Keeping The Sabbath Day Holy? Is The Sabbath For Today? Are Anabaptist Keeping The Sabbath - Leo Eby

So, just for help clarity, when I say Decalogue, I'm referring to the Ten Commandments. I don't keep any of the Decalogue for righteousness in Christ. If at the end of the day that's all my righteousness is, I'm condemned and I'm not part of the Kingdom of God. This is Leo Eby. I spent three days in Utah with this man and realized Jesus's character was probably very similar to this—his attitudes and the words of God just flowing out of his mouth constantly. I was very impressed and I wanted to invite him to speak to our church. He spent over a decade studying the Sabbath day and he wanted to share this topic with you. Normally it's five one-hour sessions and he's just condensing it to one a little over an hour in this message.

If you like this message or you want to know more, hit the like button and make sure you comment so that we can get him back and do the non-condensed version of the five sessions instead of this condensed version. So when you're looking at his slides, ignore the fact that he's zooming through them because it's part of a bigger picture. He had many, many more slides than what we showed today. And without any further ado, Leo Eby on the Sabbath day.

The subject I'd like to talk about this morning is the subject of what we know is the Sabbath day, Lord's Day subject. It's actually a subject of rest. That's really what it's all about. It's about rest. So we want to dig into this a little bit. And I've shared this topic numerous times in my life and I like to know where there's an exit because sometimes the things I say don't really fit. So I see there's an exit right there.

So if I feel like I'm getting uncomfortable, I might have to make an exit. Hebrews 1 says that God in sundry times and diverse manners, spake in times of passing to the Fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things and by whom he created the worlds, who being in the brightness of his glory and expressed image of his person and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high.

So Jesus has been revealed to this world and I also want to introduce this subject with Ephesians 1:17. It says, "The God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, hath given unto us the spirit of wisdom and revelation and the knowledge of him, him being Jesus.

For what purpose? That the eyes of your understanding might be enlightened, that ye may know what is the hope of his calling and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints and what is the exceeding greatness of his power to usward who believe, according to his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead and set him at his own right hand in heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion.

And every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come, and hath put all things under his feet and gave him to be head over all things to the church." So if we're going to find any answers today, it's going to be we're going to find them in Jesus Christ. All authority is directly in proportion to the truth in which it is lined. Therefore, Jesus being all truth is all authority.

And I think one of the best illustrations of this is when you have Jesus and Pilate face to face.

Pilate said to Jesus, "Don't you know I have the authority to put you to death?" And his reply was, "You would have no authority at all, except my Father in heaven would give you authority."

Jesus recognized the authority that Pilate had through his Father, but Pilate, I don't think, recognized the authority that Jesus had. Jesus being all truth was all authority. The fourth commandment. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Seventh day, rest. Seventh day, for some reason, our Creator thought it was good to rest after his six days of creation. But we also have Isaiah 40:28 says, "Hast thou not known, hast thou not heard that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary, there is no searching for his understanding?"

What did our Creator need rest for? Do we need rest? Who did he rest for? Does God get tired? Everything about Sabbath, what does the scriptures teach us about Sabbath? And because this is your typical Sunday school class, I'd like to engage you a little bit on this at this point. And I'd just like to, when you think of Sabbath, and by the way, the Sabbath subject isn't just an Old Testament subject. The word Sabbath is all through the New Testament as well.

So anything about Sabbath that you know of in the scriptures? It's to be kept holy. It was to be kept holy. Thank you. The Jews were to do no work on the Sabbath. They were to do no work on the Sabbath. And it was sort of a blanket statement. No work, no servile work.

There was one particular thing that they were not to do on Sabbath. Otherwise, it was a pretty blanket statement. Do you know what that is, David? They weren't to kindle the fire. They were not to start a fire. That's why food had to be prepared on the day before. No food preparation on the Sabbath day. I don't even think today that they light candles on the Sabbath day. What else about the Sabbath?

