Matthew 5:13-15 “You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people's feet. You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”
I confess in the past I've thought, "Why so much ado about the Sabbath?" In the Israelite community, if a man intentionally broke it, he was to be put death. Those who still keep the Sabbath today seem to fixate on it, and it can be hard for those who've never kept it to understand why it's so important. Why should not working on a day matter so much? Why would God kill someone who rebelliously broke it?
When you begin to study the Sabbath in earnest to answer all your questions about it, you'll discover two notable things in the scriptures.
The first notable thing is that the Sabbath is actually the most repeated commandment in the Torah (the first five books of the Bible). I'm talking about laws, not commands made to individuals (like God telling Abraham to leave his homeland or an angel telling somone not to be afraid). I discovered this while I was writing out all the commands of God with their verse references. You can read what I wrote here. I was quite shocked when I saw just how many times the Sabbath was commanded. I believe the two commandments that come after it in being most repeated are about idolatry and not consuming blood.
We all know which two commandments in the Bible are the most important, and it's these two commandments that every other commandment is categorized by. Sabbath keeping, not committing idolatry, and not consuming blood all fall into the first category of loving God with all your heart, soul, and mind, so that makes Sabbath keeping pretty important. Some preachers today try to minimalize the Sabbath by saying Jesus didn't command it like He did the other commandments, thus it was one of the discontinued commandments. It amazes me over how no-where in the Bible does it say some of the law would become "outdated" (it says exactly the opposite), yet preachers will adamantly teach this, dividing the law into categories (it was John Calvin and a few other guys who started all this), and picking out all the commands that they believe are no longer necessary. How is this any different from the Catholic church saying they have authority over the scriptures and can change God's law by that authority?
Sabbath keeping, despite being the fourth commandment and the most repeated one, is one of the first to go, with detailed explanations over why it is no longer necessary for us to rest on the Sabbath. You won't find any such decree in the Bible, however. Tithing, on the other hand, is only mentioned a few times in the Torah and isn't even one of the ten commandments, yet it is clung to by most church preachers. I have heard many teach that you are stealing from God if you don't tithe. Interesting. In the Torah, tithing was to provide for those who had no inheritance in the land, the Levites, and for the widows and orphans. This means tithing would have fallen in the second category of the two most important commands - love your neighbor as yourself. Somehow, tithing has been elevated among most churches today as a law to show you love God with all your heart, soul, and mind. I never had the guts to ask when being pressured to tithe, whatever happened to the law being "nailed to the cross" as you so teach?
The next notable thing you'll find when you study about the Sabbath is that it was an ETERNAL COVENANT between God and His people. Wow. Isn't it incredible that this eternal covenant is the first law most preachers have removed? People say, "Oh yes, that's exactly it. It's because it was only eternal for the Jews." The Enemy would like you to think that you can't become an "Israelite" so that you don't have to obey God. Dispensationalism teaches the church replaced Israel, yet this "new Israel" church doesn't have to keep any Israelite laws, while on the opposite extreme, many modern churches teach that a new body was formed by Christ and stands alongside Israel, almost like there are two brides of Christ - Israel and the church. No where does the Bible teach of a new Israel taking place of the old, nor of a new bride. It was always Israel and God from the very beginning. If you want to be considered one of God's people, you have to JOIN Israel (not replace). This means you have to walk in covenant with God and you show that you are doing that by keeping His laws. The "new" covenant that Jesus brought in was a reaffirming of the old eternal one and included all gentiles who turned to Him, allowing them to become part of Israel and SHARE in all of her blessings. This means they are expected to walk just as the Israelites walked. They are ISRAELITES. You'll find a lot of confusing scriptures in the New Testament that seem to contradict keeping God's laws, but this sadly is because preachers have taught things to be interpreted a certain way for hundreds of years, making it accepted doctrine. This "lawless" ideology has actually grown far worse even in the last twenty years. Then too poor translations and lack of contextual knowledge has further abased the importance of God's law.
The only ones who are allowed into the Holy City in the millennial kingdom are those who keep His commandments (Revelation 22:14 and watch out which translation you use to look this one up). The city has twelve gates for the twelve tribes of Israel. There is no gate for the gentiles, because if you consider yourself a gentile in that time, then you are actually not part of the family of God. God is using Israel to bring many nations to Himself. We must become children of Abraham. Throughout the Old Testament, God affirms that any foreigner (gentile) who joins himself to Israel and walks in His ways, keeping His Sabbath, he will share in the inheritance of Israel. How incredible is that!
The Sabbath is like a sign of your identity. Preachers are right in one way that the Sabbath is only for Israelites. All who keep the Sabbath are showing who they are and who their faith is in - God Almighty, the God of the Israelites. It puts into action the covenant we have made with Him. So, if you disregard the validity of the Sabbath today, it's kind of like saying God doesn't see the importance of keeping eternal law, as though He stuttered when He repeated the importance of his Sabbath over and over. As though He didn't repeat the command in the New Testament because He changed His mind and decided everything He said before was not important anymore.
Please don't exclude yourself from being one of His people by saying you aren't part of Israel and that you don't need to keep His laws. These laws don't grant us our salvation, but they do show that we love God and desire to be holy and set apart from the nations who do things their own way. I believe most Christians who don't keep the Sabbath do it in ignorance. Their heart's desire is in the right place, but the lie of the Enemy has made them believe they have not been grafted into the only nation of God that will be redeemed by Him - Israel.
To recap: One, the Sabbath is the most repeated command in the Torah and is one of the ways we show we love God with all our hearts, souls, and minds. And two, the Sabbath is a testimony of the covenant God has made between Himself and His people. It sets us apart from the nations. It is the outward symbol of submission to God and proclaims your belief and faith that you are one of His peculiar people. This is why the Sabbath is so important, and I've personally seen how God uses it as one of the first things to remove the blindfold from Christians who have been deceived into believing all manners of lies taught in modern churches.
1 Peter 2:9,10 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
John 14:15 “If you love me, you will keep my commandments."
1 John 2:3-6 And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. Whoever says “I know him” but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him: whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.
So, are you an adopted son, or are you still a slave to the world, the nations?
Galatians 4:6,7 And because you are sons, God sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba! Father! So that you no more are a slave, but a son, and if a son, also an heir of God through Christ.
Exodus 31:16,17 Therefore the people of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, observing the Sabbath throughout their generations, as a covenant forever. It is a sign forever between me and the people of Israel that in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed.
Exo 31:13 “You are to speak to the people of Israel and say, ‘Above all you shall keep my Sabbaths, for this is a sign between me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you.
Isaiah 56:3-8 Let not the foreigner who has joined himself to the Lord say, “The Lord will surely separate me from his people”... the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord, to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord, and to be his servants, everyone who keeps the Sabbath and does not profane it, and holds fast my covenant - these I will bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer; their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be accepted on my altar; for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.” The Lord God, who gathers the outcasts of Israel, declares, “I will gather yet others to him besides those already gathered.”
Ephesians 2:11-19 Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands, remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ ... So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.
Very nice. I like how all the scriptures were brought together. We are indeed Israel!