizers decided to move the New Year's festivities to Jan. 2 in order to avoid frightening horses tied outside local churches and disrupting worship services." [1]
"In keeping with this tradition, the 134th Rose Parade and 109th Rose Bowl game will be held on Monday, Jan. 2, 2023." [1]
The "Tournament House," the organizational headquarters for the Tournament of Roses Parade, established a "Never on Sunday" policy that dates back to 1893, when Sunday laws were thriving across the nation. This rule, according to the Los Angeles Times, was put in place to prevent the Rose Parade from obstructing Sunday worship:
"The Rose Parade is an event tethered to traditions — the Tournament House, the Royal Court, and its strict 'Never on Sunday' policy. The policy dates to 1893, when officials decided to move the parade to Jan. 2 because New Year's Day fell on a Sunday. The festivities, they decided, disrupted local church services." [2]
The primary justification for not holding the Tournament of Roses Parade on a Sunday was that it ought to be a day of rest and worship, and noisy parades would disrupt those activities. The San Bernardino Sun added that it was morally wrong to interfere with Sunday worship because this would go against "the Lord's Day." As a result, there is a long-standing custom known as "Never on Sunday" that prohibits the Rose Parade and the Rose Bowl on the Lord's Day.
Is it wrong to play games on Sunday? Where do we look for answers? We can only turn to the Bible as the only reliable source of truth. So, what does God's word say about parades and playing games on Sunday? Absolutely nothing. The Bible does instruct us to keep God's Sabbath day holy in the Fourth Commandment (Exodus 20:8–11). But which day is this referring to? Not Sunday. The seventh day, or Saturday, is specifically mentioned as God's Sabbath.
Unfortunately, "Never on Sunday" is regaining popularity in America and around the world, and these policies are only based on tradition, not on the inspired word of God. The following summary demonstrates how the entire Christian world has turned away from the Bible and is instead exalting tradition over the Holy Scriptures:
"The Protestants claim to stand upon the written word only. They profess to hold the Scripture alone as the standard of faith. They justify their revolt by the plea that the (Roman Catholic) Church has apostatized from the written word and follows tradition. Now the Protestant's claim, that they stand upon the written word only is not true. Their profession of holding the Scripture alone as the standard of faith, is false. PROOF: The written word explicitly enjoins the observance of the seventh day as the Sabbath. They do not observe the seventh day, but reject it. If they do truly hold the Scripture alone as their standard, they would be observing the seventh day as is enjoined in the scripture throughout. Yet they not only reject the observance of the Sabbath enjoined in the written word, but they have adopted and do practice the observance of Sunday, for which they have only the tradition of the Church. Consequently the claim of 'Scripture alone as the standard.' fails; and the doctrine of 'Scripture and tradition' as essential, is fully established." [3]
Sources
[1] https://www.sbsun.com/2022/12/12/why-the-rose-parade-and-rose-bowl-are-on-jan-2-in-2023/
[2] https://www.latimes.com/socal/glendale-news-press/news/tn-gnp-1127-never-on-sunday-for-rose-parade-story.html
[3] https://www.romeschallenge.com/
http://adventmessenger.org/the-jerusalem-post-has-called-for-legislation-to-make-sunday-a-day-of-rest-in-order-to-heal-israels-divisions/
Quoted article below from link above.
The Jerusalem Post has Called for Legislation to make Sunday a Day of Rest in Order to Heal Israel's Divisions
You know our world is in trouble when Sabbath-keeping Jews start calling for Sunday laws. We are unquestionably approaching the final crisis. The times that we have long anticipated are upon us. Prophecy is rapidly approaching its fulfillment. On December 11, 2022, The Jerusalem Post, a newspaper in Israel with a global readership, published an article entitled, "Heal Israel's divisions by giving Sunday off for everyone." In this article, a call is made to make Sunday rest a legal requirement in order to "ease tensions" by giving people more time to "live life to the fullest." The Jerusalem Post stated the following:
"Declare Sunday a weekly day off for the country, a proposal that has long been discussed at various times over the last years. The idea is to have a two-and-a-half day weekend from Friday lunchtime to Monday morning. This will free up time and space for sports, recreation and for people to visit family. And sacred time for Shabbat, our divine heritage." [1]
"91% are concerned that the tension around state and religion is undermining the unity of Israeli society. Most significantly, 83% of respondents said that making Sunday part of the weekend will reduce these tensions." [1]
"I believe that members of the new Knesset (Israel's Legislature) should pass legislation to declare Sunday a day off and, in the same act, officially recognize Shabbat as the national treasure and heritage of the Jewish people. This will give Shabbat the respect it deserves in the public domain as befitting a Jewish state, and grant the people of Israel the time and space of a free Sunday so that they can live their lives to the fullest." [1]
The Jews of Israel have been drinking from the wine of Babylon. They are urging lawmakers to make Sunday a day of rest through a legal enactment. Without a doubt, what we are witnessing defies logic. Why would Sabbath-keepers advocate for Sunday laws? These Sabbath-keeping Jews are, in fact, working with the Sunday Law movement to accomplish Rome's work. These developments, along with everything else going on in our world, indicate that intolerance and oppression will inevitably accompany the Sunday movement in the near future. Seventh-day Adventists who refuse to join the great Sunday movement will be regarded as distinct, peculiar, and a marked people in the end.
This should serve as a wake-up call to God's people that the hour of God's visitation is approaching. This should motivate us to work harder to spread the truths of the Third Angel's Message throughout the world. What are we doing to stem the tide of religious intolerance and oppression? We must educate the millions of people who are being misled by the union of church and state through Sunday-law legislation now more than ever. Through literature, evangelism, public discourse, and social media, we must raise our voices and warn politicians against making Sunday, a religious observance, a legal requirement.
"The Sabbath is the Lord's test, and no man, be he king, priest, or ruler, is authorized to come between God and man. Those who seek to be conscience for their fellow men, place themselves above God. Those who are under the influence of a false religion, who observe a spurious rest day, will set aside the most positive evidence in regard to the true Sabbath. They will try to compel men to obey the laws of their own creation, laws that are directly opposed to the law of God. Upon those who continue in this course, the wrath of God will fall. Unless they change, they cannot escape the penalty" (Testimonies, vol. 9, p. 234).
Sources
[1] https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-724403
http://adventmessenger.org/baptist-news-global-not-everyone-can-rest-until-we-set-aside-the-demands-of-productivity-and-capitalism-for-the-purpose-of-sabbath/
Baptist News Global: "Not Everyone can Rest until we set Aside the Demands of Productivity and Capitalism for the Purpose of Sabbath"
The Baptist News Global recently weighed in on the discussion of the Sabbath and society and spoke of the need for a "collective commitment" to rest. On February 3, 2023, Laura Ellis published an article in the Baptist News Global advocating the idea that Sabbath rest is not something only one person does, but rather "Sabbath happens collectively when entire communities agree to rest." Even though the article claims that it is not advocating for the return of Blue Laws, it does call for all businesses to collectively close for one day a week, in the same way that lockdowns were mandated during the pandemic, so that rest is not just a "luxury for the privileged" but rather a "basic human need for all."
If that isn't referring to the Blue Laws, then this article is partaking in some sort of fictitious fantasy because that is exactly what the Blue Laws accomplish. The Baptist News Global reported the following in part:
• "Communal Rest – During the height of the pandemic, countless articles were published about how the lockdowns were forcing society to rest as the hustle of life grinded to a soft murmur. Even the earth got a moment to breathe as emissions from planes and cars were drastically decreased. This kind of involuntary rest [mandates] was possible only because it was communal." [1]
• "Sabbath happens collectively when entire communities agree to rest. When I talk about the sabbath, I say it's not just non-work or non-productivity. It's absolutely collective non-work and non-productivity because I simply cannot stress this enough. If it's not happening collectively, it's not going to happen." [1]
• "Shulevitz cites the 1961 Supreme Court decision about Sunday closing laws when Justice Felix Frankfurter defended a societal need for collective rest. Frankfurter "talked about Sunday and Sunday quietness on the streets, near the stores. He talked about it as a cultural asset of importance, a release from the daily grind, a preserve of mental peace, an opportunity for self-disposition. ... It made our civitas a better society." [1]
• Neither Shulevitz nor I are pushing to reinstate blue laws, but Shulevitz is pointing to the reality that not everyone can rest until we've all committed to set aside the demands of productivity and capitalism for the purpose of sabbath. And when that happens, the whole of the community is bettered. [1]
• Shulevitz compares the biblical rules of Sabbath to a "mutual noncomplete clause" where closing businesses for one day a week, for example, is only possible if competing businesses do the same. Similarly, we are able to individually rest only because of the mutual societal agreement that we all rest. Without a collective commitment, rest is a luxury for the privileged rather than a basic human need for all. [1]
The Baptists are advocating in this statement that all businesses close on Sundays, as was done during the lockdowns that occurred during the Covid pandemic. They base this assertion on the idea that rest ought to be regarded as a fundamental human right. Rest and recreation are rights that belong to everyone. They used phrases like "forcing society to rest," "lockdowns," and "involuntary rest." That is referring to oppressive mandates that forced businesses to close. This is exactly what the Blue Laws were all about. In other words, the Baptists are saying that we cannot truly have a Sabbath rest in our nation until there is a "collective" action through "involuntary rest" (force) that will shut down businesses, productivity, and capitalism for one day a week.
That is tyranny with a smile. This is advocating for oppressive Sabbath rest measures disguised as benevolent or friendly. The Baptist News Global is presenting a fair front, with a lot of charm and charisma in order to gain the trust of the people. But behind the scenes and behind the false sense of security, there is a Blue Law that is ready to oppress the people and deny the rights and religious freedoms of seventh-day Sabbath-keeping Christians.
We live in a time when there are a great number of politicians and religious figures who profess to represent the will of the people while acting in an authoritarian manner. There are political and religious forces described in Revelation 13 that seem to be helpful and benevolent, but in reality, they will use their influence to control, manipulate, and persecute the people they claim to be serving.
"And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon. And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him, and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed." Revelation 13:11, 12.
: Amo Sun Feb 12, 2023 - 14:53:26
http://adventmessenger.org/baptist-news-global-not-everyone-can-rest-until-we-set-aside-the-demands-of-productivity-and-capitalism-for-the-purpose-of-sabbath/
::frown::
NO! Without the "Blue Laws" covering everyone it would not work.
Everyone includes even the ambulance, police and firefighters... and hospital workers.
IOW anyone who gets paid for anything.
It would be a start but not enough.... AND NO preaching by clergy cause they get paid also.
No radio and no TV as people get paid to work the technical ends....
And absolutely no football, baseball, or Nascar.
Right idea, wrong day.
Baptist News Global isn't a source anyone should take seriously. It is leftist.
We won't return to blue laws. The Sunday law stuff is a bunch of crap.
We won't return to blue laws. The Sunday law stuff is a bunch of crap.
Tell that to the millions of people living under them right now. In places where they never went away, and places they have recently been established, or reestablished. Constitutionally separated church and state will eventually go out the window, just like the rest of the Constitution has been and currently is. Mandates invading our personal freedoms and rights are taking place regularly. This one will just be one more by the powers that presently be responsible for many mandates here and abroad today. We are headed backwards, not forward. Politicians and religious leaders are increasingly back in bed together the world over, subjugating all under their thumbs. This is old, not new. The only thing new, is some new religions. Like Atheism, and Secular humanism, and oh yea, Evolutionism or perhaps one would say "Scientism". Folloooow the "science".
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/deaths-of-despair-may-be-driven-by-loss-of-religion-new-research-paper-argues-11673876749
The above article links deaths of despair, with doing away with the blue laws.
https://mercatornet.com/does-religion-protect-americans-from-deaths-of-despair/82681/
Quoted article below from link above. Emphasis is mine.
'Gimme that old time religion': did it protect Americans from deaths of despair?
The generation of millennials, which includes most Americans under 40, is the first one in which Christians are a minority. By the year 2070 as few as one-third of all Americans could be Christians according Pew Research Center projections. "Nones" – people without an allegiance to a religious faith, could be as many as 52 percent.
The dechristianisation of society is hard to assess and harder to predict. But we can ask: is this good news or bad news?
According to a research paper released last week by the National Bureau of Economic Research, a prominent think tank in Cambridge, Massachusetts, it is bad news. It is, in fact, literally deadly.
"Opiates of the Masses? Deaths of Despair and the Decline of American Religion" is a sobering look at the deaths due to overdoses, suicides, and alcoholic liver disease, medical conditions that increase when people believe that their long-term social and economic prospects are bleak.
Amongst middle-aged white Americans, the increase in deaths of despair has been so dramatic that mortality rates for all causes began to rise in the US after the year 2000. This perplexes demographers and economists and has been described as "one of the most important economic and demographic issues of our time".
The three authors of the article believe that empirical evidence suggests that the reason for this deadly trend is the decline of religious practice. They write:
First, starting in the late 1980s, many measures of religious adherence in the US began a sharp downturn. This decline has been noted by researchers studying religion, but its proximity to the initial rise of deaths of despair has largely gone unnoticed. Second, religiosity is well known to be strongly correlated with health outcomes. Third, this religious decline was extremely large and widespread, so that it may have had quantifiable effects on mortality rates. We know of no other phenomenon that has these three characteristics.
This is a bold and controversial assertion. What proof do they put on the table?
In an original and thought-provoking use of statistics, the researchers examined deaths of despair after American states repealed their "blue laws". These were laws which banned commerce on Sundays so that people could observe the Sabbath by attending church services and spending more time with their families. Regulations varied from state to state, but typically the sale of alcohol was restricted or banned and department stores were closed. Many of the repeals took place in the 1980s.
What happened as a result? They report that
We find that for middle-aged Americans, the repeal of blue laws had a 5- to 10-percentage-point impact on weekly attendance of religious services and increased the rate of deaths of despair by 2 deaths per 100,000 people. Applying these results to the decline in religion at the end of the century suggests that this decline could be responsible for a reasonably large share of the initial rise in deaths of despair.
The usefulness of discussions about religion based on population-level statistics is limited, but intriguing. It's important to observe that church attendance is not the same as personal spirituality. Some people attending church regularly might not appear very spiritually-minded. Some very spiritual people might not attend church. "The impact that we witness seems to be driven by the decline in formal religious participation rather than in belief or personal activities like prayer," they write.
Furthermore, other confounding factors could be at work – the opioid epidemic, downturns in the economy, unemployment, and so on.
But it does appear that church attendance, or "religiosity" as the social scientists call it, protects people against drug addiction, alcohol abuse and suicide. "The initial rise in deaths of despair in the US was preceded by a large decline in organized religious participation and ... both trends were driven by white middle-aged Americans," they say.
Perhaps that's one reason why it might be better to live in Texas than in Arizona, or in South Carolina rather than in North Dakota. "States with high levels of religiosity have suffered less from mortality due to alcohol, suicides, or drug poisonings ... States that experienced larger decreases in religiosity have had the largest gains in the rate of deaths of despair.
There is much more to be said about the consequences of rapid secularisation in the United States and elsewhere. But this look at the dark side of social change is provocative. There are many lessons to be learned.
First, those who applaud the decline of religion in the public square in the US should be careful what they wish for. Church attendance protects some vulnerable people from social isolation, introversion, alienation and even death. Regular attendance draws people into faith communities, gives them supportive fellowship and enhances a sense of meaning in their lives.
Second, it is often observed that a decline in church attendance does not necessarily mean that people are less "religious". Many of them are said to be still attuned to spiritual themes. People who fret over empty pews are supposed to take comfort in this small consolation. However, the more atomised, individual ethic underlying the retreat from a religious community still makes people susceptible to "despair".
Third, the law of unintended consequences is always at work. We have all experienced this with the Covid lockdowns. Back in the 1980s, repealing the blue laws was meant to make life more convenient. For most people, it did. But for an unlucky few, it turned their lives upside down. It even killed them.
: Amo Sat Feb 25, 2023 - 17:23:08
The above article links deaths of despair, with doing away with the blue laws.
Tell me Amo, would you be OK with blue laws that outlawed business/work on Saturday instead of Sunday?
: DaveW Mon Feb 27, 2023 - 05:39:31
Tell me Amo, would you be OK with blue laws that outlawed business/work on Saturday instead of Sunday?
Absolutely not. The government has no business dictating religious conviction or faith. Worse yet, a religion using government to enforce their dogmas.
: Amo Mon Feb 27, 2023 - 19:10:28
Absolutely not. The government has no business dictating religious conviction or faith. Worse yet, a religion using government to enforce their dogmas.
So it would be ok for the government (or industry) to FORCE you to work on Saturday?
From an email I got today from the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ):
David,
Biden is waging a clandestine war on your Christian faith at the Supreme Court. And TODAY is the deadline.
He's astonishingly asking the Supreme Court to restrict your right to go to church. This case WILL have a major impact on your religious liberty.
The U.S. Postal Service started forcing postal workers to work on Sunday, denying their religious accommodation request to attend church. A federal court ruled that these workers have NO RIGHT to go to church.
If this outrage is allowed to stand, your employer could do the SAME THING. And that's just the beginning of the radical Left's assault on your faith. The outcome will impact numerous similar cases we are fighting.
We WILL NOT let Biden and the radical Left erode our religious liberty. Church is essential, and our federal and constitutional rights to religious liberty MUST BE PROTECTED. If they can block you from going to church, what's next?
I've been arguing these kinds of cases at the Supreme Court for decades. TODAY, we are filing a critical amicus brief at the Supreme Court to defend YOUR right to go to church. As we battle against Biden's assault on your faith at the Supreme Court, we need your support.
Of course not. What does such a thing have to do with liberty of Conscience? Biden is a papal puppet. If he is doing as you suggest, it is only to arouse resistance and help bolster a movement for Sunday sacredness protection laws.
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2023/01/discussion-blue-laws-reconsidered/
DISCUSSION: Blue Laws Reconsidered?
In today's post on suicide and the loss of religion, we mentioned that researchers found a correlation with "blue laws," suggesting that getting rid of Sunday closing laws may have had the unintended consequence of increasing the suicide rate.
I found that a bit of a jump, but said that I had never thought of the dismantling of Sunday closing laws as a factor in the decline in church attendance, but it is surely a factor. If you have to work on Sunday, you can't go to church. Most of us probably know people in that predicament.
Even after the blue laws were abandoned, communities tended to protect Sundays. No more, even here in rural, Bible belt, Oklahoma, where soccer practices and little league tournaments are often scheduled on Sunday mornings.
Ironically, though, most European countries and Australia, which I know most about, have kept most of their blue laws, even though they are far more secularized than the United States. Most people there don't use Sundays to go to church, which was the origin of those laws, but they prize them as a day of rest.
We Americans still try to go to church, but we have given up our day of rest. Consequently, we are more busy than we should be, which also has unintended consequences for our mental health.
Now there are problems with rigid, legalistic approaches to the Sabbath, which gave rise to the blue laws. German Lutheran immigrants encountered hostility from the Reformed majority for breaking the Sabbath. On Sunday afternoons, after church, the Lutherans would play or watch sports, attend concerts, and, worst of all, relax at Beer Gardens. Lutherans knew that "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mark 2:27). And what man needs on the Sabbath is both worship and rest, including innocent recreation and time with family and friends.
Today any Sabbath laws would have to be packaged as days of rest with many exceptions and accommodations, as in Europe and Australia. No one religion could be privileged. Christians have Sundays as the day of worship, Jews have Saturdays, and Muslims have Thursdays. The work week and the number of hours Americans work per week are said to be contracting. Most Americans work only five days a week, but these can be different days. But is it helpful for the whole society to have days off in common? We still have weekends. We could institutionalize a three day weekend, beginning with Thursdays rather than adding Mondays, to accommodate the Muslims, thereby keeping a religious dimension to these days of rest.
So our discussion topic for this weekend is "would it be a good idea to bring back Sunday closing laws or their equivalent?"
: Amo Sat Mar 04, 2023 - 10:02:52
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2023/01/discussion-blue-laws-reconsidered/
In today's post on suicide and the loss of religion, we mentioned that researchers found a correlation with "blue laws," suggesting that getting rid of Sunday closing laws may have had the unintended consequence of increasing the suicide rate.
Good grief.
And I suppose that the covid restrictions did so as well? Especially when we could not shop for weeks on end or dine out, or see a movie?
I just have not read any increase for that based on covid
I could agree that choosing to spend one whole day a week in greater communion with God, could help prevent depression and or possibly therefore suicide. But I can't agree that forcing people to do so by law, who would rather be doing something else, might have such an effect.
http://adventmessenger.org/catholic-archbishop-herouard-we-want-to-protect-the-right-of-people-not-having-to-work-on-sunday/
Quoted article below, from link above. Link under quoted article, is to link of video discussed in article.
Catholic Archbishop Hérouard: "We want to Protect the Right of People not having to Work on Sunday"
In a video released on March 3, 2023, Archbishop Antoino Hérouard, President of the Social Affairs Commission for the Commission of Bishops' Conferences of the European Union (COMECE), reaffirmed the urgency to protect Sunday as the common day of rest for Europe. Archbishop Hérouard is a Jesuit-trained member of COMECE. [1] COMECE is the Vatican-led organization that represents Pope Francis in the European Union.
Catholic Archbishop Hérouard expressed the following in a video released by the European Sunday Alliance:
"As a founder of the European Sunday Alliance, COMECE is very well aware of protecting this particularity of the Sunday. Sunday has to be a different day for the people, a day in which they can not only have their habitual activities in their work, but to have the possibility of meeting the family, having other activities in social camps, in sports, in culture, of course, also, in spiritual and religious engagement. So we want to protect as far as possible the fact that all the people have to be able not to work on Sunday and be able to have these other opportunities in their live that are so important for everybody" (Twitter Post).
Rome is moving forward in its fight to secure Sunday closing laws across Europe. Even though Archbishop Hérouard claims his support for Sunday rest is about helping families and workers, he doesn't hide the fact that he also says it is for "spiritual and religious activities." Rome is taking advantage of every opportunity to establish Sunday as a day of rest in order to draw people to the church. That is the real motive.
The European Sunday Alliance is a coalition of civil organizations, trade unions, and religious groups from across Europe, and not only is COMECE a founding member of this alliance, but their stated goal is to "raise awareness about the unique value of Sunday for our society and on the importance of a common day of rest." [2]
Rome views Sunday closing regulations as a matter of abiding by the church's commandment. And instead of letting people decide for themselves whether Saturday or Sunday is the biblical Sabbath, the member nations of the European Union are being asked to do Rome's bidding by making Sunday a day of rest without our consent.
The campaign to secure Sunday by law is currently underway. This will force men and women to shut down everything on the first day of the week, even though God's commandments say "the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God" (Exodus 20:10). Those aware of the long history of Sunday laws dating back to 321 A.D. know that these movements happening in Europe today are bringing us one step closer to enforcing Rome's religion during the mark of the beast crisis.
Sunday agitations will only continue to grow as more and more calls are made to adopt these radical arbitrary laws. The biblical predictions found in Revelation 13 and 17 are coming to life before our very eyes. Rome is busy fulfilling her role by compelling all classes to observe her institutions. And what are the secular governments doing? They are lining up behind her. Let also the commandment-keeping people rise to the occasion and carry out their divinely appointed duty at this time:
"The people of our land need to be aroused to resist the advances of this most dangerous foe to civil and religious liberty." (Spirit of Prophecy, Vol. 4, p. 382).
"It is our duty to do all in our power to avert the threatened danger" (Testimonies, Vol. 5, p. 452).
https://twitter.com/intent/follow?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1631615934929551360%7Ctwgr%5Eb0d6b27501cf008a9f64a1d652115d2b99404000%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fadventmessenger.org%2Fcatholic-archbishop-herouard-we-want-to-protect-the-right-of-people-not-having-to-work-on-sunday%2F&screen_name=SundayAlliance
http://adventmessenger.org/hollywood-actor-mark-wahlberg-said-on-nbcs-today-show-no-matter-where-i-am-the-priority-on-sunday-is-to-go-to-church/
Quoted article below from link above. Video of the interview is on the above link as well. Bold emphasis is mine.
Hollywood Actor Mark Wahlberg said on NBC's Today Show: "No Matter Where I am, the Priority on Sunday is to go to Church"
Even famous celebrities support Sunday as the day to attend church for worship. One of Hollywood's highest-paid actors, Mark Wahlberg, has appeared in over 60 films. On February 22, 2023, Wahlberg appeared on NBC's Today Show to talk about his faith and the role it plays in his life. Wahlberg also promoted the Roman Catholic prayer app called Hallow, which was created to inspire people to pray and meditate.
During the interview with Savannah Guthrie, Mark Wahlberg stressed the importance of teaching his children that "no matter where I am, the priority on Sunday is to go to church." Given that he spoke these words on national television, his message that Sunday is for church worship spread beyond his immediate family. The live broadcast was viewed in homes all across the nation, helping to promote the popular perception that Sunday is for church and family. That was the message being communicated as Wahlberg interacted with his audience.
Sunday is being promoted by everyone. But when famous people support Sunday as the day to attend church, you know that will have an enormous impact on people in general. Celebrities can often get their fans to embrace whatever they are promoting. Movie stars have the power to shape followers' opinions and behaviors because they frequently have large fan bases on social media and other platforms. It is regrettable that God's commandments aren't being followed regarding the day He wants us to attend church.
"You know how it is with the papal power. The people have no right to interpret the Scriptures for themselves. They must have someone else interpret the Scriptures for them. Have you no mind? Have you no reason? Has not God given judgment to the common people just as well as He has to the priests and rulers? ... God help us to be Bible students. Until you can see the reason for it yourself and a 'thus saith the Lord' in the Scriptures, don't trust any living man to interpret the Bible for you. And when you can see this, you know it for yourself, and know it to be the truth of God. You will say, 'I have read it, I have seen it, and my own heart takes hold upon it, and it is the truth God has spoken to me from His Word'." (Faith and Works, pp. 77, 78).
http://adventmessenger.org/catholic-cardinal-sunday-worship-strengthens-church-and-community-life-and-those-who-deliberately-disregard-it-commit-grave-sin/
Quoted article below from link above.
Catholic Cardinal: Sunday Worship Strengthens Church and Community Life, and those who Deliberately Disregard it Commit Grave Sin
On March 11, 2023, the Catholic Archbishop of Singapore, William Goh, who was elevated to Cardinal status by Pope Francis in 2022, published a formal directive ordering people to return to church on Sunday. The order was called "Restoring the Solemnity and the Spirit of the Day of the Lord by Participation in the Sunday Eucharist." In his capacity as leader, Cardinal Goh cautioned clergy and laypeople alike that the Sunday Eucharist is the cornerstone of faith and the solution to "the world's despair." He added that it is a "grave sin" to purposely skip Sunday services. Additionally, he asserts that Catholic doctrine is "also important to strengthen the community and to help them walk together in faith."
The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Singapore published Cardinal Goh's words, which stated the following:
"The Sunday Eucharist has always been held in great importance by the Church. The commemoration of the Lord's resurrection is a tradition going back to the Apostles and hence called the Lord's Day. Celebrating the resurrection of our Lord is the heart of Christian Faith. It is the basis of our faith in Jesus as the Christ, the Son of God. It is also the answer to the world's despair and the meaning of life." [1]
"For this reason, the Church has legislated that "on Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass" (Catechism of the Catholic Church, No 2180 cf Canon Law 1247). It also states that "unless excused for a serious reason (for example, illness, the care of infants, or vulnerable to infectious disease) or given dispensation by their own pastor, those who deliberately fail in this obligation commit a grave sin" (CCC 2181, cf Canon Law 1245). This law is imposed not to make our lives inconvenient but to underscore the grave obligation that active participation in the Sunday Eucharist is vital for Christian life. We must not reduce Sunday, the Day of the Lord simply to a weekend of rest, shopping, dining, or engaging in cultural and sporting activities. Church Laws are given more for the weak, and not so much for those who are disciplined in their spiritual life." [1]
"Church Laws are also important to strengthen the community and to help them walk together in faith. That is why we should not merely fulfil the obligation in a perfunctory manner but interiorise the Spirit of the Sunday Obligation. Just "attending Mass" itself would not be the right spirit in fulfilling this obligation. One must participate in the Mass with the intention of giving glory to God, to consecrate the entire day to Him by sharing our life and love with our fellow Catholics and extending the love we receive with those who do not know Christ especially by our works of charity." [1]
It is clear from Cardinal Goh's words that he is not just speaking to his Catholic parishioners. The "community" at large and those who "do not know Christ" are both included. His message is that you are committing a great sin if you skip Sunday worship. What Cardinal Goh is saying is what the Roman Catholic Church has done for millennia. They are manipulating people, sowing seeds of doubt, and making people question what God Himself has said about the Sabbath day.
Sunday is not the Lord's Day or the day of rest and worship. Saturday is the true Lord's Day. The Sabbath has never been changed, will never be changed, and cannot be changed because it is a memorial of creation. It was blessed and sanctified by God and is enshrined in the Moral Law (Genesis 2:1–3; Exodus 20:8–11). And Jesus made it clear that He is the Lord of the Sabbath day (Mark 2:28).
You can deceive both yourself and other people by celebrating your birthday on a day other than the one on which you were actually born. You are welcome to host your friends and celebrate a day on which you were not born. You can proclaim your fictitious birthdate from the rooftops and perpetuate your fraud throughout the world. However, there is no way to alter the truth about when you were actually born or to rewrite history.
Today, the world has sanctified the first day of the week and is participating in an act of misrepresentation and fraud. Millions believe that Sunday is the day of rest, but as long as God endures, as long as His word is true, and as long as the earth remains, the seventh-day Sabbath is a rebuke to all those who are worshiping on the wrong day.
Before sin entered our world, the Sabbath was a memorial to the living God. Before sin destroyed the perfect peace and unity that existed in the Garden of Eden, the Sabbath had been established, blessed, and sanctified by the Lord. And this memorial of God will live on throughout eternity in the earth made new (Isaiah 66:22, 23). Yes, after this world has been purified and all the marks of sin have been forever removed, Saturday, not Sunday, will remain for all eternity as the true day of worship for the Creator.
The true Sabbath has not simply been forgotten by people; rather, it has been ruthlessly and purposefully trampled underfoot by the beast of Bible prophecy. Instead of keeping God's Sabbath, men have elevated a fictitious day of rest that has unholy origins. There is a power that is not godly and has sought to change the commandments of God for the traditions of men. It was the little horn (Daniel 7:25) who thinks that he could "change" times and laws. It was the mystery of iniquity, the man of sin, who changed the Sabbath from the seventh day to the day of the sun, Sunday, a day revered in paganism.
The Roman papacy officially decreed the change from Saturday to Sunday during the Council of Laodicea in AD 364:
"Christians shall not Judaize and be idle on Saturday but shall work on that day; but the Lord's day they shall especially honour, and, as being Christians, shall, if possible, do no work on that day. If, however, they are found Judaizing, they shall be shut out from Christ" (Strand, op. cit., citing Charles J. Hefele, A History of the Councils of the Church, 2 [Edinburgh, 1876] 316).
High-ranking Catholic leaders freely admit that the Catholic Church made this change:
"You may read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and you will not find a single line authorizing the sanctification of Sunday. The Scriptures enforce the religious observance of Saturday, a day which we [the Catholic Church] never sanctify." (Faith of Our Fathers, 92nd ed., p. 89).
"The Catholic Church, ... by virtue of her divine mission, changed the day from Saturday to Sunday" (The Catholic Mirror, official publication of James Cardinal Gibbons, Sept. 23, 1893).
"Protestants do not realize that by observing Sunday, they accept the authority of the spokesperson of the Church, the Pope" (Our Sunday Visitor, February 5, 1950).
"Of course the Catholic Church claims that the change [Saturday Sabbath to Sunday] was her act... And the act is a mark of her ecclesiastical authority in religious things" (H.F. Thomas, Chancellor of Cardinal Gibbons).
"The church is above the Bible, and this transference of Sabbath observance is proof of that fact" (Catholic Record of London, Ontario, Sept. 1, 1923).
"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 Catholic Church alone. The Catholic Church says, by my divine power I abolish the Sabbath day and command you to keep holy the first day of the week. And lo! The entire civilized world bows down in reverent obedience to the command of the Holy Catholic Church" (Thomas Enright, CSSR, President, Redemptorist College [Roman Catholic], Kansas City, MO, Feb. 18, 1884).
"The Pope has power to change times, to abrogate laws, and to dispense with all things, even the precepts of Christ. The Pope has authority and has often exercised it, to dispense with the command of Christ" (Decretal, de Tranlatic Episcop).
The true seventh-day Sabbath is rooted in the eternal word of God. It is as timeless as eternity. It is a memorial of God's creative and redemptive power (Deuteronomy 5:15). On the other hand, the Papacy, in its blind and blasphemous presumption, claims to be able to change the moral law of God by dispensing altogether with the Sabbath that He established. This is the same spirit that the Bible warned us about:
"For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them." Acts 20:29, 30.
"Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God." 2 Thessalonians 2:3, 4.
It appears that the "falling away" into apostasy started even in the times of the apostles, which is how the papal power came to be. Now, once again, they are making calls for the return of Sunday rest, not just for the church but for all of society. We are aware of where this is going. All the cries for tolerance and compassion, for coexistence and peace, will soon come to an end.
"God's Word has given warning of the impending danger; let this be unheeded, and the Protestant world will learn what the purposes of Rome really are, only when it is too late to escape the snare. She is silently growing into power. Her doctrines are exerting their influence in legislative halls, in the churches, and in the hearts of men. She is piling up her lofty and massive structures, in the secret recesses of which her former persecutions will be repeated. Stealthily and unsuspectedly she is strengthening her forces to further her own ends when the time shall come for her to strike. All that she desires is vantage-ground, and this is already being given her. We shall soon see and shall feel what the purpose of the Roman element is. Whoever shall believe and obey the Word of God will thereby incur reproach and persecution" (Great Controversy, p. 581).
: Amo Sun Apr 09, 2023 - 10:03:28
http://adventmessenger.org/catholic-cardinal-sunday-worship-strengthens-church-and-community-life-and-those-who-deliberately-disregard-it-commit-grave-sin/
Quoted article below from link above.
Catholic Cardinal: Sunday Worship Strengthens Church and Community Life, and those who Deliberately Disregard it Commit Grave Sin
On March 11, 2023, the Catholic Archbishop of Singapore, William Goh, who was elevated to Cardinal status by Pope Francis in 2022, published a formal directive ordering people to return to church on Sunday. The order was called "Restoring the Solemnity and the Spirit of the Day of the Lord by Participation in the Sunday Eucharist." In his capacity as leader, Cardinal Goh cautioned clergy and laypeople alike that the Sunday Eucharist is the cornerstone of faith and the solution to "the world's despair." He added that it is a "grave sin" to purposely skip Sunday services. Additionally, he asserts that Catholic doctrine is "also important to strengthen the community and to help them walk together in faith."
The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Singapore published Cardinal Goh's words, which stated the following:
"The Sunday Eucharist has always been held in great importance by the Church. The commemoration of the Lord's resurrection is a tradition going back to the Apostles and hence called the Lord's Day. Celebrating the resurrection of our Lord is the heart of Christian Faith. It is the basis of our faith in Jesus as the Christ, the Son of God. It is also the answer to the world's despair and the meaning of life." [1]
"For this reason, the Church has legislated that "on Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass" (Catechism of the Catholic Church, No 2180 cf Canon Law 1247). It also states that "unless excused for a serious reason (for example, illness, the care of infants, or vulnerable to infectious disease) or given dispensation by their own pastor, those who deliberately fail in this obligation commit a grave sin" (CCC 2181, cf Canon Law 1245). This law is imposed not to make our lives inconvenient but to underscore the grave obligation that active participation in the Sunday Eucharist is vital for Christian life. We must not reduce Sunday, the Day of the Lord simply to a weekend of rest, shopping, dining, or engaging in cultural and sporting activities. Church Laws are given more for the weak, and not so much for those who are disciplined in their spiritual life." [1]
"Church Laws are also important to strengthen the community and to help them walk together in faith. That is why we should not merely fulfil the obligation in a perfunctory manner but interiorise the Spirit of the Sunday Obligation. Just "attending Mass" itself would not be the right spirit in fulfilling this obligation. One must participate in the Mass with the intention of giving glory to God, to consecrate the entire day to Him by sharing our life and love with our fellow Catholics and extending the love we receive with those who do not know Christ especially by our works of charity." [1]
It is clear from Cardinal Goh's words that he is not just speaking to his Catholic parishioners. The "community" at large and those who "do not know Christ" are both included. His message is that you are committing a great sin if you skip Sunday worship. What Cardinal Goh is saying is what the Roman Catholic Church has done for millennia. They are manipulating people, sowing seeds of doubt, and making people question what God Himself has said about the Sabbath day.
Sunday is not the Lord's Day or the day of rest and worship. Saturday is the true Lord's Day. The Sabbath has never been changed, will never be changed, and cannot be changed because it is a memorial of creation. It was blessed and sanctified by God and is enshrined in the Moral Law (Genesis 2:1–3; Exodus 20:8–11). And Jesus made it clear that He is the Lord of the Sabbath day (Mark 2:28).
You can deceive both yourself and other people by celebrating your birthday on a day other than the one on which you were actually born. You are welcome to host your friends and celebrate a day on which you were not born. You can proclaim your fictitious birthdate from the rooftops and perpetuate your fraud throughout the world. However, there is no way to alter the truth about when you were actually born or to rewrite history.
Today, the world has sanctified the first day of the week and is participating in an act of misrepresentation and fraud. Millions believe that Sunday is the day of rest, but as long as God endures, as long as His word is true, and as long as the earth remains, the seventh-day Sabbath is a rebuke to all those who are worshiping on the wrong day.
Before sin entered our world, the Sabbath was a memorial to the living God. Before sin destroyed the perfect peace and unity that existed in the Garden of Eden, the Sabbath had been established, blessed, and sanctified by the Lord. And this memorial of God will live on throughout eternity in the earth made new (Isaiah 66:22, 23). Yes, after this world has been purified and all the marks of sin have been forever removed, Saturday, not Sunday, will remain for all eternity as the true day of worship for the Creator.
The true Sabbath has not simply been forgotten by people; rather, it has been ruthlessly and purposefully trampled underfoot by the beast of Bible prophecy. Instead of keeping God's Sabbath, men have elevated a fictitious day of rest that has unholy origins. There is a power that is not godly and has sought to change the commandments of God for the traditions of men. It was the little horn (Daniel 7:25) who thinks that he could "change" times and laws. It was the mystery of iniquity, the man of sin, who changed the Sabbath from the seventh day to the day of the sun, Sunday, a day revered in paganism.
The Roman papacy officially decreed the change from Saturday to Sunday during the Council of Laodicea in AD 364:
"Christians shall not Judaize and be idle on Saturday but shall work on that day; but the Lord's day they shall especially honour, and, as being Christians, shall, if possible, do no work on that day. If, however, they are found Judaizing, they shall be shut out from Christ" (Strand, op. cit., citing Charles J. Hefele, A History of the Councils of the Church, 2 [Edinburgh, 1876] 316).
High-ranking Catholic leaders freely admit that the Catholic Church made this change:
"You may read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and you will not find a single line authorizing the sanctification of Sunday. The Scriptures enforce the religious observance of Saturday, a day which we [the Catholic Church] never sanctify." (Faith of Our Fathers, 92nd ed., p. 89).
"The Catholic Church, ... by virtue of her divine mission, changed the day from Saturday to Sunday" (The Catholic Mirror, official publication of James Cardinal Gibbons, Sept. 23, 1893).
"Protestants do not realize that by observing Sunday, they accept the authority of the spokesperson of the Church, the Pope" (Our Sunday Visitor, February 5, 1950).
"Of course the Catholic Church claims that the change [Saturday Sabbath to Sunday] was her act... And the act is a mark of her ecclesiastical authority in religious things" (H.F. Thomas, Chancellor of Cardinal Gibbons).
"The church is above the Bible, and this transference of Sabbath observance is proof of that fact" (Catholic Record of London, Ontario, Sept. 1, 1923).
"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 Catholic Church alone. The Catholic Church says, by my divine power I abolish the Sabbath day and command you to keep holy the first day of the week. And lo! The entire civilized world bows down in reverent obedience to the command of the Holy Catholic Church" (Thomas Enright, CSSR, President, Redemptorist College [Roman Catholic], Kansas City, MO, Feb. 18, 1884).
"The Pope has power to change times, to abrogate laws, and to dispense with all things, even the precepts of Christ. The Pope has authority and has often exercised it, to dispense with the command of Christ" (Decretal, de Tranlatic Episcop).
The true seventh-day Sabbath is rooted in the eternal word of God. It is as timeless as eternity. It is a memorial of God's creative and redemptive power (Deuteronomy 5:15). On the other hand, the Papacy, in its blind and blasphemous presumption, claims to be able to change the moral law of God by dispensing altogether with the Sabbath that He established. This is the same spirit that the Bible warned us about:
"For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them." Acts 20:29, 30.
"Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God." 2 Thessalonians 2:3, 4.
It appears that the "falling away" into apostasy started even in the times of the apostles, which is how the papal power came to be. Now, once again, they are making calls for the return of Sunday rest, not just for the church but for all of society. We are aware of where this is going. All the cries for tolerance and compassion, for coexistence and peace, will soon come to an end.
"God's Word has given warning of the impending danger; let this be unheeded, and the Protestant world will learn what the purposes of Rome really are, only when it is too late to escape the snare. She is silently growing into power. Her doctrines are exerting their influence in legislative halls, in the churches, and in the hearts of men. She is piling up her lofty and massive structures, in the secret recesses of which her former persecutions will be repeated. Stealthily and unsuspectedly she is strengthening her forces to further her own ends when the time shall come for her to strike. All that she desires is vantage-ground, and this is already being given her. We shall soon see and shall feel what the purpose of the Roman element is. Whoever shall believe and obey the Word of God will thereby incur reproach and persecution" (Great Controversy, p. 581).
Happy Easter, Amo... or do you not celebrate or acknowledge that it was on a Sunday that the tomb was found empty?
Question as I labor to understand your beliefs.
The above link and quotes are certainly to outline that dastardly doings of many Catholics in their lives when it comes to their participation in the Eucharist. Sunday is a no-no. It is wrong.... but there are those who do so on Saturdays and some on Fridays.... and when ever that amass together in a sanctuary of a Catholic church... just so long as they are Catholics in godd standing.
I know your belief is that only on Saturday... (not even Friday 6PM to Sat 6PM) is the one and true Sabbath day and is the only one worthy of "Sabbath" considerations.
Would you be so kind as to tell me how you celebrate your sabbaths?
I understand you do not work. (Though must be difficult for some given their choice of professions under a boss)
But do you attend church or spend your time reflecting on what the heavenly Father has done for us and in prayer. (If it is to church, how does that work as those of service in the church are actually working to serve you)
Back in the 1970s Robert Schuller ( Crystal Cathedral) always said that since Sunday was a workday for him, he took Monday as his day of rest and he and his wife had "date night"... which of course had someone working for them.
Now... while I acknowledge that day 7 was the time God stopped working and rested in it.... And while you are honoring this day in the same way... and as the Jewish Sabbath commanded them to do.... can you explain why , when we have a new religion, apart from Judaism, that came into being through Jesus-"The Christ"... and was spread continually through out the world ... even unto today.... why there should be no day to commemorate Him , but only the original Sabbath that was in effect since creation and continues even to today with those who do not acknowledge that their Messiah came 2000 give or take years ago?
That just tells me we are ignoring the reason for our FAITH.
AGREED... GOD rested on the seventh day from His work.... and thus all were supposed to rest on that day.... And God never told us to celebrate Jesus' Birth' or the shedding of His blood for you and me... or even His resurrection.............. BUT DID GOD EVER SAY IT WAS WRONG?
Resurrection Day! The Lord's Day!
: Texas Conservative Sun Apr 09, 2023 - 11:40:06
Resurrection Day!
Yes. Yom ha Bikkurim (day of first fruits) 1 Corinthians 15:20
The Lord's Day!
No. That is the day of judgement and destruction. Joel 1:15
I think you are right Dave. The Lord's Day = Day of the Lord. The same day John was in the Spirit in Revelation 1. I don't have a big problem calling Sunday the Lord's day, but to call it that because of Rev 1 is a stretch in my opinion.
: Rella Sun Apr 09, 2023 - 10:57:34
Happy Easter, Amo... or do you not celebrate or acknowledge that it was on a Sunday that the tomb was found empty?
Question as I labor to understand your beliefs.
The above link and quotes are certainly to outline that dastardly doings of many Catholics in their lives when it comes to their participation in the Eucharist. Sunday is a no-no. It is wrong.... but there are those who do so on Saturdays and some on Fridays.... and when ever that amass together in a sanctuary of a Catholic church... just so long as they are Catholics in godd standing.
I know your belief is that only on Saturday... (not even Friday 6PM to Sat 6PM) is the one and true Sabbath day and is the only one worthy of "Sabbath" considerations.
Would you be so kind as to tell me how you celebrate your sabbaths?
I understand you do not work. (Though must be difficult for some given their choice of professions under a boss)
But do you attend church or spend your time reflecting on what the heavenly Father has done for us and in prayer. (If it is to church, how does that work as those of service in the church are actually working to serve you)
Back in the 1970s Robert Schuller ( Crystal Cathedral) always said that since Sunday was a workday for him, he took Monday as his day of rest and he and his wife had "date night"... which of course had someone working for them.
Now... while I acknowledge that day 7 was the time God stopped working and rested in it.... And while you are honoring this day in the same way... and as the Jewish Sabbath commanded them to do.... can you explain why , when we have a new religion, apart from Judaism, that came into being through Jesus-"The Christ"... and was spread continually through out the world ... even unto today.... why there should be no day to commemorate Him , but only the original Sabbath that was in effect since creation and continues even to today with those who do not acknowledge that their Messiah came 2000 give or take years ago?
That just tells me we are ignoring the reason for our FAITH.
AGREED... GOD rested on the seventh day from His work.... and thus all were supposed to rest on that day.... And God never told us to celebrate Jesus' Birth' or the shedding of His blood for you and me... or even His resurrection.............. BUT DID GOD EVER SAY IT WAS WRONG?
Sorry Rella, didn't see your post or the others till now. As it is late, I will plan on answering your questions after work tomorrow. Happy late easter to you as well. I have no problem with people celebrating that which is among the most climactic events in human history. Though the whys and wherefores of history regarding this institution are far from biblically pure. Many today do not and have not even considered such, and so for all intentional purposes, they are simply celebrating Christ's death, burial, and glorious resurrection.
Hello Rella. Now to your questions.
I know your belief is that only on Saturday... (not even Friday 6PM to Sat 6PM) is the one and true Sabbath day and is the only one worthy of "Sabbath" considerations.
The seventh day Sabbath is from evening unto evening, as it was from the beginning when all days were established at creation. That is from Friday sundown, to Saturday sundown.
Would you be so kind as to tell me how you celebrate your sabbaths?
No Problem -
Exo 20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: 10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: 11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
I endeavor to follow the above fairly simple instructions. Setting the day apart from others by not working on it for my living, spending time in study, worship, prayer, and or sharing (witnessing) regarding the truths of God's word. I have no particular set of rules apart from the plain and simple testimony found in the commandment itself.
I understand you do not work. (Though must be difficult for some given their choice of professions under a boss)
When I became convicted of the Sabbath truth, I was stationed on a ship in the United States Coast Guard. I expressed my new convictions to my immediate supervisors, who brought the issue up the chain of command. It was decided that I could switch my duties with others willing to do so or who preferred Sundays off. When I was transferred to a small boat search and rescue station which included boarding officer duties, I understood that there are some jobs which one cannot simply take off. I switched duties with others when possible, but certainly understood that emergency rescues and law enforcement could not be put off for another day. So I of course tended to these matters when necessary. As it is most certainly lawful to do good on the Sabbath.
After five years though, I determined to end my Coast Guard career for a few different reasons. Not the least of which was my desire to more regularly keep God's fourth commandment without the many interruptions which came along with my job. Since then I have passed up many jobs in order to observe God's fourth commandment as I believe He desires us to, for our own benefit. I have no regrets.
But do you attend church or spend your time reflecting on what the heavenly Father has done for us and in prayer. (If it is to church, how does that work as those of service in the church are actually working to serve you)
I attended the Seventh Day Adventist church for many years. Serving in many different offices along the way. Eventually, the direction the church was going in, didn't seem to align with what I had joined up for, so I stopped attending. I entered the denomination intending to be a part of the prophetic movement it once represented. That movement having all but vanished from the pulpit for many years, to the contrary even being downplayed from the pulpit in blatant and subtle ways, lead me to the conviction that I could no longer sit and listen to and or watch these changes that I was convicted were not according to God's will. Therefore I stopped attending. I now observe the fourth commandment as expressed earlier in this post.
Back in the 1970s Robert Schuller ( Crystal Cathedral) always said that since Sunday was a workday for him, he took Monday as his day of rest and he and his wife had "date night"... which of course had someone working for them.
Mat 12:1 At that time Jesus went on the sabbath day through the corn; and his disciples were an hungred, and began to pluck the ears of corn, and to eat. 2 But when the Pharisees saw it, they said unto him, Behold, thy disciples do that which is not lawful to do upon the sabbath day. 3 But he said unto them,
Have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungred, and they that were with him; 4 How he entered into the house of God, and did eat the shewbread, which was not lawful for him to eat, neither for them which were with him, but only for the priests? 5 Or have ye not read in the law, how that on the sabbath days the priests in the temple profane the sabbath, and are blameless? 6 But I say unto you, That in this place is one greater than the temple. 7 But if ye had known what this meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless. 8 For the Son of man is Lord even of the sabbath day.Now... while I acknowledge that day 7 was the time God stopped working and rested in it.... And while you are honoring this day in the same way... and as the Jewish Sabbath commanded them to do.... can you explain why , when we have a new religion, apart from Judaism, that came into being through Jesus-"The Christ"... and was spread continually through out the world ... even unto today.... why there should be no day to commemorate Him , but only the original Sabbath that was in effect since creation and continues even to today with those who do not acknowledge that their Messiah came 2000 give or take years ago?
Your last statement above is a gross misrepresentation of historical facts. Millions of Christians have kept God's seventh day Sabbath right from the beginning of the new covenant to the present. Not just the Jews.
The Sabbath is not Jewish. It is not the Jew's Sabbath. It is God's Sabbath, as He has declared it to be so many times over in scripture. It was established thousands of years before there ever was a Jew. When God established Israel, He told them to remember His Sabbath, not to observe a Jewish one. God's Sabbath will also be observed in heaven, as the scriptures also plainly state.
The original Sabbath does commemorate our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who created, sustains, and has saved this world. He is Lord of the Sabbath. Who established the Sabbath at creation. Called His people to remember it during the old covenant. Taught the misguided Jews its proper observance once again when here among us as our living human example. And conclusively stated that He did not come to change God's law while among us, but rather to establish it.
While there is nothing wrong with choosing to celebrate the Lord's resurrection on Sundays, there is most definitely something wrong with replacing Christ's Sabbath according to the commandment, with another extra biblical man made one. Which man made day of worship has been forced upon countless souls throughout history by human laws. As it still is today in many places around the world. Some of these laws having been established recently. There simply is no command from scripture anywhere to exalt the first day of the week as such, or enforce such upon anyone. Nevertheless, this is the history of Sunday "sacredness". Man made "sacredness" supported by man made laws.
Joh 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 The same was in the beginning with God.
3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.Col 1:12 Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: 13 Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son: 14 In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins: 15 Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature:
16 For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: 17 And he is before all things, and by him all things consist. 18 And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence.
1Co 10:1 Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; 2 And were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea; 3 And did all eat the same spiritual meat; 4 And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them:
and that Rock was Christ. That just tells me we are ignoring the reason for our FAITH.
How is keeping God's fourth commandment, ignoring the reason for our faith? How is keeping a day never even mentioned in scripture as a holy day, supposedly holy, faith? Faith in what? Apparently not God's word. Because there is nothing in God's word about doing so.
Here is how Paul describes our faith in one place -
Rom 8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: 4
That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 5 For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. 6 For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.
7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. 9 But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. 10 And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 11 But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.
It is the carnal mind which is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. How can those who would walk according to the Spirit, have the righteousness of the law fulfilled within them, while disregarding one of God's commandments? By replacing it, with a man made commandment?
AGREED... GOD rested on the seventh day from His work.... and thus all were supposed to rest on that day.... And God never told us to celebrate Jesus' Birth' or the shedding of His blood for you and me... or even His resurrection.............. BUT DID GOD EVER SAY IT WAS WRONG?
No He didn't. But He did say that it was wrong to teach others not to keep any one of His commandments. And it is wrong to replace God's Sabbath, with a man made one. Let alone force countless other people to observe it via man made legislation.
Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.Hope the above satisfactorily answers your questions Rella. God bless.
: Rella Sun Apr 09, 2023 - 10:57:34
Happy Easter, Amo... or do you not celebrate or acknowledge that it was on a Sunday that the tomb was found empty?
And I hope you had a very happy Resurrection Day. I know you were asking Amo but there was something that I hope Amo and the others here will not mind me chiming in on.
Now... while I acknowledge that day 7 was the time God stopped working and rested in it.... And while you are honoring this day in the same way... and as the Jewish Sabbath commanded them to do.... can you explain why , when we have a new religion, apart from Judaism,
While that is certainly what happened, there is no indication in scripture or elsewhere that God ever intended to make a separate religion called Christianity. Indeed, all thru Acts the early church was considered a branch of Pharisaic Judaism. It was not until after the Bar Kochba revolt that there became a permanent separation between church and synagogue. Rome enacted some very harsh laws against Judasim, and were even more harsh against Gentiles by birth who practiced anything that looked like Judaism.
So the church stopped meeting on Saturdays, stopped observing the Feasts of the Lord like Passover and Tabernacles, stopped reading the scriptures in Hebrew and instead used the Greek Septuagint; and the list could go on and on.
: DaveW Tue Apr 11, 2023 - 05:13:04
Indeed, all thru Acts the early church was considered a branch of Pharisaic Judaism.
That's not a well-established fact. Actually, that's a minority position. Most scholars find Christianity to have more in common with the Essene community than the Pharisees.
https://www.fulcrum7.com/blog/2023/4/14/supreme-court-showdown-over-sunday-could-change-us-workplaces
Quoted article below from link above.
Supreme Court Showdown over Sunday Could Change US Workplaces
When God said to remember the Sabbath, he was pretty explicit about which day it was. Sundown Friday to sundown Saturday. It is the seventh day of creation week, immortalized in the Ten Commandments, and honored by faith followers of God. But...
Some people are confused and substitute the first day of the week for the seventh, thinking it probably doesn't matter to God. It does, though.
Now we have court case that is about to be heard in the Supreme Court, where the plaintiff is demanding Sundays off from work. And he's calling it the Sabbath. Maybe the court will correct his misuse of the term—but I doubt it.
Former U.S. Postal Service letter carrier Gerald Groff spent every day for seven years delivering the mail in a rural corner of southeast Pennsylvania -- except for Sundays when he would attend worship services and rest.
But in 2019, the former Mennonite missionary and son of a truck driver said his boss forced him to choose between practicing his faith or a paycheck distributing packages, and he resigned.
Next week, Groff will ask the U.S. Supreme Court to require employers to be more accommodating of religiously observant workers, including a right to skip shifts on the Sabbath and still keep their jobs.
The case has the potential to transform workplaces -- and the employer-employee relationship -- across America, experts say.
"I didn't really think I should have to quit. I really expected the post office to find a way to accommodate me and make it work for both them and myself," Groff said.
Federal law requires employers to accommodate the religious beliefs of workers unless it would impose an "undue hardship" on business -- a standard the Supreme Court interpreted 46 years ago to mean anything more than a "de minimis cost."
The USPS says Groff's refusal to work Sundays imposed a significant cost on operations, alleging the absences "created a tense atmosphere" and bred "resentment toward management" and that the need to find substitutes was "time consuming," according to court documents.
Two lower federal courts agreed.
The Postal Service does not deliver mail on Sundays, but beginning in 2015 carriers nationwide were contracted to help deliver packages for the online retail giant Amazon. The USPS says the arrangement has been a major source of revenue in the face of declining traditional mail.
"They began to ask people in my position to deliver on Sundays or holidays, and I told them, 'I'm not going to be able to work on the Lord's day at all,'" Groff said. "The Bible says that we're supposed to keep the Lord's day as unique and holy, a day that's set apart to worship and honor God."
After being repeatedly disciplined for not showing up, Groff resigned in 2019 and sued USPS for religious discrimination.
Groff says the bar for an employer legally refusing to accommodate sincere religious practice needs to be higher. But critics warn that could create a sweeping impact on non-observant Americans.
"This case opens the floodgates to every employee in the workforce being forced to carry the burden of someone else's religious practices," said Rachel Laser, president and CEO of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.
Groff's attorneys insist those concerns are overblown.
"Why in the world do you want to get rid of the guy who's going to deliver on Thanksgiving Day and deliver two shifts on a Saturday and go into the night all the rest of the days [of the] week over a few Sundays that we can always schedule around?" asked Hiram Sasser, executive general counsel for First Liberty Institute.
The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in the case on Tuesday and issue a decision before the end of June.
At a minimum, we hope that Groff will discover the true biblical Sabbath Day, and remember it (Exodus 20:8-11). That would be a real win.
Now we will find out if the seven or eight Catholics out of our nine member Supreme Court, will submit to the teachings of their spiritual leaders. The problem with this man's argument, is of course that the bible does not say anywhere, that any should keep the first day of the week holy. Nor is Sunday the biblical Sabbath at all. So this should not be a part of his argument. Nevertheless, people should have the freedom to choose a day rest according to religious convictions, or not.
CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.
Sunday- fulfillment of the sabbath
2175 Sunday is expressly distinguished from the sabbath which it follows chronologically every week; for Christians its ceremonial observance replaces that of the sabbath. In Christ's Passover, Sunday fulfills the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath and announces man's eternal rest in God. For worship under the Law prepared for the mystery of Christ, and what was done there prefigured some aspects of Christ:[107]
Those who lived according to the old order of things have come to a new hope, no longer keeping the sabbath, but the Lord's Day, in which our life is blessed by him and by his death.[108]
2176 The celebration of Sunday observes the moral commandment inscribed by nature in the human heart to render to God an outward, visible, public, and regular worship "as a sign of his universal beneficence to all."[109] Sunday worship fulfills the moral command of the Old Covenant, taking up its rhythm and spirit in the weekly celebration of the Creator and Redeemer of his people.
A day of grace and rest from work
2184 Just as God "rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done,"[121] human life has a rhythm of work and rest. The institution of the Lord's Day helps everyone enjoy adequate rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives.[122]
2185 On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are to refrain from engaging in work or activities that hinder the worship owed to God, the joy proper to the Lord's Day, the performance of the works of mercy, and the appropriate relaxation of mind and body.[123] Family needs or important social service can legitimately excuse from the obligation of Sunday rest. The faithful should see to it that legitimate excuses do not lead to habits prejudicial to religion, family life, and health.
The charity of truth seeks holy leisure- the necessity of charity accepts just work.[124]
2186 Those Christians who have leisure should be mindful of their brethren who have the same needs and the same rights, yet cannot rest from work because of poverty and misery. Sunday is traditionally consecrated by Christian piety to good works and humble service of the sick, the infirm, and the elderly. Christians will also sanctify Sunday by devoting time and care to their families and relatives, often difficult to do on other days of the week. Sunday is a time for reflection, silence, cultivation of the mind, and meditation which furthers the growth of the Christian interior life.
2187 Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees.
2188 In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."[125]
IN BRIEF
2189 "Observe the sabbath day, to keep it holy" (Deut 5:12). "The seventh day is a sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord" (Ex 31:15).
2190 The sabbath, which represented the completion of the first creation, has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ.
2191 The Church celebrates the day of Christ's Resurrection on the "eighth day," Sunday, which is rightly called the Lord's Day (cf. SC 106).
2192 "Sunday . . . is to be observed as the foremost holy day of obligation in the universal Church" (CIC, can. 1246 # 1). "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass" (CIC, can. 1247).
2193 "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound . . . to abstain from those labors and business concerns which impede the worship to be rendered to God, the joy which is proper to the Lord's Day, or the proper relaxation of mind and body" (CIC, can. 1247).
2194 The institution of Sunday helps all "to be allowed sufficient rest and leisure to cultivate their amilial, cultural, social, and religious lives" (GS 67 # 3).
2195 Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day.
https://europeansundayalliance.eu/2023-european-day-for-a-work-free-sunday-synchronised-quality-resting-time-for-an-improved-mental-health-of-workers/
Quote article below from link above. Emphasis in blue is mine.
2023 European Day for a Work-Free Sunday: Synchronised quality resting time for an improved mental health of workers
On the occasion of the 2023 European Day for a Work-free Sunday on March 3, the European Sunday Alliance recalls the urgent need for synchronised quality and social resting tune for workers, in order to enable them to preserve their mental health.
Every worker has the right to working conditions which respect his or her health, safety and dignity. Every worker has the right to limitation of maximum working hours, to daily and weekly rest periods and to an annual period of paid leave.
Article 31 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU
Weekly rest periods not only encompass the quantity of time, i.e. a work-free day, but also the quality of this rest. A work-free day must allow to combine both personal rest and social bonding. Individuals are indeed social beings, part of a community, and their interpersonal relationships play a key role in their work-life balance, wellbeing, and recovery from work. Where resting tune can be organised as synchronised resting time, this allows individual to spend time with their family members, friends or peers, or collective social communities, which can include volunteering, worship, leisure and sport. A common day of rest during the week is a prerequisite for a healthy work-life balance and a recovery from daily stress.
Furthermore, the phenomenon of loneliness is a growing and unpreceded reality in Europe, impacting negatively the work-life balance and wellbeing of workers. Loneliness and social exclusion have also consequences at the collective level. As a recent science-for-policy report published by the European Commission's Joint Research Center (JRC) on Loneliness in the EU. Insights from surveys and online media data stresses, "research shows that loneliness and social isolation have harmful repercussions on mental and physical health, as well as significant consequences on social cohesion and community trust." Synchronised resting time is an effective tool to counter loneliness.
In 2020.25% of EU citizens felt lonely more than half of the time.[
Loneliness in the EU. Insights from surveys and online media data.
Last September, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced in her speech on the State of the Union an upcoming initiative on mental health in 2023. In the context of this initiative, the European Sunday Alliance invites interested policy makers and stakeholders to also consider the importance of the quality of synchronised resting time for the mental health of workers, not least to further the debate on the establishment of a weekly common day of rest at the EU level for all citizens.
_____________________________________
The European Sunday Alliance is a broad network of more than 100 national Sunday Alliances, trade unions, employers' organisations, civil society organisations, churches and religious communities committed to raise awareness of the unique value of synchronised free time for our European societies.[/size]
https://europeansundayalliance.eu/statement-of-the-european-sunday-alliance-on-the-annual-european-day-for-a-work-free-sunday-on-march-3-2022/
Quoted article below from link above. Emphasis in blue is mine.
Statement of the European Sunday Alliance on the annual European Day for a Work-Free Sunday on March 3 2022
On March 3, the annual European Day for a Work-Free Sunday, the European Sunday Alliance calls on political leaders to put as a priority on the EU social policy agenda the establishment of a European weekly common day of rest.
Work-life balance, as well as healthy, safe and well-adapted work environments, are at the heart of the European Pillar of Social Rights, which all EU institutions and Member States governments have committed to implement.
A weekly day of rest
One of the major impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic has been the rise of telework and the fragmentation of working time, often detrimental to the work-life balance of workers. In order to prevent a work environment that compromises the health and wellbeing of workers, it is crucial to ensure a right to disconnect, during the week but also during the weekend, with a work free day. A full day of rest per week is indispensable to recover and to ensure both a better wellbeing and a better productivity of workers.
A common day of rest
Humans are social beings, and for many of them their health requires more than individual time to spend alone. The challenges of the pandemic have highlighted the issue of loneliness in the EU. A common work-free day enables families to spend time together, children with parents and grandparents, who are the first ones to suffer from loneliness. A work free day makes it also possible to pursue volunteer work, civic engagement, joint social, sports or faith-related activities, and, more generally, to strengthen the social cohesion of our communities.
By tradition and custom, most European countries establish the weekly day of rest on Sunday.
The European Sunday Alliance thus calls on European political leaders to put as a priority the establishment of a European weekly common day of rest for workers, by tradition on Sunday, as enshrined in Art. 2 of the European Social Charter.
Interesting. Were you aware that the European International Standards Organization (ISO) has defined the calendar with Sunday as the 7th day? ISO publication 8601 moved Sunday to the last day of the week and was first adopted in 1988. It not only changed the order of days of the week, but also the length of the year. It does away with months altogether. It works on week number and day of the week number. Not all of the provisions have been adopted in general population usage, like the lack of months and month dates. But putting Sunday as the 7th day has become adopted thru much of Europe.
https://help.tableau.com/current/pro/desktop/en-us/dates_calendar.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_8601
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunday
Wasn't it the Beast who would think to change times and laws? ::pondering::
: Jaime Tue Apr 25, 2023 - 06:29:08
Wasn't it the Beast who would think to change times and laws?
Deserving of more study ( to be done later) I could not hep but think of the players in this direction and I am not... yet... thinking of those on 7 hills rofl (but am certain they are in this mix.)
Too coincidental to be ignored.
1. Michael J. Cohen, in his earlier book on Truman and Israel, states that in 1947 and 1948, "Truman arguably played the decisive diplomatic role in
the birth of the new state of Israel."2. https://www.newyork.org/history/how-and-why-israel-was-founded-in-1947
How And Why Israel Was Founded In 1947
Illuminati, Nazis & The Illegal State of Israel
Baron Edmond de Rothschild built the first oil pipeline from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean to bring BP Iranian oil to Israel. He founded Israeli General Bank and Paz Oil and is considered the father of modern Israel. The Rothschilds are the planet's wealthiest clan, worth an estimated $100 trillion.
3. The ISO story began in 1946 when delegates from 25 countries gathered in London to discuss the future of standardization. A year later, on
23 February 1947, ISO officially came into existence. In this post-war era, the founding members saw International Standards as a key to the world's reconstruction efforts. ( the very ones who Dave W said " Were you aware that the European International Standards Organization (ISO) has defined the calendar with Sunday as the 7th day? )
Jaime asks...Wasn't it the Beast who would think to change times and laws?
Apparently so..... considering he either thinks to change times and law...suggesting the law of God ...or he sets himself in the Temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God. The implication is that he has the authority to do these things ( Daniel 7:25; II Thessalonians 2:4 ).
The puzzle pieces are definitely falling more and more into the completion of that "end times" picture.
What a time to be alive.... ::eek::
Yes, it IS quite a time to be alive! With as fast as things are "progressing" today, it is a blessing my parents generation is quickly passing. Probably part of God's plan to keep each generation from melting down with the speed the world is melting down. My dad went into an immediate depression over the Oklahoma City bombing. He wouldn't have been able to take 911 and the ensuing craziness since.
Yes, very interesting. I've heard of the Sunday seventh day movement or what have you, but never dealt with any actual application, effecting anything I can see or tell.
: Amo Tue Apr 25, 2023 - 08:54:42
Yes, very interesting. I've heard of the Sunday seventh day movement or what have you, but never dealt with any actual application, effecting anything I can see or tell.
Try to buy a standard calendar in many places in Europe, Monday will be shown as the first day. I have even seen that as an option in many computer calendars.
If Son'sDay is the 7th day, then I am keeping the Sabbath. ::clappingoverhead::
That's the beast's plan. Change times and laws.
Kind of blows the whole celebrating the resurrection day theme, doesn't it?
I for one would like to see some discussion on celebrating resurrection day. A reasonable topic.
: Jaime Wed Apr 26, 2023 - 07:28:47
I for one would like to see some discussion on celebrating resurrection day. A reasonable topic.
Sounds like a good topic for a new thread.
: Amo Wed Apr 26, 2023 - 06:59:16
Kind of blows the whole celebrating the resurrection day theme, doesn't it?
Resurrection Day would now be on the Sabbath. We can update where it says first day in the NT to the 7th day.
: Texas Conservative Tue Apr 25, 2023 - 16:21:25
If Son'sDay is the 7th day, then I am keeping the Sabbath. ::clappingoverhead::
I have heard the arguments of whether what we know as Saturday is actually the same 7th day that Moses was instructed to observe, given the various bouts of idolatry and the major dispersions of the Jewish people. I say that we DO know that what we call Saturday was the same Sabbath our Lord Jesus kept 2000 years ago since the calendar has been meticulously kept since then.
And that is good enough for me.
: Texas Conservative Wed Apr 26, 2023 - 08:18:48
Resurrection Day would now be on the Sabbath. We can update where it says first day in the NT to the 7th day.
People may of course choose to update God's word as they please for themselves, because for now, God allows for such. But there will come a day when all such stand before Him to explain why they thought they had the authority to do so. The only acceptable answer will of course be, that they received such authority from Him. As some have claimed and do claim to this day concerning many things in God's word. Not the least of which, is concerning His seventh day Sabbath. I wouldn't want to be one who chose to update God's word without His direct authorization, let alone be one involved in forcing others to accept and observe such updates. I don't think such will end well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymsxnkQXfOE
The importance of Sunday as the common weekly day of rest
: Amo Wed Apr 26, 2023 - 21:43:30
People may of course choose to update God's word as they please for themselves, because for now, God allows for such.
Actually, no HE does not. God says HIS word is unchanging.
Luke 16:17
But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one stroke of a letter of the Law to fail.
Luke 21:33
Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away.
I wrote a song back in 1973. (senior in HS)
You can't get to Chicago on a ticket to LA
You'll never reach the moon by driving down the old freeway.
Even though things are changing all around us here today
You'll never get to Heaven by changing God's written way.
No you can't get to Heaven on a re-written bible,
Satan's blocked the way.
SO the only way to get there is on
Jesus' side to stay Hey hey. While my theology needed a lot of work, and my song writing skills needed to be improved, the idea stands. If we TRY to change the written Word of God, we will pay a very heavy price.
Deut. 4:2
You shall not add to the word which I am commanding you, nor take away from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you.
Prov. 30:6
Do not add to His words
Or He will reprove you, and you will be proved a liar.
Revelation 22:18-19
For I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this book; and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the Book of Life, from the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.
I was just messing with you guys.
The 7th day is always Saturday, and is the Sabbath.
I worship on the 1st day and also the 4th out of tradition. As a Christian, and a gentile, I am also not under the Law of Moses.
i am not under the curse of the Law, which is the penalty of the Law. We have been freed from then PENALTY as Christians.
Not just the penalty.
: Texas Conservative Thu Apr 27, 2023 - 11:42:50
Not just the penalty.
I guess it all depends on what one means by the term under the law. Moses didn't have a law to be under, which didn't come from God. Though God did allow him to write or author as it were, certain laws, told to him by God. The ten commandments though, were uttered, authored, and written by God Himself. They are God's law, not Moses' law. And all of God's own are admonished to keep them right up to the last book and pages of holy scripture.
Rev 12:17 And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.
Rev 14:12 Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.
Rev 22:14 Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.
: DaveW Thu Apr 27, 2023 - 09:01:24
Actually, no HE does not. God says HIS word is unchanging.
Luke 16:17
But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one stroke of a letter of the Law to fail.
Luke 21:33
Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away.
I wrote a song back in 1973. (senior in HS)
You can't get to Chicago on a ticket to LA
You'll never reach the moon by driving down the old freeway.
Even though things are changing all around us here today
You'll never get to Heaven by changing God's written way.
No you can't get to Heaven on a re-written bible,
Satan's blocked the way.
SO the only way to get there is on
Jesus' side to stay Hey hey.
While my theology needed a lot of work, and my song writing skills needed to be improved, the idea stands. If we TRY to change the written Word of God, we will pay a very heavy price.
Deut. 4:2
You shall not add to the word which I am commanding you, nor take away from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you.
Prov. 30:6
Do not add to His words
Or He will reprove you, and you will be proved a liar.
Revelation 22:18-19
For I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this book; and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the Book of Life, from the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.
I agree, but God does allow for dissenting voices now, which He will not allow for after all is settled.
: Amo Thu Apr 27, 2023 - 12:22:31
I guess it all depends on what one means by the term under the law. Moses didn't have a law to be under, which didn't come from God. Though God did allow him to write or author as it were, certain laws, told to him by God. The ten commandments though, were uttered, authored, and written by God Himself. They are God's law, not Moses' law. And all of God's own are admonished to keep them right up to the last book and pages of holy scripture.
Rev 12:17 And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.
Rev 14:12 Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.
Rev 22:14 Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.
Pretty weak. You must have never read Romans or Galatians to have that view.
Our righteousness is not by the law, no one's ever was.
: Texas Conservative Thu Apr 27, 2023 - 12:27:51
Pretty weak. You must have never read Romans or Galatians to have that view.
I don't consider any scriptures to be weak. Certainly not conclusive statements like the ones made in the scriptures I shared with you. Why do you consider them weak, and apparently some other scriptures in Romans or Galatians strong? Do the scriptures teach that some of them are weak and others are strong? To the contrary -
2Ti 3:16 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: 17 That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.
Romans 7:21 - 25
22 For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.
24 O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.
: Amo Thu Apr 27, 2023 - 12:40:32
I don't consider any scriptures to be weak. Certainly not conclusive statements like the ones made in the scriptures I shared with you. Why do you consider them weak, and apparently some other scriptures in Romans or Galatians strong? Do the scriptures teach that some of them are weak and others are strong? To the contrary -
2Ti 3:16 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: 17 That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.
I don't consider the scriptures you gave weak. I consider your argument weak.
: Jaime Thu Apr 27, 2023 - 12:48:37
Romans 7:21 - 25
22 For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.
24 O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.
Start earlier concerning the Law of Moses.
Romans 7
1Or do you not know, brethren (for I am speaking to those who know the law), that the law has jurisdiction over a person as long as he lives? 2 For the married woman is bound by law to her husband while he is living; but if her husband dies, she is released from the law concerning the husband. 3 So then, if while her husband is living she is joined to another man, she shall be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is not an adulteress though she is joined to another man.
4 Therefore, my brethren, you also were made to die to the Law through the body of Christ, so that you might be joined to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God. 5 For while we were in the flesh, the sinful passions, which were aroused by the Law, were at work in the members of our body to bear fruit for death. 6
But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter.
As Nesus properly interpreted the law in the sermon on the mount, he RAISED the bar not remove the bar. The spirit of the law was put back as God intended the law. Don't just not mirder, don't even be angry in hour heart. (Raised bar). Also, don't jist not commit the act of adultery, don't list in your heart for another woman. (Raised bar) jesus tesored the law or filled it back up from what the Pharisees etc had emptied it of - the spirit. Jesus cleansed the Law of the traditions of men added by the Pharisees.
: Jaime Thu Apr 27, 2023 - 14:02:34
As Nesus properly interpreted the law in the sermon on the mount, he RAISED the bar not remove the bar. The spirit of the law was put back as God intended the law. Don't just not mirder, don't even be angry in hour heart. (Raised bar). Also, don't jist not commit the act of adultery, don't list in your heart for another woman. (Raised bar)
We are not under the law of Moses, that is what my comments were directed about.
To comment on your tangent discussion, Jesus didn't properly interpret the law in the Sermon on the Mount. He elevated what He expected for His kingdom. The Jews rejected it.
