Participants: Charles Byrd (Host), Andrea Endries, Levi Longoria, Shalom David, Stephen Fowler
Series Code: THL
Program Code: THL000012
|
00:01 A platoon of new recruits pile off the bus
00:03 and loosely line up. 00:05 The drill sergeant starts in complaining 00:08 that he hasn't even been given men to work with. 00:12 "You think you're something" he shouts. 00:14 "But you're nothing, nothing, 00:16 absolutely nothing and I'm in charge." 00:20 "Big deal," says the recruit at the end of the line. 00:23 "So you're in charge of nothing." 00:26 I've heard it said that if Jesus is not Lord of all, 00:30 then He's not Lord at all. 00:33 The Lordship of Christ is in fact 00:35 the crucible issue for Christianity today. 00:38 Was Jesus really Emmanuel, God with us? 00:43 And if He is God, then is He Lord of all? 00:48 One of the doctrines of Jesus that caused 00:50 a great deal of political thunder was this. 00:53 "The Son of man is Lord - even of the Sabbath day." 00:59 What most people don't realize is that 01:02 that claim is more than a claim of Lordship over our hearts. 01:06 It's also a claim of Lordship of our time. 02:02 There really is little value in being in charge of, 02:05 well, nothing. 02:08 It really makes no sense to say you're a parent 02:10 when you have no children. 02:12 Or to say you're the boss when you have no employees. 02:16 In Matthew 12:8, Jesus claimed 02:19 to be Lord of something, the Sabbath. 02:23 But if there's no Sabbath, He would be Lord of nothing, 02:27 instead of Lord of something. 02:29 So what is this teaching of Jesus 02:32 that caused such a commotion? 02:33 What is this Sabbath? 02:35 This 1/7th in time that Jesus said He was Lord of. 02:40 Stephen is standing by to help us answer this question. 02:44 Thanks, Charles. 02:46 I'm standing on the Mount of Olives 02:47 just east of Jerusalem to show you 02:49 how far a Sabbath day's journey is. 02:51 It was permissible to walk from Jerusalem to here 02:53 and still keep the Sabbath holy. 02:55 Originally, a Sabbath's journey was just 2,000 cubits. 02:59 But over time, it was modified to 4,000 cubits or about 1 mile. 03:04 While the concept about Sabbath day's journey 03:06 is mentioned in Acts 1:12, 03:08 it's not a commandment of scripture, 03:10 but an added oral law of the Rabbis or the Mishnah. 03:14 Even in Christ's day, the laws regarding Sabbath 03:17 had been expanded. 03:19 The Sabbath had become a burden instead of a blessing. 03:22 Man's addition of legalistic rules 03:24 regarding the Sabbath has clouded the fact 03:26 that the Sabbath is really an issue of time. 03:29 We live in time. 03:30 Time is represented all around us. 03:32 From grandfather clocks to iPhones, 03:35 wristwatches, and timers, 03:36 from timeouts to on time, it's everywhere. 03:40 Time is, in fact, a created construct. 03:43 It's the arena in which 03:45 the game of life is played out and experienced. 03:48 Time is there just like air, lived in and experienced, 03:51 though not always in the forefront of our consciousness. 03:55 I'd like to share a thought with you. 03:56 For some, this may be a new thought, 03:59 but the God of all creation, the God who organized 04:02 the immensely complex language of DNA, 04:05 the God who sent His Son to this planet to live for us, 04:09 to die for us, wants to spend time with you. 04:12 In fact, the creator of all things 04:15 set aside a certain time each week 04:16 for intimate communion and fellowship. 04:19 This time is set more surely than a doctor's appointment, 04:22 the work schedule, or even a family vacation. 04:25 It's called Sabbath. 04:27 Some people have been misinformed 04:29 about this time God set aside. 04:31 They've been told that the Sabbath is made for the Jews. 04:34 I hear that all the time, 04:35 but it couldn't be further from the truth. 04:37 To get this story straight, 04:39 one need merely look at the Book of Genesis. 04:42 Man was created on the sixth day of creation. 04:45 The inspired author of Genesis goes on to tell us 04:48 in Chapter 2:3 that on the seventh day, 04:51 God created the Sabbath, 04:53 a space of time to be used for rest. 04:57 Okay, now don't miss this. 04:58 If you drew a timeline of creation, 05:00 Adam and Eve were created sometime 05:03 during what we now call Friday. 