It hardly seems possible that 40 years ago I graduated from high school. Last weekend our academy class of ‘69 met at an oceanfront hotel on the east coast. I won’t say where because I don’t want to identify our academy, which has since gone out of business. Most of my classmates have also gone out of business, as far as the church is concerned. Only seven or eight of the 23 in our small graduating class are still active Seventh-day Adventists.

The most amazing thing, to me, is that some of those who left our church because of the dysfunctions they experienced have since become fulfilled, fruitful and fervent Christians in other denominations.

In my worship talk to my former classmates, I testified about how I finally discovered the grace and truth of Jesus in the context of Seventh-day Adventism. For example, I keep the Sabbath now because Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath, and the seventh day is God’s symbol of entering Gospel rest. This is a drastically different experience than I was taught to have at the academy, I confessed to them. For most of us back then, the Sabbath seemed like a 24-hour tightrope stretched across the end of the week for the sake of a spiritual performance before God and humanity. (I can’t speak for everyone–just for myself and what I observed back then; but I think my perceptions are attested to by the fact that two thirds of our class has abandoned the Sabbath.)

No doubt our teachers did the best they could–and several of them were truly wonderful people. But somehow what the academy taught us may have been more like the way the Pharisees kept the Sabbath back in Jesus’ time.

Then along came Jesus, who proclaimed: “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32). And now I do experience God’s freedom and grace in the context of Seventh-day Adventist doctine–but it didn’t come easy. It was a journey of decades through the valley of dysfunction and spiritual abuse until finally, 32 years ago, I experienced the truth as it is in Jesus.

One of my classmates who left the church and found fellowship elsewhere came to me privately and said, “Do you really enjoy the Sabbath now? Do you really experience Jesus in keeping that day?”

Yes indeed. She promised to check it out by visiting our new website, www.sda4me.com. I hope she does. I think she will conclude that the truth as it is in Jesus is worth its wait in gold, even if it takes 40 years to discover it.

Meanwhile, I thank God for the present state of Adventist Christian education in the Mid-America Union. None of the abuses that our class suffered 40 to 50 years ago exist anywhere in our territory, as far as I have seen or heard in my travels and correspondence. We have grace-based, compassionate and capable teachers, and school administrators, throughout our nine-state region, and they are making a difference for eternity in the lives of their students.

This week I’ve been participating in the 180° Symposium, in which representatives from four world divisions meet once a year at Andrews University to discuss how to prevent attrition of Adventist young adults. The 2009 meeting was devoted to connecting with our students who attend secular campuses, whom we tend to lose in tragic proportions. The bottom line question: How can local churches near these secular universities be places of refuge for them and their friends?

Participants prepared papers to present to the group for discussion. Mine was entitled: “When the Canaries Stop Singing.” Here it is:
Before the days of modern technology, coal miners placed canaries in cages throughout their subterranean tunnels as an early warning against the invasion of carbon monoxide. The toxic gas often seeped into mines, odorless and thus undetected. The dying of songbirds provided an early warning that the miners were endangered in an atmosphere of systemic toxin. When the canaries stopped singing, it was the first sign that everybody in the mines was doomed unless they could get to fresh air.

For the Seventh-day Adventist Church in North America, the canaries are ceasing to sing. We are losing our young people, and our churches themselves are dying. Paul Richardson of the Center for Creative Ministry reports: “The median age for the Seventh-day Adventist community in North America, including the unbaptized children in church families, is 58. … Among native-born White and Black members, the median age is even higher.”[i]

Symposium colleague Ed Dickerson cites another study of Adventists in North America which confirms that more than half of attending members are 58 years or older.”[ii] Richardson adds the chilling statement: “There are more than 1,000 local churches in the North American Division that have no children or teens at all.”[iii]

Confronted with the loss of these songbirds, what should we do?

Many church leaders, concerned about losing our youth and young adults (YYAs), focus on what can be done to persuade them to stay with us—as if the solution to a noxious atmosphere is to develop a strain of poison-resistant victims.