Dedicated to God. It was dedicated. Where did the concept of a Sabbath come from? Where is the first place in the Bible that we hear about the Sabbath?

Is that in the creation story when it said God rested on the seventh day? The word Sabbath isn't used there, and I'm not a Hebrew scholar or anything, but the word rest. God rested on the seventh day. God completed his works, and he ceased from creating on the Sabbath. Another place, I think it's in Deuteronomy, says, "And he was refreshed." Very good. Where is the first place in the Bible the word Sabbath is actually used in our English? How about Exodus 16? In Exodus chapter 16, do you know what the occasion was?

The children of Israel were going through the wilderness, and they come through the wilderness of sin, and they were hungry and thirsty, and they begin to murmur, and God says, "I'm going to rain bread from heaven." And he introduced the idea of a Sabbath to them.

And so my point is, this happened before Exodus 19 and 20, sequentially. Before they got to Mount Sinai, God introduced the subject of the Sabbath and gave them specific instructions in how the Sabbath related to the gathering of manna. And more on the Sabbath. What day of the week was it?

Did it matter?

It was specifically the seventh day. Yes. And it said God rested on the seventh day and hallowed it. Is there any evidence of Sabbath keeping before Exodus chapter 16? Do you know of any account where the patriarchs kept the Sabbath day recorded in the scriptures? There's no record of it.

Albeit, it does say Abraham kept all of God's commandments and statutes. Job says a similar statement in Job chapter 23 that he didn't neglect the commandments of God.

What commandments did they have? We don't know for sure, but it specifically says of these two people that they kept the commandments and statutes of God. Also, Noah knew something about clean and unclean. What context was the Sabbath day commandment given in? It was given to a people that was on a journey from out of Egypt into the promised land. That's good. What other context was the commandment given in? What mountain were they at?

Mount Sinai. Mount Sinai.

They weren't listening. They weren't listening.

It was given in the context of how many other commandments? Third command. Pardon me? Third command. Third. Fourth command. Fourth. Fourth command.

Third. Third. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven images. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.

So this commandment was given in the context of ten other—it says words—but commandments that God gave, and that was nestled in the center of a whole bunch of other commandments that were given at the same time. But these words were written in what?

Stone. Stone. The rest of the words Moses wrote in a book. How were these commandments given? I mean, how were they written? God's finger. God's finger. And he wrote in what?

Stone. Stone. He didn't take a soft clay tablet and take his finger and smear it through the soft clay. He engraved it in stone with his finger.

Now, I don't know what you visualize when you visualize something like that, but I think of a plasma cutter for some reason. Anybody know what a plasma cutter is? A plasma cutter is a device that uses electrical arc and air to chisel out steel and weld and make a groove or cut.

That's just my visual of it. When God reached down and touched that stone, I believe it was sizzling and chips were flying, and the words just developed right on the stone. There's more surrounding circumstances to this giving of this law. What was that? There was a lot of commotion around this giving of this law. Lots of commotion.

There had to be the golden calf. Okay, we had the golden calf. But prior to that, when the Lord said, "Get the people ready and bring them up to the mountain," and it says the earth began to shake, a thick dark cloud came down on the mountain. The mountain began to burn with fire like a furnace.

Thunder, lightning, and a trumpet began to blow, and the trumpet did not let up. It just started getting louder and louder and louder and louder. An ear-splitting blast until Moses spoke, and then God spoke.

Hebrews says that Moses said, "The sight was so exceedingly fearful," he said, "I do exceedingly fear and quake." The people were afraid. They come to Moses and said, "Don't let God speak to us anymore. We had heard the voice of God and lived. From now on, let God speak to you and you speak to us, and we'll do all the words."

