In what sense(s) did Christ fufil the Sabbath?

[Peairtach]

This question is prompted by this blog of Rev. Lane Keister
The Sabbath and Salvation History « Green Baggins

RGM, an anti-Sabbatarian, is contending that Christ "fulfilled" the Sabbath in such a way as to completely spiritualise it.

Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.(Col 2:16-17)

 

[JML]

It has always been my understanding that Christ fulfilled the duties associated with the Mosaic aspect of the Sabbath but that the moral aspects present since creation remain as duty for us. In a sense Christ has fulfilled the moral law aspect as well in that He has purchased our rest and worship in Heaven. However, we will not partake of that aspect until we reach that promised land of rest. Until that time, we are obligated to live according to the moral requirements of the 4th commandment (work 6, rest 1).

---------- Post added at 10:03 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:58 AM ----------

P.S. Not that there will be no moral requirements in Heaven. What I mean is that Heaven will be constant Sabbath.

 

[Contra_Mundum]

One or two vv from one place in Scripture does not a complete doctrine make. At best, it must be harmonized with the whole witness of Scripture.

Let's look at another: Heb.4:8-10

For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken of another day later on. So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his.

Many anti-Sabbatarians try to refer this verse to the future, or at least to a personal future respecting their own selves. This is an excuse-making for their unwillingness to actually hear the Word in holy submission. One common device is the unsustainable position that Hebrews is written mainly to and about people who are "on their way out the door," or tempted to go out the door, or who are already out the door of the church. This puts the interpreter into the preposterous position of deciding at each exhortation whether Paul is speaking to solid Christians, or to a certain class of church-goers or apostates who aren't really committed. When we know the predominately Jewish-composition of the original audience, that helps us understand the background of thinking and living behind the letter. But that is the sum-total of the utility of that knowledge. In reality, the whole message is for the whole church, and to think otherwise leads to dead-end exegesis.

First, the term Sabbath-rest (one word in Gk) is a fairly technical term; it's found in the LXX, and it refers to a keeping-of-Sabbath.

Second, the verb "remains" means just that: there is STILL a Sabbath-keeping. It REMAINS. It hasn't gone anywhere.

Third, follow the argument of the writer.

First he points to the Israelites, and he observes that the original Promise was "rest in the land of Canaan." But the rest the people get once in the land isn't complete. In the fullest sense, Joshua doesn't give the people rest. And that this is abundantly clear even to the OT saints we know from the witness of the Psalmist, in a Sabbath-Psalm 95, which the writer to Hebrews quotes just above, vv4&7. The reason the people keep Sabbath while they are already in the land-of-rest, is because the fulfillment of that rest is still future. That is, while Israel is in the land, there yet REMAINS a rest-to-come.

The OT Sabbath, therefore, is a constant reminder that OT Israel isn't in heaven yet; while they are in this world, they STILL do not have the rest promised to their father Abraham. But every week, as they "enter into their rest," they get a foretaste of heaven.

Second, the writer to Hebrews transfers the OT hope to NT believers. But observe that he does not say that the NT believers already have their rest; but that a keeping-Sabbath-rest REMAINS. So, we hear the question, "Don't believers have "rest" in Christ?" Sure, but that observation is nowhere in view. It is completely infelicitous to apply the term "REMAINS" to the Sabbath-rest found in Christ. If one takes the aforementioned view that Hebrews is (in part or main) written to people who are superficially in the church, but not finally committed to resting-in-Christ, then this view would have greater plausibility (as in, "you should remain in Christ"). But this only highlights the confusion created when one starts trying to interpret Scripture in by identifying which parts have special application to particular sub-classes of recipients.

No, but third, we also enjoy the foretaste of heaven which is the essence of the Sabbath, and always was the essence of it. It is not that the Sabbath "remains, up there or up ahead somewhere." It REMAINS for us, here and now. The perfect rest is to be with God fully, and to know his benevolence without any sin or fear left. For us, indeed our rest is "in Christ." He is the one who makes our keeping-Sabbath-rest sweet. How much sweeter it will be, once we permanently join "the general assembly and church of the firstborn, written in heaven," and an innumerable company of angels (Heb.12:22-23), and not just specially once a week by faith and in the Spirit.​

 

[Peairtach]

Sounds like another case of an over-realised eschatology in order to side-step an aspect of God's law.

It is manifest, that although we have moved on eschatalogically and redemptively from the OT, we are still in the "already........not yet", and as such the Sabbath commandment is as relevant and as binding as it was.

The only difference is that since God in Christ's work was greater than the work of the Creation, and greater than the redemption of the Exodus, the Day has appropriately changed to commemorate that, and to remind us that we are in a new era.

 

[MW]

I think the best response to this over-realised eschatology is to refer to the Sabbath's creation partner -- marriage. Woman was made for man. So was the Sabbath. Christ fulfilled the institution of marriage, as Eph. 5 clearly teaches. Nevertheless the earthly institution continues because the conditions and ends for which it was instituted still continue. Ditto the Sabbath.

 

[Iconoclast]

As a part of His active obedience...being sent of the Father ....The Lord Jesus rescued the command from the legalistically twisted pharisees......
He delighted in the day and demonstrated proper uses of what was given through Isa58;13
13If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the LORD, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words:

14Then shalt thou delight thyself in the LORD; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it.


Matthew 12

1At that time Jesus went on the sabbath day through the corn; and his disciples were an hungred, and began to pluck the ears of corn and to eat.

2But when the Pharisees saw it, they said unto him, Behold, thy disciples do that which is not lawful to do upon the sabbath day.

3But he said unto them, Have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungred, and they that were with him;

4How he entered into the house of God, and did eat the shewbread, which was not lawful for him to eat, neither for them which were with him, but only for the priests?

5Or have ye not read in the law, how that on the sabbath days the priests in the temple profane the sabbath, and are blameless?

6But I say unto you, That in this place is one greater than the temple.

7But if ye had known what this meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless.

8For the Son of man is Lord even of the sabbath day.

As Image bearers.....we have a proper understanding of how God is sovereign over our time...both in our working,and in our rest, both now, and in the future,because Jesus made this correction and abuse of the Sabbath command. This correction and teaching extended to the real meaning of the decalogue as a whole as expressed in the sermon on the mount.

 

[J. Dean]

One or two vv from one place in Scripture does not a complete doctrine make. At best, it must be harmonized with the whole witness of Scripture.

Without starting a debate on this, let me say that in all fairness, those who believe the Sabbath was abolished do far more than simpy use one or two verses for this support.

 

[Peairtach]

Yes. But they don't give enough weight to the fact the Sabbath was a creation ordinance, made for Man, one of the Ten Commandments, and that it is explained repeatedly in the Gospels by the example and teaching of our Lord.

It's a case of dispensational antinomianism.