Posted on 03/18/2017 7:11:14 AM PDT by metmom
Should We Still Keep The Commandments?
If you are skeptical because of past experiences with religion, understand that religion is not the answer—a relationship with Christ is. There is a clear difference.
Religion says, “I have to follow rules.” A relationship with Christ says, “I want to follow His plan for my life.”
Religion says, “I have to go to church.” A relationship with Christ says, “I want to position myself to learn more, worship Him and benefit from fellowship.”
Religion offers a set of rituals; a relationship with Jesus offers a guiding light.
Religion is man’s attempt to find God; relationship assures us of His presence.
Many lose sight of purpose because they have “religion” and not a true relationship with Christ. They may know Scripture but they often do not apply it to their lives. As a result, their relationship with God is cold and distant.
A fatal statement, yet so common is, “I know what God’s Word says, but…” For example: I know that I shouldn’t watch certain movies or television programs, but I enjoy then. I know that I shouldn’t date her, but she’s very attractive. I know that I shouldn’t go there, but everyone is doing it. I know what the Bible says, but it doesn’t apply now. I know that I need to go to church, pray, and read God’s Word, but I’m too busy.
(Excerpt) Read more at westsidechristianfellowship.org ...
“Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days:”
—Colossians 2:16.....I know there are a lot of people around who ‘quote’ the Bible and believe everything it expounds. But what the hell does that quote mean? A guy tells me he doesn’t like liver, he doesn’t like Yuengling, he don’t believe in the Easter Bunny, and says the moon is still the old moon, and WHAT is a sabbath day?
And you have your own special calendar that is right and everyone else is wrong.
Isn’t that .... special....
It’s obvious that you’re so all fired up proud of your sabbath and law keeping to the letter of the Law but you are proud and judging others who disagree with you.
Again, do you keep ALL the law? or just the parts that you like the best?
Where is the Temple and God ordained priesthood that you avail yourself of to make the appropriate sacrifices so you can keep the feast days properly?
It was basically a statement by the Apostle Paul against the Judaizers who wanted to put the Christians back under the bondage of the Hebraic law. He was urging Christians not to let men judge them and put them back in bondage. For many in the early church, Christ wasn’t enough. For salvation they wanted to add adherence to certain aspects of Jewish law and custom (circumcision being a notable example) to faith in Christ, just as many continue to do this very day. But Christ fulfilled the law. He came to set men free. All those things required under the old law were mere types and shadows. They were things given that pictured various attributes of Christ and aspects of Christ’s work.
Salvation is by grace alone through faith in Christ alone. When we attempt to add law-keeping or good works to Christ’s atoning death on the cross we negate grace. Grace and works are antithetical.
And a sabbath day in Old Testament was a day of rest that pictured the Christian believer’s ultimate rest in Christ. A Christian lays everything down and looks to Christ alone for salvation.
Christs sacrifice on the cross meant an end to the Jewish legal system. The ceremonial laws concerning material things like ritual washing, meats and drinks were over. This was a bitter pill for the Jewish people (and especially their spiritual leaders) to swallow. They were the chosen people. There's even a verse (or two) exclaiming "All Israel shall be saved". It was even a SHOCK to them salvation was even available to the Gentiles! Things were changing. People don't always react well to change.
A day devoted to God. All people are to obey Gods laws and by that I mean the Ten Commandments which commands obedience to the 7th day Sabbath.
But there were additional sabbaths added for various reasons. Those are no longer valid. The first four of the Ten Commandments (KJV)relate to mans duty to God and the last six are mans duty to fellow mankind. It can be summed up in love God and love all mankind.
Beware the person who doesn't like Yuengling. :-)
Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.”
....yeah, I think I’ll fear and serve Him.
The narrow way *is* the Law of love. Most want to pile on the rules and play battle of the doctrines, whereas the rules naturally are followed if love is the foundation and motivation. It's all about paying attention to detail when a person loves another. Love begets diligent *observance* and the desire to be tuned in. No loving person even thinks, "Must I attend to my wife when she is ill?" or, "Does my baby need to be cuddled?"
