The Seventh Day Sabbath, Is It Ancient History?

29th August 2021

 

        This article will explain in detail why God’s Sabbath, created  on the seventh day, has been held in abeyance, or suspended temporary, until its purpose. will benefit mankind as God intendented.

We are told in scriptures that God worked six days, creating all of man’s physical needs, and on the sixth day created mankind, males and females. And on the seventh day created the Sabbath in which He could rest.

Genesis 1:31, And God saw everything that He had made and behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

We need to see that each of the six days of creation started with an evening. The Sabbath created on the seventh day is altogether different. There is no mention of evening associated with it because it is God’s rest and there is no evening or darkness with God. Darkness implies error or blindness, Ephesians 4:18.

All those who were created males and females were created on the sixth day in the image of God and brought in to rest with God on His Sabbath.

God resting with His children is a perfect picture of the meaning of grace. Why? There were no laws required by God for His children to perform, Romans 6:14. All that was required was that His children rest and eat what God had provided for them, Therefore this was a Feast for God as well as for His children. This was all before the Garden of Eden and before Satan and sin had entered the world.

Job Description for Adam

Genesis 1:28, And God blessed them, and God said unto them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every thing that moveth upon the earth.”

This was the job description for the males and females in Genesis chapter one. The job description for Adam in chapter two is altogether different.

Genesis 2:5, And every plant of the field before it was in the earth and every herb of the field before it grew: for the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the earth and there was not a man to till the ground.

The purpose of Adam in chapter two was to till the ground the way a farmer would prepare the soil for the planting of seed. We need to keep in mind that all men are created from the ground. At this time the ground was very fruitful and very good as God says of His creation in Genesis 1:31. When you follow the numbered days in Genesis chapter one you will understand that Adam was created from the ground like everyone else but now scripture says that God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul; he is now not only created but is now formed, Genesis 2:7. This was after God’s seventh day Sabbath rest on an eight day or one might say the first day of a second week.

Sin Enters into God’s Creation

Before Adam entered the Garden of Eden, he was warned not to take of the tree that is in the midst of the Garden, the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. That tree is Satan’s nature and called by some a serpentine nature. This nature had the same desire for Adam and Eve as the desire for Satan to be like God, Genesis 3:5; Isaiah 14:14.

Everything that God created was very good and now we have a complete change in God’s creation because of Adam and his failing when he was put to the test. Read what the Apostle Paul tells us in the Book of Romans:

Romans 5:12, “Wherefore, as by one man sin entered int the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.”

When Adam and Eve rejected their Creator God, the Tree of Life was closed to them, and they were put out of the Garden. Now, because of Adam’s sin, there was not a man on the earth as His Ambassador or Representative, 2nd Corinthians 5:20, and there would be no Sabbath rest for God, until one qualified to fulfill what Adam failed to do. Now, because of Adam and Eve’s sin, it is clear how Satan has become the god of this world for Paul states:

2nd Corinthians 4:4, “In whome the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, Who is in the image of God, should shine unto them.”

Satan was allowed to come in and damage all of God’s creation, including God’s seventh day Sabbath, showing us that now there is a change of lords. A change from the true Creator God to the one who, from the beginning, wanted to be God.

The Restoration of the Land

When Adam took of the wrong tree a curse was placed upon the land. All men are created from the ground so it follows that the curse was placed on  all of mankind.

Genesis 3:19, “In the sweat of thy face thou shall eat bread, till thou return to the ground; for out of it thou was taken: for dust thou are and to dust thou shalt return.”

Question we should ask ourselves, will this curse of the ground last forever or will it ever be removed?

If we were to back up and examine Genesis chapter 1 again, we would find that one of the first acts performed by God was the raising of the land out of the death waters causing the land to appear, Genesis 1:9. We can see from this that God had His plan of redemption even before the creation of the seventh day Sabbath and before Adam and Eve’s sin in the Garden. Nothing or no one was going to stop the plan of God, for this raising of land out of the death waters was the same, in type, as the resurrection of Jesus Christ on the third day. Without land there would be no grasses for food for cattle, and no man to form from the dust of the ground. There would be no treasures of gold or silver or any other minerals. So the land is very rich and an important item in God’s creation.

Promises Given to Abram

We need to keep in mind that as long as the land was under a curse, and mankind was created from the ground, God’s early leaders were filled with the serpentine nature as well as all men, but God, being the Father of all His children was able to use certain men for His purpose.

Genesis 12:1, Now the Lord had said unto Abram: get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy fathers house unto a land that I will shew thee.”