05:04 A few hours later at sunset, 05:06 God invites Adam and Eve to rest. 05:09 Rest? Rest from what? 05:11 They're not even 24 hours old. 05:13 So you know they're not at all tired. 05:15 But Adam and Eve weren't being asked to rest from anything. 05:19 They were being asked to rest in something. 05:22 They were being invited to rest 05:24 in the finished work of God's creation. 05:27 And how many Jews were in the Garden of Eden 05:29 at the beginning of the world? 05:31 None. Really, check it out. 05:34 The Sabbath was given to perfect people 05:36 in a perfect world with no taint of sin. 05:38 The weekly Sabbath was not a type 05:41 or a shadow of things to come, 05:43 but a living memorial of time 05:45 in honor of God's creative power. 05:48 Genesis 2:2, 3 tells us. 05:51 "And on the seventh day God ended His work 05:53 which He had made and He rested on the seventh day 05:56 from all His work which He had made. 05:58 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it, 06:01 because that in it He had rested 06:03 from all His work which God created and made." 06:07 It's important here to notice that after creating for 7 days, 06:10 the very first thing God ever made holy, 06:13 the very first thing He ever sanctified was time. 06:17 He called it Sabbath. 06:20 Some have suggested that the Sabbath 06:22 was just a time for God to rest, as stated here in Genesis. 06:25 But to come to that limited conclusion, 06:28 you must ignore the plain words of Jesus. 06:32 That's so true, Stephen. 06:34 And Jesus Himself stated why He created the Sabbath. 06:37 You'll find that in Mark Chapter 2. 06:39 Jesus was walking with His disciples 06:42 through a grain field one Sabbath afternoon. 06:46 His disciples were hungry, 06:48 so they took some grain in their hands. 06:51 They brushed the husks off and they ate it. 06:54 This greatly troubled the Pharisees 06:56 not because the disciples were stealing for its permissible 06:59 according to God's law to eat, to satisfy one's hungry. 07:03 But to the Pharisees the disciples were harvesting 07:05 on Sabbath which was work. 07:08 And working on Sabbath is unlawful. 07:11 The Jewish leaders had taken the law and made it an idol. 07:15 And they accused Jesus of breaking the very law 07:19 that He had given to Moses. 07:21 And here is where Jesus doctrines, His teachings 07:24 create a great deal of thunder in the Holy Land. 07:28 He claimed to be the Lord, the Creator of the Sabbath. 07:32 And then Jesus says, 07:35 about the day that He created back in Genesis, 07:37 "The Sabbath was made for man, 07:40 and not man for the Sabbath." 07:43 Now don't miss this. 07:44 The Sabbath was not merely for God to rest 07:47 and the Sabbath was not made for the Jews. 07:51 Jesus taught it's a doctrine of Christ 07:54 that the Sabbath was made for mankind, all of us, 07:59 prefect people, as well as sinners. 08:01 Unfortunately, traditions had grown up 08:04 around the Sabbath that made it a burden, even a curse. 08:07 But Jesus, who is the Lord of the Sabbath, 08:10 came to put His law back in its proper place. 08:14 You see, the Sabbath is not some burden to be borne. 08:18 It's not a penance inflicted upon us to create holiness. 08:22 The Sabbath is God's gift 08:24 of His personal presence to all mankind. 08:28 Even Moses knew this. 08:30 When God sent him to Egypt 08:32 to deliver the Israelites from bondage, 08:34 the very first thing He did was to insist 08:37 that they stop working on Sabbath. 08:40 Moses reminded the children of Israel 08:42 that this was God's Holy Time; time set aside to rest. 08:46 Rest from their slave labor? No. 08:50 They were to rest in His delivering power 08:53 and His awesome might. 08:54 God's people again began keeping the Sabbath 08:59 before they even left Egypt and went to Sinai. 09:02 This is why Pharaoh began to complain. 09:04 Exodus 5:5 says, "And Pharaoh said, 09:07 Behold, the people of the land are now many, 09:10 and you Moses and Aaron 09:12 make them rest from their burdens." 09:14 The word rest here in Hebrew, the word Shabath or Sabbath. 09:19 At this point, the people hadn't even gotten to Mount Sinai. 