Introduction.
Many people say that it is impossible to keep God’s commandments, and justify this by saying that just looking at a woman with lust is breaking the seventh commandment: Thou shalt not commit adultery., (Exodus 20:14), or that one could imagine having the cabin, the car or anything else that belongs to the neighbour, and which is covered by the tenth commandment: 2 Mos 20,17 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., (Exodus 20:17).
I completely agree with those who say that it is difficult to keep the commandments, because it is difficult – at least if we try it on our own. But God is not fair when He asks us to keep the commandments if it is impossible. You should think about this argument before you continue.
In conversations with the most ardent opponents of the commandments, they eventually have to admit that God’s commandments still apply – at least nine of the ten commandments. The very litmus test that determines whether the commandments are valid or not is to ask such banal questions as: A) is it okay to have other gods than God the Creator? … … or B) is it okay to kill your neighbour, covet your neighbour’s wife, property or whatever it may be?
Even the most ardent opponents of the commandments, those who claim that the law, which is God’s ten commandments, was nailed to the cross, will answer that we cannot do this. If you ask why, they will answer that the commandments, which they so firmly claim were nailed to the cross with Jesus and therefore no longer apply, say that we should not have other gods, and that we should not kill or covet any worldly things that our neighbour has or owns. Understand it who can.
During such discussions about the commandments, it quickly becomes very clear that nine of the ten commandments that God gave to mankind are still valid. Furthermore, it becomes even more clear that there is a strong unwillingness to keep God’s fourth commandment, the Sabbath commandment. The commandment that the Catholic Church has changed, indeed completely broken, because this commandment shows us who the Creator is.
As we all know, there are many different ways to approach God’s Ten Commandments. Some say that God’s Ten Commandments are no longer valid because we live under the new covenant, and some says that all of God’s Ten Commandments were nailed to the cross with Jesus. Others claim that Jesus changed the Sabbath and moved it from the last day of the week, our Saturday, to the first day of the week, Sunday. Still others stubbornly claim that the Sabbath is a Jewish invention, and that they had no concept of the Sabbath until they had received God’s Ten Commandments when they were at Sinai. Then there are some who keep God’s Sabbath as it is prescribed in the Bible, both in the Old Testament and in the New Testament.
If we go to the creation story in Genesis 2:2-3, we find this text: 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.
Then we can look at what God’s fourth commandment looks like in Exodus 20:8-11: 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.
Is there anyone who cannot see the connection between these two passages? Then it is because of prejudice, and that those who do not see the connection between Genesis 2:2-3 and Exodus 20:8-11 do not bother to study the Bible on their own, but accept what is preached in their churches without investigating the matter.
For my own part, I can only say that as a former atheist I could easily have been influenced by the pastors of my church and what they preach from the pulpits and the like, but I have always taken notes during the sermons and investigated the matter by studying the Bible afterwards. A little story in that connection.
When I was newly baptized I used to ask one of our pastors questions about what I considered to be problems in the Bible. He willingly answered my questions without giving me a concrete answer, but he led me on the right track so that I could find the right answer on my own. I have always loved to study and write, and I soon began to write down what I found of explanations in the Bible based on the help I received from my pastor.
After a while I took up the question of Armageddon and asked my pastor what this could mean. This time he gave a more concrete answer, and when I used this answer as the basis for further study I slowly but surely began to have problems, despite following the advice my pastor gave me. My studies eventually came to a complete halt, and I was getting nowhere. No matter what I did, I was stuck. If I tried to go back to where I started, I was stuck.
Then one night I had a dream. We all dream every night, but I never remember what I dreamed when I wake up, with two exceptions. The one exception came that night. I was out walking on a long plain, and in front of me was a man, he was so far ahead that I couldn’t see who it was. I was in unfamiliar terrain and since it seemed that the man was familiar with the area, I wanted to ask him which way I should go. But the faster I walked, the faster he went. Finally we came to a downhill slope, and I followed the man who was in front. At the bottom was a huge rock, and when this man got there he had to jump off the rock. I followed him down to the rock and saw that if I jumped off I would never be able to get back up. I was at a loss as to what to do and stood on the rock.
