We had now changed the name of our little church from BAC to BFC standing for Biblical Fellowship Church. We did this for two reasons. First, we were getting flack from Adventists for using their name. It was not our intent to cause hard feelings, so we thought a new name would be appropriate. A second, and perhaps more weighty reason, was that the longer we were out of the Adventist church, the more we realized we were moving further and further from Adventism and no longer wanted to be closely associated with it.
Someone suggested that we study the Sabbath in our Searching the Word hour. I pondered this idea. I had reached the conclusion that the Sabbath was not the seal of God for the last days. I knew the Holy Spirit was what sealed believers. I knew the problems associated with appropriate Sabbath observance. What was allowed and what was disallowed to be done on the Sabbath continued to be a point of discussion. Some members of our group watched sporting events on the Sabbath. Carolyn and I did not feel this was right. But I did not want to get caught up in Sabbath observance controversy—been there, done that. I recalled the many discussions on appropriate Sabbath observance we had at Monterey Bay Academy, both in faculty meetings and with my Bible doctrines classes. Was it permissible to ride bicycles on the Sabbath? The school’s position was, No. Was it appropriate Sabbath-keeping to experience nature on the Sabbath? Yes. Some of my students were scuba divers and said the best way to see the beauties of nature was to go scuba diving, and they considered this an appropriate Sabbath observance. I did not think so. While at Andrews University, I took a geo-science class that went on a field trip one Sabbath afternoon to find fossils along a little riverbank. I was appalled that the professor’s son, about nine years old, put on his swimming trunks and went swimming at this Adventist outing for pastors on Sabbath. My first week as associate pastor at the Santa Monica Seventh-day Adventist church was another shock. I was fresh from the seminary and had heard of the “worldliness” of Southern California Adventists. After church, we were invited by some of the younger couples to a potluck in a neighboring park. We went, and to our dismay, after the meal was over, they brought out bats, balls, and gloves, chose sides, and had a baseball game. I felt so foolish. I could not join them and do my own pleasure because that was against the commandment. Yet at the same time, I wanted to bond with them. Should I, as the brand new associate pastor, ask them to stop? After all, Ellen White at one time even said baseball was wrong, let alone baseball on the Sabbath.
As I continued contemplating studying the Sabbath, I recalled the advanced Bible class I taught at Monterey Bay Academy. This was an elective class for seniors and had a section on contemporary denominations. I enjoyed inviting other pastors to come and give a short summary of their beliefs to our class. We would study the particular church’s beliefs before the presentation, and I would prime the students to ask certain questions. Many of my questions were designed to show the inconstancy of the Protestant world that accepts the 10 Commandments but rejects the Sabbath. We had a Mormon, Lutheran, Baptist, and others make short presentations to our class. I felt fully comfortable in doing this as “we had the truth” that could stand up to any other church.
The Baptist minister, however, brought up some texts that I had not fully considered. He showed how the Ten Commandments were part of the old Sinaitic Covenant, and then he turned to the New Testament and read several texts that showed the old Sinaitic Covenant had been done away with. At the time, I thought I should do more study here so I could better answer his objections. I passed it off, however, for I knew that the law was “just and good.” As Paul said, “Do we make void the law? By no means, we establish the law.”
The Baptist minister, however, brought up some texts that I had not fully considered.
The Verdict journal, by Robert Brinsmead, had several articles on the covenants and Sabbath. These, too, were challenging some of my old paradigms. I did not see how these new ideas fit all that I knew to be true, so I just dropped them.
Remembering these things, I told the church I would be willing to restudy the Sabbath, but only upon several conditions: (1) we do a thorough study of the subject from all points of view; (2) we go slowly so we could keep together in our conclusions that would be based solely upon the biblical evidence; (3) we throw out all our presuppositions and do a truly inductive study. This would mean that we did not know where our study would lead or what our final conclusions would be. They agreed.
We were, in retrospect, in a unique setting to do a truly inductive study. We were still meeting on the Sabbath and felt no reason to change, yet we were far enough out of Adventism to be open to change if the conclusions from our Bible study so warranted. I had never done a truly inductive study on such a major doctrine before.
This study turned out to be one of the most rewarding and interesting studies I have ever done. I truly did not care what our conclusion would be. I was not trying to make our study reach any preconceived or predetermined goal. We decided we would not try to harmonize our tentative conclusions as we studied individual sections; rather, we would for the time being, only summarize that section and leave the final conclusion until we got to the end.
