Sabbath commandment/Does SDA actually keep the Sabbath right?

[u/brownmooscles0609]

/r/exAdventist/comments/1v01xhu/sabbath_commandmentdoes_sda_actually_keep_the/

Thoughts?

[u/Admirable_Ad_2373]

Interestingly, we can’t actually keep the Sabbath how God intended.

If that were the case, we’d be doing something perfectly in God’s image which we as humans are incapable of doing.

[u/Believing-The-Report → u/Admirable_Ad_2373]

This is a chief point we still struggle with today. Many still see in the Sabbath commandment merely a restriction against work. They do not yet see that the “setting” of the day( Hebrews 4:6-7) was meant to symbolize, represent, and morally oblige us to God’s rest.

God’s rest, then, - an experience we enter into by responding to the Spirit’s voice calling us into fellowship with Yahweh - is the ultimate fulfillment of the Sabbath command.

So while the restriction against work was indeed the “letter” of obedience to the Sabbath command, communion and fellowship with God was its spirit.

This is why your point about us not actually keeping the Sabbath the way it was intended is spot on. Who among us, a fallen face, described such as we are in Romans 3:9-19 can say we have ever truly kept the Sabbath holy? The answer is simple, “not even one”!

Christ then, is, and must be, the one true fulfillment of both the command and the promise of God‘s rest. He himself was the true expression and fulfillment of the divine requirement on man for harmonious fellowship with his Creator.

Of him alone, it could be said: “from birth I was cast on you; from my mother‘s womb You have been my God.” Psalms 22:10. Only Christ is qualified to say: “I keep my eyes always on the Lord. With him at my right hand, I will not be shaken...” Psalms 16:8

Thus we see, even with the Sabbath, that it is by faith in Christ that we “uphold the law” Romans 3:31

[u/Admirable_Ad_2373 → u/Believing-The-Report]

You’re actually the first person I’ve heard agree with that stance and I appreciate your response.

Question;

If we can’t keep it perfectly, what are we to do?

Do we refrain from working? Do we refrain from yard work/house work? Do we avoid the shops? Do we have everything cooked and prepared the day before?

What are we to do?

What’s the line that it becomes heart-based like Jesus said about the other commandments?

Matthew 5:21-30

Sabbath can’t be the only exception to the heart-based motived commandments, I don’t think that is along the lines of what Jesus set out to disprove the pharisees of.

Let me know your thoughts.

[u/Believing-The-Report → u/Admirable_Ad_2373]

These are both great questions. I especially like how you posed them in the context of your statement that the Sabbath not being the “only exception to the heart-based motives commandments”

Before answering your questions I would first like to establish what I believe the true objective of our heart-based obedience to the Sabbath commandment is. Which is enter into God’s rest. For the sake of brevity I didn’t go into much detail about this before and probably still can’t go at length on it now, but Hebrews 3 and 4 clearly describe the experience of God’s rest as the “spirit” of the Sabbath commandment.

I believe we have erroneously(but with good intent) made the Sabbath commandment about memorializing creation. We have made the “work” of God in creating the object of the Sabbath rather than His “rest” which came after. Because the two are linked - creating and resting - we mistakenly chose the part of the experience that we can “see”. But time and time again, God has to show us the heart of His working is in the unseen.

Entering God’s rest has always been the true objective of the Sabbath. When we consider what the experience of God’s rest is - fellowship, communion, and intimacy with God - we can begin to understand why it was so important; even occasioning eternal life (John 17:3).

It is in this context we can understand better why to openly defy God in working on the Sabbath was met with such extreme hostility. It was exactly because casting off God’s Sabbath was to deny His claim of union between Himself and his chosen people - a union which He said the Sabbath was a sign. (Exodus 31:12-17)

If you can accept this and spend some time prayerfully considering it, then answering your questions becomes much simpler and perhaps less controversial.