The man I had been following continued to walk down and down, and when he realized that I had not jumped down, he turned around, and then I saw his face. It was my pastor, whom I had used as a support in my studies. I was stunned.
When I woke up, I remembered the dream and it was clear to me that if I had followed this pastor further and jumped off the rock I was standing on, I would have been lost. I decided not to consult him again, and from that day on I could continue with my studies without problems.
Why do I tell this story? It is to show that we should not blindly trust what others say from pulpits, in other contexts, or blindly trust the various doctrines of each individual church. Everything must be examined with the Bible because it is the only guideline we should follow in our search for truth.
Many people are probably surprised that I say this. I often quote Ellen G. White and her writings, but these writings are not in place of the Bible, but to help us understand the Bible better. Ellen G. White herself said that everyone had to check her writings against the Bible.
Those of you who have read what I have written about the Sabbath before will probably remember much of what is written here. This post is not exactly the same as what I have written before because new and different information has been added.
All Bible texts are from the King James Version 1611/1769 unless otherwise stated.
God’s Ten Commandments.
Back to the commandments, and for the record, these are God’s Ten Commandments, as we find in Exodus 20:3-17:
1. commandment: Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
2. commandment: Thou shalt not make unto thee any 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: 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.
3. commandment: 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.
4. commandment: 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.
5. commandment: Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.
6. commandment: Thou shalt not kill.
7. commandment: Thou shalt not commit adultery.
8. commandment: Thou shalt not steal.
9. commandment: Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.
10. commandment: 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.
For comparison, I am pasting in the Catholic Church’s Ten Commandments taken from:
https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/ten-commandments-10336
1. commandment: I AM THE LORD THY GOD: THOU SHALT NOT HAVE STRANGE GODS BEFORE ME.
2. commandment: THOU SHALL NOT TAKE THE NAME OF THE LORD THY GOD IN VAIN.
3. commandment: KEEP THE SABBATH HOLY.
4. commandment: HONOUR THY FATHER AND THY MOTHER.
5. commandment: THOU SHALT NOT KILL.
6. commandment: THOU SHALT NOT COMMIT ADULTERY.
7. commandment: THOU SHALT NOT STEAL.
8. commandment: THOU SHALT NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS AGAINST THY NEIGHBOR.
9. commandment: THOU SHALT NOT COVET THY NEIGHBOR’S WIFE.
10. commandment: THOU SHALT NOT COVET THY NEIGHBOR’S GOODS.
As you can see from the text, the Catholic Church has removed the second commandment of God in its entirety. This is the commandment that prohibits the worship of images, relics, statues and people. The reason why the Catholic Church has removed this commandment is obvious, it is because worshipping such things is a part of the pagan tradition of the catholic church. The third commandment of God has become the second commandment in the catechism. Furthermore, the fourth commandment of God has been rearranged beyond recognition and made the third commandment. And the tenth commandment of God has been divided in two so that the pope’s ten commandments also consist of ten commandments.
If we go back to God’s fourth commandment, we see that the Sabbath as an institution was established already at creation, on the seventh day of the creation week when God blessed the seventh day of the week and sanctified it. Here I must clarify that the seventh day of the week, the Sabbath, is the day we call Saturday in English. On January 1, 1973, the calendar in large parts of the Western world was changed so that Monday is listed as the first day of the week instead of Sunday, and Sunday as the seventh day instead of Saturday.
The fact that the Sabbath was established at creation should alone defeat such vicarious arguments as that the Sabbath is a Jewish invention. Jew or Jewish are expressions that derives from the name of Judah, and this expression was not used until after Judah was born. Judah was Abraham’s great-grandson, and Jacob’s fourth son.
