Thought for Today: Sunday May 18
You must remember that you live in a fallen world, an abnormal world tainted by sin. Much frustrations and failures result from your seeking perfection in this life. There is nothing perfect in this life except YHVH! That is why closeness to Him will satisfy deep yearnings and can fills you with Joy.
Here's First Fruits Ministries' sermon for the Sabbath on 5/17/2025, called: "Elementary Principles, Part 10 (Baptisms, Part D):
YouTube Link:
U+2693 does anyone know of any pagan origins to the anchor symbol used by first century christians? From the little research I did, it seems to be the only non greek symbol used. I have a purpose for it, but dont want to use it if it has any pagan connections. Thank you for your input!
Blocked my first user on here. Was hoping not to have to use that feature. Glad it is there, though.
Compare Genesis 2:8,”Then the Lord God planted a garden in the East, in a place called Eden. He put the man he had formed in that garden.” with Genesis 4:17,” Cain had intimate relations with his wife. She became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch. At that time Cain was building a city. He named it after his son Enoch.” Our Creator placed Adam in the garden and after Cain kills Able he went to build and live in a city. This indicates a slight negative idea of a city as a place where people live in a type of exile far away from the perfect garden that was free of sin.
Do you truly believe the Seventh Day is the Sabbath?… Not a Christian sense of belief - an intellectual acknowledgment, an agreement with the recorded facts. No.
Do you truly believe in the biblical sense of the word believe? That is hearing, understanding, accepting and implementing.
What we believe we do… And what we think-we-believe but do not do we need to revisit and test to make sure we are not fooling ourselves.
There are many excuses for disobedience, especially when it comes to the Sabbath.
Sometimes a boss will require employees to work late on the sixth day. Or to come in on the Seventh. Sports games for the kids on the Sabbath. Weddings. Funerals. Family gatherings.
So many ordinary things are offered to us instead of our obligation to the Almighty to honor His Holy Day.
And the greatest temptation is the fact that there is no evil in these ordinarily…But there is nothing ordinary about the Sabbath Day.
Therefore, it becomes a great evil for us to make it ordinary.
Or Heavenly Father did not command us to remember that it is Sabbath in the Christian sense of remembrance… Not according to the notion that we think back upon a time long ago or call to mind a fact of reality. Rather in the biblical sense, we are called to remember the Sabbath by living it out and making it a memorial.
Nor are we required to make the Sabbath holy. It is holy by nature… Or more aptly - super-nature…
We are not required to make it holy. We are required to keep it that way.
We are to remember that it is the Sabbath and to remember that the Sabbath is holy.
It is a time of ceasing… Ceasing our malacha. That is to say our labor. Not only for our employment, but for ourselves as well. Cooking and cleaning and gardening. Shopping and outings. Building and making. None of these have any business being done by us upon the Day of ceasing.
Our Heavenly Father has handed us six out of seven days to make all this happen. In His mercy, He has offered us 6/7 of our time to accomplish all that we desire and require. And He asks for only 1/7 for Himself…
Is it really too much to give the Maker of Time as much as He asks for especially when He gave us all our time anyway?!
And in His even more infinite mercy, even when He ask us to give Him this time as special and set apart, even in this it is still for our benefit, not His.
For this reason and more, breaking the Sabbath is to be greatly abhorred.
It is stealing the special time of our Saviour and squandering it on nonsense that is neither necessary nor profitable.
Spending the Sabbath on anything but ceasing as He said is scorning all the gifts He has given. Breaking the Sabbath is deciding we know better. It is bending the straight and narrow away to avoid the inconvenience of stopping when we should and giving the One Who made The Way we walk upon His rightful due.
It is true that there are exceptions to the rule. But these are themselves not excuses. And are reserved for the most extreme of cases.
Most importantly, it must be known and understood that even for just cause, Sabbath-breaking is extremely evil.
When danger is afoot and life and death are on the line, it will at times be required to break the Sabbath… And even in these extreme instances it remains a wickedness.
It must be done sometimes when inaction would itself be iniquitous; we must choose between two sins… With no good choices we must choose what virtue values greater and which violation would be the lesser.
And we must make the choice knowing that we will have to answer for it one day. When we stand the judgment that evil will be set before us, and we will be required to testify why we did it.
For us, we would choose mercy, breaking the Sabbath to save life, but each has to stand the judgment alone and must choose for themselves.
Even if we must break the Sabbath, it is still sin. And that is always a serious matter.
How much more serious is it to break the Sabbath when life and death are not on the line?!
When family demands that we do things on the Father’s Holy Day or the boss commands our overtime on Sabbath or the kids want to play sports etc etc etc.
Our Savior said, “Who is my mother and who are my brothers? Those who do the will of My Father in Heaven are my brother and sister and mother.”
Your family demands and your boss commands… But who is your true boss and who your true family?
Are you willing to do the will of the Father that you may belong to His family? Or are you going to make excuses? Not life-and-death excuses either but simply discomfort and possible dejection.
Rather let men be offended. But whatever you do, do not tell the world you believe it is the Sabbath and strive on in your labors. Do not say you know it is the Holy Day of YHWH and treat it as common before all eyes.
Our Savior is merciful. But mercy isn’t for those who know better. It’s for those who don’t know any better.
Do you know better?…then do better.
Make none do likewise but tell all who hear who would require ought else of you but resting in the grace of Heaven that you will move heaven and earth to do labor for their wellbeing…but it will have to wait till tomorrow.
This is our Father’s Time.
Shabbat Shalom.
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