09:23 The Ten Commandments had not yet been written in stone. 09:26 But God's people in very generation have known 09:29 that God desires to spend intimate and special time 09:33 each week with His children. 09:34 This is why God gave His people the Sabbath back in Eden. 09:38 And this is why the Lord of the Sabbath 09:40 wrote with His own finger this command in stone. 09:43 "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy." 09:47 The command begins with the word remember, 09:49 because they already knew about the Sabbath. 09:52 This is a gift of time. 09:53 God wants to use this time to fellowship with us, 09:56 to commune with us in a special way. 09:59 It's His purpose to use this time 10:01 to bring restoration in our lives, to our homes. 10:04 He wants to use this time to heal marriages, 10:07 to bless our communities. 10:10 That's good news, Levi. 10:12 But two questions here beg to be asked. 10:15 First, the Jews here in Israel keep Saturday as the Sabbath. 10:19 But how do we know that Saturday 10:21 is the correct day for the Sabbath? 10:24 Maybe the weekly cycle has been changed or lost track of. 10:28 How can we know that God's Sabbath 10:30 is not Friday or Sunday or Tuesday? 10:33 To help me nail this down, I've asked Shalom David, 10:36 a Jew, who pastors here in the Jerusalem 10:38 how we can know that our present Saturday 10:41 is the Sabbath of Jesus. 10:43 Well, first you need to understand that 10:45 history is written to give us continuity with the past. 10:49 In Exodus Chapter 16, we're told 10:51 that God gave the people bread to eat. 10:53 Most people have heard the story about their manna. 10:56 But when you carefully read the entire Chapter of Exodus 16, 11:00 you discover that God was testing them 11:02 through this process. 11:04 The manna God sent from Heaven 11:05 would only fall for 6 days, Sunday through Friday. 11:09 Each day, the children of Israel 11:11 were to gather one omer or about 3½ liter for each man. 11:16 If they gather more than the amount 11:18 and try to keep it overnight, 11:20 it would spoil before the next day. 11:23 On the seventh day, the Sabbath, 11:25 no manna would fall so that people 11:27 were commanded together two omers on Friday. 11:30 But the extra omer of manna gathered on the preparation day 11:34 was miraculously preserved 11:36 and was good to eat on the Sabbath. 11:38 If this happened just one day or a month or two perhaps 11:42 that would be miracle enough. 11:45 But this went on for 40 years. 11:48 52 times every year God showed the people 11:51 by miraculous means what day was His Sabbath. 11:55 2,080 times God made clear 11:58 when He wanted to spend time with His people. 12:02 So how would that show us today 12:04 that this Saturday, now kept as Sabbath, 12:06 was the same Saturday Sabbath of the Exodus? 12:09 Because in the 12th Chapter at the beginning 12:11 of the Exodus journey into the wilderness, 12:14 God gave them a new calendar 12:16 which has been continuously observed 12:18 in the Jewish community to this very day. 12:21 There is absolutely no question 12:23 that this Saturday on your calendar 12:25 is the same Sabbath of the Jewish calendar 12:28 from the Exodus to this very day. 12:30 Okay, our Saturday 12:33 is the Sabbath of the Old Testament. 12:36 So here's the second question, 12:37 there is extensive tradition in the Christian world today 12:41 that the Sabbath was to be done away with 12:43 in the new dispensation. 12:45 Did Jesus really expect 12:47 Christian people in the new dispensation 12:49 to keep Saturday as a holy day? 12:52 Look, Jesus was a prophet. Was He not? 12:55 He predicted the destruction of Jerusalem 12:58 by the Romans in AD 70. 13:00 This would not happen for 40 years into the future. 13:03 In preparing His people for those terrible trying times, 13:07 He told them to pray. 13:09 "Pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, 13:13 neither on the Sabbath day." 13:16 So if Jesus had no intention of His disciples 13:19 keeping the Sabbath 40 years into the future, 13:21 then why would He tell His disciples to pray 13:23 that they would not have to flee on the Sabbath? 13:26 Exactly. That is precisely the point. 