He elevated it back to what God had originally intended from what the Jews had perverted, with their added on traditions of men. God's Law as originally intended and as Jesus restored it to was not hard. His yoke was light as originally intended.
God's Law was not burdensome as originally given by God according to Deut 30.
11 "For this commandment that I command you today is not too hard for you, neither is it far off. 12 It is not in heaven, that you should say, 'Who will ascend to heaven for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?' 13 Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, 'Who will go over the sea for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?' 14 But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it.
15 "See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil. 16 If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you today, by loving the Lord your God, by walking in his ways, and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his rules,2 then you shall live and multiply, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to take possession of it.
And according to Jeremiah 31:33 under the new covenant, the law will be written on our hearts.
Not back to what God had intended, that line of thinking is entirely false. The Law of Moses with the decalogue and the ceremonial law, was a blessings and curses covenant. It exposed sin. It worked as intended right from the start.
See Galatians 3
I'm very aware of Galatians 3 and yes the law was restored back by Jesus to what God intended. Not a burden to obey and a blessing for one's life.
Galatians 3 indicates the curse or penalty of the law is removed. Paul said the Law is holy and good.
As to the traditions of men:
Mathew 15
1 Then came to Jesus scribes and Pharisees, which were of Jerusalem, saying,
2 Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? for they wash not their hands when they eat bread.
3 But he answered and said unto them, Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition?
4 For God commanded, saying, Honour thy father and mother: and, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death.
5 But ye say, Whosoever shall say to his father or his mother, It is a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me;
6 And honour not his father or his mother, he shall be free. Thus have ye made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition.
7 Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying,
8 This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me.
9 But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.
: Texas Conservative Thu Apr 27, 2023 - 14:06:52
We are not under the law of Moses, that is what my comments were directed about.
To comment on your tangent discussion, Jesus didn't properly interpret the law in the Sermon on the Mount. He elevated what He expected for His kingdom. The Jews rejected it.
First, we are not discussing the law of Moses, we are discussing the law of God. The ten commandments. Second, are you suggesting that Jesus who is God, improperly interpreted the commandments of God while specifically addressing them? While you and others who agree with your views do properly interpret them? Do you also believe that the teachings of other apostles, Paul in particular, contradict our Lord's testimony in Mathew chapter five?
No one here is saying that we are under the law of Moses, or that the saved in Christ are under any law. Though apparently there is a difference of understanding regarding what being under the law actually means. I think we all agree that being under the law includes being under its condemnation, which our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ has freed His own from. The difference I suppose is regarding whether we are subject to the law of God anymore, or not. Do you believe that being under the law, and being subject to the law, are the same thing?
: Amo Fri Apr 28, 2023 - 08:10:23
The difference I suppose is regarding whether we are subject to the law of God anymore, or not. Do you believe that being under the law, and being subject to the law, are the same thing?
Do you? In answering, please give us what you think each of those two things, being under the law and being subject to the law, mean.
: Amo Fri Apr 28, 2023 - 08:10:23
Second, are you suggesting that Jesus who is God, improperly interpreted the commandments of God while specifically addressing them?
You appear to suffer from reading comprehension issues. Nowhere did I suggest Jesus improperly interpreted the commandments of God.
: Texas Conservative Fri Apr 28, 2023 - 09:19:54
You appear to suffer from reading comprehension issues. Nowhere did I suggest Jesus improperly interpreted the commandments of God.
Emphasis in the following quote is mine.
We are not under the law of Moses, that is what my comments were directed about.
To comment on your tangent discussion, Jesus didn't properly interpret the law in the Sermon on the Mount. He elevated what He expected for His kingdom. The Jews rejected it.
Kind of looks like you said "Jesus didn't properly interpret the law in the Sermon on the Mount". Does this mean you consider the law of God and the commandments of God to be completely separate?
: 4WD Fri Apr 28, 2023 - 09:18:11
Do you? In answering, please give us what you think each of those two things, being under the law and being subject to the law, mean.
What difference does it make to you? If all are free to interpret all scripture to say what ever they think? Apart from which, I did not ask you this question. Not to mention, you answered my question with a question. If you would like a response to your question, please answer mine first. After which I will be glad to reciprocate.
: Amo Fri Apr 28, 2023 - 14:29:55
If you would like a response to your question, please answer mine first. After which I will be glad to reciprocate.
Your question:
: Amo Fri Apr 28, 2023 - 08:10:23
Do you believe that being under the law, and being subject to the law, are the same thing?
My answer: No.
: 4WD Sat Apr 29, 2023 - 06:21:46
Your question:My answer: No.
Agreed.
http://adventmessenger.org/a-catholic-bishop-says-that-it-is-absolutely-essential-for-us-to-reclaim-the-temporal-and-eternal-sunday-sabbath-blessings/
Quoted article below from link above.
A Catholic Bishop Says that it is "Absolutely Essential" for us to Reclaim the "Temporal and Eternal" Sunday Sabbath Blessings
The times that we have long awaited are coming. Today, prophecy is being fulfilled so quickly that even those who have clearly understood it stand in awe as we witness a series of events happen one after another. On May 5, 2023, Bishop Robert Reed from the Archdiocese of Boston published an article in The Pilot, a Roman Catholic newspaper, titled "Sabbath: A Blessing We Should Think About Accepting." In this article, the Roman Catholic Bishop stated that Sunday rest has both a temporal and eternal blessing, and we must reclaim the Sunday Sabbath if we are going to live "well-adjusted, purposeful, and sane lives."
Bishop Reed said the following in part:
• "If we must live purposeful lives (and most of us must, to some extent), then it seems absolutely essential for us to reclaim the idea of Sabbath rest if we are to feel peaceful, well-adjusted and — dare I say it — sane." [1]
• "Jesus taught that 'the Sabbath is for man, and not man for the Sabbath' (Mk 2:27), indicating that this one day of the week is meant to be a blessing, rather than a burden, to those who observe it. We know that God rested after seven days of work, and God really did work quite extensively before resting. I mean, when was the last time you created a universe in a week?" [1]
• "I suggest we Christians take a long hard look at the Sabbath, which for us is on Sunday. Whether you're single, or married with a family, young or old, living alone or with a roommate, woman, man, priest, bishop: We all need a day of rest." [1]
• "Imagine Sunday as a day completely different from any other day of the week, a day to give glory to God and to worship him, a day to get to know and care for your family or your spouse or your neighbors or your roommates better, a day to rest and to think of other — otherworldly! — things!" [1]
• "The Sabbath was made for us! It is a gift designed and ordered to our good. Let us find a way to embrace the gift, to take advantage of the temporal and eternal blessings of this weekly day of rest." [1]
First of all, the First Angels' Message (Revelation 14:7) calls us to give glory to God and to worship Him by keeping the Sabbath of creation, which is the seventh day (Genesis 2:1–3). Secondly, God did not rest after seven days of work. God's law says that "in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it (Exodus 20:11). Thirdly, there are no "temporal" or "eternal" blessings that come from keeping Sunday holy. Isaiah 66:22–23 clearly tells us that in God's kingdom made new, those who receive eternal life will be keeping the seventh-day Sabbath, Saturday, throughout all eternity.
What's significant, though, is the part where Bishop Reed talks about the "temporal" blessings that come from keeping Sunday holy. That part is especially important because this is talking about reclaiming Sunday rest so that we can restore our personal well-being and stop all of the human misery and disasters that are happening on the earth. In other words, the spurious Sabbath must be exalted for the sake of "temporal" prosperity. The argument is being made that much of the suffering in the world is due to the fact that Sunday is not being observed as the day of rest. This is exactly what will be said during the final conflict when the mark of the beast is enforced:
"It will be declared that men are offending God by the violation of the Sunday-sabbath, that this sin has brought calamities which will not cease until Sunday observance shall be strictly enforced, and that those who present the claims of the fourth commandment, thus destroying reverence for Sunday, are troublers of the people, preventing their restoration to divine favor and temporal prosperity" (Great Controversy, p. 589, 590).
Inspiration says that the claim will be made that unless the Sunday Sabbath is restored, there can be no temporal prosperity and that distress and tribulations will continue. And on May 5, 2023, Roman Catholic Bishop Robert Reed said that it is "absolutely necessary" to "reclaim" the "temporal" blessings that come from the Sunday Sabbath. Brothers and sisters, we are seeing these words come to pass in part. This is only the beginning.
We know that human suffering and disasters will become more frequent and intense, and together, the calls for Sunday rest for temporal prosperity will also increase. This should arouse God's faithful remnant people and all those who know what these things mean to greater activity in spreading the truths of the Third Angel's Message. What is needed is the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit must descend upon God's people, causing them to be moved to greater faithfulness and zeal in their service.
First of all, the First Angels' Message (Revelation 14:7) calls us to give glory to God and to worship Him by keeping the Sabbath of creation, which is the seventh day (Genesis 2:1–3).
What Revelation 14:7 says:
6 And I saw another angel flying in midheaven, having an eternal gospel to preach to those who live on the earth, and to every nation and tribe and tongue and people; 7 and he said with a loud voice,
"Fear God, and give Him glory, because the hour of His judgment has come; worship Him who made the heaven and the earth and sea and springs of waters."Revelation 14:7 does NOT say anything about the Sabbath.
: Texas Conservative Thu May 11, 2023 - 07:47:58
What Revelation 14:7 says:
6 And I saw another angel flying in midheaven, having an eternal gospel to preach to those who live on the earth, and to every nation and tribe and tongue and people; 7 and he said with a loud voice, "Fear God, and give Him glory, because the hour of His judgment has come; worship Him who made the heaven and the earth and sea and springs of waters."
Revelation 14:7 does NOT say anything about the Sabbath.
Indeed. The word "Sabbath" never appears in Revelation at all.
The closest you can come is the idea of "rest," which does appear twice in Rev 14:
Revelation 14:11
And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever; they have no
rest day and night, those who worship the beast and his image, and whoever receives the mark of his name."
Revelation 14:13
And I heard a voice from heaven, saying, "Write, 'Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on!'" "Yes," says the Spirit, "so that they may
rest from their labors, for their deeds follow with them."
Every other use of "rest" in Revelation means remainder.
Hi Amo,
I am not trying to disparage you and your church's preference of worshipping on a Saturday.
But for once in my life I actually am finding myself in agreement in part with your posted article from the Catholic church.
My agreement is that for a very long time I have felt for what you highlighted in Red in the 4 bullet points...was long needed on this earth.
We all know that God rested on the Seventh Day ... from his creation work.
I am not going to get into if that was a 24 hour period following 144 hours of creation or if it was a longer period based on creation having taken longer.
But read what others... not just myself have commented on this about. ( All bolding or other emphasis in quotes is mine)
https://corechristianity.com/resource-library/articles/faq-why-did-the-sabbath-change-to-sunday/
Why is it that Christians have worshiped on Sunday—on the first day of the week as opposed to the last?
First and foremost, I would point to the resurrection of Jesus. Jesus rose again on the first day of the week—on Sunday, the Lord's day—and as a commemoration of that, Christians have gathered together on that day since the days of the apostles. But why?
Well, when you think about a lot of the types and shadows that you had in the Old Testament, whether it was the temple with its sacrifices, or even this idea of Sabbath, eternal rest, they all pointed to Christ. Christ is the rest in whom we enter. The author of the Hebrews talks about this, but Jesus himself says in Matthew 11:28–30: "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."
Ultimately, Christ is our Sabbath rest. We enter into him by faith. And the earliest believers began gathering together on Sunday because they recognized that they had entered into Christ, the Sabbath rest.
You see this in various places of the Scriptures where it talks about believers gathering together on the first day of the week. For example, in Acts 20 we read that they were gathered together on the first day of the week. Paul talked with them intending to depart on the next day, and he prolonged his speech until midnight. In other words, what you have here is preaching—Paul is giving a sermon (until midnight!)—and also the breaking of bread, probably a reference to the Lord's Supper. You see this earlier in Acts 2:42. You also see gathering on the first day of the week referenced in 1 Corinthians 16.
From the very beginning of the church, we see the apostles of our Lord Jesus himself gathering together on Sunday. Why? Because they've entered by faith in Jesus into that Sabbath rest. And so we gather together on Sunday, worshiping with the people of God like Christians have done for 2000 years, and we, too, rest in Christ.
It certainly seems that there may have been discussions and chastisements in that day for even PAUL commented in in Colossians 2:16 Therefore
no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or
a Sabbath day—
It's important to note that the Sabbath was not simply moved; Christians altered the observance as well as the day. Hallmarks of the early Christian "Lord's day" celebration, according to Justin Martyr (ca. 100-ca. 165), included readings from Scripture (particularly the Gospels), a sermon, communal prayer, and Communion—very different from Jewish Sabbath observance. By Jewish standards, Christians don't keep the Sabbath at all.
Jesus rose again on the first day of the week—on Sunday, the Lord's day—and as a commemoration of that, Christians have gathered together on that day since the days of the apostles.
And not the least of importance of the change can be read here:
https://christianquestions.com/bible-questions/why-was-the-sabbath-changed-to-sunday/
Why was the Sabbath changed to Sunday?
Why was the Sabbath changed from Saturday to Sunday when God specifically told the Jewish nation that He had blessed the seventh day and made it holy (Exodus 20:8- 10Open in Logos Bible Software (if available), Leviticus 23:3Open in Logos Bible Software (if available))?
When God adopted the nation of Israel as his peculiar people, he fixed for them a special day of the week, the seventh, to be their Sabbath, or day of rest. This Law specially was directed to the Jewish nation. However, those of us who are Christian and not under that Law Covenant are not bound by its limitation. Indeed, neither Jesus nor the Apostles ever placed the Gospel Church under the Law Covenant at all. This does not mean liberty or freedom to do wrong. Instead we are free to follow the spirit of the Law rather than its letter.
Following the spirit of the Law is true for the entire Ten Commandments, as well as for the Fourth. Thus to us the Seventh Day represents a Rest of a higher character than that of the Law. It is a rest of faith, instead of a physical rest. "We who believe do enter into his rest" (Hebrews 4:3Open in Logos Bible Software (if available)). This rest of faith is based upon our acceptance of Jesus as our satisfaction before God. Jesus was obligated to keep the letter of the Law in a sense and degree that he has not commanded us, his followers. Our goal is to keep the Law's spirit.
Acting along the lines of this liberty, the early Church began to meet on the First Day of the week, because it was on that day that their Redeemer arose from the dead. On that day Jesus appeared to some in the upper room and to two on the way to Emmaus and to Mary, and subsequently to others of the disciples near the tomb. These four manifestations of the Lord's resurrection marked that day in a special sense as a holy day to the early Church. They waited during an entire week and then again he appeared on the first day of the week.
So far as we may know, all of Jesus' eight appearances to his followers after his resurrection were on the first day of the week. No wonder that the Apostles knew it as the Lord's Day. No wonder that they specially associated that with all the blessings of God and a rest of faith that came to them through the Redeemer.
Therefore, we believe that Sunday, the first day of the week, is a good day for us to rest not only from our temporal work, but also, and, more importantly, "rest" in the Lord through worship, study, and fellowship with family and with those of like precious faith. "Therefore, since the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us be careful that none of us be found to have fallen short of it." (Hebrews 4:1Open in Logos Bible Software (if available))
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: Rella Thu May 11, 2023 - 12:22:16
It's important to note that the Sabbath was not simply moved; Christians altered the observance as well as the day. Hallmarks of the early Christian "Lord's day" celebration, according to Justin Martyr (ca. 100-ca. 165), included readings from Scripture (particularly the Gospels), a sermon, communal prayer, and Communion—very different from Jewish Sabbath observance. By Jewish standards, Christians don't keep the Sabbath at all.
Jesus rose again on the first day of the week—on Sunday, the Lord's day—and as a commemoration of that, Christians have gathered together on that day since the days of the apostles.
From my reading, the early church wasn't trying to
replace Sabbath with Sunday. They simply added a whole different thing, while retaining the Sabbath.
Sunday observance was instituted because they had a problem with meat-that-had-been-sacrificed-to-foreign-gods. In those days the priests
were the butchers. You brought them your cow or pig, they sacrificed it to their deity-of-choice, cut it up, kept part of the meat as payment, and gave you back the rest to eat or sell.
Market Day was every Sunday. On this day, the pagans of the world usually did not labor to grow crops and such, but instead they went to the town square (the Agora) and they sold whatever wares they had produced. This included that meat which had been sacrificed to pagan gods...
As a solution, the Church basically sat up its own observance to
compete against Market Day. Each Sunday they met at the
Pnux, which was located outside of town - as far away from the Agora as they could reasonably get everybody to travel. The observance was not modeled after the Sabbath, which is for rest, but was modeled after the usual functions of the
Pnux and the
Agora. That is to say, food was distributed, news was exchanged, and members of the body could make a case to allocate resources to any cause they thought needed addressing, out of the common fund.
Sunday is not a day of rest. It never was.
Jarrod
In my cofc background Sunday was always a day of rest because most of Protestant Christianity followed the Catholic Church in effect by going along with the Catholics transferring solemnity from the Sabbath to the First Day of the Week.
: Jaime Thu May 11, 2023 - 15:35:38
In my cofc background Sunday was always a day of rest because most of Protestant Christianity followed the Catholic Church in effect by going along with the Catholics transferring solemnity from the Sabbath to the First Day of the Week.
I think such an answer sounds nice. However, there's a bit more to it than that.
The Gentiles and Jews never quite did things the same way. Acts and some of the epistles of Paul lay out a bit of struggle between the early Jewish believers and the Gentile believers in matters of worship, etc.
: Jaime Thu May 11, 2023 - 15:35:38
In my cofc background Sunday was always a day of rest because most of Protestant Christianity followed the Catholic Church in effect by going along with the Catholics transferring solemnity from the Sabbath to the First Day of the Week.
I've been to a few masses, and let me tell you they weren't very restful. Kneel. Now stand. No kneel again. Repeat after me. Oi!
Jarrod
: Texas Conservative Thu May 11, 2023 - 07:47:58
What Revelation 14:7 says:
6 And I saw another angel flying in midheaven, having an eternal gospel to preach to those who live on the earth, and to every nation and tribe and tongue and people; 7 and he said with a loud voice, "Fear God, and give Him glory, because the hour of His judgment has come; worship Him who made the heaven and the earth and sea and springs of waters."
Revelation 14:7 does NOT say anything about the Sabbath.
No, it doesn't specifically address the Sabbath, just alludes to exactly what God's seventh day Sabbath calls for.
Exo 20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: 10 But the seventh day
is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: 11 For in six days
the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day:
wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.Believing God, and acting accordingly is the highest form of worship.
The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord our God. He established it and made it holy, exactly to commemorate His creation of the earth, sea, and all that is in them. No one can change this divinely established fact, but God Himself, and He never has. When He came and dwelt among us, He even conclusively stated that He did not come in order to change the law of God, but rather to fulfill or establish it. No person for any reason, has the authority to change a law written with the finger of God for humanity twice in stone, and spoken audibly by His own mouth to an entire nation. It is God's sabbath, not the Jew's sabbath, or anyone else's. No man or human institution has the authority to change this. Only Antichrist would claim such authority. It was established at creation before there ever was an Israelite, observed by the first Christians, and will be kept in the new heaven and earth.
Today, it is completely ignored by the vast majority of peoples, including bible believing Christians. Many of whom also believe in the theory of evolution which specifically denies the claims of the fourth commandment as well. The world certainly has come up with many reasons not to acknowledge or observe God's Sabbath. This is no way shape or form though, detracts from God's authority concerning it, or peoples responsibility to keep it. Just like the rest of God's commandments. It most certainly is a time to be reminding people of this commandment, and thereby also who created this world, and sustains their very existence. Especially as the day approaches when we will all meet God face to face.
Isa 66:22 For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the LORD, so shall your seed and your name remain. 23 And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another,
and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the LORD.Exod 20:10 But the seventh day is the
sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:
Exod 31:13 Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, Verily
my Sabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations; that ye may know that I am the LORD that doth sanctify you.
Deut 5:14 But the seventh day is the
sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou.
Lev 19:3 Ye shall fear every man his mother, and his father, and
keep my sabbaths: I am the LORD your God.
Lev 19:30 Ye shall keep
my sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary: I am the LORD.
Lev 26:2 Ye shall keep
my sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary: I am the LORD.
Isa 56:4 For thus saith the LORD unto the eunuchs that keep
my sabbaths, and choose the things that please me, and take hold of my covenant; 5 Even unto them will I give in mine house and within my walls a place and a name better than of sons and of daughters: I will give them an everlasting name, that shall not be cut off. 6 Also the sons of the stranger, that join themselves to the LORD, to serve him, and to love the name of the LORD, to be his servants, every one that keepeth the sabbath from polluting it, and taketh hold of my covenant; 7 Even them will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer: their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted upon mine altar; for mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people.
Ezek 20:12 Moreover also I gave them
my sabbaths, to be a sign between me and them, that they might know that I am the LORD that sanctify them. 13 But the house of Israel rebelled against me in the wilderness: they walked not in my statutes, and they despised my judgments, which if a man do, he shall even live in them; and
my Sabbaths they greatly polluted: then I said, I would pour out my fury upon them in the wilderness, to consume them. 14 But I wrought for my name's sake, that it should not be polluted before the heathen, in whose sight I brought them out. 15 Yet also I lifted up my hand unto them in the wilderness, that I would not bring them into the land which I had given them, flowing with milk and honey, which is the glory of all lands; 16 Because they despised my judgments, and walked not in my statutes, but polluted
my sabbaths: for their heart went after their idols. 17 Nevertheless mine eye spared them from destroying them, neither did I make an end of them in the wilderness. 18 But I said unto their children in the wilderness, Walk ye not in the statutes of your fathers, neither observe their judgments, nor defile yourselves with their idols: 19 I am the LORD your God; walk in my statutes, and keep my judgments, and do them; 20 And hallow
my sabbaths; and they shall be a sign between me and you, that ye may know that I am the LORD your God. 21 Notwithstanding the children rebelled against me: they walked not in my statutes, neither kept my judgments to do them, which if a man do, he shall even live in them; they polluted
my sabbaths: then I said, I would pour out my fury upon them, to accomplish my anger against them in the wilderness. 22 Nevertheless I withdrew mine hand, and wrought for my name's sake, that it should not be polluted in the sight of the heathen, in whose sight I brought them forth. 23 I lifted up mine hand unto them also in the wilderness, that I would scatter them among the heathen, and disperse them through the countries; 24 Because they had not executed my judgments, but had despised my statutes, and had polluted
my sabbaths, and their eyes were after their fathers' idols.
Ezek 22: 8 Thou hast despised mine holy things, and hast profaned
my sabbaths.Ezek 22: 26 Her priests have violated my law, and have profaned mine holy things: they have put no difference between the holy and profane, neither have they shewed difference between the unclean and the clean, and have hid their eyes from
my sabbaths, and I am profaned among them.
Ezek 23:38 Moreover this they have done unto me: they have defiled my sanctuary in the same day, and have profaned
my sabbaths.Ezek 44:24 And in controversy they shall stand in judgment; and they shall judge it according to my judgments: and they shall keep my laws and my statutes in all mine assemblies; and they shall hallow
my sabbaths.Neh 9:13-14 13 Thou camest down also upon mount Sinai, and spakest with them from heaven, and gavest them right judgments, and true laws, good statutes and commandments: 14 And madest known unto them
thy holy sabbath, and commandedst them precepts, statutes, and laws, by the hand of Moses thy servant:
Lev 23:3 Six days shall work be done: but the seventh day is the sabbath of rest, an holy convocation; ye shall do no work therein:
it is the sabbath of the LORD in all your dwellings.
Nevertheless, all are free to keep God's Sabbath or not, by faith in His word or not. Though the same cannot be said for the man made traditional sabbath or rest day of Sunday, which has, is now, and is continuing to forced upon humanity through human legislation in more and more places. So be it, as God's prophetic word has declared.
: Rella Thu May 11, 2023 - 12:22:16
Hi Amo,
I am not trying to disparage you and your church's preference of worshipping on a Saturday.
But for once in my life I actually am finding myself in agreement in part with your posted article from the Catholic church.
My agreement is that for a very long time I have felt for what you highlighted in Red in the 4 bullet points...was long needed on this earth.
We all know that God rested on the Seventh Day ... from his creation work.
I am not going to get into if that was a 24 hour period following 144 hours of creation or if it was a longer period based on creation having taken longer.
But read what others... not just myself have commented on this about. ( All bolding or other emphasis in quotes is mine)
https://corechristianity.com/resource-library/articles/faq-why-did-the-sabbath-change-to-sunday/
It certainly seems that there may have been discussions and chastisements in that day for even PAUL commented in in Colossians 2:16 Therefore no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day—
It's important to note that the Sabbath was not simply moved; Christians altered the observance as well as the day. Hallmarks of the early Christian "Lord's day" celebration, according to Justin Martyr (ca. 100-ca. 165), included readings from Scripture (particularly the Gospels), a sermon, communal prayer, and Communion—very different from Jewish Sabbath observance. By Jewish standards, Christians don't keep the Sabbath at all.
Jesus rose again on the first day of the week—on Sunday, the Lord's day—and as a commemoration of that, Christians have gathered together on that day since the days of the apostles.
And not the least of importance of the change can be read here:
https://christianquestions.com/bible-questions/why-was-the-sabbath-changed-to-sunday/
People can of course make up what ever reasons they wish, not to keep God's Sabbath, and to keep an extra biblical day of rest or sabbath. I suppose it is only right also, that they enforce such sabbaths or days of rest by humans legislation and laws, since such is not established by God's law or word anywhere. Which in the end will be exactly the point. Choose you this day whom you will serve. The beast, or God. Humanity, or God. Yourself, or God. Easy peasy. Then the end.
I have written on these boards extensively concerning the establishment of Sunday "sacredness". The information is here and in many places out there. People will simply choose which version and day they prefer. So be it. I have no desire to force the observance of God's sabbath upon anyone, just to warn them of the importance of the choice to be made regarding it. Can the same be said for Sunday keepers who have, do, and obviously intend to keep forcing their observance upon others? Why do you suppose they feel this is necessary? Do you think they believe God wants them to force people to worship Him? As the title of this board asks and or suggests, who are the real legalists in this scenario? Which is in fact being increasingly played out upon an ever growing field, regardless of what one chooses to believe or not.
I don't keep the Sabbath or Sunday. I am not a OT Jew or under the Mosaic law.
Jesus is my sabbath rest (Hebrews 4)
: Amo Thu May 11, 2023 - 18:26:03
People can of course make up what ever reasons they wish, not to keep God's Sabbath, and to keep an extra biblical day of rest or sabbath. I suppose it is only right also, that they enforce such sabbaths or days of rest by humans legislation and laws, since such is not established by God's law or word anywhere. Which in the end will be exactly the point. Choose you this day whom you will serve. The beast, or God. Humanity, or God. Yourself, or God. Easy peasy. Then the end.
I have written on these boards extensively concerning the establishment of Sunday "sacredness". The information is here and in many places out there. People will simply choose which version and day they prefer. So be it. I have no desire to force the observance of God's sabbath upon anyone, just to warn them of the importance of the choice to be made regarding it. Can the same be said for Sunday keepers who have, do, and obviously intend to keep forcing their observance upon others? Why do you suppose they feel this is necessary? Do you think they believe God wants them to force people to worship Him? As the title of this board asks and or suggests, who are the real legalists in this scenario? Which is in fact being increasingly played out upon an ever growing field, regardless of what one chooses to believe or not.
Early Christians... Hallmarks of the early Christian "Lord's day" celebration, according to Justin Martyr (ca. 100-ca. 165), included readings from Scripture (particularly the Gospels), a sermon, communal prayer, and Communion
You see this in various places of the Scriptures where it talks about believers gathering together on the first day of the week. For example, in Acts 20 we read that they were gathered together on the first day of the week. Paul talked with them intending to depart on the next day, and he prolonged his speech until midnight. In other words, what you have here is preaching—Paul is giving a sermon (until midnight!)—and also the breaking of bread, probably a reference to the Lord's Supper. You see this earlier in Acts 2:42.
You also see gathering on the first day of the week referenced in 1 Corinthians 16.From the very beginning of the church, we see the apostles of our Lord Jesus himself gathering together on Sunday. So if the followers of Christ chose first day of the week.... why would they do that?
Did they not spend their time following Jesus to learn of "a new" way? Why would they go back to worshipping on Friday 6PM to Saturday 6PM which primarily was the worship of God the Father... NOT God the Son after what they were taught by the Son to bring people into salvation?
Does Jesus Himself not deserve to be worshipped for what He did for us? Or do we just continue with a day of rest because the Father rested on a certain day?
In Acts 2:46, they were breaking bread and meeting together DAILY. They were eating meals together not having a communion daily. Also the passage in Acts 20 is likely a post Sabbath MEAL after sundown on Saturday or the first day of the week in their reckoning, not necessarily a communion. If it was a communion, it was on our Saturday night, which is fine. Our church had a Saturday night communion once at a special weekend event. We also had a special meal earlier that evening where we gathered together and "broke bread" together as a typical fellowship.
: Texas Conservative Thu May 11, 2023 - 19:18:52
I don't keep the Sabbath or Sunday. I am not a OT Jew or under the Mosaic law.
Jesus is my sabbath rest (Hebrews 4)
Like I said, we all have the right to choose what we believe and why. Scripture plainly states that the Ten Commandments and the seventh day Sabbath, are God's. I choose to believe this. You choose to believe that they are part of Mosaic law. I assume we both believe that neither the first, seventh, or any other day should be forced upon all as a day of rest or worship.
: Rella Thu May 11, 2023 - 20:09:46
Early Christians... Hallmarks of the early Christian "Lord's day" celebration, according to Justin Martyr (ca. 100-ca. 165), included readings from Scripture (particularly the Gospels), a sermon, communal prayer, and Communion
You see this in various places of the Scriptures where it talks about believers gathering together on the first day of the week. For example, in Acts 20 we read that they were gathered together on the first day of the week. Paul talked with them intending to depart on the next day, and he prolonged his speech until midnight. In other words, what you have here is preaching—Paul is giving a sermon (until midnight!)—and also the breaking of bread, probably a reference to the Lord's Supper. You see this earlier in Acts 2:42. You also see gathering on the first day of the week referenced in 1 Corinthians 16.
From the very beginning of the church, we see the apostles of our Lord Jesus himself gathering together on Sunday.
So if the followers of Christ chose first day of the week.... why would they do that?
Did they not spend their time following Jesus to learn of "a new" way? Why would they go back to worshipping on Friday 6PM to Saturday 6PM which primarily was the worship of God the Father... NOT God the Son after what they were taught by the Son to bring people into salvation?
Does Jesus Himself not deserve to be worshipped for what He did for us? Or do we just continue with a day of rest because the Father rested on a certain day?
The Son came to reveal the Father, not Himself, for they are one. The Son also declared that He did not come to change or abolish the law, but rather to expound upon and establish it. Nor is seventh day Sabbath worship of the Father only, it is of the Son as well, as they are one. Even more so in that all things were created for the Son, and by the Son, and through the Son. How say you the seventh day Sabbath commemorating this event is only about the Father. They are one.
Eph 3:9 And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God,
who created all things by Jesus Christ: 10 To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, 11
According to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord:Col 1:15 Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: 16
For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: 17 And he is before all things, and by him all things consist. 18 And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence. 19 For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell;
Joh 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 The same was in the beginning with God. 3
All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. 4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men. 5 And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not. 6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. 7 The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe. 8 He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light. 9 That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. 10 He was in the world,
and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. 11 He came unto his own, and his own received him not. 12 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: 13 Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. 14
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.Again, we may all choose to believe as we wish. Choosing to believe one way or another is one thing, while choosing to ignore scriptural testimony or historical facts regarding what we have chosen to believe, is another thing altogether. Though all have the freedom given to them by God, to do either. Again, the truth about the origins of Sunday sacredness and especially its establishment by human legislation, is not hidden from any who truly seek it. It is extra biblical, and directly tied to pagan influences, to this very day. These facts can be ignored by all who wish to do so, but they cannot be changed, having already been established in the pages of history.
https://archive.org/details/sundayworldsrest00inte/page/n9/mode/2up?ref=ol&view=theater
Interesting, historical, and pertinent book regarding this board. I think the title of the book is appropriate, and pretty much says it all.
The Sabbath was created to be a perpetual state that our 1st Parents and their generations were intended to stay in.
The Jewish holiday Rosh Hashanah recalls that Adam & Eve were created on the 6th day and sinned prior to entering the Sabbath (which is properly understood to be God's rest). The concept that Adam & Eve busted sod and cultivated the soil 6 days a week then ceased every subsequent 7th day is alien to Scripture and Judaism. Its a shibboleth perpetuated by anti-Trinitarians.
https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/rosh-hashanah-theology-and-themes/
It's true that in the New Testament we see references to the Apostles participating in Judaism (such as going to the Temple, visiting the Synagogue, etc.) but this is to be expected. the early Church had ZERO PROBLEMS with Jew's continuing to participate in and with the Jewish community they came out of, HOWEVER, this WASN'T Christian assembly.
Paul was explicit in Hebrews 10 that Christians were to "ASSEMBLE THEMSELVES TOGETHER" and that the failure to do so constituted sin. The Day Christians assembled themselves together on was the 1st day of the week. Its quite simple - ask a Seventh-day Adventist if at Church they pass the collection plate - they will of course say YES. Next ask them on what day the collection plate is passed and they will tell you that its on the same day they go to Church on, which is Saturday.
Scripture is explicit that the day the collection plate was passed in the early Church was the 1st day of the week, the day Christians "assembled themselves" (note: "themselves"), SUNDAY! There is no amount of mental gymnastics that will dispute this fact and that, combined with both secular Roman history as well as Jewish history and the history of the early Church should leave zero doubt in the mind that the 1st day of the week was the day the early Church assembled as a Christian community.
Yet, many of the anti-Trinitarian groups who trace their origins back to the failed Millerite movement insist that Adam and Eve worshipped on the Sabbath, and that the Apostles didn't hold Christian assembly after Jesus' Resurrection on Sunday. The whole Sabbath conspiracy is akin to those Bigfoot programs one sees on t.v.
: Cathlodox Sat May 13, 2023 - 20:06:11
The Sabbath was created to be a perpetual state that our 1st Parents and their generations were intended to stay in.
The Jewish holiday Rosh Hashanah recalls that Adam & Eve were created on the 6th day and sinned prior to entering the Sabbath (which is properly understood to be God's rest). The concept that Adam & Eve busted sod and cultivated the soil 6 days a week then ceased every subsequent 7th day is alien to Scripture and Judaism. Its a shibboleth perpetuated by anti-Trinitarians.
https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/rosh-hashanah-theology-and-themes/
It's true that in the New Testament we see references to the Apostles participating in Judaism (such as going to the Temple, visiting the Synagogue, etc.) but this is to be expected. the early Church had ZERO PROBLEMS with Jew's continuing to participate in and with the Jewish community they came out of, HOWEVER, this WASN'T Christian assembly.
Paul was explicit in Hebrews 10 that Christians were to "ASSEMBLE THEMSELVES TOGETHER" and that the failure to do so constituted sin. The Day Christians assembled themselves together on was the 1st day of the week. Its quite simple - ask a Seventh-day Adventist if at Church they pass the collection plate - they will of course say YES. Next ask them on what day the collection plate is passed and they will tell you that its on the same day they go to Church on, which is Saturday.
Scripture is explicit that the day the collection plate was passed in the early Church was the 1st day of the week, the day Christians "assembled themselves" (note: "themselves"), SUNDAY! There is no amount of mental gymnastics that will dispute this fact and that, combined with both secular Roman history as well as Jewish history and the history of the early Church should leave zero doubt in the mind that the 1st day of the week was the day the early Church assembled as a Christian community.
Yet, many of the anti-Trinitarian groups who trace their origins back to the failed Millerite movement insist that Adam and Eve worshipped on the Sabbath, and that the Apostles didn't hold Christian assembly after Jesus' Resurrection on Sunday. The whole Sabbath conspiracy is akin to those Bigfoot programs one sees on t.v.
A lot of fairy tale wishful thinking stated as fact in the above. All of which has been refuted and proved wrong many times over on these boards. Nevertheless, as time permits, I will address each issue and point out the misinformation yet again. We'll begin with the first piece of mis-information.
The Sabbath was created to be a perpetual state that our 1st Parents and their generations were intended to stay in.
Gen 2:1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. 2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. 3
And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
Your opening statement is of course extra biblical. Nothing concerning it in the creation account before or after the specific seventh day was blessed and sanctified by God. Which in fact is the basis for the seven day weekly cycle established and maintained throughout scripture and most of the known world throughout history. While the seventh day Sabbath most certainly is a sign of perpetually entering into God's rest, this sign is to be observed in a special way on the seventh day, as separated from the other days of the week. As established and commanded by God many times over in scripture. God continually addressed the observance of His Sabbath day by His people throughout scripture. During the Old Covenant He addressed the fact that they continually ignored
His seventh day Sabbath, and even punished them for doing so. During the New Covenant our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ often addressed proper seventh day Sabbath observance, as the Jews of that day had made the sabbath a burden rather than a blessing. All these instructions were concerning the observance of the seventh day exactly, not the perpetual rest it does also represent. It is God's commanded weekly memorial of His creation and the perpetual rest it represents. Who are you or your institution to declare this obligation no longer exists among God's people, and then teach and preach that your chosen day should be forced upon all through human legislation and laws. As you have done all throughout history as well. Have you not set yourself up in the temple (church) of Christ, as though you yourselves are God? Removing one of His commands, which even our Lord Jesus Christ said He did not come to change, and replacing it with one of your own. Our Lord said His law would not change before heaven and earth pass, which they have not. Do you say otherwise?
Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.Your Sunday is a sign also is it not? A sign of the new creation in Christ Jesus. That being the case, shouldn't we say as some do, that this experience is meant to be perpetual? Of course it is, and therefore Sunday observance is moot, because it is supposed to represent a perpetual condition. Not just a day. So who are you, to say it is different for the day you have chosen, but not for the day God has chosen. No one should actually keep Sundays sacred, that would be legalism, right? The day is a sign, it is not to be observed literally, right?
: Amo Fri May 12, 2023 - 09:09:43
Scripture plainly states that the Ten Commandments and the seventh day Sabbath, are God's. I choose to believe this.
Scripture plainly states that the seventh day Sabbath, are God's.
Very true. NO ONE ever says they are not.
"I assume we both believe that neither the first, seventh, or any other day should be forced upon all as a day of rest or worship."
Again very true. But our reasonings for this differ... a lot. Mine is routed in Paul.... The last paragraph of this.
We are told in Exodus 20 about the Sabbath..... to remember to keep it holy.
We are told in Deuteronomy 5 about the Sabbath ... to keep it holy and no work.
With the comment vs 15 Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the Lord your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.
Th question is... so was this day for all or those to whom it was given????
Toward the end of this is an article about the 10 commandments in the New Testament
But I have to wonder what Ellen White said about the Shmita. I have looked and looked and assume it was not of any importance to her as I find no writings of hers.
This was also a command from God and is first mentioned in Exodus. Exodus 23: 10-11. A 7 year Sabbath that was also God's.
More specific.... from Jimmy's book...
10 And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof:
11 But the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still; that the poor of thy people may eat: and what they leave the beasts of the field shall eat. In like manner thou shalt deal with thy vineyard, and with thy oliveyard.
If she ( and you feel) that the observance of the 4th commandment that God gave to Moses to carry to the people.... is still of importanct and meant for everyone today... then 3 chapters later... after the giving of the 10 to Moses... God also commanded
This Sabbath 7th year rest for the land. (More specific you can look it up), do you feel and more importantly did she feel this should also be observed?
I have tried to find what Ellen White said about this but have not, so can only conclude she felt it not important?
Perhaps Mrs White felt that because the laws were interpreted to pertain exclusively to the Land of Israel, amd they were not a major Jewish focus for the almost 2,000 years in which few Jews lived in Israel. Perhaps as the Jews did not begin returning to Israel in large numbers, until the late 19th and early 20th century, Shmita created some significant hurdles and questions for those early communities in Israel, trying on the one hand, to keep true to the ancient law of the land, and, on the other hand, to meet the conditions necessary for comforts they had grown accustomed to in modern European agricultural and economic systems
Got questions describes things as
But the Law also spoke of a sabbatical year. Leviticus 25:1–7 provides instructions for the sabbatical year to be observed after the Israelites moved into the Promised Land. (my note: the later years of the Jews return was not operational in Lev 25: 1-7)
Leviticus 25:3–5 explains what to do—or, rather, what not to do—on the sabbatical year: "For six years sow your fields, and for six years prune your vineyards and gather their crops. But in the seventh year the land is to have a year of sabbath rest, a sabbath to the Lord. Do not sow your fields or prune your vineyards. Do not reap what grows of itself or harvest the grapes of your untended vines. The land is to have a year of rest." Every seventh year, then, was to be a time of no planting or pruning of crops. The Sabbath day was a rest every week, and this rest was applied to farmland once every seven years (the sabbatical year is also mentioned in Exodus 23:10–11).
So I wonder based on the relationship of commands by God to Israel, inclusive of the 10 commandments where does the Shmita fall into things? As it is also pertaining to rest of us?
Last... lets look at the 10 commandments in the New Testament, and see what Jesus told us.
https://godwords.org/the-10-commandments-in-the-new-testament/[/size]
The 10 Commandments in the New Testament
Christianity and the Bible
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The 10 Commandments in the New Testament
A lot of people, including many Christians, are confused about whether Christians should live by the 10 Commandments. There should be no confusion.
When God made a covenant with Israel in Exodus 20, the only people involved were Israelites and those who chose to live with them. This covenant, including the 10 Commandments, never applied to anyone else... ever. Christians were never under the Law.
When I explain this, I get complaints from people who don't know what the Bible says about the Law. If we're not under the Law, they ask, are we then free to steal and kill and worship other gods? They're not asking it seriously, as if they're wondering about the answer. They're complaining that by pointing out that Christians are not under the Law, I'm telling people that God doesn't care about their behavior.
Christians aren't under the Mosaic Law, but that doesn't mean we have no law at all. Jesus said, "If you love me, keep my commands." Just before going to Heaven, Jesus said to make disciples, and to "teach them to obey everything I have commanded you." That seems pretty clear. We have commandments, but they come from Jesus, and not from the Law.
Nine of the 10 Commandments are repeated in the New Testament. That means that Christians are not supposed to steal, kill, or worship other gods. It seems silly to have to say it, but people are confused... so it needs to be said. Below are a few of the many places where the 10 Commandments are repeated in the New Testament. We'll address the missing commandment at the end of this article.
1 You shall have no other gods before me. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your
soul and with all your mind.
Matthew 22:37
2 Do not make for yourselves objects of worship. Dear children, keep yourself from idols.
1 John 5:21
3 You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God. Do not swear – not by heaven or by earth or by anything
else.
James 5:12
4 Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Not Commanded
5 Honor your father and your mother. Honor your father and mother.
Matthew 19:16-21
6 You shall not murder. You shall not murder.
Matthew 19:16-21
7 You shall not commit adultery. You shall not commit adultery.
Matthew 19:16-21
8 You shall not steal. You shall not steal.
Matthew 19:16-21
9 You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor. You shall not give false testimony
Matthew 19:16-21
10 You shall not covet anything that belongs to your neighbor. Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly
nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and
greed, which is idolatry.
Colossians 3:5
Because these commands are in the New Testament, it's clear that Christians are to obey them... not because they're part of the old covenant that God made with Moses, but because they're part of the new covenant that Jesus made with the whole world.
The Missing Commandment
There is no command in the New Testament to observe any sabbath days. All of the other commandments are repeated, but not that one. Why? Because, unlike the others, there is no longer any need for a sabbath. The sabbath was instituted as a remembrance of God's work in Genesis, and pointed to God's work of dying on the cross for the sins of the world. The sabbath was a shadow of a coming reality, and that reality has come. Here's how the apostle Paul explained it:
Before the coming of this faith, we were held in custody under the law, locked up until the faith that was to come would be revealed. So the law was our guardian until Christ came that we might be justified by faith. Now that this faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian. Galatians 3:23-25
Read more about why Christians don't observe the original sabbath.
Amo, God sanctified the 7th day because there was nothing left to do - it was perfect.
Read Genesis 3, 17-19 again and take note of what it says...
...Next NOTE the Hebrew word ʿiṣṣāḇôn.
...& realize the meaning is PAIN, LABOR, HARDSHIP....
The ground outside the garden of Eden would sprout up weeds, things wouldn't be easy, Adam would be in toil ALL THE DAYS he was alive.
So you see, the Jews got that one right - as - did the Apostolic Church.
: Rella Sun May 14, 2023 - 09:44:27
Scripture plainly states that the seventh day Sabbath, are God's.
Very true. NO ONE ever says they are not.
"I assume we both believe that neither the first, seventh, or any other day should be forced upon all as a day of rest or worship."
Again very true. But our reasonings for this differ... a lot. Mine is routed in Paul.... The last paragraph of this.
We are told in Exodus 20 about the Sabbath..... to remember to keep it holy.
We are told in Deuteronomy 5 about the Sabbath ... to keep it holy and no work.
With the comment vs 15 Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the Lord your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.
Th question is... so was this day for all or those to whom it was given????
Toward the end of this is an article about the 10 commandments in the New Testament
But I have to wonder what Ellen White said about the Shmita. I have looked and looked and assume it was not of any importance to her as I find no writings of hers.
This was also a command from God and is first mentioned in Exodus. Exodus 23: 10-11. A 7 year Sabbath that was also God's.
More specific.... from Jimmy's book...
10 And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof:
11 But the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still; that the poor of thy people may eat: and what they leave the beasts of the field shall eat. In like manner thou shalt deal with thy vineyard, and with thy oliveyard.
If she ( and you feel) that the observance of the 4th commandment that God gave to Moses to carry to the people.... is still of importanct and meant for everyone today... then 3 chapters later... after the giving of the 10 to Moses... God also commanded
This Sabbath 7th year rest for the land. (More specific you can look it up), do you feel and more importantly did she feel this should also be observed?
I have tried to find what Ellen White said about this but have not, so can only conclude she felt it not important?
Perhaps Mrs White felt that because the laws were interpreted to pertain exclusively to the Land of Israel, amd they were not a major Jewish focus for the almost 2,000 years in which few Jews lived in Israel. Perhaps as the Jews did not begin returning to Israel in large numbers, until the late 19th and early 20th century, Shmita created some significant hurdles and questions for those early communities in Israel, trying on the one hand, to keep true to the ancient law of the land, and, on the other hand, to meet the conditions necessary for comforts they had grown accustomed to in modern European agricultural and economic systems
Got questions describes things as
So I wonder based on the relationship of commands by God to Israel, inclusive of the 10 commandments where does the Shmita fall into things? As it is also pertaining to rest of us?
Last... lets look at the 10 commandments in the New Testament, and see what Jesus told us.
https://godwords.org/the-10-commandments-in-the-new-testament/
Taking a quick look, I would say your problems are concerning extra biblical surmising. You say- "Th question is... so was this day for all or those to whom it was given?". The question from who, or where, certainly not scripture. Scripture neither asks or addresses this question at all. It is extra biblical. God's seventh day sabbath was of course given to His people. One statement about the sabbath in one place, does not negate what is said in another. What Moses said in recounting the sabbath command and giving expounded reasoning for its observance, does not and cannot negate what God audibly spoke to the entire nation of Israel, and wrote in tables of stone for them twice. Within the fourth commandment itself, we see that it was instituted at creation for God's people, who at the time was and would have been apart from the fall, everyone.
Then you extra biblically bring up Ellen White, as though I or any believing the fourth commandment is still to be observed, are dependent upon her. Did she create the sabbath? Did the Jews or Christians which kept the sabbath before her do so because of her? Do you think all who keep God's sabbath today, do so because of her?
Next you present the argument that any commandments not addressed in the New Testament, are no longer applicable to Christians. Who created this mindset or question? Does the bible or our Lord and Savior, say any such thing? No, and to the contrary our Lord and Savior conclusively stated the exact opposite of what this argument states, which it of course ignores. As you apparently do as well, in bringing forth this argument.
Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18
For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.
I have quoted this very so many times over on these boards, and continually have to, because it is continually ignored by those who teach that the fourth commandment is not longer. Even the extra biblical idea and argument you presented itself quotes the following words of Jesus,
"teach them to obey everything I have commanded you.", while completely ignoring what our Lord Jesus conclusively states in the above scriptures I quoted.
Nor is the entire argument truthful at all. God's sabbath is addressed many times over in the new Testament. The argument presents no direct quotes from the first four of the Ten Commandments at all, but only references to the same principles contained within them, then denies the same criteria for the fourth commandment, which is addressed many times over in the New Testament. The entire argument is extra biblical, and proved to be bogus by its own standard.
Nevertheless I say again Rella, you can of course believe whatever you wish for whatever reasons you choose. As a bible believing seventh day sabbath keeper, I have no desire to force you to see things as I do, or make you observe God's sabbath by way of civil mandates and or legislation. My experience is in and by faith in the word of God, which neither needs or asks for man made approval or laws to sustain it. It concerns things which are not of the kingdoms of this world, and therefore neither seeks such support.
Joh 18:36 Jesus answered,
My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence. 37 Pilate therefore said unto him, Art thou a king then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice.
Also, the Ten Commandments are Christ's commandments. He is the one who called Moses to bring Israel out of Egypt, and lead Israel through the wilderness to the promised land.
Joh 8:57 Then said the Jews unto him, Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham? 58 Jesus said unto them,
Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am. 59 Then took they up stones to cast at him: but Jesus hid himself, and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by.
Exo 3:13 And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, What is his name? what shall I say unto them? 14 And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel,
I AM hath sent me unto you.1Co 10:1 Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; 2 And were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea;
3 And did all eat the same spiritual meat; 4 And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ.
: Amo Mon May 15, 2023 - 10:07:58
Next you present the argument that any commandments not addressed in the New Testament, are no longer applicable to Christians. Who created this mindset or question? Does the bible or our Lord and Savior, say any such thing? No, and to the contrary our Lord and Savior conclusively stated the exact opposite of what this argument states, which it of course ignores. As you apparently do as well, in bringing forth this argument.
I had written an extremely long reply to this yesterday, inbetween the 2 times that GC was down for me. So, it disappeared before I could post it.
It is inconsequestial.
I had commented that the more I read of Mrs White the more I respect her.... and I do find it odd that so many have "re-interpreted" her writings IF they seemingly do not agree with them.
So yes, since she is your prophet it is appropriate for me to look and see what she says and if what she says agrees with the way you present things in you debates!
However: You say "Next you present the argument that any commandments not addressed in the New Testament, are no longer applicable to Christians."
That is the way I see things.
Commandments that were under the law ARE NO longer applicable since Christ came, and doubly so since His Resurrection.
He said he did not come to replace the law but to fulfill it. To me that says 'the end"
Only those, from centuries before, that came out of His mouth and were repeated in the NT by various scribes are those that will be forever. He, nor did anyone else in the New Testament name the 4th.
But people in the New Testament did meet and worship on the first day.
You dont want to you dont have to... but if it was good enough for Paul it is good enough for me.
Paul stayed in Troas for seven days (Acts 20 : 6-7) and the church met on the first day of the week. Note also in the 1 Cor. 16:1 f passage that, though Paul is dealing with giving, there is no mention of tithing just as there is no call to assemble on the Sabbath (Saturday) as in the Old Testament.
Finally.... You say, as you suggested similarly to 3R in a post response... "Taking a quick look, I would say your problems are concerning extra biblical surmising."
Amo... good grief. You know as well as I do that if one does not reach beyond personal interpretation for wisdom and understanding then it becomes a freeforall he said, she said..... because people do not agree because people have been taught from their birth practically of "the way it is".... in "Our church" And no one can change another's mindset ... not even with outside comments.... BUT it is one way to express how others feel.
You know that from all the debates under quasi subjects of YE vs OE vs evolution vs giants.
We have posted many links on the giant ends of things..... all have fallen on deaf ears, and they also are blinded to what scripture says.
You need to go outside of the four corners of the Holy Book Just so long as the outside source does not change or add to it.
OKAY.... I am done..... ( Just one more thing. You find it offensive that I bring Ellen Whites writings up a lot? Have you never used any of her writings for your support? Your referencing or using such are outside also. Just sayin)
Have a good and blessed day
So yes, since she is your prophet it is appropriate for me to look and see what she says and if what she says agrees with the way you present things in you debates!
If she is not God's prophet, she is no prophet at all. Though I have quoted her on rare occasions more to exhibit her accuracy concerning this or that prophetic fulfillment, I do not use her writing to back up my beliefs, knowing that none here believe she had the gift of prophecy. The vast majority of my quotes from her writings, are only to point out the misuse and or twisted lies which many make of her writings. By either misquoting, quoting only snippets which can be twisted to say that which was never intended, or quotes which are misapplied or completely out of context concerning what she believe and or clearly wrote elsewhere.
However: You say "Next you present the argument that any commandments not addressed in the New Testament, are no longer applicable to Christians."
That is the way I see things.
I understand that is the way you see it. I just don't understand why, or by what authority, since the concept is extra biblical. Who do you actually claim as the authority on this matter?
Only those, from centuries before, that came out of His mouth and were repeated in the NT by various scribes are those that will be forever. He, nor did anyone else in the New Testament name the 4th.
Again, where is this rule in scripture? By what authority do you acknowledge such as truth, while scripture makes no such distinction? But rather admonishes all to keep God's commandments right up to the last chapter and book of the bible. Even identifying the saints as those who keep the commandments of God and have the faith or testimony of Jesus Christ.
What do you mean by naming a commandment? I'm pretty sure that none of the fist four commandments were repeated verbatim in the New testament. Is this what you mean by naming, repeating basically verbatim? If so, are none of the first four commandments now applicable to Christians? All the first four commandments including the fourth are certainly addressed in the New testament though. Regarding their principles and proper observance. So what exactly is the difference you are indicating by saying some are not named? This is not to mention, that their would be no need to stress of emphasize the fourth commandment itself, to a people already overly hung up and zealous for its observance, as the Jews were in Jesus' day. To the contrary, its true and correct observance would have to be addressed and taught, as our Lord and Savior did so several times in the New Testament. Why waste such time on commandment you are just about to do away with?
Commandments that were under the law ARE NO longer applicable since Christ came, and doubly so since His Resurrection.
No commandment of God has or ever can be under the law, they are the law. Laws are the standards, they can't be under themselves. People are under them, or not. They are under the condemnation of them, when they brake them. This is what God's people in Christ Jesus our Lord are delivered from, not the authority of God's law, which cannot be changed by any but God Himself. People may choose to be under the authority of God's law, without condemnation of course. Just like any other law, when you obey it you are not under its condemnation, when you break it you are. The gospel is not just about forgiveness and or justification, it is also about becoming new creatures in Christ Jesus or sanctification. Fulfilling the law does not end the law or its authority, it only ends the condemnation of breaking the law. Paul clearly teaches that such establishes the law, not does away with it. He also teaches that Jesus came so that the law might be fulfilled within us as well, not ended in us.
Rom 8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law could not do,
in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin,
condemned sin in the flesh: 4 That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 5 For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. 6 For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7
Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. 9 But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. 10 And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 11 But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.
How can the law be fulfilled in us, if we disobey and or no longer even acknowledge the authority of it? If fulfill means end, then the law is no more, and the saved most certainly should no keep any of it. Everyone should in fact do exactly as they feel and wish at all times, for there is no law and or condemnation to concern one's self with. This though, is not at all what scripture teaches.
But people in the New Testament did meet and worship on the first day.
You dont want to you dont have to... but if it was good enough for Paul it is good enough for me.
They met and worshiped on every day, which did not make every day a commanded day of rest. Nor does scripture say anywhere that Christians met on Sundays specifically to worship. Nor were collections taken up on Sundays, but Paul simply told individuals to lay aside monies individually for the work on that day to be collected later.
1Co 16:1 Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I have given order to the churches of Galatia, even so do ye. 2 Upon the first day of the week
let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him,
that there be no gatherings when I come. 3
And when I come, whomsoever ye shall approve by your letters, them will I send to bring your liberality unto Jerusalem.The above is most obviously not about a church gathering where collections should be taken up.
Paul stayed in Troas for seven days (Acts 20 : 6-7) and the church met on the first day of the week. Note also in the 1 Cor. 16:1 f passage that, though Paul is dealing with giving, there is no mention of tithing just as there is no call to assemble on the Sabbath (Saturday) as in the Old Testament.
Act 20:7 And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and continued his speech until midnight.
Again, Jesus and the Apostles broke bread and preached every day of the week. To do away with and or change a commandment of God because they happened to do so on a Sunday as well, makes no sense. Especially when there is no indication anywhere in scripture that such a transition from one day to another had been taught or observed. This is not to mention, that the above events likely took place on what we view as Saturday night, as days were reckoned from evening to evening by the Jews. Nevertheless, one does not do away with a commandment of God, concerning such flimsy suggested evidence that such a thing took place. Though all are free to do such, without establishment of the authority of scripture.
Note also in the 1 Cor. 16:1 f passage that, though Paul is dealing with giving, there is no mention of tithing just as there is no call to assemble on the Sabbath (Saturday) as in the Old Testament.
Exactly! Because no gathering on the Sabbath, or Sunday(Lord's day as some would say), as a day of rest, is the or at issue in the quoted verse. No reference to any such thing, because no such thing was going on or being suggested. It is only wishfully presumed to be such, by those who already choose to believe in Sunday sacredness. Without this prerequisite, there would be no reason to consider such, as such.
Finally.... You say, as you suggested similarly to 3R in a post response... "Taking a quick look, I would say your problems are concerning extra biblical surmising."
Amo... good grief. You know as well as I do that if one does not reach beyond personal interpretation for wisdom and understanding then it becomes a freeforall he said, she said..... because people do not agree because people have been taught from their birth practically of "the way it is".... in "Our church" And no one can change another's mindset ... not even with outside comments.... BUT it is one way to express how others feel.
You know that from all the debates under quasi subjects of YE vs OE vs evolution vs giants.
We have posted many links on the giant ends of things..... all have fallen on deaf ears, and they also are blinded to what scripture says.
You need to go outside of the four corners of the Holy Book Just so long as the outside source does not change or add to it.
I emphasized the truth you stated above. Since that is pretty much what we are debating. Whether Sunday sacredness is extra biblical, that is added to the bible, or not.
One final question. When you say Christians began Sunday sacredness immediately after the resurrection, do you consider the great many professors of Christianity who kept the seventh day sabbath for hundreds of years after Christ's resurrection and all throughout history to this present day, Christians? If so, shouldn't you make or acknowledge this distinction when addressing this subject. If not, why not?
Have a good and blessed day
You to Rella.
: TN.Frank Wed Oct 31, 2012 - 10:24:23
Many keep missing the point that the Sabbath was brought into being before there were any Jews. The Sabbath was also brought into being BEFORE any Sin had entered into the World. The Saturday Sabbath is a Celebration of God and His Creation.
Ill be brief... for the moment.
The first mention of the Sabbath can be found in Exodus 16, right after Israel was delivered from Egypt. Please notice how the concept of Sabbath seems so new to the Israelites. God had to carefully explain that concept like a teacher carefully explaining the concept of addition to a young child. Could it be that this really was a new concept to them? Could it be that no one in their day kept the Sabbath day of rest? Why is the Bible so silent about this?
Let's look at Ex 16:23-30: "This is what the LORD commanded: 'Tomorrow is to be a day of rest, a holy Sabbath to the LORD. So bake what you want to bake and boil what you want to boil. Save whatever is left and keep it until morning.'" So they saved it until morning, as Moses commanded, and it did not stink or get maggots in it. "Eat it today," Moses said, "because today is a Sabbath to the LORD. You will not find any of it on the ground today. Six days you are to gather it, but on the seventh day, the Sabbath, there will not be any." Nevertheless, some of the people went out on the seventh day to gather it, but they found none. Then the LORD said to Moses, "How long will you refuse to keep my commands and my instructions? Bear in mind that the LORD has given you the Sabbath; that is why on the sixth day he gives you bread for two days. Everyone is to stay where he is on the seventh day; no one is to go out." So the people rested on the seventh day." NIV
The first instruction about keeping the Sabbath day rest was concerning food. Don't collect food on the seventh day. God will provide a double portion on the sixth day. None will be sent down on the Sabbath day. On any other day, if an Israelite kept some manna until the next day, the food would rot. But not on the Sabbath day! From this, the Israelites learned that God is a provider. In other words, you can really trust in God. Your can really depend on Him and rest in Him. In other words God wanted a relationship with His people, a relationship based on trust!
Let this sink in until later.
: Rella Wed May 17, 2023 - 11:08:52
Ill be brief... for the moment.
The first mention of the Sabbath can be found in Exodus 16, right after Israel was delivered from Egypt. Please notice how the concept of Sabbath seems so new to the Israelites. God had to carefully explain that concept like a teacher carefully explaining the concept of addition to a young child. Could it be that this really was a new concept to them? Could it be that no one in their day kept the Sabbath day of rest? Why is the Bible so silent about this?
Let's look at Ex 16:23-30: "This is what the LORD commanded: 'Tomorrow is to be a day of rest, a holy Sabbath to the LORD. So bake what you want to bake and boil what you want to boil. Save whatever is left and keep it until morning.'" So they saved it until morning, as Moses commanded, and it did not stink or get maggots in it. "Eat it today," Moses said, "because today is a Sabbath to the LORD. You will not find any of it on the ground today. Six days you are to gather it, but on the seventh day, the Sabbath, there will not be any." Nevertheless, some of the people went out on the seventh day to gather it, but they found none. Then the LORD said to Moses, "How long will you refuse to keep my commands and my instructions? Bear in mind that the LORD has given you the Sabbath; that is why on the sixth day he gives you bread for two days. Everyone is to stay where he is on the seventh day; no one is to go out." So the people rested on the seventh day." NIV
The first instruction about keeping the Sabbath day rest was concerning food. Don't collect food on the seventh day. God will provide a double portion on the sixth day. None will be sent down on the Sabbath day. On any other day, if an Israelite kept some manna until the next day, the food would rot. But not on the Sabbath day! From this, the Israelites learned that God is a provider. In other words, you can really trust in God. Your can really depend on Him and rest in Him. In other words God wanted a relationship with His people, a relationship based on trust!
Let this sink in until later.
Got to get busy now. Look at this in more depth later. Just a quick comment regarding the faulty premise from the get go of the above post.
Gen 2:1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. 2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. 3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
The above is the first mention of God's Sabbath in scripture, not the verse you quoted. This is what the Israelites were to remember. God's seventh day Sabbath was established 2000 years before the Jewish nation. Long before there ever was an Israelite.
: Amo Wed May 17, 2023 - 11:31:43
Got to get busy now. Look at this in more depth later. Just a quick comment regarding the faulty premise from the get go of the above post.
Gen 2:1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. 2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. 3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
The above is the first mention of God's Sabbath in scripture, not the verse you quoted. This is what the Israelites were to remember. God's seventh day Sabbath was established 2000 years before the Jewish nation. Long before there ever was an Israelite.
Matter of interpreted semantics.
There was no specific command at this point . Yes, God set it aside but obviously was ignored to the point of needing to be made into a commandment. A command to certain people.
Your entire paragraph "The above is the first mention of God's Sabbath in scripture, not the verse you quoted. This is what the Israelites were to remember. God's seventh day Sabbath was established 2000 years before the Jewish nation. Long before there ever was an Israelite." seems odd to me.
The first mention of God's Sabbath is what the Israelites were to remember!!!! But was established 2000 years before the Jewish Nation or even an Israelite????? ::shrug::
That is why there had to be a command.
And it was NOT called a Sabbath then....
https://www.biblegateway.com/resources/encyclopedia-of-the-bible/Sabbath
Sec B 1.
The first two chs. describe God's creative activity during six days and His sanctification of the seventh day by His cessation from His creative work ( Gen 1:1-2:3 ). The word "sabbath" is not employed, but it is certain that the author meant to assert that God blessed and hallowed the seventh day as the sabbath.
https://www.biblestudytools.com/dictionary/sabbath/
Bible Study Tools
First, Exodus 20:8-11 makes a clear connection between the Sabbath day and the seventh day on which God the Creator rested. Sabbath observance therefore involves the affirmation that God is Creator and Sustainer of the world. To "remember the Sabbath" meant that the Jew identified the seven-day-a-week rhythm of life as belonging to the Creator.
https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/shabbat-in-the-bible/
My Jewish Learning:
The concept of the Sabbath as a memorial of God's resting from the work of creation is expressed in Genesis 2:1-3 and repeated in Exodus 20:11 and 31:17. The latter passage broadens the concept in defining the Sabbath as "a sign forever between me and the people of Israel."
And a little more to think on... especially the final paragraph.
From http://www.sabbaths.org/commandments.html
The Sabbath commandment was given by God, along with the other 9 commandments, to the Israelites at Sinai: Ex 20:8-11 "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates. For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy."
The Exodus account of the commandments refers to the creation and the fact that God rested on the seventh day as the reason for the Sabbath day. Interestingly, this was the way the Israelites needed to learn to rest in the Lord. Please note that the commandments forbade the Israelites from doing "any work" on that holy day.
A notion that this was a creation ordinance is quite possible. The text definitely allows for this explanation. It also allows for the idea that since God is the Creator, we are to worship Him as such.
The 10 commandments are again recorded in the book of Deuteronomy. Here Moses is giving his last speech to the Israelites. Again, the Sabbath is mentioned as the 4th commandment. But there is a different reason given for keeping the Sabbath this time. Deut 5:12-15 "Observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy, as the LORD your God has commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your ox, your donkey or any of your animals, nor the alien within your gates, so that your manservant and maidservant may rest, as you do. Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the LORD your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the LORD your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day." NIV
Interestingly, the reason given in this rendition of the commandments is not creation, but the Israelites' deliverance from Egypt! It is also interesting to note that throughout the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, God is clearly addressing the Israelites when He commands them to observe His Sabbaths. Ex 31:12-32: "Then the LORD said to Moses, "Say to the Israelites, 'You must observe my Sabbaths. This will be a sign between me and you for the generations to come, so you may know that I am the LORD, who makes you holy. "'Observe the Sabbath, because it is holy to you. Anyone who desecrates it must be put to death; whoever does any work on that day must be cut off from his people. For six days, work is to be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of rest, holy to the LORD. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day must be put to death. The Israelites are to observe the Sabbath, celebrating it for the generations to come as a lasting covenant. It will be a sign between me and the Israelites forever, for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day he abstained from work and rested.'" When the LORD finished speaking to Moses on Mount Sinai, he gave him the two tablets of the Testimony, the tablets of stone inscribed by the finger of God."
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: Rella Wed May 17, 2023 - 14:05:17
Matter of interpreted semantics.
There was no specific command at this point . Yes, God set it aside but obviously was ignored to the point of needing to be made into a commandment. A command to certain people.
Your entire paragraph "The above is the first mention of God's Sabbath in scripture, not the verse you quoted. This is what the Israelites were to remember. God's seventh day Sabbath was established 2000 years before the Jewish nation. Long before there ever was an Israelite." seems odd to me.
The first mention of God's Sabbath is what the Israelites were to remember!!!! But was established 2000 years before the Jewish Nation or even an Israelite????? ::shrug::
That is why there had to be a command.
And it was NOT called a Sabbath then....
https://www.biblegateway.com/resources/encyclopedia-of-the-bible/Sabbath
https://www.biblestudytools.com/dictionary/sabbath/
https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/shabbat-in-the-bible/
And a little more to think on... especially the final paragraph.
From http://www.sabbaths.org/commandments.html
Yes, the different reason is an additional reason, not a contradicting reason. The Sabbath is a sign that God is Creator, Deliverer, Redeemer, and Savior of His people. As God delivered Israel from Egyptian slavery, he also delivers all of humanity who put their trust in Him, from the slavery and condemnation of sin.
I suppose the perspective issues we have regarding the sabbath, and when it was commanded, is connected to our differing views regarding Creation itself. If creation was not in six literal days as scripture simple states, then the whole idea doesn't really make much sense. Since right from the get go, it has to be symbolic rather than a literal command, as it would be concerning a literal six day creation. If as scripture simply states in the creation account and elsewhere, it took place in six literal days, then the sabbath declaration was as much of a command as the rest of the proclamations declared by God at creation. A command which immediately began to establish that which was commanded, being completed and established the day it was commanded. Which could not be changed or done away with by any but God himself. On the other hand, if the whole thing is symbolic or metaphorical, then just about any speculations are game. No big deal in changing or surmising things contrary to what was only a metaphor to begin with. We do see things very differently I suppose, right from the get go. No surprise then, that the deeper we look at the subject, the greater becomes our divide regarding details and understanding. I will share my views in following statement, and then get back to the topic at hand, regarding which chosen sabbath day is really legalistic or not.
8-The Sabbath, a sign
Exodus 31 12And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 13Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, Verily my sabbaths ye shall keep:
for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations; that ye may know that I am the LORD that doth sanctify you. 14Ye shall keep the sabbath therefore;
for it is holy unto you: every one that defileth it shall surely be put to death: for whosoever doeth any work therein, that soul shall be cut off from among his people. 15Six days may work be done; but in the seventh is the sabbath of rest, holy to the LORD: whosoever doeth any work in the sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death. 16Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the sabbath, to observe the sabbath throughout their generations,
for a perpetual covenant. 17It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for ever: for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed. 18And he gave unto Moses, when he had made an end of communing with him upon mount Sinai, two tables of testimony, tables of stone,
written with the finger of God.The above scriptures have a vitally important introduction. Verse twelve says that the words following were spoken directly by God himself, to Moses. What we are reading in verses thirteen through seventeen are not the words of a man inspired by God, but words spoken by God himself. The Ten Commandments which were given to Moses by God, were written with God's own finger. The fourth commandment being a vital part of the ten. It points out who God is, and why He has authority to give these commands. Twice, God said to Moses, that those who would not observe the day, should be put to death. This is how important the keeping of this commandment was to God. It was, and it is vital to humanity, that they be reminded at least once a week, who God is, and who they are in relation to Him. To forget this means certain death, for there is nothing apart from God. Those who choose to be apart from God, are choosing nonexistence. In our fallen nature especially, we need this constant reminder.
God said that the seventh day Sabbath is a sign that He is the one who sanctifies the sinner. The seventh day is a holy day to all those who would be sanctified by God. It is a perpetual covenant between God and the people which He sanctifies, that is makes holy. The day is holy, and those who observe it by faith in the word of God signify that they wish also to be made holy. This is accomplished through faith alone, in the word of God. If we wish to be like God, we must believe that He is, who He is. He is the creator and sustainer of all life. The observance of the seventh day Sabbath is a proclamation of the same. Faith in God must embrace, and begin with this most basic fact.
Hebrews 11 1Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. 2For by it the elders obtained a good report. 3Through
faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear........................................
6But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.It is impossible to please God without faith. Our faith begins with the "understanding that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear." Chapter eleven of Hebrews goes on to testify of the accomplishments of those who had faith in God. All of these great men and women of faith believed that God was the creator and sustainer of all life. A faith which is promulgated, and perpetuated by the observance of the seventh day Sabbath. When we demonstrate our faith by observing the fourth commandment, we express our faith in Christ, for He is the creator.
Ephesians 3 9And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ: 10To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God,
11According to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord: 12In whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him. 13Wherefore I desire that ye faint not at my tribulations for you, which is your glory. 14For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, 15Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, 16That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man;
17That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, 18May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height;
19And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God. 20Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, 21Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.
God created all things by Jesus Christ. He did so with a purpose of making known the manifold wisdom of God. This was, and is, "according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord." Part of this purpose was that Christ might dwell in our hearts by faith, and that we might come to understand, and know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge. The ultimate goal being, that we might be filled with the fullness of God.
Christ created the world (John 1: 1-3&14). He sustains the world (Col. 1: 16&17). He became one of us, to redeem the world after the fall (Heb. 2: 14-18). He succeeded in redeeming the world (Col. 1:14). He now ever lives to intercede for those who have chosen to be His (Heb. 7:22-28). He will come again and receive His own (John 14:1-3). Christ is all in all. When He has finished His work, He will subject Himself to the Father, that God may be all in all. This is the eternal purpose in Christ Jesus. That is, to bring all creation back into harmony and willing submission to God. This He accomplished by revealing the true character and love of God (John 14: 9&10), which had been maligned by the accusations of Satan and his angels, and supported by fallen humanity.
1 Corinthians 15 20But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept. 21For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. 22For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. 23But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming. 24Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. 25For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. 26The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. 27For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith all things are put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted, which did put all things under him.
28And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.Man rebelled against God, resulting in death. Christ became a man, and lived a life of perfect obedience to God. He then died the death that we deserve, and was raised from the dead as the first fruits of all those who believe in Him. Condemnation and death came to all of us through Adam, though we had nothing to do with his actions. So also, life and justification have come to all through the Lord Jesus Christ, though we had nothing to do with His actions. Now the choice is ours. Do we choose life through Christ unto righteousness, or do we choose death through Adam unto rebellion. It is all about authority. Who is in authority? Who can be trusted with authority? God, through His Son Jesus Christ, is both in authority, and has proved that He can be trusted with authority.
The issue remains only within us then. Will we submit to the trustworthy authority of God, or will we continue in rebellion and the exaltation of self? Christ is the for-runner, He has shown us the way. Will we follow Him? How many have heard the question, what would Christ do. There are bumper stickers, and hats, and shirts with that question on them. I ask you concerning the observance of the seventh day Sabbath, what would Christ do? There is only one answer to this question, for He did it. He faithfully observed all of the commandments of God when here on earth as one of us, including the fourth commandment. Again, it is simply a question of authority. Whose authority do you claim to obey? Whose authority do you really obey?
John 8 27They understood not that he spake to them of the Father. 28Then said Jesus unto them, When ye have lifted up the Son of man, then shall ye know that I am he,
and that I do nothing of myself; but as my Father hath taught me, I speak these things. 29And he that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him. 30As he spake these words, many believed on him.
John 5 19Then answered Jesus and said unto them,
Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise. 20For the Father loveth the Son, and showeth him all things that himself doeth: and he will show him greater works than these, that ye may marvel. 21For as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them; even so the Son quickeneth whom he will. 22
For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son: 23That all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which hath sent him. 24Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life. 25Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live. 26For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself; 27And hath given him authority to execute judgment also, because he is the Son of man. 28Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, 29And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation. 30
I can of mine own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me.Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6). No man can come to the Father but by him. It is through the Son, that we are to approach the Father. If we wish to be the sons and daughters of God, then we must follow the example of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ. Christ did not seek the accomplishment of His own will, but rather the accomplishment of the will of His Father. How about you? Do you seek to accomplish your own will, or do you seek to accomplish the will of your Father in heaven? Those who seek to do the will of their Father in heaven, will be called forth from the grave by the Son, to live forever with God in heaven. Or do you not understand that you have been made the literal sons and daughters of God by the sacrifice of His Son Jesus Christ? If only you will accept this gift, and act accordingly. That is to say, as if you really believe that you are the sons and daughters of God. Our minds are not even capable of comprehending the depth of what has been done for us. To be made the literal flesh and blood sons and daughters of the living God.
Philippians 2 1If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels and mercies, 2Fulfil ye my joy, that ye be likeminded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. 3Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves. 4Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others.
5Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: 6Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: 7But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: 8And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. 9Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: 10That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; 11And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.Let this mind be in you, that is the mind of Christ, not the mind of Satan. Christ did not strive to be equal with God though He was God. He humbled himself, and became obedient to God the Father, even to the point of death. Christ exalted the Father by submitting to His authority in all things. Satan on the other hand, chose to follow his own leading, even to the point of murdering the Son of God. This is where all self-exaltation leads. God alone is worthy of our praise and worship. Anyone who desires to have that which belongs only to God, wishes to be in God's place. This of course is impossible, for the created being cannot take the place of the creator. For the creator is also the sustainer, which thing the created being is not capable of.
Ironically enough, this is exactly what God allowed in the crucifixion of His Son the Lord Jesus Christ. He allowed created beings in rebellion against Him, to kill Him, in and through His Son Jesus Christ. This He did that all creation might understand where all sin really leads. It is a question of authority. What is sin, but the breaking of the commandments of God? Whose commands will you follow? The Ten Commandments came directly from the mouth of God, and were written directly by the finger of God. Will you acknowledge His authority or not? This is the question that will divide this world in two.
The fourth commandment is ignored by the vast majority of professed Christians. They will not submit to the authority of God concerning this vital part of the Ten Commandments. They forsake the commandment of God, in favor of upholding the traditions of man. They believe that because they profess the name of Jesus, they do not have to obey God. They do not understand that professing the name of Jesus means submitting to the authority of God the Father in all things. They do not understand that workers of iniquity will not be in heaven, even if they claimed to profess the name of Jesus Christ.
Matthew 7 21Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. 22Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? 23And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.
What is a worker of iniquity? Have we not all sinned, and fallen short of the glory of God? Is it only those who have become totally perfected in Christ that will be saved? If we sin, we have an advocate with the Father (1 John 2:1). If we confess our sins, He is faithful, and just to forgive us of our sins (1 John 1:9). We have all sinned, and are all sinners. We can all however be forgiven of our sins, and herein lies the problem. To be forgiven of sin, one must confess their sins. The one who will not acknowledge sin as sin, will not confess it as such, and cannot be forgiven. Observe the following.
1 John 1 8If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
10If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us. All those who have truly accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Savior, have confessed that they have sinned. This is why we accept Him, to be forgiven for our sins, and saved from their consequences. It is clear from the scriptures however, that many will make this general acknowledgement, while rejecting the truth regarding certain particulars of sin. To reject the truth, is sin. It leaves the one who does so, without hope of forgiveness or victory over deception and its result, which is sin. Let's take a look at what the scriptures say regarding this matter.
2 Thessalonians 2 3Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; 4Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God. 5Remember ye not, that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things? 6And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time. 7For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. 8And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: 9Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders,
10And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: 12That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.Those who perish will do so because they " received not the love of the truth". They choose to believe a lie. Therefore they cannot be forgiven, since they will never confess that sin, which they will not acknowledge as sin. Nor can they even begin recovery, since they will not admit their true condition. A drunk cannot recover from being a drunk until he or she admits that they are a drunk. Likewise with the thief, murderer, adulterer, and so on, and so on. So also, the one who will never acknowledge the validity of the fourth commandment, will never change their course of action in regards to it. Nor will they seek forgiveness for that which they do not believe to be sin. Thus, by choosing to believe a lie, they have cut themselves off from the saving arm of their God. Lest we forget, Jesus Christ is the Word of God, and the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Rejecting the truth of God's word, is verily rejecting the Lord Jesus Christ.
The above scriptures are not only referring to a condition, but also a time. It is in the last days that strong delusion will be sent upon the world, because it has already chosen to believe a lie. This is exactly what we are addressing in this book. The last message for this world, in its last days. Quite fittingly, it is the man of sin who opposes and exalts himself above God, that brings about this deception with all the lying wonders of Satan himself. This is the man who will establish sin in this world through deception. This man is also spoken of in the book of Daniel.
Daniel 7 23Thus he said, The fourth beast shall be the fourth kingdom upon earth, which shall be diverse from all kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, and shall tread it down, and break it in pieces. 24And the ten horns out of this kingdom are ten kings that shall arise: and another shall rise after them; and he shall be diverse from the first, and he shall subdue three kings.
25And he shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time. 26But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end. 27And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him. 28Hitherto is the end of the matter.
This beast speaks great words against the most high, it wears out the saints of the most high, and it thinks to change times, and laws. These things we know to be fulfilled by the Church of Rome, as we have already established. The changing of times and laws is exactly what we are discussing. The fourth commandment, is the only commandment dealing specifically with time. The Church of Rome has claimed authority to change the time of the Sabbath of the fourth commandment. This is a lie. Those who accept this lie as the truth, have chosen to believe a lie. If they will not admit their true condition, they cannot be saved. These things transpire immediately before the Lord returns. This we will discuss in more detail, in following chapters.
As previously mentioned, it is a message from God that will divide the world in two before he returns. It is not the Devil's deceptions that will bring about the end, but rather, a message from God regarding the truths of His word. These things will all take place because God's word has said it will be so, not because Satan has power to make anything happen of his own accord. The Devil does not want this world to come to the point of decision, for he knows that when it does, it is the end for him. This is why the responsibility for giving this message to the world, so that Christ may return, lies squarely upon those who claim Christ as their Lord.
The observance of the seventh day Sabbath is therefore a sign in these last days especially, that one is a true worshiper of the true God. It is a sign that those who observe it believe that God is the creator of this world in and through his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ (Exo. 20:8-11, & John 1:1-3 & 14). That He sustains this world and all life in it, in and through His Son the Lord Jesus Christ (Col. 1: 16&17). That He has saved this world in rebellion in and through His Son the Lord Jesus Christ, and there is salvation in no other (John 3:16, & Acts 4:12). That salvation comes to the believer by entering into God's rest in and through His Son the Lord Jesus Christ. Which very thing the Sabbath itself is a sign of (Matt. 11:28&29, & Heb. 4). That He has provided continual intercession for all of humanity in and through His Son the Lord Jesus Christ (Heb. 4:14-16, & Heb. 7:22-28). That He will sanctify, yes make holy, those who have faith in Him in and through His Son the Lord Jesus Christ. Which thing also the Sabbath is a sign of (Exo. 31:12-18, John 17:17-19, Acts 26:15-18, 1 Cor. 6:9-11, Heb. 10:7-17). That all of the above was and is according to the eternal purpose of God in and through His Son Jesus Christ. That is in the creation, preservation, and redemption of this world (Eph. 3:9-12).
The Sabbath is a sign that those who observe it believe that Jesus Christ is all in all. That He created the world. He sustains the world. He has redeemed the world. He ever liveth to make intercession for the world. He sanctifies His own in the world through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, whom he sends (John 14:26, 15:26&27). He came to this world as one of us, and is our example for living. He is the living word of God. As he himself has said "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." (Matt. 4:4).
Those who observe the seventh day Sabbath, do so strictly by faith in the word of God. There is nothing about the seventh day that separates it from any of the rest, save the word of God pertaining to it. Nothing out of the ordinary happens on this day to anyone accept the believer. The believer accepts by faith, that the day is blessed and holy, and therefore acts accordingly. The result is first the exaltation of God, by the obedience of those who submit to His rightful and trustworthy authority. The second, is the establishment of that authority in the life of the believer, and the essential reminder to the believer of their proper place in relation to our infinite God. Thus the day is a reminder that God is all in all to those whom He has created. A day to set aside all else, and rest in the word of our creator, sustainer, and redeemer. The observance of the seventh day Sabbath is a perfect example of faith in God's word, in action. We will close this chapter with the message of the first angel.
Revelation 14 6And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, 7Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come:
and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.
Amo:
Thank you for your detailed explanation, of which I did not copy here... ( for length).... reply #707
It might surprise you to hear I am not totally in disagreement with all you say, though I will do a slower re-read incase I missed something. rofl
But here is a major disagreement I have.
8-The Sabbath, a sign
Exodus 31 12And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
13Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, Verily my sabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations; that ye may know that I am the LORD that doth sanctify you.
unto the children of Israel..... Verily my sabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your
generations A sign between me and you the children of Israel.
14Ye shall keep the sabbath therefore; for it is holy unto you: every one that defileth it shall surely be put to death: for whosoever doeth any work therein, that soul shall be cut off from among his people.
15Six days may work be done; but in the seventh is the sabbath of rest, holy to the LORD: whosoever doeth any work in the sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death.
16Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the sabbath, to observe the sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant.
the children of Israel shall keep the sabbath, to observe the sabbath throughout their generations
17It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for ever: for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.
It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for ever
18And he gave unto Moses, when he had made an end of communing with him upon mount Sinai, two tables of testimony, tables of stone, written with the finger of God.
written with the finger of God.
So, your first example is what God intended for Israel. NO ONE ELSE.
The fact that we have been grafted in does not change the fact that originally God had specifics for Israel.
There were things they were commanded that we were never under.
All the other sabbath celebrations, for one.
We were never told to kill a lamb as the Israelites were commanded to slaughter the Passover and daub its blood on the two sides and top of the doorway of their houses ( Exod. 12:7 ).
We were never told of the Shmita of the land .
And other things that were specifically between God and his chosen.
We were grafted in, so we are told, but not until Jesus came in person. And even at that Jesus first said in Matthew
"But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel."
He wanted to claw back those who wandered or strayed away.... of the Jews.
So once we were grafted in and he was asked about things like the 10 commandments... He , as recorded by the various NT books named 1,2,3,5,6,7,8,9,10 for all to keep....
But #4 about the Sabbath was not named, as the Jews would automatically honor the Sabbath by God's command, but we were not in that mix.... because that was between God and them.
Now... I shall go and re-read you and if I have other to add I shall ::tippinghat::[/size]
: Rella Thu May 18, 2023 - 11:20:26
Amo:
Thank you for your detailed explanation, of which I did not copy here... ( for length).... reply #707
It might surprise you to hear I am not totally in disagreement with all you say, though I will do a slower re-read incase I missed something. rofl
But here is a major disagreement I have.
So, your first example is what God intended for Israel. NO ONE ELSE.
The fact that we have been grafted in does not change the fact that originally God had specifics for Israel.
There were things they were commanded that we were never under.
All the other sabbath celebrations, for one.
We were never told to kill a lamb as the Israelites were commanded to slaughter the Passover and daub its blood on the two sides and top of the doorway of their houses ( Exod. 12:7 ).
We were never told of the Shmita of the land .
And other things that were specifically between God and his chosen.
We were grafted in, so we are told, but not until Jesus came in person. And even at that Jesus first said in Matthew
"But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel."
He wanted to claw back those who wandered or strayed away.... of the Jews.
So once we were grafted in and he was asked about things like the 10 commandments... He , as recorded by the various NT books named 1,2,3,5,6,7,8,9,10 for all to keep....
But #4 about the Sabbath was not named, as the Jews would automatically honor the Sabbath by God's command, but we were not in that mix.... because that was between God and them.
Now... I shall go and re-read you and if I have other to add I shall ::tippinghat::
As a creationist who believes in the literal six day creation, as explained before the quoted chapter I shared, I believe the establishment of God's seventh day sabbath at creation was a command. Just as all the other commands of creation before it. God spoke and the thing was done. Which none but God can ever change. God blessed and sanctified the seventh day, and it was so, and has been ever since. Nor did those He created it for ignore that command or establishment, as so many presume today.
Psa 33:4 For the word of the LORD is right; and all his works are done in truth. 5 He loveth righteousness and judgment: the earth is full of the goodness of the LORD. 6 By the word of the LORD were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth. 7 He gathereth the waters of the sea together as an heap: he layeth up the depth in storehouses. 8 Let all the earth fear the LORD: let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him. 9 For he spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast.
Mar 2:27 And he said unto them,
The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath: 28 Therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath.The Sabbath was made for man by our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, who is Lord of the sabbath. Man did not ignore this command and establishment given by God, no doubt while they were in His very presence.
: Amo Thu May 18, 2023 - 23:02:36
As a creationist who believes in the literal six day creation, as explained before the quoted chapter I shared, I believe the establishment of God's seventh day sabbath at creation was a command. Just as all the other commands of creation before it. God spoke and the thing was done. Which none but God can ever change. God blessed and sanctified the seventh day, and it was so, and has been ever since. Nor did those He created it for ignore that command or establishment, as so many presume today.
Psa 33:4 For the word of the LORD is right; and all his works are done in truth. 5 He loveth righteousness and judgment: the earth is full of the goodness of the LORD. 6 By the word of the LORD were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth. 7 He gathereth the waters of the sea together as an heap: he layeth up the depth in storehouses. 8 Let all the earth fear the LORD: let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him. 9 For he spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast.
Mar 2:27 And he said unto them, The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath: 28 Therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath.
The Sabbath was made for man by our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, who is Lord of the sabbath. Man did not ignore this command and establishment given by God, no doubt while they were in His very presence.
Good morning Amo,
Have a wonderful sabbath rest and when you feel to read this, please do so. I may not even get it completed today as I still have that nasty eye infection that has blossomed into the biggest stye , in the middle of the infection, that is painful and itchy at the same time... but I digress.
I have no disagreement with what you say..." The Sabbath was made for man by our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, who is Lord of the sabbath. Man did not ignore this command and establishment given by God, no doubt while they were in His very presence."
And I actually have no disagreement that creation was completed in 6 .... what I prefer to call creation periods.
And I have no disagreement that the Sabbath observance was commanded by God ... but only for His people. The original "Chosen"
But I do have the problem of the length of time it took to get to the Sabbath day that was commanded for the "Chosen"
Do you ever wonder what , during creation, at the very beginning, there was evening, and there was morning.... and no mention of afternoon?
Do you not think that when the original accounting of Genesis wa written that the author(s) use the term day whatever because they had not a way to express things differently?
I have read many accounts of Genesis 1 and 2 over the years with a multitude of translated ideas that boiled down somewhere between the following
examples: day 1, 1 day,
a first day, but for it to be an absolute continuous 6- 24 hour periods does NOT sit well
with me.
The Septuagint translates Gen 1:31 as the sixth day.
The Hebrew interlinear ~ the sixth day morning and there was evening and there was
more easily read as and there was evening and there was morning the sixth day.
Jimmy's translation ~ And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.
The latest LSV ~ and there is an evening, and there is a morning—the sixth day.
But first of all we are not even told these 6 creation periods of 6 evenings and 6 mornings how long they are? WHATEVER HAPPENED TO AFTERNOONS??????
Perhaps they were siesta times ::tippinghat::
An evening and a morning do not a 24 hour day make.....
I read... the same as you that God told us that He Created the earth in six Days. On Mount Sinai, God clearly told Moses, "For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them" (Exodus 20:11).
It was amidst fire and smoke that Yahweh, God of Israel, revealed himself to his people. He told them: over six days you shall labour and do your work, but on the seventh you shall not labour, for in six days Yahweh made heaven and earth, the sea and everything in them, and rested the seventh day.
Yahweh, God of Israel, revealed himself
to his people.While I am in full agreement that God rested on the seventh.... and commanded
His people to do likewise, I do not agree, first of all, that this 7th "day" is a literal 24 hour day... and even if it is that it necessarily at the end of 144 hours... WHEN you cannot get 144 hours from an evening and a morning.
Also... Is it not odd that the 7th is not mentioned until Gen 2. Gen 1 ends with the 6th. What would we think if chapter 2 never was written or if it was lost. Do we even know if it was written by the same person because 2 seems to be a recap of 1 except
the writing styles are different....
Now... without getting into the YE v. OE debate again...for neither of us will change on that score please consider this.
Some very well known men of the faith had this to say about a literal 24 hour period that we call day.
Augustine, writing in the early fifth century, noted, "What kind of days these were it is extremely difficult, or perhaps impossible, to determine" (City of God 11.7).
J. Gresham Machen (1881-1937), author of the 20th century's best critique of theological liberalism, wrote, "It is certainly not necessary to think that the six days spoken of in that first chapter of the Bible are intended to be six days of twenty four hours each."
Old Testament scholar
Edward J. Young (1907-1968), an eloquent defender of inerrancy, said that regarding the length of the creation days, "That is a question which is difficult to answer.
Indications are not lacking that they may have been longer than the days we now know, but the Scripture itself does not speak as clearly as one might like."
Theologian
Carl F. H. Henry (1913-2003), one of the most important theologians in the second half of the twentieth century and a defender of Scriptural clarity and authority, argued that "Faith in an inerrant Bible does not rest on the recency or antiquity of the earth. . . .
The Bible does not require belief in six literal 24-hour creation days on the basis of Genesis 1-2. . . . it is gratuitous to insist that twenty-four hour days are involved or intended."Old Testament scholar and Hebrew linguist
Gleason Archer (1916-2004), a strong advocate for inerrancy, wrote "On the basis of internal evidence,
it is this writer's conviction that yôm in Genesis could not have been intended by the Hebrew author to mean a literal twenty-four hour day."Now... I have some links I would like to copy for ease of reading about the subject of th length of day and as this is likely to get very long and OT for this forum I shall post a second thread for them.
Title ~Yom in Sabbath, Sunday, and Legalism So we know they are related.
In case that does not make it these are the links you can read there.
1. https://www.gci.org/articles/genesis-1-are-the-six-days-of-creation-literal-or-figurative/
2. https://reasons.org/explore/publications/articles/how-long-was-creation-day-six
It's kinda confusing for us westerners because our morning is comprised of everything from midnight to noon (both dark morning and light morning) and our evening is comprised of the time from noon to midnight. Afternoon is a subset of evening in my West Texas vernacular. Of course, to me in my farm background, we called the noon meal dinner and the evening meal supper.
In my view, God's people or the olive tree is comprised of Jews and Gentiles and is referred to as Israel, both natural branches and wild branches. God's people back in those days was Israelites and thise strangers who sojourned
WITH them.
http://adventmessenger.org/sunday-rest-has-become-the-convergence-point-for-lgbt-inclusion-labor-unions-earth-day-celebrations-and-other-religious-and-secular-ideologies/
Quoted article below from link above.
Sunday Rest has become the Convergence Point for LGBT+ Inclusion, Labor Unions, Earth Day Celebrations and other Religious and Secular Ideologies
Affirming Sunday, a Christian tradition celebrating LGBTQUI+ identities, will once again be celebrated on Sunday, June 4, 2023, during Pride Month. This event is a nationwide initiative that recognizes both Sunday and the LGBT+ movement. The sponsors of Affirming Sunday published the following call for everyone to embrace this expanding celebration:
"The 2nd Annual Affirming Sunday, scheduled for June 4th, is a nationwide initiative aimed at promoting LGBTQIA+ inclusion and acceptance in Christian communities, through inclusive sermons, guest speakers, and community events, sponsored by nuFoundation, believr, and Launchpad Partners." [1]
"Held on the first Sunday of Pride Month, Affirming Sunday encourages churches to embrace both pride and faith by supporting and recognizing the experiences of LGBTQIA+ individuals within their communities. This year, churches and church leaders are invited to participate in various activities that demonstrate solidarity and support, such as delivering inclusive sermons, inviting LGBTQIA+ guest speakers, organizing community outreach events, and offering education and resources on LGBTQIA+ issues." [1]
"We're excited to launch the second year of Affirming Sunday and continue expanding a network of affirming and inclusive Christian communities nationwide," said Adam Evers, Co-Founder and Executive Director of NuFoundation. "Last year's event had a clear positive impact, and we hope to see even more churches participate this year, showing their commitment to promoting inclusion, affirmation, and acceptance for LGBTQIA+ individuals." [1]
"Churches and church leaders can participate in Affirming Sunday by delivering inclusive sermons, inviting LGBTQIA+ guest speakers, organizing community outreach events, and providing education and resources on LGBTQIA+ issues. Social media assets can be downloaded from the Affirming Sunday website, and churches are encouraged to use the hashtag #AffirmingSunday when sharing their support." [1]
Sunday has evolved into the focal point for all ideologies, social movements, and human traditions. Sunday observance has become the context of every political, social, and religious issue. There is one thing that all anti-biblical movements have in common: they all agree on the importance of Sunday. Sunday is the unifying platform in the coming prophetic landscape during the Mark of the Beast crisis.
Not only has the LGBT+ movement embraced Sunday, so have the labor unions [2], the Earth Day celebrations [3], civil governments [4], politicians [5], and even secular businesses [6]. Of course, we know Rome is the driving force behind the Sunday rest movement. [7] We are being told that incorporating Sunday rest will save our society. Sunday is the answer to all our problems. This appears to be the strategy because everyone is involved.
Our world is changing, and Sunday is gradually becoming the universal day of rest preferred by the majority of people. It is the day that Pope Francis, the Christian world, trade unions, secular governments, and now even the LGBT+ movement have designated. Soon, it will be imposed by law. Soon we will be forced to rest on Sunday. But there is a problem. The Bible tells us to:
"Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come; and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters." (Revelation 14:7).
This is a call to embrace God as the Creator. It is a call to worship and honor the One who created heaven and earth. It is a call to embrace the seventh-day Sabbath, a monument to both the Creator and creation. If we are to speak of a day of rest for humanity or creation, we must first acknowledge that all things were created by Christ (Colossians 1:16, 17) and that nothing exists without Him (John 1:1–3). We must also recognize that when we talk about the Sabbath, we're talking about the rest of God (Genesis 2:1–3). Since God created the Sabbath, only He knows why He created it.
"And he said unto them, The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath: therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath." Mark 2:27, 28.
Only Jesus can tell us when the Sabbath is, what it is for, and how to observe it. Any statement made by men or any church about which day is the true Sabbath rest or how we honor the Creator is nothing more than a man-made addition to God's word. Human ordinances, human decrees, and human encyclicals will always be invalid. Only God's Word should serve as our guide. Nobody can ever be wrong if they cling to the Holy Scriptures and are taught by God.
God will have a people who will keep His commandments, not man's (Revelation 12:17, 14:12, 22:14). The time is coming, and it is now, when our world will exalt human wisdom (2 Thessalonians 2:4) by exalting the false day of sun worship (Ezekiel 8:16) above the commandment of God that says: "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy" and "the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God" (Exodus 20:8, 10).
http://adventmessenger.org/christian-network-europe-sunday-voting-is-a-desecration-of-the-lords-day-and-a-defiance-and-mockery-of-god-and-religion/
Quoted article below from link above
Christian Network Europe: Sunday Voting is a "Desecration of the Lord's Day" and a "Defiance and Mockery of God and Religion"
Christian Network Europe is a Protestant news website that focuses on issues affecting Christians in Europe. Christian Network Europe (CNE) issued a scathing rebuke to Spain's political establishment on June 9, 2023, for scheduling the general election for July 23, 2023, which happens to fall on Sunday. In the article, the CNE argues that voting on Sunday is a desecration of the Sabbath, and if Sunday is not protected, then what hope is there for safeguarding the rest of the commandments of the Decalogue? The article expressed the following concern:
"Voting on Sunday is a desecration of the Lord's Day. The fact that rulers in Spain summon the citizenry to vote precisely on Lord's Day cannot be considered in any other way than defiance and mockery of God and religion. Inevitably, the idea is transmitted to the population that God's commandments are only there to be transgressed. If this is done with the commandment of the First Tablet of the Decalogue, which is closest at hand, what will not be done with the rest of the commandments of the Second Tablet?" [1]
Everyone is advocating for Sunday rest: Catholics, Protestants, agnostics, politicians, governments, economists, environmentalists, labor unions, businesses, social organizations, and members from all over the private and public sectors. However, what makes this call for Sunday rest significant is that the Christian Network Europe sees the "desecration" of Sunday as an opening wedge for the breakdown of all the other moral principles in God's law. In other words, when Sunday is violated, the rest of God's law quickly follows. This so-called "desecration" of the Sunday Sabbath actually fulfills what we read in the book, The Great Controversy:
"Yet this very class put forth the claim that the fast-spreading corruption is largely attributable to the desecration of the so-called 'Christian sabbath,' and that the enforcement of Sunday observance would greatly improve the morals of society. This claim is especially urged in America, where the doctrine of the true Sabbath has been most widely preached. Here the temperance work, one of the most prominent and important of moral reforms, is often combined with the Sunday movement, and the advocates of the latter represent themselves as laboring to promote the highest interest of society" (Great Controversy, p. 586).
The demand for Sunday rest is not being made by some obscure fringe group of radicalized Christians. No. Sunday is being promoted by the mainstream churches in Europe. The Christian Network Europe represents the dominant view within European society. I hope that every Seventh-day Adventist is aware of what is going on in the world. Only one question remains: "How long before Sunday laws are passed in America, especially since all the arguments are being made public today?" We don't have time to lose. Every effort must be made to clear up the lies and exalt the true Sabbath of the Lord. May God give us the strength to accomplish His will while the lines of communication are still open.
"That institution (seventh-day Sabbath) which points to God as the Creator is a sign of his rightful authority over the beings he has made. The change of the Sabbath (to Sunday) is the sign, or mark, of the authority of the Romish Church. Those who, understanding the claims of the fourth commandment, choose to observe the false in place of the true Sabbath, are thereby paying homage to that power by which alone it is commanded. The change in the fourth commandment is the change pointed out in the prophecy, and the keeping of the counterfeit Sabbath is the reception of the mark ... The test upon this question does not come until Sunday observance is enforced by law, and the world is enlightened concerning the obligation of the true Sabbath (Saturday, the seventh-day). Not until the issue is thus plainly set before the people, and they are brought to choose between the commandments of God and the commandments of men, will those who continue in transgression receive the mark of the beast" (Spirit of Prophecy, Vol. 4, p. 281).
Sources
[1] https://cne.news/article/3176-column-from-spain-voting-on-sunday-can-be-a-dilemma-for-christians
http://adventmessenger.org/polands-justice-minister-calls-upon-the-supreme-court-to-enforce-its-sunday-trading-ban/
Quoted article below from link above.
Poland's Justice Minister Calls Upon the Supreme Court to Enforce its Sunday Trading Ban
While the Supreme Court of the United States is about to decide whether or not businesses can force people to work on Sundays, Poland is asking its highest court to order businesses to remain closed on Sunday. Thanks to the collaborative efforts of the Roman Catholic Church and trade unions, Poland passed a Sunday trading ban back in 2018, but certain businesses have found creative ways to remain open. Now the Supreme Court has been asked to force all shops to comply with the Sunday law. On April 19, 2023, the news media reported the following:
"Poland's justice minister Zbigniew Ziobro has turned to the Supreme Court in an effort to prevent shops from evading a ban on Sunday trading by offering reading clubs, travel services or equipment rental to exploit exemptions in the law. The trading ban, which was introduced in 2018 by the government after being advocated by the Solidarity trade union and Catholic church, obliges shops to close on all but seven Sundays a year. However, it included a number of exemptions allowing certain types of businesses to remain open. That has led many shops to find creative ways to stay open on Sundays." [1]
Rome is backing these Sunday laws worldwide. Protestants, trade unions, community organizations, governments, and environmental groups are following Rome's lead to secure Sunday as a day of rest. Laws to preserve the sacredness of Sunday are being debated as we speak. These measures will compel all men and women to close everything down on the first day of the week, even though God's commandments say "the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God" (Exodus 20:10). Those aware of the long history of Sunday laws, starting in 321 A.D., know that these movements happening across the world today are bringing us one step closer toward enforcing Rome's religion.
This Sunday movement will only continue to grow as more and more nations adopt these radical Sunday measures. The Biblical predictions found in Revelation 13 and 17 are coming to life before our very eyes. Rome is busy fulfilling her role by compelling all classes to observe her institutions. And what are the secular governments doing? They are lining up behind her. Let also the commandment-keeping people rise up to the challenge and accomplish their divinely appointed duty:
"The people of our land need to be aroused to resist the advances of this most dangerous foe to civil and religious liberty." (Spirit of Prophecy, Vol. 4, p. 382).
"It is our duty to do all in our power to avert the threatened danger" (Testimonies, Vol. 5, p. 452).
Sources
[1] https://notesfrompoland.com/2023/04/19/justice-minister-turns-to-supreme-court-to-prevent-shops-evading-polands-sunday-trading-ban/
https://cne.news/article/2689-portugese-catholics-fight-to-bring-back-the-work-free-sunday
Quoted article below from link above.
Portugese Catholics fight to bring back the "work-free Sunday"
A Catholic organisation in Portugal wants to revive the idea of a "work-free Sunday".
The Liga Operária Católica (LOC/MTC) said to Ecclesia that the "work-free Sunday" is a necessary measure to protect the lives of families.
"The fight for a work-free Sunday, more than fair, is necessary, so that there is family life for everyone! So that families, all workers, can live together and fraternize and build a fairer and more solidary world," the organisation said.
Reflect
LOC also said that the day is intended to reflect on how twenty-first century consumption habits are infringing on the lives of both families and workers.
"In telework, the border between professional work time and free time is poorly defined and the working conditions and the quality of life of the worker have been worsened."
Little choice
While much of Portugal sees the Sunday as a rest day, many businesses continue to keep their doors open. Retail and service sector workers are often left with little choice in taking off Sundays in their schedules. According to Belzuz, a law firm that operates in Spain and Portugal, current labour laws state that an employee can designate one "rest day" in the week. However, in many cases, the "rest day" cannot be on a Sunday, where it is "not required to close or suspend its operations for a full day during the week or obliged to close or suspend operations other than Sunday."
Complex
The complex nature of Portugal's labour laws has led to the intervention of its Supreme Court. According to a 20minutos report from last November, the Supreme Court released parents from the responsibility of working on weekends, including Sundays. However, the law only applies to parents of children under the age of 12 and in cases where the employee is not irreplaceable. Still, the ruling makes it difficult for companies to prove that an employee's absence is "essential" enough to maintain the company's operations.
The Court's ruling is based on a grievance from an employee who worked at a shopping centre near Lisbon. She was responsible for taking care of her children while her husband worked. However, if both would be called in to work, her children would be left alone at home. After writing a letter to her company, the company accepted her request but could not make any guarantees if she had to come in to work. Later in 2022, the Supreme Court ruled in her favour.
I thought these boards were gone for good. Surprise surprise. There were only a handful when the link shut down, looks like even less now. Maybe more will trickle back over time. The following link is a short video about the communal sabbath rest recommended in project 2025.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-RYT2NB4ClU
http://adventmessenger.org/the-vatican-announces-the-launch-of-its-ecological-conversion-2030-initiative/
Article below from link above.
The Vatican Announces the Launch of its Ecological Conversion 2030 Initiative
The Holy See is advancing its globalist agenda by launching a number of climate initiatives that adhere to the guidelines outlined in Pope Francis' Laudato Si' and Laudate Deum. Vatican City State has become one of the first nations to lead the world by setting an example as they put into practice the Pope's agenda through practical applications. According to a November 16, 2023, Vatican News article, the Holy See has launched an Ecological Conversion 2030 initiative and has started replacing its state-owned cars with electric ones in an effort to achieve carbon neutrality by 2030.
• "Applying the principles of the Encyclical Letter Laudato Si' and the Apostolic Exhortation Laudate Deum, it is among the first States in the world to pursue sustainability projects by seeking innovative solutions that will help change the way of working while taking care of the protection of the 'Common Home' by adopting projects that, also through the use of reliable and eco-friendly technologies, will concretely reduce the impact of human activity on the environment." [1]
• "Achieving neutrality will require investments in technological facilities using renewable energies, offsetting emissions produced in one area and reducing them in another, and above all, promoting electric and hybrid mobility. For this reason, the Governorate haslaunched a sustainable mobility development program called 'Ecological Conversion 2030', also designed to reduce the CO2 impact of its vehicle fleet. To this end, it intends to: gradually replace State-owned cars with electric vehicles; make its car fleet carbon-neutral by 2030." [1]
Given the multitude of problems facing our world, it is obvious that the Vatican is more focused on moving the entire world closer to their Ecological Conversion 2030 agenda. This plan is in line with the UN's 2030 Sustainable Development Goals and will unite people worldwide around the Pope's message that has emphasized the concept of ecological conversion within the context of the Catholic Church, calling for a change in how individuals and communities view and interact with the environment and with each other.
Let's be clear, though: The ecological conversion that Rome is imposing is much more than just addressing environmental concerns. For example, the Jesuit publication American Magazine published an article titled "Laudato Si' Calls Us to Ecological Conversion. What Does that Look Like?" They state unequivocally in it that ecological conversion includes both protecting the environment and preserving Sunday as the day of rest. The Jesuit publication stated:
• "Solutions to the environmental crisis were not only about eliminating problems but restoring relationships. This is precisely what Pope Francis exhorted the church to in Laudato Si'. The encyclical ... was a call to more than eliminating plastic water bottles, using public transportation or advocating for the Paris climate agreement. 'The ecological crisis is also a summons to profound interior conversion,' Pope Francis writes. Rather than 'ridiculing expressions of concern for the environment,' he says, Christians need 'an ecological conversion'." [2]
• "Ecological conversion also entails bridging the gap between the sacramental life and environmental awareness." [2]
• "In Laudato Si', Francis echoes this realization: 'The sacraments are a privileged way in which nature is taken up by God to become a means of mediating supernatural life.' The pope asks that the sacraments inform our approach to issues facing the planet today. He suggests a renewed understanding of the Eucharist and recovery of the celebration of a day of rest." [2]
• "Every Sunday, participation in the Eucharist can call forth in the church a deeper care and attention to creation as it is consecrated and reverenced. 'Sunday is meant to be a day which heals our relationships with God, with ourselves, with others and with the world,' Pope Francis says. Approaching Sunday with a deeper sense of rest and contemplation can help cultivate the interior conversion called for by Pope Francis." [2]
With unwavering clarity, Roman Catholic Bishop John Sherrington of the Diocese of Westminster in London also stated that one of the first steps towards ecological conversion is to show gratitude and reverence for Sunday.
• "A first step towards ecological conversion is to appreciate more deeply the mystery of God's creation and to respond with gratitude and reverence. At the end of the sixth day of creation, 'God saw all that he had made, and indeed it was very good' (Gen 1:31). On the seventh day he rested, 'God blessed the seventh day and made it holy' (Gen 2:3). The account of creation in the Book of Genesis establishes the pattern of the Jewish Sabbath as a holy day and a day of rest. Saint John Paul in his encyclical Dies Domini (1998) explores the rich meaning of the Lord's Day – Sunday – in the light of its Jewish origins ... Every Sunday we celebrate the joy of Easter Sunday, the mystery of our redemption, the gift of God's creation and are caught into the mystery Of the 'new creation' as all things are renewed in Christ. There is an invitation to deepen our contemplation of the gift of all God's creation on this day of gratitude. We can each take practical, small steps to deepen the appreciation of this gift; to pause and behold the beauty of a plant, to walk in nature, to clean up rubbish and seek to make the world more beautiful." [3]
Sunday sacredness and Rome's climate agenda are inextricably linked. You cannot separate them. Bible prophecy tells us that in the last days, Antichrist's end-time kingdom of universal fraternity and solidarity will establish the mark of the beast upon the entire world. Currently, Pope Francis is trying to unite all people under the authority of a single, global, political-religious authority. This is how the Book of Revelation describes it:
"And all the world wondered after the beast." Revelation 13:3.
"These have one mind, and shall give their power and strength unto the beast." Revelation 17:13.
"For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies." Revelation 18:3.
The whole world will be united, including Catholics, Protestants, pagans, spiritualists, and agnostics. Biblical prophecy also tells us that this end-time world power will dominate world trade and international relationships so that "no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name" (Revelation 13:16).
If we embrace the true gospel of Christ, we will not be swept away by the deadly errors of the last days. If we really believed in the Holy Scriptures, we would warn the world against the mark of papal apostasy—the Sunday law. Scripture calls us to embrace the seal of the living God, which is the keeping of the seventh-day Sabbath. Additionally, we are to warn against the impending mark of the beast, which is the legal imposition of Sunday rest.
This is the scenario that is unfolding, and in this context, a worldwide message from God will be sounding out loud, saying: "If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of His indignation." Revelation 14:9. The great messages of Revelation 14:6–12 must be proclaimed at this very hour, saying: "Here is the patience of the saints; here are they that keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus." Revelation 14:12.
: Amo Wed May 17, 2023 - 11:31:43Got to get busy now. Look at this in more depth later. Just a quick comment regarding the faulty premise from the get go of the above post.
Gen 2:1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. 2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. 3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
The above is the first mention of God's Sabbath in scripture, not the verse you quoted. This is what the Israelites were to remember. God's seventh day Sabbath was established 2000 years before the Jewish nation. Long before there ever was an Israelite.
People are very surprised even today when they learn about the Sabbath, you can even say shocked when they discern the truth of the matter.
: Hobie Fri Dec 08, 2023 - 05:26:18People are very surprised even today when they learn about the Sabbath, you can even say shocked when they discern the truth of the matter.
With all the chaos, confusion, misdirection, misinformation, and straight up information overload today, that is no surprise. According to the evil one's plans, arriving at truth is becoming increasingly difficult over time. God help us, and He will help all who ask Him for such. Amen.
http://adventmessenger.org/catholics-argue-that-the-blue-laws-established-by-protestants-are-good-for-reviving-church-attendance-and-providing-a-greater-good-for-society/
Article below from link above.
Catholics Argue that the Blue Laws Established by Protestants are Good for Reviving Church Attendance and Providing a Greater Good for Society
"Word on Fire" is an online Catholic publication proclaiming the "universality of the Catholic faith" to millions of people. [1] On November 30, 2023, they published an article that presented all the arguments for why Sunday laws are good and necessary in today's society. The goal was to persuade readers to take action by adopting Sunday as a day of rest and to propose that both church and state preserve this day as holy.
Notice how religious voices have come out openly with their proposals to reinstate Sunday laws in America:
• "As Protestant authors Jim Davis and Michael Graham point out, the majority of adults in America today do not attend church—an historic first in the eighty years since Gallup began tracking church attendance." [2]
• "In short, not only most Americans, but even Christians increasingly question the practical necessity of Sunday church attendance for a fulfilling life." [2]
• "Thomas Aquinas teaches that the third commandment, to remember the Sabbath and keep it holy, is fittingly expressed as the precept that establishes man in true religion." [2]
• "Many Protestant churches historically did require the Sunday obligation on the pain of not only sin but also legal penalty." [2]
• "Indeed, the obligation of Christians to set aside the Sabbath day for church attendance was so deeply ingrained in the Christian civilization that the United States both inherited and perpetuated that Christian rest on Sundays demanded legal recognition. Sunday closing "blue laws" were on the books of the earliest American colonies and most states up until the Supreme Court considered and upheld their constitutionality in 1961." [2]
• "The continued force of the Sunday obligation precept in the Catholic Church is thus an enduring sign of its unique claim of authority to bind all baptized Christians in a way that Protestantism long ago forswore. And, at any rate, the dechurching data indicates that the 'freedom' to attend or not in Protestant churches is no guarantor that the pews will be filled 'willingly'." [2]
• "Imagine a polity in which citizens were invited, but not required, to pay taxes and testify as witnesses in legal proceedings." [2]
• "If then we willingly accept legally enforced positive obligations for membership in political community, which secures a subordinate common good, then how much more should the Christian willingly embrace obligations imposed by the Church, for an immeasurably higher good?" [2]
• "Let Catholics therefore rejoice in and proclaim the wisdom of the Sunday obligation, for it helps the faithful avoid becoming a slothful people and prescribes the most powerful medicine that can heal our slothful age." [2]
Here, we see Roman Catholics endorsing their idea of forcing the general public to observe Sunday as a holy day. This type of religious imposition can be seen as oppressive, especially in societies with diverse religious or non-religious backgrounds. Since Saturday is the seventh day of the week and is recognized by Seventh-day Adventists and other Christians as the true day of worship, according to God's word, they encounter difficulties and hardships whenever Sunday laws are implemented.
We know that when Protestants and Catholics start collaborating to push Sunday laws, the rights of religious minorities will be infringed. Unfortunately, Sunday laws disproportionately prioritize the rights of Sunday-keepers over those of everyone else.
"These records of the past clearly reveal the enmity of Rome toward the true Sabbath and its defenders, and the means which she employs to honor the institution of her creating. The word of God teaches that these scenes are to be repeated as Roman Catholics and Protestants shall unite for the exaltation of the Sunday ... It has been shown that the United States is the power represented by the beast with lamblike horns, and that this prophecy will be fulfilled when the United States shall enforce Sunday observance, which Rome claims as the special acknowledgment of her supremacy." (Great Controversy, p. 578).
We can clearly see where all of this is headed. The ecumenical movement that is bringing Protestants and Catholics together is determined to exalt Sunday worship, promote spiritualism, reject biblical truth, and unite us under one head, Rome. All of these events are contributing to the elimination and suppression of present truth.
"When the leading churches of the United States, uniting upon such points of doctrine as are held by them in common, shall influence the State to enforce their decrees and to sustain their institutions, then Protestant America will have formed an image of the Roman hierarchy, and the infliction of civil penalties upon dissenters will inevitably result." (Great Controversy, p. 445).
Sources
[1] https://www.wordonfire.org/about/our-story/
[2] https://www.wordonfire.org/articles/the-invitation-and-obligation-of-the-lords-day/
http://adventmessenger.org/car-free-sunday-comes-to-new-york-citys-iconic-fifth-avenue-and-the-police-will-enforce-this-event/
Car-Free Sunday Comes to New York City's Iconic Fifth Avenue and the Police will Enforce this Event
Full article at link provided.
http://adventmessenger.org/nextdoor-i-love-the-blue-laws-it-is-the-future-i-will-do-more-for-the-environment-than-electric-cars/
Quoted article below from link above.
Nextdoor: "I Love the Blue Laws! It is the Future. It will do more for the Environment than Electric Cars."
Nextdoor is a social media platform that helps you interact and communicate with your neighbors. It allows you to have discussions in your local community about topics that are important to people who live around you. Nextdoor focuses more on community relationships than personal ones.
On Sunday, December 24, 2023, a community post was published in Conroe, Texas, on the subject of Sunday laws, which received a lot of positive responses. The post said:
• "Has anyone been on the streets today? It's wonderful. It's sane! Just imagine, if we had blue laws again, it could be Like this every Sunday!
This communication attracted more praise than criticism, and the supporters of Sunday laws came out in full force. Some of the responses were as follows:
• K.H: "I miss the blue law."
• D.H. "It's the future! Lower fossil fuel usage, less greenhouse. It will do more for the environment than electric cars."
• A.B. "I love the blue laws!"
• P.R. "If people would not shop on Sundays then the stores would start closing on Sundays."
This is not an isolated incident. It's just one of many instances where people are insisting that Sunday laws should be reinstated in order to preserve society. The fact that social media is being used to advocate for Sunday as a day of rest shows how powerful these online spaces have become, rivaling, if not surpassing, mainstream media in numbers and influence. Its strength lies in its unparalleled ability to connect people globally, providing a platform for instant information dissemination and interaction. Without doubt, social media is helping to shape narratives, public discourses, and opinions—even when it comes to blue laws.
What we can see from this call for the return of blue laws on Nextdoor is that more and more communities are ready to recognize Sunday as the Sabbath, and they are open to seeing some kind of legal mechanism put into place to stop all the commercial activity on this day. Moreover, the effort that is in place to shut down everything on Sunday encompasses a wide spectrum of advocates. Some do it for religious reasons and others for the environment, but the end result is the same: get the legislation passed to secure Sunday as the day of rest once again for our society.
When national governments begin imposing Sunday rest through legislation, civil liberties will be sacrificed for the sake of the common good. We are not far from a time when violating the Sunday-Sabbath will be considered a global health, environmental, and social crisis.
"It will be declared that men are offending God by the violation of the Sunday-sabbath, that this sin has brought calamities which will not cease until Sunday observance shall be strictly enforced, and that those who present the claims of the fourth commandment, thus destroying reverence for Sunday, are troublers of the people, preventing their restoration to divine favor and temporal prosperity." (Great Controversy, p. 590).
The dangers of Sunday laws are slowly but steadily threatening us on all sides. These laws are a threat to our religious and civil liberties, as we know from both prophecy and history. Sunday laws are also in direct conflict with God's Word, which commands us to keep Saturday as the seventh-day Sabbath. The Three Angels' Messages place a strong emphasis on the Sabbath of the Decalogue, revealing the close connection between the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus. We must warn the rest of the world about the formation of the image of the beast, the union of church and state, the notorious Sunday laws, and the global shift toward Rome. This is the time to sound the trumpet and warn people about the dangers that are about to take the world by storm.
http://adventmessenger.org/according-to-aol-news-the-benefits-of-blue-laws-were-so-great-that-the-supreme-court-upheld-them-safeguarding-the-citizens-rights-to-a-uniform-day-of-rest/
Quoted article below from link above.
According to AOL News, the Benefits of Blue Laws were "So Great" that the Supreme Court Upheld them, Safeguarding the Citizens' Rights to a Uniform Day of Rest
AOL is an American online service provider and news portal based in New York City that provides news in the U.S. and around the world. On December 31, 2023, AOL News added its voice to a growing list of proponents calling for the return of Sunday laws in America. In an article called "Church as Resistance," AOL News argued that blue laws contributed to the well-being of individuals and society and called on the churches to "reclaim" the "unique role" that Sunday played in our culture.
The article said, in part:
• "As the mother of three teenagers, I often find myself trying to persuade them of things that previous generations took for granted. Most recently, I've been attempting to convince my 17-year-old son of the value of attending church on Sunday morning."
• "And while parents can count on the state to enforce school attendance, we're on our own when it comes to church."
• "To this day, attendance remains highest among those who enjoy social and financial stability. Even so, it is declining across the board, and Sunday morning is increasingly used to catch up on all the things we missed during the week: hearty breakfasts, grocery shopping, home-improvement projects, visiting friends, and maybe even a run."
• "In a similar way, "blue laws" protected commercial workers by restricting retail sales and recreational activity on Sunday. So great was the benefit of such laws that the Supreme Court upheld them in McGowan v. Maryland (1961) despite the fact that they were originally linked to religious observance. Not only did the court find that they didn't violate the establishment clause, they also viewed them as protecting workers by providing "a uniform day of rest for all citizens."
• "No, attending church is not just another activity. It's a form of resistance in a culture that knows no bounds. It is a dam against the churning waters of productivity that would otherwise swallow up every available ounce of time, energy, and emotion."
• "Churches, therefore, must remember and reclaim the unique role they play as outposts of grace in an increasingly demanding world. They must guard Sunday morning as a place of refuge, wonder, and presence. A place where we might experience the miraculous because we've finally stopped long enough to open ourselves to it."
• "As the calendar turns and we consider the lives we want to live in 2024, let me invite you to join me and my begrudging son in the pew. Perhaps this is the year you carve out a space for a weekly dose of wonder, beauty, and grace. Perhaps this is the year you become more comfortable with sitting still and doing nothing. Or, if nothing else, perhaps this is the year you attend church as a simple, calculated (if not adolescent) way of sticking it to the man."
There should be little doubt about what is being said here. This is a call to designate Sunday as a day of rest in order to provide people with a collective pause from the demands of modern life. In an increasingly fast-paced secular world, so many people are saying that we can somehow improve family cohesion, mental health, societal stability, leisure, and spirituality by setting aside Sunday for rest and worship. Although it may sound good on the surface, the Puritans used blue laws during the colonial era to impose tyranny and enforce the strict observance of Sunday.
Because of their intense religious zeal, the colonists of early America interpreted Scripture to mandate Sunday rest by law, with penalties for noncompliance. They felt that enforcing blue laws was their religious obligation to protect our morals. Unfortunately, minority groups were subjected to public humiliation, persecution, and suppression as a result of the intolerance shown towards dissenting opinions. Sunday laws were enforced as a result of the merging of religious and civil authority, which restricted the freedoms of individuals who held different beliefs.
AOL News is basically advocating for a return to the 1630s, when anyone who disagreed with those in spiritual authority on matters of faith risked legal repercussions. We must challenge any attempt to bind church and state by calling for the complete separation of civil and religious authorities. Religious freedom and tolerance are incompatible with theocratic forms of government. It is bad theology and even more dangerous politics when demands are made for the government to enforce church doctrine. When this happens, it will mark the end of our nation's long-standing practice of providing a safe haven for people fleeing religious persecution.
"I have been much burdened in regard to movements that are now in progress for the enforcement of Sunday observance. It has been shown to me that Satan has been working earnestly to carry out his designs to restrict religious liberty. Plans of serious import to the people of God are advancing in an underhand manner among the clergymen of various denominations, and the object of this secret maneuvering is to win popular favor for the enforcement of Sunday sacredness. If the people can be led to favor a Sunday law, then the clergy intend to exert their united influence to obtain a religious amendment to the Constitution, and compel the nation to keep Sunday" (Review and Herald, December 24, 1889).
https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2024/01/23/rest-day-climate-change-green-sabbath/
Quoted article below from link above. Emphasis is mine. My comments in blue.
Why reviving a 2,600-year-old spiritual practice made my life better
Every Friday around sunset, I close my laptop. For 24 hours, my work is done. No email. No news. No social media. If it's work-related, it waits.
What I try to do is — nothing at all. Or, rather, I spend time with people I love, usually outdoors. I swim or surf. I share a meal with friends and family. Sometimes, I just lie on my back in the park enjoying the sun.
It has rekindled a sense of joy I last felt when I was a kid with nothing to do, and gratitude for whatever miraculous series of events led me here to this moment.
For years, this one-day pause seemed untenable. For many, it's virtually impossible to set aside an entire day for rest free from responsibilities to work and family.
But on the verge of burnout a few years ago, I began to practice a Sabbath. Giving myself permission to stop doing was hard. My brain betrayed my intentions, unconsciously leading me to flick open my phone, check work emails or scurry ahead to a Monday that hadn't yet begun. Disconnecting took practice, and still does.
But as the weeks rolled on, I discovered a freedom I hadn't known I'd lost. My Sabbath jolted me out of a daze.
For millennia, religions have regarded this ritual rest as a spiritual necessity. Yet clergy are now arguing that this practice, whether in a secular or religious context, can help redirect the world's societies away from catastrophic climate change. In their view, it's as essential to the future as any clean-energy technology or electric vehicle.
A shared day of rest, at a minimum, might slow the pace of consumption, curb emissions or ease the burden of so many people working weary weekends. But slowing down, even for a day, may also be at the heart of a cultural change convincing society that a more sustainable way of life is not only good for the planet, but also good for them.
Here's how a green Sabbath may be the right idea for one's soul, and the world.I wonder what day this man thinks the world would share as a day of rest.
Obviously this guy is going to advocate that we enact "Saturday Law" and try to restrict the worship by those who gather in the name of Jesus on the Lord's Day (1st day of week).
: Texas Conservative Sat Jan 27, 2024 - 18:26:29Obviously this guy is going to advocate that we enact "Saturday Law" and try to restrict the worship by those who gather in the name of Jesus on the Lord's Day (1st day of week).
To the contrary, after sharing his personal experience and choice regarding which day, he avoids recommending that day as the "green sabbath". Instead simply stating that a shared day of rest by all would be good for one's soul and the world.
Those who keep God's Sabbath, are a small minority compared to the masses which observe the "Lord's day" so called. The numerous civil laws throughout history and at present concerning Sunday rest, testify to which day will be chosen by this world.
Quoted articles below, from links provided above them.
https://www.resurgence.org/magazine/article238-green-sunday.html
GREEN SUNDAY A response to the climate change crisis.
SIR NICHOLAS STERN has written a lengthy report for the British Government outlining the urgent action needed in response to the imminent climate crisis. Most of his solutions to global warming are technological, based on finding alternative, non- fossil-fuel sources of energy. They are all commendable, but it will be some time before we can implement these solutions.
In the meantime, we can do something immediately: we can declare Sunday to be a fossil- fuel-free day or at least an energy-saving day. We can start this week, this month or this year. We can start individually and collectively.
Not long ago Sunday used to be a day of rest, a day of spiritual renewal, a day for families to come together, but we have changed Sunday from a day of rest to a day of shopping, flying and driving. However, in the context of excessive carbon emissions into the atmosphere, which are bringing catastrophic upheavals, we can and should restore Sunday to a day for Gaia, the Earth. There will be no great hardship in cutting down all non-essential and non-urgent use of fossil fuels for one day a week. We can easily close supermarkets, department stores and petrol stations, stop deliveries and reduce mobility to the bare essentials. We can enjoy Sunday once more with our family and friends, or by gardening, writing, painting, walking or simply spending time in contemplation. This will be good for our personal health as well as for the health of the planet. At a stroke, we can reduce by one seventh our carbon emissions into the atmosphere.
SATISH KUMAR[/quote]
https://www.stjohnarmenianchurch.org/green-sunday-sunday-of-the-world-church/
GREEN SUNDAY, SUNDAY OF THE WORLD CHURCH
Sunday, April 23, 2023
Easter Sunday is followed by a period of fifty days (Hinoonk). This period from the Resurrection to Pentecost (Hokekaloost) is dedicated to the glorification of the Resurrection. Each of the seven Sundays of Hinoonk has a special name. This Sunday, April 23, is Green Sunday (Ganach Giragi), also called Sunday of the World Church (Ashkharhamadoor), that commemorates the establishment in Jerusalem of the first Christian church where Christ had the Last Supper and met with the Apostles in the upper room after the Resurrection.
Green Sunday most probably originates from an ancient holiday celebrating spring. Our forefathers, seeing mother earth bloom after long winter months, glorified the Creator with an act of thanksgiving and celebrated by decorating the church and themselves with greenery. The reawakening of nature is symbolic of the Resurrection. Green is the color of life, freshness, and promise. After a barren winter and with the Resurrection we are filled with hope, life, and love.
Green Sunday is the perfect time for us to remember and strengthen our obligations as good stewards of the earth and caretakers of the gifts given to us by God.
https://vovworld.vn/en-US/spotlight/green-sunday-movement-launched-nationwide-1083609.vov
"Green Sunday" movement launched nationwidehttps://www.theguardian.com/environment/cif-green/2009/sep/17/low-carbon-sunday
Slow Sunday: The simple solution to global warminghttps://www.greensabbathproject.net
Increasing numbers of people see the wisdom of observing a technology shabbat, a break from all devices with screens. Every Sunday since 2007 Mexico City has handed over some 55 km of streets around the historic city center to bicyclists, skateboarders, rollerbladers, toddlers on push toys, parents behind strollers, and other pedestrians, attracting sometimes tens of thousands of people. More recently, Bogotá, Colombia, has introduced car-free Sundays that the population savors, while England's Playing Out has helped parents in hundreds of places temporarily close off local neighborhood streets to car traffic so that kids can play. When Israeli cities shut down for the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur (the day of atonement), nitrogen oxide pollution in the air decreases for the day by 70-99% .
Many cultures have instituted ritualized days of rest. The Igbo, who currently live mostly in Nigeria, have a four-day week. They consider the second day, Orie, to be a holy day of obligation, on which farmers rest from farming and feast with their family. Among some Fante fishing communities on Ghana's coastline there are sacred days, usually Tuesday, set aside as a rest day for fishermen. No fishing is allowed on those days. This gives the sea the time to replenish its fish stock. Similarly, among the people of Dormaa Traditional Area in the Brong Ahafo Region of Ghana it is prohibited to work the land or go into the bush/forest for any occupational activity on Tuesday. As a respite from the tremendous pressures of his political activism, Mohandas Gandhi took each Monday as a day of total silence. His inspiration was the practice of many Hindus to fast on a particular day of the week -- each day is dedicated to a different god. A typical Vrata (day of fasting and/or religious rituals) involves a fast for a fixed period of time, usually from sunrise to sunset, where either no food is eaten or only one meal is eaten, or only a certain food such as milk is consumed. Silence is usually maintained. Other practices include sleeping on the ground or for only a short time, or yoga with meditation, reading Hindu scriptures and charitable giving. Since the Buddha's time, many Buddhists have observed uposatha days, often on a weekly basis in conjunction with the phases of the moon. Uposatha days were intended by the Buddha for cleansing the mind. On these days practitioners intensify their practice, observe certain forms of abstinence, deepen their knowledge and express communal commitment through acts of reciprocity.
Try it. One day a week, minimize the need for more goods, minimize the use of natural resources, minimize the emission of carbon dioxide and other pollutants.
The Sabbath is said to be a foretaste of the world to come (Babylonian Talmud, Berakhot 57b). Literally. If you care about our future, about your well-being, observe a real sabbath day of rest. It helps cultivate community, self-discipline, inner calm and contentment. One powerful weapon in the fight against environmental deterioration and climate disaster may just be an age-old spiritual technology.
It could be merely a question of doing nothing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ue6WlSF54M
Video about Chrislam and Sunday.
Muslims gather together on Fridays.
The early church gathered together on the 1st day.
: Texas Conservative Sun Feb 04, 2024 - 06:50:31Muslims gather together on Fridays.
The early church gathered together on the 1st day.
Such is based upon one obscure verse. While we know many met on the sabbath as believing Jews, and the apostles did as well, preaching to them and others.
This is not to mention the large amount of historical testimony from the past regarding Christians continuing seventh day Sabbath observance for centuries after our Lord's first coming. Which you of course ignore with an obscure blunt statement that Christians met on the first day, as though this is what they all did. This is not to mention the many candid statements by Sunday keepers throughout history, concerning the many Christians who continued to observe God's seventh day Sabbath for centuries as already mentioned. Believe as you wish of course, and ignore what you wish of course.
Obscure? The book of Acts
Naw. That's a sad response.
The early Jewish church met in the synagogues with other Jews on Shabbat, and together on the 1st Day.
This is when they assembled together for the Lord's Supper and to learn more about Christ.
This would be a good time to review the difference between The Sabbath God Vs. the Sunday God.
According to the SDA Pioneers (early Adventists & Ellen White) the Sabbath God [flesh Father] had (and has) a body of flesh complete with organs, members and parts. The Sabbath Father god has a digestive tract JUST LIKE YOU DO!
The Sunday God was a Trinitarian God, One Being, three Persons contrasted with the Sabbath god which is understood to be THREE PERSONS who are also THREE SEPARATE BEINGS.
Important to keep these facts in mind when discussing the Sabbath.
: Texas Conservative Sun Feb 04, 2024 - 14:46:47Obscure? The book of Acts
Naw. That's a sad response.
The early Jewish church met in the synagogues with other Jews on Shabbat, and together on the 1st Day.
This is when they assembled together for the Lord's Supper and to learn more about Christ.
Act 20:7 And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and continued his speech until midnight. 8 And there were many lights in the upper chamber, where they were gathered together.
The above scriptures do not mention the Lord's day, and refer to a meeting in the evening of the first day, which would be what people today refer to as Saturday night. Thus the lighting required. Using these scriptures to pronounce observance of the Lord's day as understood by countless Christians today, is a long stretch. Supplying very little real evidence of any such thing. It is therefore an obscure reference unto supposed Sunday worship, not clearly revealing or establishing anything but ion the mind of those wishing it to be so.
Early Christians met to break bread every day, not just on the first day, because one scripture which you supplied says they did.
Act 2:42 And they continued stedfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers. 43 And fear came upon every soul: and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles. 44 And all that believed were together, and had all things common; 45 And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need.
46 And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, 47 Praising God, and having favour with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved.
You are making a mountain out of a mole hill. A doctrine out of nothing but presumption.
: Cathlodox Fri Feb 09, 2024 - 09:21:21This would be a good time to review the difference between The Sabbath God Vs. the Sunday God.
According to the SDA Pioneers (early Adventists & Ellen White) the Sabbath God [flesh Father] had (and has) a body of flesh complete with organs, members and parts. The Sabbath Father god has a digestive tract JUST LIKE YOU DO!
The Sunday God was a Trinitarian God, One Being, three Persons contrasted with the Sabbath god which is understood to be THREE PERSONS who are also THREE SEPARATE BEINGS.
Important to keep these facts in mind when discussing the Sabbath.
You're like a broken record. A lying broken record. Since your above statements have been proved false. Been an SDA for 43 years. Never met anyone who believed, or heard anything like the rubbish you keep repeating over and over. Nevertheless, you do have the right to Babyl-on.
http://adventmessenger.org/us-catholic-magazine-claims-that-the-sunday-sabbath-issue-is-now-on-the-table/
Quoted article below from link above.
US Catholic Magazine Claims that the Sunday-Sabbath Issue is "Now on the Table"
A new documentary makes a case for
reviving the Sabbath
Sabbath is a spiritual discipline. Should it also be a social policy?
US Catholic Magazine is a publication that promotes Catholic spiritual life in the United States. On February 2, 2024, US Catholic Magazine published an article discussing the revival of the "Sunday Sabbath" and the need to observe this day collectively so that the community as a whole can cultivate a just and united social order. They also claim that when it comes to labor unions, the Sabbath rest issue is "now on the table." Basically, Sunday is being offered by Catholics here in America as the time for spiritual reflection, rest, worship, fair labor practices, reducing consumption, and sustainability.
Without a doubt, this is a call to make fundamental changes to our political, economic, and social systems. They are treating Sunday rest as an urgent matter that requires immediate action. It is an effort to challenge the current system through transformative "policies." They believe that by reviving Sunday as the day of rest for society, this would help alleviate the labor injustices and deep-rooted inequalities in our nation, as well as restore our worship to God.
The article stated, in part:
• "The Puritans brought an especially rigorous and rigid observation of the Sunday Sabbath to American shores, and in this their cultural influence outlasted their doctrinal dominance. Well into the mid-20th century, laws requiring businesses to close on Sunday were common in the United States. In fact, in one of Sabbath's most surprising segments, we learn that Bergen County, New Jersey, a New York City suburb, has Sunday closings to this very day. In a 1993 referendum, the county's residents upheld the Sunday regulation by a 2–1 vote."
• "However, Bergen County is an outlier. In the rest of the United States most Sunday closing laws were abolished by a combination of business interests and secular liberals, who argued that Sunday closings constituted discrimination against non-Christians."
• "Throughout the two hours of Sabbath [documentary], the word that kept coming into my mind was enough. Observance of Sabbath is a way of saying that there is such a thing as enough—enough of work, enough of social media, enough of shopping, even enough of youth sports. Clearing away the noise and distraction of our daily lives can help us see and hear the presence of God among us."
• "Sabbath may be personal, but it is never individual. It is an observance that a community does together and one that has clear implications for the making of a just and sustainable social order."
• "Historian Thomas Kidd notes that labor unions and churches have often worked together to advocate for days of rest."
• "As a result, many labor advocates, and even a few business leaders, have begun to advocate a four-day work week, with 32 hours of work for no reduction in pay. In the recent United Auto Workers strike, this expansion of the Sabbath concept was one of the UAW's demands."
• "The UAW didn't get the four-day week this time, but the issue is now on the table, and the concept of Sabbath rest lives on."
Roman Catholics are applauding these efforts to bring back Sunday rest. According to US Catholic Magazine, the Sunday issue is still on the table. Are you aware of what it means to have something "on the table?" This simply means that the Sunday issue is actively being discussed and considered by certain parties. It implies that the matter is under examination. In other words, the Sunday movement is advancing through the shadows, as inspiration suggests:
"The Sunday movement is now making its way in darkness. The leaders are concealing the true issue, and many who unite in the movement do not themselves see whither the undercurrent is tending. Its professions are mild and apparently Christian, but when it shall speak it will reveal the spirit of the dragon. It is our duty to do all in our power to avert the threatened danger" (Testimonies, Vol. 5, p. 452).
Rome has made no secret of its desire to see Sunday restored as a day of worship and rest. They are openly proclaiming Sunday rest as a necessary day for building a just society. According to Bible prophecy, the churches will have to appeal to the civil authorities in order to achieve their goals. Here in America, Catholics are now helping to promote the work of securing Sunday as the day of rest in order to save society. Sunday is quickly becoming the official day to reduce carbon emissions, reduce work stress levels, and worship. When the state begins to actively enforce compulsory Sunday observance, we know the end has come.
"From the first, every move made by Satan, from the beginning of his work and to continue to the end, was to exalt the false sabbath to take the place of the genuine Sabbath of Jehovah. He is just as intent now and more determined to do this than ever before. He has come down with great power to deceive them who dwell on the earth with his satanic delusions" (Manuscript 6, 1889).
http://adventmessenger.org/due-to-poor-air-quality-cars-in-mexico-city-were-ordered-to-rest-on-sundays-or-face-a-3257-fine/
Quoted article below from link above.
Due to Poor Air Quality, Cars in Mexico City were Ordered to Rest on Sundays or Face a $3,257 Fine
Even on Sunday! What cars are resting TODAY, February 25, due to environmental contingency in Mexico City?
"It is the spirit of the papacy—the spirit of conformity to worldly customs, the veneration for human traditions above the commandments of God—that is permeating the Protestant churches and leading them on to do the same work of Sunday exaltation which the papacy has done before them" (Great Controversy, p. 573).
Thanks to the climate crisis, Sunday laws are practically writing themselves. Here we see a Sunday rest city ordinance with teeth. Prophecy calls this speaking like a dragon. We are told in the book The Great Controversy that Sunday exaltation is the "spirit of the papacy." Today this spirit is working in darkness to accomplish exactly what Rome wants: Sunday rest by law.
On February 25, 2024, a mandatory car-free Sunday with penalties was enforced on everyone in Mexico City. In an article published by Medio Tiempo News titled "Even on Sunday! What cars are resting TODAY, February 25, due to environmental contingency in Mexico City," the city's air pollution problem is being addressed by ordering nearly all of the cars to take a break on Sunday. This city ordinance, which came with a hefty fine to enforce compliance, would save energy, lower consumption, and limit pollution.
The article stated, in part:
• "Even on Sunday! What cars are resting TODAY, February 25, due to environmental contingency in Mexico City?" [1]
• "Mexico City and the metropolitan area has led to not only issuing recommendations to avoid health risks, but also carrying out measures such as reinforcing the "No Travel Today" program, and reduce the emission of pollutants." [1]
• "Not even Sunday was saved, after two days in a row in which holograms 0 and 00 had to rest in an extraordinary way due to the poor air quality reported by the unit formed by the Environmental Commission of the Megalopolis, where several of the entities of central Mexico." [1]
• "We tell you which cars, although they have a 0 and 00 hologram, cannot circulate this Sunday, in addition to the rest that must be added to the measures taken with the aim of reducing pollutants in the city." [1]
• "At what times does "No Travel Today" apply? Generally, the "No Travel Today" program has an extension of hours between 5:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m., covering most of the day; However, this Sunday it was announced that it would operate from 5:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., so after that time, all vehicles can return to operating normally." [1]
• "What is the fine for not resting during "No Travel Today?" The sanctions for not respecting the "No Travel Today" program are mainly monetary, which are calculated in payments ranging from 20 to 30 UMAs, that is, between $2,171.4 and $3,257.1 (Mexican pesos). [1]
• "What cars are NOT driving this Sunday, February 25? These are the vehicles that CANNOT circulate this Sunday, February 25, between 5:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m." [1]
• "Private use vehicles with verification hologram 2." [1]
• "Private use vehicles with verification hologram 1, whose last numerical digit is 0, 2, 4, 6 and 8." [1]
• "Private use vehicles with verification hologram 00 and 0, blue sticker, plate termination 9 and 0." [1]
• "Local or federal freight vehicles stop circulating between 6:00 and 10:00 a.m." [1]
•"Taxis with verification hologram "00", "0", "1" or "2" that must stop circulating in accordance with the provisions indicated in sections 1, 2, and 3, will be subject to the restriction on circulation from 10:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m." [1]
A $3,257 fine in Mexican pesos comes to around $190 US dollars, which is a lot of money for people who don't make much. Residents of Mexico City were being warned not to drive on Sunday due to environmental regulations! And the harsh penalties served to guarantee that the law was followed. The car-free Sunday program included fines as a means of upholding public safety, protecting the environment, maintaining order, safeguarding the common good, and enforcing Sunday rest.
History shows that whenever Sunday is exalted, what follows is that the seventh-day Sabbath, Saturday, the true Lord's Day, is suppressed. The rest that comes from keeping God's true Sabbath is a spiritual rest. The coming Sunday law will be a civil rest that will come from human government. Instituting Sunday rest by law, even for environmental reasons, is to assume the power and authority that belong solely to God. Whenever politicians enact Sunday rest measures, they are stepping into the realm of God, which they have no right or authority to do. These are matters that belong to the Creator.
"Protestantism shall give the hand of fellowship to the Roman power. Then there will be a law against the Sabbath of God's creation, and then it is that God will do His 'strange work' in the earth" (Bible Commentary, Vol. 7, p. 910).
Sounds like Saturday law. Can't drive your car on the Lord's Day to gather with other Christians on the day of the resurrection.
: Texas Conservative Tue Mar 05, 2024 - 08:03:10Sounds like Saturday law. Can't drive your car on the Lord's Day to gather with other Christians on the day of the resurrection.
Yes, it sounds like old covenant Sabbath law, of a nation which rightfully combined church and state. Because God Himself was their leader. The New covenant church in Christ Jesus our Lord though, is no literal nation of this earth. And should not therefore make any laws applicable to all citizens of any town, city, state, country, or nation of this world. Rather calling only for chosen obedience to the law of God. Which God Himself in Christ Jesus our Lord forces upon no one.
Jhn 18:36 Jesus answered,
My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence.Mat 22:21 They say unto him, Caesar's. Then saith he unto them,
Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's.
https://www.comece.eu/european-sunday-alliance-issues-new-manifesto-promoting-a-work-free-sunday-for-all/
Quoted article below from link above.
The Catholic Church in the European Union
Commission of the Bishops' Conferences of the European Union
European Sunday Alliance issues new Manifesto promoting a Work-free Sunday for all
In view of the European Day for a Work-free Sunday (3 March), the European Sunday Alliance (ESA) issues on Friday, 1 March 2024, a new manifesto stressing that "synchronised resting time is an effective tool to counter loneliness and highlights its importance for the mental health of workers".
Furthermore, in the view of upcoming EU elections in June 2024, the European Sunday Alliance calls on Members of the European Parliament and candidates to the European Elections to support the Manifesto of its Steering Committee and recognise the value of the establishment of a weekly common day of rest, by tradition on Sunday, at the EU level for all citizens.
In recent days, the European Sunday Alliance ran a video campaign, raising awareness among EU and national political leaders, as well as private citizens, about the positive effects of a synchronised weekly day of rest. All videos can be viewed on ESA's social media accounts – Twitter and Facebook – or on the COMECE YouTube.
The list of MEPs that are promoting ESA's campaign includes: Miriam Lexmann (EPP – Slovakia), who is also the main sponsor of the Alliance, Gabriele Bischoff (S&D – Germany), Tomáš Zdechovský (EPP – Czech Republic), Michaela Šojdrová (EPP, Czech Republic), Katrin Langensiepen (Greens – Germany), Evelyn Regner (S&D, Austria), Dragoș Pîslaru (Renew Europe, Romania), Dennis Radtke (EPP, Germany), Brando Benifei (S&D, Italy).
The Alliance is a broad network of more than 100 national Sunday alliances, trade unions, employers' organisations, civil society associations, Churches and religious communities in the European Union. The Alliance is committed to raise awareness about the unique value of Sunday for our society and on the importance of a common day of rest. COMECE is a founder member of the European Sunday Alliance.
http://adventmessenger.org/the-leading-online-college-platform-for-women-urges-people-to-embrace-sundays-for-rest-relaxation-and-reset/
Quoted article above from link below.
The Leading Online College Platform for Women Urges People to Embrace Sundays for Rest, Relaxation and Reset
EMBRACING EUROPEAN SUNDAYS: A TIME
FOR REST, RELAXATION, AND RESET
Her Campus is the leading media platform dedicated to empowering college women around the globe. Her Campus was created by college students for college students and reaches hundreds of campuses worldwide. Members of this online community have gone on to secure jobs at the New York Times, Vogue, Vanity's Fair, NBCUniversal, Meta, Netflix, Spotify, The Washington Post, and other places.
On March 12, 2024, Her Campus published an article that encouraged everyone to start making Sunday their time for rest, relaxation, and reset. It urged us to follow the European model, which sees most businesses close on Sundays.
The article stated the following:
• "When I first moved to Europe to study abroad, I anticipated long weeks of excitement, with little time to rest. What I did not expect was the complete and utter aversion here to doing any sort of work on Sundays. I had previously heard of the stereotypical European weekends, a time for leisure away from work, but I had not truly understood the way in which certain cities seem to shut down entirely for a day of rest."
• "I initially found it very difficult to respect this day of doing nothing. I wanted to use Sundays as a time to go grocery shopping, do work at a café, or do any other sort of activity. However, with grocery stores and other shops closed, I was forced to fend for myself to figure out how to fill this day in other ways."
• "Initially, I resisted the break. Instead, I used Sundays to do everything that I could without anything being open. However, as my life grew busier, I learned to appreciate the European way of living by participating in this much-needed break."
• "Sundays became a quiet and peaceful day. With extremely busy weeks of school, homework, traveling, and other activities, it is highly important to give yourself grace and take breaks when you need them. This pre-established break once a week allows for a socially acceptable chance to do very little to absolutely nothing throughout the day."
• "I am not suggesting that every week you do absolutely nothing on Sundays (even though this is still perfectly respectable). I only urge you to take some of this European advice and incorporate it into your daily routine. Don't live for school and work, and instead take the time to give yourself a day of resting, resetting, and transitioning into your next week."
You can see how people are being conditioned to gradually but surely accept the notion of having a weekly day of rest for society. Even though this article was written for the secular mind and in no way represents a call to revive religion in society, it is still a call to embrace Rome's papal mark of apostasy, Sunday. People from all walks of life have a common goal: to restore Sunday as the traditional day of rest. Whether it's the secular media, the churches, labor unions, or even college campuses, people are talking about reviving Sunday in society.
Without a doubt, efforts are being made to raise awareness of the need to provide individuals with much-needed time off from their regular routines, jobs, and schooling. The only problem is that the proposed solution that is being offered, Sunday rest by force, will bring us to the mark of the beast crisis.
"Sooner or later Sunday laws will be passed. But there is much for God's servants to do to warn the people. This work has been greatly retarded by their having to wait and stand against the devisings of Satan, which have been striving to find a place in our work. We are years behind. God's law is to be vindicated, by the obedience of heart and mind, and by strong arguments" (Review and Herald, February 16, 1905).
http://adventmessenger.org/us-senate-committee-hearings-on-a-32-hour-work-week-argued-that-people-cannot-attend-church-on-sundays-if-they-work-70-hours/
Quoted article below from link above. My comments in blue.
US Senate Committee Hearings on a 32-hour Work Week Argued that People Cannot Attend Church on Sundays if They Work 70 Hours
The U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions heard a speech by Connecticut Democrat Senator Chris Murphy on Thursday, March 14, 2024. The committee hearings addressed the need for a 32-hour work week that would give Americans more time for leisure activities such as family socials and Sunday church services. Speaking to Mr. Shawn Fain, International President of the United Auto Workers Union, Senator Murphy said that the reason for the drop in religious attendance is that individuals are simply too exhausted after their week of work. In response, the head of the union reaffirmed that those who work too much don't have time for worship on Sundays.