This was the start of a pilgrimage for Abram/Abraham, Isaac and Jacob along with the twelve son;s of Jacob, now called Israel, who were all on a journey to a land promised by God to Abram.

Along their journey, God, instead of suppling the people with earthy food, He supplied them with something called manna, food from heaven. This experience was a type but the reality wouldn’t occur until we find it written in the Gospels.

John 6:32, Then Jesus said unto them, “verily, verily, I say unto you,  Moses gave you not that bread from heaven; but My Father giveth you the true bread from heaven, 33, For the bread of God is He which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life to the world.”

Jesus is telling His disciples that He, the true manna from heaven, gives life to the world. In Genesis 2:9 we read that the Tree of Life, Jesus Christ, was in the midst of the Garden. Adam had a choice of taking of the Tree of Life but passed it up. If he had taken of the Tree of Life he would have started to fill himself with Jesus Christ, as the Word. What would have been the results? Jesus Christ, the Word, referred to as the Tree of Life in the Garden, would have raised the physical man to a higher level into the spirit demension through resurrection. Not to be equal with God but into a new and higher life. The Apostle Paul describes this life as leaving the old man, the fleshy man, and growing into a new man, the spiritual man, Ephesians 4:22 and 4:24. Adam would have started a process in which the other children would have followed his example. Now it will be Jesus Christ, the Word of God, in which the reality of that process will be realised.

Thse Who Are in Christ

 

Because of the failing of Adam, God would need to fulfill His purpose another way. The New Testament refer’s to this new way many times in scripture, Hebrews 10:20; 2nd Peter 2:2; Acts 18:26.

This new way would be a new beginning starting with the planting of  a seed. A seed is the beginning of everything including the new way.

Genesis 3:15, “And I will put amenity between thee and the woman and between thy seed and her Seed: it shall bruise thy head and it shall bruise His heel.”

The woman was Mary, the Mother of Jesus and He would be called Immanuel, meaning God with us, Isaiah 7:14. This is the one Who became a perfect sacrifice and was accepted by God to be the Redeemer of all men.

The job description for Adam was to till the ground and prepare the ground for the planting of seed. The ground, that’s you and me, we are the fertile soil to have the promised seed planted within ourselves. This Seed is “Christ in us.” Jesus Christ became the last Adam, 1st Corinthians 15:45, meaning He was the last of the flesh man Who would bring about a new beginning, a transition from the flesh to the spirit.

What about this seventh day Sabbath? The number seven in the Bible means completion. It means that all of the physical creation was accomplished. Notice that God works first and then He rests. We, on the other hand, are expected to rest first before we will be qualified to work, Anyone who want’s to work in a craft needs to educates himself first in order to qualify in any job. A good example of this is Moses on the Mountain of God. Moses was called when he was forty years old but wasn’r sent out to begin the Exodus for God’s people until he was eighty years old. God was teaching Him to fill himself with the Godly nature first, so much so, that when he came down the Mountain, his face showned, Exodus 34:29. It is the same with the priest. A priest had to learn first before he would qualify for the priesthood at thirty years of age, Numbers 4:3; Luke 3:21. if we desire God’s rest we need to learn of Jesus Christ first. This learning and educating ourselves, according to the mind of God, is in our reality, our resting.

The Apostle Paul as excellent as he was wanted to be sure he didn’t fall short of achieving the “Prize”. What prize is Paul talking about. It is, as some suppose, eternal life and it is not because everyone who respons to the gospel will have eternal life. Paul here is referring to an incorruptible crown, 1st Corinthians 9:25.

To answer the question, what happened to the Seventh Day Sabbath.We need the scriptures to clarify that subject. The last part of Revelation tells us that, “their works do follow them”. Did God have works? Yes He did. No one could destroy God’s Sabbath but Satan and his army  could harm God.s Physical creation.

Romans 8:22, “For we know that The whole creation groaneth and travelled in pain until now,”

So what went wrong with the physical creation? Adam and Eve sin in the Garden caused the changing of Lords, Satan vs. the Creator God causing a groaneth upon the entire creation. We read that man needs a renewing of our minds, Ephesians 4:23 ; there will be a new heaven and a new earth, Revelation 21:1; There will be a new man as well as woman, Ephesians 4:24; The nature of the animal kingdom will be changed, Isaiah 11:6.

What is the reason for all these positive changes? God’s Spirit, working with His Son, Jesus Christ, The Tree of Life, which was once rejected by Adam and Eve is now opened for all to see, Revelation 22: 2.

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