Did Christ Keep The Sabbath? 2012_05

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Hi J____,

Thank you for your questions, and thank you for standing firm on the Word of God in the face of all this pressure you are facing from the modern day Judaizers there.
O. K., that verse I said was Luk 4:49 concerning the blood of all the prophets from Abel to Zacharias being required of this generation is actually Luk 11:49-51. Forgive me for making that mistake.

Luk 11:49 Therefore also said the wisdom of God, I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they shall slay and persecute:
Luk 11:50 That the blood of all the prophets, which was shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this generation;
Luk 11:51 From the blood of Abel unto the blood of Zacharias, which perished between the altar and the temple: verily I say unto you, It shall be required of this generation.

You have asked me to comment on whole chapters which your Jewish friends have given you, and I cannot do that verse by verse simply because I do not have the time to do that. But I did read the various scriptures you listed, and I think I see what their point is. If I have missed the point, please let me know. Here in Isa 24 we have the scriptural basis for the judgment of the great harlot of Rev 17-18.
“Spiritual Sodom” is “that great city where our Lord was crucified. Isa 1 is “concerning Judah and Jerusalem” (verse 1), and this is what the spirit calls Judah and Jerusalem there in Isa 1:

Isa 1:10 Hear the word of the LORD, ye rulers of Sodom; give ear unto the law of our God, ye people of Gomorrah.
Isa 1:21 How is the faithful city become an harlot! it was full of judgment; righteousness lodged in it; but now murderers.

So it is the spirit of “Judah and Jerusalem” which to this very day constitutes the “great harlot” and “that great city wherein our Lord was crucified.
Now what I saw in both Isa 24 and in Dan 7 which I understand to be the point your Jewish friends are making is:

Isa 24:5 The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant.

and…

Dan 7:25 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.

Here is that section of Dan 7:

Dan 7:23 Thus 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.
Dan 7:24 And 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.
Dan 7:25 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.
Dan 7:26 But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end.
Dan 7:27 And 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.

Your Jewish friends are confusing orthodox Christianity, in which we have all had our part, with the doctrine of Christ. Christ did not come to change the sabbath from Saturday to Sunday as the Catholics have done and as the Protestants have continued doing. He came instead to fulfill every jot and tittle of the law.

Mat 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,

But Christ is the fulfilling of every type and shadow of the law:

Heb 10:1 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.

Christ is our passover, and He has fulfilled the passover so that we need never again offer a calf or a lamb for our sins.

Heb 9:19 For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and of goats, with water, and scarlet wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book, and all the people,
Heb 9:20 Saying, This is the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto you.
Heb 9:21 Moreover he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle, and all the vessels of the ministry.
Heb 9:22 And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission.
Heb 9:23 It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves [ you and me] with better sacrifices than these.

Christ is our ‘blood and water’:

Joh 19:34 But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water.

So He is also fulfilling the days of unleavened bread in our lives by living His life within us and granting that we can now purge out the sin that was dominating our lives and granting us that we die daily to that sin by destroying the man of sin within us. In Christ we now keep that feast of unleavened bread “with the unleavened bread of sincerity and Truth”.

1Co 5:7 Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us:
1Co 5:8 Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

That is the bread, and Christ is that passover, and the days of unleavened bread are now kept with “the unleavened bread of sincerity and Truth 24/7, 365 days a year.
In the same way Christ has fulfilled the day of Pentecost by founding His church and coming to us via His Father’s spirit as that day portended in the law of Moses.

Act 2:1 And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.
Act 2:2 And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting.
Act 2:3 And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them.

He has fulfilled the feast of trumpets by blowing the seven trumpets within our lives and beginning judgment at His own house with the fire from the altar of God in heaven. All who are the temple of God will keep the things written in the revelation of Jesus Christ, including the seven trumpets of that revelation:

Rev 1:3 Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.
Rev 8:1 And when he had opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour.
Rev 8:2 And I saw the seven angels which stood before God; and to them were given seven trumpets.
Rev 8:3 And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given unto him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne.
Rev 8:4 And the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angel’s hand.
Rev 8:5 A nd the angel took the censer, and filled it with fire of the altar, and cast it into the earth: and there were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake.
Rev 8:6 And the seven angels which had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound.

Trumpets warn of the fiery judgment of God’s word, which is now on the house of God:

1Pe 4:12 Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you:
1Pe 4:13 But rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ’s sufferings; that, when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy.
1Pe 4:17 For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?

Christ has fulfilled the day of atonement by reconciling us to God and atoning for our sins once and for all time:

Rom 5:11 And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement.

Finally, Christ is also our feast of tabernacles and our last great day, because it is through Him and His anointed that rivers of living waters of mercy will flow to all men of all time:

Joh 7:37 I n 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.
Joh 7:38 He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.
Rom 11:30 For as ye in times past have not believed God, yet have now obtained mercy through their unbelief:
Rom 11:31 Even so have these also now not believed, that through your mercy they also may obtain mercy.

So it is true, Christ did not come to change times or seasons, but He did come to fulfill them all. And He also come to change the priesthood and the law and to hold both to a far higher bar than either had ever been before. Both are now spiritual, and that had never been so before. We are plainly told of this reformation, and it was this reformation that the Judaizers of Paul’s day and of today refuse to acknowledge:

Heb 9:10 Which [ Old Testament offerings, according to the law] stood only in meats and drinks, and divers washings, and carnal ordinances, imposed on them until the time of reformation.