The following exchange occurred in our US Congress between Senator Murphy and Union President Fain:
Senator Chris Murphy: "There's a pretty wild thing happening in America today: in 2000, 70 percent of Americans belonged to a religious institution, but today that number is 50 percent. There has been a pretty precipitous decline in the ability or willingness of Americans to go to church or to a religious institution on a regular basis. And I think that has lots of broad impacts in our society. There are a lot of reasons for that, but one of them is that Americans just have less free time. When you have to work 70 hours to get the same standard of living for your family that 40 hours would have gotten you a few decades ago, you don't have time to go to Wednesday night Bible study; you might not have the ability to even attend church services on a Sunday. You can talk about church if you want or if you don't want, but it is just true that some of the leisure time activities, some of the institutions that Americans found value and meaning in, are less accessible when you have to work these long hours. I'd love to just hear your thoughts on that."
Shawn Fain, UAW President: "One of the biggest, one of the things we talked about was the 32-hour work week when we put that in our contract talks was the fact that we wanted to create work life balance ... And as I say when you're working multiple jobs to live paycheck to paycheck or you're working seven days a week, 12 hours a day, something else is sacrificed in that, and that's what ends up happening. You have to sacrifice, you know, the ability to go to church. If it's something else to do on a Sunday, maybe you get a Sunday off and you haven't slept all weekend, and you spend the whole day sleeping. I mean that that is a reality a lot of workers face on some of the schedules they work ... I do believe Congress has an obligation here, spending priorities and regulations. And that may be an ugly word to some people that represent business."
Senator Chris Murphy: "Well, listen, I agree with you. I think we should have an interest in leisure time. We should have an interest in making sure that people are able to find value outside of work. A lot of people find value in work, and I'm glad that they do, but a lot of people find more value by the institutions and the social clubs and the churches that they affiliate and spend time with outside of work. But that is just less accessible for people today and that should be a public policy interest of the United States Congress. I appreciate this hearing allowing us to talk about that. Thank you, Mr. Chairman."
A sitting US senator is urging policymakers to get involved in ensuring that people have more time for church and recreation. According to Senator Murphy, the desire for more leisure ought to be considered a "public policy interest of the United States Congress." This is a call being made in a Senate committee to reduce the work week, and one of the justifications is so that people can get back to church on Sundays. It's not simply a call, though. A bill to cut the workweek down to only 32 hours has already been introduced.
"The dignitaries of church and State will unite to bribe, persuade, or compel all classes to honor the Sunday. The lack of divine authority will be supplied by oppressive enactments. Political corruption is destroying love of justice and regard for truth; and even in free America, rulers and legislators, in order to secure public favor, will yield to the popular demand for a law enforcing Sunday observance. Liberty of conscience, which has cost so great a sacrifice, will no longer be respected. In the soon-coming conflict we shall see exemplified the prophet's words: 'The dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ'." (Great Controversy, p. 592).
So now, the same politicians who will not lift a finger to stop the non stop corruption and two tiered justice system we Americans observe, want to mandate leisure? The same politicians who have allowed for if not straight up caused the gross debt and financial decline of our nation, are going to mandate how many hours people can work in trying to cope with constant decline in the value of our money they themselves have caused? This is the complete arrogant disconnect between our politicians, and the citizens they presume to lord themselves over.
Believe it or not you bonehead arrogant politicians, some of us still demand our rights and freedoms. Still believe in the Constitutional government our forefathers created, where politicians serve the people they are supposed to represent, rather than lording themselves over them with one mandated law rule and regulation after another add nauseam. Such are the actions of self important tyrants, not those seeking to serve the citizens of a Constitutional Democratic Republic. We do not want to be your servants. We want our freedoms, our rights, and our liberties protected. Protected from the arrogant individuals who have existed all throughout history and in the present, who think they know what is best for everyone, and intend for force that vision upon everyone else.
We are not looking for such self imagined demigods to rule over us. We do not want a nanny state, or to be dependent at all upon a handful of people who have come to think way too highly of themselves. As though they were far above the rest of us. To the contrary, we see and hear just exactly the opposite concerning your non stop political intrigues and supposed wisdom. Leave us alone. Protect our interests, liberties, rights, and freedoms as our founders intended. Quit being traitorous impostures who swear to uphold the Constitution and principles this nation was built upon, and then destroy
all of the same in either self interest or traitorous service to others above and over the wishes of your own citizens. Traitorous sellouts are you almost all.
https://europeansundayalliance.eu/march-3-european-day-for-a-work-free-sunday/
Quoted article below from link above.
March 3: European Day for a Work-free Sunday
On this year's annual European Day for a Work-free Sunday the European Sunday Alliances launches its manifesto for the upcoming EU elections
On the occasion of this year's annual European Day for a Work-free Sunday on March 3, the European Sunday Alliance reminds that synchronised resting time is an effective tool to counter loneliness and highlights its importance for the mental health of workers.
In the view of upcoming EU elections in June 2024, the European Sunday Alliance calls on Members of the European Parliament and candidates to the upcoming European Elections to support the Elections Manifesto of its Steering Committee to recognise the value of the establishment of a weekly common day of rest, by tradition on Sunday, at the EU level for all citizens.
On the occasion of the European Day for a Work-free Sunday, the European Sunday Alliance is glad about support for a work-free Sunday as expressed by a series of Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) from different political groups, among them Brando Benifei (S&D, Italy), Gabriele Bischoff (S&D, Germany), Katrin Langensiepen (Greens/EFA, Germany), Dragos Pislaru (Renew, Romania), Dennis Radtke (EPP, Germany), Evelyn Regner (S&D, Austria), Michaela Sojdrova (EPP, Czech Republic) and Tomas Zdechovsky (EPP, Czech Republic) – and, as sponsor of the European Sunday Alliance, Miriam Lexmann (EPP, Slovakia):
At the link provided there are several videos from some of the people listed above, voicing their support for the Alliance.
https://europeansundayalliance.eu/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/European-Sunday-Alliance-EU-elections-manifesto-2024-draft-20231212_06.pdf
Quoted Manifesto below from link above.
Manifest of the Steering Committee of the European Sunday Alliance on the occasion of the EU elections 2024
Achieving a common day of rest for workers in the EU
The European Sunday Alliance is a network of national Sunday Alliances, trade unions, civil society organizations and religious communities committed to raising awareness of the unique value of synchronised free time for our European societies.
It is coordinated by a Steering Committee bringing together the Commission of the Bishops' Conference of the EU (COMECE), the Protestant Church in Germany (Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland, EKD), the European Confederation of Independent Trade Unions (CESI), the Federation of Catholic Family Associations in Europe (FAFCE), the European Services Workers Union (UNI Europa), Don Bosco International (DBI), the Jesuit European Social Centre (JESC), the International Young Christian Workers (JOCI-IYCW), the German Sunday Alliance, and the Austrian Sunday Alliance.
On the occasion of the EU elections in June 2024, the Steering Committee of the European Sunday Alliance invites interested policy makers to support the role of synchronised free time as a key element in addressing mental health issues and loneliness in our society, in particular by:
1. ensuring that all relevant EU legislation and non-legislative measures respect and promote the protection of a common weekly day of rest for all people living and working in the EU, which shall be in principle on a Sunday, in order to protect workers' health, promote a better work-life balance, and foster adequate time especially for families and young workers for worship and community, social & religious engagement.
2. promoting EU legislation guaranteeing sustainable working time patterns, including through a right to disconnect and based on the principle of decent work benefiting individual workers and thus society as well as the economy as a whole.
3. considering the great value and positive impact of synchronised free time on Sundays when it comes to finding solutions to urgent challenges of our time such as loneliness and related mental health issues.
Contacts of the Steering Committee of the European Sunday Alliance -
Commission of the Bishops' Conference of the EU
alix.dewasseige@comece.eu
Protestant Church in Germany
franziska.kuster@ekd.eu
European Confederation of Independent Trade Unions
meerkamp@cesi.org
Federation of Catholic Family Associations in Europe
m.waszkiewicz@fafce.org
The European Services Workers Union
Ilaria.Costantini@uniglobalunion.org
Sunday Alliance Germany
Stefan.Eirich@kab.de
Don Bosco International
dbi@sdb.org
Jesuit European Social Centre
benoit.willemaers@jesc.eu
International Young Christian Workers
caro.moch@joceurope.org
Sunday Alliance Austria
info@freiersonntag.at
http://adventmessenger.org/protestants-and-catholics-are-on-the-inevitable-path-to-elevate-sunday-rest-in-society/
Quoted article below from link above.
Protestants and Catholics are on the Inevitable Path to Elevate Sunday Rest in Society
Today, more than ever, our Seventh-day Adventist eschatology has proven to be accurate and relevant. In fact, the closer we get to the end of time, the more spiritually significant our final warning message becomes. Consider the bold predictions made over 130 years ago regarding the issues that will be at the forefront during the final crisis when Protestants and Catholics come together to fulfill their prophetic destiny:
"The Word of God teaches that these scenes are to be repeated as papists and Protestants shall unite for the exaltation of the Sunday. The prophecy of Revelation 13 declares that the power represented by the beast with lamb-like horns shall cause the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the papacy—there symbolized by the beast like unto a leopard" (Great Controversy, p. 578).
In the last days, loyalty will be the main issue, with the day of worship being the focal point. Shortly before the return of Jesus, the word of God tells us in Revelation 13 that Protestantism and Catholicism will cooperate in an attempt to impose Sunday worship. These lobbying efforts will be successful when a national Sunday law is passed in the United States, followed by an international Sunday law. Those who align themselves with the Catholic-Protestant union and pay homage to the spurious day of worship will receive the mark of the beast. Notice what Protestants and Catholics have published during this month alone.
On March 12, 2024, Catholic News Agency published an article called "A New Sabbath" and made the following bold and false claims:
• "Celebration of the Sunday Eucharist is the sign of the new and everlasting covenant for Christians"
• "If the Sabbath was Saturday, why do we emphasize Sunday? The move from Saturday to Sunday, from Sabbath to the Lord's Day, is intimately connected to the Resurrection of Jesus from the dead."
• "Sunday is thus distinguished from the Sabbath in that it replaces it, fulfills the truths of it and announces man's eternal rest in God."
• "So, it is primarily the resurrection that leads to worship and adoration of our Father on Sunday instead of Saturday."
On March 8, 2024, Hope 103.2 FM, an Evangelical Christian radio station in Sydney, Australia, published an article titled "The Sabbath Points Us to Jesus" and stated the following:
• "Jesus was resurrected on the first day of the week, Sunday, which became our day of worship. This transformation from the seventh day to the first points to a new creation in Christ, fulfilling the Sabbath's foreshadowing of renewal."
On March 13, 2024, Crossway, a Protestant global media ministry, published an article titled "Does the Law of Moses Matter for Christians Today?" in which they asserted the following:
• "We gather often on Sunday because that was the definitive day that Sabbath went public, that rest became realized. So Jesus transforms the Sabbath, not that we're keeping the Sabbath one day a week, we gather for worship one day a week, but to remind ourselves what he has given us seven days a week. The law has transformed."
The argument for enforcing a Sunday law will be based on these appeals endorsing Sunday as the day of worship and rest. In fact, the efforts to make Sunday the day of rest are a sign that the end is near.
"God keeps a record with the nations: the figures are swelling against them in the books of heaven; and when it shall have become a law that the transgression of the first day of the week shall be met with punishment, then their cup will be full" (Bible Commentary, Vol. 7, p. 910).
There is a darker aspect to the push for Sunday, one that stems from animosity toward people who observe Saturday, the seventh day, God's true day of worship. The faithful remnant people of God will be the target of the intense resentment that will accompany the Sunday law:
"The whole world is to be stirred with enmity against Seventh-day Adventists, because they will not yield homage to the papacy, by honoring Sunday, the institution of this antichristian power. It is the purpose of Satan to cause them to be blotted from the earth, in order that his supremacy of the world may not be disputed" (Testimonies to Ministers, p. 37).
However menacing, deceptive, and blasphemous the calls for Sunday rest may appear, political and religious systems are held in check. In times of peril, we are reminded:
"The designs of wicked men, the enemies of the church, are subject to His power and overruling providence ... He will restrain the forces of darkness until the warning is given to the world and all who will heed it are prepared for the conflict" (Testimonies, Vol. 5, pp. 452-453).
As God restrains the forces of evil determined to impose Sunday rest laws on society, we must continue to work, presenting the standard of God's true Sabbath and warning against the loss of liberty of conscience that will accompany the impending Sunday law crisis:
"We are not doing the will of God if we sit in quietude, doing nothing to preserve liberty of conscience" (Testimonies, Vol. 5, p. 714).
"It is our duty to do all in our power to avert the threatened danger. We should endeavor to disarm prejudice by placing ourselves in a proper light before the people. We should bring before them the real question at issue, thus interposing the most effectual protest against measures to restrict liberty of conscience" (Ibid., p. 452).
http://adventmessenger.org/a-new-marketing-campaign-tries-to-help-you-combat-your-sunday-fears-by-making-you-relax-on-sundays-by-consuming-cannabis/
Quoted article below from link above.
A New Marketing Campaign Tries to Help You Combat Your Sunday Fears by Making You Relax on Sundays by Consuming Cannabis
Just when you thought that the movement to revive Sunday in society could not sink any lower, it did. A new California-based cannabis company has come out with a product to combat "Sunday Scaries." Sunday scaries is a term that has become very popular in today's society and is used to describe the feeling of anxiety and dread that many people experience on Sundays, typically in anticipation of the upcoming workweek or school week. The Sunday Scaries cannabis company claims that certain "experts" say this condition arises every Sunday and is marked by stress, depression, or tension related to the responsibilities that await people on Monday morning.
The cannabis company made the following claims:
• "Sunday Scaries are the irrational fears and internal darkness that overcome you on Sundays, when the impending doom of Monday is right around the corner."
• "Many people face this challenge, but fortunately, there are ways to combat these feelings of apprehension and regain control over your weekends. With our guidance below and the products we've designed specifically for the Sunday scaries, relief is well within reach."
• "Sunday anxiety can cause a range of symptoms from mild to severe. These include: anxiety, depression, panic attacks, mind racing, low self-esteem, increased sweating, upset stomach, headache, heart attack."
This is a marketing scheme designed to get you to buy cannabis for rest and relaxation on Sunday. Even though many people claim that the ingestion of cannabis has therapeutic benefits, including relief from pain, anxiety, and other health issues, the negative effects far exceed any minor temporary relief. A recent study published by CBS News states that cannabis, whether "smoked, eaten, or vaporized," leads to a higher risk of heart attack and stroke.
Those are just two reasons to be concerned, not to mention that cannabis also leads to impaired driving, addiction, other respiratory illnesses, mental health issues, and a host of other problems. Cannabis is just like Sunday worship; it is a scam and a hoax and will never lead to lasting relief.
The solution to Sunday Scaries and every other ailment and suffering is to love God and keep his commandments, including the seventh day, Saturday, and recognize Sunday as just another work day. God has given us the gift of work, which is nothing to be ashamed of or afraid of. Additionally, when we rest on God's true Sabbath, we will experience His divine favor and blessings:
"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 LORD, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: Then shalt thou delight thyself in the LORD; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it." Isaiah 58:13, 14.
The Sabbath is a sign of God's favor for His people. When we delight ourselves in the God of the Sabbath, goodness and mercy will follow us, and we will enjoy both physical and spiritual blessings, including prosperity. We must remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.
http://adventmessenger.org/earth-sabbath-calls-on-pope-francis-to-use-his-moral-authority-to-introduce-a-weekly-day-of-rest-during-the-g7-summit-to-combat-climate-change/
Quoted article below from link above.
Earth Sabbath Calls on Pope Francis to Use His Moral Authority to Introduce a Weekly Day of Rest During the G7 Summit to Combat Climate Change
The 2024 G7 Summit will be held in Italy from June 13 to 15, 2024. This is the annual meeting of the world's seven most developed economies: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The European Union also attends the summit. The G7 Summit's purpose is to discuss and coordinate economic policies, global challenges, and international cooperation on a wide range of issues, including economic growth, trade, security, climate change, and development.
Pope Francis will attend the G7 Summit for the first time, after being invited by the world's major economies and developed nations. This is significant because the agreements and commitments made during this summit have the potential to influence national policies and global governance.
To add to the gravity of the situation, the Earth Sabbath movement is urging Pope Francis to use his moral influence during the G7 Summit to stress the need for establishing a weekly day of rest to combat climate change. Earth Sabbath is an advocacy organization dedicated to reducing our carbon footprint and energy consumption by persuading individuals, world leaders, and church groups to take one day off per week for the earth.
Is it just a coincidence that everyone is looking to the Pope of Rome to initiate a weekly day of rest for the world? A climate war is being fought politically, spiritually, environmentally, and economically in order to transform our world. Advocacy groups are putting pressure on politicians and religious leaders to act. And, once again, Pope Francis is at the forefront and center of temporal affairs, with the world's seven most powerful nations eager to hear his message.
This is not a coincidence. Prophecy describes how the beast of Revelation will be dictating the actions of governments. Rome will have a vital role in discussions that have to do with guiding humanity into the future. We don't have to connect the dots when it comes to Bible prophecy; world events are doing it for us. The Papal power of Bible prophecy has emerged as the primary facilitator of international peace, climate solutions, economics, ecumenism, science, and AI.
"These have one mind, and shall give their power and strength unto the beast." Revelation 17:13
"And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him?" Revelation 13:4.
The papacy, as a "queen" (Revelation 18:7) and the "mother of harlots" (Revelation 17:5), manipulates all other earthly powers. The entire world is being enticed to follow and support the great apostate power. At the G7 Summit, we will see the world's combined political powers following the beast's dictates. Bible prophecy is clear about the Pope's influence in international affairs.
If you have any doubts that Rome is working nonstop to force Laudato Si' on all world leaders, you are fast asleep, just as inspiration has said. Rome is not slowing down. She will continue to push these initiatives until the entire world accepts her policies and receives her mark of apostasy—Sunday worship by law.
"If every soldier of Christ had done his duty, if every watchman on the walls of Zion had given the trumpet a certain sound, the world might ere this have heard the message of warning. But the work is years behind. While men have slept, Satan has stolen a march upon us" (Testimonies, Vol. 9, p. 29).
http://adventmessenger.org/an-alaska-newspaper-encourages-its-readers-to-make-sunday-a-delight-to-strengthen-their-relationship-with-jesus/
Quoted article below from link above.
An Alaska Newspaper Encourages Its Readers to Make Sunday a Delight to Strengthen Their Relationship with Jesus
On May 6, 2024, the Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman, a south-central Alaska newspaper, ran an article titled "We Delight on Sunday." According to the article, Sunday is called the biblical Sabbath and is, to them, the last day of the week when we should rest and enjoy ourselves in order to strengthen our relationship with Jesus.
The newspaper published the following:
• "What do you do on the Sunday? Maybe the better question is, what do you not do on Sunday? Growing up, I heard a lot of ways people spent the last day of their weekend. Some people could do anything as long as they wore their Sunday best. Others went to church and then went on with their lives as usual. Some believed they shouldn't work on Sunday."
• "I've pondered on this frequently: what does it mean to remember the Sabbath and to keep it holy? It doesn't mean refraining from work or avoiding worldliness. In my family of origin, Sunday traditions usually involved church attendance and then letting Mom nap before she prepared a large family meal. Friends of mine might get home from church, change, and then go for a hike or a picnic to make the most of our precious Alaskan summer days."
• "The Sabbath is a day to look forward to. It's a day to break from the monotony of life and come closer to the Lord ... We should look at Sunday as a delight, a treat at the end of the week, and an opportunity for rejuvenation for the next. The Sabbath is a delight that chases away some of the darkness of our regular turmoil as we build stronger relationships and connections with Jesus Christ. After all, what is the Lord if he's not our Light?"
Part of the final work that will be done in the last days of earth's history will be to announce that the Sabbath of the Lord has been changed. Prophecy warned us that the Little Horn would attempt to change the true Lord's Day to a spurious one (Daniel 7:25). The urgency becomes clear when we consider that the secular media, political leaders, religious leaders, and the majority of the world are banding together to promote Sunday as the universal day of rest. This is why we must give God's last warning to the world right now.
We truly live in a time when the following inspired statements are unfolding before our very eyes:
"False religion will be exalted. The first day of the week, a common working day, possessing no sanctity whatever, will be set up as was the image at Babylon. All nations and tongues and peoples will be commanded to worship this spurious Sabbath [Sunday]. This is Satan's plan to make of no account the day instituted by God, and given to the world as a memorial of creation." (Bible Commentary, Vol. 7, p. 976).
"God's memorial, the seventh-day Sabbath, the sign of His work in creating the world, has been displaced by the man of sin. God's people have a special work to do in repairing the breach that has been made in His law; and the nearer we approach the end, the more urgent this work becomes. All who love God will show that they bear His sign by keeping His commandments" (Testimonies, Vol. 6, p. 265).
The eternal gospel of Jesus Christ must be preached in the context of the Three Angels' Messages in today's world. It is a tremendous responsibility and sacred trust to carry God's end-time message to the world. It indicates that this movement has received a special message from Heaven to prepare men and women for the culmination of the plan of redemption. May God keep us faithful at a time when His law is being made of no effect.
: Amo Sat May 11, 2024 - 13:45:20http://adventmessenger.org/an-alaska-newspaper-encourages-its-readers-to-make-sunday-a-delight-to-strengthen-their-relationship-with-jesus/
Quoted article below from link above.
::headscratch::
Everything said here sounds good and right... except to those who hold to Saturday.
This even says that Sunday is the last day of the week.
Would it not be grand if when they wrote the book of Genesis that days were actually named and not just numbered?
: Rella Sun May 12, 2024 - 09:38:10::headscratch::
Everything said here sounds good and right... except to those who hold to Saturday.
This even says that Sunday is the last day of the week.
Would it not be grand if when they wrote the book of Genesis that days were actually named and not just numbered?
Not really. Apparently God has ordained the seven day weekly cycle, and refers to them by number Himself. In both the creation account, and the fourth commandment. No doubt He knew the contention there would be concerning His chosen sabbath day, verse man's chosen sabbath day. It has been part of the plan from the very beginning. To simplify the matter of who worships who in one last generation before He returns unto the execution of judgment. Seven numbered days, are easier to keep track of throughout time, than seven named days, which names have been changed over the course of time. As stated previously, God Himself has reestablished which day is the seventh more than once throughout history.
Exo 20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9
Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: 10 But
the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: 11
For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
Exo 23:12
Six days thou shalt do thy work, and on
the seventh day thou shalt rest: that thine ox and thine ass may rest, and the son of thy handmaid, and the stranger, may be refreshed.
Exo 31:15
Six days may work be done; but in the seventh is the sabbath of rest, holy to the LORD: whosoever doeth any work in the sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death.
Exo 31:17 It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for ever:
for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.
Exo 34:21
Six days thou shalt work, but on the seventh day thou shalt rest: in earing time and in harvest thou shalt rest.
Exo 35:2
Six days shall work be done, but on the seventh day there shall be to you an holy day, a sabbath of rest to the LORD: whosoever doeth work therein shall be put to death.
Lev 23:3
Six days shall work be done: but the seventh day is the sabbath of rest, an holy convocation; ye shall do no work therein: it is the sabbath of the LORD in all your dwellings.
Deu 5:12 Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee. 13
Six days thou shalt labour, and do all thy work: 14 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou.
Isa 66:1 Thus saith the LORD, The heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool: where is the house that ye build unto me? and where is the place of my rest? 2 For all those things hath mine hand made, and all those things have been, saith the LORD: but to this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word. 3 He that killeth an ox is as if he slew a man; he that sacrificeth a lamb, as if he cut off a dog's neck; he that offereth an oblation, as if he offered swine's blood; he that burneth incense, as if he blessed an idol.
Yea, they have chosen their own ways, and their soul delighteth in their abominations. 4 I also will choose their delusions, and will bring their fears upon them; because when I called, none did answer; when I spake, they did not hear: but they did evil before mine eyes, and chose that in which I delighted not. 5 Hear the word of the LORD, ye that tremble at his word; Your brethren that hated you, that cast you out for my name's sake, said, Let the LORD be glorified: but he shall appear to your joy, and they shall be ashamed. 6 A voice of noise from the city, a voice from the temple, a voice of the LORD that rendereth recompence to his enemies.
God spoke His holy sabbath into existence on the seventh day before all creation. He spoke it with His own mouth again for Israel at Sinai, and wrote it with His own finger twice. But Israel and now the bulk of humanity and even "Christianity" choose not to hear, choosing their own way instead. They are not among those who hear and tremble at the word of the Lord. Instead, they choose that in which the Lord has no delight. They choose not the sanctification of the Lord, but rather to sanctify themselves. So be it.
Gen 2:1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. 2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. 3
And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
Exo 31:12 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 13 Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, Verily my sabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations;
that ye may know that I am the LORD that doth sanctify you. 14 Ye shall keep the sabbath therefore; for it is holy unto you: every one that defileth it shall surely be put to death: for whosoever doeth any work therein, that soul shall be cut off from among his people.
God's seventh day sabbath is a sign between Him and His own, that God alone can sanctify and therefore save anyone. Those who understand this truth, and reject it, are lost. Having rejected the sanctification of the Lord, which alone can save anyone.
The following is from the CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.
Sunday- fulfillment of the sabbath
2175 Sunday is expressly distinguished from the sabbath which it follows chronologically every week; for Christians its ceremonial observance replaces that of the sabbath. In Christ's Passover, Sunday fulfills the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath and announces man's eternal rest in God. For worship under the Law prepared for the mystery of Christ, and what was done there prefigured some aspects of Christ:[107]
Those who lived according to the old order of things have come to a new hope, no longer keeping the sabbath, but the Lord's Day, in which our life is blessed by him and by his death.[108]
2176 The celebration of Sunday observes the moral commandment inscribed by nature in the human heart to render to God an outward, visible, public, and regular worship "as a sign of his universal beneficence to all."[109] Sunday worship fulfills the moral command of the Old Covenant, taking up its rhythm and spirit in the weekly celebration of the Creator and Redeemer of his people.
A day of grace and rest from work
2184 Just as God "rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done,"[121] human life has a rhythm of work and rest. The institution of the Lord's Day helps everyone enjoy adequate rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives.[122]
2185 On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are to refrain from engaging in work or activities that hinder the worship owed to God, the joy proper to the Lord's Day, the performance of the works of mercy, and the appropriate relaxation of mind and body.[123] Family needs or important social service can legitimately excuse from the obligation of Sunday rest. The faithful should see to it that legitimate excuses do not lead to habits prejudicial to religion, family life, and health.
The charity of truth seeks holy leisure- the necessity of charity accepts just work.[124]
2186 Those Christians who have leisure should be mindful of their brethren who have the same needs and the same rights, yet cannot rest from work because of poverty and misery. Sunday is traditionally consecrated by Christian piety to good works and humble service of the sick, the infirm, and the elderly. Christians will also sanctify Sunday by devoting time and care to their families and relatives, often difficult to do on other days of the week. Sunday is a time for reflection, silence, cultivation of the mind, and meditation which furthers the growth of the Christian interior life.
2187 Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day. Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. With temperance and charity the faithful will see to it that they avoid the excesses and violence sometimes associated with popular leisure activities. In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees.
2188 In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."[125]
IN BRIEF
2189 "Observe the sabbath day, to keep it holy" (Deut 5:12). "The seventh day is a sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord" (Ex 31:15).
2190 The sabbath, which represented the completion of the first creation, has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ.
2191 The Church celebrates the day of Christ's Resurrection on the "eighth day," Sunday, which is rightly called the Lord's Day (cf. SC 106).
2192 "Sunday . . . is to be observed as the foremost holy day of obligation in the universal Church" (CIC, can. 1246 # 1). "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass" (CIC, can. 1247).
2193 "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound . . . to abstain from those labors and business concerns which impede the worship to be rendered to God, the joy which is proper to the Lord's Day, or the proper relaxation of mind and body" (CIC, can. 1247).
2194 The institution of Sunday helps all "to be allowed sufficient rest and leisure to cultivate their amilial, cultural, social, and religious lives" (GS 67 # 3).
2195 Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day.
Even if or when the whole world bows to the above papal decree, they can sanctify nothing, let alone a day which the Lord never sanctified, or commanded to be observed. Those who choose to attempt to sanctify a day by their own works, or lack thereof while ignoring the day which the Lord Himself has sanctified, will be lost. They will be lost because they refused to hear the word of the Lord, and chose that which He did not delight in, over that which His word declared was a delight and should be considered such by his own.
1Sa 15:22 And Samuel said,
Hath the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. 23 For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, he hath also rejected thee from being king.
Psa 1:1 Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.
2 But his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night. 3 And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. 4 The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away. 5 Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. 6 For the LORD knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish.
Psa 40:6 Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire; mine ears hast thou opened: burnt offering and sin offering hast thou not required. 7
Then said I, Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, 8 I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart.Heb 10:5 Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith,
Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me: 6 In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou hast had no pleasure. 7 Then said I, Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me,) to do thy will, O God. 8 Above when he said, Sacrifice and offering and burnt offerings and offering for sin thou wouldest not, neither hadst pleasure therein; which are offered by the law; 9
Then said he, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second. 10 By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.Isa 58:13 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 LORD, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: 14 Then shalt thou delight thyself in the LORD; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it.
In the end, all will have chosen between the sanctification of the Lord and that which He delights in, and the traditions of men and that which they delight in. The commands of God, or the commands of men. The worship of God, nor the worship of men.
Rev 13:11 And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon. 12 And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him,
and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. 13 And he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men, 14 And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live. 15 And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak,
and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed. 16 And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: 17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. 18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.
Rev 7:1 And after these things I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, nor on the sea, nor on any tree. 2 And I saw another angel ascending from the east,
having the seal of the living God: and he cried with a loud voice to the four angels, to whom it was given to hurt the earth and the sea, 3 Saying, Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads. 4 And I heard the number of them which were sealed: and there were sealed an hundred and forty and four thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel.
Rev 9:1 And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from heaven unto the earth: and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit. 2 And he opened the bottomless pit; and there arose a smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit. 3 And there came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth: and unto them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power. 4
And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads.Rev 14:1 And I looked, and, lo, a Lamb stood on the mount Sion, and with him an hundred forty and four thousand,
having his Father's name written in their foreheads. 2 And I heard a voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of a great thunder: and I heard the voice of harpers harping with their harps: 3 And they sung as it were a new song before the throne, and before the four beasts, and the elders: and no man could learn that song but the hundred and forty and four thousand, which were redeemed from the earth. 4 These are they which were not defiled with women; for they are virgins.
These are they which follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth. These were redeemed from among men, being the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb. 5 And in their mouth was found no guile: for they are without fault before the throne of God. 6 And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, 7 Saying with a loud voice,
Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters. 8 And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. 9 And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, 10 The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: 11 And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.
12 Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus. 13 And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them. 14 And I looked, and behold a white cloud, and upon the cloud one sat like unto the Son of man, having on his head a golden crown, and in his hand a sharp sickle. 15 And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in thy sickle, and reap: for the time is come for thee to reap; for the harvest of the earth is ripe. 16 And he that sat on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the earth; and the earth was reaped. 17 And another angel came out of the temple which is in heaven, he also having a sharp sickle. 18 And another angel came out from the altar, which had power over fire; and cried with a loud cry to him that had the sharp sickle, saying, Thrust in thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth; for her grapes are fully ripe. 19 And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. 20 And the winepress was trodden without the city, and blood came out of the winepress, even unto the horse bridles, by the space of a thousand and six hundred furlongs.
Mrk 7:6 He answered and said unto them,
Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. 7 Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. 8 For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do. 9 And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition. 10 For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother; and, Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death: 11 But ye say, If a man shall say to his father or mother, It is Corban, that is to say, a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; he shall be free. 12 And ye suffer him no more to do ought for his father or his mother; 13 Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye.
I am not going to quote your entire post due to length.
From it you say
"God's seventh day sabbath is a sign between Him and His own,
( And His own during creation and Genesis were the ones that Jesus came for when he said
But He answered and said, "I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.")
that God alone can sanctify and therefore save anyone. Those who understand this truth, and reject it, are lost. Having rejected the sanctification of the Lord, which alone can save anyone."
I am trying not to assume that by this you mean that those who do not celebrate the "Sabbath" which is Friday 6PM to Saturday 6PM cannot be saved????
I will remind you that the Sabbath is NOT Saturday. It is Friday evening until Saturday evening ... Just like the creation days stated... evening and morning aere day whatever.
You said...
"As stated previously, God Himself has reestablished which day is the seventh more than once throughout history."
Well... he did not say it was anything other then the 7th in the Bible.
Exo 20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
You also said
"God spoke His holy sabbath into existence on the seventh day before all creation"
Then why did it take until the 2nd chapter of Genesis to be mentioned?????? Not even with the first 6 days.
God's seventh day sabbath is a sign between Him and His own, that God alone can sanctify and therefore save anyone. Those who understand this truth, and reject it, are lost. Having rejected the sanctification of the Lord, which alone can save anyone.
You know... There is nothing that was posted leading up to your RCC post that says that Sunday was the first day of the week in creation.
We do not know if Monday might have been the first day of the week like many European Calendars show their weeks.
It could have been Wednesday, or Thursday because I never saw the name Sunday posted in the Bible.
It says 6 days .. and for this I wont argue that they well could have been 6 creation periods.....
We do know that on the 7th God rested. We just dont know what actual day the 7th was on.
We also know .... in King Jimmy's translation that Gen 2 says:
And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.
3And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
No one argues that. I question why Gen 1:2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters
was on a Sunday. If it was.
We also do not know if possibly God when said to work 6 days and the 7th Sabbath rest and worship that it could apply to any stretch of 6 days and the 7th would be holy for us.
https://www.historyandheadlines.com › when-did-people-start-naming-days-of-the-week
When Did People Start Naming Days of the Week?
Christian Roman Emperor Constantine made the seven day week official in AD 321, complete with names for the days, a date that can be used for the "official" start of naming the days of the week.
https://www.cgg.org/index.cfm/library/bqa/id/118/what-are-origins-of-names-our-days-months.htm
According to the Encyclopedia International, article "Week," the days were names for the sun, the moon, and the five visible planets, all of which were associated with pagan deities. The names of the days of the week and their meanings are as follows:
Day
Corresponds To
Sunday
The sun, in honor of the sun god.
Monday
The moon, in honor of the moon god.
Tuesday
The planet Mars, in honor of the god Mars. The Saxons named this day after their god Tiw and called it Tiw's day. "Tuesday" comes from the name of this Saxon god.
Wednesday
The planet Mercury, later named in honor of the Teutonic god Wedn or Woden.
Thursday
The planet Jupiter, later named in honor of the Teutonic god Thor.
Friday
The planet Venus, later named in honor of the Teutonic goddess Frigg or Freia.
Saturday
The planet Saturn, in honor of the Roman god Saturn.
But how did this planetary week come to be so commonly used in the professing Christian world?
Hutton Webster, in his book Rest Days, provides the answer: "The early Christians had at first adopted the Jewish seven-day week with its numbered weekdays, but by the close of the third century AD this began to give way to the planetary week. . . . The use of planetary names by Christians attests the growing influence of astrological speculations introduced by converts from paganism. . . . Thus, gradually a pagan institution was engrafted on Christianity" (emphasis added; see pages 220-221).
This planetary week with its days named after pagan deities is not of God. God Almighty did create the week with seven days, but He merely numbered the days one through seven (Genesis 1:3—2:3). The only day He named was the seventh day, calling it the "Sabbath" (Exodus 16:22-26; 20:8-11).
https://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2013/04/the-origin-of-the-7-day-week-and-the-names-of-the-days-of-the-week/
Whatever the case, the Ancient Romans, during the Republic, did not use a seven day week, but rather went with eight days. One "eighth day" of every week was set aside as a shopping day where people would buy and sell things, particularly buying food supplies for the following week.
Rather than labeling the days of the week with actual names, at this time the Romans labeled them with letters, A-H. You might think from this that the "H" was always the shopping day, but this isn't correct. You see, the calendar year did not divide evenly by eight. Thus, the day of the week that was the day to go shopping changed every year, but they still often referred to days based on its proximity to the shopping day.
For reasons not entirely clear, within a century after the introduction of the Julian Calendar was introduced in 46 BC, the eight day week started to diminish in popularity in favor of the seven day week. The full switch was not sudden, happening over centuries, and for a time, as the seven day week grew in popularity, both the seven and eight day weeks were used in Rome simultaneously. Finally, after the popularity of the eight day week diminished to almost nothing, Constantine, the first Christian Roman Emperor, made the seven day week official in AD 321. Due to the influence of both Rome and Christianity, this has stuck in most regions of the world ever since.
We will not know the truth until we get off this planet.
( And His own during creation and Genesis were the ones that Jesus came for when he said
But He answered and said, "I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.")
There was no Israel at creation. Nor was Jesus sent only to the lost sheep of Israel, but the statement was made by Jesus to test the faith of the Canaanite woman who was seeking healing from Him. Go back and read it in context.
Jhn 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. 17 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. 19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.I am trying not to assume that by this you mean that those who do not celebrate the "Sabbath" which is Friday 6PM to Saturday 6PM cannot be saved????
I will remind you that the Sabbath is NOT Saturday. It is Friday evening until Saturday evening ... Just like the creation days stated... evening and morning aere day whatever.
Yes, I know when the sabbath begins and ends. God alone can sanctify anything, whether it be a day as He sanctified the sabbath, or a person as He sanctifies the saved. Man cannot sanctify either a day, or themselves. They are dependent upon God for this, through Christ Jesus our Lord. When one rejects what God has sanctified, while trying to sanctify that which He has not, they are in a lost condition.
Then why did it take until the 2nd chapter of Genesis to be mentioned?????? Not even with the first 6 days.
The chapter divisions of scripture we read today, are not part of the original format of scripture. The following link might help.
https://www.biblestudytools.com/bible-study/topical-studies/when-and-how-was-the-bible-split-into-chapters-and-verses.html
You know... There is nothing that was posted leading up to your RCC post that says that Sunday was the first day of the week in creation.
We do not know if Monday might have been the first day of the week like many European Calendars show their weeks.
It could have been Wednesday, or Thursday because I never saw the name Sunday posted in the Bible.
It says 6 days .. and for this I wont argue that they well could have been 6 creation periods.....
We do know that on the 7th God rested. We just dont know what actual day the 7th was on.
We also know .... in King Jimmy's translation that Gen 2 says:
And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.
3And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
No one argues that. I question why Gen 1:2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters
was on a Sunday. If it was.
We also do not know if possibly God when said to work 6 days and the 7th Sabbath rest and worship that it could apply to any stretch of 6 days and the 7th would be holy for us.
Do you think the Lord Jesus Christ did not know which was the first day of the week, or the seventh day sabbath? Have Christians and Jews lost track of the seventh day or first day over time? People can't have it both ways. If we do not know when the seventh day is, then we do not know when the first day is either. The supposed Lord's day of Sunday keepers has no meaning therefore as well.
God made the seven day week official at creation, and His people have maintained it ever since. When He established His nation of Israel, He established the seven day week again, and His holy sabbath. When our Lord Jesus came and established truth, He confirmed the seventh day sabbath once again. Or do you think God forgot which day it was?
: Amo Mon May 13, 2024 - 21:15:38Do you think the Lord Jesus Christ did not know which was the first day of the week, or the seventh day sabbath? Have Christians and Jews lost track of the seventh day or first day over time? People can't have it both ways. If we do not know when the seventh day is, then we do not know when the first day is either. The supposed Lord's day of Sunday keepers has no meaning therefore as well.
God made the seven day week official at creation, and His people have maintained it ever since. When He established His nation of Israel, He established the seven day week again, and His holy sabbath. When our Lord Jesus came and established truth, He confirmed the seventh day sabbath once again. Or do you think God forgot which day it was?
Can you prove to me that 6000 some years ago that from 6PM last night to 6PM this evening could not have been the day that....1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 The earth was [a]formless and void, and darkness was over the
surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was [c]moving over the [d]surface of the waters. 3 Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light. 4 God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light day, and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.
WE KNOW that there was a day one. We also know that the days of the week were not named for a very long time...
from above...
https://www.historyandheadlines.com › when-did-people-start-naming-days-of-the-week
When Did People Start Naming Days of the Week?
Christian Roman Emperor Constantine made the seven day week official in AD 321, complete with names for the days, a date that can be used for the "official" start of naming the days of the week.
Also: from above
Hutton Webster, in his book Rest Days, provides the answer: "The early Christians had at first adopted the Jewish seven-day week with its numbered weekdays,
Also: from above
Whatever the case, the Ancient Romans, during the Republic, did not use a seven day week, but rather went with eight days. One "eighth day" of every week was set aside as a shopping day where people would buy and sell things, particularly buying food supplies for the following week.
Rather than labeling the days of the week with actual names, at this time the Romans labeled them with letters, A-H. You might think from this that the "H" was always the shopping day, but this isn't correct. You see, the calendar year did not divide evenly by eight. Thus, the day of the week that was the day to go shopping changed every year, but they still often referred to days based on its proximity to the shopping day.
For reasons not entirely clear, within a century after the introduction of the Julian Calendar was introduced in 46 BC, the eight day week started to diminish in popularity in favor of the seven day week. The full switch was not sudden, happening over centuries, and for a time, as the seven day week grew in popularity, both the seven and eight day weeks were used in Rome simultaneously. Finally, after the popularity of the eight day week diminished to almost nothing, Constantine, the first Christian Roman Emperor, made the seven day week official in AD 321. Due to the influence of both Rome and Christianity, this has stuck in most regions of the world ever since.
I have been spending an excruciating amount of time recently in study of calendars to actually.... (never mind, it is a subject for another time) But I can tell you there were not just one calendar of the day... there was enough to make the pinpointing of a day vary so that it is purely guess work and speckulation on ... well, lets say, for example the exact years Herod died and Jesus was born.
Some fun facts:
https://www.webexhibits.org/calendars/year-history.html
As a result, it wasn't until 1582, by which time Caesar's calendar had drifted a full 10 days off course, that Pope Gregory XIII (1502 - 1585) finally reformed the Julian calendar. Ironically, by the time the Catholic church buckled under the weight of the scientific reasoning that pointed out the error, it had lost much of its power to implement the fix. Protestant tract writers responded to Gregory's calendar by calling him the "Roman Antichrist" and claiming that its real purpose was to keep true Christians from worshiping on the correct days. The "new" calendar, as we know it today, was not adopted uniformly across Europe until well into the 18th century.
https://acearchive.org/history-of-calendars
One such structure is the Wurdi Youang stone arrangement found in Victoria, Australia. The site could date back more than 11,000 years and is believed to have been used for tracking the movements of the sun. While the estimate is based on the inaccuracy of the calendar, which is consistent with how the Earth's supposed orbit is thought to have changed during that time, it is still a remarkable example of prehistoric timekeeping.
Interesting.... we have time keeping before Adam walked in the garden...... LOVE it ::inlove::
In Bulgaria, a ceramic artifact known as the Slatino furnace model has been hailed as the oldest known calendar representation. Dating back to roughly 5,000 BC, the artifact depicts what is believed to be a lunar calendar, although this claim is not endorsed by mainstream views.
In Scotland, a mesolithic arrangement of twelve pits and an arc was discovered in Warren Field, Aberdeenshire. Dating back to roughly 8,000 BC, the arrangement has been described as a lunar calendar and was dubbed the "world's oldest known calendar" in 2013. This discovery has led to a rethinking of the technological and intellectual capabilities of prehistoric societies.
The Vučedol culture archaeological findings in Vinkovci, modern-day Croatia, included a ceramic vessel dated to 2,600 BC that was interpreted as an astral calendar. The vessel bears inscribed ideograms of celestial objects and is considered the oldest one in Europe that shows the year starting at the dusk of the first day of spring.
___________-
Most of these are long after creation....
In my studies recently there are those who have their calendars over lapping with each other... and depending on who you are or lived... they will be different.
Two of the papers I have recently read on the birth of Jesus... which of course is only guess work like the others
state definitively
the Messiah was born just before the close of the Sabbath on Nisan 1, March 20, 6 BC.
yet another claims
We can be relatively certain, therefore, that Jesus must have been born sometime between the ith month of Saturninus' term as governor of Syria in 8 bc, and the ith month of 7 bc, still during Saturninus' term, given that governors arrived in their provinces at the beginning of each year.
So if there is confusion about a 2000 year old event that actually had a calendar of the time...
HOW can you be so sure that DAY1 was Sunday and the Sabbath was Saturday (Fri-Sat) not today?
You cannot.....
: Rella Tue May 14, 2024 - 08:05:32HOW can you be so sure that DAY1 was Sunday and the Sabbath was Saturday (Fri-Sat) not today?
You cannot.....
"Sabbath" is just Hebrew for "7th." I reckon we can know for sure that the 7th day was the 7th day. ::lookaround::
But that is an issue for Sabbatarians. They want a special day with a special name, but the reality is it's quite generic.
If you read "7th" throughout your Bible rather than "sabbath" - and you should - then the commandment is much less strict. Any 7th day will work - whether it's a Saturday or Sunday or even a Wednesday - as long as you do it regularly every 7th day.
: Wycliffes_Shillelagh Tue May 14, 2024 - 14:58:13"Sabbath" is just Hebrew for "7th." I reckon we can know for sure that the 7th day was the 7th day. ::lookaround::
But that is an issue for Sabbatarians. They want a special day with a special name, but the reality is it's quite generic.
If you read "7th" throughout your Bible rather than "sabbath" - and you should - then the commandment is much less strict. Any 7th day will work - whether it's a Saturday or Sunday or even a Wednesday - as long as you do it regularly every 7th day.
Exactly.
Most Cnristian's give special status to the first day of the week or Sunday or as they call it "the Lord's Day. There is no more credence to that than what Jarod described the 7th day. Might it be ANY First day as one finds his circumstances to be? I don't buy that the Sabbath was nust ANY 7th day as we see fit anymore than Sunday having the same flexibiility.
: Jaime Wed May 15, 2024 - 11:22:55Most Christian's give special status to the first day of the week or Sunday or as they call it "the Lord's Day. There is no more credence to that than what Jarod described the 7th day. Might it be ANY First day as one finds his circumstances to be?
I don't buy that the Sabbath was just ANY 7th day as we see fit anymore than Sunday having the same flexibility.
Is Sunday-observance the same as Sabbath-rest? I don't think they are. They certainly didn't start out to be...
The Mosaic commandment for Sabbath was a worker's right. The intention was that employees would not be worked to death. This intention is upheld when one rests every 7th day, regardless of which day you rest. This is what I said previously.
The New Testament practice of observing The Lord's Day was NOT for rest. It was for the church's business - the collection and distribution of alms being the chief one.
While the day officially coincides with the day of the Lord's resurrection, the timing was chosen specifically so that it would compete with the pagan practice of Market Day. The Greeks and Romans assembled at the town center on the 1st day of the week to sell their goods, including the meats-sacrificed-to-idols that Paul addresses at some length. By meeting outside the city, the church assured that its members couldn't attend market day and limited the purchase of idol-meat and other items dedicated to demons, with the happy side-effect of causing them to give business to each other.
Today, we still have a two-day weekend, with one day being for rest (Saturday) and one for assembling the brethren (Sunday). Give each day its due, and let's not confuse the two of them.
I go with God setting a weekly "date night" so to interact with his beloved people, natural branches and grafted on branches of His olive tree; an appointed time, as He calls it, and not intended in any way as a burden, but a delight. The Pharisees had corrupted the Sabbath into a burden much like they did with the rest of Torah. Jesus's Sermon on the Mount in Mathew 5 brought the Torah back into proper perspective, inclusive of the Spirit of the Law like God intended and not just the LETTER of the Law.
In Isaiah 58:
13 "If you turn back your foot from the Sabbath,
from doing your pleasure[c] on my holy day,
and call the Sabbath a delight
and the holy day of the Lord honorable;
if you honor it, not going your own ways,
or seeking your own pleasure,[d] or talking idly;[e]
14 then you shall take delight in the Lord,
and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth;[f]
I will feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father,
for the mouth of the Lord has spoken."
In Mark 2:
27 And he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. 28 So the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath."
It's God's day. Kinda like OUR date nights with our spouse.
Are we (Gentiles) grafted in to The Law?
No.
Was Isaiah written to us (Gentiles grafted in)?
No. Though certainly there for edification and knowledge of God's story.
Was the Sermon on the Mount delivered specifically to us (Gentiles grafted in)?
Again, no.
The early church met together with each other on the 1st day. And this happened in the church in Jerusalem in the beginning and in the churches with Gentiles.
If you want to meet on Friday night or in the day on Saturday (1st day), go right ahead. Fulfill what your conscience tells you.
However, the reasoning given is not accurate. Context and intended audience matter.
The sermon on the Mount was Jesus correct the Pharisees. faulty interpretation of the Law. Hes my reasons are accurate. We are grafted into the people of God, the israel of God.
The Isaiah passage points out that the Sabbath was meant for a delight motburden. GOD's and OUR delight. It is God's day. His appointed time. AND Jesus is the Lord of that Day, His, the Lord's Day.
I also encourage you to meet when your conscience dictates.
Also many met on tbe Sabbath in the first century. I don't believe the case for Sunday is at all strong. In Acts 2 they were meeting every day breaking bread in rach other's homes. Yoo do what you think is right and I and others will do what we think is right.
The last thing I wanted was to argue about it, but present a perspective of the date night since that perspective affected my understanding of the Sabbath fairly recently. HSimilar to my recent understanding that Sinai was a wedding ceremony with vows etc. and even a wedding feast. I had missed that most of my life as I had missed about the grafted in part that was ommitted my whole life in the cofc because of their insistance that Romans 9-11 was a paranthetic passage aside from the real lesson of Romans, so it was never included in any series on Romans. I can only assume that was a result of antisemitic thinking of that day.
I have met with other Christians on Saturday, and now do it on Sunday morning. And Wednesdays, if not at other times. I regard each day of the week for those not under the law to be the same (Colossians 2).
Romans 9-11 were taught and are taught in my brotherhood.
I do not believe that God's promises to physical Israel were discarded once the church came into existence.
I also lean more towards God choosing than the "free will" position because God clearly says He chooses and that we are spiritually dead up until the time the Holy Spirit draws us. And I believe the draw of the Holy Spirit is not just the arrival of the bible, and someone telling us the gospel.
I don't believe God's special day was changed., except by the Catholics which most of Christianity inherited that decision. If it had changed in the Bible, it would be MUCH clearer and not at all as stealthy of a notion as it seems to me.
We argue about the purpose of baptism, and to me the purpose of Sabbath is a whole lot clearer.
: Jaime Thu May 16, 2024 - 15:11:01I don't believe God's special day was changed., except by the Catholics which most of Christianity inherited that decision. If it had changed in the Bible, it would be MUCH clearer and not at all as stealthy of a notion as it seems to me.
We argue aboit the pirposr of baptism, and to me the Sabbath is a whole lot clearer.
You are arguing against something I didn't say.
Sabbath = Friday evening to Saturday evening. Always has been.
However, we are not under The Law as Christians.
I am not just addressing you but anyone reading my comments about the Sabbath.
The Sabbath was pre-mosaic law. God's Law is the 10 commandments and not just 9 are eternal in my opinion. The ceremonial law of sacrifices and such was nailed to the cross. i believe we are not under the law of sin and death as Christians.
: Rella Tue May 14, 2024 - 08:05:32Can you prove to me that 6000 some years ago that from 6PM last night to 6PM this evening could not have been the day that....1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 The earth was [a]formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was [c]moving over the [d]surface of the waters. 3 Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light. 4 God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light day, and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.
WE KNOW that there was a day one. We also know that the days of the week were not named for a very long time...
from above...
https://www.historyandheadlines.com › when-did-people-start-naming-days-of-the-week
When Did People Start Naming Days of the Week?
Christian Roman Emperor Constantine made the seven day week official in AD 321, complete with names for the days, a date that can be used for the "official" start of naming the days of the week.
Also: from above
Hutton Webster, in his book Rest Days, provides the answer: "The early Christians had at first adopted the Jewish seven-day week with its numbered weekdays,
Also: from above
Whatever the case, the Ancient Romans, during the Republic, did not use a seven day week, but rather went with eight days. One "eighth day" of every week was set aside as a shopping day where people would buy and sell things, particularly buying food supplies for the following week.
Rather than labeling the days of the week with actual names, at this time the Romans labeled them with letters, A-H. You might think from this that the "H" was always the shopping day, but this isn't correct. You see, the calendar year did not divide evenly by eight. Thus, the day of the week that was the day to go shopping changed every year, but they still often referred to days based on its proximity to the shopping day.
For reasons not entirely clear, within a century after the introduction of the Julian Calendar was introduced in 46 BC, the eight day week started to diminish in popularity in favor of the seven day week. The full switch was not sudden, happening over centuries, and for a time, as the seven day week grew in popularity, both the seven and eight day weeks were used in Rome simultaneously. Finally, after the popularity of the eight day week diminished to almost nothing, Constantine, the first Christian Roman Emperor, made the seven day week official in AD 321. Due to the influence of both Rome and Christianity, this has stuck in most regions of the world ever since.
I have been spending an excruciating amount of time recently in study of calendars to actually.... (never mind, it is a subject for another time) But I can tell you there were not just one calendar of the day... there was enough to make the pinpointing of a day vary so that it is purely guess work and speckulation on ... well, lets say, for example the exact years Herod died and Jesus was born.
Some fun facts:
https://www.webexhibits.org/calendars/year-history.html
As a result, it wasn't until 1582, by which time Caesar's calendar had drifted a full 10 days off course, that Pope Gregory XIII (1502 - 1585) finally reformed the Julian calendar. Ironically, by the time the Catholic church buckled under the weight of the scientific reasoning that pointed out the error, it had lost much of its power to implement the fix. Protestant tract writers responded to Gregory's calendar by calling him the "Roman Antichrist" and claiming that its real purpose was to keep true Christians from worshiping on the correct days. The "new" calendar, as we know it today, was not adopted uniformly across Europe until well into the 18th century.
https://acearchive.org/history-of-calendars
One such structure is the Wurdi Youang stone arrangement found in Victoria, Australia. The site could date back more than 11,000 years and is believed to have been used for tracking the movements of the sun. While the estimate is based on the inaccuracy of the calendar, which is consistent with how the Earth's supposed orbit is thought to have changed during that time, it is still a remarkable example of prehistoric timekeeping.
Interesting.... we have time keeping before Adam walked in the garden...... LOVE it ::inlove::
In Bulgaria, a ceramic artifact known as the Slatino furnace model has been hailed as the oldest known calendar representation. Dating back to roughly 5,000 BC, the artifact depicts what is believed to be a lunar calendar, although this claim is not endorsed by mainstream views.
In Scotland, a mesolithic arrangement of twelve pits and an arc was discovered in Warren Field, Aberdeenshire. Dating back to roughly 8,000 BC, the arrangement has been described as a lunar calendar and was dubbed the "world's oldest known calendar" in 2013. This discovery has led to a rethinking of the technological and intellectual capabilities of prehistoric societies.
The Vučedol culture archaeological findings in Vinkovci, modern-day Croatia, included a ceramic vessel dated to 2,600 BC that was interpreted as an astral calendar. The vessel bears inscribed ideograms of celestial objects and is considered the oldest one in Europe that shows the year starting at the dusk of the first day of spring.
___________-
Most of these are long after creation....
In my studies recently there are those who have their calendars over lapping with each other... and depending on who you are or lived... they will be different.
Two of the papers I have recently read on the birth of Jesus... which of course is only guess work like the others
state definitively
the Messiah was born just before the close of the Sabbath on Nisan 1, March 20, 6 BC.
yet another claims
We can be relatively certain, therefore, that Jesus must have been born sometime between the ith month of Saturninus' term as governor of Syria in 8 bc, and the ith month of 7 bc, still during Saturninus' term, given that governors arrived in their provinces at the beginning of each year.
So if there is confusion about a 2000 year old event that actually had a calendar of the time...
HOW can you be so sure that DAY1 was Sunday and the Sabbath was Saturday (Fri-Sat) not today?
You cannot.....
It seems the source of your troubles in this area, is akin to those of the evolutionary faith. In that they are basing what they believe upon extra biblical authority or histories above the testimony of scripture. As though they were more accurate or trustworthy. The matter does not concern what kind of weekly cycle pagans or others kept or not. It concerns the weekly cycle clearly delineated in the holy scriptures, and or if, God's own ever lost track of that seven day weekly cycle. Leading to the conclusion that it now no longer matters which day we observe as God's holy Sabbath.
According to biblical history of course, we have not. Neither have we according to the history of Christianity in general, and in relation to paganism. As already stated on this thread, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ who was and is God, did not keep the wrong seventh day sabbath. Neither have the Jews or Christians lost track of which day is God's sabbath, or the first or seventh day of the week. To the contrary, these two days have been points of interest and or contention throughout history to date. We have not lost track of their proper places in, or the weekly cycle.
The following quote is from the link provided above it. It was provided in the OP of this thread years ago. According to it, we can know which day is the first or Sunday, by the attention drawn to it all throughout history to the present. This attention being unavoidable for all citizens of various empires and nations, due to the great many Sunday laws in existence since the Roman Empire, both of pagan and "Christian" origin and or intent. Knowing which day the first day or Sunday has been since that time, we of course know then also, which has continued to be the seventh day.
http://www.archive.org/stream/sundaylegislat00lewi#page/n3/mode/2up
Sunday legislation began in the Pagan State Church of the Roman Empire, as the following pages show. To the Romans religion was only a department of civil government. The emperor had absolute power to appoint days in honor of the gods, and the first Sunday edict was purely Pasran in honor of the Sun God. Much of the genius of the Roman Empire passed into the first great State Church — the Roman Catholic. Legislation touching Sunday and many associate days was a prominent feature in the history of that Church through the centuries of its supremacy in Europe. The reformers of the sixteenth century continued such legislation. Puritanism invented a new religious theory of Sunday observance and supported it by rigid civil laws. These were fully enforced under the Theocracy of the Colonial Period in America. From that time to the present the evolution of Sunday legislation in the United States has gone forward rapidly, and the following verdicts now demand consideration :
The successful enforcement of Sunday legislation has never been attained except when men have had conscientious regard for it because imposed by the State Church, as under Roman Catholic rule, or because of divine authority believed to be embodied in the civil law, as under Cromwell and in the New England Theocracy.
(2) The evolution of Sunday legislation under the State-Church system in Europe has resulted in the " Continental Sunday." That result was inevitable.
(3) Christians and non-Christians now agree that Sunday laws can not be enforced on religious grounds ; nevertheless, the Sunday laws continue to be self-contradictory by making things which are intrinsically good and desirable up to tAvelve o'clock on Saturday night criminal for the next twenty-four hours. A law which makes it a crime not to be idle for a specific number of hours in each week can not stand the tests of logic and common sense in this tAventieth century.
(4) Enforced idleness, under Sunday laws, strengthens the saloon and the brothel, and makes Sunday their best harvest-time. This is one reason why the saloon seeks for legalized opening.
(5) The Avorst evils of the present time Avill continue and increase until idleness on Sunday is made permissive and not compulsory.
pelling all men to be idle on a given day, when religious convictions do not demand idleness, fosters the lower types of holidayism and debauchery. The situation in New York city is an index of the situation in all our larger cities.
(6) Two alternatives are at the door, and the American people must choose between them :
(a) The strengthening and perpetuating of the liquor traffic and its associate evils, through the present system of compulsory idleness on Sundays, and legalized saloons on all other days.
(b) A new departure which will secure permissive and protected rest to each employed person for one day in the week, the day being determined by the employed person and the employer. Meanwhile, legislation touching the liquor traffic should separate that traffic from all other forms of business.
(7) These are some of the verdicts which history has recorded concerning Sunday legislation ; prayers and politics will strive in vain to evade them or the logical results yet to follow.
We can see and understand the same truth verified from the above histories regarding Sunday legislation, in examining the history of the seventh day sabbath observance of Jews and Christians to date as well. As there have been seventh day sabbath keepers all throughout history since the Roman Empire as well. We have not lost track of the proper place of these chosen and observed holy days since the time of Christ our Lord, who unquestionably observed the proper seventh day sabbath of holy scripture. I will repost the histories of seventh day sabbath observance on this thread again as time provides.
: Texas Conservative Thu May 16, 2024 - 16:07:05You are arguing against something I didn't say.
Sabbath = Friday evening to Saturday evening. Always has been.
However, we are not under The Law as Christians.
Will you declare the same about the other ten commandments, to the effect that they are not longer to be kept by Christians? If not, why not? If so, are you declaring that there is no longer sin in the world to be avoided by Christians?
1Jn 3:4 Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.
: Amo Sat May 18, 2024 - 07:03:30Will you declare the same about the other ten commandments, to the effect that they are not longer to be kept by Christians? If not, why not? If so, are you declaring that there is no longer sin in the world to be avoided by Christians?
1Jn 3:4 Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.
The commandment concerning the sabbath is the only one of the ten that is not repeated in one form or another in the NT. And beyond that, Paul spoke out against passing judgment in questions with regard to the sabbath (Col 2:16).
: 4WD Sat May 18, 2024 - 07:48:46The commandment concerning the sabbath is the only one of the ten that is not repeated in one form or another in the NT. And beyond that, Paul spoke out against passing judgment in questions with regard to the sabbath (Col 2:16).
Wouldn't the admonition to the gentile church at Colossi have been to remind the gentiles there not to judge those that keep the Sabbath or eat Kosher instead of the other way around?
Personally I like this quote from the link provided:
In addition to being God's appointment (appointed) time with us,
As followers of Jesus, God does not expect us to live by Israel's laws. However, the wisdom of these laws remains, and the law of the Sabbath is rich with significance for us today. Sabbath is not a commandment we are bound to; it's a promise we're invited to enjoy.
Sabbath rest is an invitation to practice for eternity in God's presence. It is an act of regular and intentional trust of God's rule on Earth. We shabbat in order to nuakh—when we stop working, we can truly rest in God's presence. When we practice this purposeful pause, we make room for God to take up residence in our individual lives and communities. And when we do this, we take part in the new creation story, setting the stage for God to make his dwelling place once again on Earth.
https://bibleproject.com/articles/keeping-the-sabbath-is-it-still-relevant-to-christians-today/#:~:text=Sabbath%20is%20not%20a%20commandment,of%20God's%20rule%20on%20Earth. (https://bibleproject.com/articles/keeping-the-sabbath-is-it-still-relevant-to-christians-today/#:~:text=Sabbath%20is%20not%20a%20commandment,of%20God's%20rule%20on%20Earth.)
: 4WD Sat May 18, 2024 - 07:48:46The commandment concerning the sabbath is the only one of the ten that is not repeated in one form or another in the NT. And beyond that, Paul spoke out against passing judgment in questions with regard to the sabbath (Col 2:16).
The sabbath is mentioned 50 times in the gospels of the King James version. Much of this in relation to controversy between our Lord Jesus Christ who declared Himself Lord of the sabbath, concerning the sabbath's proper observance. Our Lord never hinted at anything like an end to sabbath observance or an end to any of the Ten Commandments of God. The bible and New Testament admonish all to keep the commandments of God right up to the last book and chapter.
Once again, here you are suggesting biblical doctrine built upon what scripture does not say anywhere, rather than that which it does plainly state. Your false contention that the sabbath of God need not be kept anymore because there is not an exact quote of the commandment in the New Testament, is contradicted by the following conclusive statement by our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you,
Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.Mat 12:1 At that time Jesus went on the sabbath day through the corn; and his disciples were an hungred, and began to pluck the ears of corn, and to eat. 2 But when the Pharisees saw it, they said unto him, Behold, thy disciples do that which is not lawful to do upon the sabbath day. 3 But he said unto them, Have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungred, and they that were with him; 4 How he entered into the house of God, and did eat the shewbread, which was not lawful for him to eat, neither for them which were with him, but only for the priests? 5 Or have ye not read in the law, how that on the sabbath days the priests in the temple profane the sabbath, and are blameless? 6 But I say unto you, That in this place is one greater than the temple. 7 But if ye had known what this meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless.
8 For the Son of man is Lord even of the sabbath day. 9 And when he was departed thence, he went into their synagogue: 10 And, behold, there was a man which had his hand withered. And they asked him, saying, Is it lawful to heal on the sabbath days? that they might accuse him. 11 And he said unto them, What man shall there be among you, that shall have one sheep, and if it fall into a pit on the sabbath day, will he not lay hold on it, and lift it out? 12 How much then is a man better than a sheep?
Wherefore it is lawful to do well on the sabbath days. 13 Then saith he to the man, Stretch forth thine hand. And he stretched it forth; and it was restored whole, like as the other. 14 Then the Pharisees went out, and held a council against him, how they might destroy him.
Your use of Col 2:16 as proof that the fourth commandment is no more, has been addressed many times already on these boards. The fourth commandment of God, spoken by His own mouth and written with His own finger, reaffirmed by Christ Jesus our Lord who declared Himself the Lord of the sabbath, does not fit into the category or context of laws being addressed by Paul in those verse. Which Paul declares to be about commandments and doctrines of men. It is about the ceremonial laws and sabbaths which were but a shadow of the truth in Christ Jesus our Lord, written by the hand of Moses and others later. Not the commandments of God which the New Testament admonishes all to keep up to the last book and chapter, which Paul himself also admonishes all to keep in his testimonies.
Col 2:16 Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: 17 Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ. 18 Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels, intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, 19 And not holding the Head, from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God. 20 Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances,
21 (Touch not; taste not; handle not; 22 Which all are to perish with the using;) after the commandments and doctrines of men?
http://www.projectrestore.com/library/timejoy/tjoych11.htm
Quotes below from link above.
1ST CENTURY AD
"For almost all churches throughout the world celebrate the sacred mysteries [Lord's supper] on the Sabbath of every week." Socrates Scholasticus, Eccl. History
"Then the spiritual seed of Abraham [Christians] fled to Pella, on the other side of Jordan, where they found a safe place of refuge, and could serve their Master and keep His Sabbath." Eusebius's Ecclesiastical History.
Philo, the philosopher and historian, affirms that this Sabbath was on the seventh-day of the week.
2ND CENTURY
"The primitive Christians had a great veneration for the Sabbath, and spent the day in devotion and sermons... They derived this practice from the Apostles themselves, as appears by several scriptures to that purpose." D. T H. Morer (Church of England) Dialogues on the Lord's Day, London, 1701.
2ND, 3RD, 4TH CENTURIES
"From the apostles' time until the Council of Laodicea [364 AD], the holy observation of the Jews' Sabbath continued, as may be proved out of many authors: yea, notwithstanding the decree of the council against it." John Ley, Sunday A Sabbath, London, 1640.
3RD CENTURY
"As early as 225 A.D. there existed large Sabbath-keeping bishoprics or conferences of the Church of the East stretching from Palestine to India." Mingana, Early Spread of Christianity.
4TH CENTURY
"In the church of Milan (Italy) it seems that the Saturday was held in a fair esteem. Not that the Eastern churches or any of the rest which observed that day, were inclined to Judaism; but that they came together on the Sabbath day to worship Jesus the Lord of the Sabbath." Dr. Peter Heylyn, History of the Sabbath, London, 1636.
"For more than 17 centuries the Abyssinian Church continued to sanctify Saturday as the holy day of the 4th commandment." Ambrose de Morbius.
"Ambrose, the celebrated bishop of Milan, said that when he was in Milan he observed Saturday, but when in Rome observed Sunday. This gave rise to the proverb, 'When you are in Rome, do as Rome does."' Heylyn, History of the Sabbath
Persia 335-375 A.D. "They [the Christians] despise our sun-god. Did not Zoroaster, the sainted founder of our divine beliefs, institute Sunday one thousand years ago in honor of the sun and supplant the Sabbath of the Old Testament? Yet these Christians have divine services on Saturday." O'Leary, The Syriac Church and Fathers.
5TH CENTURY
"Augustine [whose testimony is made the more impressive by his being a committed Sunday-keeper] shows.. that the [seventh-day] Sabbath was observed in his day 'in the greater part of the Christian world."' Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 1st series, voL 1, pp. 353, 354
"Down even to the fifth century the observance of the Jewish Sabbath was continued in the Christian church." Lyman Coleman, Ancient Christianity Exemplified , p. 526.
"In 411 [Mingana, leader of the Eastern Churches] appointed a metropolitan director for China. These churches were sanctifying the seventh day." J. F. Colthart, The Sabbath Through The Centuries, p. 11.
6TH CENTURY
"In this latter instance they [the Scottish Church] seem to have foflowed a custom of which we find traces in the early monastic church of Ireland by which they held Saturday to be the Sabbath on which they rested from all their labors." W. T. Skene, Adamnan's Lfe of St. Columba, 1874, p. 96.
On Columba of lona: "Having continued his labors in Scotland thirty-four years, he clearly and openly foretold his death, and on Saturday, June ninth, said to his disciple Diermit: 'This is the day called the Sabbath, that is, the rest day, and such it will truly be to me; for it will put an end to my labors."' Butler's Lives of the Saints, article on "St. Columba."
7TH CENTURY
"It seems to have been customary in the Celtic churches of early times, in Ireland as well as Scotland, to keep Saturday ... as a day of rest from labor. They obeyed the fourth commandment literally on the seventh day of the week." Jas. C. Moffatt, The Chutch In Scotland.
From Gregory I, Pope of Rome 590-604: "Roman citizens: It has come to me that certain men of perverse spirit have disserninated among you things depraved and opposed to the holy faith, so that they forbid anything to be done on the day of the Sabbath. What shall I call them except preachers of anti-christ?"
8TH CENTURY
India, China, Persia, etc. "Widespread and enduring was the observance of the seventh-day Sabbath among the believers of the Church of the East and the St. Thomas Christians of India, who never were connected with Rome. It was also maintained among those bodies which broke off from Rome after the Council of Chalcedon, namely the Abyssinians, the Jacobites, the Marionites, and the Armenians." New Schaff Hertog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, article "Nestorians."
"On the seventh day we offer sacrifices, after having purified our hearts, and receive absolution for our sins. This religion, so perfect and so excellent, is difficult to name, but it enlightens darkness by its brilliant precepts." China, 781 A.D. The China Monument
9TH CENTURY
"Pope Nicholas I, in the ninth century, sent the ruling prince of Bulgaria a long document saying in it that one is to cease from work on Sunday, but not on the Sabbath. The head of the Greek Church, offended at the interference of the papacy, declared the Pope excommunicated." B. G. Wilkinson, Ph.D., Truth Triumphant, p. 232.
10TH CENTURY
"The Nestorians eat no pork and keep the Sabbath. They believe neither in auricular confession nor purgatory." New Schaff Hertog Encyclopedia, article, "Nestorians."
11TH CENTURY
"Margaret of Scotland in 1060 attempted to bring ruin to Columba's spiritual descendants by moving against those who observed the seventh-day Sabbath instead of Sunday." Reported by T. R. Barnett in Margaret of Scotland; Queen and Saint, p. 97.
Concerning the separation of the Greek Church from the Latin Church in 1054: "The observance of the Saturday, is, as everyone knows, the subject of bitter dispute between the Greeks and the Latins." J.M. Neale, A History of the Holy Eastern Church, voL 1, p. 731.
12TH CENTURY
"Traces of Sabbath-keepers are found in.. the twelfth century in Lombardy."Strong's Encyclopedia.
On the Waldenses of 1120: "Observance of the Sabbath.. is enjoined." Blair, History of the Waldenses, vol.1, p. 220.
France: "For twenty years Peter de Bruys stirred southern France. He especially emphasized a day of worship that was recognized at that time among the Celtic churches of the British Isles, among the Paulicians, and in the great Church of the east, namely, that seventh day of the fourth commandment." Coltheart; p. 18
13TH CENTURY
"Canons Against Sabbathkeepers, Council of Toulouse, 1229: Canon 3. The lords of the different districts shall have the villas, houses, and woods diligently searched, and the hiding places of the heretics destroyed. Canon 4. Lay members are not allowed to possess the books of either the Old or the New Testaments:" Hefele.
"The Paulicians, Petrobusians, Passaginians, Waldenses, Insabbatati were great Sabbath-keeping bodies of Europe down to 1250." Coltheart, p. 19.
14TH CENTURY
"In 1310, two hundred years before Luther's theses, the Bohemian brethren constituted one-fourth of the population of Bohemia, and were in touch with the Waldenses who abounded in Austria, Lombardy, Bohemia, north Germany, Thuringia, Brandenburg, and Moravia. Erasmus pointed out how strictly Bohemian Waldenses kept the seventh day Sabbath." Robert Cox, The Literature of the Sabbath Question, vol.2, pp. 201, 202.
Norway: "Also the priests have caused the people to keep Saturdays as Sundays." Theological Periodicals For the Evangelical Church in Norway," vol.1, p. 184.
15TH CENTURY
"Erasmus testifies that even as late as about 1500 these Bohemians not only kept the seventh day scrupulously, but were also called Sabbatarians." R. Cox. op. cit.
Norway, Catholic Provincial Council at Bergen, 1435: "We are informed that some people in different districts of the kingdom, have adopted and observed Sabbath-keeping. It is severely forbidden -- in holy church canon -- one and all to observe holy days excepting those which the holy Pope, archbishop, or bishops command. Saturday-keeping must under no circumstances be permitted hereafter further than the church canon cornmands. Therefore we counsel all the friends of God throughout Norway who want to be obedient towards the holy church to let this evil of Saturday-keeping alone; and the rest we forbid under penalty of severe church punishment to keep Saturday holy." Dip. Norveg., 7, 397.
16TH CENTURY
Norway, 1544: "Some of you, contrary to the warning, keep Saturday. You ought to be severely punished. Whoever shall be found keeping Saturday must pay a fine of ten marks." Krag and Stephanius, History of King Christian III.
Liechtenstein: "The Sabbatarians teach that the outward Sabbath, i.e., Saturday, must still be observed. They say that Sunday [as the weekly day of worship] is the Pope's invention." Wolfgang Capito, Refutation of the Sabbath, c. 1590.
India: "The famous Jesuit, Francis Xavier, called for the Inquisition, which was set up in Goa, India. in 1560, to check 'the Jewish wickedness, Sabbath-keeping."' Adeney, The Greek and Eastern Churches, pp. 527, 528.
Abyssinia: "It is not in imitation of the Jews, but in obedience to Christ and His holy apostles, that we observe that day [the Sabbath]." From an Abyssinian legate at the court of Lisbon, 1534, quoted in Geddes's Church History of Ethiopia, pp. 87, 88.
17TH CENTURY
"About 100 Sabbath keeping churches, mostly independent, flourished in England in the 17th and 18th centuries." Dr. Brian W. Ball, The Seventh-Day Men, Sabbatarians and Sabbatarianism in England and Wales, 1600-1800, Clarendon Press, Oxford University, 1994.
[Editor's note: The Sabbath was also kept in various parts of Europe and America.]
18TH CENTURY
Germany: "Tennhardt of Nuremberg holds strictly to the doctrine of the Sabbath, because it is one of the ten commandments." J.A. Bengel, Lehen und Wirken, p. 579.
"Before Zinzendorf and the Moravians at Bethlehem [Pennsylvania] thus began the observance of the Sabbath and prospered, there was a small body of German Sabbath-keepers in Pennsylvania." Rupp, History of the Religious Denominations in the United States.
"The Abyssinians and many continental Europeans, especially in Romania, Bohemia, Moravia, Holland and Germany continued to keep the Sabbath. Wherever the church of Rome predominated these Sabbatarians suffered confiscation of property, fines, imprisonment and execution." Coltheart, p. 26.