I want to read briefly out of Exodus chapter 24. Exodus chapter 24, verse 4, "And Moses wrote all the words of the Lord and rose up early in the morning and built an altar unto the hill, 12 pillars, according to the 12 tribes of Israel. And he sent young men of the children of Israel, which offered burnt offerings and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen unto the Lord. And Moses took half the blood and put it in basins, and half the blood he sprinkled on the altar. And he took the blood of the covenant and read it in the audience of the people. And they said, 'All that the Lord has said we will do, and be obedient.'

And then the covenant was ratified with blood." It says Moses took the blood and sprinkled it on the people and said, "Behold the blood of the covenant which the Lord hath made with you concerning all these words."

So we see that this covenant was ratified in blood because it was a covenant that God had made with his people of children of Israel.

This covenant was directly for the Jewish people. He was making a covenant with them. But was this moral covenant? Did it have any implications out beyond the Jewish people? What do you think?

Romans 3:19 says, "Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law, that every mouth might be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God." So not only was this covenant made with the children of Israel, the children of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, it had implications that reached into the whole world for the purpose of bringing the whole world guilty before God. Was there any penalties involved for breaking this commandment?

Was there any penalties involved for breaking this covenant? Yes, there was.

The scriptures are very clear in Exodus chapter 31:13-18 that the penalty for breaking the commandments of God was death. We actually have a story illustration in Numbers chapter 15. Does anybody know what happened in Numbers chapter 15?

A man was found gathering sticks on the Sabbath day, and they put him in prison until they wanted to find out what the Lord wanted to be done. And his Lord said, "The man must be put to death." And so all the congregation of Israel stoned him to death. In the New Testament, nobody has mentioned anything in the New Testament as far as what was said about the Sabbath. Does anyone want to bring up any New Testament subjects about the Sabbath? Yes.

One of the things they tried to accuse Jesus of was healing a man on the Sabbath. Act. Jesus responded and said, "Who of you whose sheep didn't fall into a well or something would rest him on the Sabbath?" Thank you.

In every account of the gospel, scripture is given for the conflict of the Sabbath day with Jesus and the Pharisees.

Jesus made many statements about the Sabbath day. He said the Sabbath was not a man was not made for the Sabbath, but the Sabbath was made for man. He also said, "I am Lord also of the Sabbath." Read Matthew chapter 12. What does James have to say about this law?

So here we are. We've developed this Sabbath day commandment into the context of the Decalogue. The Decalogue means Ten Commandments. We have developed that into the context of a covenant. So now we have the Decalogue connected with a covenant, and James has some more to say about it. "Whosoever shall keep the whole law, yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all." One of my goals this morning in this period is to make you uncomfortable.

Because I don't know your lives very well. I don't know if there's anybody here that actually keeps the Sabbath day commandment or not. But I would venture a guess that most of you didn't keep a Sabbath yesterday.

Fact of it is, it probably was a pretty busy day. Let me read you a few excerpts out of this book. "Some people claim to be New Testament Christians, implying they consult the New Testament alone for teaching. Unfortunately, someone taught them, these well-intentioned believers, that the New Testament canceled the teachings of the Old. Paul disagrees. He said, 'God inspired all scripture to equip us for the work.' All scripture is given by inspiration from God and is profitable for what? For doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and instruction in righteousness. For what purpose? That the man of God might be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.

It is said of Abraham, 'My voice and kept my Abraham obeyed my voice and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.' The eternal Ten Commandment law was included in both the Old and New Covenants. God's law served as a standard of judgment before Mount Sinai and continued to do so after the resurrection. Sunday keeping is a tradition of men.

Most Bible scholars readily admit that. Of course, I quite well know that Sunday did come into use in early Christian history as a religious day, as we learn from the Christian fathers and other sources. But what a pity that it comes branded with the mark of paganism and Christian with the name of the sun god, then adopted and sanctified by the papal apostasy and bequeathed as a sacred legacy to the Protestants. So the question you need to ask yourself, are you making void the commandment of God by your traditions? How can you justify what you did yesterday and what you're doing today? One of the things when I was searching for answers that I got very uncomfortable with was that people that were trying to justify the Lord's Day would say things like this, that in the beginning, God made the principle or established the principle that one day in seven, a man should rest.