Christ is that great reformer, and He has fulfilled every Old Testament type and shadow by dying for our sins and by fulfilling every jot and tittle of the law of Moses in doing so:

Heb 7:12 For the priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of the law.

“The law of Christ” (Gal 6:2), also called “the law of the spirit” (Rom 8:2), is now far superior to the law of Moses, which was a “carnal commandment” for a very carnal nation. The good that comes of “the law of Christ” and “the law of the spirit” is much better than anything that could come of the “carnal commandment” law which Christ had given to Moses:

Heb 9:11 But Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building;
Heb 10:1 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.

“Good things” must not be confused with ‘easy things’. Every “but I say unto you” word or reformation which Christ uttered in Matthew chapters 5 and 6 is not easy to do. It is not easy to love one’s enemies. It is not easy to turn the other cheek, and it is not easy to refrain from fornication in one’s heart.
Neither is it easy to acknowledge and live a life which acknowledges that Christ came and fulfilled every jot and tittle of the law of Moses, including the weekly sabbath. It is one of the very hardest things we are confronted with in following in His footsteps:

1Pe 2:21 For even hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps:

Your Jewish friends point out all the verses which mention the sabbath as if Christ were observing the sabbath when nothing could be further from the Truth.

Luk 4:16 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.

There is no denying that Christ was “made of a woman, made under the law” until the day of His baptism and the beginning of His reforming ministry. So of course it was ‘His custom” to go “into the synagogue on the sabbath day”. But being “under the law” was before His ministry began. Until that time He submitted Himself to His very Jewish parents:

Luk 2:51 And he went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them: but his mother kept all these sayings in her heart.
Luk 2:52 And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man.

Just like each of us, Christ was first “under the law” when He was a child.

Gal 4:3 Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world:
Gal 4:4 But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law,
Gal 4:5 To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.

But Christ had not come to this earth to remain “under the law… under the elements of the world… keeping days, months, times, and years”:

Gal 4:9 But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage?
Gal 4:10 Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years.
Gal 4:11 I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labour in vain.

When Christ was baptized by John, He was no longer a child. In Mat 12 Christ, who was of the tribe of Judah and was neither a priest nor a Levite, openly confessed to “doing that which was unlawful for him to do” and “profaning the sabbath” simply because “In this place is one greater than the temple, [ and] the Son of Man is Lord even of the sabbath day”. Christ made no appeal to the law of Moses to justify the actions of His disciples. There is not one word about properly obeying the commandments concerning the sabbath here at all:

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.
Mat 12:2 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.
Mat 12:3 But he said unto them, Have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungred, and they that were with him;
Mat 12:4 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?
Mat 12:5 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?
Mat 12:6 But I say unto you, That in this place is one greater than the temple.
Mat 12:7 But if ye had known what this meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless.
Mat 12:8 For the Son of man is Lord even of the sabbath day.

Then just for all of us who, at our own appointed time are where your Jewish friends still are, we are plainly told by the holy spirit that Christ “had broken the sabbath [ and] said that God was His Father”:

Joh 5:17 But Jesus answered them, My Father worketh hitherto, and I work [ on the sabbath].
Joh 5:18 Therefore the Jews sought the more to kill him, because he not only had broken the sabbath, but said also that God was his Father, making himself equal with God.

The holy spirit did not inspire the apostle to tell us ‘they thought He had broken the sabbath’. We are rather told that His Father works on the sabbath, and Christ did too, and therefore the Jews sought to kill Him.
Those who are given ‘eyes that see’ will notice that the apostle John never refers to the Jewish festivals as the festivals of God. He actually goes to great lengths to distance himself from that entire economy by calling them “a feast of the Jews” or “the Jews feast…”

Joh 5:1 After this there was a feast of the Jews; and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
Joh 6:4 And the passover, a feast of the Jews, was nigh.
Joh 7:2 Now the Jews’ feast of tabernacles was at hand.

Christ’s law is impossible for the flesh, but if Christ is living within us, He will strengthen us to do all things:

Php 4:13 I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.

But one thing Christ will not strengthen you to do is to “observe days, months, times, and years”.
“The ends of the world” have been upon God’s people ever since the days of Christ:

1Co 10:11 Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.

That being the case, we can expect the whole orthodox Christian world to “depart from the faith” in which our Lord walked.

1Ti 4:1 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;
1Ti 4:2 Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron;

It is not easy to follow in the steps of our Lord, but if He is in you, that is what you will do.
It is my prayer that these verses will give you the clarity you are seeking. The paper The Law of Moses Versus The Law of The Spirit deals with all of this in great depth. I hope you will be edified by all these verses. If you still need anything clarified please feel free to write back.
I will take this opportunity to encourage you to watch our weekly Sunday 11 A. M. ET Bible studies on ustream, and to join us in the review of those studies at 12:30, right after the studies are completed.
Your brother who seeks only to be a “helper of your joy”

2Co 1:24 Not for that we have dominion over your faith, but are helpers of your joy: for by faith ye stand.

Mike

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