19TH CENTURY
China: "The Taipings when asked why they observed the seventh-day Sabbath, replied that it was, first, because the Bible taught it, and second, because their ancestors observed it as a day of worship." "A Critical History of Sabbath and Sunday."
"Thus we see Dan. 7:25 fulfilled, the little horn changing 'times and laws.' Therefore it appears to me that all who keep the first day for the sabbath are the Pope's Sunday-keepers and God's Sabbath-breakers." T.M. Preble, American Seventh Day Baptist, 1845.
http://adventmessenger.org/protestants-call-on-the-ni-football-league-to-stop-organizing-games-on-sundays-to-avoid-desecrating-the-sabbath-and-discriminating-against-christians/
Quoted article below from link above. My comments in blue.
Protestants Call on the NI Football League to Stop Organizing Games on Sundays to Avoid Desecrating the Sabbath and Discriminating Against Christians
In many places where the church possesses significant political power, it will often use its influence to advocate for laws that protect what they call the sanctity of Sunday as a day of rest and worship. Such efforts seek to encourage people to focus on religious activities and family time rather than secular pursuits and sports. Historically, these laws were based on religious traditions and reflected the social and moral values of the past. While such laws have gradually relaxed over the years, there is a movement underway that is seeking to reintroduce Sunday into society.
On June 5, 2024, the Belfast News Letter Today published an article titled "Free Presbyterian Church Accuses Northern Ireland Football League of Anti-Christian 'Discrimination' for Staging Matches on Sunday" that called for an end to the desecration of Sunday. In other words, playing football on Sunday violates both the Sabbath and discriminates against Christians, neither of which is true.
The Belfast News Letter Today published the following:
• "The Free Presbyterian Church has written to the NI Football League (NIFL) to complain that it is discriminating against practicing Christians by staging matches on the Sabbath."
• "The letter says ... 'We, in keeping with the historic position of Protestant Churches hold Sunday to be the Christian Sabbath'."
• "We hold it to be a special day and a day that is marked by the worship of God and rest and it has been kept this way by thousands of evangelical Christians for hundreds of years."
• "Now, however, with Premiership football matches to be held on Sunday NIFL are robbing Christian fans of the opportunity of supporting their team from week to week and they are closing the door for Christian footballers to be able to play in the top league in Northern Ireland."
• "In a day when we are being told that there should be equal opportunities for all, this does not seem to include evangelical Christians."
• "We are calling on NIFL to reverse course on the matter of Sunday football."
Basically, the argument that the Free Presbyterian Church in Ireland is making is that playing football on Sunday is both immoral and illegal. This message was not just conveyed to the football league but also published in the local press. The terms "robbing" Christians, "discrimination," "closing the door" for Christians, and "equal opportunity" are all loaded with legal implications.
These are the types of pressure tactics that the church will use on its citizens in order to revive Sunday laws. As societies grapple with issues like the loss of spirituality, overwork, burnout, and the erosion of family time, there will be renewed interest in preserving Sundays as a day for worship, reflection, and community engagement. The revival of Sunday rest will be driven by a desire to promote a sense of well-being and solidarity in an increasingly fast-paced and spiritually devoid world.
"The dignitaries of church and state will unite to bribe, persuade, or compel all classes to honor Sunday. The lack of divine authority will be supplied by oppressive enactments. Political corruption is destroying love of justice and regard for truth; and even in free America, rulers and legislators, in order to secure public favor, will yield to the popular demand for a law enforcing Sunday observance" (Great Controversy, p. 592).
I wonder if these Sunday keepers have the same concerns for those who keep the seventh day sabbath, or possibly other days? Won't hold my breath waiting for them to show such concern. This appears to be a case of professed Christians, who are not even willing to suffer the slightest inconveniences for their faith, let alone be persecuted for it.
http://adventmessenger.org/baptists-honor-green-sunday-a-celebration-of-god-care-for-creation-and-sunday-worship/
http://adventmessenger.org/a-north-carolina-newspaper-says-that-god-will-look-favorably-on-us-if-we-keep-sunday-holy/
http://adventmessenger.org/earth-sabbath-claims-that-it-is-time-to-heed-the-popes-call-and-put-into-actions-a-weekly-earth-sabbath/
More articles regarding sabbath and Sunday at the above links.
Amo said: I wonder if these Sunday keepers have the same concerns for those who keep the seventh day sabbath, or possibly other days? Won't hold my breath waiting for them to show such concern. This appears to be a case of professed Christians, who are not even willing to suffer the slightest inconveniences for their faith, let alone be persecuted for it.
Amo, I'm happy for you that you worship on Saturday - I can assure you that the Catholic Church isn't concerned or offended in the least that you observe the Sabbath day. This isn't a problem whatsoever, the issue with Adventism is it's rejection of the Trinity Doctrine. THAT, is a problem.
Yes, I am sure that freedom among our members to have perhaps differing views regarding the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, irks Catholic leadership. Nevertheless, we care nothing for a great many Catholic teachings, nor do we recognize their authority on any matter. To the contrary, we preach against their tendencies, and present as well as ancient efforts to force their beliefs upon all. Such as their teaching and support of local, city, state, and or national Sunday laws. Which would force their chosen and created rest day upon all.
http://adventmessenger.org/over-100-million-people-in-1500-cities-around-the-world-will-celebrate-car-free-sunday-on-september-22-2024/
Article below from link above.
Over 100 Million People in 1,500 Cities Around the World will Celebrate Car-free Sunday on September 22, 2024
National Today is a news media company that tracks all the special holidays and events around the world. National Today just announced that the International Car-Free Sunday celebration will be held on Sunday, September 22, 2024. Sponsoring this kind of global event on Sunday serves two purposes. First, it establishes a global forum for community action aimed at promoting more sustainable car and transportation habits. Secondly, it designates Sunday as the official day to sponsor these kinds of leisurely activities due to the fact that so many people already see Sunday as the collective day of rest. Sunday is traditionally associated with family gatherings, church worship, and relaxation, which makes it the perfect day to participate in environmental stewardship.
National Today published the following about Car-Free Sunday 2024:
• "World Car Free Day is celebrated every September 22. The day encourages motorists to give up their cars for a day. Some cities and countries organize events in celebration of this day. The events, which vary by location, give motorists and commuters a glimpse of what their locality would be like with fewer cars."
• "Car-Free Sunday has its origins from when the Environmental Transport Association (ETA) set the inaugural annual Car-Free Day on the first Tuesday in their Green Transport Week, which was sometime around 17 June. In 2000, the agreement was made for it to be a self-standing day held on September 22 — originally as a pan-European day — organized under the sponsorship of the European Commission. It was later expanded globally — during this time, a large number of cities around the world were invited to close their centers to cars. Pedestrians, cyclists, and other forms of sustainable transportation were encouraged instead."
• "The idea of this holiday is that people can reflect on what their city would look like with fewer cars, and what measures would be required to bring that picture to reality. Advocates report that over 100 million people in 1,500 cities around the world celebrate International Car-Free Day, though it is done on days they choose and in ways they choose as well."
• "The idea behind Car-Free Sunday is to do without your car that whole day. You can cycle or take another means of sustainable transportation instead."
In an effort to lessen pollution and save the environment, there is a global movement underway that is seeking to ban automobiles on Sunday for at least one day a year. But dedicating even a single Sunday to the environment creates a dangerous precedent because it sets a standard for others to follow in the future, which could very easily lead to a weekly day of rest.
One thing is certain: the idea that Sundays are for the environment is becoming increasingly popular. How popular is it? It has become so popular that on September 22, 2024, 100 million people will join in on Car-Free Sunday. How can anyone deny that Sunday rest and ecological sustainability are being aligned together—hand in hand—in today's society?
"In free America, rulers and legislators, in order to secure public favor, will yield to the popular demand for a law enforcing Sunday observance" (Great Controversy, p. 592).
Car free Sunday?????????????????????????? rofl rofl rofl
A great way to keep the masses from going to church... OR
Sunday brunch. Or to the game.
Or to the emergency rooms if needed.
Idiots.
: Rella Sun Jun 16, 2024 - 06:11:18Car free Sunday?????????????????????????? rofl rofl rofl
A great way to keep the masses from going to church... OR
Sunday brunch. Or to the game.
Or to the emergency rooms if needed.
Idiots.
Yes. People would need to go to assemble with other Christians on Saturday.
That's why we would call this "Saturday Law."
There is a continuing push to get everyone centrally located in cities and get rid of any significant "rural" element to society. It is in the rural element that most of the fight against the "New World Order" originates. The no-cars holiday is but one such move. I believe that the push for EV transportation is along that same line.
: Texas Conservative Sun Jun 16, 2024 - 06:55:44Yes. People would need to go to assemble with other Christians on Saturday.
That's why we would call this "Saturday Law."
Darn. You figured out our master plan immediately.
http://adventmessenger.org/catholics-argue-that-adventist-teachings-are-incorrect-and-that-sunday-should-be-protected-by-public-authorities-since-it-is-the-day-of-rest/
Quoted article below from link above.
Catholics Argue that Adventist Teachings are Incorrect and that Sunday Should be Protected by Public Authorities Since it is the Day of Rest
Catholic Answers, a media ministry dedicated to defending Catholic teachings, stated on July 21, 2024, that Seventh-day Adventists are wrong to observe Saturday as the day of rest. They stated in a published article that Adventist doctrine is false according to the Bible. Going a step further, Catholic Answers cites the Catholic Catechism to support its claim that, although the Fourth Commandment is no longer legally binding, we must continue to observe Sunday as the Lord's Day.
Catholic Answers published the following, attempting to pass on error as biblical truth:
• "Seventh-day Adventists claim that we as Christians are still bound to keep the Sabbath—that's to say, we must worship God on Saturday. But Paul's teaching in our second reading proves otherwise."
• "Paul teaches this elsewhere. Consider, for example, Colossians 2:16. There Paul writes, "Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to a festival or a new moon or sabbaths."
• "This means that Christians are no longer bound to hold to the Sabbath law just as they are no longer bound to hold fast to Mosaic law's precepts governing these other things."
• "So, the Seventh-day Adventist claim is falsified by Paul's teaching."
• "Even though we're no longer bound to observe the Sabbath, the idea of rest does carry over to our celebration of Sunday, the Lord's Day."
• "Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day."
• "In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees."
• "The Catechism affirms the good of Sunday rest and leisure for society, stating: In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society."
Colossians 2:16 is a Bible verse that is often used to try to show that Sabbath observance is no longer necessary. However, we must know that any doctrine or teaching should be established or rejected only after careful study of everything the Bible teaches on a given subject and not by quoting Bible verses out of context. Context is crucial when making interpretations. Many words have more than one meaning, and context helps clarify what the meaning is.
To address the objection raised by those who claim that Colossians 2:16 proves that the seventh-day Sabbath was abolished at the cross, one must show by the context and from other scriptures that the "handwriting of ordinances that was against us" (Col. 2:14) is not the Decalogue, and further, that the weekly seventh day Sabbath is not a "shadow of things to come" (Col. 2:17).
The festivals, new moons, and annual Sabbaths (Day of Atonement, Passover, and Feasts of Tabernacles), including the meat and drink offerings celebrated on those days, are the ones referred to in Colossians 2:16. In fact, God's word expressly distinguishes the annual Jewish festivals from the weekly seventh-day Sabbaths, or the Sabbaths of the Lord:
"These are the feasts of the LORD, which ye shall proclaim to be holy convocations, to offer an offering made by fire unto the LORD, a burnt offering, and a meat offering, a sacrifice, and drink offerings, every thing upon his day: Beside the sabbaths of the LORD." Leviticus 23:37, 38.
Unlike the other feasts, which were instituted after sin entered the world, the weekly day of rest was established before sin, at the very creation of our world. It was sanctified by God on the seventh day of creation, serving as a perpetual reminder of His creative power. Enshrined in the Ten Commandments, the weekly Sabbath is given a place of special prominence, with the Fourth Commandment calling on all people to "remember" and keep it holy. Thus, the weekly Sabbath not only predates sin and human history but also serves as an enduring symbol reminding us that God is our Creator.
The weekly Sabbath is not a shadow or symbol of something that was to come, but rather it serves as a reminder of what has already been. Unlike other ceremonial practices that foreshadowed future events, such as the sacrificial system pointing to the Messiah, the Sabbath directs our attention backward to the origin of our creation. According to the biblical account in Genesis, after six days of creating the heavens, the earth, and all living beings, God rested on the seventh day. This rest was not due to fatigue but was an intentional act to sanctify and bless the seventh day, setting it apart from all others as holy. The weekly Sabbath is a timeless institution, not tied to some future fulfillment but firmly rooted in the past.
The weekly Sabbath is also portrayed in the Bible as an eternal institution, one that transcends time and extends into the new earth. Established at Creation and reaffirmed in the Ten Commandments, the Sabbath is not a temporary observance but a perpetual covenant between God and His people. In Isaiah 66:22–23, God reveals that from one Sabbath to another, all flesh will come to worship before Him in the new earth, indicating that the Sabbath will continue to be honored even in eternity. This continuity emphasizes the Sabbath's enduring significance as a symbol of God's creative and redemptive work, offering a timeless rhythm of rest and worship that will be joyfully observed in the renewed creation, where peace, harmony, and communion with God are fully restored.
Tragically, Catholic Answers provides no real Bible to validate the keeping of Sunday. They simply quote from the Catholic Catechism. Establishing doctrines based on man-made traditions rather than Scripture is not biblical and contradicts the teachings of Jesus. Throughout the Gospels, Jesus consistently rebukes the religious leaders of His time for placing human traditions above the commandments of God. In Matthew 15:9, Jesus clearly states, "But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men," highlighting the danger of allowing man-made teachings to overshadow divine revelation. True doctrine must be grounded in the Word of God, as Scripture alone is the authoritative and inspired guide for faith and practice.
Apparently, the Catholics who wrote that being quoted in the above quoted article, do not see the hypocrisy of their position. Demanding that no one need keep the fourth commandment of God anymore by faith or otherwise, while demanding that even civil laws enforce their created day of worship upon all of the faith or not. What is forced Sunday rest by sacred Sunday believers, but forced worship. What does the final beast of biblical prophecy do, but force a certain type of worship upon all, creating an image to the beast before it which did the same thing. That is the Catholic faith controlling and manipulating the leaders of the "Holy Roman Empire". Who themselves also forced Sunday sacredness upon all. So be it, as God's prophetic word has determined.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYDhvjmwk-E
Excellent video regarding the manipulated war between Democrats and Republicans, and the results of each party moving back and forth unto more radical outcomes. A Sunday law being one of those radical intentions of the right, in response to the lefts ever increasingly radical amoral tendencies. Of course as I have always testified, I believe this is all intentional manipulation from a third entity employing the Hegelian Dialectic upon this country and most of Europe, if not the world. That entity being the Papacy, whose adherents line both sides of the political isles in this and many European nations. Thus the oft and truthful claims of many concerning the Uniparty that is actually in control, manipulating both sides of the isle unto predetermined outcomes concerning real and or created crisis. Basically, the intoxication of the political and religious leaders and their adherents or constituents the world over, by the wine of BABYLON THE GREAT.
Jer 51:6 Flee out of the midst of Babylon, and deliver every man his soul: be not cut off in her iniquity; for this is the time of the LORD'S vengeance; he will render unto her a recompence. 7 Babylon hath been a golden cup in the LORD'S hand, that made all the earth drunken: the nations have drunken of her wine; therefore the nations are mad. 8 Babylon is suddenly fallen and destroyed: howl for her; take balm for her pain, if so be she may be healed. 9 We would have healed Babylon, but she is not healed: forsake her, and let us go every one into his own country: for her judgment reacheth unto heaven, and is lifted up even to the skies.
http://adventmessenger.org/on-the-last-day-of-the-olympic-games-us-catholic-bishop-robert-barron-advocated-for-sports-free-sunday-on-fox-news/
Quoted article below from link above.
On the Last Day of the Olympic Games, US Catholic Bishop Robert Barron Advocated for Sports-Free Sunday on Fox News
Roman Catholic Bishop Robert Barron of the Diocese of Winona-Rochester in Minnesota argued on one of the most influential news networks in the country and during the most significant sporting event in the world that it is important to give God the glory in sports by abstaining from competition on Sundays, which he called the Sabbath. This was the message he delivered on nationwide television during an interview with Fox News on Sunday, August 11, 2024, as the Olympic competitions were coming to an end.
The Catholic Church is now advocating their Sunday rest message during media interviews and is calling for the need to respect God in sports by urging for a return to the tradition of keeping Sundays free from organized games and competitions. And as always, the media has become the spokesperson for the church, giving Rome access to a far wider audience and platform to spread their Sunday message to a wider public.
Fox News published the following:
• "Bishop Robert Barron offered the example of Scottish Olympian Eric Liddell as proof that achieving athletic excellence should be about ultimately giving glory to God."
• "In light of the ongoing Paris Summer Olympics, Barron spoke to Fox News Digital about Liddell, the Scottish gold medalist whose choice to forego a surefire gold medal win in honor of the Sabbath – and his subsequent gold medal win in the 400-meter race in the 1924 games – was immortalized in the movie "Chariots of Fire."
• "Liddell's powerful story in the 1924 Olympic Games, also held in Paris that year, is memorable not only because of his supreme running ability, but because of how he displayed his deep Christian faith. Thanks to his talent, Liddell was considered a shoo-in for the gold medal in the 100-meter dash but declined to race because it fell on a Sunday, the Sabbath. "
• "Instead, Liddell opted for a race on a later date that he was supposedly less adept at, the 400-meter, though he won the gold, reaching the finish line a full meter ahead of the silver-medalist and beating the previous 400-meter world record, a moment powerfully depicted in the 1981 film."
• "He also told Fox that the attitude people should have about sports, like any other earthly pursuit, is that it should be done for God's glory."
Whether it's a car-free Sunday, a work-free Sunday, or a sports-free Sunday, it all works the same. The Catholic prelate's message to the sports world is to set aside Sunday as a day free from scheduled sporting events, placing an emphasis on rest, spiritual reflection, and family time instead of the usual activities tied to competitive sports. Sunday is being referred to as the Sabbath on national television because, despite the lack of biblical evidence, Rome regards it as the holy day for rest and worship.
Observing a sports-free Sunday aligns with the belief that this day should be dedicated to Eucharistic worship, and by promoting no sports on this day, the Catholic Church aims to preserve the sanctity of Sunday as the official day of rest.
"When our nation shall so abjure the principles of its government as to enact a Sunday law, Protestantism will in this act join hands with popery; it will be nothing else than giving life to the tyranny which has long been eagerly watching its opportunity to spring again into active despotism" (Testimonies, Vol. 5, p. 711).
"If popery or its principles shall again be legislated into power, the fires of persecution will be rekindled against those who will not sacrifice conscience and the truth in deference to popular errors. This evil is on the point of realization" (Testimonies, Vol. 5, p. 712).
"Through the two great errors, the immortality of the soul, and Sunday sacredness, Satan will bring the people under his deceptions. While the former lays the foundation of Spiritualism, the latter creates a bond of sympathy with Rome. The Protestants of the United States will be foremost in stretching their hands across the gulf to grasp the hand of Spiritualism; they will reach over the abyss to clasp hands with the Roman power; and under the influence of this threefold union, this country will follow in the steps of Rome in trampling on the rights of conscience" (Great Controversy, p. 588).
: Amo Tue Aug 20, 2024 - 07:57:26http://adventmessenger.org/on-the-last-day-of-the-olympic-games-us-catholic-bishop-robert-barron-advocated-for-sports-free-sunday-on-fox-news/
Quoted article below from link above.
I am all in favor of a Mass free Sunday.
Yep, it is coming... and I see no way to stop it.
: Rella Tue Aug 20, 2024 - 12:22:14I am all in favor of a Mass free Sunday.
Yep, it is coming... and I see no way to stop it.
Sometimes when I'm bored I think that it might be fun to start a church that is centered around Sunday football. A weekly tailgate spot...
Our Lady of the Gridiron
::peeking::
: Wycliffes_Shillelagh Tue Aug 20, 2024 - 12:58:19Sometimes when I'm bored I think that it might be fun to start a church that is centered around Sunday football. A weekly tailgate spot...
Our Lady of the Gridiron
::peeking::
I'll join.
The only way to stop it for now at least, is for Americans to stand up for their own, or others rights to do as they please on Sundays and or any other day of the week. This will of course become increasingly difficult as the calamities our Lord has predicted, begin to transpire with even more frequency than at present. When people become afraid and accept that these are the judgements of God, and seek to appease him in national "repentance". Which will undoubtedly include the establishment of Sunday sacredness.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCyvKTfV8as
Good one about the devil's attack upon marriage and God''s Sabbath.
http://adventmessenger.org/according-to-a-us-catholic-publication-the-blue-laws-made-it-easier-to-worship-on-sunday-and-the-state-has-a-duty-to-protect-this-day/
Quoted article below from link above.
According to a US Catholic Publication, the Blue Laws Made it Easier to Worship on Sunday and the State has a Duty to Protect This Day
On August 28, 2024, an article titled "The Rest of Ordinary Time" was published in The Pilot, which is regarded as the oldest Catholic publication in America. According to the article, Sunday was given to us by God for our physical and spiritual well-being and we are unable to reap its benefits due to the fast-paced lifestyle of contemporary society. The Pilot expressed that when the Blue Laws were in effect, it was easier to enjoy the benefits of rest and worship, and that perhaps recovering Sunday is even more urgent today.
The Pilot stated the following about Sunday rest and worship:
• "I know that Sunday is a day we are commanded to 'keep holy' and that it is a day to be set aside for rest, just as God Himself rested on the seventh day. I know that Sunday should be devoted first and foremost to the worship of God and, then, for that sacred rest that allows us to recreate ourselves and spend time caring for and being cared for by our loved ones. I know that there is a loving God who planned this order of things, knowing that rest refreshes and renews."
• "Yet, it is so easy to resist this plan. Sundays, it seems, have become just as hectic as the other six days of the week. Stores bustle with shoppers. Work emails are sent and received. Online orders are filled and ubiquitous delivery trucks prowl the neighborhoods. The early morning cacophony of lawn mowers and string trimmers breaks the peace of quiet streets, while Sunday traffic jams rival those of weekdays. Youth sports – even in Catholic leagues and Catholic schools – maintain grueling Sunday schedules. Many employers, customers, and clients now expect 24-7 availability, not merely 24-6 access. The urge to keep up with others and not fall behind makes it ever more difficult to see Sunday as a special day, distinct and different from the others."
• "It is easy to look back with nostalgia at a time when so-called 'blue laws' slowed the treadmill of life a bit and may have made it easier to keep Sundays as a day of worship and rest. Nevertheless, even though it seems harder now, the importance of a restful, prayerful Sunday may be more urgent than ever before."
• "Our attitudes toward Sundays are especially worth reflecting upon as our nation celebrates Labor Day."
• "In a particular way, labor leaders influenced by Catholic social teaching fought strenuously for the right of workers to have their Sundays as a day of worship and rest. In 1891, Pope Leo XIII spoke of this in 'Rerum Novarum.' In addressing the obligation to protect workers on their days of rest and worship, he wrote that a worker 'has interests in which he should be protected by the State; and first of all, there are the interests of his soul. ... From this follows the obligation of the cessation from work and labor on Sundays and certain holy days."
• "As a new season comes and we celebrate the dignity of workers, there is a chance to think of Sundays anew, to recommit to their sacred purpose, and celebrate the holy rest of ordinary time."
Rome is intentionally pushing to make Sunday the day of rest not just in America but also for the world. The Sunday rest advocates are not slowing down with their effort to generate interest for the reinstatement of the Blue Laws. There is a growing sentiment in society that says we should return to the good old days when family, church, and Sunday were at the center of public and private life. This is a call to fast-tracking measures that will strike directly against religious liberty.
Freedom of religion has been one of America's most cherished liberties and one of the reasons why America became a great refuge for the persecuted. On the other hand, Blue Laws mandated Sunday rest. People were urged to attend church on Sundays by these oppressive religious laws. They discriminated against minorities who kept the seventh-day Sabbath, Saturday, holy while helping the Sunday-keeping majority. Those who disobeyed these rest mandates were also subject to fines and imprisonment under the blue laws.
Great horrors await this nation if this trend continues. Now is the time for the third angel's message to be proclaimed with power. May we share the present truth, God's last-day message to this perishing world.
"They are working in blindness. They do not see that if a Protestant government sacrifices the principles that have made them a free, independent nation, and through legislation brings into the Constitution, principles that will propagate papal falsehoods and papal delusions, they are plunging into the Roman horrors of the Dark Ages" (Review and Herald, December 11, 1888).
https://europeansundayalliance.eu/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/European-Sunday-Alliance-EU-elections-manifesto-2024-draft-20231212_06.pdf
Manifest of the Steering Committee of the European Sunday Alliance on the occasion of the EU elections 2024
Achieving a common day of rest for workers in the EU
The European Sunday Alliance is a network of national Sunday Alliances, trade unions, civil society organizations and religious communities committed to raising awareness of the unique value of synchronised free time for our European societies.
It is coordinated by a Steering Committee bringing together the Commission of the Bishops' Conference of the EU (COMECE), the Protestant Church in Germany (Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland, EKD), the European Confederation of Independent Trade Unions (CESI), the Federation of Catholic Family Associations in Europe (FAFCE), the European Services Workers Union (UNI Europa), Don Bosco International (DBI), the Jesuit European Social Centre (JESC), the International Young Christian Workers (JOCI-IYCW), the German Sunday Alliance, and the Austrian Sunday Alliance.
On the occasion of the EU elections in June 2024, the Steering Committee of the European Sunday Alliance invites interested policy makers to support the role of synchronised free time as a key element in addressing mental health issues and loneliness in our society, in particular by:
1. ensuring that all relevant EU legislation and non-legislative measures respect and promote the protection of a common weekly day of rest for all people living and working in the EU, which shall be in principle on a Sunday, in order to protect workers' health, promote a better work-life balance, and foster adequate time especially for families and young workers for worship and community, social & religious engagement.
2. promoting EU legislation guaranteeing sustainable working time patterns, including through a right to disconnect and based on the principle of decent work benefiting individual workers and thus society as well as the economy as a whole.
3. considering the great value and positive impact of synchronised free time on Sundays when it comes to finding solutions to urgent challenges of our time such as loneliness and related mental health issues.
: Amo Sun Sep 08, 2024 - 09:55:10https://europeansundayalliance.eu/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/European-Sunday-Alliance-EU-elections-manifesto-2024-draft-20231212_06.pdf
Amo,
IF "Sunday Law" were to be enacted would it affect you?
Have you read anything that would stop any religious service from happening on other days of the week?
Do you remember when all stores were closed and only places that sold food were allowed to be open on Sundays?
I do.
I also remember when a work week was 5 days with 2 days off. If one was lucky to have Saturday and Sunday... or Sunday and Monday.. Great.
I had the later for a long time.
You still could do your expected SDA things on Saturday, and then come Sunday have a solid day of rest with zero expectations....
I never read they would stop SDA from Saturdays or my Jewish Friends from Friday nights....
Might have missed it but then ????????///
I would imagine one impediment to Sunday Law in this country would be that the Muslim holy day is Friday all day. The Muslim population likely would not stand for it, if I understand Sunday Law.
: Jaime Mon Sep 09, 2024 - 07:51:33I would imagine one impediment to Sunday Law in this country would be that the Muslim holy day is Friday all day. The Muslim population likely would not stand for it, if I understand Sunday Law.
Jaime... I dont really follow this so tell me.
In a Sunday law it it specified one HAS to worship on Sunday. No atheist or agnostic would.
If y'all afraid of losing Sunday sports... well...
If y"all afraid of not going to the local wherever for a drink.... well..
They can have their Fridays... The SDA can have their Saturdays... and they both would benefit from another day of rest.
We are the ones who lose out but then I have truied for Sat and Sun for years. ::noworries::
I guess the SDAs are afraid of being banned to worship on any day but Sunday. That's the opposition to Sunday Laws not the missing out on sports. If someone is atheistnor ag ostic, they aren't affected by Sunday laws as Inunderstand it. The fear is IF you worship it would be mandated on Sunday.
https://www.quora.com/Why-do-Seventh-day-Adventists-believe-there-will-be-a-National-Sunday-Law (https://www.quora.com/Why-do-Seventh-day-Adventists-believe-there-will-be-a-National-Sunday-Law)
On September 22, 2024, over 100 million people in 1,500 cities worldwide will celebrate Car-Free Sunday, a global event that encourages motorists to leave their cars at home for a day. This initiative, promoted by organizations like the Environmental Transport Association (ETA) and sponsored by the European Commission, aims to raise awareness about sustainable transportation and to provide a glimpse of what cities would look like with fewer cars. National Today notes that Car-Free Sunday has evolved from a European event to a global movement, with cities worldwide closing their centers to cars and encouraging alternative transportation methods.
The choice of Sunday for this event is strategic, as Sunday is widely recognized as a day of rest, family gatherings, and worship. By dedicating Sunday to environmental activities, proponents aim to align ecological sustainability with a collective day of rest. However, this also raises concerns among some who see it as a step towards enforcing Sunday observance more broadly. The popularity of combining Sunday rest with environmental action suggests a growing trend, and it remains to be seen how this movement will influence future policies and societal norms.
__________________________
: Rella Mon Sep 09, 2024 - 07:39:27Amo,
IF "Sunday Law" were to be enacted would it affect you?
Have you read anything that would stop any religious service from happening on other days of the week?
Do you remember when all stores were closed and only places that sold food were allowed to be open on Sundays?
I do.
I also remember when a work week was 5 days with 2 days off. If one was lucky to have Saturday and Sunday... or Sunday and Monday.. Great.
I had the later for a long time.
You still could do your expected SDA things on Saturday, and then come Sunday have a solid day of rest with zero expectations....
I never read they would stop SDA from Saturdays or my Jewish Friends from Friday nights....
Might have missed it but then ????????///
The Sunday law is just the beginning of the end. A national Sunday law will be rapidly followed by national ruin. The judgments of God in the seven last plagues of the book of Revelation. When the judgments begin, the deceived will be looking for someone to blame. Those who have been warning them of the danger of such a law will become the targets of their pride and fear. They will eventually outlaw seventh day sabbath observance, and persecute and imprison those who refuse to stop, just as in the dark ages.
Christians cannot go back and reestablish what once was, during the Reformation processes of growth in greater knowledge of biblical truth, when leaving Babylon behind. If they choose to go back and reestablish both Babylon's established day of worship, and Babylon's unity and authority over government, the judgments of God will be poured out upon these willing subjects of BABYLON THE GREAT. They will have willingly and knowledgeably returned to Babylon, thereby rejecting the truth and therefore Christ our Lord also, who is the way, the truth, and the life. The following prophetic words of the apostle Paul shall be fulfilled.
2Th 2:1 Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, 2 That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. 3 Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; 4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God. 5 Remember ye not, that, when I was yet with you, I told? 6 And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time. 7 For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way.
8 And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: 9 Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, 10 And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11 And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: 12 That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.The books of Daniel and Revelation delve deeper into Paul's prophecy above. The book of Revelation more specifically addressing BABYLON THE GREAT'S intricate involvement with the final beasts of biblical prophecy. Her relationship with the kings or leaders of the world, the rich and powerful, conglomerate corporations, international organizations, and even entertainers of the world as well. These who are and will be key figures in establishing the mark of the beast which will be forced upon all, in cooperation with the Church of Rome and her apostate "Christian" and other religious allies. They will help her establish her mark of authority by law upon all, which is Sunday sacredness created and established by her own.
When this abomination of desolation is placed once again in the place of God's holy sabbath by global law, the desolating effects of God's judgment will begin to be poured out upon humanity in rebellion against their God. For much greater detail concerning these events, see -
Well, I was going to direct you to a thread I posted years ago, addressing this subject in detail. But it has apparently been removed, I suppose while the board was down for quite some time. I will therefore begin to repost the book posted on that thread. As the author of this unpublished work, there should be no legal issues. Look for the title Sabbath, Sunday, and the Abomination of Desolation, or S,S,& A of B.
I found the link I was looking for concerning the history and prophetic significance of Sunday sacredness in relation to God's true sabbath. I was looking to far back for it, as I posted it about ten years ago. The following link Rella, is the one I intended in response to your post.
https://www.gracecentered.com/christian_forums/index.php?topic=82438.0
http://adventmessenger.org/evangelicals-labor-unions-and-retailers-join-forces-to-campaign-to-keep-sunday-special/
Quoted article below from link above.
Evangelicals, Labor Unions, and Retailers Join Forces to Campaign to Keep Sunday Special
The Evangelical Alliance and the Church of England have partnered with a number of trade unions and retail alliances to work to keep Sunday special in society throughout the United Kingdom. Members of the National Federation of Retail Newsagents, the Federation of Wholesale Distributors, the National Federation of Sup-Postmasters, the Association of Convenience Stores, the Union of Shop, Distributive, and Allied Workers, and other organizations have banded together to act in defense of Sunday. Retailers and labor unions have supported the church's efforts to establish Sunday as the day of rest for society.
All this is helping to fulfill the following prediction made in the Spirit of Prophecy:
"There will be a universal bond of union, one great harmony, a confederacy of Satan's forces. 'And shall give their power and strength unto the beast.' Thus is manifested the same arbitrary, oppressive power against religious liberty—freedom to worship God according to the dictates of conscience—as was manifested by the papacy, when in the past it persecuted those who dared to refuse to conform with the religious rites and ceremonies of Romanism." (Selected Messages, Vol. 3, p. 392).
The same aggressive measures that were used to enforce health mandates during the pandemic will soon be used to enforce Sunday rest. This will lead to the ultimate destruction of our civil and religious liberties. This "Keep Sunday Special" initiative is being driven by churches. They are fighting to secure Sunday by petitioning lawmakers across the UK. They are asking fellow church goers to get involved in the fight to keep Sunday special.
This endeavor aligns with Rome's commitment to safeguard Sunday worldwide. This means that Rome's Sunday movement will have the full support of the Protestant churches, the labor sectors, the retailers, and the politicians. Basically, we are witnessing the different segments of society coming to the aid of Rome to advance her goal. It is clear that the world is ready to unite its forces to propel the counterfeit Sabbath to the forefront.
And if governments begin to pass policies that favor Sunday rest legislation, we will have no one to thank but apostate Protestants who have committed themselves to this downward path with Rome. This is a clear sign and warning that Sunday laws are inevitable. Although many do not recognize it, the result is clear: laws will soon be passed that will impose the mark of the beast.
"Sooner or later Sunday laws will be passed. But there is much for God's servants to do to warn the people. This work has been greatly retarded by their having to wait and stand against the devisings of Satan, which have been striving to find a place in our work. We are years behind" (Review and Herald, February 16, 1905).
In a generation Friday might be the most special day in the UK.
That may be true if present rates of immigrating Muslims, and births to and within the UK do not slow down. Even so, Muslims will no doubt still respect and or support Sunday laws. As they are ever increasing relations with Roman Catholicism, and also do not believe in the separation of church and state.
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/tags/1842/catholic-muslim-relations
Attending Mass on Saturday fulfills the Sunday obligation...
...This is Catholic law & it's true to say that in the U.S. alone.
...More Catholics go to Church on Saturday than there are SDA's.
For the Catholic Church to outlaw going to Church on Saturday...
...Would default into the Catholic Church ceasing to be Catholic.
...You would have a better chance if:
An army of Sasquatch scientists created a cure for all diseases known to man.
In other-words the idea of a National Sunday law is idiotic and akin to thanking Jesus for Triceratops.
Attending Mass on Saturday fulfills the Sunday obligation...
...This is Catholic law & it's true to say that in the U.S. alone.
...More Catholics go to Church on Saturday than there are SDA's.
Yes, one massive migration of Catholics after another which continues to this very day, has greatly increased their numbers in this once predominantly Protestant nation. Nothing to see here, move along.
For the Catholic Church to outlaw going to Church on Saturday...
...Would default into the Catholic Church ceasing to be Catholic.
...You would have a better chance if:
An army of Sasquatch scientists created a cure for all diseases known to man.
In other-words the idea of a National Sunday law is idiotic and akin to thanking Jesus for Triceratops.
Hmmmm, and yet -
The Synod of Laodicea - 343-381 A.D. - furnishes a decree which is quoted by many:
"Christians shall not Judaize and be idle on Saturday [Sabbatum is always used for the Sabbath and is translated Saturday in the English edition of Hefele], but shall work on that day; but the Lord's-day they shall especially honor, and as being Christians, shall, if possible, do no work on that day. If, however, they are found Judaizing they shall be shut out from Christ. (Canon 29, Hefele, Vol. 2, p. 316.)
Pope Gregory I (AD 590-604) said :
"Gregory, bishop by the grace of God to his well-beloved sons, the Roman citizens: It has come to me that certain men of perverse spirit have disseminated among you things depraved and opposed to the holy faith, so that they forbid anything to be done on the day of the Sabbath. What shall I call them except preachers of anti-Christ?." Epistles of Gregory I, b.13, epist.1, found in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers.
Chap.4
59....................More than a "replacement" for the Sabbath, therefore, Sunday is its fulfilment, and in a certain sense its extension and full expression in the ordered unfolding of the history of salvation, which reaches its culmination in Christ.
62. It is the duty of Christians therefore to remember that, although the practices of the Jewish Sabbath are gone, surpassed as they are by the "fulfilment" which Sunday brings, the underlying reasons for keeping "the Lord's Day" holy — inscribed solemnly in the Ten Commandments — remain valid, though they need to be reinterpreted in the light of the theology and spirituality of Sunday: "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days you shall labour, and do all your work; but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. Then you shall do no work, you, or your son, or your daughter, or your servant, or your maid, or your ox, or your ass, or any of your beasts, or the foreigner within your gates, that your servant and maid may rest as well as you. You shall remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded that you keep the Sabbath day" (Dt 5:12-15). Here the Sabbath observance is closely linked with the liberation which God accomplished for his people.
63. Christ came to accomplish a new "exodus", to restore freedom to the oppressed. He performed many healings on the Sabbath (cf. Mt 12:9-14 and parallels), certainly not to violate the Lord's Day, but to reveal its full meaning: "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mk 2:27). Opposing the excessively legalistic interpretation of some of his contemporaries, and developing the true meaning of the biblical Sabbath, Jesus, as "Lord of the Sabbath" (Mk 2:28), restores to the Sabbath observance its liberating character, carefully safeguarding the rights of God and the rights of man. This is why Christians, called as they are to proclaim the liberation won by the blood of Christ, felt that they had the authority to transfer the meaning of the Sabbath to the day of the Resurrection. The Passover of Christ has in fact liberated man from a slavery more radical than any weighing upon an oppressed people — the slavery of sin, which alienates man from God, and alienates man from himself and from others, constantly sowing within history the seeds of evil and violence.
(APOSTOLIC LETTER DIES DOMINI by John Paul II)
Synod of Laodicea (4th Century)
The Canons of the Synod Held in the City of Laodicea, in Phrygia Pacatiana, in which Many Blessed Fathers from Divers Provinces of Asia Were Gathered Together.
The holy synod which assembled at Laodicea in Phrygia Pacatiana, from various regions of Asia; set forth the ecclesiastical definitions which are hereunder annexed.
Canon 29
Christians must not judaize by resting on the Sabbath, but must work on that day, rather honouring the Lord's Day; and, if they can, resting then as Christians. But if any shall be found to be judaizers, let them be anathema from Christ.
The Canons of the Eastern Orthodox Church
II Nicaeanum (787)
Canon VIII.
That Hebrews ought not to be received unless they have been converted in sincerity of heart.
Since certain, erring in the superstitions of the Hebrews, have thought to mock at Christ our God, and feigning to be converted to the religion of Christ do deny him, and in private and secretly keep the Sabbath and observe other Jewish customs, we decree that such persons be not received to communion, nor to prayers, nor into the Church; but let them be openly Hebrews according to their religion, and let them not bring their children to baptism, nor purchase or possess a slave. But if any of them, out of a sincere heart and in faith, is converted and makes profession with his whole heart, setting at naught their customs and observances, and so that others may be convinced and converted, such an one is to be received and baptized, and his children likewise; and let them be taught to take care to hold aloof from the ordinances of the Hebrews. But if they will not do this, let them in no wise be received.
Second Council of Nicaea - 787 A.D. part two
CANONS
8
Since some of those who come from the religion of the Hebrews mistakenly think to make a mockery of Christ who is God, pretending to become Christians, but denying Christ in private by both secretly continuing to observe the sabbath and maintaining other Jewish practices, we decree that they shall not be received to communion or at prayer or into the church, but rather let them openly be Hebrews according to their own religion; they should not baptize their children or buy, or enter into possession of, a slave. But if one of them makes his conversion with a sincere faith and heart, and pronounces his confession wholeheartedly, disclosing their practices and objects in the hope that others may be refuted and corrected, such a person should be welcomed and baptized along with his children, and care should be taken that they abandon Hebrew practices. However if they are not of this sort, they should certainly not be welcomed.
http://adventmessenger.org/churches-and-trade-unions-join-forces-to-close-supermarkets-on-sunday/
Quoted article below from link above.
Churches and Trade Unions Join Forces to Close Supermarkets on Sunday
The Christian Institute is a nondenominational Christian organization with more than 60,000 supporters and more than 5,000 churches that is dedicated to "the furtherance and promotion of the Christian religion in the United Kingdom and elsewhere." On October 3, 2024, the Christian Institute published an article detailing how Christian leaders and union leaders are coming together to petition for the closing of businesses on Sunday.
The Christian Institute reported:
• "Church leaders on the Isle of Lewis are urging Tesco (Supermarket) to abandon plans to open on Sundays. Ministers from the Reformed Presbyterian Church and the Free Church of Scotland have called on the supermarket chain to respect the island's long-standing Sabbath observance, as it consults staff about opening seven days a week."
• "Currently, Tesco's Stornoway store is its only UK branch to remain closed on Sundays. Co-op, the island's only other large supermarket, also shuts on a Sunday. Rev. Greg McDonald, a Free Church of Scotland minister, told BBC Radio Scotland: "Only by trusting in Jesus as our Saviour will people be forgiven. Anything that makes it harder for the shelf stacker, or van driver, or anyone else to come to church to hear that message, I take as a mistake."
• "Earlier this year, a top union representative said that restricting Sunday trading hours for online businesses and deliveries would benefit families. John Barstow, an Executive Council Member of the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers (USDAW), said that society would benefit from a break in trading, rather than dispensing with Sunday trading hours for high street shops in England and Wales so they can compete with online stores."
Despite being unlikely allies, churches and labor unions are finding common ground in a shared campaign for Sunday rest. Traditionally, labor unions have focused on workers' rights and economic justice, while churches emphasize spiritual renewal and moral values. However, both sides are working to secure Sunday as the day of rest for society.
Labor unions, while historically claiming to seek to protect the rights of workers, have employed disruptive tactics to push for their demands. Some of the more notorious antics include shutting down entire industries, deliberately reducing productivity to cripple companies, and, in some cases, sabotage. We are reminded that labor unions will be one of the agencies that will help bring about the great time of trouble.
"The trades unions will be one of the agencies that will bring upon this earth a time of trouble such as has not been since the world began" (Selected Messages, Vol. 2, p. 142).
When labor unions and church leaders collectively work together to stop Sunday trading, you know that we are quickly reaching this time of trouble. While religious institutions seek to restore Sunday as a time for community worship, labor unions argue that Sunday rest combats work burnouts. In any case, these two groups are working together to promote regulations designating Sunday as a day of rest, which appeals to both secular and religious motives.
"The time is fast coming when the controlling power of the labor unions will be very oppressive. Again and again the Lord has instructed that our people are to take their families away from the cities, into the country, where they can raise their own provisions; for in the future the problem of buying and selling will be a very serious one" (Selected Messages, Vol. 2, p. 141).
Amo said: Yes, one massive migration of Catholics after another which continues to this very day, has greatly increased their numbers in this once predominantly Protestant nation. Nothing to see here, move along.
Only you are not a Protestant - if you are a Seventh-day Adventist you are a "Restorationist" -
huge difference between that and a Protestant.
Amo said: Hmmmm, and yet
Amo goes on to quote from Laodicea
What you intentionally withhold from Laodicea is that the early Church was condemning Christians from claiming that they had to be observant Jews to be saved Christians. The Church was absolutely RIGHT to prohibit that kind of behavior. Look at the text again, it condemns Christians for secretly observing the Sabbath
AND OTHER JEWISH ACTS.
Read Acts Chapter 15 again Amo, you'll see from Scripture that anyone advocating Christians observe Jewish acts for salvation DIDN'T have any authority to claim such things and were in fact working AGAINST the Apostles.
I can appreciate how this fact fly's in the face of the SDA narrative but it's accurate. Own it Amo. I don't think Christians condemn SDA's for their devotion to the Sabbath - they are condemned for teaching things contrary to the Gospel of Christ. I'm speaking of the SDA proclivity of boasting Christ could have sinned and lost His Salvation - THIS is anti-Trinitarian and absolutely contrary to the Gospel. This is the issue, not your devotion to the Sabbath (which if anything is commendable.
: Cathlodox Mon Oct 07, 2024 - 20:16:40Only you are not a Protestant - if you are a Seventh-day Adventist you are a "Restorationist" - huge difference between that and a Protestant.
What you intentionally withhold from Laodicea is that the early Church was condemning Christians from claiming that they had to be observant Jews to be saved Christians. The Church was absolutely RIGHT to prohibit that kind of behavior. Look at the text again, it condemns Christians for secretly observing the Sabbath AND OTHER JEWISH ACTS.
Read Acts Chapter 15 again Amo, you'll see from Scripture that anyone advocating Christians observe Jewish acts for salvation DIDN'T have any authority to claim such things and were in fact working AGAINST the Apostles.
I can appreciate how this fact fly's in the face of the SDA narrative but it's accurate. Own it Amo. I don't think Christians condemn SDA's for their devotion to the Sabbath - they are condemned for teaching things contrary to the Gospel of Christ. I'm speaking of the SDA proclivity of boasting Christ could have sinned and lost His Salvation - THIS is anti-Trinitarian and absolutely contrary to the Gospel. This is the issue, not your devotion to the Sabbath (which if anything is commendable.
Holy scripture says nowhere, either to stop observing God's seventh day sabbath, or to start observing a first day or Sunday sabbath. I am not the one taking away from, or adding to the holy scriptures. This is what the Catholic church has, does, and will continue to do.
I am not intentionally withholding information from anyone. None of the quotes I supplied mention any teaching claiming that one must keep certain Jewish ordinances in order to be saved. Please do provide further context from the documents I quoted, stating that this is what those choosing to observe God's seventh day sabbath or other suggested Jewish customs were teaching. No one can be saved by keeping God's commandments, but many will be lost for breaking them. As all are lost because of their condemnation by the law, who will not accept the gift of salvation found in and through the Lord Jesus Christ alone.
The Catholic church decided to cut off every professed Christian that believed the following words of Jesus Christ applied to all the commandments of God, including the fourth.
Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.Those who believed the above words of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ over and above the conflicting testimony of the Catholic church and others, chose to continue their faith apart from this institution by refusing to acknowledge its authority over them. I do not care what Catholics or anyone else decides to call or label me, my intention is to follow the example of the life and teachings of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Whom I do not believe any of the Apostles contradicted in any way shape or form, in their teachings and writings. Though a great many contradicting teachings arose among professed Christinas after their departure as the Apostle Paul himself warned would happen.
You and those before you as quoted in my previous post which you are addressing, claim that those who did or will continue to keep God's seventh day sabbath are in error. We claim that you are. We continue to admonish all to keep God's seventh day sabbath by faith in His word alone, and Sunday keepers continue to resort to civil legislation to force everyone to keep their chosen day. This is the testimony of history over and again. So be it, as God's word predicted it would transpire.
The following link is to the book - A Critical History Of Sunday Legislation From 321 To 1888 AD.
https://archive.org/details/criticalhisto00lewi/page/n5/mode/2up
As this thread itself reveals and testifies, the push for Sunday laws the world over has continued from 1888 to this very day. Nor will it end or go away, until the end. If you would like a much more in depth view of my beliefs upon the matter, see the link to the following thread below.
https://www.gracecentered.com/christian_forums/index.php?topic=82438.0
Amo said: Holy scripture says nowhere, either to stop observing God's seventh day sabbath, or to start observing a first day or Sunday sabbath. I am not the one taking away from, or adding to the holy scriptures. This is what the Catholic church has, does, and will continue to do
Where is it, Amo, that you find Biblical support for no longer observing the Day of Atonement or any of the other feasts of the Lord?
I'll wait for your answer before developing this for you.
: Cathlodox Tue Oct 08, 2024 - 21:54:13Where is it, Amo, that you find Biblical support for no longer observing the Day of Atonement or any of the other feasts of the Lord?
I'll wait for your answer before developing this for you.
So now you will pretend that you do not know? The books of Acts and Hebrews address many obvious changes. Though none regarding the end of the seventh day sabbath, or the beginning of a first day sabbath. You already know this of course, if you believe your own popes and church teachings.
This is not to mention the teachings and or prophecies of Jesus Himself when here among us, regarding the fate of the existing literal temple. And who or what the real temple of the new covenant is.
@Amo
If we get Sunday law.... what will that do? How will things change?
: Amo Tue Oct 08, 2024 - 22:31:59So now you will pretend that you do not know? The books of Acts and Hebrews address many obvious changes. Though none regarding the end of the seventh day sabbath, or the beginning of a first day sabbath. You already know this of course, if you believe your own popes and church teachings.
Stop avoiding the question and just let us know where you find justification for not observing the Day of Atonement and other feasts of the Lord you evidently blow off.
Acts 15 clearly identifies what a Judaizer is and given you need a little help here I can tell you that the Judaizers LOST the argument they had with Apostolic Christianity.
Now is your big chance to show everyone your Biblical proof for blowing off all those other feasts of the Lord.
: Rella Wed Oct 09, 2024 - 11:12:16If we get Sunday law.... what will that do? How will things change?
The powers that be aren't pushing towards Sunday law... they're pushing towards no-religion-at all.
Is this not obvious to others? Is it just me?
: Wycliffes_Shillelagh Thu Oct 10, 2024 - 01:08:49The powers that be aren't pushing towards Sunday law... they're pushing towards no-religion-at all.
Is this not obvious to others? Is it just me?
Ok Jarrod.
I have not read that. In fact I have read very little explanation
other then people are panicked at the very idea.
Except Frankoie seems to lean that way and I just wonder what is in it for him?
: Wycliffes_Shillelagh Thu Oct 10, 2024 - 01:08:49The powers that be aren't pushing towards Sunday law... they're pushing towards no-religion-at all.
Is this not obvious to others? Is it just me?
I wouldn't call it no-religion at all. The religion would be the state/some kind of secular humanism focused on state/media.
Sunday Law is just a bunch of bunk. Commerce/Media/State will not shut down on Sundays.
Our bread and circuses are on Sundays.
: Rella Wed Oct 09, 2024 - 11:12:16@Amo
If we get Sunday law.... what will that do? How will things change?
When the abomination of desolation is set up by mans law, in the place of God's holy sabbath in these United states of America, national ruin will follow. As the leading and exemplary biblically based and once Protestant government of this world, its exemplary final rejection of those principles by mandating Babylon's mark and seal of authority above God's, will be the beginning of the very end.
The final contest between those who worship the God of the bible, and those who worship the god or gods of their own creation will come to its climax. God's own will give the final loud cry and warning for this earth, while the majority whom Babylon rides upon will not repent, but rather harden their hearts as did the Pharaoh of Egypt of old. Persecuting seventh day sabbath keepers, and finally forbidding seventh day sabbath observance. At or during which time the seven last plagues will be poured out upon rebellious humanity for supporting the enforcement of the mark of the beast upon all. As all those who will not cooperate, will not be able to buy or sell, and finally face a death decree.
Rev 14:6 And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, 7 Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come:
and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters. 8 And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. 9 And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice,
If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, 10 The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: 11 And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.
12 Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus. 13 And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them.
The difference between those who worship the beast and the saints, will be that the saints keep the commandments of God. Obviously therefore, those who worship the beast will not. There is only one commandment of God, which Catholics and most professed Christians do not believe in keeping. Choosing rather their own day which was never commanded or sanctioned by holy scripture. It is one thing to choose not to obey a commandment of God and replace it with another, it is another thing altogether, to force compliance of all to that man made commandment.
At which time humanity will have passed beyond the limits of God's grace and mercy. Therefore will the final global message of mercy be given, and the rebellion of humanity against God be played out. This is the scenario prophesied in the beasts of the book of Revelation, who are ridden and or cooperate with Babylon the great. Most wish to deny the scenario has anything to do with man made Sunday sacredness. Yet there are few institutions which have been as often supported by civil laws throughout history since Constantine's first Sunday law.
Jer 3:8 And I saw, when for all the causes whereby backsliding Israel committed adultery I had put her away, and given her a bill of divorce; yet her treacherous sister Judah feared not, but went and played the harlot also. 9 And it came to pass through the lightness of her whoredom, that she defiled the land, and committed adultery with stones and with stocks.
Ezek 16:14 And thy renown went forth among the heathen for thy beauty: for it was perfect through my comeliness, which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord GOD. 15 But thou didst trust in thine own beauty, and playedst the harlot because of thy renown, and pouredst out thy fornications on every one that passed by; his it was.
Ezek 16:28 Thou hast played the whore also with the Assyrians, because thou wast unsatiable; yea, thou hast played the harlot with them, and yet couldest not be satisfied. 29 Thou hast moreover multiplied thy fornication in the land of Canaan unto Chaldea; and yet thou wast not satisfied herewith.
Hosea 4:15 Though thou, Israel, play the harlot, yet let not Judah offend; and come not ye unto Gilgal, neither go ye up to Bethaven, nor swear, The LORD liveth.
The nation of Israel was referred to as a harlot by God, when she had illicit relationships with the kings, or nations around her, and their gods. That is to say, when she trusted and relied upon the power of other nations, and their gods, over the true God of heaven and earth. The same no doubt will hold true for those who now claim to be God's people, but have illicit relationships with the nations of this earth, and their' gods. That is to say, with those who claim to be Christians, but are involved in the same.
The writer contends that the great city we are discussing is none other than Rome, and the harlot, is none other than the Church of Rome. For she is that original form of apostate Christianity, that first abandoned the power of the Holy Spirit in favor of the power of the state. She leaned on the latter, because she had already lost the former. Through compromise, and mixing pagan practices with the true religion, which is an abomination to God, she lost the power of the Holy Spirit, and thus strove for the power of the state.
It is not such a simple thing as to say that the Church of Rome was that apostate Christian institution which first sought the power of the state, over the power of the Holy Spirit. Moreover, she is the result of apostate Christianity seeking the power of the state, because she had lost the power of the Holy Spirit. Among the various apostate Christian entities of the day, she is the one who gained the favor of the state, to the furtherance of her ends. The struggle between these various groups of apostate Christians requires too much detail to address. The observation of which, would convince any true Christian of their fallen state. The purpose of the following is to establish the fact of her relations, and empowerment, with and by the kings of this earth.
The text of Constantine's Sunday Law of 321 A.D. is :
"One the venerable day of the Sun let the magistrates and people residing in cities rest, and let all workshops be closed. In the country however persons engaged in agriculture may freely and lawfully continue their pursuits because it often happens that another day is not suitable for gain-sowing or vine planting; lest by neglecting the proper moment for such operations the bounty of heaven should be lost. (Given the 7th day of March, Crispus and Constantine being consuls each of them the second time." Codex Justinianus, lib. 3, tit. 12, 3; translated in History of the Christian Church, Philip Schaff, D.D., (7-vol.ed.) Vol. III, p.380. New York, 1884
Dr. A.Chr. Bang says regarding this Law :
"This Sunday law constituted no real favoratism to Christianity..... It is evident from all his statuatory provisions that the Emperor during the time 313-323 with full consciousness has sought the realisation of his religeous aim: the amalgamation of heathenism and Christianity." Kirken og Romerstaten (The Church and the Roman State) p.256. Christiania, 1879
In A.D. 321, to please the bishops of the Catholic Church, he issued an edict commanding judges, townspeople, and mechanics to rest on Sunday. Yet in this also his paganism was still manifest, as the edict required rest on "the venerable day of the sun," and "enjoined the observance, or rather forbade the public desecration, of Sunday, not under the name of Sabbatum, or Dies Domini, but under its old astrological and heathen title, Dies Solis , familiar to all his subjects, so that the law was as applicable to the worshipers of Hercules, Apollo, and Mithras, as to the Christians." (History of the Christian Church, Vol. 3, sec. 75, par. 5.-Schaff.) ( The Great Empires of Prophecy by Alonzo Jones page 391 )
In the above quotes, we see some of the identifying marks of Babylon being fulfilled. The establishment of the first Sunday law came about through the illicit relationship of those who claimed to be God's people, with unconverted and even pagan kings of the earth. In Constantine, we find the first Emperor of Rome to begin committing fornication with the Mother of Harlots, that is Babylon.(Sabbath, Sunday, and the Abomination of Desolation, chap. 3)
: Cathlodox Wed Oct 09, 2024 - 22:07:56Stop avoiding the question and just let us know where you find justification for not observing the Day of Atonement and other feasts of the Lord you evidently blow off.
Acts 15 clearly identifies what a Judaizer is and given you need a little help here I can tell you that the Judaizers LOST the argument they had with Apostolic Christianity.
Now is your big chance to show everyone your Biblical proof for blowing off all those other feasts of the Lord.
I am not avoiding anything. Nor Am I beholden to you, in any way, shape, or form. I will answer you, when I choose, or if I choose. I leave you with the following pertinent words from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Mat 21:33 Hear another parable: There was a certain householder, which planted a vineyard, and hedged it round about, and digged a winepress in it, and built a tower, and let it out to husbandmen, and went into a far country: 34 And when the time of the fruit drew near, he sent his servants to the husbandmen, that they might receive the fruits of it. 35 And the husbandmen took his servants, and beat one, and killed another, and stoned another. 36 Again, he sent other servants more than the first: and they did unto them likewise. 37 But last of all he sent unto them his son, saying, They will reverence my son. 38 But when the husbandmen saw the son, they said among themselves, This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and let us seize on his inheritance. 39 And they caught him, and cast him out of the vineyard, and slew him. 40 When the lord therefore of the vineyard cometh, what will he do unto those husbandmen? 41 They say unto him, He will miserably destroy those wicked men, and will let out his vineyard unto other husbandmen, which shall render him the fruits in their seasons. 42 Jesus saith unto them, Did ye never read in the scriptures, The stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner: this is the Lord's doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes? 43 Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof. 44 And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken: but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder.
Mat 23:37 O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! 38 Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.
: Texas Conservative Thu Oct 10, 2024 - 09:52:48I wouldn't call it no-religion at all. The religion would be the state/some kind of secular humanism focused on state/media.
Sunday Law is just a bunch of bunk. Commerce/Media/State will not shut down on Sundays.
Our bread and circuses are on Sundays.
Accept that there have been continuous Sunday laws throughout history since Constantine's. Several passed in recent years in various countries, and no small number of people desiring to pass more of them. Including within these United States. As this thread itself testifies.
: Wycliffes_Shillelagh Thu Oct 10, 2024 - 01:08:49The powers that be aren't pushing towards Sunday law... they're pushing towards no-religion-at all.
You are 100% right about that!
Amo said:I am not avoiding anything. Nor Am I beholden to you, in any way, shape, or form. I will answer you, when I choose, or if I choose. I leave you with the following pertinent words from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
That's true, you're not beholden to me. You have however demonstrated you lack the ability to explain your beliefs from the Bible. Don't take it to hard on yourself Amo, I knew you wouldn't be able to state why you blow off the other feasts of the Lord while at the same time maintaining everyone needs to observe the Sabbath on Saturday.
http://adventmessenger.org/a-local-community-starts-a-sunday-closing-petition-after-trade-unions-and-churches-led-the-way/
Quoted article below from link above. My comments in blue.
A Local Community Starts a Sunday Closing Petition After Trade Unions and Churches Led the Way
The Christian Institute published on October 3, 2024, that churches and trade unions have joined forces to close supermarkets on Sunday. Now on October 11, 2024, The Christian Institute has reported that a formal petition has been launched by the people to make "Sundays as a guaranteed day of rest."
The Christian Institute published the following update:
• "More than 1,500 people have signed a petition urging Tesco on the Isle of Lewis to keep Sunday special."
• "Tesco's Stornoway store is its only UK branch to remain closed on Sundays, but it is consulting staff about opening seven days a week."
• "Members of the public added several comments on the issue, including: 'The Lord's Day is a great blessing not only for Christians but for society'."
• "Mr. Macleod said: 'Many of us hold cherished memories of island Sundays as a guaranteed day of rest, relaxation and no work — a precious day of family time and worship. However, this simple yet profound day is at risk due to the concept of seven-day trading creeping into our culture. When stores and businesses open their doors on Sunday ... the resulting ripple effect leaves workers with less time to rest, less time for family, less time for church worship and invariably, a lower quality of life."
We are seeing precisely how Sunday laws will be implemented in the United States. Churches and trade unions have united for the common goal of securing Sunday as a day of worship and rest. As a result, the community has launched a petition to persuade political, social, and business leaders to respect the so-called Sunday Sabbath. Typically, petitions are sent to governmental organizations, courts, businesses, or other establishments with the authority to deal with the issue and implement the required changes.
This is what inspiration says will take place:
"The dignitaries of church and state will unite to bribe, persuade, or compel all classes to honor the Sunday ... in order to secure public favor, will yield to the popular demand for a law enforcing Sunday observance" (Great Controversy, p. 592).
When churches, labor unions, and local communities unite to advocate for Sunday rest, this collaboration creates a powerful movement that can set a precedent for others. In a prophetic context, such broad alignment by various parties to enforce Sunday rest is what the book of Revelation warns us about in the coming mark of the beast crisis. Should they succeed in keeping this supermarket closed on Sunday, a growing number of Christians will certainly be inspired to follow similar efforts in other regions.
Sooner or later, Sunday laws will be universally adopted as they will be driven by social, religious, and labor coalitions. Sunday observance will play a role in the fulfillment of end-time events as described in Revelation when religious persecution will come to those who will not embrace the mark of papal apostasy.
"Those who honor the Bible Sabbath (Saturday) will be denounced as enemies or law and order, as breaking down the moral restraints of society, causing anarchy and corruption, and calling down the judgments of God upon the earth" (Great Controversy, p. 592).
"The whole world is to be stirred with enmity against Seventh-day Adventists, because they will not yield homage to the papacy, by honoring Sunday, the institution of this anti-Christian power" (Review and Herald, August 22, 1893).
I've been keeping the seventh day sabbath for forty some odd years now. Passed up and or left jobs in order to observe the day according as my faith dictated. Never once have I even considered that the government should make a law to shut everyone else down according to my faith. If Sunday keepers do not have enough faith in following their convictions regardless of what other people choose to do, that is and should be their problem. Not everyone else's by government mandate because of their lack of conviction to follow through with their faith regardless of what others think or do.
Chick-fil-A is a prime example of what Sunday keepers with real conviction of their faith should practice. They just did what they thought was right, and have been blessed for doing so. God will not ever bless anyone forcing their religious convictions upon everyone else. If He believed in that, believe me, we would all be worship Him exactly how and when He wanted us to.
: Cathlodox Thu Oct 10, 2024 - 20:19:05That's true, you're not beholden to me. You have however demonstrated you lack the ability to explain your beliefs from the Bible. Don't take it to hard on yourself Amo, I knew you wouldn't be able to state why you blow off the other feasts of the Lord while at the same time maintaining everyone needs to observe the Sabbath on Saturday.
Apparently, you wouldn't know an answer, if I put it right in front of your face. As I already have. There is no longer any temple, priesthood, or high priest of this world to perform the ceremonies attached to the day of atonement. Which themselves were only shadows or symbols of the real.
Christ is now our High Priest, and the sacrifice of animals once again after our Lord has been sacrificed once and for all, would constitute a major affront to God.
http://adventmessenger.org/a-360000-strong-labor-union-tells-political-leaders-to-secure-sunday-for-family-and-worship/
Quoted article below from link above.
A 360,000+ Strong Labor Union Tells Political Leaders to Secure Sunday for Family and Worship
"Trade unions will be the cause of the most terrible violence that has ever been seen among human beings" (Manuscript Release, Vol. 4, p. 23).
On October 6, 2024, Belfast Live reported that the Belfast City Council is planning to extend working hours on Sunday. The current law only allows shops to open from 1 pm to 6 pm. However, news of the proposed change in the law to allow shops to open even longer on Sundays has been met with resistance from the Union of Shop, Distributive, and Allied Workers (Usdaw), one of the United Kingdom's biggest trade unions, representing over 360,000 members.
According to Paddy Lillis, the head of the labor union, allowing people to work more hours on Sunday would have a "negative impact on retail workers, their families, and our communities." He also argued that Sunday should be better spent with "families" or in "church."
Belfast Live reported that the union's general secretary made the following statement.
• "Usdaw General Secretary, Paddy Lillis, said: 'Usdaw is disappointed to read news that the issue of extended Sunday trading hours in Belfast is again being discussed by the City Council. This was reviewed in 2020, 2017 and numerous times before that. On all of those occasions, it was determined that such an extension is not the right move'."
• "Paddy added: 'Our members remain opposed to extending Sunday trading hours. Allowing large stores to open for longer hours on Sundays would have a negative impact on retail workers, their families and our communities. Longer Sunday trading would take a heavy toll on staff who would come under even more pressure to work, when they would rather be spending time with family and engaging in community, sports and leisure activities or attending church'."
• "Usdaw says it has written to every councillor in the city emphasising it's an 'emphatic no' from them on longer trading times which they say will have a 'negative impact on retail workers, their families and our communities'."
Here we see one of the UK's largest unions asking political leaders to vote an "emphatic no" on extending Sunday working hours. Unions, which say their reason for existing is to protect workers' rights, are also seeking to protect the right of worshipers to go to church on Sundays. This is what they have declared. They need Sundays, not just for family or free time; they also need to protect this day for worship.
This begs the question: Who are the labor unions working for—the people or for Rome—because they are petitioning politicians to protect Sunday for rest, family, and worship? Labor unions, along with the media and the Protestant churches, are truly doing the bidding of Rome. Powerful labor unions, which exert significant influence on labor, commerce, industry, politicians, and society in general, are engaging in a campaign to promote the papal mark of apostasy.
When labor unions begin to promote Sunday as the Lord's Day, this sets a dangerous precedent because they are serving as an agent for the church by promoting religious interests. This will lead to the erosion of our civil and religious liberty during the mark of the beast crisis. This type of pressure and advocacy can sway public opinion and policy in favor of religious groups, undermining the separation of church and state. Such a development is problematic in pluralistic societies where multiple religions and belief systems coexist.
Sunday laws are returning, and their purpose is to limit our behavior on Sundays. This is intended to encourage people to go to church on Sundays because, in the opinion of Sunday supporters, they are essential to maintaining the moral and social fabric of society. Sunday rest by law conflicts with God's moral law. God's law, which supersedes all human laws, commands us to rest on His seventh-day Sabbath, or Saturday. Additionally, God's law designates Sunday as a working day. As evidenced by Exodus 20:8–11, God Himself actually set the example by working on Sunday, the first day, and resting on Saturday, the seventh.
"The time is not far distant when the test will come to every soul. The observance of the false sabbath will be urged upon us. The contest will be between the commandments of God and the commandments of men" (Prophets and Kings, p. 188).
"The Sunday movement is now making its way in darkness. The leaders are concealing the true issue, and many who unite in the movement do not themselves see whither the undercurrent is tending. Its professions are mild and apparently Christian, but when it shall speak it will reveal the spirit of the dragon. It is our duty to do all in our power to avert the threatened danger. We should endeavor to disarm prejudice by placing ourselves in a proper light before the people. We should bring before them the real question at issue, thus interposing the most effectual protest against measures to restrict liberty of conscience" (Testimonies, vol. 5, p. 452).
http://adventmessenger.org/according-to-a-secular-non-profit-academic-think-tank-university-students-need-sundays-off-for-church-rest-and-mental-health/
Quoted article below from link above.
According to a Secular, Non-profit Academic Think Tank, University Students Need Sundays Off for Church, Rest, and Mental Health
Minding the Campus is a subsidiary of the National Association of Scholars (NAS), a New York City-based secular, nonprofit organization that publishes "essays and short pieces written by professors, academics, students, journalists, and concerned citizens" in an effort to promote reasoned scholarship at American universities. In an article titled "Students Need Rest; Christian Colleges Should Set the Example," published on October 18, 2024, Minding the Campus urged colleges and universities nationwide, both Christian and secular, to make Sunday a priority for students to attend church, relax, and take a break. The essay stated that securing Sunday rest would help students feel less pressured by the rigorous academic and work schedules that leave little time for mental recovery, which can lead to stress and negatively impact their wellbeing.
Minding the Campus published the following:
• "Sundays used to signify a day of rest, reflection, and worship—now, for college students, they signify 11:59 p.m. deadlines and endless Canvas notifications. The constant pressure of online grading systems and classes keeps students in a state of perpetual stress—even at Christian colleges, where Sabbath-honoring should be prioritized. Said religious universities ceaselessly stress the significance of worship, emphasizing that weekly chapel requirements are no substitute for Sunday service, while hypocritically following the oppressive secular model of interminable technological attachment."
• "There is a constant pressure to keep up. Even when you've done everything required, it feels like there is something still to be done ... This pressure is even greater for an online class, where such a system gives students the false impression that they must be continuously plugged in and pumping out assignments to be productive in the course."
• "Young adults are constantly warned of technological obsession through the overuse of social media, and yet, they are also trained to be ceaselessly available to respond to emails and submit assignments regardless of the date or time. This does not trivialize the threat of social media; however, it would be of great benefit to students' mental health if educators and curriculum designers, particularly in Christian universities, abide by the Biblically derived idiom, 'Practice what you preach'."
University students do have demanding schedules, with back-to-back classes, study sessions, assignments, and, for many, part-time jobs to help cover expenses. Minding the Campus says that the constant pace and lack of downtime leave no time for recovery and claims that if students were to take Sundays off for rest and worship, they could benefit from a structured break each week.
According to these so-called "experts" who are dedicated to researching and analyzing campus life, Sunday rest is the solution to reset mentally. Sunday is the day to reflect and connect with your values and community. Sunday would not only give them a needed physical and mental rest but also serve as a weekly anchor, helping them refocus and manage their lives. Sunday rest and worship is the answer to a healthier balance and more sustainable academic performance.
While there is a wealth of statistical evidence demonstrating that the human body and mind absolutely need rest to function well, there is no scientific or biblical proof that we must get our rest on Sunday. Students and people in general certainly need more rest to reduce stress, improve focus, and prevent burnout, but why is it that the consensus from everyone, including academia, agrees that Sunday is the solution to save society? You will find this same consensus among most Christians, labor unions, politicians, and the mainstream media who believe that Sunday, not Saturday, is the universal day of rest.
God, in His wisdom, created rest during creation week. In Genesis 2:2, 3, God "rested," "blessed," and "sanctified" the seventh day, meaning He set it apart for a holy or religious use and for a time of rest. Through these three distinct acts, the day of rest was established. It was committed to Adam, the father of our race, and was made into a memorial of creation. This rest was also enshrined in the moral law (Exodus 20:8–11). This holy Sabbath rest is at the same time a sign of sanctification, a sign of the believer's rest from his own works of sin and his entrance into the rest of the soul, which Jesus promises to those who come to Him according to Hebrews 4:1–10.
Before sin entered our world, the Sabbath was a memorial to the living God. Before sin destroyed the perfect peace and unity that existed in the Garden of Eden, the Sabbath had been established, blessed, and sanctified by the Lord. And this memorial of God will live on throughout eternity in the earth made new (Isaiah 66:22, 23). Yes, after this world has been purified and all the marks of sin have been forever removed, Saturday, not Sunday, will remain for all eternity as the true day of worship for the Creator.
Today, the world has sanctified the first day of the week and is participating in a fraud, a lie, a deception. Millions believe that Sunday is the day of rest, but as long as God endures, as long as His word is true, and as long as the earth remains, the seventh-day Sabbath is a rebuke to all those who are worshiping on the wrong day. Regardless of how many times people tell us that Sunday is the Lord's Day, the Fourth Commandment remains unchanged and requires observance of the seventh-day Sabbath.
http://adventmessenger.org/a-political-party-in-india-calls-on-legislators-to-keep-sunday-work-free-and-not-stray-from-christian-principles/
Quoted article below from link above.
A Political Party in India Calls on Legislators to Keep Sunday Work-Free and not Stray from Christian Principles
The Mokokchung Times, an independent newspaper in the Mokokchung district of Nagaland state in India, reported on November 6, 2024 that one of its local political parties had asked local legislators and municipal leaders to defend Christian values ��and protect Sunday as a holy day. The Rising People's Party criticized the government's decision to allow secular business transactions on Sunday to accommodate tourists during the annual Hornbill Festival, a week-long cultural celebration organized by the state government.
In its protest, the Rising People's Party warned that Sunday is the day of rest and should not be like any other work day and urged political leaders not to deviate from Christian ethics and principles.
The Mokokchung Times reported the following:
• "The Rising People's Party (RPP) has issued a strong statement urging the Dimapur Municipal Council (DMC) to reconsider its decision to declare Sundays as a day for business transactions. The party emphasized that Nagaland is a Christian state and asserted that every other citizen of India who has made Nagaland their homes are guests of this state."
• "The RPP criticized the state government's prioritization of the Hornbill Festival over the sanctity of the Sabbath, stating, 'It's unbecoming of the state government to give undue importance to Hornbill Festival while utterly neglecting the sacrilege being committed on Sabbath days by its affiliated agencies such as the DMC'."
• "It befuddles the RPP that under the garb of the so-called 'Festive Season' the DMC should normalize Sabbath day as any other day of the week,' the RPP press statement read."
• "In addressing the issue of Sunday shop openings, the RPP called for all legislators across political parties and various church organizations to reach a consensus. "It's imperative that the Christian state of Nagaland take this issue seriously," it urged. The party stressed that the government and its affiliate organizations must recognize that despite our varied political stance and views we do not stray from the core principles of Christian ethics and principles."
• "The RPP issued a warning, stating, 'Unless we the stakeholders take corrective measures now, the coming generation of Nagas will end up as 'Wokes' or spiritual illiterates, and this may well spell the end of our culture and identity, including our Christian identity'."
This is exactly how Sunday laws will be passed. In this particular case, we see an organized body of people who share common political goals who are pushing for Sunday to be respected by government leaders. They are basically telling those in authority that they are guilty of desecrating Sunday by permitting widespread buying and selling, which in their minds threatens to erode the Christian culture and heritage that values this day as sacred.
This is happening right now in India. Christians in India are fighting for Sunday to prevent this day from becoming just another business day. They claim that Sunday is an integral part of their Christian identity, and they are fighting to preserve it. Sunday has indeed become a special day of significance throughout the entire world, and Christians are advocating for their so-called Sabbath to be respected by those in political offices.
It won't be long. Sunday will soon become the focal point once again in America. Even in our nation, there is a movement working to preserve this day to be free from commerce. In the final conflict, all earthly powers will unite to enforce laws compelling worship on a day that has not been divinely sanctioned for worship—Sunday.