13:28 Using the manna, God was testing the people, 13:31 would they let Him be their God 13:33 or would they make gods of their own reason. 13:36 And He is still testing us to this very point today. 13:40 What do we do with the God of creation 13:43 with Jesus and His Sabbath? 13:46 Stephen, Levi, and Andrea have helped us understand 13:49 the history of the Sabbath, this time He made holy, 13:54 this time He wants to spend with us. 13:57 Time is one of the seven fundamental physical quantities 14:01 in the international system of units. 14:03 The great scientist, Sir Isaac Newton believed that 14:06 time is part of the fundamental structure of the universe, 14:10 a dimension in which events occur in sequence. 14:15 According to the author of Genesis, 14:16 time is marked and measured by heavenly bodies. 14:20 Days, months, and years are all determined 14:24 by the rotations and circuits of the earth and moon 14:27 in their journey through space. 14:30 The daily cycle is predicated upon 14:32 one earth rotation on its axis. 14:35 A monthly cycle is determined 14:37 by the sequence of the moon waxing and waning. 14:40 The yearly cycle happens when our blue orb 14:43 makes another circuit around the sun. 14:47 But can you tell me why we have a 7-day week? 14:50 It doesn't fit nicely into any planetary structure or pattern. 14:55 There is only one reason for a 7-day week, just one 15:00 because God in 6 literal days created our world. 15:05 That's the reason He gives in the Decalogue. 15:08 He created everything and then on the seventh day, He rested. 15:13 He paused to spend time 15:15 with His newest masterpiece, His intelligent creation. 15:19 And from that time to the present, 15:22 the weekly cycle has been made up of 7 consecutive days. 15:27 From that time to the present, God has set aside a Sabbath, 15:32 this weekly 24-hour period 15:34 to spend with those who love Him. 15:37 This time retunes us. 15:39 It balances our spirits and opens the door 15:42 of relationship between the creator and His creation. 15:47 This gift of time was a blessing 15:50 to perfect people in a perfect world. 15:52 And it's still a blessing today 15:55 for those who choose to spend it with Him. 15:58 Claudie English is God's friend. 16:02 It's a simple, uncomplicated relationship, 16:05 but it wasn't always that way. 16:07 In all his first 20 years, Claudie had nothing do with God. 16:11 He didn't have anything against religion. 16:13 He simply had no exposure to it. 16:16 But one night, Claudie saw some activity at the sports arena, 16:20 thought there might be a wrestling match. 16:22 What he ended up attending for the next 5 or 6 nights 16:26 was some meetings about Jesus and the Bible. 16:30 Though he hadn't learned much, 16:31 he was baptized following those meetings. 16:34 And in his heart, a single-minded flame of resolve 16:37 that was never to be extinguished 16:39 had been kindled in the deepest core of his being. 16:42 No matter what, he was going to be faithful to God. 16:47 He didn't know how. He just knew he would. 16:50 The second thing he knew about religion 16:52 was that from now on he would be going to church 16:55 on Saturday, the Sabbath of the Bible. 17:00 Shortly, after I was baptized, I was drafting into the army. 17:06 I thought, "Well, that will interfere with my Sabbath, 17:10 but I'm gonna keep the Sabbath regardless." 17:12 And keep the Sabbath, Claudie did. 17:15 From Sunday on Friday, till Sunday on Saturday, 17:17 he disqualified himself from the army 17:19 by not showing up for roll calls. 17:22 In an uncompromising way, Claudie had determined that 17:25 that time belonged to his creator. 17:29 I made them a good soldier for 6 days a week, 17:33 but the seventh day wasn't theirs. 17:36 It belonged to the Lord. And I served Him that day. 17:42 Claudie was deployed to the front lines in Korea 17:45 and assigned to the Medic corps 17:46 driving into no man's land to pick up the wounded. 17:49 After receiving his orders, 17:51 he gave the officers, God's orders. 17:55 I explained to them, just before they left me, 17:59 I said, "I want ya'll to send me relief up here, 18:03 2 hours before sun down every Friday evening. 