Let us remember that the loss of our YYAs is evidence that our entire church system suffers from a toxic atmosphere; it’s just that YYAs are the most vulnerable to it. Their demise warns of impending doom for all. Our task is to identify what’s poisoning our YYAs and then lead our whole church into life-giving fresh air.

My thesis is that the toxin we suffer from is systemic judgmentalism, resulting from a lack of love. It’s not that we want to be unloving; on the contrary, we care deeply, as evidenced by how deeply our church invests in educating children right through their college years. But we suffer from a misunderstanding of how to love that generates judgmentalism. How come? We have forgotten the major issue of the Great Controversy—that love requires freedom of choice, despite the inevitable risks. Thus, paradoxically, our very concern about safeguarding the spirituality of our young adults generates a coercive and judgmental counterfeit of love that drives them away in a spirit of toxic anxiety.

Good intentions do not guarantee good results. I may open my car door with no intention of denting yours, but the damage is done just the same—and I may not even realize that I caused your problem.

We will look for solutions to YYA attrition after documenting evidence of the problem and its causes.

Evidence of Systemic Judgmentalism

With Adventists in North America increasingly older in their demographic profile, we obviously suffer YYA attrition. We need not wonder why. ValueGenesis I and II documented that many Adventist youth have felt condemned and unloved by elder members. More recent studies indicate that judgmentalism persists.

In the previous report of this Symposium,[iv] Van G. Hurst, president of the Indiana Conference, asks: “What is causing Adventist youth to leave the local church?” He cites a non-scientific but broad-based study that lists a number of reasons. Here are the first 12 reasons given by the YYAs themselves:

• Conservative elderly people that criticize us
• Older folks never let it go if you do mess up so that you will never feel accepted there again.
• Peer pressure is causing youth to leave.
• Pushy grown-ups spouting rules instead of a real message
• Church is boring and often we have non-existent youth groups.
• The older people make you feel like a sinner and that you do nothing right.
• Adults freak out over the smallest things like clothing (they need to worry about more important stuff).
• People judging the youth the ways we dress
• Church if boring with songs from the 1800’s that I’ve never heard.
• Crazy old people with really strict views
• The majority of our views always seem to come from Ellen White.
• People are constantly looking down and judging the youth.

These future voices from the grave should command our attention. Hurst’s data are replicated in the DMin project of this author, a scientific study of attrition among adult children of SDA clergy. My study identified 40 attrition factors, 11 of them extreme. Nearly all of these could be negatively understood, directly or indirectly, as an expression of judgmentalism.[v]

It bears reemphasis that our problem as Adventists is not that we don’t care about YYAs. In prayer meetings, our predominant concern is their attrition. Often tears are shed. No fair-minded observer could accuse these praying grandparents (most prayer meeting attendees seem to be older members) of not caring about their kids, young and old. And yet many prayer warriors—in the same spirit of concern that stimulates their intercession—form the core group of judgmentalists in the church. What makes them oppressive to YYAs is their confused idea of love as being a forceful “straight testimony” rather than relational mentoring.

Picture the Adventist grandmother who stays up past bedtime to bake cookies for the youth group; then when delivering those cookies she feels compelled to admonish (scold) the teens for what they are wearing or listening to. Her condemnation is done for the sake of Christian love. But talking about love—and even trying to love—is not the same as actually being loving. Even though our intentions are good, we need to learn what love is and how to express it.

Consider Hollywood’s obsession with love, obviously a counterfeit. Could the same thing happen in church—not the world’s over-tolerant perversion of love, but a religious counterfeit of love from the opposite extreme of intolerance?

LEARNING TO LOVE

Biblical love comes not only from a caring heart but an educated mind. Paul said: “It is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve what is excellent” (Phil. 1: 9-10).

Without knowledge and discernment that empowers us to approve what is excellent, our attempts to love may find a counterfeit expression in intolerance.

We see this in the agape love chapter, 1 Corinthians 13. Verse 5 says of true love: “It does not insist on its own way.” This is typically interpreted as selfishness, and often is. But there is another way in which people withhold love by insisting on their own way: expecting that everybody agree with their own views of dress, diet, music, worship, and everything else. They canonize their convictions, and anyone out of compliance may become the target of gentle yet judgmental correction, even coercion.