"The substitution of the false for the true is the last act in the drama. When this substitution becomes universal, God will reveal Himself. When the laws of men are exalted above the laws of God, when the powers of this earth try to force men to keep the first day of the week, know that the time has come for God to work. He will arise in His majesty, and will shake terribly the earth. He will come out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the world for their iniquity" (Bible Commentary, Vol. 7, p. 980).
Interesting, that Sunday is being called the sabbath, and that its observance should be maintained by the state in order to help combat wokeness. One of the very things our new President intends to combat as well, and rightly so. The question is how far he will go to do such. Will he also seek to more firmly establish Sunday sabbath through legislation as well? Time will tell.
This also continues to add one reason after another to the list of reasons Sunday keepers want their day protected and therefore also enforced upon all. This is only because they have hijacked the many personal and societal benefits and blessings of observing God's sabbath, and transferred them to a day of their own choosing.
And whose choosing was it originally, but that of "BABYLON THE GREAT'S". And what are all these Sunday sacredness proponents doing but drinking the wine of Babylon, and seeking to cause all others to do so as well.
APOSTOLIC LETTER DIES DOMINI by John Paul II63. Christ came to accomplish a new "exodus", to restore freedom to the oppressed. He performed many healings on the Sabbath (cf. Mt 12:9-14 and parallels), certainly not to violate the Lord's Day, but to reveal its full meaning: "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mk 2:27). Opposing the excessively legalistic interpretation of some of his contemporaries, and developing the true meaning of the biblical Sabbath, Jesus, as "Lord of the Sabbath" (Mk 2:28), restores to the Sabbath observance its liberating character, carefully safeguarding the rights of God and the rights of man. This is why Christians, called as they are to proclaim the liberation won by the blood of Christ,
felt that they had the authority to transfer the meaning of the Sabbath to the day of the Resurrection. The Passover of Christ has in fact liberated man from a slavery more radical than any weighing upon an oppressed people — the slavery of sin, which alienates man from God, and alienates man from himself and from others, constantly sowing within history the seeds of evil and violence.
The following is from the CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.2190
The sabbath, which represented the completion of the first creation, has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ. The following is taken from
THE AUGSBURG CONFESSION OF FAITH Which Was Submitted to His Imperial Majesty Charles V at the Diet of Augsburg in the Year 1530. by Philip Melanchthon Article XXVIII. Even then, the Catholic Church claimed to have changed the Sabbath.
Moreover, it is disputed whether bishops or pastors have the right to introduce ceremonies in the Church, and to make laws concerning meats, holy-days and grades, that is, orders of ministers, etc. They that give this right to the bishops refer to this testimony John 16, 12. 13: I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit when He, the Spirit of Truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth. They also refer to the example of the Apostles, who commanded to abstain from blood and from things strangled, Acts 15, 29.
They refer to the Sabbath-day as having been changed into the Lord's Day, contrary to the Decalog, as it seems. Neither is there any example whereof they make more than concerning the changing of the Sabbath-day. Great, say they, is the power of the Church, since it has dispensed with one of the Ten Commandments! Stephen Keenan, A Doctrinal Catechism 3rd ed., p. 174."Question: Have you any other way of proving that the Church has power to institute festivals of precept?
"Answer: Had she not such power, she could not have done that in which all modern religionists agree with her-
she could not have substituted the observance of Sunday, the first day of the week, for the observance of Saturday, the seventh day, a change for which there is no Scriptural authority."
John Laux, A Course in Religion for Catholic High Schools and Academies (1 936), vol. 1, P. 51."Question: How prove you that the Church hath power to command feasts and holy days?
"Answer.
By the very act of changing the Sabbath into Sunday, which Protestants allow of, and therefore they fondly contradict themselves, by keeping Sunday strictly, and breaking most other feasts commanded by the same Church.'
James Cardinal Gibbons, Archbishop of Baltimore (1877-1921), in a signed letter."Is Saturday the seventh day according to the Bible and the Ten Commandments? I answer yes. Is Sunday the first day of the week and did the Church change the seventh day - Saturday- for Sunday, the first day?
I answer yes. Did Christ change the day'? I answer no!"Faithfully yours, J. Card. Gibbons"
Catholic Virginian Oct. 3, 1947, p. 9, art. "To Tell You the Truth.""For example,
nowhere in the Bible do we find that Christ or the Apostles ordered that the Sabbath be changed from Saturday to Sunday.We have the commandment of God given to Moses to keep holy the Sabbath day, that is the 7th day of the week, Saturday. Today most Christians keep Sunday because it has been revealed to us by the [Roman Catholic] church outside the Bible."
Peter Geiermann, C.S.S.R., The Converts Catechism of Catholic Doctrine (1957), p. 50."Question: Which is the Sabbath day?
"Answer: Saturday is the Sabbath day.
"Question: Why do we observe Sunday instead of Saturday?
"Answer. We observe Sunday instead of Saturday
because the Catholic Church transferred the solemnity from Saturday to Sunday."
Peter R. Kraemer, Catholic Church Extension Society (1975), Chicago, Illinois."Regarding the change from the observance of the Jewish Sabbath to the Christian Sunday, I wish to draw your attention to the facts:
"1) That Protestants, who accept the Bible as the only rule of faith and religion, should by all means go back to the observance of the Sabbath. The fact that they do not, but on the contrary observe the Sunday, stultifies them in the eyes of every thinking man.
"2) We Catholics do not accept the Bible as the only rule of faith. Besides the Bible we have the living Church, the authority of the Church, as a rule to guide us. We say, this Church, instituted by Christ to teach and guide man through life, has the right to change the ceremonial laws of the Old Testament and hence,
we accept her change of the Sabbath to Sunday. We frankly say, yes, the Church made this change, made this law, as she made many other laws, for instance, the Friday abstinence, the unmarried priesthood, the laws concerning mixed marriages, the regulation of Catholic marriages and a thousand other laws.
"It is always somewhat laughable, to see the Protestant churches, in pulpit and legislation, demand the observance of Sunday, of which there is nothing in their Bible."
From the Catholic Mirror of Sept. 23, 1893The first proposition needs little proof. The Catholic Church for over one thousand years before the existence of a Protestant,
by virtue of her divine mission changed the day from Saturday to Sunday. We say by virtue of her divine mission, because he who called Himself the "Lord of the Sabbath," endowed her with His own power to teach, "he that heareth you, heareth Me;" commanded all who believe in Him to hear her, under penalty of being placed with the "heathen and publican;" and promised to be with her to the end of the world.
From the Catholic Mirror of Dec. 23, 1893"The arguments contained in this pamphlet are firmly grounded on the word of God, and having been closely studied with the Bible in hand, leave no escape for the conscientious Protestant except the abandonment of Sunday worship and the return to Saturday, commanded by their teacher, the Bible, or, unwilling to abandon the tradition of the Catholic Church, which enjoins the keeping of Sunday, and which they have accepted in direct opposition to their teacher, the Bible, consistently accept her in all her teachings. Reason and common sense demand the acceptance of one or the other of these alternatives; either Protestantism and the keeping of Saturday, or Catholicity and the keeping of Sunday. Compromise is impossible."
Rome's Challenge www.immaculateheart.com/maryonline Dec 2003"Most Christians assume that Sunday is the biblically approved day of worship.
The Catholic Church protests that it transferred Christian worship from the biblical Sabbath (Saturday) to Sunday, and that to try to argue that the change was made in the Bible is both dishonest and a denial of Catholic authority. If Protestantism wants to base its teachings only on the Bible, it should worship on Saturday."
Catholic Virginian, October 3, 1947, p. 9, article "To Tell You the Truth."For example,
nowhere in the Bible do we find that Christ or the Apostles ordered that the Sabbath be changed from Saturday to Sunday.We have the commandment of God given to Moses to keep holy the Sabbath day, that is the 7th day of the week, Saturday. Today most Christians keep Sunday because it has been revealed to us by the [Roman Catholic] church outside the Bible."
The Catholic Encyclopaedia, vol. 4, "The Ten Commandments", 1908 edition by Robert Appleton Company; and 1999 Online edition by Kevin Knight, Imprimatur, John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York."Written by the finger of God on two tables of stone, this Divine code (ten commandments) was received from the Almighty by Moses amid the thunders of Mount Sinai...Christ resumed these Commandments in the double precept of charity--love of God and of the neighbour; He proclaimed them as binding under the New Law in Matthew 19 and in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5)...
The (Catholic) Church, on the other hand, after changing the day of rest from the Jewish Sabbath, or seventh day of the week, to the first, made the Third Commandment refer to Sunday as the day to be kept holy as the Lord's Day...He (God) claims one day out of the seven as a memorial to Himself, and this must be kept holy..."
St. Catherine Church Sentinel, Algonac, Michigan, May 21, 1995."Perhaps the boldest thing, the most revolutionary change the Church ever did,
happened in the first century. The holy day, the Sabbath, was changed from Saturday to Sunday. 'The day of the Lord' was chosen, not from any direction noted in the Scriptures, but from the (Catholic) Church's sense of its own power...People who think that the Scriptures should be the sole authority, should logically become 7th Day Adventists, and keep Saturday holy." St. Catherine Church Sentinel, Algonac, Michigan, May 21, 1995.
Catholic Press, Sydney, Australia, August 1900."Sunday is a Catholic institution and its claim to observance can be defended only on Catholic principles...
From beginning to end of Scripture there is not a single passage that warrants the transfer of weekly public worship from the last day of the week to the first." Catholic Press, Sydney, Australia, August 1900.
Our Sunday Visitor, February 15, 1950."Protestants...accept Sunday rather than Saturday as the day for public worship
after the Catholic Church made the change...But the Protestant mind does not seem to realize that...In observing the Sunday, they are accepting the authority of the spokesman for the church, the Pope." Our Sunday Visitor, February 15, 1950.
The Catholic Universe Bulletin, August 14, 1942, p. 4."
The (Roman Catholic) Church changed the observance of the Sabbath to Sunday by right of the divine, infallible authority given to her by her founder, Jesus Christ. The Protestant claiming the Bible to be the only guide of faith, has no warrant for observing Sunday."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=St825WwI_iw
Pink Sundays. The man of sin and lawlessness moves his agenda forward.
Amo, you still haven't answered the question. Posting lengthy quotes from others works is not dealing with the question. You should be able to, in your own words, directly answer the question as to why one of the Lord's ceremonial feasts stands out from all the others and why (as your Church claims) will be the final test of faith.
: Cathlodox Sat Nov 16, 2024 - 09:11:14Amo, you still haven't answered the question. Posting lengthy quotes from others works is not dealing with the question. You should be able to, in your own words, directly answer the question as to why one of the Lord's ceremonial feasts stands out from all the others and why (as your Church claims) will be the final test of faith.
My own words, just like your's and all other's, are dust like us. Here today gone tomorrow. Unless they be in accordance with the word of God which stands fast forever. You have been shown the truth from God's word, which I have quoted and addressed extensively. I would tell you to go to, and find the words of some other mere man to rely upon, as I have no interest in anyone hanging upon my words. But I believe you have already done so.
I have no interest in getting people to believe my own words. All should seek to understand, acknowledge, and believe in the word of God. Holy scripture.
http://adventmessenger.org/the-powerful-us-conference-of-catholic-bishops-claims-that-the-best-way-to-honor-laudato-si-is-to-implement-sunday-rest-for-the-good-of-the-environment-and-society/
Quoted article below from link above.
The Powerful US Conference of Catholic Bishops Claims that the Best Way to Honor Laudato Si' is to Implement Sunday Rest for the Good of the Environment and Society
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) is the governing and unifying body of American Catholics, providing moral, spiritual, theological, public policy, and pastoral guidance to American Catholics and policymakers. Strategically located in Washington, DC, the USCCB interacts directly with legislators and federal agencies on issues that align with Catholic teaching. As the central organization representing the Catholic Church in the United States, the USCCB also coordinates with the Vatican ambassador to the United States, known as the Papal Nuncio, or the official representative of the Holy See's ecclesiastical authority. In other words, the USCCB exerts significant influence in the United States through its advocacy efforts, engagement with high-level government leaders, and mobilization of grassroots initiatives through parishes and diocesan networks.
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops gathered for their annual fall meeting from November 11-14, 2024, in Baltimore, and called for all to honor the Sunday Sabbath and to turn to the sacrament of the Eucharist for the 10th anniversary of Pope Francis' encyclical, Laudato Si'. The Rome-based news agency Aleteia published the following:
• "US Bishops' Conference discusses plans for 10th anniversary of Laudato Si', Pope Francis' encyclical on care for creation."
• "Catholics would do well – and the environment would benefit – by paying greater attention to certain 'pauses' in their everyday lives, including a more faithful observance of Friday abstinence from meat and the Sabbath rest.
• "That was the suggestion of a bishop who chairs the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development."
• "Archbishop Borys Gudziak, together with Bishop A. Elias Zaidan, Chairman of the Committee on International Justice and Peace, addressed the bishops' conference's annual fall meeting in Baltimore November 13 on implementing Pope Francis' 2015 encyclical on care for creation, Laudato Si'."
• "Because creation is connected to everything human, our efforts around Laudato Si' need not be weighed down by many new programs and tasks. Rather, Laudato Si' can be integrated into our core mission of evangelization."
• "We live in a world of constant work and stimulation, with ever-present phones, screens and gadgets. In essence, our world does not rest and struggles with leisure."
• "Christian care for creation is nourished by the Sabbath precept of rest for the land, forgiveness, restoration, festivity, and freedom ... Our hyperactive world yearns for the Sabbath, which is expressed in the Sunday Eucharist when the Lord makes 'all things new.'"
The movement to reestablish Sunday as a universal day of rest is a multi-faceted effort involving Protestants, Catholics, labor unions, social groups, media networks, business leaders, and others, each with distinct motivations but overlapping goals. Religious organizations often lead the charge, emphasizing Sunday as a sacred day for worship and family, rooted in biblical traditions and historical observance. Labor unions and worker advocacy groups champion the cause as a way to combat overwork and promote employee well-being, arguing that Sunday is the collective day of rest. Social and community leaders also support the initiative, seeing it as a means to strengthen family bonds and to counter the relentless pace of modern life. Business leaders sometimes advocate for Sunday rest in order to increase productivity and job satisfaction during the workweek. Together, these diverse actors form a coalition that appeals to both spiritual values and secular ideals of rest and community.
Rome is no exception. They will play a major role in advocating for Sunday rest. The restoration of Sunday in society will be promoted by both Protestants and Catholics. Even in Protestant America, Rome is helping to achieve this and will no doubt be one of the "leading churches" directing the campaign for Sunday laws:
"When the leading churches of the United States, uniting upon such points of doctrine as are held by them in common, shall influence the State to enforce their decrees and to sustain their institutions, then Protestant America will have formed an image of the Roman hierarchy, and the infliction of civil penalties upon dissenters will inevitably result." (Great Controversy, p. 445).
"These records of the past clearly reveal the enmity of Rome toward the true Sabbath and its defenders, and the means which she employs to honor the institution of her creating. The Word of God teaches that these scenes are to be repeated as papists and Protestants shall unite for the exaltation of the Sunday"(Great Controversy, p. 578).
"Under one head—the papal power—the people will unite to oppose God in the person of His witnesses. This union is cemented by the great apostate. While he seeks to unite his agents in warring against the truth" (Testimonies, Vol. 7, p. 182).
http://adventmessenger.org/christians-are-fuming-over-sunday-openings-in-a-divided-community/
Quoted article below from link above.
Christians are "Fuming" over Sunday Openings in a Divided Community
Christians in the United Kingdom are expressing frustration after a Tesco retailer located in Stornoway, which is considered to be part of Britain's Bible Belt, decided to operate on Sundays, which are considered by Catholics and the majority of Protestants to be the day of rest and worship. The local religious community has been protesting Tesco's plan to operate on Sundays by putting up signs that read, "Remember the Sabbath," at shoppers entering the store.
Critics of the Sunday openings argue that such practices place unnecessary pressure on employees to work on a day that should instead be spent on spiritual reflection in church. This so-called desecration of the Sunday Sabbath has caused Christians to come together for a renewed emphasis on calling for the community to keep Sunday holy.
MSN News published the following article titled "Christian Fundamentalists Fuming over Tesco Opening on Sabbath Day in Britain's Bible Belt" on November 18, 2024:
• "Christian campaigners on a Scottish Island were deeply upset at their local Tesco deciding to open on Sundays."
• "Members of the religious community took to the outside of the shop on the first open Sunday in a silent protest, holding signs reminding customers to "Remember the Sabbath."
However, not everyone was upset with the decision to open on Sundays. Some members of the community were actually praising the decision.
• "But despite the protest, the branch saw a full car park within 10 minutes of opening. Happy shoppers said the decision was 'well overdue,' and that it was time for the Church's influence over people's lives to stop."
• "Retired plumber William Macdonald said: 'It's long overdue. I am more than pleased, especially for the tourists. It's good for the islands and its progress. Times have changed'."
• "Bus driver John Macleod echoed these remarks and said: 'This is my first shop of the week so I'm glad it's open. It is well overdue. The Church should keep its nose out of people's business. I hope it's here to stay'."
• "Another woman, who did not want her name shared, said: 'We are in the 21st century and some people here are culturally suppressed. Religion is being used to control people's lives but times have changed'."
• "It has been a strong tradition on the Isle of Lewis to observe the Sabbath, and more than 2,000 people signed a petition to oppose the Sunday opening."
The religious communities advocating for Sunday closures are showing no signs of slowing down their efforts. They are committed to continuing the fight and are remaining steadfast in their so-called moral imperative to secure Sunday rest by law if necessary. These churches are on a misguided mission to protect Sunday as the day of rest and worship for family and community.
Around the world, including the United States, there is a campaign to mobilize Christian groups to influence policymakers to restore religious principles and teachings. With increasing momentum, churches are working to build alliances with community and political leaders, urging them to champion their cause. Advocates believe that once they gain the necessary political support and public backing, they will achieve the legislative recognition they seek, ensuring that Sunday becomes a legally protected day of rest, a move they say will benefit both society as well as the soul.
"The dignitaries of church and State will unite to bribe, persuade, or compel all classes to honor the Sunday. The lack of divine authority will be supplied by oppressive enactments. Political corruption is destroying love of justice and regard for truth; and even in free America, rulers and legislators, in order to secure public favor, will yield to the popular demand for a law enforcing Sunday observance. Liberty of conscience, which has cost so great a sacrifice, will no longer be respected" (Great Controversy, p. 592).
http://adventmessenger.org/major-global-media-company-why-sunday-should-still-be-a-day-of-rest-shops-should-close-so-that-families-can-stay-together/
Major Global Media Company: "Why Sunday Should Still be a Day of Rest—Shops Should Close so that Families can Stay Together"
If you were ever wondering if the media was part of the conspiracy to push Sunday closures in society, there is no more need to wonder. One of the largest news media companies in the world has just voiced its support for closing stores on Sunday. The Daily Mail is a major British newspaper and media outlet and one of the most visited English-language news websites globally, averaging 314,000,000 monthly visitors.
On November 20, 2024, the Daily Mail weighed in on the controversy surrounding the small island town of Stornoway in Scotland. In an article titled "Why Sunday should Still be a Day of Rest, says Peter Hitchens—Shops should close so that families can stay together—just like in my childhood," the Daily Mail advocated for the return to a time when Sundays were respected by society and families were more united. The article expressed the following:
• "The people of Stornoway on the Isle of Lewis are still fighting against the supermarket giant's decision to start trading on the Sabbath on November 17. It is part of a long, slow war between the modern world and the old one, which reached its final stage with the introduction of Sunday air services to the island, in 2002, and Sunday ferries in 2009. Yet Lewis still has a very high proportion of Christian believers, and the idea of Sunday as a day of rest is still one of the Ten Commandments."
• "The Lord's Day Observance Society and the National Secular Society have both been involved in the Stornoway stand-off."
• "I am very sorry for the Christians of Lewis. Couldn't we still have somewhere in these islands where the old ideas were still respected?"
• "There has to be some time when families can get together. If there is no such time, families can weaken and break, as they lose proper contact with each."
• "It isn't the person who works on Sunday who is damaged by it. It is the people who would have preferred him or her to be at home."
• "I remember Sundays as they were in this country 60 years ago. In the small Devon town where I was at boarding school, the loudest noise was that of church bells. The streets were bleakly empty. Traffic was sparse. The pubs opened for two hours at lunchtime and then for three hours in the evening, in both cases after church services had finished."
• "It is in fact a very good description of the somnolent, silent, domestic Sundays we all once had, perhaps relieved by an uplifting Charles Dickens adaptation on the TV. It was a day quite different from any other day, and I miss it."
• "You do not need to be part of it to be impressed by the unity of it, and – if you are me – to envy the peace and release from the clangour and urgency of everyday."
There is a culture war raging between secular and religious groups. In this conflict, we know who will come out on top. Bible prophecy warns us that the beast, the image, the ruling kings, the merchants of the earth, and apparently news media companies will all be conspiring together to impose a false system of worship. In the context of prophetic interpretation drawn from Revelation 12–18, enforced Sunday worship will become the mark of the beast during the final crisis.
This view is rooted in the idea that the "beast" represents a power that seeks to enforce religious doctrines that are contrary to God's commandments, specifically the observance of the seventh-day Sabbath (Saturday). During this time, the beast and its image—symbolizing a union of church and state—will compel global allegiance by mandating Sunday worship, a tradition that is based on human authority rather than divine law. Those who resist, adhering instead to God's law and the Sabbath, will face persecution. This test of loyalty will distinguish those aligned with the Creator's authority from those who submit to human systems of worship, culminating in the sealing of God's faithful and the condemnation of those who receive the mark of the beast.
Whenever we hear calls to bring back Sunday as the weekly day of rest, we can know for certain that these are attempts to mobilize people into political action for sinister purposes. The truth is that Sunday will never become the day of rest and worship without enforcing this day through state power. Laws can limit people's actions, but they can't change their hearts. Instead of restoring society through the union of church and state, these actions will lead to the implementation of the mark of the beast during the final crisis. All false doctrine and oppressive dragon-like actions by governments will soon vanish during the outpouring of the seven last plagues (Revelation 16). Our only hope is to rely on God and His Word.
"Sooner or later Sunday laws will be passed. But there is much for God's servants to do to warn the people" (Review and Herald, February 16, 1905).
"Those who are under the influence of a false religion, who observe a spurious rest day, will set aside the most positive evidence in regard to the true Sabbath. They will try to compel men to obey the laws of their own creation, laws that are directly opposed to the law of God. Upon those who continue in this course, the wrath of God will fall. Unless they change, they cannot escape the penalty. The law for the observance of the first day of the week is the production of an apostate Christendom. Sunday is a child of the papacy, exalted by the Christian world above the sacred day of God's rest. In no case are God's people to pay it homage" (Testimonies, Vol. 9, pp. 234, 235).
: Amo Sun Nov 24, 2024 - 08:44:47http://adventmessenger.org/major-global-media-company-why-sunday-should-still-be-a-day-of-rest-shops-should-close-so-that-families-can-stay-together/
Well, they dog gone better push for no Sunday Football or Baseball cause all those people have to work to entertain the folks.
: Rella Mon Nov 25, 2024 - 15:23:42Well, they dog gone better push for no Sunday Football or Baseball cause all those people have to work to entertain the folks.
They are working on it.
: Amo Wed Nov 27, 2024 - 09:11:11They are working on it.
Good. I dont even have the TV on. Laptop is until Church is over and done today. Though in truth, I do get caught up daily in the religious forums reading and posting...
I guess that should stop... along with the church end cause due to physical limitations at the moment I cannot go... and due to people getting sick then dieing for decades that I took care of or helped to
church became on TV or PC.....with the occasional visit. (I have been a member of mine for 52 years this year)
But then if we go to church on the day we worship look how many people have to work.
The Pastor, the aids, Elders and Deacons) (Sunday School teachers) and those that set up the baptisms and communions. the choir. ( I would not miss them) and the
electrical guy who gets it on the PC.
The people who clear the snow...
So many for that hour and 10 minute service from a bible I dont read.... NIV
Nope. Should be no church on Sunday and should be not church on the Sabbath....
We should all be Quakers. They may end up being the only true believers saved??? But not in a Meetinghouse. We can all be quiet together from our homes ::nodding::
Anyway, I happened upon this again
http://adventmessenger.org/major-global-media-company-why-sunday-should-still-be-a-day-of-rest-shops-should-close-so-that-families-can-stay-together/
"why-sunday-should-still-be-a-day-of-rest-shops-should-close-so-that-families-can-stay-together/" and it brought to mind an old Andy Griffith Mayberry program where the minister preached on how they all needed to rest on Sundays, yada yada... and they went home and proceeded to do just that sitting on the front porch drinking lemonade that Aunt Bea had made... until after an excruciatingly long time someone asked what time it was ... and like 45 min had passed.
Was not long before it was back to Sundays as usual. Opie and Andy I think went fishing.... Aunt Bea got busy to make the Sunday dinner
and beyond that I forget
https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/info/2023/09/11/230911a.html
Quoted article below from link above.
PRESS RELEASE
ATHLETICA VATICANA
Blessing and inauguration of the "Vatican House of Sport"
Inauguration of the operational headquarters of the official Vatican Sport Association
Wednesday, 20 September 2023, 18:30
Vatican City, 11 September 2023 - A "House" with its doors wide open to welcome women and men of sport, professionals and amateurs. Relaunching the inclusive and solidarity-based vision of Pope Francis to truly be "Fratelli tutti", brothers to all - the theme of his latest encyclical - also through sport.
In the ancient heart of Trastevere, in Palazzo San Calisto, which is an extraterritorial area of the Holy See, Athletica Vaticana places its operational headquarters (the registered office is in Via del Pellegrino in the Vatican City) at the disposal of the world of sport, as a crossroads of encounters between athletes of different cultures and religions, with special attention to the most fragile people.
The "Vatican House of Sport" will be blessed and inaugurated on Wednesday 20 September, at 18.30, by Cardinal José Tolentino de Mendonça, prefect of the Dicastery for Culture and Education, to whom the Pope, in the recent Apostolic Constitution (2022), entrusted sport.
The inclusive and supportive style, the human and fraternal service of sharing, and humble Christian witness among sporting women and men sport give meaning to the Vatican's official multi-sports association. Athletica Vaticana is an "ambassador of the Pope", because it "bears concrete witness, on the streets and in the midst of the people, to the solidarity face of sport, welcoming young migrants and people with disabilities", wrote Pope Francis in his message on the occasion of the Mediterranean Games in Algeria.
A unique "sports diplomatic corps" made up of some 200 men and women - Athletica Vaticana proposes - with the new "House" in Palazzo San Calisto - to experience sport as an opportunity for encounter, sociality, dialogue with all, and friendship that becomes fraternity. A particularly important, even decisive, service in a society torn by wars, tensions, divisions, fears. Because sport, if lived in its soul and preserving its gratuitousness and noble "amateur" spirit, may not only give hope but even prevent conflicts, large and small, between states and between people.
No worries. The Mother church of Sunday sacredness, has entered the sports arena, to work upon establishing her social justice agenda regarding Sunday "sacredness".
https://www.churchpop.com/does-the-nfl-violate-the-sabbath-priest-explains-if-sports-are-okay-on-sundays/
Quoted article below from link above.
Does the NFL Violate the Sabbath? Priest Explains If Sports Are Okay on Sundays
Are sports okay on Sunday?
In this episode of "Ask a Marian," Father Chris Alar, MIC, answered the viewer's question: "Father, what is the Catholic Church teaching about sports? My neighbor said the NFL violates the Sabbath and therefore it is sinful to watch games on Sunday. Is this true?"
Father Chris begins by noting the importance of how an individual views sports, saying,
"If sports to us are just a casual way to relax or enjoy the company of others over a good meal after the proper worship of God and fulfillment of our duties are done, it can be a positive thing."
However, he also warns of sports becoming an idol keeping us from Sunday Mass, in which case it becomes a problem.
What does the Catholic Church say about Sports?
Father Chris explains that in the writings of Saint Augustine, Saint John Paul II, and even Saint Paul, we can find references that reflect the Church's position on sports.
More specifically, the belief that sportsman-like discipline is important in cultivating virtue, and that, like athletes, we must train our souls on our journey to heaven.
Father Chris notes that the king virtues of charity and humility learned in team sports are also of great importance. He also mentions his personal experience of learning valuable life skills throughout his high school athletic career.
Then, Father Chris points to the Vatican document, "'Giving the best of yourself: a Document on the Christian perspective on sport and the human person, from the Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life."
The document explains more about what the Church says regarding the value of sports and how it benefits Christians, especially how we understand our vocation as children of God. However, the document also acknowledges the risk of sports being an occasion to "divide a family and to diminish the sanctity of Sunday as a holy day to uphold."
Lastly, Father Chris Alar points out a part of the document that encourages priests to be knowledgeable about contemporary sports, "especially as they affect the youth."
The Bottom Line
As with most joys in life, it must be rightly ordered!
If your interest or relationship with sports causes you to sin, it's time to reevaluate their role in your life. If you prioritize watching the big game on Sunday instead of participating in the Holy Mass, it's a serious soul-threatening problem, too.
Otherwise, sports on Sunday are not off-limits or sinful! In fact, they could be a powerful tool in your spiritual tool kit.
You can find a list of patron saints for athletes here.
: Amo Sat Dec 14, 2024 - 08:11:17https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/info/2023/09/11/230911a.html
Quoted article below from link above.
No worries. The Mother church of Sunday sacredness, has entered the sports arena, to work upon establishing her social justice agenda regarding Sunday "sacredness".
https://www.churchpop.com/does-the-nfl-violate-the-sabbath-priest-explains-if-sports-are-okay-on-sundays/
Quoted article below from link above.
But you cannot have Sunday sports without there being someone working. ::tippinghat::
: Rella Sat Dec 14, 2024 - 09:16:42But you cannot have Sunday sports without there being someone working. ::tippinghat::
Exactly. Working, and spending and making a whole lot of money. Sports on Sunday will have to go, or the hypocrisy of such maintained by complicated laws.
http://adventmessenger.org/catholic-advocacy-group-is-calling-for-the-restoration-of-constantines-sunday-laws-in-europe/
Quoted article below from link above.
Catholic Advocacy Group is Calling for the Restoration of Constantine's Sunday Law in Europe
Family Solidarity is an Irish conservative advocacy group run by Roman Catholics. [1] Part of their advocacy work is to petition politicians to enact legislation that aligns with Catholic values. For example, Family Solidarity outlined the following objectives in their mission statement:
• " When the pope says 'positive social and legal action' he means, amongst other things, lobbying for good laws and regulations and to change bad ones. Lobbying is part and parcel of the working democracy everywhere. To neglect it would mean allowing our opponents complete freedom for their destructive activity in this area."
The Catholic Church is deeply involved in political lobbying and engages with governments to influence legislation. Rome believes that Catholic doctrine should guide action not just in personal life but also in shaping society. Recently, Family Solidarity has openly called for the return of Constantine's Sunday laws to be revived again in Europe. Anytime Roman Catholics begin advocating for laws that would make Sunday the required day of rest and worship, this is a significant step toward the fulfillment of end-time prophecy concerning the mark of the beast.
Family Solidarity recently published the following regarding Sunday laws:
• "Once upon a time, not so long ago, Sunday was considered a day of rest. But now, like every other day of the week, it has basically been captured by the demands of commerce. So there is no longer a communal day of rest in a lot of countries. This needs to change. There needs to be a European weekly common day of rest, together with the right to disconnect from work."
• "In most European countries, Sunday is traditionally the day of rest from work. This is the heritage of the Christian tradition. Precisely 1,700 years ago, the Emperor Constantine decreed Sunday to be a day of rest protected by law. Nonetheless, many countries, including Ireland, allow businesses to run seven days a week. This has a profound impact on workers and their families."
• "The European Sunday Alliance is a network of trade unions, religious bodies and civil society organizations that want to raise awareness of the importance and value of a weekly day free from work. They also, ask for legislation at EU and Member States levels to be more protective of the health, safety, dignity of everyone and should more attentively promote the reconciliation of professional and family life."
This union of church and state that will work to pass Sunday laws signals a return to the type of religious persecution seen in history when liberty of conscience was overridden by church doctrine. Such legislation compromises the principles of religious liberty by compelling individuals to observe Sunday as the day of rest. This goes contrary to the conviction of those who honor the biblical Sabbath on Saturday.
Revelation 13 warns that the mark of the beast involves allegiance to human authority over God's law, and the enforcement of Sunday, the mark of papal apostasy, would serve as a test of loyalty during the final crisis. Those who refuse to comply will face cancellation, economic penalties, persecution, and even death. Those who remain faithful during this time are described as those who keep God's commandments and the faith of Jesus (Revelation 14:12) and will be vindicated at Christ's Second Coming.
Prophecy is being fulfilled before our eyes as we witness events aligning with biblical predictions about the end times. Increasing global unrest, natural disasters, moral decline, the rise of technologies, and the calls to reinstate Constantine's Sunday laws are reflective of the prophetic descriptions that tell us clearly that we are living in unprecedented times. These are not coincidences but divine warnings that point to the nearing of Christ's return.
Will we not recognize the urgency of the hour? Now more than ever, people need to turn to Jesus, repent of their sins, share the everlasting gospel of Revelation 14, and prepare for His second coming.
: Amo Sat Dec 14, 2024 - 13:01:53http://adventmessenger.org/catholic-advocacy-group-is-calling-for-the-restoration-of-constantines-sunday-laws-in-europe/
Quoted article below from link above.
Sent you a link to look at by PM.
Now as to Frankie.
I have read so many times over the years that not only does the pope
claim, or it is assumed he IS God, or that definitely he is Jesus here on earth.
Looks like Frankie has dropped the Papal ball.
Why?
With the number of Catholics world wide that handing on his every word
if anyone really believed any of this ::eek::
But these five things every Catholic believes...
#1 – He is the Successor of Peter
#2 – He is only Human
#3 – He is the Vicar of Christ
#4 – He Can Teach Infallibly Concerning Faith and Morals
#5 – His Mission is the Unity of the Church
Now... if he has this kind of weight with those who follow him...
WHY does he not simply declare "Sunday" law? Instead of globe trotting and trying to sell the idea to other leaders?
His faithful would follow his directive. I know someone who is denied
the opportunity to take communion in that church because he is divorced and remarried. This one has for year been looking for a church home for his wife and him, but he, as most all Catholics are, has been taught that they are the one true church and that is where he will go even without the bread and wine. ::shrug::
You are so right Amo.
Prophecy is being fulfilled before our eyes as we witness events aligning with biblical predictions about the end times. Increasing global unrest, natural disasters, moral decline, the rise of technologies, and the calls to reinstate Constantine's Sunday laws are reflective of the prophetic descriptions that tell us clearly that we are living in unprecedented times. These are not coincidences but divine warnings that point to the nearing of Christ's return.
Now more than ever, people need to turn to Jesus, repent of their sins, share the everlasting gospel of Revelation 14, and prepare for His second coming.
But I am afraid that John 20:40 is outweighing any common sence that people might have
"HE HAS BLINDED THEIR EYES AND HE HARDENED THEIR HEART, SO THAT THEY WOULD NOT SEE WITH THEIR EYES AND PERCEIVE WITH THEIR HEART, AND BE CONVERTED AND I HEAL THEM."
Maranatha,
Amen
: Rella Sat Dec 14, 2024 - 14:13:41Sent you a link to look at by PM.
Now as to Frankie.
I have read so many times over the years that not only does the pope
claim, or it is assumed he IS God, or that definitely he is Jesus here on earth.
Looks like Frankie has dropped the Papal ball.
Why?
With the number of Catholics world wide that handing on his every word
if anyone really believed any of this ::eek::
But these five things every Catholic believes...
#1 – He is the Successor of Peter
#2 – He is only Human
#3 – He is the Vicar of Christ
#4 – He Can Teach Infallibly Concerning Faith and Morals
#5 – His Mission is the Unity of the Church
Now... if he has this kind of weight with those who follow him...
WHY does he not simply declare "Sunday" law? Instead of globe trotting and trying to sell the idea to other leaders?
His faithful would follow his directive. I know someone who is denied
the opportunity to take communion in that church because he is divorced and remarried. This one has for year been looking for a church home for his wife and him, but he, as most all Catholics are, has been taught that they are the one true church and that is where he will go even without the bread and wine. ::shrug::
You are so right Amo.
Prophecy is being fulfilled before our eyes as we witness events aligning with biblical predictions about the end times. Increasing global unrest, natural disasters, moral decline, the rise of technologies, and the calls to reinstate Constantine's Sunday laws are reflective of the prophetic descriptions that tell us clearly that we are living in unprecedented times. These are not coincidences but divine warnings that point to the nearing of Christ's return.
Now more than ever, people need to turn to Jesus, repent of their sins, share the everlasting gospel of Revelation 14, and prepare for His second coming.
But I am afraid that John 20:40 is outweighing any common sence that people might have
"HE HAS BLINDED THEIR EYES AND HE HARDENED THEIR HEART, SO THAT THEY WOULD NOT SEE WITH THEIR EYES AND PERCEIVE WITH THEIR HEART, AND BE CONVERTED AND I HEAL THEM."
Maranatha,
Amen
True. Yet there are still a great many who will turn and receive the truth as the end approaches and the issues become more plain and simple to see. As unfortunate and uncomfortable as it may be, the church sees some of its most sincere growth and conversions during times of persecution. As harsh as the reality is, it clearly exposes who is actually following the righteous and merciful one, and who is not. The differences between them becoming increasingly focussed, as each plays out the role they have chosen in following either the Father and Son, or the evil one. So be it as our Lord has predicted and determined.
Jhn 15:18 If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. 19 If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. 20 Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also. 21 But all these things will they do unto you for my name's sake, because they know not him that sent me.
Mat 5:10 Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. 12 Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.
http://adventmessenger.org/the-secular-media-protests-the-desecration-of-sunday-and-christmas-and-calls-it-an-act-of-disrespect-to-our-creator/
Quoted article below from link above.
The Secular Media Protests the Desecration of Sunday and Christmas and Calls it an Act of Disrespect to our Creator
The Odessa American is one of the leading sources of local news information, entertainment, and sports for western Texas, particularly in the Permian Basin region. In a December 22, 2024 article titled "What Happened to Sundays and Christmas?", the Odessa American claims that the gradual disregard for Sundays and Christmas has opened the doors for disobedience to govern our lives.
The Odessa American published the following:
• "If there is any single thing that has happened in my lifetime that is brutally tormenting, it is the gradual disregard for Sundays and Christmas Day. Growing up in the fifties and sixties, the remembering of stores being closed on Sunday and Christmas Day, very strongly lingers in my mind."
• "Apparently the presence of greed (1 Timothy 6:10) in our world has preempted the word and will of God. It is also evident, that for employers to sustain a monetary gain in their businesses, they feel the need to open on the days that have been deemed by our Creator as sacred."
• "We also have a large segment of the population for which Christmas Day and Sunday mean no more than a Monday or Wednesday."
• "When we open our stores or engage in those non-essential actions that our earthly wisdom tells us 'That's not so bad,' we open a door for disobedience to govern our lives. We humans are vulnerable to our own notions and opinions. We are vulnerable to the retailers that tell us to shop and buy on Sunday."
• "We are vulnerable to the restaurants that cater to the after church crowd. How many of us have attended church on Sunday morning then ate lunch at a restaurant after the church service? Does that not encourage the restaurateurs to open their doors on the Sabbath?"
• "Our indifferent attitudes toward the Sabbath and Christmas Day scream volumes about our disregard for our Creator. Just as our parents gave us life, Christ Jesus gave us eternity. How can anyone ignore that?"
According to these statements, ignoring Sunday means ignoring eternal life. Remaining indifferent to the desecration of Sunday means ignoring our Creator. The Odessa American also claims that by patronizing stores on Sunday we are encouraging people to violate the Sabbath.
Here we see the secular news media advocating for the closure of businesses on Sundays in order to restore the sanctity of that day and encourage renewed reverence of God within society. They argue that the relentless pace of modern life and the 24/7 consumer culture have eroded the spirituality of Sunday, replacing rest and faith with commercial pursuits. By closing businesses on this day, they contend that we can reclaim God, faith, family, and community.
This is a fulfillment of what we read in the book The Great Controversy. Ellen White cautions us that the time will come when individuals and institutions will advocate for the enforcement of Sunday rest laws as the means to improve the moral decline in society. She warns that such measures will be promoted under the guise of restoring virtue and public decency by appealing to religion.
"Yet this very class put forth the claim that the fast-spreading corruption is largely attributable to the desecration of the so-called 'Christian Sabbath,' and that the enforcement of Sunday observance would greatly improve the morals of society. This claim is especially urged in America, where the doctrine of the true Sabbath has been most widely preached." (Great Controversy, p. 587).
All of these efforts to promote Sunday rest are deceptive because they divert attention from true obedience to God's commandments and will lead to the erosion of religious liberty. We are commanded to be watchful and obedient to biblical truth at this precise moment, particularly with the observance of the seventh-day Sabbath as outlined in the Fourth Commandment.
"The Sabbath truth is to be presented to the world as the seal of the living God. Through it, God designs to distinguish His people from the disobedient and the careless." (Evangelism, p. 233).
"The truth for this time, the third angel's message, is to be proclaimed with a loud voice ... The Sabbath of the fourth commandment is to be exalted before the people." (Testimonies, Vol. 6, p. 353).
"The Sabbath will be the great test of loyalty; for it is the point of truth especially controverted. When the final test shall be brought to bear upon men, then the line of distinction will be drawn between those who serve God and those who serve Him not." (Great Controversy, p. 605).
"In the closing work of the gospel, there is a special effort required to exalt the Sabbath and make it stand out in its true character." (Prophets and Kings, p. 183).
"Let nothing lessen the force of the truth for this time; the third angel's message must do its work of separating from the churches a people who will take their stand on the platform of eternal truth." (Evangelism, p. 225).
Sunday is not the sabbath, but by command of the Roman Catholic church. The bible says nothing about the sabbath being changed, or about Sunday having anything to do with honoring our Creator. This is exactly what holy scripture declares concerning the seventh day, not Sunday. The seventh day is God's sabbath, as scriptures declares many times over. The Sunday sabbath is the man of sins chosen sabbath, which the Roman Catholic church claims credit for establishing, apart from the authority of holy scripture. Only by the Roman churches claim to be above the authority of holy scripture. This is the man of sin, who thinks to change God's times and law. When they succeed in forcing this man made sabbath upon all, to be observed by law over and above God's created seventh day sabbath, all of humanity will choose whether they will worship and obey God or man. That is to say, self. So be it as God's word has foretold.
http://adventmessenger.org/israel-embraces-the-monday-to-friday-trading-week-with-sundays-off-in-order-to-align-with-international-markets/
Quoted article below from link above.
Israel Embraces the Monday-to-Friday Trading Week with Sundays Off in Order to Align with International Markets
Participation in the global market and international trade is essential for nations because being connected drives economic development and prosperity. In the context of the final crisis during the mark of the beast, economic systems are expected to play a pivotal role as tools for control and compliance. According to Revelation 13:16-17, the mark of the beast will be tied to the ability to buy and sell, revealing to us that in the last days, global economic systems will become highly centralized and regulated to ensure that Sunday is respected as the day of rest.
This is exactly what is happening today in Israel. On December 31, 2024, The Times of Israel reported the following:
• "Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich on Monday approved a shift to a Monday-to-Friday trading week to align the local stock exchange with global standards and markets abroad."
• "Smotrich said that the transition away from the current Sunday-to-Thursday trading week is intended to adapt the local capital market so it overlaps more with the trading week and hours on Wall Street and European bourses."
• "Changing the trading days is a central component of our vision to strengthen the connection between the Israeli capital market, the Israeli economy, and global markets," Smotrich said. "This move will allow global investors to access the Israeli capital market more easily, invest in our attractive local market without unnecessary and harmful barriers, and strengthen the Israeli economy in the long term."
In the last days, prophecy reveals that participation in the coming global economy will become contingent upon nations and individuals embracing Sunday as the universal day of rest and worship, aligning with the papal mark of apostasy described in Revelation 13. Nations will be compelled to adopt this system under a "pay-to-play" scheme, where compliance with Sunday laws becomes a prerequisite for access to global markets and financial systems. Those who reject this mandate will face economic exclusion and persecution, fulfilling the prophecy that no one will buy or sell without the mark. This scenario reflects a unification of political and religious powers, using economic systems as tools of coercion to enforce false worship and undermine individual liberty of conscience.
"In the last great conflict of the controversy with Satan those who are loyal to God will see every earthly support cut off. Because they refuse to break His law in obedience to earthly powers, they will be forbidden to buy or sell. It will finally be decreed that they shall be put to death. But to the obedient is given the promise, 'He shall dwell on high: his place of defense shall be the munitions of rocks: bread shall be given him; his waters shall be sure.' Isaiah 33:16. By this promise the children of God will live. When the earth shall be wasted with famine, they shall be fed" (Desire of Ages, p. 121).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B74vL06qsnw
Sunday agitation. Weak minded, fearful, and or power hungry people want the government to force them and everyone else to take a stand upon Sunday sacredness issues. Acting as though people are being forced to work on Sundays, when all they need is enough back bone about their own convictions to follow through with them. Even if it hurts their pocket books a little, or a lot.
They brought up Chick-fil-a as an example, but do not intend to follow their example. Chick-fil-a did not wait around for government action or blue laws before demonstrating their faith in their convictions. They took action upon them, regardless of consequence. Which has worked out very well. Is the government your God whom you depend upon to enforce your convictions so that you will obey them, and everyone else as well, regardless of what they think of them? Or is the Lord Jesus Christ your Savior and God, whose example you should follow? Choose you this day whom you will serve, and or who will be your master.
http://adventmessenger.org/the-ecumenical-movement-with-its-adventist-observers-is-seeking-to-impose-sunday-observance-by-law-inside-the-personal-homes-of-people/
Quoted article below is from link above.
The Ecumenical Movement with its Adventist Observers is Seeking to Impose Sunday Observance By Law Inside the Personal Homes of People
"Freikirchen," which translates to "Free Churches," is the official name of the largest ecumenical organization in Switzerland. Freikirchen is an umbrella association comprised of various Protestant churches that are not official state churches or funded by tax money, like the Roman Catholic Church. Baptists, Mennonites, Pentecostals, Methodists, the Salvation Army, and other free Evangelical churches are members of this organization. Seventh-day Adventists, on the other hand, maintain an "observer status" within the same organization.
In Switzerland, working on Sunday is generally forbidden. This has been a long-standing policy that has benefited Rome and the Sunday-keeping Protestant churches. Unless you have a special permit granted by the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs, you cannot do business on Sunday. However, a new law is currently being debated that seeks to allow those who do "teleworking," or remote work from home, to work on Sundays in the comfort and privacy of their own homes.
The National Council, which represents the people, is now, in 2025, debating a proposed bill called "More Creative Freedom when Working from Home," which was filed in the Swiss Legislature back in 2016. The language of the bill would allow people who work remotely from home to work on Sunday, if they so choose.
Parliamentary Initiative 16.484 says:
• "No authorization is required for Sunday work carried out in the home of employees who can largely determine their own working hours."
• "Public Sunday rest period would not be disturbed in any way if the employee carried out Sunday work at home. For Sunday work carried out in the home by employees who can set their own working hours to a large extent, a Sunday work permit should therefore not be required."
This proposal has upset the Sunday-keeping churches, and they are working to overturn this measure—which means that the churches want the state to dictate what a person can or cannot do in the privacy of their own home on Sunday.
On December 11, 2024, Freikirchen published an official protest on behalf of their member churches and "observers," against the new law in Switzerland that is seeking to relax Sunday restrictions for employees who work remotely from home.
Freikirchen stated the following in their press release:
• "The umbrella organization Freikirchen speaks out against the parliamentary initiative 'More Creative Freedom when Working from Home' in its consultation response. Freikirchen firmly rejects the proposed exemptions to the Sunday work ban because they run counter to the principle of the general Sunday work ban."
• "Sunday is protected as a day off work in the Labor Code. Sunday is associated with central values that are of particular social and religious importance,' explains Peter Schneeberger, president of the umbrella organization Freikirchen."
• "Sunday offers society a common day to breathe and relax, thus structuring the week between working days and days when leisure, sport, community and social life, family life and, last but not least, for many people in Switzerland, attending a church service together are possible."
• "In recent years, exemptions to the Sunday work ban have increasingly been permitted. Already, more than 15 percent of employed people regularly work on Sundays and the numbers will continue to rise according to BFS data from 2023."
• "This change sends the wrong signal and ignores the need for protection of employees. Teleworking (working remotely from home) on Sundays does not meet any compelling social need."
The notion of the churches petitioning the state to prohibit individuals from working inside of their own homes on Sundays is a profound overreach that undermines personal freedom and privacy. Such a suggestion completely disregards the basic human right of people to manage their own lives. Is it now up to these misguided churches to dictate what we can or cannot do in the sanctity of our own homes?
It is one thing to force businesses to close their doors on Sunday, but it is entirely different—and absurd—to impose Sunday observance inside the personal homes of people, and especially those who do not share the same beliefs. This intrusion into the privacy of citizens reflects the danger of uniting church and state.
Our homes must remain sacred sanctuaries of privacy, where individuals are free from external pressures telling us how to live, think, and act. A man's home is his castle, meaning that a person's home is their private domain, where they have the right to feel safe, secure, and free to follow their own conscience on faith and worship without interference or intrusion from a corrupt church-state tyranny.
Today we see ecumenical alliances fighting to keep Sunday work-free in Switzerland. Once again, this highlights the problem with the ecumenical movement. Ecumenism will pave the way for the Mark of the Beast crisis.
"The Word of God teaches that these scenes are to be repeated as papists and Protestants shall unite for the exaltation of the Sunday" (Great Controversy, p. 578).
"When Protestantism shall stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of the Roman power, when she shall reach over the abyss to clasp hands with spiritualism, when, under the influence of this threefold union, our country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions, then we may know that the time has come for the marvelous working of Satan and that the end is near" (Testimonies, Vol. 5, p. 451).
The ecumenical movement is laying down the foundation and preparing the world for the final crisis. Seventh-day Adventists have no business joining forces with those advocating for the legalization of Sunday rest in order to restrict our freedoms. God never called us to be "observers," but rather to be watchmen. Today, we are to lift up our voices declaring the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus (Revelation 14:12) at a time when the churches are exalting Sunday.
If we fail to do the work God has entrusted to us, we risk not only losing the opportunity to see people saved, but we also risk losing our own souls. God's purposes will always prevail, and if we refuse to obey His calling, He will raise up someone else to accomplish His will.
"The Lord gives a special truth for the people in an emergency. Who dare refuse to publish it? He commands his servants to present the last invitation of mercy to the world. They cannot remain silent, except at the peril of their souls. Christ's ambassadors have nothing to do with consequences. They must perform their duty, and leave results with God" (Great Controversy, p. 609).
http://adventmessenger.org/greek-labor-union-calls-for-sunday-shopping-to-end-with-a-new-campaign-slogan-sunday-closed-i-dont-shop-i-dont-work/
Quoted article below from link above.
Greek Labor Union Calls for Sunday Shopping to End with a New Campaign Slogan: "Sunday Closed! I Don't Shop! I Don't Work!"
"Trade unions will be the cause of the most terrible violence that has ever been seen among human beings" (Manuscript Release, Vol. 4, p. 23).
Whether they know it or not, labor unions are serving the interests of Rome. Rome will use anyone to further its Sunday agenda. While apostate church leaders will seek to justify Sunday-keeping through so-called moral and spiritual support, labor unions perform the dirty work of engaging in chaos, disruptions, and fighting. In Greece, labor unions today are pressuring authorities and employers to keep Sunday work-free.
On January 16, 2025, To Vima, a news media company in Athens, Greece, published an article about how trade unions are calling for Sunday shopping restrictions and are arguing that Sunday store openings violate the fundamental rights of workers.
To Vima published the following:
• "The Working Consumers of Greece (EEKE) is urging consumers to avoid shopping on Sundays as part of a broader effort to restore balance in the retail sector and protect workers' rights."
• "According to EEKE, the opening of stores on Sundays creates conditions that favor monopolistic practices, undermining healthy competition and inevitably driving many small and medium-sized businesses to closure."
• "Additionally, EEKE argued that Sunday openings disrupt personal and family life, violating fundamental labor rights that are both constitutionally guaranteed and the result of hard-fought battles by workers."
• "In its statement, the Union is urging consumers to support businesses that remain closed on Sundays. Their campaign slogan reads: "Sunday Closed! I Don't Shop – I Don't Work!"
It is not a coincidence that labor unions have designated Sunday as the day for workers to have time off for rest, family, and friends. The unions are simply joining the chorus of those calling for Sunday to become the universal day of rest for all people. In other words, this is a public call to increase awareness for Sunday closings.
The labor industry, along with the churches and the news media, is aligning itself in order to achieve one ultimate objective. They are working to obtain the same outcome. They are campaigning to make Sunday popular again. According to God's prophetic word, there will be a "popular demand" for Sunday observance:
"Rulers and legislators, in order to secure public favor, will yield to the popular demand for a law enforcing Sunday observance" (Great Controversy, p. 592).
http://adventmessenger.org/a-leading-catholic-publication-claims-that-the-popes-call-for-sabbath-rest-in-laudato-si-is-the-best-way-to-combat-the-dangers-of-ai-technology/
Quoted article below from link above.
A Leading Catholic Publication Claims that the Pope's Call for Sabbath Rest in Laudato Si' is the Best Way to Combat the Dangers of AI Technology
With 3.3 million followers, Aleteia is "one of the world's leading Catholic online news sites" and is published in five different languages. [1] In an article titled "Keeping the Sabbath in the Age of Artificial Intelligence," published on February 8, 2025, Aleteia asserted that Pope Francis' Laudato Si' exhortation about the "Sabbath" will help in reclaiming our humanity and combating the threats posed by AI.
Aleteia published the following about AI and the Sabbath:
• "While AI can free up more of our time, it also tempts us to fill that time with more work. Sabbath rest offers a lens through which to examine this tension."
• "The Sabbath is not just a break from labor; it's a sacred pause that acknowledges our limitations and reorients us toward what truly matters: relationships, contemplation, and gratitude."
• "AI, by contrast, operates without limits. It doesn't tire, doesn't need breaks, and can process data endlessly ... But unlike AI, we are not limitless. We are bodies—fragile, finite, and gloriously dependent on rhythms of rest and renewal."
• "In this context, the Sabbath becomes not just a religious observance but, we could say, even an act of resistance—a bold declaration that our value is not defined by productivity. Pope Francis, in Laudato Si', speaks of the need to recover time to contemplate, to recognize, and to give thanks."
• "Perhaps it's for prayer. For play. For rest that nourishes both body and soul."
• "In the end, keeping the Sabbath in the age of AI isn't just about setting boundaries with technology. It's about reclaiming our humanity—one heartbeat, one breath, one sacred pause at a time."
There you have it—the way to avoid the threat that AI poses to humanity is to embrace the Sabbath rest found in Laudato Si'. In recent years, religious leaders of various denominations, including Roman Catholics, have increasingly expressed the importance of setting aside a "Sabbath" as a day for both physical rest and spiritual renewal. Citing the increasing pressures of modern life, they argue that society has lost a crucial rhythm of rest that not only benefits individuals but also strengthens families and communities. Pope Francis, along with other Christian leaders, has emphasized the need to reclaim the "Sabbath" to heal our relationships, and Sunday is the day they aim to secure to prioritize their efforts.
In Laudato Si', when Pope Francis speaks of a day of rest, he clearly refers to Sunday:
"On Sunday, our participation in the Eucharist has special importance. Sunday, like the Jewish Sabbath, is meant to be a day which heals our relationships with God, with ourselves, with others and with the world. Sunday is the day of the Resurrection, the "first day" of the new creation, whose first fruits are the Lord's risen humanity, the pledge of the final transfiguration of all created reality." (Laudato Si' #237).
Rome has clearly emphasized the importance of Sunday in developing a closer relationship with God and community, and Protestant and Orthodox leaders have echoed similar sentiments. Together they urge governments and companies to respect the so-called sanctity of Sunday. This push aligns with what God's prophetic word predicts will happen when churches come together to make Sunday the universal day of rest during the mark of the beast crisis.
"The Word of God teaches that these scenes are to be repeated as papists and Protestants shall unite for the exaltation of the Sunday" (Great Controversy, p. 578).
As momentum to protect Sunday builds, discussions about the observance of this day will become more pronounced in public discourse. This will raise questions about how a Sunday rest initiative might shape legislation, labor policies, and social standards in the coming years. Protestants and Catholics will both be involved in this effort to secure Sunday, and it all starts when the churches find common ground. No religious leader has done more to promote the unification of the churches, especially the merger of church and state, than Pope Francis:
"When the leading churches (including Catholicism) of the United States, uniting upon such points of doctrine as are held by them in common, shall influence the State to enforce their decrees and to sustain their institutions, then Protestant America will have formed an image of the Roman hierarchy, and the infliction of civil penalties upon dissenters will inevitably result." (Great Controversy, p. 445).
http://adventmessenger.org/utah-lawmakers-just-advanced-a-sunday-rest-bill-recently-introduced-by-a-project-2025-contributor/
Utah Lawmakers Just Advanced a Sunday Rest Bill Recently Introduced by a Project 2025 Contributor
Back in January, we published an article about how Ken Ivory, a Republican member of the Utah House of Representatives and a contributor/author for the Project 2025 handbook, introduced a bill, HB-441, into the state legislature that would mandate time off on Sundays for rest and worship.
It turns out that the bill was just approved by the House Business, Labor, and Commerce Committee in an 8-3 vote and is now awaiting a vote by the full House, according to the Salt Lake Tribune. On February 18, 2025, the following article titled "Lawmakers Advance Bill that Could Close More Utah Stores on Sundays" was published, and it expressed the following:
• "The Utah House is weighing a bill aimed at protecting franchises from opening on religious holidays or days of worship."
• "Sponsored by Rep. Ken Ivory, R-West Jordan, and a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, HB441 would expand on an initial proposal, outlined in a news release, that focused exclusively on protecting franchises from having to operate on Sundays."
• "The bill, advanced last week by the House Business, Labor and Commerce Committee in an 8-3 vote."
Sunday laws are real, Project 2025 is real, and real discussions and efforts are being proposed to secure Sunday as the day of rest through legislative enactments. It is only a matter of time before we begin to see similar proposals to secure the legal recognition of Sunday as the day of rest at the federal level.
"Sooner or later Sunday laws will be passed" (Review and Herald, February 16, 1905).
"Soon the Sunday laws will be enforced, and men in positions of trust will be embittered against the little handful of God's commandment-keeping people" (Manuscript Releases, Vol. 4, p. 278).
There is no time to lose—God's people must give the warning about the beast, his image, and the mark now, before the final crisis unfolds. Once the test comes, decisions will have already been made, and if we remain quiet, many souls will be unprepared. The warning must go out while hearts are still open to truth.
Truly, our world is moving towards the fulfillment of prophecy, and events are setting the stage for the enforcement of laws that will challenge the commandment of God. Now is the time to sound the alarm, to call people to obedience and faithfulness, and to urge them to stand firmly on God's Word before the Sunday law deception and coercion sweep the world.
"Are we to wait until the fulfillment of the prophecies of the end before we say anything concerning them? Of what value will our words be then? Shall we wait until God's judgments fall upon the transgressor before we tell him how to avoid them? Where is our faith in the word of God? Must we see things foretold come to pass before we will believe what He has said? In clear, distinct rays light has come to us, showing us that the great day of the Lord is near at hand, 'even at the doors.' Let us read and understand before it is too late" (Testimonies, Vol. 9, p. 20).
https://mariancatechist.com/blogs/devotion-to-the-immaculate-heart-of-mary/saturdays-the-immaculate-heart-of-mary-and-heavens-request
Quoted article below from link above.
Saturdays, the Immaculate Heart of Mary and Heaven's Request
by Kathryn Mulderink
"I promise to assist at the hour of death, with the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months shall confess, receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary, and keep me company for fifteen minutes while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me."
Most of us are familiar with these words of our Blessed Mother, spoken to Lucia, one of the three young visionaries of Fátima, at her convent in Pontevedra, Spain. This message, given in 1925, was a sort of "follow-up" to the words Our Lady had spoken to Lucia in the second apparition of Fátima in June, 1917, when she told Lucia that she was to remain in the world because "Jesus wishes to use you to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart."
It may come as some surprise that this devotion requested by Heaven was not absolutely new. It fit precisely into the long tradition of Catholic piety that, having devoted Fridays to the remembrance of the Passion of Jesus Christ and to honoring His Sacred Heart, found it very natural to devote Saturdays to His Most Holy Mother.
In fact, the great request of Pontevedra appears as the joyous culmination of a whole movement of devotion. It began spontaneously, was encouraged and codified by Rome, and seems to be nothing less than the providential preparation for what was to come later.
Saturdays Devoted to the Virgin
Honoring the Blessed Virgin Mary on Saturday was first "officially" promoted by Saint Alcuin (735-804), the Benedictine monk who was "Minister of Education" for the court of Charlemagne and who contributed in a decisive manner to the Carolingian liturgical reform. He composed different formulas for Votive Masses for each day of the week, with two set aside to honor Our Lady on Saturday. This practice was quickly and enthusiastically embraced by both clergy and laity, the Mass of the Blessed Virgin Mary on Saturday eventually becoming the Common of the Blessed Virgin.
There were several theological reasons for dedicating this day to Mary. A 15th century missal gives several of those reasons in a hymn: Saturday is the day when creation was completed; therefore it is also celebrated as the day of the fulfillment of the plan of salvation, which found its realization through Mary. Sunday is the Lord's Day, so it seemed appropriate to observe the preceding day as Mary's day. In addition, as Genesis describes, God rested on the seventh day, Saturday. The seventh day, and the Jewish Sabbath, is Saturday; we rest on Sunday, because we celebrate the Resurrection as our Sabbath Day. In parallel, Jesus rested in the womb and then in the loving arms of Mary from birth until she held His lifeless body at the foot of the Cross; thus the God-head rested in Mary.
The great theologians of the 12th and 13th centuries, Sts. Bernard of Clairvaux, Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventure, explained the dedication of Saturdays to Mary by pointing to the time of Christ's rest in the grave. On that first Holy Saturday, while everyone else had abandoned Christ, Mary continued to believe, demonstrating her deep faith by never doubting for a moment her Son's promise of resurrection. As stated in the Pontifical document, Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy, Saturday is designated as a memorial of the Blessed Virgin as "a remembrance of the maternal example and discipleship of the Blessed Virgin Mary who, strengthened by faith and hope, on that great Saturday on which Our Lord lay in the tomb, was the only one of the disciples to hold vigil in expectation of the Lord's resurrection; it is a prelude and introduction to the celebration of Sunday, the weekly memorial of the Resurrection of Christ; it is a sign that the 'Virgin Mary is continuously present and operative in the life of the Church.'"
The custom of dedicating Saturday Masses to Mary was fostered especially in the cloister churches of the various orders, and quickly spread throughout the whole Church. Hence, through the early centuries of the Church, Saturday acquired its great Marian tone and the existing fast on that day became associated with Mary.
During the second millennium of Christianity, other great souls furthered and refined these pious devotions. Cardinal Peter Damian († 1072) fostered Marian Saturday celebrations. During the time of the crusades, Peter of Amiens started out with a vanguard for Constantinople on a Saturday, March 8, 1096, under the protection of the Blessed Virgin. Pope Urban II (1088-1099) admonished the faithful to pray the liturgy of the hours in honor of the most holy Virgin for the crusaders.
In the centuries to follow, the Marian Saturdays were expressed in several local devotions. This was the day the faithful selected to go on pilgrimages. Sodalities held their meetings on Saturdays and called them Fraternity Saturdays or Sodality Saturdays. The seven colors or sorrows of Mary were in some places commemorated on seven consecutive Saturdays. The 15 Saturdays before the liturgy in honor of Mary as Queen of the Rosary, October 7, recalled the fifteen decades of the rosary; in some areas this was the day that the crops and harvests were blessed and celebrated. An Irish version of the Saturday devotions to Mary is known as the Fifteen Saturdays of the Rosary. The devotion consists in receiving Holy Communion and saying at least five decades of the Rosary sometime during the day or evening on fifteen consecutive Saturdays or to meditate in some other way on its mysteries. The three Golden Saturdays that followed the Feast of St. Michael were festively celebrated in Austria, Bohemia, and Bavaria with reception of the sacraments and with pomp and circumstance particularly at places of pilgrimage. Traces of the festivities are still found in these cultural areas today.
The growing devotion in honor of the Immaculate Conception by the Franciscans also contributed to furthering the Marian Saturdays. In 1633 the Order's Chapter determined that a Holy Mass in honor of this mystery was to be celebrated.
Vatican II with its liturgical reforms did not abolish the practice of Masses in honor of Our Lady. A new sacramentary and lectionary were published with 46 options for votive Masses in honor of Our Lady. Today, the strongest trace of Mary's relationship with Saturday occurs in the Liturgy. Saturday is dedicated to Mary by a Mass or Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Through these liturgical acts, Christians exalt the person of Mary in the action that renews the sacrifice of Christ and in the action that prolongs his prayer.
Devotion to the Immaculate Heart
The first indication of this general Saturday devotion to the Blessed Mother being connected with her Immaculate Heart comes from St. John Eudes, (1601-1670) whom Pope St. Pius X called the Immaculate Heart's Father, Doctor and Apostle. It was through him that this devotion was made public and received ecclesiastical approbation. St. John Eudes, as a theologian, was the first to explain this devotion to Mary's Heart in his book, The Admirable Heart of Mary. The feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, which is celebrated on the first Saturday after the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (which is celebrated on the first Friday after the feast of Corpus Christi), was established in 1644 as the paternal feast of his congregation of Priests, for which he composed a Mass and office. Later it was established throughout the French dioceses (being extended to the Universal Church in 1944 by Pope Pius XII).
Modern times have seen a further focusing and codification of this devotion. In 1889, Pope Leo XIII granted to all the faithful a plenary indulgence for the well-established practice of the fifteen consecutive Saturdays. This pope, who wrote 12 encyclicals on the Rosary, and in June of 1899 had consecrated the whole world to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, was asked to make a similar act to honor the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Both Pope Leo XIII and his predecessor, Pope Pius IX, felt this honor should be given to Our Lady but that the time had not yet come.
The First Saturday of Reparation
In 1889, an Italian woman named Maria Inglese, prompted by an interior revelation, instituted the pious practice of "Communions of Reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary" with the approval and recommendation of her Bishop. In 1904 she composed a series of prayers for each mystery of the Rosary, as well as prayers for the Holy Hour of Reparation to Mary. She brought these to Rome and St. Pius X indulgenced them immediately, warmly encouraging Maria to continue her apostolate. He later encouraged this devotion throughout the Church. Thus, with St. Pius X, the First Saturday Devotion of Reparation to the Immaculate Heart was introduced. He later promoted it further by the granting of additional indulgences on June 13, 1912: "All the Faithful who, on the first Saturday or first Sunday of twelve consecutive months, devote some time to vocal or mental prayer in honor of the Immaculate Virgin in Her conception gain, on each of these days, a plenary indulgence. Conditions: Confession, Communion, and prayers for the intentions of the Sovereign Pontiff."
Five years later, on that same date, June 13, there took place at Fátima the great manifestation of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, "surrounded with thorns which seemed to pierce it." Sister Lucia was to say later on: "We understood that it was the Immaculate Heart of Mary, outraged by the sins of humanity, which demanded Reparation." It was also on this day that Our Lady told Lucia she was to remain in the world because "Jesus wishes to use you to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart."
One month later, on July 13th, in the third apparition of Fátima, the children were shown a vivid vision of condemned souls. Our Lady said to them, "You have seen Hell, where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart... I shall come to ask for the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, and the Communion of Reparation on the first Saturdays. If what I ask is done, many souls will be saved and there will be peace."
Our Lady would wait eight years to make that request of Lucia.
Heaven's Request
As if in anticipation of this request, five years earlier, November 13, 1920, the Church, in the person of Pope Benedict XV, encouraged the devotion of the Saturdays of Reparation by granting new indulgences to this practice when accomplished on the first Saturday of eight consecutive months.
Finally, on December 10, 1925, Heaven crystallized all these devotions, and sealed them with a magnificent promise from the Blessed Virgin Mary. Mary and the Child Jesus appeared to Lucia at her convent in Pontevedra, Our Lady resting her hand on Lucia's shoulder and revealing a heart encircled by thorns.
The Child Jesus said: "Have compassion on the heart of your most holy Mother, covered with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to make an act of reparation..."
Our Lady spoke next, saying: "Look, my daughter, at my heart, surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You at least try to console me and say that I promise to assist at the hour of death, with the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months, shall confess, receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary, and keep me company for fifteen minutes while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me."
How awesome it is to see Heaven at work, laying the foundation, and setting each stone in its due time, using the incremental steps of devoted souls. By the time of this apparition, all the preliminary steps had been taken, so that it seemed Heaven was only crowning a great movement of Catholic piety. In requesting the Pope to solemnly approve the devotion of Reparation revealed at Pontevedra, Our Lady was not really asking for anything new. Providence had prepared everything so thoroughly that in 1925 this devotion was right in line with a series of papal decisions refining the First Saturday devotion as we know it.
And yet, there are new elements in this message of Pontevedra, notably in the concessions which only Heaven could grant: the Virgin Mary does not require fifteen, twelve, or even eight Saturdays to be devoted to Her. She asks for only five Saturdays – as many as the decades on our Rosary.
Then, above all, the promise joined with it has increased so remarkably we would be foolish to ignore it. No longer are we merely granted indulgences [that is, the remission of punishment for sins already forgiven], but a much more irresistible grace: the assurance of receiving at the moment of death "all the graces necessary for salvation."
Such is the generosity of our God, and the tenderness of Our Lord for His Mother; in His ardent desire to see her consoled He makes such a lavish promise in exchange for our love. A more powerful promise could hardly be conceived.
Kathryn Mulderink is a home schooling mother of seven, a Consecrated Marian Catechist, a member of the Catholic Writer's Association, the Blue Army, and is a Secular Discalced Carmelite. She has given presentations at various home school conferences and she and her husband head the local chapter of the Fátima Family Apostolate. They live near Grand Rapids, Michigan.
The Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy, Chapter V, has principles and guidelines regarding Devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Originally published in The Tilma, Summer 2003.
The word of God -
Exo 20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: 10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: 11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
https://adventmessenger.org/how-the-modern-media-is-preparing-society-to-embrace-sunday-rest/
Quoted article below from link above.
How the Modern Media Is Preparing Society to Embrace Sunday Rest
Across the world, major media outlets are redefining Sunday as the official day of rest—a day for mental, physical, and emotional well-being. The Times of India, the most-read and largest-circulation English-language newspaper in the world, published an article on November 16, 2025, declaring that Sunday is "the golden opportunity to reset the body and mind."
These claims are significant because before any civil authority can successfully mandate Sunday observance, public sentiment must first be shaped to accept it. Society must be conditioned to view Sunday as a necessary day for personal and national health. What is first normalized through the media can later be formalized through policy and ultimately legislated into law.
The Times of India published the following statements:
• "Sunday is more than just a day off—it's a golden opportunity to reset your body and mind, laying the groundwork for a balanced, productive week ahead."
• "Using Sunday intentionally to recharge can help prevent that stress from spiraling."
• "Begin your Sunday by stepping away from screens."
• "Spend time outside to tap into nature's healing power."
• "Use Sunday to nourish both your body and your week ahead by preparing healthy, balanced meals."
• "Dedicate at least one uninterrupted hour to self-care ... this ritual is a signal to your body and mind that it's safe to slow down, helping reduce stress and restore calm."
• "Use Sunday evening as a transition point to close the week and look ahead."
• "End your day with a calming bedtime ritual. Spend a few minutes writing down 3–5 things you're grateful for or one hopeful thing for the week ahead."
Sunday rest is no longer just about religion; it's about universal human well-being. By presenting Sunday as the key to a stress-free life, the media is creating the powerful narrative that Sunday is necessary for rest. In other words, Sunday becomes the responsible choice, and those who do not adopt it risk being seen as unhealthy, irresponsible, or out of step with society's well-being. This is precisely the kind of groundwork needed for future Sunday laws—laws that will be justified in the name of public health and the so-called common good.
The Times of India article emphasized the following points:
• Use Sunday to recharge.
• Use Sunday by stepping away from screens.
• Use Sunday to tap into nature's healing power.
• Use Sunday to nourish your body.
• Use Sunday for self-care.
• Use Sunday as a transition point.
• Use Sunday as a calming bedtime ritual.
• Use Sunday as the day to give thanks.
These are not random lifestyle tips—they form a deliberate call to establish a consistent pattern across society. The media is assigning Sunday a moral and social value, elevating it as the ideal day for rest, renewal, and responsible living. This is, in effect, the sanctification of Sunday without using religious language. The next step will be calls for Sunday shutdowns to become official public policy.
When the final crisis arrives, and the call goes forth to enforce Sunday observance—as Revelation 13 forewarns—under the pretext of universal health, world peace, climate stability, and economic prosperity, the groundwork will already be in place. The public will not resist it; they will welcome it, believing it to be the solution to the world's problems.
What begins today as simple wellness advice is, in reality, preparing the world for a future religious crisis. What prophecy has declared—the world wondering after the beast—will become a reality in part because the media has already shaped the hearts and minds of millions to view Sunday as the solution to all our problems.
Isn't India predominantly Hindu, Buddhist, and or Muslim?
https://adventmessenger.org/the-secular-media-admits-that-rome-changed-gods-sabbath-and-now-claims-sunday-rest-is-a-protected-labor-right-across-western-nations/
Quoted article below from link above.
The Secular Media Admits that Rome Changed God's Sabbath—and Now Claims Sunday Rest is a Protected Labor Right Across Western Nations
Listín Diario, founded in 1889, is one of the most important and influential daily newspapers in the Dominican Republic, published in the capital city of Santo Domingo. In its November 9, 2025 article titled "SUNDAY: Constantine's Legacy as a Day of Rest," Listín Diario lays out a history that, in effect, advocates for the return of blue laws. After correctly tracing how the Roman Church changed the biblical Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday and sanctified it by ecclesiastical authority, the paper argues that Sunday must now be upheld as the official weekly day of rest to safeguard the physical and emotional health of workers. By presenting Sunday rest not merely as a religious tradition but as a necessary policy rooted in health, well-being, and public order, the article presents Sunday observance as a civic obligation worthy of state support—precisely the rationale historically used to justify Sunday laws and blue-law enforcement.
Listín Diario reported the following history about the change from Saturday to Sunday:
• "The origin of the Sabbath is rooted in the Bible and is found in the book of Genesis (2:2-3), where it is recounted that God, after completing creation, rested on the seventh day, blessed it, and sanctified it. This divine act gave rise to the Fourth Commandment, found in Exodus 20:8-10: 'Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy ... the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God'."
• "In the Judeo-Christian tradition, the day of rest—the Sabbath—occupies a central place in the spiritual experience, while in modern Western culture, Sunday has acquired both religious and work-related connotations. How did this shift occur? What role did imperial power, nascent Christianity, and current legal norms play in this transformation?"