It says in Genesis 2:3 the following: 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 that arises is why it is specified so clearly in this verse that God blessed the seventh day and made it holy. Let us first look at the last part of this verse which says because that in it he had rested … … Now it is not that God gets tired or weary like us humans, but He had finished the creation and wanted to spend His time with the people He had created. After creation, God wanted an intimate and loving relationship with the people He had created, and He still wants that to this day.
Then we have to look at the word sanctified: It is not just anyone who can make something or someone holy. Only God can do that, not me, not you, not even the pope can make someone or something holy. It does not matter what the individual pope says about the matter, if it conflicts with the word of God, it is a lie. In Leviticus 20:26 the Lord says the following: And ye shall be holy unto me: for I the LORD [am] holy, and have severed you from [other] people, that ye should be mine. Here it says that God’s people are to be holy precisely because God, who is holy, has separated them from the world, and with this He has sanctified them. Only God’s presence can sanctify an object, a day or a person. This is an eternal arrangement and applies just as much in our time as when the Sabbath was instituted at creation and will apply as long as the earth exists as it is today.
But the resistance to the commandments, at least God’s fourth commandment, is incredibly great among Christians in general. In many of my conversations with other Christians about the commandments, and especially the Sabbath commandment, I am often asked if it is so important which day of the week we keep holy, as long as we keep holy one day each week. Actually a stupid question, because when I answer that if it’s not important to you which day of the week you keep holy, you might as well keep God’s Sabbath, the seventh day of the week – our Saturday – holy, then I don’t get any clear answers, just some guttural sounds in an attempt to save themselves from an unbearable situation they have put themselves in.
I therefore conclude that Christians generally believe that it is immaterial which day you keep holy if you keep the Sabbath holy, but if you keep Sunday holy, then this is such an essential day for the fallen church family that it simply must be kept. This despite the fact that God Himself when He created blessed and sanctified the seventh day, which He has never done with any of the other six days of the week.
In the beginning, I mentioned a claim that is often used by those who hold Sunday as the Sabbath day, that it is a day of rest given to the Jews, and that the Sabbath was first given to Israel when they came to Sinai, it falls on its own unreasonableness. History tells us that before Israel came to Sinai, they were given manna to eat, and with the manna came a commandment. You shall gather a double portion on the sixth day of the week, Friday, because God would not give them manna on the seventh day of the week, Saturday. Yet many went out to find manna on Saturday, and God asked Moses the following question: How long refuse ye to keep my commandments and my laws? (Exodus 16:28) A timely question, because during the time Israel was in Egypt they had forgotten God’s laws, and the Sabbath commandment was broken. When they then break the Sabbath commandment to find manna, it is not surprising that God asks, «How long refuse ye to keep my commandments and my laws».
But what does God really want to do for us and with us if we keep God’s Sabbath? Does God want to give us a day that will be a burden for us, or does God want to give us a day filled with joy and blessings?
With this blessing and sanctification of the Sabbath, God tells us that He wants to meet His faithful people in a special way on this day to bless them and sanctify them. And how does the Bible characterize God’s faithful people? In Revelation 12:17 it is said of them that they: keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ … // … and in Revelation 14:12 it is said that they: keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.
By all means, we can and not least should worship God every day, but there is only one day and only this one day that God has blessed and sanctified. That should tell us how important this is to God. More than 400 times expressions and words describing the Sabbath are used in the Bible, these are Sabbath in all forms and inflections, the Lord’s day, the Lord’s holy day and other words and expressions that reflect the Sabbath or the Lord’s [holy] day. In other words, the Sabbath is so important to God that He has mentioned it more than 400 times in the Bible. It was and still is so important to God that He blessed the seventh day and made it holy, which He has not done with any other day.
Other arguments they give for avoiding keeping one of God’s Ten Commandments is what Paul says in Colossians 2:16: Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of a holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath [days].
