July 27–August 2 Commentary

This weekly feature is dedicated to Adventists who are looking for biblical insights into the topics discussed in the Sabbath School lesson quarterly. We post articles which address each lesson as presented in the Sabbath School Bible Study Guide, including biblical commentary on them. We hope you find this material helpful and that you will come to know Jesus and His revelation of Himself in His word in profound biblical ways.

 

Week 5: “The Cry of the Prophets”

There is not much in this week’s lesson that is good or that makes accurate use of God’s Word. It is, first and foremost, a call for social justice — to make things right for the downtrodden and poor — and it uses several of the Old Testament prophets to support this idea.

While it’s true that during the times that Israel strayed from God, the poor and oppressed were mistreated, the prophets called attention to this because it was one of the symptoms of the problem, not the central problem in itself.

To reduce God’s call to return to Him to a matter of social justice is to reduce God’s call to simply a matter of this physical life and the need to make a good life for everyone

Although the poor treatment of the weak and poor is one of many things that shows the reprobate hearts of the people, this is not the main focus of the condemnation. The problem is much greater than social justice or the treatment of the poor and widows — it is the hearts and minds turned away from God. The mistreatments listed are only outward symptoms of the inner problem.

Even in Israel, outward good deeds, even to the poor and needy, were just that — only outward goodness. By not following God’s instructions on the treatment of the poor and needy, they were demonstrating the results of their separation from God.

For us, in the New Covenant, the true problem was the inner soul which was lost and dead without the new birth of the Spirit. A call to “social justice” is useless when it addresses only outward behavior. Good things can be done by “good” people, but even those good people can be dead inside, and the good they do profits them nothing.

There are a couple of things in the lesson on which I would like to comment.

In the section on Amos we see a reference to “a future restoration for God’s people” recorded in Amos 9.

It is truly ironic for the author to use this passage to talk about making society better when the whole passage is talking about the Millennium on earth when Jesus will reign from Jerusalem, and there will truly be God’s will done on the restored earth. 

In fact, this use of the text is particularly ironic since Adventist beliefs deny that the Millennium will be here on earth; instead they claim that the earth will be desolate and only Satan will be here, isolated and alone for 1,000 years while the redeemed will be in heaven searching the books hoping to vindicate God.

At the end of Wednesday’s lesson there is this question:

“How important is it to you that our God is a God who offers second chances — and more — even to His people who have done wrong after having had the chance to make better choices?”

It may seem to be an innocuous, even encouraging question when one reads it through Adventist theological lenses; but when one sees it in light of the New Covenant, it becomes something quite different.

If you believe the Adventist doctrines of sin and salvation, you believe that when you sin, you can lose your salvation; then, when and if you confess, God will give you that ‘second chance’ to be forgiven and restored to salvation. 

The whole New Testament rings with the assurance of salvation, and Jesus Himself speaks words of promise that He will never let us go. 

My favorites are these:

For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me. This is the will of Him who sent Me, that of all that He has given Me I lose nothing, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life, and I Myself will raise him up on the last day” (Jn. 6:38–40).

My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one” (Jn. 10:27–30).

How blessed to know and trust Jesus that when you are His, you stay His. You don’t need endless ‘second chances’ to become His again every time you sin! †