Well, I guess that's a good try. But the fact of it is, God specifically identified which day. He didn't say one day in seven. He said, "Six days shalt thou work, and the seventh day shall be a Sabbath unto the Lord thy God."

It's not a one in seven, "Come, take this one, leave that one." That's not the way it works. The seventh day is always the seventh day.

Well, James puts a real conviction into my heart when I was going through my journey. This was become a real—pardon me—a real wrestling thing with me to get a grip on just where I stood as far as my relationship with God. And so God's covenant, this Decalogue, which was written, engraved in stone, was a manifestation of God's covenant with the people of Israel.

And in Deuteronomy chapter 27, "Cursed be he that conformeth not all the words of this law to do them." And all the people said, "Amen." Now, Jeremiah says 31, verse 31, "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah." Listen carefully. "Not according to the covenant I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them up out of the land of Egypt with my covenant they break, although I was a husband to them, saith the Lord. But this shall be the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord.

I will put my law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts and will be their God, and they shall be my people."

Let's talk about Sunday, the first day, the eighth day. Am I not keeping the Sabbath on Sunday? After all, didn't Jesus change the Sabbath to Sunday? Let's see what the scriptures say. Of course, Sunday isn't mentioned in the scriptures, but the word first day is.

The first day is mentioned eight times in the New Testament, and we're going to take a quick look at it. Matthew 28 has to do with Mary Magdalene on the first day of the week. She went to see the sepulchre. The second one is in Mark chapter 16. Very early on the first day of the week, they came to the sepulchre at the rising of the sun, number three. Now, when Jesus was risen on the first day of the week, he appeared to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast seven devils. Number four, now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came into the sepulchre bringing the spices which they had prepared and certain others with them, Luke chapter 24:1.

Number five, first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene, another account of that, John 20:1. Number six, the same day at evening being the first day of the week on John 20:19, when the doors were shut where the disciples assembled because of the fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst and said unto them, "Peace be unto you."

So these first six reference the first day either of Jesus' resurrection or the people coming to the empty sepulchre or the gathering together of disciples and says specifically why they were gathered together because of the fear of the Jews.

Number seven, Acts 20:7, and upon the first day of the week when the disciples came together to break bed, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow and continued his speech into midnight. So we have a count of Paul preaching on the first day of the week. Number eight, 1 Corinthians 16:1-2, now concerning the collection of the saints, as I have given order to the church of Galatia, even so do you. Upon the first day of the week, let every one of you lay by him in store as God has prospered him, that there be no gathering when I come.

So we have two of the most weighty evidences in number seven and number eight where they have a count of the disciples gathering together the first day of the week. But there's no reference anywhere where it says that you shouldn't do business on the Sunday. It doesn't say you shouldn't work on Sunday. It doesn't say that the Sabbath was ever changed to Sunday. There's no wording like that.

Do the churches keep the Ten Commandments as a combined unit? Do we have the authority to choose which of the Ten Commandments to keep? Sadly, most Christians ignore the fourth. They say, "Well, we keep nine out of ten."

What's wrong with the fourth one?

Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.

"This people draw nigh unto me with their lips and nigh unto me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but the heart is far from me. But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrine the commandments of men." Mark 7:9, and he said unto them, "Fool well ye reject the commandments of God that ye may keep your own traditions." Most Christians, with a few exceptions, traditionally have observed a first day, Lord's Day, Sunday as a rest in public worship in exchange for the Sabbath, ignoring the Sabbath.

Revelation 4:12, here is the patience of the saints. "Here are they that keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus Christ." John 15:10, "If you keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love, even as I have kept my Father's commandment and abide in his love." And hereby we do know that we know him if we keep his commandments. Are you listening? "He that saith, I know him and keepeth not his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him." 1 John 3:22, "And whatsoever ye ask, we receive of him because we keep his commandments and we do those things that are pleasing in his sight."