If no other commandment has been abolished, then at least this verse shows that the Sabbath commandment has been abolished, as many Christians claim, either because Jesus Himself abolished the Sabbath, or because one of His disciples did so. Here the argument is as vicarious as the one we saw earlier, when they say that no one should judge anyone in matters of Sabbaths. The Greek word for Sabbath is sa’bbaton, and in Colossians 2:16 it is inflected in the plural – sabba’tôn.
Sabba’tôn can refer to either a true plural form of the Greek sa’bbaton, or a transliteration of the Aramaic shabbata’, a singular form. Therefore, sa’bbaton, although the word refers to a grammatical plural, can often be used in the singular. Either form can be used here, for the interpretation of the passage does not depend on whether the reading is “sabbaths” or “sabbath.” The type of Sabbath that sabba’tôn refers to comes from the expression that is a shadow of things to come (Colossians 2:17). The weekly Sabbath is also a memorial of the creation that occurred at the beginning of earth’s history (Genesis 2:2-3; Exodus 20:8-11).
Therefore, the Sabbaths that Paul speaks of in Colossians 2:16 cannot be types* or shadows of what was to come in Christ, and which point forward to Him and His sacrificial death on the cross, referring to the weekly Sabbath designated by the fourth commandment, but the word sabbaths points to the ceremonial feast days, which were also called Sabbaths because the people had rest from their labours on those days. All of these ceremonial Sabbath days were fulfilled in Christ’s life and death on the cross.
* We must remember that the Bible is a typological book where an event that we call a type points forward to a corresponding event or antitype at a later time. Type and antitype were something that were introduced only after sin had entered the world through Adam and Eve’s disobedience. All animal sacrifices in the Old Testament were all types of Jesus’ death on the cross, and Jesus’ death on the cross is therefore the antitype of the animal sacrifices.
Those who interpret Colossians 2:16 to be the weekly Sabbath completely overlook what this verse is about, and this, as said, comes out in the next verse: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body [is] of Christ, (Colossians 2:17). This verse, Colossians 2:17, is therefore the key to understanding verse 16. All the elements Paul lists in verse 16 are shadows, or types, that symbolized the reality that came in Christ. A shadow has no substance or value in itself; it is an image (type) of something substantial. The Old Testament ceremonies or feast days were only shadows of the heavenly realities. The life, ministry, and kingdom of Christ are the reality. What Paul refers to in Colossians chapter 2 were only shadows.
Others claim that the fourth commandment is not mentioned in the New Testament. Well, such an argument is also an assumed argument all the time James says the following: For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one [point], he is guilty of all, (James 2:10). The law in question here is God’s Ten Commandments, and it contains the Sabbath commandment, as is well known. So even though the Sabbath commandment is not specifically mentioned in words, it is covered by this verse. In the New Testament, there are at least 57 verses that relate directly to the Sabbath commandment and what is and is not allowed to do on this day, including in connection with the death of Jesus. In addition, there are verses such as James 2:10 and similar verses.
The fact that the Sabbath commandment is not mentioned directly in the New Testament is probably related to the fact that it was not a matter of discussion whether the Sabbath was a valid law for the Jews, not that the Sabbath had been abolished by Jesus.
By the time of Jesus, the religious leaders in Jerusalem had made more than 600 different additional laws to the Sabbath commandment to “help” the people keep the Sabbath properly. One of these additional laws concerns how far one could walk on the Sabbath. The following is taken from https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/484235/jewish/How-far-am-I-allowed-to-walk-on-Shabbat.htm: Jewish law sets the maximum walking range from one’s city to 2,000 cubits (3,049.5 feet, 0.596 miles (960 meters). [However, this measurement starts 70 2/3 cubits (112.24 ft.) from the city limits.] Practically speaking, this means that you may not walk a straight line more than .598 miles (3161.74 ft.) in any direction in the wilds outside your city limits.
As we see, one could not walk more than a certain distance on the Sabbath according to what this additional law determined. But the religious leaders also made an additional law to this additional law! which said that if you placed an object you owned, for example a chair, at the place where the 960 meters stopped, you could walk 960 meters further, because the chair was considered part of your home.