• "The decisive turning point came on March 7, 321 AD, when Emperor Constantine the Great, ruling a still predominantly pagan Roman Empire, issued an edict declaring Sunday a mandatory day of rest. His edict acted as a civil-religious dogma in the newly emerging imperial Christendom."
• "This decision was not motivated by Christian beliefs, but rather by cultural reasons: Sunday was the day dedicated to Sol Invictus, the solar deity venerated in the Empire and a symbol of the emperor's personal faith."
• "Later, the Synod of Laodicea (363–364 AD) solidified the shift to Sunday. Its 29th canon instructed that 'Christians should not Judaize by resting on the Sabbath, but rather work on that day and honor the Lord's Day.' From this arose the name Dies Dominicus (day of the Lord), origin of the term 'Sunday' in many Latin languages."
• "This change had not only theological implications, but also disciplinary ones: those who persisted in observing the Sabbath were considered anathema, that is, cursed or excluded from the Christian community."
• "In 1998, the Holy Father John Paul II, in his Apostolic Letter Dies Domini, addressed to the episcopate, the clergy and the faithful on the sanctification of Sunday, recalled the importance of this practice: 'It is necessary, therefore, to reread the great page of creation and to delve deeper into the theology of the Sabbath, in order to enter into the full understanding of Sunday'."
• "Today, weekly rest, and in particular Sunday rest, has transcended its religious meaning to become a labor right recognized in most Western countries."
• "The history of the day of rest—from the seventh day sanctified by God, to Sunday made official by the Roman Empire, and later turned into labor law—illustrates how religious norms and legal structures intertwine, influencing each other over time."
• "Today, Sunday rest not only protects the physical and emotional health of workers, but also preserves an ancestral memory, full of symbolism, spirituality and social justice. Thus, each Sunday of rest encapsulates centuries of history, faith, power, and law."
The Listín Diario article openly acknowledges that the biblical Sabbath is the seventh day, then traces how Constantine's civil edict and later Catholic Church councils replaced it with Sunday. From there, it elevates Sunday as the true Christian day of worship and argues that Christianity must now find its weekly identity in Sunday observance.
The media then shifts from its faulty theology to public policy, claiming that Sunday rest has "transcended its religious meaning" and become a legally recognized labor right throughout the Western world. When major newspapers argue that Sunday is both the rightful Christian day of worship and a protected labor right necessary for the physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being of society, they are laying the groundwork for a future Sunday law. By mixing bad theology and coercive history with public policy, the article effectively seeks to persuade readers that the state has a responsibility—even a moral duty—to safeguard Sunday.
Once the public is convinced that Sunday is essential for national health and economic stability, the next logical step—especially during times of crisis—is for lawmakers to formalize and enforce it in the name of the "common good." This is exactly how past Sunday laws emerged: first through moral persuasion, then through appeals to health emergencies, and finally through legal mandates. When Sunday is elevated by major media outlets as an absolute right and necessity, the path toward state enforcement becomes not only possible but, in the eyes of lawmakers, reasonable, justifiable, and ultimately inevitable.
"It will be declared that men are offending God by the violation of the Sunday-sabbath, that this sin has brought calamities which will not cease until Sunday observance shall be strictly enforced, and that those who present the claims of the fourth commandment, thus destroying reverence for Sunday, are troublers of the people, preventing their restoration to divine favor and temporal prosperity ... As the wrath of the people shall be excited by false charges, they will pursue a course toward God's ambassadors very similar to that which apostate Israel pursued toward Elijah" (Great Controversy, p. 590).
Sources
https://listindiario.com/puntos-de-vista/20251109/domingo-legado-constantino-dia-reposo_881520.html
https://adventmessenger.org/catholics-are-using-charlie-kirks-new-book-to-rally-all-christians-to-advocate-for-the-return-of-sunday-laws/
Quoted article below from link above.
Catholics Are Using Charlie Kirk's New Book About the Sabbath to Rally All Christians to Advocate for the Return of Sunday Laws
Catholic Vote is a prominent website whose mission is to inspire "every Catholic in America" to live out their "faith in public life." In a December 9, 2025, article titled "Charlie Kirk's Widow Highlights How Her Husband Urged Americans to Observe the Sabbath," Catholic Vote reported that Erika Kirk claimed her husband's "observance of the Sabbath" saved his life and that honoring a weekly day of rest would "help save America."
What is especially revealing—and deeply concerning—is the way many Roman Catholics are responding to Charlie Kirk's call, in his book, to restore Sabbath observance. Some view this moment as an opportunity to openly advocate for the return of Sunday laws, urging all Christians to unite behind such efforts. Unfortunately, this is precisely how the conversation is being hijacked and redirected into a push to make Sunday the legally required day of rest and worship through civil enactment.
In the comments section of the article, the following remarks were posted, indicating how society is becoming increasingly receptive to Sunday laws.:
• "I think all Christians should unite to reclaim Sundays ... unless absolutely necessary (hospitals, certain businesses/services), ALL stores closed on Sundays! Let's be a society that worships on Sundays, has meals with family, friends around the table, and literally rests. In a post-Christian era, I doubt this could happen but with GOD, all things are possible, and I would love to be part of a movement that brings civilization back to keeping Sunday sacred, whether you're a Christian or not, you would benefit from this simple slowdown!"
• "Christians rest on SUNDAYS, the Lords day."
• "Here in the US 40-50 years ago everything was closed on Sunday."
• "Yes! I'm in my late 40s and remember as a child how Sundays were much less hectic. Church, go to the grandparents, and that was about it. Let's reclaim Sundays! Someone in the Catholic influencer sphere, are you reading this? Let's Reclaim Sundays!"
• "I'm with you. It was a better time all around. We just met the cutoff for experiencing that world. I miss those days."
• "That used to be in Germany for decades. All non-essentials were closed."
• "Here in the US 40-50 years ago everything was closed on Sunday."
• "I have faith that our generation could help slow things down and/or turn it around, but it would take almost all of us to reclaim Sundays!"
What will it take to arouse our people to the seriousness of the hour in which we live? If this is not a clear indication of how Catholics—and many Evangelicals—are interpreting Charlie Kirk's book as a justification for reviving Sunday laws, then what more proof do you need? The time is fast approaching when these calls to protect Sunday by law will shape public opinion, urging political leaders to revive the era when Sunday was strictly enforced and everything was closed.
These developing events are not new or unexpected. For more than 130 years, Seventh-day Adventists have warned that a time would come when religious sentiment would once again be used to influence civil power, leading to laws that restrict freedom of conscience—especially surrounding worship and rest. What we are now witnessing is the gradual fulfillment of those warnings.
Calls for legislated Sunday rest are a defining hallmark of Bible prophecy that Revelation 13 and 14 have consistently warned about. These developments confirm that the prophetic message we have proclaimed for generations is unfolding before our eyes—step by step—exactly as God foretold.
As we hear increasing calls to reclaim Sundays, prophecy warns us that the time is coming when oppressive legislation will be enacted—laws that will restrict personal freedoms and limit many of the opportunities we now have to prepare. Now is the time to work earnestly, to warn faithfully, and to prepare souls for heaven—while the door of mercy remains open.
"Sooner or later Sunday laws will be passed. But there is much for God's servants to do to warn the people. This work has been greatly retarded by their having to wait and stand against the devisings of Satan, which have been striving to find a place in our work. We are years behind" (Review and Herald, February 16, 1905).
https://adventmessenger.org/washington-d-c-based-conservative-think-tank-calls-for-policies-protecting-workers-right-to-refuse-sunday-labor/
Quoted article below from link above.
Washington, D.C.–Based Conservative Think Tank Calls for Policies Protecting Workers' Right to Refuse Sunday Labor
The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research (AEI) is a conservative think tank founded in 1938 and based in Washington, D.C. In a recent article published by the institute, AEI is making a significant claim: that the Sabbath is not just a religious practice but a form of civic infrastructure essential for a healthy democracy. The article follows Charlie Kirk's Sabbath message and argues that citizens are increasingly overworked, exhausted, and digitally overwhelmed, and on that basis calls for public policy interventions—including protections allowing workers to refuse employment on Sundays.
AEI published the following statements:
• "Across America, a growing number of people are rediscovering an ancient practice that even the late conservative activist Charlie Kirk had begun advocating before his recent death: the weekly observance of Sabbath."
• "The beauty of Sabbath principles lies in their adaptability. You don't need to be Jewish, or even religious, to benefit from weekly rhythms of rest and connection."
• "The Civic Case for Sabbath— Sabbath isn't just personal wellness; it is civic infrastructure. Democracy requires citizens who can deliberate, compromise, and work together toward common goals."
• "Choose a consistent 24-hour period for rest and connection—Friday evening to Saturday evening, Sunday morning to Monday morning, or any schedule that works."
• "Communities can support this through policy: quiet hours that limit noise pollution, restaurant and retail workers' right to refuse Sunday shifts, and public spaces designed for gathering rather than consuming."
• "Low-wage workers often lack control over their schedules, single parents face overwhelming demands, and many Americans work multiple jobs to survive. These realities require systemic solutions."
• "Whether motivated by faith, wellness, or simple exhaustion with digital overwhelm, Americans are rediscovering that we need practices that remind us who we are beyond our productivity."
• "In a democracy under strain, that weekly return might be exactly what we need to find our way forward, together.''
• "The choice isn't whether to rest, but whether we'll reclaim it voluntarily or have it forced upon us by burnout. The Sabbath whispers what our bodies scream: stop. Just stop."
The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research is presenting Sunday as a civil tool for stabilizing our political, social, and economic systems, arguing that any policies—including laws—designed to protect this day can therefore be justified. The institute calls for limits on noise and commerce, along with protections allowing workers to refuse Sunday labor. Together, these proposals advance the idea that government should intervene to secure a collective rest by establishing a synchronized day of rest for all Americans.
Although AEI claims individuals may choose their own Sabbath, its argument gravitates toward Sunday when addressing labor protections and public policy. This is precisely how Sunday laws have functioned historically—first under Constantine, later within early American colonial Puritan societies, and ultimately as the dominant pattern throughout Western culture.
Brothers and sisters, the civil case for Sunday rest is being built step by step. Under the banner of the common good, wellness, and civic renewal, Sunday is being elevated as the practical day of rest, accompanied by calls for government-backed protections and restrictions. This scenario is precisely what Bible prophecy warned would precede the mark of the beast—when the state assumes the power to mandate sacred time as a moral duty, enforced through economic pressure and oppressive laws. The issue will ultimately be about authority: who has the right to dictate worship and obedience? God or man?
"The Sabbath will be the great test of loyalty, for it is the point of truth especially controverted. When the final test shall be brought to bear upon men, then the line of distinction will be drawn between those who serve God and those who serve Him not. While the observance of the false sabbath in compliance with the law of the state, contrary to the fourth commandment, will be an avowal of allegiance to a power that is in opposition to God, the keeping of the true Sabbath, in obedience to God's law, is an evidence of loyalty to the Creator. While one class, by accepting the sign of submission to earthly powers, receive the mark of the beast, the other, choosing the token of allegiance to divine authority, receive the seal of God" (Great Controversy, p. 605).
https://adventmessenger.org
Quoted article below from link above.
The Push for a Uniform Day of Rest: Saving America or Sacrificing Liberty?
The Heritage Foundation on January 8, 2026, recently published a policy document titled "Saving America by Saving the Family: A Foundation for the Next 250 Years," which is a renewed effort to elevate Sunday as a civilly protected day of rest. Described as a solution to family breakdown and moral decline, the document argues that restoring social stability requires the reestablishment of shared rhythms of rest—implicitly centered on Sunday. Though presented in the language of compassion, wellness, and societal healing, the proposal ultimately advances restrictions on commerce and public activity on Sundays, placing religiously rooted practices within the sphere of public policy.
Basically, The Heritage Foundation believes that "saving America" requires the reintroduction of Sunday observance into public policy backed by civil authority, raising serious concerns about religious liberty and the separation of church and state. The Heritage Foundation's views on Sunday can no longer be ignored or dismissed as abstract theory, as the current administration has explicitly embraced its blueprint as a framework for governance.
The close tie between The Heritage Foundation's Project 2025 and Donald Trump's administration is clearly understood by the fact that many of the people who helped write the Project 2025 policy blueprint are now serving in his government. In other words, The Heritage Foundation has emerged as a central influence shaping President Donald Trump's policy direction.
On pages 38 and 39 of the newly released document, "Saving America by Saving the Family: A Foundation for the Next 250 Years," the following appears under the section titled "Support for a Uniform Day of Rest":
• "Support for a Uniform Day of Rest—As zoning laws allow a community to determine where one can operate certain businesses, "blue laws" reflect the local judgments as to when one can operate certain businesses. In the case of McGowan v. Maryland (1961), the Supreme Court held by an eight-to-one vote that Sunday-closing laws that include the purpose of providing a uniform day of rest are constitutional and can accommodate the fact that the majority of people who take a day of rest for religious reasons do so on Sundays. Massachusetts, for example, requires that "every employer of labor engaged in carrying on any manufacturing, mechanical, or mercantile establishment or workshop...shall allow every person...at least twenty-four consecutive hours of rest...in every seven consecutive days."
• "A uniform day of rest that limits commercial activity can provide temporal boundaries that help communities to set aside time for religious observance, family gatherings, outdoor activities, and rest. A stable base of research shows that these practices correlate with better mental health, stronger social bonds, and more stable family structures."
• "With the advent of on-demand delivery, shopping can be shifted easily and conveniently to other days of the week. By restoring a common rhythm of rest and reflection, community rest laws could help to reverse the trend toward 'spiritual homelessness' and foster the social habits necessary for communities to cohere and flourish."
• "Despite today's on-demand culture, the U.S. Postal Service does not deliver regular mail on Sundays, most organized youth sports avoid Sunday competitions, and most banks are closed on Sundays. The ever-popular Chick-Fil-A chain closes its restaurants on Sundays for the benefit of its workers and their families. Where new, planned communities or transitioning communities form, they should consider adding rest days as part of their master plans for balanced and thriving community life."
The Heritage Foundation cites McGowan v. Maryland (1961) as their justification to rehabilitate and revive Sunday laws in America. This U.S. Supreme Court decision, which has remained largely dormant for decades, upheld Sunday laws on the grounds that they were deemed to serve a secular purpose—providing a common day of rest for workers—rather than enforcing a religious mandate. In other words, The Heritage Foundation argues that the ruling establishes a valid constitutional precedent for reactivating Sunday closing measures. On this basis, the Kevin Roberts' think tank and foundation encourages local governments and planners to incorporate mandated rest days into broader "master plans" aimed at restoring balance between work and family life.
Here is the problem: the U.S. Supreme Court doesn't always get things right—and it has been wrong before on issues of basic freedom, including Sunday laws. The Court gravely erred when it abandoned basic constitutional principles during the Jim Crow era, upholding racial segregation and state-sponsored discrimination in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896). Rather than defending God-given human dignity and equal protection under the law, the Court bowed to prejudice and hate, demonstrating that what is declared legal by the state is not always morally right.
The same pattern was repeated in 1961, when the Court upheld Sunday closing laws (McGowan v. Maryland). Although these laws clearly involved a religious observance, the Court mischaracterized them as "secular" labor regulations. In doing so, it legitimized the state's power to regulate God's sacred time, once again abandoning the minority—Seventh-day Adventists and Jews—and caving to the majority and its tradition, Sunday sacredness, a blatant violation of religious liberty.
Then came Roe v. Wade (1973), when the Supreme Court of the United States again overstepped its constitutional role by declaring a right that had never previously existed in American law. The decision opened the door to abortion on demand and even partial-birth abortion—practices that permit abortion for any reason, or no stated reason at all. These are not medical procedures or necessities but legal constructs presented as rights, despite having no foundation in either Scripture or the text and original intent of the U.S. Constitution.
In each case—Jim Crow laws, Sunday laws, and abortion—the Court failed because it abandoned constitutional restraint, upheld human reasoning, and interpreted rights according to the popular sentiments of the time rather than enduring constitutional principles. History shows that when courts get such issues wrong, they do not safeguard liberty; instead, they lay the groundwork for abuse and discrimination.
It is time for McGowan v. Maryland (1961) to be overturned, as it was wrongly decided when the Court upheld Sunday closing laws by rebranding a distinctly religious observance as a secular institution. Today, The Heritage Foundation is seeking to revive these same Sunday laws—measures that clearly and unequivocally arose from apostate religious worship—by resurrecting the argument that so-called blue laws are merely neutral labor regulations. This reasoning allows the state to regulate sacred time while denying that it is doing so and also destroys the First Amendment's protection by permitting the government to enforce the religious traditions of the majority under the pretext of saving society, families, mental health, and overall well-being.
If this policy proposal by The Heritage Foundation—calling for Sunday to be established as a uniform national day of rest—begins to take hold in American public life, then the United States will truly be speaking "as a dragon" while still claiming to be lamb-like. When Sunday observance is promoted as a civic duty and social necessity, it represents the elevation of Catholic doctrine as a remedy for national renewal and moral restoration. From a prophetic perspective, this development is precisely the type of deception we were warned would take place during the final crisis, as religious apostasy and papal decrees are promoted under the banner of unity, healing, and national salvation.
"And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb." Revelation 14:9-10.
https://adventmessenger.org/the-north-carolina-state-board-of-elections-rejects-sunday-voting-because-thats-the-lords-day/
Quoted article below from link above.
The North Carolina State Board of Elections Rejects Sunday Voting Because "That's the Lord's Day"
Religious beliefs are beginning to influence voting policies, and this influence is showing signs of spreading to other areas of public life, particularly attempts to restrict activities on Sundays. On January 14, 2026, the Border Belt Independent newspaper reported that the North Carolina State Board of Elections blocked Sunday voting in Columbus County on religious grounds. While officials publicly stated that their decision was based on providing a day of rest for election workers, the chairman's own words revealed the true motive: "I don't think we should be voting on Sundays ... because that's the Lord's Day."
The Border Belt Independent reported the following:
• "Columbus County residents won't have the option to vote on Sunday ahead of the March 3 primary election."
• "The North Carolina State Board of Elections on Tuesday rejected a plan for the county to offer early voting on Sunday, February 15. The 3-2 vote was split along party lines, with the Republican majority opposing the plan."
• "Republican board chairman Francis X. De Luca told reporters at the meeting that poll workers should be allowed to rest on Sundays. He also said that Sunday voting approved by the state board couldn't be retracted in the future."
• "I don't think we should be voting on Sunday," De Luca said. "I know lots of people who do nothing on Sunday because that's the Lord's day."
This news item matters because it shows how Sunday is increasingly being treated as a sacred day whose perceived religious character is allowed to influence public behavior. In other words, a personal religious conviction about Sunday observance was used to limit access to a civic right—voting. Once state officials accept religious reasoning as a valid basis for restricting voting on Sunday, a precedent is established. If Sunday can be treated as "off-limits" for voting because it is considered the Lord's Day, it becomes far easier to argue that other activities on Sunday should also be restricted for the same reason.
As religious language becomes more normalized in public decision-making, efforts to shut down activity on Sunday will also increase. North Carolina's decision on voting shows that Sunday closing laws are not theoretical but are real. It is happening in real time, affecting real rights. Civil ordinances about Sunday activity are being justified on the basis of religion. What is happening in North Carolina is not an isolated incident. It is an early warning of how religious convictions about Sunday are moving from the pulpit into the polling place—and, eventually, into every corner of public life.
"The pressure of the Sunday law has come and is coming. It has been ordered that all stores shall be closed on Sunday, and this is being rigidly enforced. The government is trying to have God acknowledged in the constitution. Our people are making just as vigorous a stand as possible that it shall not be. They have been securing names to a petition to this effect. We can see that that which we have been talking about for the last thirty-five years—this law causing the Sunday to be exalted and making human inventions take the place of God's holy day—is now being fulfilled. There is much excitement now in regard to these matters" (Letter 28, 1897).
As is obvious, this issue has been around for a long time. Eventually legalistic Sunday observers will get their way, when God determines the time is right. When such a predicted fulfillment will reveal just how close to the second coming we are.
https://therokuchannel.roku.com/watch/e8eef714fbe55d33927bedd49bbe8785
Strange Alfred Hitchcock Presents episode from 1959, which touches upon several familiar present world realities and or related events. One very interesting and predictive scene in accordance with this topics subject, is played out beginning about the 18 minutes and 22 seconds into the episode. Quite amazing actually.
https://adventmessenger.org/secular-media-restore-sunday-as-a-true-lords-day-before-its-too-late/
Quoted article below from link above.
Secular Media: "Restore Sunday as a True Lord's Day Before It's Too Late"
Noti Red Mérida is a local media outlet based in Mérida, the capital of the Mexican state of Yucatán, which primarily focuses on reporting on issues in the city and the surrounding region. However, on January 28, 2026, the outlet published an article titled "Sundays Are a Whole Day for God, Not Just an Hour," which expressed concern over the cultural and spiritual erosion of Sunday as a sacred day of rest.
The article argued that what was once widely recognized as a day set apart for worship and family time has gradually been reduced to just another commercial day. It cited both religious and sociological reasons for restoring reverence for Sunday through meaningful rest and devotion, and it called on society to "turn back" and "restore Sunday" before it is too late.
Noti Red Mérida published the following:
• "At what point did Sunday stop being the Lord's Day and become just an hour dedicated to God?"
• "I remember that in my childhood, the only places open on Sundays were churches and hospitals."
• "The only people who should be working were emergency personnel, doctors, law enforcement, and ministers or priests."
• "There were no organized sports leagues or scheduled practices on Sundays. Sunday rest was a universally respected cultural institution."
• "Currently, virtually all shops remain open, with exceptions such as Hobby Lobby and Chick-fil-A, sporting activities have invaded even Sunday mornings. They need to accommodate all the tournament matches, and Sunday has become as busy as any other day of the week."
• "The Lord's Day has become yet another victim on our wide highway to spiritual perdition."
• "This reality has become prevalent in the United States, Canada, and Europe."
• "Church attendance statistics in the West show a steady decline: in the United States, regular attendance at religious services has fallen from 70% in the 1950s to less than 47% today."
• "In Europe, the numbers are even more dramatic, with countries like France where only 5% of Catholics regularly attend Sunday mass."
• "Sociological studies have shown that the loss of the collective 'day of rest' has negative effects on family and community cohesion."
• "Families have fewer opportunities to get together without the distractions of work, shopping, or scheduled activities. The frenetic pace that has invaded even our supposed day of rest contributes significantly to the increasing levels of stress, anxiety, and exhaustion that characterize modern society."
• "The Catholic Church, through documents such as Pope John Paul II's 'Dies Domini,' has consistently reaffirmed the importance of Sunday as a day dedicated not only to attending Mass, but also to spiritual renewal, physical rest, strengthening family ties, and practicing works of charity."
• "Turn around before it's too late ... restore Sunday as a true Lord's Day, not out of legalistic obligation, but as a loving response to the God who first loved us."
The author's central burden is that Sunday has lost its sacred meaning, and he argues that this has contributed to spiritual decline, weakened families, and widespread cultural exhaustion. These concerns closely align with the growing agenda of Christian nationalist movements and organizations such as the Heritage Foundation, which seek to restore Sunday as a unifying day of rest through public policy. What is now being expressed in religious and cultural commentary in Mexico is, in the United States, being pursued through political means—namely, the reestablishment of Sunday observance as a way to reverse moral decay, restore family cohesion, and reassert Christian identity in public life.
At the heart of the modern effort to restore Sunday lies the Catholic foundation. Through official documents such as Dies Domini, Laudato Si', and others, the Roman Catholic Church has consistently called for Sunday to be reclaimed as a sacred institution. Yet beneath this appeal lies a deeper reality: Sunday, as a religious obligation, is rooted in Catholic theology and Papal authority. By presenting Sunday observance as a remedy for moral decline, they are laying the foundation for uniting religious influence with state power, just as Revelation 13 warns us. The same power that once changed God's Sabbath is now moving once again to elevate Sunday, this time under the banner of moral renewal and societal good.
"The enforcement of Sunday-keeping on the part of Protestant churches is an enforcement of the worship of the papacy—of the beast. Those who, understanding the claims of the fourth commandment, choose to observe the false instead of the true Sabbath are thereby paying homage to that power by which alone it is commanded. But in the very act of enforcing a religious duty by secular power, the churches would themselves form an image to the beast; hence the enforcement of Sunday-keeping in the United States would be an enforcement of the worship of the beast and his image" (Great Controversy, p. 448).
https://adventmessenger.org/lifestyle-magazine-worshipping-god-on-sunday-is-an-act-of-obedience-that-requires-working-harder-on-the-other-six-days/
Quoted article below from link above.
Lifestyle Magazine: Worshipping God on Sunday is an Act of Obedience that Requires Working Harder on the Other Six Days
A Productive Household is an online lifestyle magazine that focuses on enhancing people's lives by offering advice on everyday matters, including fashion, health, beauty, travel, home décor, and even Sunday worship. By following its guidance, readers are promised a more "productive household." Unfortunately, this illustrates how a lifestyle magazine can help normalize Sunday as the official day of rest. By appealing to both secular and religious audiences alike, such outlets often succeed in advancing erroneous teachings about Sunday worship beyond church walls and into everyday life.
A Productive Household published the following on January 1, 2026:
• "By the grace of God, for the past 7 years, we've been setting aside Sundays—the Christian Sabbath—for rest and worship. I'll be the first to admit that this was a hard arrangement for me to accept at first! We all need rest, and yet, resting doesn't come naturally."
• "There's so much to do. And there are even things we miss out on because Sundays are set aside for worship and rest. But at this point, I can confidently say the blessings of the Lord's Day—and most of all, of obedience to God—are far greater than anything we've ever missed out on on a Sunday."
• "After weeks, probably a couple of years, to be honest, of fighting the sabbath in my heart, it's now so obvious that we as humans don't have time to NOT take a sabbath. Resting on Sundays precedes work, and it necessitates hard work the other 6 days of the week."
• "Sundays offer the physical rest and the rest in Christ that we need to give us abundant energy for the blessings and demands of the other 6 days."
The article begins by explicitly redefining Sunday as "the Christian Sabbath," immediately establishing the discussion in theological terms and presenting Sunday observance as an act of obedience to God. No scriptural evidence is offered to support this claim—only a confident, unsubstantiated assertion. Without explaining how or why such a shift is biblically justified, Sunday rest is simply elevated as the wiser, healthier, and more responsible choice.
After mistakenly establishing Sunday as the day for worship and rest, the article takes a significant turn by revealing that honoring Sunday requires even more intense work during the remaining six days, including Saturday. In other words, Sunday is not just a special day; it becomes the justification for increasing the workload during the rest of the week.
What makes this error especially egregious is that Saturday is not treated as a distinct or protected day in any way. Instead, the seventh day is explicitly categorized as a workday—one that, because of Sunday observance, is expected to be even more laborious. This directly reverses the biblical structure of the week. Instead of working six days and then resting on the seventh day—Saturday—just like God clearly laid out in the Ten Commandments, the article flips the order and treats Sunday as the real day of rest, while Saturday is while Saturday is coungted like just another regular workday.
In Scripture, God established a clear and unchanging order—six days of labor followed by the seventh-day Sabbath, which He blessed and sanctified as holy. Yet Satan has simply switched the labels, so that today many believe they are obeying God while doing the very opposite of what He commanded. The day God blessed and set apart for rest is treated as a common workday, while rest is observed on a day God designated for labor.
Isaiah warned of this very condition: "Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!" Isaiah 5:20. In such a system, the final deception is complete: the commandments of God are honored in name only but denied in practice. The greatest danger today is the devotion to a counterfeit faith and a counterfeit day of worship that feels right, sounds biblical, and is widely accepted.
"The Protestant world have set up an idol sabbath in the place where God's Sabbath should be, and they are treading in the footsteps of the Papacy" (Selected Messages, Vol. 2, p. 359).
https://adventmessenger.org/pope-leo-xiv-elevates-human-tradition-to-the-same-level-as-the-divine-word-of-god/
Quoted article below from link above.
Pope Leo XIV Elevates Human Tradition to the Same Level as the Divine Word of God
"And he shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws." Daniel 7:25
On January 28, 2026, during a general audience at the Vatican, Pope Leo XIV addressed visitors from around the world on the relationship between Scripture and tradition. In his remarks, the Pope reaffirmed the long-standing Roman Catholic principle that church tradition stands on the same level as—if not above—the Holy Scriptures. This position stands in direct contrast to historic Protestant belief, which holds that when tradition becomes a second authority in the church, it gains the power to reinterpret, correct, or even override what God Himself has written, making the final judge of truth no longer God's Word but fallible men who claim the authority to define tradition.
The Holy See Press Office published the following statement from Pope Leo XIV:
• "Today we will reflect on the relationship between Sacred Scripture and Tradition."
• "It is what the Second Vatican Council affirms, using an evocative image: 'There exists a close connection and communication between sacred tradition and Sacred Scripture. For both of them, flowing from the same divine wellspring, in a certain way merge into a unity and tend toward the same end."
• "The Council affirms that 'this tradition which comes from the Apostles develops in the Church with the help of the Holy Spirit'."
• "The Church, in her teaching, life and worship, perpetuates and hands on to all generations all that she herself is, all that she believes[/color]."
• "Sacred tradition and Sacred Scripture form one sacred deposit of the word of God, committed to the Church, interpreted by the living teaching office of the Church, whose authority is exercised in the name of Jesus Christ."
• "Scripture and Tradition ... are so linked and joined together that they cannot stand independently, and together, each in their own way, under the action of the one Holy Spirit, they contribute effectively to the salvation of souls."
When human tradition is treated as authoritative, it can supersede and effectively nullify God's commandments by substituting His clear instructions with man-made rules. Jesus Himself rebuked religious leaders for elevating human tradition in a way that set aside the Word of God:
"For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men." Mark 7:8.
"Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye." Mark 7:13.
"But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men." Matthew 15:9.
When tradition is viewed as equal to the Holy Scriptures, it becomes a rival rule of faith—an alternate standard that many end up following instead of submitting to what God's Word actually teaches. Yet Scripture presents itself as the sole measuring rod for doctrine and practice. Once tradition is placed on the same level as the Bible, Scripture ceases to be the clear and final authority, and truth is increasingly determined by long-standing traditions rather than by the plain teaching of God's Word.
"To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." Isaiah 8:20.
"These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so." Acts 17:11.
"All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works." 2 Timothy 3:16-17.
Tradition allows non-biblical beliefs and practices to take root without clear biblical support. God's word warns against teaching human rules as divine requirements. When tradition is granted the same authority as Scripture, errors can become locked in—because people will treat those traditions as untouchable and refuse to correct them even when the Bible shows they're wrong.
"Not giving heed to Jewish fables, and commandments of men, that turn from the truth." Titus 1:14.
"Wherefore the Lord said, Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men." Isiah 29:13.
"And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables." 2 Timothy 4:4.
"Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils." 1 Timothy 4:1.
When fables, seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils are placed on equal footing with Scripture, heresies can be accepted simply because they are ancient or widely practiced, rather than because they are clearly taught in God's Word. Over time, this has allowed doctrines such as Sunday sacredness, the natural immortality of the soul, prayers to dead saints, purgatory, the eternal torment of the wicked, the veneration of Mary, and many other errors to take root in the church—not through explicit biblical command, but through tradition, philosophical influence, and human authority.
Once these non-biblical ideas became embedded in the church, Scripture was often reinterpreted to support them, rather than being allowed to test and correct them. As a result, divine revelation has been gradually replaced with human teachings, and serious errors have been preserved, defended, and passed down through generations under the assumption that long-standing traditions are equal with biblical truth, even when those doctrines plainly conflict with the clear teaching of Scripture.
In the last days, Scripture reveals that the final conflict will center on worship and authority—whether people will obey the commandments of God or submit to the traditions of men. The true biblical Sabbath, established by God at Creation and written into His law, stands as a visible sign of loyalty to the Creator, while the Papal Sabbath, Sunday, was instituted by man, changed by human authority, and is the counterfeited day of rest. In this crisis, the Sabbath becomes decisive because it directly confronts the question of who has the right to define worship—God alone or man—and this is what separates those who keep the commandments of God from those who follow the commandments of men.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3a-NZGrW8M
A good one by Clash of Minds pertinent to the subject of this thread.
I would think the main problem is in defining the foreign Greek word Sabbath like a few other left in the Greek obscured. Like apostle, prophet, prophecy, baptism. Many have no idea what the words are saying
If a person changes the meaning of one word it becomes spirit plagiarism it can change all the commandment giving them over to the father of lies
Deuteronomy 4:2 Ye shall not add unto the word(singular) which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it(singular), that ye may keep the commandments(multiple) of the Lord your God which I command you.
Sabbath is eternal rest of our Holy father who works in us giving us rest establishing after 6 days it is finished nothing can be added to it or taken away form it .
It not something we do its something he finished .demonstrated in a ceremonial law as a parable hiding the spiritual understanding from the father of lies the true fast (gospel)
Isiah 58 the commentary on the rest (sabbath) of Christ in us.
Isiah 58:6-7 Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of wickedness,to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover him and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?
The weekend fast the five day work period .First day of in preparation for the gospel feast .gather as much as you can and cook it some grabbed little others more both had just enough to please Our Holy Father Christ. On one occasion one refused to obey the ceremonial law and cook the mana the dat before he cooked and was stoned to death for violating's the ceremonial law <just like Aaron two son that thought baptism was a time to add to scriptura with false prophecy strange fire .the fire consumed them thier priestly attire not a hint of smoke .
Sabbath (eternal rest) moved to the first day (let there be Light establishing children of light Christian).last becomes the first. ---It is one day a week we can share what Christ has given us to His glory.
: garee Fri Feb 06, 2026 - 06:03:50I would think the main problem is in defining the foreign Greek word Sabbath like a few other left in the Greek obscured. Like apostle, prophet, prophecy, baptism. Many have no idea what the words are saying
If a person changes the meaning of one word it becomes spirit plagiarism it can change all the commandment giving them over to the father of lies
Deuteronomy 4:2 Ye shall not add unto the word(singular) which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it(singular), that ye may keep the commandments(multiple) of the Lord your God which I command you.
Sabbath is eternal rest of our Holy father who works in us giving us rest establishing after 6 days it is finished nothing can be added to it or taken away form it .
It not something we do its something he finished .demonstrated in a ceremonial law as a parable hiding the spiritual understanding from the father of lies the true fast (gospel)
Isiah 58 the commentary on the rest (sabbath) of Christ in us.
Isiah 58:6-7 Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of wickedness,to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover him and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?
The weekend fast the five day work period .First day of in preparation for the gospel feast .gather as much as you can and cook it some grabbed little others more both had just enough to please Our Holy Father Christ. On one occasion one refused to obey the ceremonial law and cook the mana the dat before he cooked and was stoned to death for violating's the ceremonial law <just like Aaron two son that thought baptism was a time to add to scriptura with false prophecy strange fire .the fire consumed them thier priestly attire not a hint of smoke .
Sabbath (eternal rest) moved to the first day (let there be Light establishing children of light Christian).last becomes the first. ---It is one day a week we can share what Christ has given us to His glory.
The fourth commandment is not a ceremonial law. The seventh day Sabbath of God was established for humanity at the end of creation. It was established and existed for humanity before sin ever even entered the picture. Before there was even such a thing as ceremonial laws. Which laws are all about and in relation to atonement between sinners and their holy God.
Nor was the fourth commandment reestablished by God for his chosen people on this earth as part of the ceremonial laws He established for them as well. Rather to the contrary, the Sabbath commandment was placed right in the heart of the moral laws God established for His people of all time. The seventh day Sabbath was given to humanity in the sinless perfection in which God originally created them, and it will be kept by all of humanity in that exact same state of being in the new heaven and earth. AMEN!
Isa 66:22 For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the LORD, so shall your seed and your name remain. 23 And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the LORD.
https://adventmessenger.org/news-media-sunday-sport-is-a-form-of-baal-worship-that-keeps-people-from-church/
Quoted article below from link above.
News Media: Sunday Sport is a form of Baal Worship that Keeps People from Church
On February 7, 2026, the day before Super Bowl LV, the Marietta Times published an article claiming that Sunday sports are a form of Baal worship that prevents people from attending church. The article also spoke favorably of the era when Blue Laws restricted commerce on Sundays in order to make room for worship and argued that their absence has contributed to declining church attendance. In doing so, the Marietta Times is promoting the same growing narrative that argues that church attendance is declining due to the abundance of activities available on Sundays.
The article expressed the following:
• "Today, a multitude of activities compete with church attendance. Just 50 or 60 years ago, most businesses closed on Sunday because of 'Blue Laws,' sometimes called 'Sunday closing laws,' that regulated activities in deference to religious traditions that designated Sunday as a day of worship. But for many stores and restaurants today, Sunday will be the busiest day of the week. Youth activities are now commonly scheduled for Sundays, prompting author Jim Elliff to pen an article entitled, 'When Ball becomes Baal,' a not-so-subtle reference to the idolatry of ancient Israel."
• "Each of us needs to be in the worship assembly, and each of us needs the other to be there, too. On our own, the Devil breaks us too easily. He's a roaring lion looking for folks to devour."
The message is unmistakable: communities will function better when Sunday is protected by law. The solution implied by the modern media is to restore society by limiting sports, shopping, and other activities that have made Sunday the busiest day of the week. By invoking phrases such as "When Ball Becomes Baal," the so-called desecration of Sunday is elevated to the level of idolatry. Once Sunday commerce is labeled as idolatry, restrictions on that day become justified and necessary. This reflects the mindset of a growing segment of Christian nationalists and others who seek to re-establish Sunday as a uniform day of rest.
Because Sunday activity is increasingly portrayed as a cause of family breakdown and moral decline, churches are turning to government to enforce laws that would close businesses, restrict commerce, and limit other activities on that day in order to encourage church attendance. Prophecy warns that enforced worship does not begin with persecution but with moral appeals and social pressure—before ultimately ending in coercion. Whenever civil power is employed to accomplish what the church cannot achieve through persuasion alone, the law becomes the mechanism by which Sunday observance is imposed.
"Yet this very class put forth the claim that the fast-spreading corruption is largely attributable to the desecration of the so-called 'Christian Sabbath,' and that the enforcement of Sunday observance would greatly improve the morals of society. This claim is especially urged in America, where the doctrine of the true Sabbath has been most widely preached" (Great Controversy, p. 587).
Just like Jesus taught, if the world will not do what the church thinks it should, then make laws to force the world to obey the church. That is why He gave Peter the power that He did, so that the church could force the world to worship God on Sundays and enforce other religious dogma upon the unconvinced and or unwilling.
Those silly legalistic seventh day Sabbath keepers who keep telling people they should keep God's Sabbath by faith in His word, just don't understand the nature of the real gospel, which is to be forced upon the world of course. Cause everyone knows that forcing people to keep a holy day against their will is not legalism, but asking them to do so by faith in God's word is.
It is no surprise that such mentality should develop as professed truth, where another present professed truth is that a man is a woman if he says so, and a woman is a man if she says so. Go figure.
2Th 2:1 Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, 2 That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. 3 Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; 4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God. 5 Remember ye not, that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things? 6 And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time. 7 For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. 8 And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: 9 Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, 10 And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish;
because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11 And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: 12 That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
https://adventmessenger.org/vogue-fashion-magazine-calls-the-effort-to-protect-sunday-rest-non-negotiable/
Quoted article below from link above.
Vogue Fashion Magazine Calls the Effort to Protect Sunday Rest "Non-Negotiable"
Vogue magazine has long been synonymous with fashion, culture, luxury, and the arts. It does not merely report on trends—it helps create them. Vogue has an international following and helps shape what its readers perceive as desirable and elegant. On February 12, 2026, Vogue published an article connecting Sunday rest with French culture and sophistication, promoting the concept of a "French Sunday." By depicting Sunday as the day set apart for leisure, beauty, and rest—the magazine has elevated the day to something more refined and aspirational, above the rest of the days of the week.
Vogue described the meaning of "French Sunday" as follows:
• "The art of Sunday à la française, otherwise known as 'French Sunday,' has recently come to wider attention. With good reason: In France, the last day of the week is not reserved for chores or errands, but for resting, reflecting, reconnecting, and resetting. It's for nurturing connections with family, friends, and yourself. In many regions of the country, most shops and services are closed, so there's not much pressure to get a lot done anyway."
• "Sunday should be a day of rest, and it must be protected from the efficiency and urgency that often permeates the rest of the week."
• "The French even have sayings that capture this directive, like "Que votre dimanche soit comblé de grâce, de paix, et de bénédiction," which basically means "May your Sunday be filled with grace, peace, and blessings."
• "French Sundays are supposed to be lazy, stress-free days, when the main activity is to do nothing."
• "In France, it's considered an essential break that allows for space to breathe. And, it's non-negotiable."
• "First, you have to make the radical decision that you're not going to maximize every minute of your Sunday—or, at least, not in the traditional, hustle-culture way. You're going to turn your alarm clock off, cancel hectic plans, and rely on your intuition and body to set the rhythm of your day instead."
• "You're going to put your phone on do not disturb—or, maybe you're going to turn it off completely."
• "Most of all, it's about embodying the softer side of life and yourself with the deep inner knowing that taking it easy is just as worthwhile as everything else."
The language used by Vogue romanticizes Sunday as something superior to the rest of the week. By presenting "French Sunday" as something refined and cultured, Vogue is intentionally elevating Sunday above all other days. But it goes even further. The article states that Sunday "must be protected," implying that the day is under threat and that society bears a responsibility to safeguard it. This type of language lays out the justification to preserve Sunday through legislative measure.
Vogue also seeks to normalize the idea that on Sunday, business activity should be shut down. It argues that "most shops and services are closed," calling reduced commerce on Sunday something healthy and beneficial for society. The article concludes by describing Sundays as being "filled with grace, peace, and blessings." This view implies that Sunday is sacred and that a spiritual blessing is received by setting it apart for rest.
Vogue is not a theological journal or a church publication; but it is one of the most influential cultural and fashion authorities in the world. When a platform of that magnitude begins calling for Sunday to be "protected" and describes its preservation as "non-negotiable," this indicates that one day Vogue will join the popular push for legal enactment. From a prophetic perspective, this normalization of Sunday rest represents a preliminary step in shaping public sentiment to support a Sunday law.
Interesting. The nation that above any other, most violently rejected Papal authority and teaching during the French Revolution to the point of rejecting God altogether and basically creating political Secular Humanism, is now in full agreement with Roman policy of enforced Sunday sacredness as it were. It looks quite a bit to me, like the deadly wound the first beast of Revelation received during the French Revolution, is well on its way to being fully healed.
https://adventmessenger.org/the-news-media-pushes-for-a-return-to-sunday-shutdowns/
Quoted article below from link above.
The News Media Pushes for a Return to Sunday Shutdowns
The secular media is increasingly describing modern life as overstimulated, over-commercialized, and exhausting—and points to the desecration of Sunday as evidence of that shift. More and more articles, editorials, and opinion pieces look back favorably to an earlier era when stores were closed, malls were quiet, and major sporting events were limited or nonexistent on Sundays. That period is frequently described as simpler and more community-oriented, marked by quieter streets, more time spent with family, regular Sunday church attendance, and the absence of a continuous 24-hour retail cycle.
On February 13, 2026, The Daily News published the following:
• "Somewhere along the way, we reduced the Ten Commandments to nine. A half-century ago, businesses were closed on Sunday, and sporting events recognized Sunday as a day for worship. All that has changed. Today, our calendars are filled with a 24/7 frenzy. We effectively eliminated the fourth commandment as irrelevant and archaic: 'Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy'."
• "A report from the American Psychological Association stated, 'Chronic stress is increasingly eating away at our overall well-being. The psychological and physical toll of stress in America will undoubtedly continue to snowball if something doesn't change'."
• "In 1924, Scotland's Eric Liddell, the fastest runner in the world, refused to compete at the Olympics on the Lord's Day. When the King of England commanded him to run for his country on Sunday, Liddell respectfully replied he had a higher king."
• "Sabbath requires time for rest, silence, solitude and worship, but it is more than a day of rest. It is a way of life that is filled with wonder, worship, awe and delight."
By contrasting that past with today's constant Sunday commercial activity and sports culture, the message suggests that restoration of Sunday closures will help repair social breakdown. The tone is often secular in language—mental health, work-life balance, labor protections, environmental sustainability, family cohesion—rather than explicit theology. Yet the practical implication of many of these arguments is the same: reduce or eliminate commercial and entertainment activity on Sunday.
When repeated consistently, this message normalizes the idea that Sunday rest is not only desirable but also necessary for the common good. Whether one agrees or disagrees, it is clear that the growing narrative being promoted more and more is this: if we want healthier communities, stronger families, and less chaos, we may need to return to a time when Sunday was different—when commerce stopped, stadiums were quiet, and the people had a uniform day of rest.
Even though much of the world is increasingly calling for Sunday to be protected as the day of rest, the foundation for such a call must be examined in light of God's Word. The fourth commandment plainly declares: "Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy ... the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God" (Exodus 20:8–11). Scripture identifies a specific day—the seventh day—not a generally accepted day of rest to be reassigned by tradition or civil authority. When society promotes Sunday as the universal solution for rest and renewal, it is advocating for a day that God never designated in His law. The biblical Sabbath, according to the commandment itself, is the seventh day—what we call Saturday—and any movement that substitutes another day, however well-intentioned, departs from the clear language of Scripture.
"God has given men the Sabbath as a sign between Him and them as a test of their loyalty. Those who, after the light regarding God's law comes to them, continue to disobey and exalt human laws above the law of God in the great crisis before us, will receive the mark of the beast" (Evangelism, p. 235).
Yes, somewhere along the way we reduced the Ten Commandments to nine, and we know by whom and when that was.
The Synod of Laodicea - 343-381 A.D. - furnishes a decree which is quoted by many:
"Christians shall not Judaize and be idle on Saturday [Sabbatum is always used for the Sabbath and is translated Saturday in the English edition of Hefele], but shall work on that day; but the Lord's-day they shall especially honor, and as being Christians, shall, if possible, do no work on that day. If, however, they are found Judaizing they shall be shut out from Christ. (Canon 29, Hefele, Vol. 2, p. 316.)
When Roman "Christianity", replaced one of God's commandments with their own tradition.
Pope Gregory I (AD 590-604) said :
"Gregory, bishop by the grace of God to his well-beloved sons, the Roman citizens: It has come to me that certain men of perverse spirit have disseminated among you things depraved and opposed to the holy faith, so that they forbid anything to be done on the day of the Sabbath. What shall I call them except preachers of anti-Christ?." Epistles of Gregory I, b.13, epist.1, found in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers.
2190 The sabbath, which represented the completion of the first creation, has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ. (CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.)
63. Christ came to accomplish a new "exodus", to restore freedom to the oppressed. He performed many healings on the Sabbath (cf. Mt 12:9-14 and parallels), certainly not to violate the Lord's Day, but to reveal its full meaning: "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mk 2:27). Opposing the excessively legalistic interpretation of some of his contemporaries, and developing the true meaning of the biblical Sabbath, Jesus, as "Lord of the Sabbath" (Mk 2:28), restores to the Sabbath observance its liberating character, carefully safeguarding the rights of God and the rights of man. This is why Christians, called as they are to proclaim the liberation won by the blood of Christ, felt that they had the authority to transfer the meaning of the Sabbath to the day of the Resurrection. The Passover of Christ has in fact liberated man from a slavery more radical than any weighing upon an oppressed people — the slavery of sin, which alienates man from God, and alienates man from himself and from others, constantly sowing within history the seeds of evil and violence. (APOSTOLIC LETTER DIES DOMINI by John Paul II)
Sabbath as Eternal Rest
The Sabbath simply means rest, with no other meanings added. It is not tied to any specific day of the week. True rest is eternal—available anytime a person does not harden their heart but acknowledges that it is Christ who works in dying mankind, both to hear and to be empowered to do the holy will of the Holy Father Christ.
According to Hebrews 6, this rest is "the better thing" that accompanies salvation. God promises He will not forget every good work a born-again believer does, according to His good pleasure.
The gospel fast is a ceremonial shadow, without substance in itself. Consider the man who, under the ceremonial law, began preparing sticks for the fire on the day of the fast—it was meant to be prepared the day prior. He was stoned, just as Aaron's two sons died in false pride. Similarly, John, though beheaded, thirsted for hearing the gospel fast.
The rest was moved from the last day to the first day to represent the whole, Alpha and Omega—the just and the justifier. It is an eternal rest, available any time the voice calls, "This is the way, My way—the green pasture way.."My High way
: garee Sun Feb 15, 2026 - 19:30:40Sabbath as Eternal Rest
The rest was moved from the last day to the first day to represent the whole, Alpha and Omega—the just and the justifier. It is an eternal rest, available any time the voice calls, "This is the way, My way—the green pasture way.."My High way
Question: WHO moved it?
Yes, who moved it? Why did they move it? By whose authority did they move it? And by whose authority has it been and continues to be established by civil legislation?
If you and or others can simply change God's law as you please, then who are you to tell anyone else they are wrong if they would change it back or choose Thursday instead? Or do you and others claim to stand in the place of God here on earth, with authority to change God's law and or the testimony of Holy Scripture as you see fit? While others cannot, apparently.
Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
Are your words and teachings above those of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ?
Daniel 7:25 He shall speak words against the Most High,
and shall wear out the saints of the Most High,
and shall think to change the times and the law[u/];
Daniel 7 describes the person or the entity pretty clearly it seems.
: Jaime Sun Feb 15, 2026 - 20:54:39Question: WHO moved it?
I would offer. .This isn't really about one day at all---it's about where righteousness is aimed and who it's aimed towards.
When Sabbath-keeping or fasting becomes a badge of identity, it can slowly shift from obedience toward God into self-reference. That's the thread running through the examples of the Sabbaths
The manna: it was meant to be received, not managed. Gathering sticks to cook on that day to be eaten wasn't just "work"—it was a refusal to trust the word already given.(Numbers 15:33)
Nadab and Abihu: "strange fire" wasn't creative worship; it was adding to what God had spoken. A second of visibility, a flash of self-assertion—twelve seconds of false fame,.
Isaiah 58:3 Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? wherefore have
we afflicted our soul, and thou takest
no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast ye
find pleasure, and exact all your labours.
Fasting in Isaiah 58 cuts straight through religious performance. They afflicted their souls, but only inwardly and selectively. (Outward ritual, inward pleasure. God calls that. They had their own righteousness as an offering.
That line hits. Scripture consistently treats self-generated righteousness as counterfeit currency—religious in appearance, empty in substance. The fast was meant to be a sign to the nations, not a mirror for self-congratulation. Same with Sabbath rest: it points beyond timekeeping to eternal rest, not identity policing.
This is also where critiques of traditions like the Seventh-day Adventist Church often land—not because rest is wrong, but because fixation on the sign can eclipse the thing signified. When the symbol becomes the center, the rest is no longer rest.
Isaiah 58 doesn't abolish fasting; it redefines it: loosing our burdens---freeing the oppressed---pouring yourself out for the hungry
That's righteousness that flows outward, not inward. Paul's warnings about "confidence in the flesh"
The Pharisee's Takanot or Traditions of men that were actually contrary to Torah was the reason for their angst with Jesus and his proper interpretation of Torah that included the SPIRIT of Sabbath rather than their narrow faulty interpretation. They accused Jesus of breaking the Sabbath, he did not. He properly interpretted Sabbath Filling it FULL back to what God intended and they had effectively emptied or abolished. Hence as Jesus said in Mathew 5:17, he did not come to abolish or empty the Law (as these Pharisee clowns have), but he came to fulfill or fill full Torah BACK to what God originally intended NOT just the hollow shell of the Letter of the Law. They entire Sermon on the Mount is Jesus properly interpreting the Law or Torah. You have heard it said ————-, but I say to you ———-. Sabbath was one of those instances.
Same thing in Mark 7:19. Jesus wasn't overturning the food laws, but clearly addressing the faulty Tradition of men involving handwashing. That was a contrived rule by the Pharisees NOT God's law in the Torah.
Thanks Hi-Me ::preachit::
: garee Mon Feb 16, 2026 - 08:16:27I would offer. .This isn't really about one day at all---it's about where righteousness is aimed and who it's aimed towards.
When Sabbath-keeping or fasting becomes a badge of identity, it can slowly shift from obedience toward God into self-reference. That's the thread running through the examples of the Sabbaths
The manna: it was meant to be received, not managed. Gathering sticks to cook on that day to be eaten wasn't just "work"—it was a refusal to trust the word already given.(Numbers 15:33)
Nadab and Abihu: "strange fire" wasn't creative worship; it was adding to what God had spoken. A second of visibility, a flash of self-assertion—twelve seconds of false fame,.
Isaiah 58:3 Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours.
Fasting in Isaiah 58 cuts straight through religious performance. They afflicted their souls, but only inwardly and selectively. (Outward ritual, inward pleasure. God calls that. They had their own righteousness as an offering.
That line hits. Scripture consistently treats self-generated righteousness as counterfeit currency—religious in appearance, empty in substance. The fast was meant to be a sign to the nations, not a mirror for self-congratulation. Same with Sabbath rest: it points beyond timekeeping to eternal rest, not identity policing.
This is also where critiques of traditions like the Seventh-day Adventist Church often land—not because rest is wrong, but because fixation on the sign can eclipse the thing signified. When the symbol becomes the center, the rest is no longer rest.
Isaiah 58 doesn't abolish fasting; it redefines it: loosing our burdens---freeing the oppressed---pouring yourself out for the hungry
That's righteousness that flows outward, not inward. Paul's warnings about "confidence in the flesh"
Sabbath IS a sign between God and his people, of which we as Christians are grafted into. Sabbath is an appointment with the living God. Sabbath is a "date Night" so to speak with our creator. Honoring Sabbath as special is no more sectarian or divisive than honoring Sunday as most of Christianity does and holds to as its identity. I believe solemnity and function of Sabbath was transferred to Sunday by primarily the Catholic church. I have always been puzzled as to why pretty much the whole of Christianity swallowed that hook line and sinker. Well I DO know because my tribe the Churches of Christ relied heavily on Acts 20 for their justification, which I think is very weak for such a momentous change to be marked by a vague reference about the first day of the week. For Paul a Jew the first day of the week would have begun on Saturday night at sundown, and I believe those in Acts 20 were likely observing a Sabbath and had a separate meeting AFTER the Sabbath for Paul to talk to them about his leaving on his trip the next day. No previous reference announcing this momentous change, strange to say the least. And I think it is a stretch to say the meal they had there was a communion service. Break bread could and does also refer to a regular meal, which they would typically enjoy at the close of Sabbath or Saturday at sundown, something Jewish Christians would have done. Also I believe Eutychus fell out of the window at midnight on Saturday approximately 6 hours after Paul started speaking not 12 or 16 hours if they were supposedly gathering on Sunday morning as I was taught.
I have always been open to challenge so called "truths" and long held paradigmsI I have been taught. Admittedly unusual for a Church Christ guy accused of being so narrow minded I could read a newspaper throigh a keyhole - With both eyes open! If we aren't open to challenge key teachings, I think we could gradually vear from the intended measage of a scripture. 1% error translates to a huge dvergence from the path of "truth" after 2000 years.
I don't "honor" Sunday. It's just the day my congregation meets together. The Sabbath is still Saturday, I was born a Gentile and I am not under The Law.
Why would you be under the law by honoring God's day that he sanctified in the beginning back in Genesis before the Law. Would the de-sanctifying of the Sabbath be a scriptural fanfare or a total mystery to all mankind, except those bowing to the Catholic Church's decisions?
: garee Mon Feb 16, 2026 - 08:16:27I would offer. .This isn't really about one day at all---it's about where righteousness is aimed and who it's aimed towards.
When Sabbath-keeping or fasting becomes a badge of identity, it can slowly shift from obedience toward God into self-reference. That's the thread running through the examples of the Sabbaths
The manna: it was meant to be received, not managed. Gathering sticks to cook on that day to be eaten wasn't just "work"—it was a refusal to trust the word already given.(Numbers 15:33)
Nadab and Abihu: "strange fire" wasn't creative worship; it was adding to what God had spoken. A second of visibility, a flash of self-assertion—twelve seconds of false fame,.
Isaiah 58:3 Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours.
Fasting in Isaiah 58 cuts straight through religious performance. They afflicted their souls, but only inwardly and selectively. (Outward ritual, inward pleasure. God calls that. They had their own righteousness as an offering.
That line hits. Scripture consistently treats self-generated righteousness as counterfeit currency—religious in appearance, empty in substance. The fast was meant to be a sign to the nations, not a mirror for self-congratulation. Same with Sabbath rest: it points beyond timekeeping to eternal rest, not identity policing.
This is also where critiques of traditions like the Seventh-day Adventist Church often land—not because rest is wrong, but because fixation on the sign can eclipse the thing signified. When the symbol becomes the center, the rest is no longer rest.
Isaiah 58 doesn't abolish fasting; it redefines it: loosing our burdens---freeing the oppressed---pouring yourself out for the hungry
That's righteousness that flows outward, not inward. Paul's warnings about "confidence in the flesh"
One also once argued that it wasn't really about whether one ate from the tree of the knowledge of good or evil at all, it was rather about whether we should know good and evil or not, as God does. Nevertheless, death entered the world as God had said it would. God's commands are not suggestions. They are what those who intend to be part of His eternal kingdom will accept as the rules of life. Those who will not accept these rules of God's government, will not have eternal life in His kingdom. This is the consistent message of holy scripture right up to the last book and chapter of holy scripture.
Rev 12:17 And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed,
which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.Rev 14:12 Here is the patience of the saints: here are they
that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.Rev 22:14
Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.
https://adventmessenger.org/national-catholic-authority-the-loss-of-sunday-has-led-to-a-decline-in-gender-equality-family-cohesion-and-the-public-good-its-time-to-free-this-day-up/
Quoted article below from link above.
National Catholic Authority: The Loss of Sunday Has Led to a Decline in Gender Equality, Family Cohesion, and the Public Good—It's Time to Free This Day Up
The Italian Episcopal Conference (CEI) is the permanent governing body of the Catholic Church in Italy, composed of the country's Catholic bishops. It is responsible for promoting and coordinating the Church's mission and pastoral life at the national level. Based in Rome, its president and general secretary are appointed by the Pope. The CEI also owns the newspaper Avvenire, which serves as a principal national voice of the Church, communicating the Catholic Church's positions on a wide range of social, moral, and public issues.
On January 26, 2026, Avvenire published a very concerning article written by Elisabeth Cara, a professor at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart in Milan. The article, titled "Not Just Rest: Sunday Is a Social Resource and It's Time to Free It Up," presents Sunday not only as a necessary religious imperative but also as a matter of social justice that should be protected by public authorities. In her argument, the erosion of Sunday rest—and the expectation that people must work on that day—is portrayed as contributing to gender inequality and social discrimination. Rome, through its official national publication, is advancing a narrative that will help secure the necessary legislation needed to end the so-called injustice of forcing people to work on Sunday.
Pay close attention to how Roman Catholics in Italy are shaping the arguments today—arguments that are being used by Protestants in America and other Christians elsewhere. What is now being presented as a matter of social justice, saving the family, and protecting human dignity is becoming the foundation for the movement to institutionalize Sunday rest across society.
Avvenire published the following:
• "The loss of Sunday creates new temporal inequalities and makes gender inequalities visible, challenging society to consider how to protect and make shared time more equitable."
• "For a long time, Sunday was the only truly 'different' day from the work and school week. Then, gradually, this protected time was joined by a non-working Saturday for many sectors, and subsequently even schools reduced attendance to five days."
• "Saturday remained largely a 'hybrid' day, marked by the opening of shops, while Sunday retained its character as a collectively suspended time."
• "Today, the extension of Sunday opening hours, the flexibilization of working hours, and the society of seven-day-a-week services tend to erase even this distinction. The risk is that the 'special' days are no longer two, but none."
• "And it is precisely in this transition that Sunday gradually loses its value as a shared temporal space. Sunday is not simply a day of rest, which can be replaced by any other day of the week, or a cultural custom, but represents one of the few moments in which individual time can synchronize and the family can exist as a concrete unit of relationships, and not just as the sum of personal agendas. In this sense, Sunday represents a public relational good: a social resource that supports parenthood, solidarity between generations, and family and community cohesion."
• "Research shows that time spent together on weekends, and especially on Sundays, is qualitatively different from that on weekdays."
• "It's not just about having more time, but a different kind of time, more continuous and symbolically charged, in which family memories and a sense of belonging are built."
• "This means that working on Sundays doesn't just mean losing a day of rest, but also losing access to shared time. This gives rise to a new form of temporal inequality: not everyone has the same opportunity to share time with their family."
• "This disrupts the synchronization of family time, reduces opportunities for shared life, and transforms Sunday from shared time to residual time."
• "Surveys on time use clearly show that for many women, Sunday also remains a day of work: cooking, caring, organizing family life, managing parental relationships. Shared time, therefore, is not neutral. Its relational potential is distributed asymmetrically and can continue to reproduce gender inequalities, highlighting how invisible family work remains structurally unbalanced."
• "Sunday can be a space of unity, but it can also become a space where unequal workloads and responsibilities are concentrated. Therefore, reflection on Sunday is neither nostalgic nor confessional. It is not about longing for an idealized past, but about recognizing that shared time is a fragile and precious social resource, which must be protected and made more equitable."
• "Defending Sunday, then, means defending not only the possibility of being together, but the possibility of a less unequal, less fragmented, and richer family life of meaningful relationships."
In Italy, Catholic leaders speaking through outlets like Avvenire are laying the groundwork for policies that would set aside Sunday as the common day of rest for all people. In the United States, organizations such as The Heritage Foundation and other Christian nationalist movements similarly argue that America's moral decline, family disintegration, and social division also require a restoration of shared Christian standards in public life—often including the recovery of Sunday as a protected day for worship and renewal. What is unfolding in America parallels the European Catholic strategy: to construct a comprehensive set of moral arguments and justifications leading to legislation that mandates Sunday as a day of rest for family, leisure, worship, and health.
The Catholic and Protestant visions for the future are strikingly similar. Both appeal to the "common good" as justification for closing businesses and giving people Sundays off. However, the entire movement to elevate Sunday as society's sacred day of rest is fundamentally flawed and misguided because, according to Scripture, God has already established His appointed day of rest—the seventh-day Sabbath—Saturday. In Genesis 2:2–3, God blessed and sanctified the seventh day at Creation, setting it apart before sin entered the world and long before the rise of any political power or religious institution. The Fourth Commandment (Exodus 20:8–11) explicitly identifies the seventh day—not the first—as the Sabbath of the Lord. In this view, true rest and peace are not produced by civil law or tradition, but by obedience to God's revealed will.
Those who defend Sunday observance have no choice but to appeal to church tradition and so-called perceived social benefits, because Scripture contains no command calling us to sanctify the first day of the week as holy. That is why the work of securing Sunday as the remedy for society's moral dilemmas and social crises has become a spiritual snare. It diverts attention from what God has actually called us to do—to keep all of God's commandments. The rest God promises His people is both physical and spiritual and must be rooted in obedience and loyalty (Hebrews 4:9–10). That rest comes only after we align with God's law—including keeping holy the seventh day He sanctified.
"Great peace have they which love thy law: and nothing shall offend them." Psalm 119:165.
: Amo Fri Feb 20, 2026 - 09:58:13https://adventmessenger.org/national-catholic-authority-the-loss-of-sunday-has-led-to-a-decline-in-gender-equality-family-cohesion-and-the-public-good-its-time-to-free-this-day-up/
Quoted article below from link above.
I would think changing the direction of the shadow of a ceremonial fasting law from the end Saturday behind to a new beginning the shadow ahead Sunday the first day the new creation the never ending .
The word sabbath in the literal sets it straight once then again the rest of the time false last day Saturday.
Mathew 28:KJ21 At the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first
day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulcher.
Mathew 28 YLT And on the eve of the sabbaths, at the dawn, toward the first of the sabbaths (plural), came Mary the Magdalene, and the other Mary, to see the sepulchre,
Then the Youngs makes the same mistake using the word week rather than sabbaths plural) showing a mistranslation to fast twice a week
Luke 18:12
I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.
: garee Fri Feb 20, 2026 - 19:38:30I would think changing the direction of the shadow of a ceremonial fasting law from the end Saturday behind to a new beginning the shadow ahead Sunday the first day the new creation the never ending .
The word sabbath in the literal sets it straight once then again the rest of the time false last day Saturday.
Mathew 28:KJ21 At the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulcher.
Mathew 28 YLT And on the eve of the sabbaths, at the dawn, toward the first of the sabbaths (plural), came Mary the Magdalene, and the other Mary, to see the sepulchre,
Then the Youngs makes the same mistake using the word week rather than sabbaths plural) showing a mistranslation to fast twice a week
Luke 18:12
I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.
No one but you, is talking about ceremonial fasting laws. ?
: Amo Sat Feb 21, 2026 - 10:08:23No one but you, is talking about ceremonial fasting laws. ?
The ceremonial sabbath fast is what I thought we were discussing ?Are you referring to a different kind of rest?
: garee Sun Feb 22, 2026 - 08:42:15The ceremonial sabbath fast is what I thought we were discussing ?Are you referring to a different kind of rest?
No, we are not talking about a ceremonial fast rest, whatever you think that is. We are discussing God's holy Sabbath rest instituted by our Lord at the end of creation before there was anything like ceremonial laws and or any need of them. Sin not existing, and therefore no need for any ceremonies in relation to forgiveness and right standing with God.
The fourth commandment of God being of the moral law which has nothing to do with ceremony, but rather proper principles of living in manifesting the character of God, which the moral law reveals. The basic understanding and faith in the fourth commandment being the fundamentals of the faith necessary to salvation. Acknowledging that God actually is, exactly who the fourth commandment testifies that He is.
Heb 11:1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. 2 For by it the elders obtained a good report. 3
Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.This topic addresses the fact that seventh day Sabbath keepers are actually the ones who observe their day by faith in God's word, while Sunday keepers are not able to do so, and therefore have relied upon civil legislation to enforce their day of observance throughout history. As they continue to call for such legislation to this very day. They themsleves being the actual legalists between us. Though the opposite accusation is often made by them concerning those who believe the testimony of God's commandments spoken from his own mouth to humanity, as well as written by His own finger in tables of stone for those who would be His own. Go back to the OP for clarity. Thank you.
: Amo Sun Feb 22, 2026 - 10:54:15No, we are not talking about a ceremonial fast rest, whatever you think that is. We are discussing God's holy Sabbath rest instituted by our Lord at the end of creation before there was anything like ceremonial laws and or any need of them. Sin not existing, and therefore no need for any ceremonies in relation to forgiveness and right standing with God.
The fourth commandment of God being of the moral law which has nothing to do with ceremony, but rather proper principles of living in manifesting the character of God, which the moral law reveals. The basic understanding and faith in the fourth commandment being the fundamentals of the faith necessary to salvation. Acknowledging that God actually is, exactly who the fourth commandment testifies that He is.
Heb 11:1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. 2 For by it the elders obtained a good report. 3 Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.
This topic addresses the fact that seventh day Sabbath keepers are actually the ones who observe their day by faith in God's word, while Sunday keepers are not able to do so, and therefore have relied upon civil legislation to enforce their day of observance throughout history. As they continue to call for such legislation to this very day. They themsleves being the actual legalists between us. Though the opposite accusation is often made by them concerning those who believe the testimony of God's commandments spoken from his own mouth to humanity, as well as written by His own finger in tables of stone for those who would be His own. Go back to the OP for clarity. Thank you.
Thanks The sabbath ceremony is the two day resting fast used as ceremonial laws as shadows to reveal the unseen eternal good things to come.
The creative let there be and it was God alone good began in the first verse "let there be the substance of my shadow .
Hebrews 10 For the law having a
shadow of good things to come, and
not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect. For then would they not have ceased to be offered? because that the worshippers once purged should have had no more conscience of sins. But in those sacrifices there is a remembrance again made of sins every year. ...
Aaron two sons shadow worshipers) demonstrated what happens when a person violate a ceremonial law as shadow a sign to the world not a sign to dying mankind the church ---they have prophecy no need of signs that lead a person to the father living word
The ceremonial Sabbath fast .the two day fast . The first preparation day collect and cook the the what is it? (manna) ? the next day of the weekend fast eat and share with the others the gospel fast.
Isaiah 58:6-8 Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke?Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?
Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the Lord shall be thy reward.
Numbers 15:32-34King James Version And while the children of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man that gathered sticks upon the
sabbath day.And they that found him gathering sticks brought him unto Moses and Aaron, and unto all the congregation.
AI help organize which I do not have great fact checker.
1. The Law as Shadow — pointing forward, not the final substance
You quoted Hebrews 10:1, which gives the key principle:
"For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things..."
This same teaching appears clearly in:
Colossians 2:16–17 —
"Let no man therefore judge you... in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ."
Scripture distinguishes two things:
Shadow — ceremonial forms, sacrifices, sabbaths, rituals
Substance (Body) — Christ Himself and His finished work
The shadow was real, but temporary. It revealed something greater to come. 🌅
2. Sabbath preparation and manna — shadow of dependence on God
In Exodus 16, God gave manna with a specific pattern:
Six days: gather manna
Sixth day: gather double
Seventh day: rest (Sabbath)
This taught several spiritual truths:
Visible lesson (shadow):
Trust God's provision
Obey His command
Rest from labor
Spiritual meaning (substance):
Christ is the true manna (John 6:35)
Salvation is not earned by works
True rest comes from trusting God's finished work
"There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God."
— Hebrews 4:9
This rest ultimately points to faith in Christ, not merely a calendar day. 🕊�
3. The Sabbath violator gathering sticks (Numbers 15:32–36)
This event demonstrated how serious the covenant law was under Moses.
Why such seriousness?
Because the Sabbath was a sign of the covenant (Exodus 31:13):
It represented obedience
It represented God's authority
It represented covenant relationship
Violating it publicly was rejecting the covenant sign itself.
Again, this functioned as a shadow sign, showing that sin leads to death and that obedience matters.
4. Fasting — outward practice pointing to inward transformation
You correctly quoted Isaiah 58, which explains God's true intention for fasting:
True fast is not merely abstaining from food, but:
Loosing wickedness
Helping the oppressed
Feeding the hungry
Showing mercy and love
This reveals an important principle:
External rituals were never the ultimate goal.
They pointed toward inward transformation of the heart. ❤️
5. Nadab and Abihu — Aaron's sons and unauthorized worship
Leviticus 10 records that Aaron's sons offered "strange fire" and died.
This showed:
Worship must follow God's instruction
Humans cannot invent their own approach to God
God defines acceptable worship
Again, this was a visible shadow demonstrating a deeper spiritual reality.
6. Fulfillment: Christ is the substance behind every shadow
Scripture consistently teaches that the ceremonial system pointed forward to Christ.
Examples:
Passover lamb → Christ the Lamb of God
Manna → Christ the Bread of Life
Sabbath rest → Rest in Christ
Temple → Christ and His people
Sacrifices → Christ's once-for-all sacrifice
Hebrews 10:10:
"We are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all."
No repeated sacrifices needed.
The shadow ended when the substance came. ✝️
7. Key principle: Shadow teaches — substance saves
The ceremonial laws served important purposes:
They:
Taught spiritual truths
Pointed forward prophetically
Revealed God's holiness
Prepared humanity for Christ
But they could not themselves remove sin permanently.
Only Christ could do that.
Summary in simple form
Shadow (Old Covenant) → Substance (Christ)
Manna → Christ the Bread
Sabbath → Christ our Rest
Sacrifices → Christ's sacrifice
Temple → Christ's presence
Ceremonial fasting → Spiritual transformation
The shadow was real — but the substance is greater.
: garee Thu Feb 26, 2026 - 08:57:12Thanks The sabbath ceremony is the two day resting fast used as ceremonial laws as shadows to reveal the unseen eternal good things to come.
The creative let there be and it was God alone good began in the first verse "let there be the substance of my shadow .
Hebrews 10 For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect. For then would they not have ceased to be offered? because that the worshippers once purged should have had no more conscience of sins. But in those sacrifices there is a remembrance again made of sins every year. ...
Aaron two sons shadow worshipers) demonstrated what happens when a person violate a ceremonial law as shadow a sign to the world not a sign to dying mankind the church ---they have prophecy no need of signs that lead a person to the father living word
The ceremonial Sabbath fast .the two day fast . The first preparation day collect and cook the the what is it? (manna) ? the next day of the weekend fast eat and share with the others the gospel fast.
Isaiah 58:6-8 Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke?Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?
Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the Lord shall be thy reward.
Numbers 15:32-34King James Version And while the children of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man that gathered sticks upon the sabbath day.And they that found him gathering sticks brought him unto Moses and Aaron, and unto all the congregation.
AI help organize which I do not have great fact checker.
1. The Law as Shadow — pointing forward, not the final substance
You quoted Hebrews 10:1, which gives the key principle:
"For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things..."
This same teaching appears clearly in:
Colossians 2:16–17 —
"Let no man therefore judge you... in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ."
Scripture distinguishes two things:
Shadow — ceremonial forms, sacrifices, sabbaths, rituals
Substance (Body) — Christ Himself and His finished work
The shadow was real, but temporary. It revealed something greater to come. 🌅
2. Sabbath preparation and manna — shadow of dependence on God
In Exodus 16, God gave manna with a specific pattern:
Six days: gather manna
Sixth day: gather double
Seventh day: rest (Sabbath)
This taught several spiritual truths:
Visible lesson (shadow):
Trust God's provision
Obey His command
Rest from labor
Spiritual meaning (substance):
Christ is the true manna (John 6:35)
Salvation is not earned by works
True rest comes from trusting God's finished work
"There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God."
— Hebrews 4:9
This rest ultimately points to faith in Christ, not merely a calendar day. 🕊�
3. The Sabbath violator gathering sticks (Numbers 15:32–36)
This event demonstrated how serious the covenant law was under Moses.
Why such seriousness?
Because the Sabbath was a sign of the covenant (Exodus 31:13):
It represented obedience
It represented God's authority
It represented covenant relationship
Violating it publicly was rejecting the covenant sign itself.
Again, this functioned as a shadow sign, showing that sin leads to death and that obedience matters.
4. Fasting — outward practice pointing to inward transformation
You correctly quoted Isaiah 58, which explains God's true intention for fasting:
True fast is not merely abstaining from food, but:
Loosing wickedness
Helping the oppressed
Feeding the hungry
Showing mercy and love
This reveals an important principle:
External rituals were never the ultimate goal.
They pointed toward inward transformation of the heart. ❤️
5. Nadab and Abihu — Aaron's sons and unauthorized worship
Leviticus 10 records that Aaron's sons offered "strange fire" and died.
This showed:
Worship must follow God's instruction
Humans cannot invent their own approach to God
God defines acceptable worship
Again, this was a visible shadow demonstrating a deeper spiritual reality.
6. Fulfillment: Christ is the substance behind every shadow
Scripture consistently teaches that the ceremonial system pointed forward to Christ.
Examples:
Passover lamb → Christ the Lamb of God
Manna → Christ the Bread of Life
Sabbath rest → Rest in Christ
Temple → Christ and His people
Sacrifices → Christ's once-for-all sacrifice
Hebrews 10:10:
"We are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all."
No repeated sacrifices needed.
The shadow ended when the substance came. ✝️
7. Key principle: Shadow teaches — substance saves
The ceremonial laws served important purposes:
They:
Taught spiritual truths
Pointed forward prophetically
Revealed God's holiness
Prepared humanity for Christ
But they could not themselves remove sin permanently.