The divine pun is that the Messiah *is* the Law, because he is the embodiment of all who God is, how God operates. God's word, rounded up into one man who simply DOes it. He shows just how to accomplish that: by his love, by his example. When people experience how this man loves them "just because", and they see how it works and the result (life from the dead zone), well it's amazingly contagious. Dead leaven of the experts, or the live leaven of the Redeemer.
Traditions are pretty difficult (almost impossible) to uproot, though, so even sitting in a pew week after week, year after year, he could go wholly unrecognized, even while being who he is completely out in the open for all to see.
God's funny.
There’s an awful lot of noise in the religious world that serve to take our eyes off the most important things. I’m a Baptist, a Calvinist, and a young Earth creationist out of biblical conviction. However, I also know that men are saved by Christ, not by a perfect understanding of doctrine. I’m not all that interested in convincing men to adopt all of my views, but I’m very interested in spreading the gospel of free grace. I want men to know Christ, the real Christ of the Bible who came to seek and save the lost, the Christ of the Bible who willingly gave His life for sinners like me. He went to that cross with my sin on His shoulders. He paid the penalty for my sin, something I couldn’t do in an eternity.
A lot of churches today simply aren’t preaching and teaching the gospel. All churches have some sort of gospel, but there’s only one that can save a man’s eternal soul. Here’s a link to a good solid explanation of that soul-saving gospel. This is a well-made short movie. I know one of the three men in the movie. He’s very hopeful many will see this little film and come to know the Lord.
Unpopular the Movie
https://youtu.be/97k4z6Qe7JM
Romans 1:16 says “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.”
quote-And you have your own special calendar that is right and everyone else is wrong.
Isn’t that .... special....
Not mine, metmom.
It’s His. And it is in His Word. Rome has counterfeited it. We tend to mock what we don’t understand, but if one is blessed to understand this, lots of Truth starts to unfold that exposes Rome.
If one is willing to seek, one can find..
I was led to one bible verse and asked, sought and knocked..
And it’s humbling, because satan deceives the whole world, and I understand that this is not readily seen.
I admit I was deceived by Rome and I was never a Roman Catholic.
But Judaism is deceived, Islam, Christianity, the whole world- just like the scriptures say.
And the calendar in the scriptures is all about Him and His Work.
His Work of Creation, Redemption, Convicting the world..
Rome can’t teach that because they ignore one day in each of the Father’s calendar months.
It is special. and it is Kingdom based. and nobody gets the glory but Him.
And that template can explain why Israelites were to circumcise their boys on the 8th Day.
And why the bible reads a little funny in Genesis 2 (or does in older versions) when it reads that God finished all His work of Creation on the 7th Day and God rested from all His work that He made on the 7th Day. A contradiction that is explained perfectly with His calendar.
And why Passover is the 14th Day and not some other day..
And why Israel had their 1st ‘Sabbath’ in the wilderness on the 22nd Day of the 2nd..
And why the 22nd Day on the 7th month is also a Sabbath..
And why Passover and Good Friday are not always on the same day..
Ezekiel 46:1 is the bible verse I asked Him about..
And I simply asked what is a New Moon day if it isn’t one of His 6 work days or His 7th Day Sabbath..
Most don’t ask that because most are okay with the way the world is run.
But He blessed my asking, seeking and knocking..
And I have been blessed to understand exactly why times and laws changing have affected people’s ability to see Truth.
I know that Good Friday means nothing to the Father or Son.
Passover(14th Day) is His 6th Day. And that is the Day the Son finished His work. Scripture confirms this- not me. His calendar reinforces it.
Because every 14th day, of every one of God’s calendar months, is a commemoration of the Son finishing His work of Redemption on the ‘6th’ work day before He rested in the tomb on the 7th Day Sabbath.
Just like every 7th Day of every one of God’s calendar months commemorates the completing of His work of Creation on the ‘6th’ work day before He rested on the ‘7th’ Day (8th Day of His calendar month) Day Sabbath.
Rome’s calendar doesn’t do that.
People are free to follow Rome, though.
