Creation and Conversion
By A. E. Place
The Sabbath a Sign of Both — The Same Power Displayed in Each — Conversion a New Creation 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.” Eze. 20:12. The Sabbath of the Bible is the Sabbath of the fourth commandment of God’s immutable, eternal ten. The Sabbath of the Bible is “the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.” Ex. 20:10. It must therefore be “the Lord’s day.” The Sabbath of the Bible is the seventh day, not the first. “The seventh day is the Sabbath.” Ex. 20:10. The Sabbath of the Bible is a memorial of God’s work of creation. “For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, . . . and rested the seventh day.” Ex. 20:11. The Sabbath is therefore a sign of God’s creative power. Creative Power in the Gospel
God’s power manifested in the gospel is also creative power, for “if any man is in Christ, there is a new creation.” 2 Cor. 5:17. “Created in Christ Jesus unto good works [obedience].” Eph. 2:10. “I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation.” Rom. 1:16. “Create in me a clean heart, O God.” Ps. 51:10; etc. It took creative power to make the worlds. It requires creative power to take a vile sinner and make him a saint. Jesus Christ was the active agent associated with the Father in the creation of the worlds. John 1:1-3; Heb. 1:1, 2. He was the only one by whom He could redeem the fallen world or the fallen race. Redemption is re-creation. Christ is Redeemer because He is Creator. Were He not Creator, He could not redeem. The Sabbath in Sanctification
The Sabbath was sanctified at the close of creation’s week. It is therefore a sign of all the creative and sanctifying power of God, and hence of the sanctifying power of God in the gospel. “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.” Eze. 20:12. As God sanctified the Bible Sabbath, the seventh day, so He will sanctify His people. But Jesus Christ is the Sanctifier of His people. Sanctification comes only through Him. 1 Cor. 1:30; Acts 4:12. Therefore the Edenic Sabbath stands as a sign, seal, token, or pledge, of sanctification through Jesus Christ in the gospel. God wants His people everywhere to know that the sanctification of the Sabbath, and the sanctification of the sinner who turns to God with all his heart, are the same, and that the one who sanctifies the sinner is the one who, under the almighty Father, sanctified the original and only genuine Sabbath this old world has known, or ever will know, “the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.” Therefore let us paraphrase our text: “The Sabbath is a sign between Me and My people, that they may know that as I sanctified the Sabbath, so I will sanctify all who will give themselves to Me.” We believe, then, it is not too much to claim that the Edenic seventh-day Sabbath stands for or embraces all that is given to the world through the gospel of Jesus Christ. As evidence, let us consider a few comparisons between the making of the Sabbath and the making of the Christian. 1. It is but reasonable to believe that from the beginning of God’s week of creation, He had in mind the sanctification of the Sabbath day. So from the beginning of God’s work for the sinner, He has in mind the sinner’s sanctification. 2. God’s first act toward the making of the Sabbath was His choice of the day—“the seventh day.” So God’s first act in making a new man is His choice of the man—“whosoever will,” “if ye will hear His voice.” 4. God rested in the day. He gave to the seventh day His sacred rest. So He enters the weary, troubled heart of the repentant sinner, and gives to that heart His sacred rest. “Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.” Matt. 11:28. “For we which have believed do enter into rest”—His rest. Heb. 4:3. 5. After resting in the day, He blessed it, “because that in it He had rested.” Gen. 2:3. So He blesses, with His holy blessing, all who accept His holy rest. Isa. 56:2; 58:13, 14; Rev. 22:14. 6. God’s closing act for the Sabbath was its sanctification. “God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it.” Gen. 2:3. To sanctify is to “set apart to a sacred use.” God sent His holy, blessed, sanctified Sabbath day on its mission around the world, and that mission was to bring holiness, blessing, and sanctification, to men and women in all the world. So God sets apart His true Sabbath-keeping people, and sends them to all the world (“Go ye into all the world.” Mark 16:15), that they may take to all men the rest, the blessing, and the sanctification that the divine Saviour gave to the Edenic Sabbath day; and that His people may, in their Sabbath-keeping, be the sign of that sanctifying power manifested by Him in the making of His Sabbath day—“the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.” “ONLY by the aid of that Spirit who in the beginning ‘was brooding upon the face of the waters,’ of that Word by whom ‘all things were made,’ of that ‘true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world,’ can the testimony of science be rightly interpreted. Only by their guidance can its deepest truths be discerned. Only under the direction of the Omniscient One shall we, in the study of His works, be enabled to think His thoughts after Him.”