"Blessed are they that do his commandments. They shall have the right to the tree of life and may enter into the gates of his city." Revelation 22:14.

I don't know how you feel by this point, but when I got to this point, I was convinced of one thing, and that was I was a commandment breaker in its entirety. There was no getting around it. I didn't have to consult some theologian to understand that I wasn't keeping the commandments.

And James makes it clear that if you break one, you've broken them all.

The question that stuck with me, though, is, was I a lawless person despising the word of God, or was I establishing the word of God?

Was I destroying the law, or was I establishing the law? What is the Decalogue capable of doing? I guess everybody knows what the word Decalogue means. It means the Ten Commandments. I try to use as many words as I can because the word law has so many nuances of meaning that you can get lost in it. So just for help clarity, when I say Decalogue, I'm referring to the Ten Commandments. The Decalogue can only do one of two things, and that's make me a self-righteous person or convince me that I'm a sinner.

Luke chapter 18, Jesus gives this illustration in a parable. He said, "Two men went up to the temple to pray, the one a Pharisee, the other a sinner. And the Pharisee stood thus and prayed thus with himself. And he said, 'I thank thee, God, that I'm not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this publican.

I fast twice a week.

I give tithes of all that I have.'" The publican was somewhere far off, and he said he couldn't even so much as lift his head up towards heaven, but he smurred his chest and said, "Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner."

Jesus said, "I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other." You see, the law has a purpose to it. If it makes you a self-righteous person, it can't take you any further than that. But if it convinces you that you are a sinner, there's hope for you because then you cry out for mercy and God will reach out and touch your life.

I'm an amateur PowerPoint builder, so not everything gets quite in line like I'd like for it to, but I'd like to talk a little bit about this story here. Our bishop gives a story one time. One Sunday afternoon, a group of boys were playing around, and the farm where they were at, there were two 80-foot concrete silos with railing around the top.

So the boys decided, "We're going to go up the silo." So they went up the silo, and they got to the top of the silo. The big boys decided, "You know what? I think we can go from one top of the silo to the other silo."

So the big boys stepped out over the rail, reached out as far as they could, put their foot on the other side, grabbed the rail, and moved across.

But one little boy on the end, he was too short.

His legs didn't reach the other silo, neither did his arms.

He didn't want to go back down the silo. So what did it take? He had to let go of the one and leap for the other one.

And there's a reason for why I'm telling this, and I'll probably bring this up later in my talk if I don't run out of time. But my next step in my testimony is that somewhere around the middle of 2007, when I was trying to get through all my questions and all the answers I was looking for, we got a Times Magazine in the mail one day. And I opened up the Times Magazine, and here there was an article in the Times Magazine concerning Pope Benedict and a rabbi named Rabbi Jacob Neunster.

And this article was about a dialogue and a conversation they had. And I was reading through the article, and it was given some of the questions that Pope Benedict was asking the rabbi. And so he said to the rabbi, "So what did Jesus take away from your Torah?" And the rabbi's answer was, "Nothing." He said, "Did he add anything?" He said, "Yes." He said, "What was that?" He said, "He added himself."

And when I read those words, I understood something I just didn't have understood before. And maybe that's not clear to you, but that little pronoun, when Jesus says, "I and my in the word of God," he is communicating something to you that you should pay attention to because Jesus is putting himself in a crucial position in the word of God.

Jesus isn't a factor in our redemption. He's the sum of our redemption, the person of Jesus Christ. Who is he? His deity, his incarnation in humanity, and his purpose. Now, what I'm going to share next, I normally spend an hour and a half on, but it's so important. I don't have time to actually expound on it, but I'm just going to go through briefly these slides. I'm going to take about 10 minutes to go through these, and we're going to take a look at just who Jesus is.

