WM 389: Another Unicorn Sighting!

 

JTR

The Vision (7.24.26): Do Christian today still keep the sabbath?

 

Image: Morning skies, North Garden, Virginia, July 2026.

Note: Devotion taken from last Sunday's sermon on Mark 2:23--3:6.

Is the moral law of God, as epitomized in the Ten Commandments, still binding on the consciences of believers today?

We would probably not have an argument over 9 of the 10 commandments. The controversial one would be the fourth commandment: Remember the sabbath day to keep it holy (Exodus 20:8).

Many evangelicals today would say this law is now abrogated, like the dietary rules or the keeping of the Passover.

One popular Study Bible (MacArthur’s) has a note at Exodus 20:8 which says of the fourth commandment, “Belonging especially to Israel under the Mosaic economy, the Sabbath could not apply to the believer of the church age for he is living in a new economy” (p. 125).

Reformed (Biblical) theology, however, rejects the rejection of the Sabbath.

We maintain that God’s moral law has not fundamentally changed. The fourth commandment is a creation ordinance. It was established when God made the world in the space of six day and all very good and then rested on the seventh day (Exodus 20:11), and it remains.

The only shift that has occurred in this commandment since the coming of Christ is that the sabbath is no longer a seventh day sabbath, but it is now a first day sabbath, the day when Christ was gloriously raised from the dead (John 20:1, 19; Acts 20:6-7; 1 Corinthians 16:1-2). So, from creation to the resurrection, the sabbath was the seventh day, and from the resurrection of Christ till the second coming, it is the first day of the week.

As Paul wrote in Hebrews 4:9: “There remaineth therefore a rest [sabbatismos] to the people of God.”

We believe that when we look at the Scriptures, and especially at the Gospels, we find that Christ nowhere rejected the sabbath, although he did reject those who were adding unbiblical laws about the sabbath (like forbidding works of necessity, Mark 2:23-28, and mercy, Mark 3:1-6).

Christ affirmed Biblical sabbath keeping and rejected unbiblical sabbath keeping.

On this special day we set aside what is lawful to do on other days and give ourselves to the public and private exercises of God’s worship.

Let us follow Christ’s teaching and example and call the sabbath a delight (Isaiah 58:13). Let us not think that we have to keep the sabbath, but that we get to keep the sabbath.

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

WM 388: Responding to an INQUISITOR: Is affirming the MASORETIC TEXT as "kept pure in all ages" INCOHERENT?

 

JTR

WM 387: BLQ Article: THE SEPTUAGINT & MODERN CHALLENGES to the Traditional Text of the OT (Part 1)

 

Read a PDF of the article here on my academia.edu page.

JTR

WM 386: Interview: JOSEPH WEISSMAN on Defending the MASORETIC TEXT of the OT (VERITAS HEBRAICA)

 

JTR

The Vision (7.17.26): Murmuring & Manna

 

Image: July evening sky, North Garden, Virginia.

Note: Devotion taken from Lord's Day afternoon sermon on July 5, 2026.

And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness (Exodus 16:2).

And when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another, It is manna: for they wist not what it was. And Moses said unto them, This is the bread which the Lord hath given you to eat (Exodus 16:15).

Exodus 16:1-21 describes the pilgrimage of Israel after leaving its bondage in Egypt, as they move from Elim to the wilderness of Sin on their way to Sinai where they will receive God’s law.

Here are three spiritual applications one might draw from this passage:

Notice first: The LORD meets their murmuring with manna.

When the people murmur against Moses and Aaron, Moses tells them, “your murmurings are not against us, but against the LORD” (v.8). Nevertheless, the LORD did not pour out his wrath on them or abandon them. Instead, he gave them quail in the evening and manna (literally, “What is it?”) in the morning. The LORD is great in grace, mercy, and compassion toward his elect people. As Paul wrote to Timothy, “If we believe not [i.e., if we are not faithful], yet he abideth faithful: he cannot deny himself” (2 Tim 2:13).

Notice second: This passage challenges us to consider our confidence in the Lord’s provision for us.

He provided for the Israelites of old even though they murmured. Will he not provide for us in our material and spiritual needs?

In Philippians 4:19, Paul said, “But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.”

As the Psalmist noted, “the cattle on a thousand hills are thine” (Ps 50:10).

Notice Third: The provision of manna in the wilderness points toward a greater fulfillment of the LORD provision in Christ for spiritually hungry and thirsty men and women.

In John 6, after feeding five thousand physically hungry men, Christ declared,, “I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst” (John 6:35).

After reminding them that their fathers “ate manna in the wilderness, and are dead,” Christ added, “I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world” (v.51).

The Lord did indeed meet our murmuring with manna, even the Lord Jesus Christ.

To Him be all praise and glory!

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

Beza on the Mark of the True Church

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"The mark of the true Church is the preaching of Word of God in which the Lord is made manifest to us, as the books of the Prophets and Apostles declare Him. And, consequently, we join to the Word the Sacraments and the administration of ecclesiastical discipline, such as God has ordained."

"To conclude, to what place the Word of God is purely preached, the Sacraments purely administered and ecclesiastical discipline conducted conformably to the holy and pure doctrine, there we recognize the Church of God, no matter how few (Matt 18:20; Luke 12:32) or small of appearance in men's eyes (Luke 10:21; 1 Cor 1:19-28; Matt 11:17)."

-Theodore Beza (1519-1605), The Christian Faith, 66, 67.