We studied Desmond Ford, The Forgotten Day, Samuelle Bachaccii, From Sabbath to Sunday, D.A. Carson, From Sabbath to Lord’s Day, and several Verdicts on the topic of the Sabbath and the Covenants by Robert Brinsmead. I listened to a set of tapes by Nordon Winger, a former SDA pastor who left the Adventist church about the same time as I did, and who had taken the Paradise Gospel Fellowship through a study of the Sabbath. For the most part, however, we studied the Bible.
I made inductive study guides on each section of Scripture, and during our Searching the Word hour, we divided into small groups to do our study; then, near the conclusion of the hour, we would share our findings. It was exciting as none of us knew where our study would lead. I stayed only one week or so ahead of the group. For me, this study could be compared to an exploration through new country that I had never entered before. Each new discovery opened up vistas of pristine grandeur.
Sure, I had studied the Sabbath before, plenty of times. I took “Theology of the Sabbath” at Andrews University from Dr. Hans LaRondelle, one of my favorite professors. I loved it and received an “A” grade. Every SDA pastor knows the SDA position on the Sabbath and how to defend it well. Yet the study we were doing was different. We were not going down a list of proof texts and explaining each one with another. Rather, we were seeking to squeeze everything out of a given text or section that was there and tried not to make the text say more than it did. For the first several months, I thought for sure we would end up with the traditional SDA understanding of the Sabbath, except, as mentioned before, I had already concluded that the Sabbath was not the “seal of God.”
For the first several months, I thought for sure we would end up with the traditional SDA understanding of the Sabbath…
When we did a thorough, inductive study of the covenants, the tentative conclusions we reached on individual passages seemed contradictory to what we had believed. I was not sure we could find harmony. Then it happened. Like the explorers who first discovered Yosemite Valley must have felt, that “eureka experience” took us by surprise. I was struggling to fit some of Paul’s “difficult statements” in Romans, Galatians, 2 Corinthians , and Hebrews into our old paradigm. I had always “forced” them to fit before like putting a puzzle piece into an opening that looked correct, but upon trying to make the piece fit it would be close enough that one could force it in, but then it messed up the picture because it was not the right piece. Now, however, I had no reason to force anything. Instead, I thought, perhaps I need to accept a new paradigm and see if our tentative conclusions fit it. Therefore, I took Paul’s statements about law at face value: the law was “added” at the time of Moses and was to last “until Christ.” Christians are not under the paradigm, which I could not do, I took Paul’s paradigm and tried to fit the other conclusions of our study into it. They fit! Suddenly, in an instant of time, my whole theological “picture” changed. No longer was the law the focus, no longer was the Sabbath the “testing truth.” Now Christ alone was at the center of theology and life. He was the testing truth. He was my true rest.
I will not go into the details of our Sabbath study as I have written extensively on this subject in Sabbath in Crisis, now revised, enlarged and reprinted under the title, Sabbath in Christ.
In summary, we found there is only one “law of the Lord” in the Old Testament, not two or three.92 The 10 Commandments are the very words of the Sinaitic Covenant document. The other laws—still part of the one law of the Lord—expanded and applied this covenant to the life experiences of the Israelites. In this arrangement, the Sabbath played a central, important role and served as the covenant reduced to a dynastic sign. The covenant was made between God and Israel only. It was hard for me to accept this, but we found it was the clear and undisputed teaching of Scripture. We found that circumcision was the one-time entrance sign of the Sinaitic Covenant,93 and the Sabbath was the repeatable sign Israel was to remember.
When we came to the new covenant, we found that the covenant partners were the Father and the Son. Jesus is the new covenant center. We receive the benefits of the covenant through our faith in Christ as “our Covenant Keeper.” This covenant was not limited to one nation or people—or denomination but was specifically stated to be for all nations, tongues, and peoples. The new covenant was not like the Sinai covenant, which was centered on law with only shadows of grace.94 Rather, the new covenant was ablaze with the glory of God’s grace and Spirit.95 The new covenant also required a change of law,96 a law suitable for any nation, culture, or geographical area, devoid of all the “ceremonial” practices97 and one that would allow for Christian evangelism to penetrate all cultures without creating culture wars.98 Hence, the new covenant law was reduced to only the eternal, moral principles99 and the two new covenant signs. Baptism, not circumcision, we found was the entrance sign in to the new covenant church.100 As Jesus inaugurated the new covenant with His disciples, he gave them a new repeatable sign they were to “remember” in the Lord’s supper.101 Unlike the old covenant, which is filled with detailed instructions for every aspect of worship, in the new covenant, the details are left out so that our attention may be focused on the object: Christ—and not the form.102
There is no command to keep the Sabbath in the New Testament.