Knowing who Jesus is is important and critical understanding and interpretation of the Sabbath day, Lord's Day subject. Philippians 3:9, one of my favorite verses. "That I may be found in him, not having my own righteousness, which is of the law, but that righteousness which is of faith in Jesus Christ, that righteousness which is of God by faith." One of the secrets I discovered in understanding this subject is to understand the concept of the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Who is this person, Jesus? He is the word of God, that which we from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, our hands of hand of the word of life.

He is the Son of God. He is the Son of the living God. He is the Son of Man. He is Emmanuel. He is the Holy Child. He is the Creator. He is the Son. Notice how that's spelled. This is prophetic language from Malachi 4:2. And I'm going to stop and just tell you a little story in relation to this. In my journey in this subject, this was an important part of my experience when I was searching for answers. I was invited to go with a young man that I do business with to Fairfax, Virginia one day because I'm a lumberman. This man in Virginia had some trees that he wanted me to look at.

So the young man I was with, his name was Joey, and we left real early one morning, I think about 5 o'clock, and we drove to Fairfax, Virginia to see this man's trees because this man's acquaintance was with my friend Joey, not myself.

So we get down to Fairfax, Virginia, and we look at the man's trees, but the trees weren't of any consequence as far as business goes. But the man was nice enough. He was an elderly man. And we got there about 7:30 in the morning, and we looked at his trees, decided it wasn't anything that we could do business with. And he said, "Would you come into my house to have breakfast with me?"

And the young man that was with me said, "No, let's don't go in there." And I said, "Well, why not? Let's just go eat breakfast with the man." After all, he invited us in, and he said, "Now, we don't have meat." He said, "Well, you don't eat meat, but he said, we're having eggs for breakfast." I said, "Well, that's fine. I don't have to have meat for my breakfast." So I went into the house, and we sat down, and his wife brought the breakfast to us, and we ate it. And meanwhile, while I was eating, this man began to ask me questions to figure out who I was.

And after he figured out who I was, he took it upon himself to let me know. He said, "I have to let you know how deceived you might be." Okay? And so he began to tell me how that my lack of observation of the Sabbath day was a result of paganism brought into the church through Constantine, the emperor Constantine, back in 312, I believe it was, and that Constantine was responsible for combining paganism and Christianity and making Sabbath day Sunday and making Sunday laws and laws against Sabbath day, and that ultimately Sunday worship is the mark of the beast.

So I listened very carefully to what he said, and it just so happened that I had been just recently been familiarized with Malachi 4:2. And I said, "Well, sir," I said, "if you read in your King James Version of Malachi 4:2, that unto them that fear my name shall the Son of Righteousness arise with healing in his wings." And I said, "If you check, that's spelled capital S-U-N." And I said, "That's prophetic language of Jesus." And so I'm here to tell you, I'm an unashamed sun god worshiper.

End of discussion. And I walked out of that house.

I was just amazed that the Spirit had brought that. Number one, that the Spirit had even given me that verse to reply with. And I was able to do it in a very polite way where I wasn't confrontational or anything like that. But it became a critical part of my experience of understanding the subject of who Jesus is. He is the light. He is the lawgiver.

For the Lord is our judge. The Lord is our lawgiver. The Lord is our King. He will save us. There is only one lawgiver who is able to save and destroy. Who art thou that judges another? He is the law.

I'm going to stop here just a little bit because this is critical. Come ye Isaiah 2:3, "Let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of God of Jacob, and he will teach us his ways, and we will walk in his paths. For out of Zion shall go forth a law and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem."

Why would Isaiah be talking about a law coming out of Zion when we already had the law given on Mount Sinai? Another reference in Isaiah, Isaiah 42:4, "And the owl shall wait for his law." What for law are we waiting for? Of course, this is pre-Christ, pre the incarnation of Christ. He is the seed. He is the Lamb of God. Let me back up. There is something to say about the seed. A seed demonstrates something about the laws of God that are very integral to unpacking this thing. Jesus said, "Except the grain of corn fall in the ground and die, it abides alone. But if it dies, it brings forth life." I was walking through the forest one day with a young man who was an unbeliever, and I picked up an acorn.