18:06 I'm a Seventh-day Adventist Christian 18:09 and that's the Sabbath." 18:12 Even without a replacement, Claudie prayerfully, 18:15 but deliberately walked off the front lines 18:18 though he could have faced 18:19 a court martial or a firing squad. 18:21 Claudie says that he left God to take care of things. 18:25 The whole time that I was there, 18:28 I never had any problem at all with the Sabbath. 18:32 The Sabbath day really means a lot to me. 18:36 It means more to me than anything else. 18:39 The reason for that is because I love the Lord 18:42 and I want to place Him in the things 18:45 that I do and say every day. 18:48 Pavel Goia was born in communist Romania in 1964. 18:53 Ceausescu's regime didn't take well to Christians 18:56 who put God and His Sabbath above the state. 19:00 But Pavo was raised by godly parents 19:03 who taught him to pray and obey 19:05 a living God who looks after His children. 19:09 I was 17 when I decided to start a business, glass business. 19:14 And it was a co-op where the government 19:17 would get 65% of your net clean profit. 19:20 And you'd get just 35%. And it was going pretty well. 19:25 When the President asked me to work on Sabbath, 19:27 I did explain that I cannot because of my faith. 19:30 And he made fun. He said, "There's no God. 19:33 In this country, we don't believe in God." 19:36 And he said, "I would like to see God." 19:38 Well, I went back and talked to him. 19:41 And I told him, "I cannot come. 19:42 I would be willing to work a lot more." 19:44 He said, "No, you will come." 19:47 That Sabbath I didn't go to work for sure. 19:49 And the boss took full advantage of the situation 19:52 and delivered glass that had been improperly stored outside. 19:56 That glass was virtually welded together 19:59 and the crate was totally rotten. 20:02 So he said, "You have two options. 20:04 You come to work on Sabbath 20:06 and I'll forgive you or if not, you pay for it. 20:08 And if you cannot pay, you go to prison." 20:10 Well, I prayed about it and talked to him again. 20:13 And I said, "Let me bring this glass 20:15 back to the store house, to the warehouse. 20:19 And I will double my work and double the profit you have 20:22 and if you're not happy, we talk then. 20:24 And he smiled and he said, 20:26 "You cannot transport this glass because this is rotten. 20:30 The boxes, the crates are rotten. 20:33 You don't know what you talk about. 20:35 And if you try to transport it, you will break it, 20:37 and then you do have to pay for it." 20:39 And I said, "What do you lose?" 20:40 And he says, "Yeah, somebody needs to pay for this. 20:43 I guess, I don't lose anything. 20:45 If you break it, you pay. 20:46 If you don't break it, you work. 20:48 Yeah, do that." 20:49 So I hired a driver with a truck that had a crane. 20:51 And when he came and saw the boxes, rotten boxes, 20:56 he refused to do it because he was afraid, 20:58 he would be responsible if they break, 21:00 and sure they would break. 21:02 So I had to write a paper and sign that 21:04 I will take full responsibility if something happens, 21:07 so he will not have to pay for it. 21:08 Well, the boxes, each box would be about 18 meters tall, 21:15 22 meters wide or long, 22 to 24 sheets of glass, 21:20 each one 4 millimeters, all together 21:23 an average of more or less 4,000 pounds a box. 21:28 The box would have some wood shoulders here and here 21:34 that you put the cables around and hook it, 21:36 lift it in the air, and then load it in the truck. 21:40 Well, when the driver put the hooks 21:44 around the shoulders and lift it, 21:47 the box, the first one 21:49 when it was high enough when he did the rotation, 21:52 the bottom of the box broke because it was totally rotten, 21:56 the finger could go to the wood. 21:59 And all that glass fell from the box. 22:03 So in that instant, the glass stopped in the air 22:07 and the box was over moving slowly in the wind. 22:11 And there was nothing under the glass, nothing over. 22:15 The driver asked me, "What should we do?" 22:17 I said, "I don't know, just lower the box back." 22:20 So as he was lowering the box, the box was moving. 22:23 He asked me to hold it. 22:24 I caught the bottom of the box, kept it still. 