We found there is good reason to believe the Gentile Christians were never instructed to keep the Sabbath. There is no command to keep the Sabbath in the New Testament. Every Sabbath meeting in the book of Acts is in a Jewish setting. Sabbath-breaking is never mentioned in any of the lists of New Testament sins. The Epistles never give any instruction on Sabbath observance. If Sabbath observance is to continue in the new covenant, as we had previously believed, how could it be that the subject of appropriate Sabbath observance is conspicuously absent from the letters written to young Gentile churches? Anyone who has tried to keep the seventh-day Sabbath according to biblical guidelines will tell you that there are many, many gray areas that require clarification. While this may be an argument from silence, it nevertheless shouts its importance and authenticity. Further, the Epistles never place positive emphasis on Sabbath-keeping. Rather, the Sabbath is listed with the other old covenant observances as a shadow of Christ.103
When we studied the Sabbath in eschatology, we found that SDA’s proof texts, when studied without bias and within there own contexts, do not yield the Adventist conclusions. There is no compelling reason to believe that the “commandments” in Rev. 14:12 have the Ten Commandments in view. John nowhere, in any of his writings, uses the Greek word, “entole” (translated commandment) for any old covenant law. Rather, he always uses “nomos” (translated law) when referring to the old covenant.104
Our conclusion after seven months of study was that there was nothing wrong with worship on Saturday (Sabbath).105 We also concluded that Sabbath observance was not required, or even expected, of new covenant Christians.106 We continued to meet on Saturday, but no longer could use Sabbath-keeping as an evangelistic tool to persuade people to join our fellowship.
Nearly everyone in our fellowship accepted our conclusions. However, some felt that because of family and other social considerations, they wanted to continue to meet on Saturday, which we did.
In time, however, we found it harder to get people of the community to visit our church. People moving into the community would not look for a new church that met on Saturday.
We also noticed we were getting a few non-Adventist Sabbatarians. Often these people came with a truckload of weird ideas and hang-ups, and some were legalistic and controlling.
We also noticed we were getting a few non-Adventist Sabbatarians. Often these people came with a truckload of weird ideas and hang-ups, and some were legalistic and controlling.
Therefore, as pastor, I wanted to move to Sunday services—not Sunday “worship.” While we did find evi- dence that the “Lord’s day” referred to Sunday, we could not find any transference of Sabbath “observance” to Sunday “observance.” This conclusion fit our new covenant paradigm where ceremonies are of minimal value because everything important centers on Christ.
When we had completed our study, many encouraged me to put it in book form. This I did, but it took me many years to complete the task.
Soon I was to revisit the topic of the Holy Spirit. I was forced to repent, not for rejecting the counterfeit, but for “backing off” from the true. This time God really got my attention.
NEXT WEEK: “ENCOUNTER WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT
ENDNOTES
91 Gal. 3:16, 17, 19; Jn. 1:17; 7:19; Rom. 5:13, 14, 20; 9:14; Heb. 7:11; 9:19.
92 See Riggle, The Sabbath and the Lord’s Day, p. 53–73 for an excellent summary of biblical evidence supporting this statement.
93 Actually, it was the sign of the Abrahamic Covenant, but as the Jews were descendents of Abraham, it continued in the Sinaitic Covenant.
94. Heb. 10:1.
95. 2 Cor. 3.
96. Heb. 7:12.
97. Col. 2:16, 17.
98. 1 Cor. 9:19–23.
99. Jn. 13:34, 35; 14:17; 15:12; Rom. 13:9, 10; Gal. 5:14; Jas. 2:8.
100. Matt. 28:19; Col. 2:11,12.
101. Matt. 26:26–29; Lk. 22:19, 20; 1 Cor. 11:24, 25.
102. Compare the instructions for making the bread of presence in the Old Testament with the new. In the old there was a recipe, they were told just how to arrange the plates and how often to put fresh bread out. However, in the new covenant the only instruction we have is “as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.” See Lev. 24:6 and 1 Cor. 11:26.
103. Col. 2:16, 17.
104. See Ratzlaff, Sabbath in Christ, p. 374–376 for a complete listing of John’s uses of these two words.
105. Rom. 14:5.
106. The reader is referred to Sabbath in Crisis, now Sabbath in Christ, and Riggle, The Sabbath and the Lord’s Day, for additional evidence supporting this statement.
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