 |
| Eric Liddell refused to run on Sunday, the Christian Sabbath, in the 100-metres race during the 1924 Summer Olympics in Paris. |
If you read the article which was the subject of my post about Mars Hill Church, you may have noticed an interesting detail to the story; a detail that caught my eye anyway. The article was about Westboro Baptist Church picketing Mars Hill Church and how Pastor Mark Driscoll led his church in responding with Christ-like love. It's really a great story. The detail that caught my eye was a brief statement toward the end of the article. The article states that on the particular Sunday that Westboro Baptist had planned to picket Mars Hill, Pastor Mark's sermon was prerecorded so he could attend a baseball tournament that his son was playing in. I understand this to mean that he missed Sunday services in order to go to this baseball tournament. The Pastor was not at Sunday services with his church?
Growing up in the Catholic Church, my parents and our priests instilled in me the value for attending Mass on Sundays. When I was in the Army, on my own and away from home, I attended Mass sporadically. In college I really didn't attend at all; but once our first child was born, Margaret and I began attending Mass again on a regular basis. If there was something happening on Sunday that prevented us from attending, we would go to Mass on Saturday evening which was permissible in the Catholic Church and 'counted' as Sunday Mass. There was some security knowing that the church was there and the priests were going to be there to perform the service. Never was service cancelled and the priests always showed up. I've heard of pastors broadcasting services across town to multiple church sites, but a pastor prerecording a sermon and not evening showing up?
I know that Sunday is not the Sabbath that we, Torah-Observant Messianics, observe; but Christians do believe that Sunday is the Sabbath or their Sabbath, as in the 4th Commandment. Whether Christians have the day wrong or not is not what I am concerned about here. The Biblical principle of Sabbath observance should be, theoretically, the same whether you worship on Saturday or on Sunday. I know some Messianics may get up in arms about this comment and may find it wrong and/or impossible for me to compare Christians with Messianics, Saturday with Sunday; and that Sabbath observance cannot be done on the wrong day. I've thought about all of this, just hear me out. My point is this: Adonai commanded us to rest and convocate on the Sabbath. My questions are this: 1) What does it mean for us to rest on the Sabbath? 2) What does it mean for us to convocate on the Sabbath? 3) Finally, is attending a baseball tournament (or a similar event) a valid, Biblical reason to break the commandment to convocate (and potentially the commandment to rest) and miss Sabbath Services?
I am finding it necessary to explore these questions and more regarding the 4th Commandment and Messianic Sabbath observance from an Hebraic perspective. I'm really not too concerned about Mars Hill and whether Mark Driscoll missed Sunday services or not; my concern is for our local community and the development of a Sabbath halacha for our congregation. I hope to delve into this subject over a series of posts. My goal is to begin a discussion for the leaders in our community regarding Sabbath observance for Messianics today.
Below are some passages worth looking into:
Genesis 2:1-3
Exodus 16:23-30
Exodus 20:8-11
Exodus 23:12
Exodus 31:13-17
Exodus 35:2,3
Leviticus 19:3
Leviticus 23:3
Leviticus 26:2
Deuteronomy 5:12-15
Nehemiah 13:16-19
Ezekiel 20:12
Matthew 12:1-13
Matthew 24:20
Mark 2:18-28
Mark 3:1-12
Mark 15:42-16:13
Luke 4:14-30
Luke 13:10-17
Luke 14:1-6
Luke 23:50-56
John 7:14-36
John 19:31-37
Acts 15:6-21
Colossians 2:16-23
Hebrews 4:1-10
~
No comments:
Post a Comment