I said, "You see this acorn? If you study that acorn, you can understand something about the gospel of Jesus Christ. For an acorn to grow, this acorn must die in order for life to come forth. He is the Lamb of God. He is the ram of God." I wish I had time to develop that one, but it's referencing the ram that was caught in the thicket when Abraham was out going to offer Isaac. If you want to note something, note that the ram was caught in the thicket by his horns. He is the great high priest. He is a prophet.

Peter references Moses. He said, "God's going to raise up a prophet like unto me of your brethren. Him shall you hear and all the things that he shall say unto you." We have four accounts of the mount of the transfiguration in the scriptures, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and also 2 Peter references the transfiguration. And in all the accounts, we have James and John and Peter with Jesus on the mount.

And lo and behold, two men show up to speak with Jesus, Moses and Elijah. And it even says what they discussed. They discussed his decease, his death. And it says, "A cloud, a bright cloud come down on the mount." And out of that voice, the disciples heard. They said, "This is my beloved Son. Hear ye him." What happens next?

The cloud goes up, and the only one remaining standing was Jesus.

That's significant.

And it connects the link right back to Moses. And what he was prophesied about, he is the rock. He is a rock. He is that stone which was cut out of the mountain. Just like Moses. Remember when Moses came down from the mount and he had made the calf? He took the two tablets of stone, and in his wrath, he threw them down and he just shattered them.

God told him, "Here you have two more stone tablets like unto the first." And so God wrote the second time in there. And just as Moses broke the tablets of the testament beneath the mount because of the sins of the people, so Jesus, that rock was broken on Mount Calvary for my sin and the sin of all the people. He is the tabernacle, temple.

Jesus answered, "Son of them, destroy this temple in three days while I raise it up."

And this is one of the rare occasions in the scriptures where there's an immediate interpretation of what Jesus meant. But he spoke of the temple of his body. He is that greater temple which he spoke in Matthew 12:6. There was conflict between Jesus and the Pharisees there. He's the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the ending, which is and which was and which is to come, the Almighty.

He is the great I Am. I Am the way, the truth, and the life. Notice the pronoun. Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life." I am the good shepherd. I am the door. I am the bread of life. And he references that manna in the wilderness. Note that. I am the resurrection and the life. He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.

I am the resurrection and the life. Whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believeth thou this? Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation, but pass from death unto life. There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ, Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made us free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do in that it was weak to the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh.

That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. Verily, verily, I say unto you, the hour is coming and it now is when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God and they that hear shall live. That's a resurrection concept. And Jesus wasn't speaking to people that were buried in the ground. He was talking to people that were on their feet walking.

And he is saying, "There's coming a day when those that are dead shall rise." But he also said, "It is now as well." Wherefore he saith, "Awake thou that sleepest and arise from the dead and Christ shall give thee light." Ephesians 5:14.

The words of Jesus are so powerful that when the gospel is given, the dead must rise, either unto life or unto death.

He was considered a blasphemer. "Are thou the Son of Christ, the Son of blessed?" And Jesus said, "I am. And ye shall see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of the power coming in clouds of heaven." Then the high priest rent his clothes and said, "What need we any further witness? Ye have heard the blasphemy. What think ye?" And they all condemned him to be guilty of death.

John 19:7, they scream, "We have a law, and by our law, this man ought to die." They threw him under the total condemnation of the law. They couldn't find him a sinner, but the righteousness of Christ has no fellowship with the righteousness of the law. There was conflict there. He is King. He that hath on his vesture and on his thigh name King of kings and Lord of lords. He is King of the Jews.

Pilate put him on the cross. Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews. Jesus is only King of the Jews. Did you know that?

Unless you're a spiritual Jew, circumcised of the heart, then he's your king.

