Your ShelfYour Projects

THE LAW OF GOD

3%

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Aug 19, 1886

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 12, No. 32.

Read the full edition

THE LAW OF GOD.

Sabbath in the New Testament.

(Lesson 20.—Sabbath, September 4.)
1. How DID Jesus regard the commandments?
“If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love.” John 15 : 10.
2. Then must he not have kept the Sabbath? —He must; for the keeping of the Sabbath is enjoined in the law.
3. What direct evidence have we that Christ kept the Sabbath?
“And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up; and, as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up for to read.” Luke 4 : 16.
4. What is the meaning of the word “custom”?—“Frequent repetition of the same act; way of acting; ordinary manner; habitual practice; usage.”
5. How can people show themselves to be Christians?
“He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked.” 1 John 2 : 6.
6. What apostle is specially noted as being a follower of Christ in respect to the Sabbath?
“Now when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where was a synagogue of the Jews; and Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three Sabbath days reasoned with them out of the Scriptures.” Acts 17 : 1, 2.
7. Can you cite other instances of this practice by Paul and his fellow-laborers?
“But when they departed from Perga, they came to Antioch in Pisidia, and went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and sat down.” “And when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles besought that these words might be preached to them the next Sabbath.” “And the next Sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God.” “And he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks.” Acts 13 : 14, 42, 44; 18 : 4.
8. While at Antioch in Pisidia, what did Paul say of the relation of the Jews to the prophecies concerning Christ?
“For they that dwell at Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they knew him not, nor yet the voices of the prophets which are read every Sabbath day, they have fulfilled them in condemning him.” Acts 13 : 27.
9. How often did he say these prophecies were read?—Every Sabbath day.
10. What did James say on the same subject?
“For Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every Sabbath day.” Acts 15 : 21.
11. What do these texts prove?—They prove that in the New Testament no day is recognized as the Sabbath except the day on which the Jews habitually worshiped. The regular reading of the Scriptures in the synagogues was only on the seventh day of the week, and since that is said to have been “every Sabbath day,” it shows that no day but the seventh day is recognized as the Sabbath.
12. When the prophets and apostles wrote the Bible, by whose authority did they write?
“For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man; but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.” 2 Peter 1 : 21.
13. Then what is indicated by the fact that the seventh day, both in the Old Testament and in the New, is always spoken of as the Sabbath?—That the Spirit of God attests that the seventh day is the Sabbath. Christians must call a thing by the same name that God does.
14. After Christ had healed a man on the Sabbath day, what did he say?
“How much then is a man better than a sheep? Wherefore it is lawful to do well on the Sabbath days.” Matt. 12 : 12.
15. What does this indicate?—That Christ recognized a Sabbath law.
16. Where is the only law for the Sabbath?
“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, 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.” Ex. 20 : 8-11.
17. Why is not this commandment repeated in the New Testament?—“Express warrant is needed to warrant a change; but it is not needed to warrant a continuation. When once bidden to walk in a straight line, it does not require the successive impulse of new biddings to make us persevere in it. But it would require a new bidding to justify our going off from the line, into a track of deviation.” —Dr. Chalmers; 14th Lecture on Romans.
18. On whose authority does the Sabbath rest?
“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 : 3.
“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.” Ex. 20 : 11.
19. Why then must we expect to find no change in the Sabbath law?
“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.” James 1 : 17.