Only Christ could do that.
Summary in simple form
Shadow (Old Covenant) → Substance (Christ)
Manna → Christ the Bread
Sabbath → Christ our Rest
Sacrifices → Christ's sacrifice
Temple → Christ's presence
Ceremonial fasting → Spiritual transformation
The shadow was real — but the substance is greater.
Gobbledegook. The seventh day Sabbath of the moral law is not a shadow of anything, it is part of the substance which needed no transformation before the Old or New covenants. It was observed on the very first complete day of humanities existence in a perfect world, by beings in the created perfection of God. It is not among the ceremonial or shadowy sabbaths spoken of in Colossians, concerning the traditions or rudiments of this world, or ordinances, commandments, and doctrines of men. It is a commandment of God, to be observed by God's own before there was sin, more especially afterwards, and even more especially when sin has been eradicated. As Holy Scripture itself testifies.
Rev 21:1 And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. 2 And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. 4 And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. 5 And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, Write: for these words are true and faithful. 6 And he said unto me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely. 7 He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. 8 But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death. 9 And there came unto me one of the seven angels which had the seven vials full of the seven last plagues, and talked with me, saying, Come hither, I will shew thee the bride, the Lamb's wife. 10 And he carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain, and shewed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, 11 Having the glory of God: and her light was like unto a stone most precious, even like a jasper stone, clear as crystal; 12 And had a wall great and high, and had twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and names written thereon, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel: 13 On the east three gates; on the north three gates; on the south three gates; and on the west three gates. 14 And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and in them the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. 15 And he that talked with me had a golden reed to measure the city, and the gates thereof, and the wall thereof. 16 And the city lieth foursquare, and the length is as large as the breadth: and he measured the city with the reed, twelve thousand furlongs. The length and the breadth and the height of it are equal. 17 And he measured the wall thereof, an hundred and forty and four cubits, according to the measure of a man, that is, of the angel. 18 And the building of the wall of it was of jasper: and the city was pure gold, like unto clear glass. 19 And the foundations of the wall of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones. The first foundation was jasper; the second, sapphire; the third, a chalcedony; the fourth, an emerald; 20 The fifth, sardonyx; the sixth, sardius; the seventh, chrysolite; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, a topaz; the tenth, a chrysoprasus; the eleventh, a jacinth; the twelfth, an amethyst. 21 And the twelve gates were twelve pearls; every several gate was of one pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass.
22 And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it. 23 And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. 24 And the nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it: and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour into it. 25 And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day: for there shall be no night there. 26 And they shall bring the glory and honour of the nations into it. 27 And there shall in no wise enter into it any thing that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie: but they which are written in the Lamb's book of life.
No temple in the new heaven, earth and Jerusalem. No shadows, only substance. Nevertheless, God's holy Sabbath shall still be kept in the new heaven and new earth, where all will come to worship before Him.
Isa 66:22 For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the LORD, so shall your seed and your name remain. 23 And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another,
and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the LORD.God's holy Sabbath was established amidst the substance of perfection, and will continue long after all shadows have been replaced by substance alone.
: Amo Fri Feb 27, 2026 - 09:59:08Gobbledegook. The seventh day Sabbath of the moral law is not a shadow of anything, it is part of the substance which needed no transformation before the Old or New covenants. It was observed on the very first complete day of humanities existence in a perfect world, by beings in the created perfection of God. It is not among the ceremonial or shadowy sabbaths spoken of in Colossians, concerning the traditions or rudiments of this world, or ordinances, commandments, and doctrines of men. It is a commandment of God, to be observed by God's own before there was sin, more especially afterwards, and even more especially when sin has been eradicated. As Holy Scripture itself testifies.
Rev 21:1 And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. 2 And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. 4 And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. 5 And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, Write: for these words are true and faithful. 6 And he said unto me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely. 7 He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. 8 But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death. 9 And there came unto me one of the seven angels which had the seven vials full of the seven last plagues, and talked with me, saying, Come hither, I will shew thee the bride, the Lamb's wife. 10 And he carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain, and shewed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, 11 Having the glory of God: and her light was like unto a stone most precious, even like a jasper stone, clear as crystal; 12 And had a wall great and high, and had twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and names written thereon, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel: 13 On the east three gates; on the north three gates; on the south three gates; and on the west three gates. 14 And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and in them the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. 15 And he that talked with me had a golden reed to measure the city, and the gates thereof, and the wall thereof. 16 And the city lieth foursquare, and the length is as large as the breadth: and he measured the city with the reed, twelve thousand furlongs. The length and the breadth and the height of it are equal. 17 And he measured the wall thereof, an hundred and forty and four cubits, according to the measure of a man, that is, of the angel. 18 And the building of the wall of it was of jasper: and the city was pure gold, like unto clear glass. 19 And the foundations of the wall of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones. The first foundation was jasper; the second, sapphire; the third, a chalcedony; the fourth, an emerald; 20 The fifth, sardonyx; the sixth, sardius; the seventh, chrysolite; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, a topaz; the tenth, a chrysoprasus; the eleventh, a jacinth; the twelfth, an amethyst. 21 And the twelve gates were twelve pearls; every several gate was of one pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass. 22 And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it. 23 And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. 24 And the nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it: and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour into it. 25 And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day: for there shall be no night there. 26 And they shall bring the glory and honour of the nations into it. 27 And there shall in no wise enter into it any thing that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie: but they which are written in the Lamb's book of life.
No temple in the new heaven, earth and Jerusalem. No shadows, only substance. Nevertheless, God's holy Sabbath shall still be kept in the new heaven and new earth, where all will come to worship before Him.
Isa 66:22 For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the LORD, so shall your seed and your name remain. 23 And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the LORD.
God's holy Sabbath was established amidst the substance of perfection, and will continue long after all shadows have been replaced by substance alone.
I get it moral law thou shall not or you are deader than deep fried chicken ---Remember the Holy Spirit according to the law of interpretation ..without
parables the signified understand of the gospel.. Christ spoke not even once . In that was the ten commandment make up a parable as a witness two Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5 by the understanding of no understanding the law of the witness of two
After revealing the moral law of those who take his name in vain then the remembrance like a shadow In one Exodus 20identifying the eternal rest Christ uses Creation as the reasoning authority
And in the born again freedom from captivity(Deuteronomy 5) the gospel of two working as one
God does not provide reasoning with moral laws thou shall no deader than deep fried chicken only with shadows good enriching parables hid from the father of lies
Exodus 20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle,
nor thy stranger that is within
thy gates:For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
Deuteronomy 5:12-15 Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee.Six days thou shalt labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou. A
nd remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day.
My Ditor
1. The Sabbath command appears twice, with two different reasons
You quoted both correctly, and the difference is significant.
In Exodus 20 — the Sabbath rooted in Creation
"For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth... and rested the seventh day." — Exodus 20:11
Here, the Sabbath points back to God's rest after creation. It establishes God as Creator and the source of order and life.
In Deuteronomy 5 — the Sabbath rooted in Redemption
"Remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt... therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day." — Deuteronomy 5:15
Here, the Sabbath points to deliverance from bondage.
So the Sabbath has two witnesses:
Creation rest
Redemption rest
Both point to God as the source of life and freedom.
2. Scripture itself says the law contains shadows pointing to Christ
The New Testament explains that the law was not the final reality, but a shadow pointing forward.
Colossians 2:16–17 — "Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ."
Hebrews 10:1 — "The law having a shadow of good things to come."
The shadow prepares the way for the substance.
3. Christ spoke in parables to reveal and conceal truth
You correctly noted that Christ used parables consistently.
Matthew 13:34 — "Without a parable spake he not unto them."
Matthew 13:11 — "It is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven."
Parables reveal truth to those seeking understanding, while concealing it from those not ready to receive it.
4. Christ is presented as the fulfillment of the Sabbath rest
The New Testament connects Sabbath rest with Christ Himself.
Hebrews 4:9–10 — "There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God."
Matthew 11:28 — "Come unto me... and I will give you rest."
This rest is not merely physical cessation from labor, but spiritual rest in God.
5. The law serves as a witness pointing beyond itself
Paul explains the purpose of the law clearly:
Galatians 3:24 — "The law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ."
The law reveals God's holiness and prepares the way for grace.
It exposes sin, but Christ provides life.
Summary of the biblical pattern you're describing
Scripture presents:
The law as a witness
The Sabbath pointing to creation and redemption
Parables revealing deeper spiritual truth
Shadows pointing to Christ as fulfillment
Christ as the source of true rest
: garee Sat Feb 28, 2026 - 08:54:18I get it moral law thou shall not or you are deader than deep fried chicken ---Remember the Holy Spirit according to the law of interpretation ..without parables the signified understand of the gospel.. Christ spoke not even once . In that was the ten commandment make up a parable as a witness two Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5 by the understanding of no understanding the law of the witness of two
After revealing the moral law of those who take his name in vain then the remembrance like a shadow In one Exodus 20identifying the eternal rest Christ uses Creation as the reasoning authority
And in the born again freedom from captivity(Deuteronomy 5) the gospel of two working as one
God does not provide reasoning with moral laws thou shall no deader than deep fried chicken only with shadows good enriching parables hid from the father of lies
Exodus 20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within
thy gates:For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
Deuteronomy 5:12-15 Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee.Six days thou shalt labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou. And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day.
My Ditor
1. The Sabbath command appears twice, with two different reasons
You quoted both correctly, and the difference is significant.
In Exodus 20 — the Sabbath rooted in Creation
"For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth... and rested the seventh day." — Exodus 20:11
Here, the Sabbath points back to God's rest after creation. It establishes God as Creator and the source of order and life.
In Deuteronomy 5 — the Sabbath rooted in Redemption
"Remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt... therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day." — Deuteronomy 5:15
Here, the Sabbath points to deliverance from bondage.
So the Sabbath has two witnesses:
Creation rest
Redemption rest
Both point to God as the source of life and freedom.
2. Scripture itself says the law contains shadows pointing to Christ
The New Testament explains that the law was not the final reality, but a shadow pointing forward.
Colossians 2:16–17 — "Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ."
Hebrews 10:1 — "The law having a shadow of good things to come."
The shadow prepares the way for the substance.
3. Christ spoke in parables to reveal and conceal truth
You correctly noted that Christ used parables consistently.
Matthew 13:34 — "Without a parable spake he not unto them."
Matthew 13:11 — "It is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven."
Parables reveal truth to those seeking understanding, while concealing it from those not ready to receive it.
4. Christ is presented as the fulfillment of the Sabbath rest
The New Testament connects Sabbath rest with Christ Himself.
Hebrews 4:9–10 — "There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God."
Matthew 11:28 — "Come unto me... and I will give you rest."
This rest is not merely physical cessation from labor, but spiritual rest in God.
5. The law serves as a witness pointing beyond itself
Paul explains the purpose of the law clearly:
Galatians 3:24 — "The law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ."
The law reveals God's holiness and prepares the way for grace.
It exposes sin, but Christ provides life.
Summary of the biblical pattern you're describing
Scripture presents:
The law as a witness
The Sabbath pointing to creation and redemption
Parables revealing deeper spiritual truth
Shadows pointing to Christ as fulfillment
Christ as the source of true rest
Actually the Sabbath commandment is not a thou shalt not do commandment, it is a thou shalt do commandment.
The first declaration in Exodus being spoken directly by the mouth of God to the entire nation of Israel, and written with his own finger in tables of stone for them as well. The second account being spoken by the mouth of Moses in summary of that event.
Both declarations of course being true, while neither negates the truth of the other in any way. The first declaration by God being a reference to the Sabbath established at creation by God to be observed by the substance of perfection in which humanity was brought forth by the hand, word, and spirit or breath of God. The second declaration by Moses referring to this Sabbath as well, but more specifically in relation to humanities deliverance from sin after the fall. The observance of which became even more crucial for those who need the rest of salvation from sin and guilt, by remembering that their great God and creator can and will save them from the consequences of sin, which is death. AMEN!
Which Sabbath will be observed as a memorial of both of course in the new heaven and new earth for eternity as an everlasting sign and seal of these most basic truths which must be believed by the saved. That God alone created and sustains any and all life, and that his great mercy can, has, and will always save to the uttermost all who will place their faith in Him regardless of any and all circumstances. AMEN!
: Amo Sun Mar 01, 2026 - 10:04:14Actually the Sabbath commandmentis not a thou shalt not do commandment, it is a thou shalt do commandment.
The first declaration in Exodus being spoken directly by the mouth of God to the entire nation of Israel, and written with his own finger in tables of stone for them as well. The second account being spoken by the mouth of Moses in summary of that event.
Both declarations of course being true, while neither negates the truth of the other in any way. The first declaration by God being a reference to the Sabbath established at creation by God to be observed by the substance of perfection in which humanity was brought forth by the hand, word, and spirit or breath of God. The second declaration by Moses referring to this Sabbath as well, but more specifically in relation to humanities deliverance from sin after the fall. The observance of which became even more crucial for those who need the rest of salvation from sin and guilt, by remembering that their great God and creator can and will save them from the consequences of sin, which is death. AMEN!
Which Sabbath will be observed as a memorial of both of course in the new heaven and new earth for eternity as an everlasting sign and seal of these most basic truths which must be believed by the saved. That God alone created and sustains any and all life, and that his great mercy can, has, and will always save to the uttermost all who will place their faith in Him regardless of any and all circumstances. AMEN!
Actually the Sabbath commandment is not a thou shalt not do commandment, but do it as commanded a shadow of good things to come not the very thing . Aarons two Sons when performing the ceremonial shadow law as a sign to the whole unbelieving world they did not take the sign lightly it consumed them not a hint of smoke of the ceremonial attire .Just like the Sabbath guy gathering firewood of the day he was to eat and share the gospel fast .it is a thou shall do the loving shadow commandment for a sign to the whole unbelieving world commandment.
The sign like manna (what is it) is still doing its work drawing men in to its source Bible
Make a little clearer AI edit
1. The Law Contained Shadows of Future Things
Hebrews 10:1
"For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things..."
A shadow is not the substance itself.
It points forward to something greater.
The ceremonial laws were therefore:
visible
temporary
instructional
They were teaching signs pointing to Christ and the gospel.
2. The Sabbath Was Explicitly Called a Sign
Exodus 31:13
"Verily my sabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations."
This shows two things:
The Sabbath was a sign.
Signs function as visible teaching markers.
A sign is something seen that points beyond itself.
That is the very definition of a shadow.
3. Paul Connects Sabbaths With Shadows
Colossians 2:16-17
"Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days:
Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ."
Here Scripture plainly says:
Sabbaths = shadow
Christ = substance
So the Sabbath was a visible sign-shadow pointing to the rest found in Christ.
4. The Seriousness of Ceremonial Signs
You brought up two important examples that show how seriously God treated these sign-shadows.
Nadab and Abihu – Aaron's Sons
Leviticus 10:1-2
They offered strange fire in the sanctuary.
Result:
"There went out fire from the LORD, and devoured them."
Because the ceremonial worship was a prophetic shadow, it could not be altered.
The Sabbath Breaker Gathering Wood
Numbers 15:32-36
A man gathered sticks on the Sabbath.
God commanded he be stoned.
Why?
Because the Sabbath was a public covenant sign.
Violating the sign destroyed the lesson it was meant to teach the world.
5. Signs Were Given for Witness to the World
Signs in Scripture often serve as visible testimony.
Examples:
Sabbath – sign between God and Israel
Circumcision – sign of covenant (Genesis 17:11)
Passover – memorial sign (Exodus 12:13)
They teach the gospel through visible actions.
6. The Shadow Continues to Point to the Reality
Even after Christ fulfilled the shadows, the lesson remains.
The shadow taught:
God provides rest
Man cannot save himself
Salvation is God's finished work
Hebrews 4:9-10
"There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God."
The Sabbath shadow pointed to the true rest in Christ.
7. Your Main Point (Well Said)
You are essentially saying:
The Sabbath command was not just a prohibition ("thou shalt not work").
It was a commanded sign-shadow meant to teach the gospel.
It was a do this commandment, not merely avoid something.
The shadow was meant to draw men to the reality.
Short way to summarize your thought
You could phrase it like this:
The Sabbath was a commanded sign-shadow, not merely a prohibition.
As Hebrews teaches, the law contained shadows of good things to come, not the substance itself.
When Nadab and Abihu corrupted the ceremonial sign, judgment came immediately, showing that the shadow was sacred because it pointed to Christ.
These visible signs were given as a witness to the world, drawing men to the unseen reality.
Actually the Sabbath commandment is not a thou shalt not do commandment, but do it as commanded a shadow of good things to come not the very thing . Aarons two Sons when performing the ceremonial shadow law as a sign to the whole unbelieving world they did not take the sign lightly it consumed them not a hint of smoke of the ceremonial attire .Just like the Sabbath guy gathering firewood of the day he was to eat and share the gospel fast .it is a thou shall do the loving shadow commandment for a sign to the whole unbelieving world commandment.
WRONG!
Gen 2:1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. 2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. 3
And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.The Sabbath was established at creation by the word of God, as the rest of creation was as well. For humanity in the perfection of substance in which God created us. Before anything like a shadow was needed to represent anything else. You may ignore this if you wish, but this will not, and cannot change the truth of the matter. You will simply be choosing to ignore the truth. Such is a very unhealthy decision though.
2Th 2:7 For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. 8 And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: 9
Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, 10 And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11 And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: 12 That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.The moral law of God, the Ten Commandments are not shadows, they are the standard by which we shall be judged. If we will believe this, we will know of our true condition before the Lord, seek out forgiveness, repentance, and a right standing with these standards unto salvation through Christ alone. It was the laws pertaining to our salvation in Christ as our Sacrifice, Mediator, and Righteousness, that were shadows of the real substance which is Christ, during the Old Covenant. The purpose of the moral law though, remains the same. To convict and convert the heart toward conviction, repentance, and conversion in Christ our Lord alone. As our Savior Himself testified.
Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets:
I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 9 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.As Paul expressed as well.
Rom 7:7 What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. 8 But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead. 9 For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died. 10 And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death. 11 For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me. 12
Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good. 13 Was then that which is good made death unto me?
God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful.Rom 8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus,
who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: 4
That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 5 For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. 6
For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7
Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. 9
But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.
: Amo Fri Mar 06, 2026 - 21:44:15WRONG!
Gen 2:1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. 2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. 3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
The Sabbath was established at creation by the word of God, as the rest of creation was as well. For humanity in the perfection of substance in which God created us. Before anything like a shadow was needed to represent anything else. You may ignore this if you wish, but this will not, and cannot change the truth of the matter. You will simply be choosing to ignore the truth. Such is a very unhealthy decision though.
2Th 2:7 For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. 8 And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: 9 Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, 10 And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11 And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: 12 That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
The moral law of God, the Ten Commandments are not shadows, they are the standard by which we shall be judged. If we will believe this, we will know of our true condition before the Lord, seek out forgiveness, repentance, and a right standing with these standards unto salvation through Christ alone. It was the laws pertaining to our salvation in Christ as our Sacrifice, Mediator, and Righteousness, that were shadows of the real substance which is Christ, during the Old Covenant. The purpose of the moral law though, remains the same. To convict and convert the heart toward conviction, repentance, and conversion in Christ our Lord alone. As our Savior Himself testified.
Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 9 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
As Paul expressed as well.
Rom 7:7 What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. 8 But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead. 9 For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died. 10 And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death. 11 For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me. 12 Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good. 13 Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful.
Rom 8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: 4 That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 5 For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. 6 For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. 9 But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.
It would seem you forgot the other witness. At the witness of one no doctrine can be developed.
The witness of Christ's faithfulness .two fold - - -Let there be" (1) And "it was God alone very good" (2) it also avoids cherry picking take a verse out of context .
Like the two parables in mind One parable Creation 7th day in another gospel parable new creation born again experience the beginning of the forty year rest not under the rule of another nation .
Deuteronomy 5:15 And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God
brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to
keep the
sabbath day.
We keep the sabbath day as as long as we do not harden our hearts against the two different reasoning working as one. If we look for earthly rewards divide the two.. no matter where you go there you are. Got to dig a little for the pearl raking the leaves will not work .
: garee Sat Mar 07, 2026 - 07:52:49It would seem you forgot the other witness. At the witness of one no doctrine can be developed.
The witness of Christ's faithfulness .two fold - - -Let there be" (1) And "it was God alone very good" (2) it also avoids cherry picking take a verse out of context .
Like the two parables in mind One parable Creation 7th day in another gospel parable new creation born again experience the beginning of the forty year rest not under the rule of another nation .
Deuteronomy 5:15 And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day.
We keep the sabbath day as as long as we do not harden our hearts against the two different reasoning working as one. If we look for earthly rewards divide the two.. no matter where you go there you are. Got to dig a little for the pearl raking the leaves will not work .
I have not forgotten anything, as I have already stated that the seventh day Sabbath of God has even more significance and importance for fallen humanity in particular, than it had when established for the perfection of God's creation. I just do not negate either by the other. The seventh day Sabbath of God has not become a shadow, because it now represents a new creation for those who will once again choose to rest in God's grace and mercy. His grace and mercy have always been the traits of His character, which have become more crucial to the believer since our fall. As likewise His seventh day Sabbath therefore has also become more crucial to our experience. See post #7 at the link below.
https://www.gracecentered.com/christian_forums/index.php?topic=113707.0
https://adventmessenger.org/a-call-to-revive-sunday-laws-prominent-methodist-bishop-says-they-helped-fill-the-pews/
Quoted article below from link above.
A Call to Revive Sunday Laws: Prominent Methodist Bishop Says They Helped Fill the Pews
On March 2, 2026, Bishop David Bard, Chair of the Committee on Faith and Order in the United Methodist Church, spoke about the need to revive the civil structures that once played a beneficial role in supporting religious life in America. He pointed out that "Sunday closing laws were seen as support for Christian churches" and that they made "inviting people to participate in our church a bit easier."
The bishop was highlighting a period in American history when Sunday laws restricted commercial activity so that society as a whole paused for worship and rest. He explained that these "social pressures" encouraged participation in Sunday worship, acknowledging that government policies once created a favorable environment for churches. In other words, Sunday worship was not entirely voluntary but was reinforced by legal and cultural pressures.
Bishop David Bard expressed the following remarks:
• "I chair the Committee on Faith and Order, which is charged with giving leadership to The United Methodist Church in reflecting upon, discerning and living out matters of faith, doctrinal teaching, order, and discipline in the midst of mission and ministry in the church and world."
• "On the Sunday I was in Copenhagen, many of us attended a United Methodist church ... One of the things that struck me was the intertwining of church and crown, church and state, in Danish history."
• "While we have no long history of a state church in the United States, we certainly have a long history of broad social and cultural support for and reinforcement of participation in religious communities. Sunday closing laws were seen as support for Christian churches."
• "Just as the state church in Denmark no longer functions as it once did, so, too, have most of the broad social and cultural supports for religious participation eroded in the United States. People no longer assume that most of their coworkers belong to a religious community."
• "In light of that, the church's task has become more challenging. It is one thing to have broad social forces that encourage religious participation. That makes inviting people to participate in our church a bit easier, though truth be told, we relied too long on such social pressures to do our work for us."
• "We have a task, and it is no longer supported by the social and cultural contexts it once was."
• "I think people want to see people of faith speak about and work for the common good. We will wade into some uncomfortable territory here, as the common good concerns our shared life in political communities. We need to continually raise questions about how we promote the flourishing of all, how we create a more beloved community."
• "We need to engage in actions for the common good with a generous spirit and kind, compassionate hearts."
The Bishop lamented that these social supports—namely, Sunday laws—have "eroded," essentially making the church's work more difficult for them. His comparison with Denmark's historical union of church and state reinforces the idea that religious institutions often benefit when church doctrines are supported by civil authority. His argument points back to a time when Sunday laws helped strengthen churches and normalize Christian worship in society. By emphasizing the loss of these supports, he indirectly implies that the church would benefit if society once again promoted religious participation through public mandates.
Furthermore, when the Bishop David Bard speaks about Christians engaging politically to promote the "common good," he opens the door for the church to influence the state through public policy. The concept of the "common good" has historically been used by many religious leaders to justify legislation that reflects Christian moral values. In this context, speaking positively about Sunday laws while simultaneously encouraging the church to engage politically is to advocate for Sunday laws.
By presenting Sunday closing laws as helpful to churches and lamenting their disappearance, the argument clearly points toward the idea of reviving these laws in order to strengthen religious participation. The logic is that the government can and should support Sunday observance in order to benefit both the church and society.
"The enforcement of Sunday-keeping on the part of Protestant churches is an enforcement of the worship of the papacy—of the beast" (Great Controversy, p. 448).
The following is from the CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.
2188 In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church's holy days as legal holidays. They have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society. If a country's legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share in this "festal gathering," this "assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven."[125]
https://adventmessenger.org/the-conference-of-catholic-bishops-in-france-claims-that-sunday-rest-serves-society-as-a-whole-and-makes-life-more-humane/
Quoted article below from link above.
The Conference of Catholic Bishops in France Claims that Sunday Rest Serves Society As a Whole and Makes Life More Humane
The Conference of Catholic Bishops is the national authority within a country and functions as the policy and teaching entity for the Roman Catholic Church. This body does advocate for public policies on national issues; they meet with lawmakers and publish their policy priorities, which are shared with local and national leaders. Recently, the Conference of Catholic Bishops in France published a statement on the "Christian meaning of Sunday," which was posted on its official church website.
The article stated the following:
• "Sunday for Christians is the "Lord's Day," the day of Christ's resurrection, the first day of the week ... Therefore, the meaning of Sunday, for a Christian, through the celebration of the Eucharist to which he is invited, preceded in the early centuries the establishment of Sunday as a weekly day of rest."
• "The blessed tradition of Sunday as a day of rest has enriched the celebration of the Lord's Day. Taking time off from work to refresh oneself spiritually, strengthening family and fraternal bonds, and taking time for contemplation is already a taste of the joy of the resurrection."
• "Therefore, the meaning of Sunday, for a Christian, through the celebration of the Eucharist to which he is invited, preceded in the early centuries the establishment of Sunday as a weekly day of rest."
• "Man is not reducible to his economic dimension. The questioning of Sunday, which would tend to make it a day like any other, risks obscuring the meaning of human life as revealed to us by Christ."
• "Certainly, modern life requires adjustments to ensure that social life can continue on Sundays. These adjustments should only be considered as exceptional measures that concern only certain specific areas: health, safety, transport, leisure, professionals, etc."
• "By preserving for Sunday the meaning of the celebration of the Resurrection, the Church affirms its desire to enable Christians to experience it under favorable conditions. It also wishes to serve society as a whole so that it may find a path that makes human life ever more humane.
When the Roman Catholic Church says that Sunday rest serves society and makes life more humane, the real goal is to make Sunday the universal day of rest for all people. The Catholic Bishops are advocating for Sunday as the Christian Sabbath to be recognized and observed by society as a whole. By presenting Sunday rest as beneficial for workers, families, and social stability, the argument becomes more appealing to governments and the public, making it easier to promote legislation to stop activities and commerce on that day.
This emphasis reinforces the prophetic warning found in Daniel 7:25 and reflects the Catholic Church's long-standing position that it has the authority to designate Sunday as the day of rest and worship in place of the biblical seventh-day Sabbath. By promoting Sunday rest in society and encouraging people and governments to structure their lives and laws around church attendance on that day, it seeks to establish Sunday as the universal day of rest and worship for all people, elevating a tradition of the church above the commandment of God.
This is exactly the kind of development Bible prophecy warned about in the books of Daniel and Revelation. The Great Controversy also predicted that a movement would arise to promote Sunday through the untion of both church and state, presenting it as something good for society while setting aside the biblical seventh-day Sabbath. As these signs become more visible around us, the real question is: when will God's people wake up to what is happening, believe the warnings given in the Bible and the Spirit of Prophecy, and boldly share the message of Revelation 14 with a world that is quickly moving toward the fulfillment of these prophecies?
"In a special sense Seventh-day Adventists have been set in the world as watchmen and light bearers. To them has been entrusted the last warning for a perishing world. On them is shining wonderful light from the word of God. They have been given a work of the most solemn import—the proclamation of the first, second, and third angels' messages. There is no other work of so great importance. They are to allow nothing else to absorb their attention." (Testimonies, Vol. 9, p. 19).
Rev 14:6 And I saw
another angel fly in the midst of heaven,
having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, 7 Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters. 8 And there followed
another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city,
because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. 9 And the
third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice,
If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, 10 The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: 11 And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name. 12
Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.
https://adventmessenger.org/brazil-enacts-law-ending-sunday-labor-mandating-union-approval-for-businesses-to-operate-on-this-day/
quoted article below from link above.
Brazil Enacts Law Ending Sunday Labor, Mandating Union Approval for Businesses to Operate on This Day
A new labor law in Brazil, MTE nº 3.665/2023, goes into effect in March 2026, which will change how retailers can operate on Sunday. The law effectively closes retail stores on Sunday and requires approval from trade unions in order for businesses to open their doors on that day. If a business wants to operate on Sunday, it must get express authorization through collective bargaining. This new measure does in fact restrict Sunday activities, strengthening Sunday rest throughout the nation.
Pinto & Fernando Pinto Law Firm published the following explaining how the new law works:
• "MTE Ordinance No. 3,665/2023 has introduced significant changes to the rules authorizing work on Sundays and holidays within the retail sector. The regulation will come into full effect in March 2026 and significantly alters how establishments may organize their work schedules on these days."
• "Under the new regulation, provisions of MTP Ordinance No. 671/2021—which previously allowed commercial establishments to operate automatically on Sundays and holidays—have been revoked."
• "Under the new rule, working on these dates now requires express authorization via a collective bargaining agreement negotiated between companies and the relevant trade unions."
The new ordinance revokes earlier rules that allowed retail stores to operate automatically on Sundays and holidays. Work on those days now requires explicit authorization negotiated between companies and trade unions—a process that is so restrictive and bureaucratically burdensome that obtaining approval becomes exceedingly difficult, effectively limiting or preventing Sunday operations.
Across many parts of the world, a clear pattern has been emerging: governments, labor organizations, and religious groups are increasingly promoting Sunday as a protected weekly day of rest. The goal is simple: restricting commercial activity on Sunday and elevating it as a special day within society. These developments are not isolated, and Brazil is the most recent nation to get on board the growing international movement to normalize Sunday as the official day of rest in civil law.
: Amo Sat Mar 07, 2026 - 10:24:39I have not forgotten anything, as I have already stated that the seventh day Sabbath of God has even more significance and importance for fallen humanity in particular, than it had when established for the perfection of God's creation. I just do not negate either by the other. The seventh day Sabbath of God has not become a shadow, because it now represents a new creation for those who will once again choose to rest in God's grace and mercy. His grace and mercy have always been the traits of His character, which have become more crucial to the believer since our fall. As likewise His seventh day Sabbath therefore has also become more crucial to our experience. See post #7 at the link below.
https://www.gracecentered.com/christian_forums/index.php?topic=113707.0
The eternal Kingdom of God our husband does not come by observing dead things that some lust after
It was that kind of spirit of this world that caused the atheist Jew to try and make Jesus the Son of man into a circus seal...do some magic work a miracle then when we see with our own eyes we will trust for a 1/2 a second.
John 4:48Then said Jesus unto him, Except ye see
signs and
wonders, ye will
not believe.
John 6:30They said therefore unto him, What
sign shewest thou then, that
we may see, and
believe thee? what dost
thou work?
Ceremonial signs are gospel signs to the unbelieving world as shadow they point ahead they lead mankind to the one source of faith (sola scriptura) sign for unbeliever prophecy for those who do believe unto salvation without a sign--- no need to wonder, wonder, wonder. Making it into a works righteousness ending up in death each time. There is no sign we could perform outwardly that would prove Christ in us.
: garee Mon Mar 16, 2026 - 09:20:19There is no sign we could perform outwardly that would prove Christ in us.
What about confess with our lips that Jesus is lord? (Romans 10:9)
: Jaime Fri Mar 20, 2026 - 07:18:04What about confess with our lips that Jesus is lord? (Romans 10:9)
Hear the confession not seeing it.....Like with Hannah
1 Samuel 1:13 Now Hannah, she spake in her heart; only her lips moved, but her voice was not heard: therefore Eli thought she had been drunken.
Christ uses an object lesson as a sign to teach the spiritual understanding as a parable
John20: 27 Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and
be not faithless, but
believing.
There Christ the Holy Father working through Jesus the prophet lovingly commanded Thomas to believe ---then the confession or witness not seen
John20:29 And Thomas
answered and said unto him, My
Lord and my
God. Jesus saith unto him, Thomas,
because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are
they that
have not seen, and yet have
believed.
The eternal Kingdom of God our husband does not come by observing dead things that some lust after
God's holy sabbath created by His word at creation, is not a dead thing, to be lusted after. For He spoke, and it stood and stands fast. It is a command of God, which has and will stay in force until God Himself determines otherwise, and no one else. The law of God is the standard. It is not the standards of God that must die, but rather the sinner that breaks them. We will either die in Christ Jesus our Lord unto a new life conformable to his law, or we will die the second and final death by the condemnation of that law.
No one will be saved by keeping the law, but many will be lost for breaking the law. Not just that they broke it, for they can be forgiven of such, if they will confess their sins and repent. It is those who reject the law, or say the law no longer matters, who cannot be saved. For they will not confess sins, they do not believe are sins, if the law no longer matters to them. Nevertheless -
Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you,
Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.1Jn 2:3
And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments. 4 He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. 5 But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected: hereby know we that we are in him. 6 He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked.
1Jn 5:1 Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God: and every one that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him. 2
By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God, and keep his commandments. 3 For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.Rev 12:16 And the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed up the flood which the dragon cast out of his mouth. 17 And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed,
which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.Rev 14:12 Here is the patience of the saints: here are they
that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.Rev 22:14
Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.
It was that kind of spirit of this world that caused the atheist Jew to try and make Jesus the Son of man into a circus seal...do some magic work a miracle then when we see with our own eyes we will trust for a 1/2 a second.
What does God's law or his sabbath have to do with the gobbledygook you wrote above? The perfect life and death of our Lord Jesus Christ which perfectly fulfilled the law of God, was in no way shape or form, a circus or any other of the gobbledygook you have suggested above. Our Lord overcame sin, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled within us also.
Rom 8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: 4
That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 5 For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. 6
For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.
You seem to be greatly confused concerning the gospel.
John 4:48Then said Jesus unto him, Except ye see signs and wonders, ye will not believe.
John 6:30They said therefore unto him, What sign shewest thou then, that we may see, and believe thee? what dost thou work?
Ceremonial signs are gospel signs to the unbelieving world as shadow they point ahead they lead mankind to the one source of faith (sola scriptura) sign for unbeliever prophecy for those who do believe unto salvation without a sign--- no need to wonder, wonder, wonder. Making it into a works righteousness ending up in death each time. There is no sign we could perform outwardly that would prove Christ in us.
Like I said, you are confused. God's holy sabbath is not part of the ceremonial laws, it is one of the Ten Commandments of God. As already stated, it was established at creation for humanity in perfection, in a perfect world. Before there was ever a need for ceremonial sacrifices or anything else, according to the ceremonial laws of Israel long after the fall. If you reject this, you simply reject biblical truth.
https://adventmessenger.org/msn-news-misrepresents-the-seventh-day-sabbath-falsely-claiming-it-belongs-to-israel-not-christians/
Quoted article below from link above.
MSN News Misrepresents the Seventh-day Sabbath, Falsely Claiming it Belongs to Israel, Not Christians
On March 20, 2026, MSN News published an article claiming that keeping Saturday as the Sabbath was intended only for Israel and not for the Christian church. It further falsely stated that neither Jesus nor Paul ever spoke about the Sabbath, using this claim to reject the seventh-day Sabbath altogether. Once again, this type of reporting by the mainstream media aligns perfectly with longstanding Roman Catholic teachings on rest and worship and contributes to the growing movement to promote Sunday within society.
MSN News published the following:
• "The Bible says that the Sabbath, the fourth commandment, was a sign given to the nation of Israel. Christians do not keep the biblical Saturday Sabbath, because Christianity is not Israel, and because the Lord Jesus Christ is our rest. We try our best to keep the moral commandments of the law, which Jesus summarized as "love thy neighbor as thyself." When listing commandments to follow, as recorded in the New Testament, neither Jesus nor Paul mentioned the Sabbath—just the moral commands."
First, the argument that the Sabbath belongs only to Israel ignores its origin at Creation. The Sabbath was not introduced at Sinai; it was established in Eden when God rested on the seventh day: "And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made." Genesis 2:2-3.
This took place long before the existence of the Jewish nation, indicating that the Sabbath was designed for all of God's children. Jesus affirmed the universal application of the Sabbath when He declared, "The sabbath was made for man" (Mark 2:27). The language includes all nations and people, not only Jews. Therefore, to dismiss the Sabbath on the basis that Christians are not Israel is to overlook the clear teachings of the Bible.
Second, while it is true that Jesus offers spiritual rest to the weary (Matthew 11:28), Scripture never presents this rest as a replacement for obedience to God's commandments. Instead, Christ's rest addresses the burden of sin, not the removal of the moral law. The idea that spiritual rest eliminates the need for obedience is not biblical. Christ is our righteousness, but it does not eliminate the need for righteous living. Christ being the truth does not eliminate truth. And Christ being our rest does not abolish the Sabbath commandment.
Hebrews 4:9 explicitly states, "There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God." The Greek New Testament word for "rest" in the verse is "sabbatismos," implying Sabbath-keeping. The verse literally says that there remains a "Sabbath-keeping" for the people of God. This indicates that the Sabbath continues to hold relevance even after the cross.
Third, the claim that Christians must only follow parts of the moral law ignores that the Sabbath is part of it. The Ten Commandments, written by the finger of God on stone, represent an unchanging moral standard. The fourth commandment—"Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy" (Exodus 20:8)—stands in the middle of this law, not apart from it. There is no biblical basis for removing one commandment while retaining the other nine. To do so undermines the integrity of the entire law, as James 2:10 warns that breaking one point makes one guilty of all.
Fourth, the claim that neither Jesus nor Paul emphasized the Sabbath is not true. It's a lie. Jesus Himself kept the Sabbath regularly, as seen in Luke 4:16, where it was His custom to attend synagogue on that day. Moreover, in Matthew 24:20, Christ instructed His followers to pray that their flight from Jerusalem would not occur on the Sabbath—an event that would take place decades after His crucifixion. This demonstrates that He anticipated the continued observance of the Sabbath among His followers.
Likewise, the apostle Paul consistently worshiped and preached on the Sabbath. In Acts 13, Gentiles specifically requested that Paul preach to them "the next sabbath," and the following week nearly the entire city gathered. Acts 17:2 and Acts 18:4 further show that Paul reasoned in the synagogues every Sabbath, engaging both Jews and Gentiles. This pattern reflects not a temporary accommodation, but an established practice in the early Christian church.
Fifth, while love is indeed the fulfillment of the law (Romans 13:10), it does not replace the law. Paul himself illustrates this by listing commandments such as "Thou shalt not steal" and "Thou shalt not kill" immediately after affirming love as the fulfilling of the law. In the same way, the Sabbath commandment expresses love toward God by setting aside sacred time for Him and love toward others by ensuring rest for all. To remove the Sabbath on the basis of love is to misunderstand love's relationship to obedience.
The Sabbath serves as a sign of God's authority as Creator and a symbol of loyalty to Him (Ezekiel 20:12; Exodus 20:11). In the final message of Revelation, God's people are described as those who "keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus" (Revelation 14:12). The Sabbath, therefore, is not a side issue but a central expression of obedience and worship.
The claim that Christians are not required to keep the biblical seventh-day Sabbath, Saturday, does not come from the Holy Scriptures. The Sabbath was established at Creation, upheld by Christ, practiced by the apostles, and embedded within God's moral law. Far from being abolished, it remains a lasting sign of God's authority and a call to faithful obedience.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGmAmtE0xX8
Issues regarding Sunday laws.
https://m.egwwritings.org/en/book/133.2557#2557
Quoted chapter below from link above. Emphasis is mine.
The Great Controversy (1888 ed.)
Chapter 35—Character and Aims of the Papacy
Romanism is now regarded by Protestants with far greater favor than in former years. In those countries where Catholicism is not in the ascendency, and the papists are taking a conciliatory course in order to gain influence, there is an increasing indifference concerning the doctrines that separate the reformed churches from the papal hierarchy; the opinion is gaining ground, that, after all, we do not differ so widely upon vital points as has been supposed, and that a little concession on our part will bring us into a better understanding with Rome. The time was when Protestants placed a high value upon the liberty of conscience which has been so dearly purchased. They taught their children to abhor popery, and held that to seek harmony with Rome would be disloyalty to God. But how widely different are the sentiments now expressed.
The defenders of popery declare that the church has been maligned; and the Protestant world are inclined to accept the statement. Many urge that it is unjust to judge the church of today by the abominations and absurdities that marked her reign during the centuries of ignorance and darkness. They excuse her horrible cruelty as the result of the barbarism of the times, and plead that the influence of modern civilization has changed her sentiments.
Have these persons forgotten the claim of infallibility put forth for eight hundred years by this haughty power? So far from being relinquished, this claim has been affirmed in the nineteenth century with greater positiveness than ever before. As Rome asserts that she "never erred, and never can err," how can she renounce the principles which governed her course in past ages?
The papal church will never relinquish her claim to infallibility. All that she has done in her persecution of those who reject her dogmas, she holds to be right; and would she not repeat the same acts, should the opportunity be presented? Let the restraints now imposed by secular governments be removed, and Rome be re-instated in her former power, and there would speedily be a revival of her tyranny and persecution.
A recent writer [Josiah Strong, D.D., In "Our Country," pp. 46-48.] speaks thus of the attitude of the papal hierarchy as regards freedom of conscience, and of the perils which especially threaten the United States from the success of her policy:—
"There are many who are disposed to attribute any fear of Roman Catholicism in the United States to bigotry or childishness. Such see nothing in the character and attitude of Romanism that is hostile to our free institutions, or find nothing portentous in its growth. Let us, then, first compare some of the fundamental principles of our government with those of the Catholic Church.
"The Constitution of the United States guarantees liberty of conscience. Nothing is dearer or more fundamental. Pope Pius IX., in his Encyclical Letter of August 15, 1854, said: 'The absurd and erroneous doctrines or ravings in defense of liberty of conscience, are a most pestilential error—a pest, of all others, most to be dreaded in a State.' The same pope, in his Encyclical Letter of December 8, 1864, anathematized 'those who assert the liberty of conscience and of religious worship,' also 'all such as maintain that the church may not employ force.'
"The pacific tone of Rome in the United States does not imply a change of heart. She is tolerant where she is helpless. Says Bishop O'Connor: 'Religious liberty is merely endured until the opposite can be carried into effect without peril to the Catholic world.'" "The archbishop of St. Louis once said: 'Heresy and unbelief are crimes; and in Christian countries, as in Italy and Spain, for instance, where all the people are Catholics, and where the Catholic religion is an essential part of the law of the land, they are punished as other crimes.'"
"Every cardinal, archbishop, and bishop in the Catholic Church takes an oath of allegiance to the pope, in which occur the following words: 'Heretics, schismatics, and rebels to our said lord the pope, or his aforesaid successors, I will to my utmost persecute and oppose.'"
It is true that there are real Christians in the Roman Catholic communion. Thousands in that church are serving God according to the best light they have. They are not allowed access to his Word, and therefore they do not discern the truth. They have never seen the contrast between a living heart-service and a round of mere forms and ceremonies. God looks with pitying tenderness upon these souls, educated as they are in a faith that is delusive and unsatisfying. He will cause rays of light to penetrate the dense darkness that surrounds them. He will reveal to them the truth, as it is in Jesus, and many will yet take their position with his people.
But Romanism as a system is no more in harmony with the gospel of Christ now than at any former period in her history. The Protestant churches are in great darkness, or they would discern the signs of the times. The Roman Church is far-reaching in her plans and modes of operation. She is employing every device to extend her influence and increase her power in preparation for a fierce and determined conflict to regain control of the world, to re-establish persecution, and to undo all that Protestantism has done. Catholicism is gaining ground upon every side. [See Appendix, Note 10.] See the increasing number of her churches and chapels in Protestant countries. Look at the popularity of her colleges and seminaries in America, so widely patronized by Protestants Look at the growth of ritualism in England, and the frequent defections to the ranks of the Catholics. These things should awaken the anxiety of all who prize the pure principles of the gospel.
Protestants have tampered with and patronized popery; they have made compromises and concessions which papists themselves are surprised to see, and fail to understand. Men are closing their eyes to the real character of Romanism, and the dangers to be apprehended from her supremacy. The people need to be aroused to resist the advances of this most dangerous foe to civil and religious liberty.
Many Protestants suppose that the Catholic religion is unattractive, and that its worship is a dull, meaningless round of ceremony. Here they mistake. While Romanism is based upon deception, it is not a coarse and clumsy imposture. The religious service of the Romish Church is a most impressive ceremonial. Its gorgeous display and solemn rites fascinate the senses of the people, and silence the voice of reason and of conscience. The eye is charmed. Magnificent churches, imposing processions, golden altars, jeweled shrines, choice paintings, and exquisite sculpture appeal to the love of beauty. The ear also is captivated. The music is unsurpassed. The rich notes of the deep-toned organ, blending with the melody of many voices as it swells through the lofty domes and pillared aisles of her grand cathedrals, cannot fail to impress the mind with awe and reverence.
This outward splendor, pomp, and ceremony, that only mocks the longings of the sin-sick soul, is an evidence of inward corruption. The religion of Christ needs not such attractions to recommend it. In the light shining from the cross, true Christianity appears so pure and lovely that no external decorations can enhance its true worth. It is the beauty of holiness, a meek and quiet spirit, which is of value with God.
Brilliancy of style is not necessarily an index of pure, elevated thought. High conceptions of art, delicate refinement of taste, often exist in minds that are earthly and sensual. They are often employed by Satan to lead men to forget the necessities of the soul, to lose sight of the future, immortal life, to turn away from their infinite Helper, and to live for this world alone.
A religion of externals is attractive to the unrenewed heart. The pomp and ceremony of the Catholic worship have a seductive, bewitching power, by which many are deceived; and they come to look upon the Roman Church as the very gate of Heaven. None but those who have planted their feet firmly upon the foundation of truth, and whose hearts are renewed by the Spirit of God, are proof against her influence. Thousands who have not an experimental knowledge of Christ will be led to accept the forms of godliness without the power. Such a religion is just what the multitudes desire.
The church's claim to the right to pardon, causes the Romanist to feel at liberty to sin; and the ordinance of confession, without which her pardon is not granted, tends also to give license to evil. He who kneels before fallen man, and opens in confession the secret thoughts and imaginations of his heart, is debasing his manhood, and degrading every noble instinct of his soul. In unfolding the sins of his life to a priest,—an erring, sinful mortal, and too often corrupted with wine and licentiousness,—his standard of character is lowered, and he is defiled in consequence. His thought of God is degraded to the likeness of fallen humanity; for the priest stands as a representative of God. This degrading confession of man to man is the secret spring from which has flowed much of the evil that is defiling the world, and fitting it for the final destruction. Yet to him who loves self-indulgence, it is more pleasing to confess to a fellow-mortal than to open the soul to God. It is more palatable to human nature to do penance than to renounce sin; it is easier to mortify the flesh by sackcloth and nettles and galling chains than to crucify fleshly lusts. Heavy is the yoke which the carnal heart is willing to bear rather than bow to the yoke of Christ.
There is a striking similarity between the Church of Rome and the Jewish Church at the time of Christ's first advent. While the Jews secretly trampled upon every principle of the law of God, they were outwardly rigorous in the observance of its precepts, loading it down with exactions and traditions that made obedience painful and burdensome. As the Jews professed to revere the law, so do Romanists claim to reverence the cross. They exalt the symbol of Christ's sufferings, while in their lives they deny him whom it represents.
Papists place crosses upon their churches, upon their altars, and upon their garments. Everywhere is seen the insignia of the cross. Everywhere it is outwardly honored and exalted. But the teachings of Christ are buried beneath a mass of senseless traditions, false interpretations, and rigorous exactions. The Saviour's words concerning the bigoted Jews, apply with still greater force to the Romish leaders: "They bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers." [Matthew 23:4.] Conscientious souls are kept in constant terror, fearing the wrath of an offended God, while the dignitaries of the church are living in luxury and sensual pleasure.
The worship of images and relics, the invocation of saints, and the exaltation of the pope, are devices of Satan to attract the minds of the people from God and from his Son. To accomplish their ruin, he endeavors to turn their attention from Him through whom alone they can find salvation. He will direct them to any object that can be substituted for the One who has said, "Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest." [Matthew 11:28.]
It is Satan's constant effort to misrepresent the character of God, the nature of sin, and the real issues at stake in the great controversy. His sophistry lessens the obligation of the divine law, and gives men license to sin. At the same time he causes them to cherish false conceptions of God, so that they regard him with fear and hate, rather than with love. The cruelty inherent in his own character is attributed to the Creator; it is embodied in systems of religion, and expressed in modes of worship. Thus the minds of men are blinded, and Satan secures them as his agents to war against God. By perverted conceptions of the divine attributes, heathen nations were led to believe human sacrifices necessary to secure the favor of Deity; and horrible cruelties have been perpetrated under the various forms of idolatry. The Romish Church, uniting the forms of paganism and Christianity, and, like paganism, misrepresenting the character of God, has resorted to practices no less cruel and revolting. In the days of Rome's supremacy, there were instruments of torture to compel assent to her doctrines. There was the stake for those who would not concede to her claims. There were massacres on a scale that will never be known until revealed in the Judgment. Dignitaries of the church studied, under Satan their master, to invent means to cause the greatest possible torture, and not end the life of their victim. The infernal process was repeated to the utmost limit of human endurance, until nature gave up the struggle, and the sufferer hailed death as a sweet release.
Such was the fate of Rome's opponents. For her adherents she had the discipline of the scourge, of famishing hunger, of bodily austerities in every conceivable, heartsickening form. To secure the favor of Heaven, penitents violated the laws of God by violating the laws of nature. They were taught to sunder every tie which he has formed to bless and gladden man's earthly sojourn. The churchyard contains millions of victims, who spent their lives in vain endeavors to subdue their natural affections, to repress, as offensive to God, every thought and feeling of sympathy with their fellow-creatures.
If we desire to understand the determined cruelty of Satan, manifested for hundreds of years, not among those who never heard of God, but in the very heart and throughout the extent of Christendom, we have only to look at the history of Romanism. Through this mammoth system of deception the prince of evil achieves his purpose of bringing dishonor to God and wretchedness to man. And as we see how he succeeds in disguising himself, and accomplishing his work through the leaders of the church, we may better understand why he has so great antipathy to the Bible. If that book is read, the mercy and love of God will be revealed; it will be seen that he lays upon men none of these heavy burdens. All that he asks is a broken and contrite heart, a humble, obedient spirit.
Christ gives no example in his life for men and women to shut themselves in monasteries in order to become fitted for Heaven. He has never taught that love and sympathy must be repressed. The Saviour's heart overflowed with love. The nearer man approaches to moral perfection, the keener are his sensibilities, the more acute is his perception of sin, and the deeper his sympathy for the afflicted. The pope claims to be the vicar of Christ; but how does his character bear comparison with that of our Saviour? Was Christ ever known to consign men to the prison or the rack because they did not pay him homage as the King of Heaven? Was his voice heard condemning to death those who did not accept him? When he was slighted by the people of a Samaritan village, the apostle John was filled with indignation, and inquired, "Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elias did?" Jesus looked with pity upon his disciple, and rebuked his harsh spirit, saying, "The Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them." [Luke 9:54, 56.] How different from the spirit manifested by Christ is that of his professed vicar.
The Romish Church now presents a fair front to the world, covering with apologies her record of horrible cruelties. She has clothed herself in Christ-like garments; but she is unchanged. Every principle of popery that existed in past ages exists today. The doctrines devised in the darkest ages are still held. Let none deceive themselves. The popery that Protestants are now so ready to honor is the same that ruled the world in the days of the Reformation, when men of God stood up, at the peril of their lives, to expose her iniquity. She possesses the same pride and arrogant assumption that lorded it over kings and princes, and claimed the prerogatives of God. Her spirit is no less cruel and despotic now than when she crushed out human liberty, and slew the saints of the Most High.
Popery is just what prophecy declared that she would be, the apostasy of the latter times. [2 Thessalonians 2:3, 4.] It is a part of her policy to assume the character which will best accomplish her purpose; but beneath the variable appearance of the chameleon, she conceals the invariable venom of the serpent. "We are not bound to keep faith and promises to heretics," she declares. Shall this power, whose record for a thousand years is written in the blood of the saints, be now acknowledged as a part of the church of Christ?
It is not without reason that the claim has been put forth in Protestant countries, that Catholicism differs less widely from Protestantism than in former times. There has been a change; but the change is not in the papacy. Catholicism indeed resembles much of the Protestantism that now exists, because Protestantism has so greatly degenerated since the days of the reformers.
As the Protestant churches have been seeking the favor of the world, false charity has blinded their eyes. They do not see but that it is right to believe good of all evil; and as the inevitable result, they will finally believe evil of all good. Instead of standing in defense of the faith once delivered to the saints, they are now, as it were, apologizing to Rome for their uncharitable opinion of her, begging pardon for their bigotry.
A large class, even of those who look upon Romanism with no favor, apprehend little danger from her power and influence. Many urge that the intellectual and moral darkness prevailing during the Middle Ages favored the spread of her dogmas, superstitions, and oppression, and that the greater intelligence of modern times, the general diffusion of knowledge, and the increasing liberality in matters of religion, forbid a revival of intolerance and tyranny. The very thought that such a state of things will exist in this enlightened age is ridiculed. It is true that great light, intellectual, moral, and religious, is shining upon this generation. In the open pages of God's holy Word, light from Heaven has been shed upon the world. But it should be remembered that the greater the light bestowed, the greater the darkness of those who pervert or reject it.
A prayerful study of the Bible would show Protestants the real character of the papacy, and would cause them to abhor and to shun it; but many are so wise in their own conceit that they feel no need of humbly seeking God that they may be led into the truth. Although priding themselves on their enlightenment, they are ignorant both of the Scriptures and of the power of God. They must have some means of quieting their consciences; and they seek that which is least spiritual and humiliating. What they desire is a method of forgetting God which shall pass as a method of remembering him. The papacy is well adapted to meet the wants of all these. It is prepared for two classes of mankind, embracing nearly the whole world,—those who would be saved by their merits, and those who would be saved in their sins. Here is the secret of its power.
A day of great intellectual darkness has been shown to be favorable to the success of popery. It will yet be demonstrated that a day of great intellectual light is equally favorable for its success. In past ages, when men were without God's Word, and without the knowledge of the truth, their eyes were blindfolded, and thousands were ensnared, not seeing the net spread for their feet. In this generation there are many whose eyes become dazzled by the glare of human speculations, "science falsely so-called;" they discern not the net, and walk into it as readily as if blindfolded. God designed that man's intellectual powers should be held as a gift from his Maker, and should be employed in the service of truth and righteousness; but when pride and ambition are cherished, and men exalt their own theories above the Word of God, then intelligence can accomplish greater harm than ignorance. Thus the false science of the nineteenth century, which undermines faith in the Bible, will prove as successful in preparing the way for the acceptance of the papacy, with its pleasing forms, as did the withholding of knowledge in opening the way for its aggrandizement in the Dark Ages.
In the movements now in progress in the United States to secure for the institutions and usages of the church the support of the State, Protestants are following in the steps of papists. [See Appendix, Note 11.] Nay, more, they are opening the door for popery to regain in Protestant America the supremacy which she has lost in the Old World. And that which gives greater significance to this movement is the fact that the principal object contemplated is the enforcement of Sunday observance,—a custom which originated with Rome, and which she claims as the sign of her authority. It is the spirit of the papacy,—the spirit of conformity to worldly customs, the veneration for human traditions above the commandments of God,—that is permeating the Protestant churches, and leading them on to do the same work of Sunday exaltation which the papacy has done before them.
If the reader would understand the agencies to be employed in the soon-coming contest, he has but to trace the record of the means which Rome employed for the same object in ages past. If he would know how papists and Protestants united will deal with those who reject their dogmas, let him see the spirit which Rome manifested toward the Sabbath and its defenders.
Royal edicts, general councils, and church ordinances sustained by secular power, were the steps by which the pagan festival attained its position of honor in the Christian world. The first public measure enforcing Sunday observance was the law enacted by Constantine. [A. D. 321.] This edict required townspeople to rest on "the venerable day of the sun," but permitted countrymen to continue their agricultural pursuits. Though virtually a heathen statute, it was enforced by the emperor after his nominal acceptance of Christianity.
The royal mandate not proving a sufficient substitute for divine authority, Eusebius, a bishop who sought the favor of princes, and who was the special friend and flatterer of Constantine, advanced the claim that Christ had transferred the Sabbath to Sunday. Not a single testimony of the Scriptures was produced in proof of the new doctrine. Eusebius himself unwittingly acknowledges its falsity, and points to the real authors of the change. "All things," he says, "whatsoever that it was duty to do on the Sabbath, these we have transferred to the Lord's day." But the Sunday argument, groundless as it was, served to embolden men in trampling upon the Sabbath of the Lord. All who desired to be honored by the world accepted the popular festival.
As the papacy became firmly established, the work of Sunday exaltation was continued. For a time the people engaged in agricultural labor when not attending church, and the seventh day was still regarded as the Sabbath. But steadily a change was effected. Those in holy office were forbidden to pass judgment in any civil controversy on the Sunday. Soon after, all persons, of whatever rank, were commanded to refrain from common labor, on pain of a fine for freemen, and stripes in the case of servants. Later it was decreed, that rich men should be punished with the loss of half of their estates; and finally, that if still obstinate they should be made slaves. The lower classes were to suffer perpetual banishment.
Miracles also were called into requisition. Among other wonders it was reported that as a husbandman who was about to plow his field on Sunday, cleaned his plow with an iron, the iron stuck fast in his hand, and for two years he carried it about with him, "to his exceeding great pain and shame."
Later, the pope gave directions that the parish priest should admonish the violators of Sunday, and wish them to go to church and say their prayers, lest they bring some great calamity on themselves and neighbors. An ecclesiastical council brought forward the argument, since so widely employed, even by Protestants, that because persons had been struck by lightning while laboring on Sunday, it must be the Sabbath. "It is apparent," said the prelates, "how high the displeasure of God was upon their neglect of this day." An appeal was then made that priests and ministers, kings and princes, and all faithful people, "use their utmost endeavors and care that the day be restored to its honor, and, for the credit of Christianity, more devoutly observed for time to come."
The decrees of councils proving insufficient, the secular authorities were besought to issue an edict that would strike terror to the hearts of the people, and force them to refrain from labor on the Sunday. At a synod held in Rome, all previous decisions were reaffirmed with greater force and solemnity. They were also incorporated into the ecclesiastical law, and enforced by the civil authorities throughout nearly all Christendom.
Still the absence of scriptural authority for Sunday-keeping occasioned no little embarrassment. The people questioned the right of their teachers to set aside the positive declaration of Jehovah, "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God," in order to honor the day of the sun. To supply the lack of Bible testimony, other expedients were necessary. A zealous advocate of Sunday, who about the close of the twelfth century visited the churches of England, was resisted by faithful witnesses for the truth; and so fruitless were his efforts that he departed from the country for a season, and cast about him for some means to enforce his teachings. When he returned, the lack was supplied, and in his after-labors he met with greater success. He brought with him a roll purporting to be from God himself, which contained the needed command for Sunday observance, with awful threats to terrify the disobedient. This precious document—as base a counterfeit as the institution it supported—was said to have fallen from Heaven, and to have been found in Jerusalem, upon the altar of St. Simeon, in Golgotha. But in fact, the pontifical palace at Rome was the source whence it proceeded. Frauds and forgeries to advance the power and prosperity of the church have in all ages been esteemed lawful by the papal hierarchy.
The roll forbade labor from the ninth hour, three o'clock, on Saturday afternoon, till sunrise on Monday; and its authority was declared to be confirmed by many miracles. It was reported that persons laboring beyond the appointed hour were stricken with paralysis. A Miller who attempted to grind his corn, saw, instead of flour, a torrent of blood come forth, and the mill-wheel stood still, notwithstanding the strong rush of the water. A woman who placed dough in the oven, found it raw when taken out, though the oven was very hot. Another who had dough prepared for baking at the ninth hour, but determined to set it aside till Monday, found, the next day, that it had been made into loaves and baked by divine power. A man who baked bread after the ninth hour on Saturday, found, when he broke it the next morning, that blood started therefrom. By such absurd and superstitious fabrications did the advocates of Sunday endeavor to establish its sacredness.
In Scotland, as in England, a greater regard for Sunday was secured by uniting with it a portion of the ancient Sabbath. But the time required to be kept holy varied. An edict from the king of Scotland declared that Saturday from twelve at noon ought to be accounted holy, and that no man, from that time till Monday morning, should engage in worldly business.
But notwithstanding all the efforts to establish Sunday sacredness, papists themselves publicly confessed the divine authority of the Sabbath, and the human origin of the institution by which it had been supplanted. In the sixteenth century a papal council plainly declared: "Let all Christians remember that the seventh day was consecrated by God, and hath been received and observed, not only by the Jews, but by all others who pretend to worship God; though we Christians have changed their Sabbath into the Lord's day." Those who were tampering with the divine law were not ignorant of the character of their work. They were deliberately setting themselves above God.
A striking illustration of Rome's policy toward those who disagree with her was given in the long and bloody persecution of the Waldenses, some of whom were observers of the Sabbath. Others suffered in a similar manner for their fidelity to the fourth commandment. The history of the churches of Ethiopia and Abyssinia is especially significant. Amid the gloom of the Dark Ages, the Christians of Central Africa were lost sight of and forgotten by the world, and for many centuries they enjoyed freedom in the exercise of their faith. But at last Rome learned of their existence, and the emperor of Abyssinia was soon beguiled into an acknowledgment of the pope as the vicar of Christ. Other concessions followed. An edict was issued forbidding the observance of the Sabbath under the severest penalties. But papal tyranny soon became a yoke so galling that the Abyssinians determined to break it from their necks. After a terrible struggle, the Romanists were banished from their dominions, and the ancient faith was restored. The churches rejoiced in their freedom, and they never forgot the lesson they had learned concerning the deception, the fanaticism, and the despotic power of Rome. Within their solitary realm they were content to remain, unknown to the rest of Christendom.
The churches of Africa held the Sabbath as it was held by the papal church before her complete apostasy. While they kept the seventh day in obedience to the commandment of God, they abstained from labor on the Sunday in conformity to the custom of the church. Upon obtaining supreme power, Rome had trampled upon the Sabbath of God to exalt her own; but the churches of Africa, hidden for nearly a thousand years, did not share in this apostasy. When brought under the sway of Rome, they were forced to set aside the true and exalt the false Sabbath; but no sooner had they regained their independence than they returned to obedience to the fourth commandment. [See Appendix, Note 12.]
These records of the past clearly reveal the enmity of Rome toward the true Sabbath and its defenders, and the means which she employs to honor the institution of her creating. The Word of God teaches that these scenes are to be repeated as papists and Protestants shall unite for the exaltation of the Sunday.
The prophecy of Revelation 13 declares that the power represented by the beast with lamb-like horns shall cause "the earth and them which dwell therein" to worship the papacy—there symbolized by the beast "like unto a leopard." The beast with two horns is also to say "to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast;" and, furthermore, it is to command all, "both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond," to receive "the mark of the beast." [Revelation 13:11-16.] It has been shown that the United States is the power represented by the beast with lamb-like horns, and that this prophecy will be fulfilled when the United States shall enforce Sunday observance, which Rome claims as the special acknowledgment of her supremacy. But in this homage to papacy the United States will not be alone. The influence of Rome in the countries that once acknowledged her dominion, is still far from being destroyed. And prophecy foretells a restoration of her power. "I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed; and all the world wondered after the beast." [Revelation 13:3.] The infliction of the deadly wound points to the abolition of the papacy in 1798. After this, says the prophet, "His deadly wound was healed; and all the world wondered after the beast." Paul states plainly that the man of sin will continue until the second advent. [2 Thessalonians 2:8.] To the very close of time he will carry forward his work of deception. And the Revelator declares, also referring to the papacy, "All that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life." [Revelation 13:8.] In both the Old and the New World, papacy will receive homage in the honor paid to the Sunday institution, that rests solely upon the authority of the Romish Church.
For about forty years, students of prophecy in the United States have presented this testimony to the world. In the events now taking place is seen a rapid advance toward the fulfillment of the prediction. With Protestant teachers there is the same claim of divine authority for Sunday-keeping, and the same lack of scriptural evidence, as with the papist leaders who fabricated miracles to supply the place of a command from God. The assertion that God's judgments are visited upon men for their violation of the Sunday-sabbath, will be repeated; already it is beginning to be urged. And a movement to enforce Sunday observance is fast gaining ground.
Marvelous in her shrewdness and cunning is the Romish Church. She can read what is to be. She bides her time, seeing that the Protestant churches are paying her homage in their acceptance of the false Sabbath, and that they are preparing to enforce it by the very means which she herself employed in by-gone days. Those who reject the light of truth will yet seek the aid of this self-styled infallible power to exalt an institution that originated with her. How readily she will come to the help of Protestants in this work, it is not difficult to conjecture. Who understands better than the papal leaders how to deal with those who are disobedient to the church?
The Roman Church, with all its ramifications throughout the world, forms one vast organization, under the control, and designed to serve the interests, of the papal see. Its millions of communicants, in every country on the globe, are instructed to hold themselves as bound in allegiance to the pope. Whatever their nationality or their government, they are to regard the authority of the church as above all other. Though they may take the oath pledging their loyalty to the State, yet back of this lies the vow of obedience to Rome, absolving them from every pledge inimical to her interests.
Protestants little know what they are doing when they propose to accept the aid of Rome in the work of Sunday exaltation. While they are bent upon the accomplishment of their purpose, Rome is aiming to re-establish her power, to recover her lost supremacy. Let history testify of her artful and persistent efforts to insinuate herself into the affairs of nations; and having gained a foothold, to further her own aims, even at the ruin of princes and people. Romanism openly puts forth the claim that the pope "can pronounce sentences and judgments in contradiction to the right of nations, to the law of God and man." [The "Decretalia."]
And let it be remembered, it is the boast of Rome that she never changes. The principles of Gregory VII. and Innocent III. are still the principles of the Romish Church. And had she but the power, she would put them in practice with as much vigor now as in past centuries. Let the principle once be established in the United States, that the church may employ or control the power of the State; that religious observances may be enforced by secular laws; in short, that the authority of church and State is to dominate the conscience, and the triumph of Rome in this country is assured.
God's Word has given warning of the impending danger; let this be unheeded, and the Protestant world will learn what the purposes of Rome really are, only when it is too late to escape the snare. She is silently growing into power. Her doctrines are exerting their influence in legislative halls, in the churches, and in the hearts of men. She is piling up her lofty and massive structures, in the secret recesses of which her former persecutions will be repeated. Stealthily and unsuspectedly she is strengthening her forces to further her own ends when the time shall come for her to strike. All that she desires is vantage-ground, and this is already being given her. We shall soon see and shall feel what the purpose of the Roman element is. Whoever shall believe and obey the Word of God will thereby incur reproach and persecution.
https://adventmessenger.org/the-catholic-diocese-of-green-bay-urges-businesses-to-close-on-sundays-so-people-can-attend-church-for-worship/
Quoted article below from link above.
The Catholic Diocese of Green Bay Urges Businesses to Close on Sundays so People can Attend Church for Worship
On April 22, 2026, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Green Bay, Wisconsin, published an article in its "On Mission" magazine titled "What Does It Mean to Reclaim Sunday?" The plan to reclaim Sunday involves closing businesses on that day, with the aim of reshaping society around a unified day of rest and worship. The message extends far beyond the walls of the church and targets daily life directly, urging people to change their behavior and to cease "buying and selling" on Sundays—language that parallels the warning of Revelation 13:17.
The Catholic Diocese's magazine stated the following:
•, "Closing on Sundays—taking a break from buying and selling, and resting from work—is not the only way to follow the third commandment, but it is a great place to start."
•, "This simple yet impactful act sets small and large businesses apart and has been done since the dawn of Christianity. While other stores or restaurants may close over the weekend, companies like Hobby Lobby and Chick-fil-A are known for closing on Sundays explicitly to make time for Christian worship."
•, "Sunday, the Lord's Day, isn't the same as the Jewish Sabbath, but it is a similar celebration based on the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. Keeping the Lord's Day holy, and reclaiming Sunday, is not simply about rest or setting the day apart, it is about divine worship."
•, "Experiencing the closure of businesses on the Lord's Day, both as a consumer and laborer, can remind the faithful that divine worship is the top priority on that day and participating in commerce can take away from our ability to participate in divine worship."
When the Catholic Church points to businesses such as Hobby Lobby and Chick-fil-A as successful examples, it is attempting to demonstrate that closing on Sunday is both practical and beneficial. In doing so, it is seeking to normalize the idea within the culture that Sunday should—and can—be different.
Rome's underlying message is clear: Sunday commerce competes with worship, and limiting business activity on that day will elevate spiritual priorities. As this idea spreads, it will shift public thinking toward viewing the closure of commercial activity on Sunday as a necessary step for the "common good." History demonstrates that what begins as an invitation and a call to protect Sunday will eventually lead to coercive laws mandating Sunday rest.
"Fearful is the issue to which the world is to be brought. The powers of earth, uniting to war against the commandments of God, will decree that all, "both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond," [Revelation 13:16.] shall conform to the customs of the church by the observance of the false sabbath. All who refuse compliance will be visited with civil penalties, and it will finally be declared that they are deserving of death" (Great Controversy, p. 604).
Chick-fil-A and Hobby Lobby are actually good examples of how it should be done. They are convicted that they should not open on Sunday, and choose to close of their own will. Revealing authentic faith in what they have chosen to believe. Backing up what they profess with their own actions. How it should be.
We know however, that the Catechism of the Catholic Church calls its adherents to seek to ensure that civil legislation backs up this belief. Which is exactly how it should not be done as either an authentic Christian, or a good American who believes and will back up the Constitution of these Untied States. What do authentic Christians have to do with forcing other people to obey God? Is this the gospel of Jesus Christ? What, He was unable to do so when here as one of us, so now He asks us to do so? Not!
This is beside the issue of course, that neither God nor the bible commands the observance of the first day of the week as a sabbath anywhere. This is the creation by law, of the first professed Christian Roman Pontifex Maximus, the emperor Constantine, not a law of God. Why would Christ's church want to create a state of legalism by forcing people to do what they deem as right, without being converted to wanting to do so for themselves. Such is dead legalism, and will not only not save them, but to the contrary condemn their souls.
You suggested "Closing on Sundays—taking a break from buying and selling, and resting from work—is not the only way to follow the third commandment, but it is a great place to start.
fourth loving commandment as a parable
No such works righteousness.
The word fast .Hold fast (firm, fixed, constant) to a rule or vow. Not a fast for food but a fast for hearing the word and sharing the food.
https://adventmessenger.org/belgian-news-site-calls-sunday-reopening-a-civilizational-compromise-and-profound-upheaval/
Quoted article below from link above.
Belgian News Site Calls Sunday Reopening a "Civilizational Compromise" and "Profound Upheaval"
Belgium's debate over Sunday reopening is being presented as a great injustice that will compromise civilization and radically transform society for the worse. The message conveyed by the local press is that the government's plan to remove Sunday work restrictions threatens to erode a long-standing social order built around rest, family, worship, and worker rights.
On April 25, 2026, the German-language Belgian news outlet BRF published the following regarding the protests in Belgium over plans to expand Sunday business openings:
• "Shops open seven days a week until 9 p.m. – the unions are furious," reads the lead story in L'Avenir. The federal government yesterday approved a relaxation of the shop closing law. According to the new regulations, shops will now be allowed to remain open until 9 p.m. Furthermore, the legally mandated day of rest will be abolished. The unions believe this goes too far and are now even considering legal action."
• "Now, the 'holy Sunday' is being sacrificed on the altar of flexibility. It wasn't 'holy' for purely religious reasons anymore; it was almost a civilizational compromise. Sunday was the day we could spend time together, a collective break with family, friends, or neighbors. And that's exactly what they want to dismantle now. In the name of modernization. This is much more than just a 'technical' correction; in practice, it amounts to a profound upheaval."
The very public debate unfolding in Belgium demonstrates that Sunday continues to occupy a prominent role in discussions involving economics, labor rights, family values, and Christian identity. The fierce reaction from labor unions and various media outlets shows that Sunday is still widely viewed as a day that deserves legal protection.
Public controversies like these are preparing the public to become more receptive to Sunday protections and less resistant to future Sunday legislation. Efforts to preserve Sunday's special status harmonize with the prophetic expectation that Sunday will ultimately become the central issue where church, state, economics, and liberty of conscience unite in the final conflict over worship and obedience.
These people have a problem with allowing those who do not hold Sunday as sacred to work on that day, but no problem with the government acting as even above God, in forcing all to observe a day they consider holy. Our Lord Jesus Christ has neither called for any of His own to force everyone else to worship Him on Sunday or any other day, or declared Sunday to be holy anywhere at all. A man declared Sunday holy, not God.
https://adventmessenger.org/proposed-sunday-work-expansion-sparks-nationwide-labor-strikes-across-60-belgian-retailers/
Quoted article below from link above.
Proposed Sunday Work Expansion Sparks Nationwide Labor Strikes Across 60 Belgian Retailers
On April 25, 2026, The Brussels Times, a leading Belgian news outlet, published a report detailing how the ALDI supermarket chain proposed expanding Sunday store openings, requiring employees to work on that day. ALDI's proposed Sunday expansion has sparked nationwide labor strikes across 60 stores, leading to widespread shutdowns as workers strongly resisted efforts to make Sunday a regular workday.
The Brussels Times reported the following:
• "At least 60 Aldi supermarkets have shut their doors on Friday due to spontaneous staff protests against the management's plan to open stores on Sundays, according to the Christian trade union CNE."
• "Union officials are supporting the protest and assisting staff. 'We stand by the workers,' said Évelyne Zabus, permanent secretary of the CNE."
• "The union has expressed disappointment with management's approach, claiming the Sunday opening plan was introduced during discussions intended to focus on employee demands, such as salary improvements."
Employees opposed the move to open stores on Sundays and responded with strikes, effectively shutting down numerous locations as workers walked off the job. They view Sunday openings as a serious challenge to long-standing tradition that regards Sunday as a protected day of rest.
Labor unions are also a powerful force in resisting efforts to relax Sunday labor restrictions, arguing that Sunday is a unique day worthy of legal protection as a designated day for workers. In Belgium, unions are at the forefront of opposing expanded Sunday openings, fighting to keep it from being just another commercial workday.
This struggle demonstrates that across Europe and in many parts of the world, Sunday remains a deeply contested issue at the center of growing social and economic controversy—one that many continue to defend as essential for rest, family, and worship. It is more than just a labor dispute. This conflict reveals the ongoing efforts to preserve Sunday's distinct role within society, as advocates argue that maintaining this day as work-free is essential for everyone.
More of the same.