I don't think Pilate knew what good theology he was using. My kingdom is not of this world. He makes alive.

1 Corinthians 1:30, "But of him are ye in Christ Jesus who of God is made unto us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption." He's the total package. Therefore, while I divide with him a portion with greatness, he divided the spoil with strong because he had poured out his soul into death and he was numbered with the transgressors and he bear the sins of many and made intercession for the transgressors. He is Lord of the Sabbath.

For the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath. I don't think we can grasp what an extravagant statement is being said here.

He is a Sabbath worker. John 5:16-17. So not only did they accuse him of breaking the Sabbath, but then he called God his Father, making him equal with God. And they went about to stone him. Therefore, did the Jews persecute Jesus and sought to slay him because he had done these things on the Sabbath day. Here was his defense. He didn't say, "Well, you know what? You folks are getting this misunderstanding. I wasn't really working on the Sabbath day after all." That's not the way he addressed the accusation. His accusation was, or pardon me, his reply was, "My Father worketh and so I work."

Keep in mind, the day that they were discussing this was the Sabbath day, the seventh day of the week. And he's saying, "My Father works on this day and I'm going to work on this day." How do you reconcile that with Genesis chapter 2 where it says, "And God rested from all his works on the seventh day." And he rested and he sanctified the day. And Jesus says, "No, no, no, no. My Father's working on this day."

How do you reconcile those thoughts? Jesus' kingdom business is a 24/7 operation.

God, the Father, the creative works, he only rested from his creative works. But his kingdom purposes and all his works related to the kingdom continue around the clock. God doesn't rest, he doesn't slumber, he doesn't go away, he don't go on a journey. He's always at this business. Therefore, the Jews sought more to kill him because he not only had broken the Sabbath, but also that God was his Father making himself equal with God. He is our rest. "Come unto me, all ye that labor and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me. I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest to your souls.

For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

The word Sabbath isn't in there. But the implications can't be missed. Because right following these verses is Matthew chapter 12, where the conflict of the Sabbath rages on. And Jesus is saying, "I will give you rest." Rest? These people didn't need rest. They had the Sabbath day coming up. They had a night's sleep coming up. What in the world is Jesus referring to?

How could Jesus, as a man, provide rest? Jesus was an ordinary-looking man. It says there was no beauty in him that we should even desire him. He was not head and shoulders over the people like King Saul was.

He didn't have muscles like Samson, places that you didn't know there were places. He didn't have a—he wasn't King David. He didn't have a history of warfare and enemy slaughter like King David. But here's this humble man saying that if you come to me, I will give you rest.

Just how important is rest in your life? Some of you got home late last night. You desperately needed what? Rest. Do you know that we spend about a third of our life trying to rest, either resting or trying to rest? That's how important—that's how important rest is.

And we're not even talking about Sabbath day yet. But could there be a deeper problem here? You see, men aren't really at rest even when they're sleeping because they have a problem inside called sin. And they need an answer to that. And it is so weighty that it actually destroys men. That's how much burden we're carrying with our sin. And this isn't just true for Jesus' audience. This is true for me. This is true for you.

Is that we have a deep need for rest. So when Jesus looked at his crowd of people, whether they were farmers or carpenters or whatever they were, I don't think he had in mind, "Hey, folks, I know you worked hard today, but you need to have some rest."

No, he was touching a deeper matter down deep in his heart of rest that every person needs. Do you know one of the descriptions of eternal destruction is in Revelation chapter 14, verse 11? It says, "And they shall have no rest day or night." That's one of the horrors of eternal destruction. No rest.

Constant torment. No rest. He is our advocate. The law of Ten Commandments was given in a fearful demonstration of power at Mount Sinai. So fearful that Moses exceedingly feared and quaked. But God also demonstrated his power in the bringing in of the Son of God into the earth. And that was revealed in Ephesians chapter 1, the mighty power when he raised him from the dead and sat him at his own right hand, far above all principality and power and might and dominion.