The pioneers paid toll on Sabbath when unavoidable.

Only eat out on Sabbath if it is absolutely necessary (the children are starving, etc).

Non-competitive outdoor activities on Sabbath should be done within one's physical abilities. For example, hike no further or faster than you can handle and still meditate on the Word.

Where do you find a restaurant where you can eat without someone working for you, i.e. being your manservant/maidservant? We are commanded to let them rest also.

They are already working. Plus, leave them a tip. However, you could buy food at a store. I have paid for meals for homeless people on the Sabbath - when the Spirit leads.

True, but they only start working for you when you walk in. That's the point where you get purposely involved in their Sabbath activity.


One tip we could leave is to remember the Sabbath day. But our patronage would make us seem hypocritical. Better to just give them money outright.


Wouldn't that push the idea that business on the Sabbath is lucrative? That would strengthen the owners' and workers' bondage.


Great for the homeless, but maybe not so great for those who are forgetting the Sabbath. And to pay for meals for ourselves, who can probably survive missing a meal or two, is much farther down that slippery slope.

The Sabbath is a day of relationship --
A day to put aside our hectic work schedules and free up the time to glorify God, spend time with Him.
Any work should be to help others see Christ?

We should NOT buy food for ourselves on Sabbath -- that should be done in the six days. But if a poor mother with a baby comes to the church door asking for milk for her baby on Sabbath, yes, we have gone out and bought formula for her.
I think Jesus would have done the same.

A story was shared concerning a gas station owner out in the country, who rightly closed his station during the Sabbath hours. But one day a man carrying a gas can came walking down the road and knocked on his door asking for a bit of gas so he could drive to the next town. The Adventist turned him down, leaving him to walk or hitch hike many more miles in order to get gas. What was this Adventist's witness -- it was not for God's glory. Why didn't he just give the man a bit of gas?

I am not comfortable with the restaurant idea -- it's not a good witness. Better go to the restaurant and share a little with the workers there on OTHER days of the week, and NOT buy food on the Sabbath, then they are more likely to believe you when you invite them to keep God's holy day.

As to being out in nature -- (walking, hiking, skiing, canoeing)
it's not so much the activity as how the activity is done and where the mind is during the activity. Is it for sport, or is it to reflect on our Creator, meditate on Him, and bring others closer to Him?

The Sabbath was given mankind for restoration, to bring them closer to their Creator and Savior, and also a day to reach out and bring others closer to Christ, and show them Christian love.

It is not a day for selfishness or self-righteousness.

Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.
We can't keep anything holy, unless Christ's holiness is transforming our hearts and lives.

Lesson 12 *September 13-19

Death and Resurrection


Sabbath Afternoon

Read for This Week’s Study: John 11:11; John 1:1-4; Luke 8:54-55; John 5:28-29; Matt. 5:22, 29; John 11:38-44.

Memory Text: Jesus said to her, I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live (John 11:25, NKJV).

Humans have an innate repulsion toward death because we were created only to live and never to die. Death is an intruder; it was not meant to be.
That’s why, during His earthly ministry, Jesus showed immense sympathy toward the bereaved. When He saw the widow of Nain taking her only son to the grave, He had compassion on her and said to her, Do not weep (Luke 7:13, NKJV). To a heartbroken father of a twelve-year-old girl who had just died, Christ consoled him, saying: Do not be afraid; only believe (Mark 5:36, NKJV). Every time death strikes our loved ones, Jesus is tenderly moved by our grief. His compassionate heart weeps with us.
But Christ does far more than weep. Having conquered death with His own death and resurrection, He owns the keys of death, and He promises to raise everyone who believes in Him to eternal life. This is, by far, the greatest promise that we have been given in God’s Word; otherwise, if death has the final say, our whole lives and everything we have ever accomplished will be in vain.
Study this week’s lesson to prepare for Sabbath, September 20.

Sunday September 14

The State of the Dead
Old Testament writers consistently held that humanity is an indivisible living being. The various Hebrew terms usually translated as flesh, soul, and spirit are just alternative ways to describe, from different points of view, the human person as a whole. In harmony with this perspective, the Scriptures use different metaphors to describe death. Among them, sleep stands out as a fitting symbol to reflect the biblical understanding of the condition of the dead (see Job 3:11-13, 14:12, Ps. 13:3, Jer. 51:39, Dan. 12:2). Death is the total end of life. Death is a state of unconsciousness in which there are no thoughts, emotions, works, or relationships of any kind (Eccles. 9:5-6, 10; Ps. 115:17; 146:4).
By the time of Jesus, however, this view of humanity, and particularly of death, was challenged by the pagan dualistic concept of the immortality of the soul, which was rapidly propagating throughout the known world.
How did Jesus describe the death of His friend Lazarus? See John 11:11.
Despite this and other passages, a number of Christians argue that Jesus believed in the immortality of the soul, for He said to the thief on the cross: Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise (Luke 23:43, NKJV). The meaning of this text changes entirely, depending on where the commas are placed. (The oldest Greek manuscripts of the New Testament don’t have punctuation marks). If the comma is placed after you, as most Bible versions render the text, it means that Jesus and the thief went to Paradise that same day; if the comma is after today, the text means that Jesus assured the thief his future redemption. Actually, Jesus’ words emphasize assurance of salvation, not the timing of the thief’s entrance into heaven. The context confirms this. To begin with, the thief had not asked for an immediate transfer to heaven at death but rather to be remembered when the Lord would come into His kingdom. Moreover, three days later Jesus Himself affirmed that He had not yet ascended to Paradise (John 20:17). This text, therefore, does not teach that the souls of the dead go to heaven after death.
Because we understand that death is an unconscious sleep, why is the teaching of the resurrection so crucial to us?

Is the tip to ease your own guilty conscience? or is it to buy forgiveness for making them work for you on the Sabbath day?

Some Jews used to hire the Gentiles to do their Sabbath work, since the Jews could not do it themselves. Are we but modern Pharisees?

Blessings,

Green Cochoa.

The teaching in scripture concerning the resurrection loses it's meaning and importance for those who believe they go to heaven when they die. Why would they need a "resurrection" at the end of earth's time? Why would a "free spirit" want to come back and be encumbered with an earthly body again?

But for those who understand death as an unconscious sleep, realize that the resurrection means being raised to LIFE!

Jesus said "I am the resurrection and the life".
Resurrection and life go together.
When Christ raises the dead, He restores their life!

Also at the resurrection it is not the old body that is restored but we will have glorious bodies.


1 Cor. 15:42 So also [is] the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption:
15:43 It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power:
15:44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.

Our belief regarding the state of the dead denies dualistic concepts such as the immortality of the soul. However, some of our other views, such as the stuggle between the flesh and the spirit, are being labeled by some as dualistic. Some even go so far as to say that Paul did not believe it, but used the metaphor in order to reach the Gentiles.

What are the arguments for and against this idea? How much can we distinguish between the spirit and the flesh, if at all? Are there non-Pauline Scriptures that make a distinction?

It is lawful to do well on the Sabbath. Buy a meal for the homeless. Buy gas for the stranded motorist.