They are being robbed of wisdom, understanding and knowledge of the Word and the Word Made Flesh.
The Jewish calendar is lunar based. I get that. New moons are the first of each month and so on. Then there is the seven day week which has no correlation to any known astronomical events. It stands alone. It is Gods declaration of a 7 day week. If you have something different because your decoder ring unlocked secret information . . . well good for you.
The narrow way is CHRIST, not the law.
Not any law.
The rest are details.
We cannot obey the first without doing the second. But the first must come first, lest what we do in love for our neighbor what is really not good or best for them.
Yes. While under the OT God required killing false prophets, this is not the case under the New, and killing people due to theological beliefs is thus be murder, which the 10 Commandments forbids, and yet which both Caths and Prots have done.
But the 10 Commandments are not meant to stand by themselves, but as with other commands, they were to be better or correctly understood in the light of fuller revelation, which teaches what murder is.
1 Cor. 13:13 “And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love.” Fear didn’t make the list. Sorry.
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Pagans can love. How do you love properly?...the way God wants you to love. Follow his Commandments. If you don’t then you DO have reason to fear God...despite however much “love” you claim to have.
That's a good one! "Mud" meaning what the mod calls "spitwads."
quote-The Jewish calendar is lunar based. I get that. New moons are the first of each month and so on. Then there is the seven day week which has no correlation to any known astronomical events. It stands alone. It is Gods declaration of a 7 day week. If you have something different because your decoder ring unlocked secret information . . . well good for you.
Not sure of a decoder ring, bipolar.
Just following His pattern. and watching Truth unfold.
God doesn’t have another 7 day pattern that is going on outside of His 1+6+1 pattern. That is it. That is the template in His Word.
I use Good Friday and Passover as the best example because it is a difference that pops up in different months, let along different days.. and the difference can be described as subtle.
People either believe Christ was killed on Good Friday, according to Rome; or Passover, according to Scripture. Those aren’t the same days and they may not point to the same Jesus either.
Christianity and Judaism can understand that the day after Passover is simply the weekly Sabbath.
He has that ‘baked’ into His calendar cake. That is what the 1+6+1 template teaches.
Not a special sabbath. The weekly sabbath. After 6 days of work..
But try ‘remembering that sabbath’ next month when Woden’s Days are ‘work days’ to Rome.
His Feast of Unleavened Bread(15th) and Tabernacles(15th) each begin on the 7th Day Sabbath too (1+6+1 +6+1 ).
Judaism can’t understand that today.
Christianity can, and then teach them, but they have a problem.
Their problem is that kind of Truth is a blow to Christianity, too, because they already are taught, by Rome,that Christ died on Good Friday, ignoring scripture.
The enemy is subtle..
Rome has another Jesus and another 1st importance of the gospel- not by word or deed. but simply by how they make the world tell time..
One need not have a decoder ring, but one simply needs to have the scriptures, and test everything they’ve been taught- even the no brainer stuff like, ‘is saturday the sabbath’?
The answer He gave me to that last question was ‘sometimes’..
but ‘sometimes’ it’s Rome’s other days.. which would be news to all the world, especially people of faith who believe in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
This is one way that scripture is fulfilled when it says satan deceives the whole world.
Sometimes the muslims keep the sabbath. sometimes its those sunday worshippers who keep the sabbath.. sometimes its judaism and seventh day christians. and sometimes its nobody..
Which is exactly how the enemy works. fudging truth and having the world believe it.
There is no decoder ring, bipolar- but there are scales that can come off our eyes to see this.
And our Creator and Redeemer is the only one who can help us to see..
You are absolutely free to keep Saturday holy and call it the Sabbath.
You do it by faith. We all live by faith. Just be able to defend what your faith is in. Because friday,saturday,sunday is rome’s truth, not found in the Word.
For His Glory!
“The narrow way is CHRIST, not the law.
Not any law.”
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“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.”
Mathew 5:17
It takes a lot of mental gymnastics to come to the opinion that the Narrow Way doesn’t involve the Law. That’s precisely what NT writers like John, Peter, James, and Jude were condemning.
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