An orthodox Jew cannot take the elevator alone on the Sabbath, as it is considered work to press the button to call the elevator, or to indicate the floor you are going to. But he can stand and wait until another person comes who can press the button! Another hopeless additional law is that they must use two knives when they eat on the Sabbath, one for butter, and one for all other food, because there is no way to know whether the milk used for the butter was produced on a Sabbath, therefore you cannot use the same knife for butter as for meat, for example.
The additional laws that were added to the Sabbath commandment made the Sabbath appear to be a burden instead of a joy. Instead of celebrating the Sabbath with joy, the religious leaders made the day a burden with all these strange regulations. Jesus dealt with this forcefully many times, including in Matthew chapter 23 where He rebukes the religious leaders.
Jesus says to them the following:
For 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). In reference to all the strange additional laws in general.
But woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye neither go in [yourselves], neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in, (Matthew 23:13). This is the result of the legalistic laws that the scribes and Pharisees burdened God’s Ten Commandments with.
So no matter how we turn and turn this around, the Sabbath will always be valid. We have Jesus’ own word for that. Just look at what He says in Matthew 5:17-18: Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 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.
What is Jesus saying? He says that He will not destroy the law, but fulfill it, and then in the sense of making the law clearer to people, making the content of the law clearer. There is a common misunderstanding of the law’s fulfillment meaning the end of the law.
And in verses 21 and 22 He elaborates on what He means by fulfilling the law.
Verse 21: Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment.
Verse 22: But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.
Here we see that God’s 6th commandment says, Thou shalt not kill and whosoever shall kill will be in danger of the judgment. This is the law and the commandment. What Jesus does now is to fulfill, or fill up, the law and the commandment by adding that whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire. How can this be read as if the law has been abolished? The sixth commandment is thus fulfilled by what verse 22 says. To be angry with your brother without cause, to call your brother Raka (worthless) or to call him a fool is as serious as killing a person.
Jesus fulfills, that is, fills up the seventh commandment in the same way: The seventh commandment in Exodus 20:14 says: Thou shalt not commit adultery. About this commandment, Jesus says in Matthew 5:27-28: Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery: But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. Once again, the meaning of the commandment is expanded and Jesus clarifies this by saying that if one looks at a woman with lust, one has already committed adultery.
And as if this were not enough, he adds in verses Matthew 5:31-32 another aspect of committing adultery: It hath been said, Whosoever shall put away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorcement: But I say unto you, That whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causeth her to commit adultery: and whosoever shall marry her that is divorced committeth adultery. Jesus admits that it is lawful to divorce, and Moses required that everyone who divorced his wife, for any reason, should give her a certificate of divorce. But Jesus tightens this up and fills out the meaning of the law by saying that the only reason for divorce is fornication and adds that the man who marries a divorced woman commits adultery, that is, commits fornication.
The reason why so many Christians believe that Jesus in Matthew 5:17 says that the law has been abolished is related to the way the Greek words are translated into Norwegian and into all other languages. Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. The Greek word that is translated fulfill in Norwegian is plêro’ô (conjugated in aorist, active, infinitive and written plêrô’sai) is translated as fill, fulfill, complete, make perfect. What Jesus did with the law was to make it perfect, not abolish it as many believe.
I have two English versions that express this better than most other translations: God’s Word Translation says: Don’t ever think that I came to set aside Moses’ Teachings or the Prophets. I didn’t come to set them aside but to make them come true … // … and God’s News Translation says: Do not think that I have come to do away with the Law of Moses and the teachings of the prophets. I have not come to do away with them, but to make their teachings come true.
Others again say that we are no longer under the law, but under grace. This is a strange argument – … simply a weird argument, and we will look at this shortly. First, I would like to say that grace is something we all need, and that there is a certain relationship between the law and the grace; the law and the salvation; and the grace and the salvation. These three, law, grace, and salvation, are closely related, and I will try to show how.