22:27 And as the box was coming down, it got to the glass 22:30 and the glass started to get inside 22:32 until the whole glass got all together inside. 22:36 And he lowered it down to the ground. 22:39 And then he put cables around. 22:41 And I remember the President came to me. 22:44 He was pale. He was afraid. 22:46 And he said, "I want you to go. 22:50 You don't have to pay. You don't have to go to prison. 22:53 You don't have to work on Sabbath. 22:54 I just want you to go away from this place. 22:56 Move, move, and don't curse me or my family. Just go. 23:01 We don't want you close around. 23:02 We just-- please stay away from us." 23:04 Sabbath is a clear command from God. 23:08 And if we choose to obey in faith, 23:10 He can use that for His honor and for His glory. 23:14 In every religion, men revere something, 23:18 shrines, cities, even people. 23:24 They kiss holy land. 23:26 They immerse themselves in holy water. 23:30 Their ears clutch the syllables of holy men. 23:34 Tangibles, touchables, 23:37 holy things that they can see, revere, feel. 23:42 In Genesis, however, the first thing declared holy 23:45 is not a hill, a shrine, or a place, 23:49 but a block of time, the seventh day, 23:52 "Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it." 23:57 The word sanctified is translated from 24:00 the "Hebrew as Qadash, which means sanctify, hallow, 24:06 or to set apart for holy use. 24:10 Though creation dealt with the heavens, 24:12 the earth, the birds, the sea, 24:14 and the beasts of the earth, 24:16 all things of space, it was time not space 24:20 that God first pronounced blessed and holy. 24:24 And this action makes sense because besides space, 24:27 time is the dimension in which God's creation, 24:30 the heavens, the earth, the birds, the sea, 24:33 and the beasts of the earth exist. 24:36 Also, if God had made one specific place holy, 24:40 a hill, a spring, a city, 24:42 not all people would have easy access to it. 24:45 They would have to travel to worship there. 24:48 But time comes to us instead of us going to it. 24:52 Once a week, at 1,000 miles per hour, 24:55 the approximate speed at which the earth rotates on its axis, 24:59 the Sabbath circles the globe, 25:02 arriving on one sun down, leaving on the next. 25:06 The seventh day washes over the planet 25:08 each week like a huge cleansing wave. 25:11 We never have to seek it, the day always finds us. 25:15 Meanwhile, holy cities can be burned. 25:19 Holy people can be killed. Holy shrines can be looted. 25:23 But time is beyond fire and knife, 25:26 no man can touch much less destroy it. 25:29 Therefore, by making a special time holy, 25:33 God has made the Sabbath invincible, 25:36 placing it in an element 25:37 that transcends any devices of mankind. 25:41 Armies can sack cities, rulers can ban pilgrimages, 25:46 but no military tank, no swirl of ink 25:49 can keep away the seventh day. 25:52 We can no more stop the Sabbath than we can the sun rise. 25:56 God protected this memorial from the objects of space, 26:00 which are vulnerable to man 26:02 by placing it in time, which is not. 26:06 Finally, men can avoid holy things. 26:09 They can hide from objects, people, places, 26:11 but they cannot flee from time. 26:15 We can ignore it. Be ignorant of it, hate it. 26:19 But the Sabbath always comes and nothing, no one can stop it. 26:25 Skipping over it, no man yet beyond 26:27 the destructive grasp of all, the Sabbath stands 26:31 as the universal yet invincible 26:33 memorial of God's work in making mankind. 26:37 Framed in time, the most basic element of God's creation, 26:42 the Sabbath more than any other biblical symbol, 26:45 points us to the essence of our existence, 26:49 that we are the handy work of God. 26:53 Thus as the prime symbol of our roots, 26:56 the Sabbath tells us also who we are, 26:59 why we are and where we are going, 27:02 all in a mere 24 hours. 27:06 So is Jesus, Lord of the Sabbath or Lord of nothing? 27:12 Is He Lord of your life? 27:15 You can't say, yes, He is the Lord of my life, 27:18 if He's not Lord of your 1/7th in time. 27:22 Will you spend that time with Him? 27:25 He's waiting to spend each Sabbath with you. |
Revised 2014-12-17