To further clarify the connection between knowledge and love, 1 Corinthians 13:9 warns, “Now we know in part.” Nobody but God knows everything, and true love recognizes this, not only individually but corporately. Loving members and churches humbly tolerate some variance in understanding and expressing Christian standards: “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Cor. 3:17).

The fact that love requires liberty lies at the heart of Great Controversy truth, wherein a God of love extends freedom to His creation, despite its risks, since we must have liberty in order to experience God’s love—and to share it in our churches and communities (including secular campuses). Liberty of conscience is vintage Adventist doctrine, so we all of Christians ought to understand the need for it. Proof that we do not is judgmentalism, generated by a perversion of godly love.

Another evidence that love is lacking is the toxic anxiety throughout our system. “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear” (1 John 4:18[vi]). . Besides the fear of freedom that robs us of love and causes judgmentalism, other systemic anxieties in North American Adventism are just as toxic, such as:

• Fear of culture—incarnation as God’s ambassadors in secular society
• Fear of man—intimidation by church bullies so that we enable them
• Fear of truth—reluctance to journey on the road of theological discovery
• Fear of joy—so afraid of emotionalism that worship becomes lifeless
• Fear of job—career fear that makes leaders hirelings instead of shepherds
• Fear of funding—dread of financial crisis if benefactors become offended

Each of these systemic anxieties robs the church of its capacity to love, and each is worthy of its own chapter in a new book that must be written soon.

CONCLUSION

A toxic atmosphere in our churches is killing our youth and young adults, which is an early warning that the rest of the Adventist Church in North American church is endangered—as evidenced by our alarmingly aging demographic profile. We desperately need the fresh air of love to cast out systemic anxiety and liberate us in the Spirit to fulfill God’s end-time calling. Then judgmentalism will cease and our young adults will have the freedom to sing their own song. And they will find our churches a safe place to bring home their friends from secular campuses.

[vii]

---

[i] Quoted in A. Allan Martin, “Burst the Bystander Effect: Making a Discipling Difference with Young Adults.” In Roger Dudley, ed., Ministering to Millennials: a complete report on the 180° Symposium (Lincoln, NE: AdventSource, 2009), 112. Hereafter cited as Millennials.

[ii] Ed Dickerson, “Suffer the Little Children (and the young adults),” in Millennials, 48.

[iii] Martin, Ibid.

[iv] Van G. Hurst, “Unity and Ministry Through the Massification of Adventism,” in Millennials, 85.

[v] Martin Weber, “Resolving Young Adult Attrition,” in Millennials, 185ff.

[vi] Unless noted, all scriptures are from the English Standard Version.

A story on homosexuals and the Seventh-day Adventist Church was featured in the Journal Star, daily newspaper of Lincoln, Nebraska (Thursday, October 15 edition; also posted online as the lead item: http://journalstar.com). It reports on two California producers doing a film documentary about gays who have a Seventh-day Adventist background. The producers visited Lincoln during a nationwide road trip in which they are interviewing Adventists and ex-Adventists who have a homosexual orientation or are sympathetic toward gays. To promote their project, the producers are seeking exposure in local media markets.

Although the Journal Star reporter perhaps shares the mainstream media’s pro-homosexual bias, she seems fair-minded, having contacted the regional headquarters of the SDA Church to invite a response. As communication director for the Mid-America Union, I provided her with a special statement from Mid-America Union president Roscoe J. Howard III, plus the official SDA church statement on homosexuality. She published Howard’s statement in its entirety as a sidebar (reproduced below).

My assessment: Lincoln residents with an Adventist background who have homosexual inclinations or sympathies received favorable media exposure, but the SDA Church in Mid-America also had opportunity to witness to our community. The statement of our president confirmed our commitment to biblical marriage while also inviting anyone of a homosexual orientation to fellowship with us and experience God’s grace by visiting Adventist worship services.

Here now is the statement from Roscoe J. Howard III, Mid-America Union president:

Seventh-day Adventists are committed to traditional marriage between a man and a woman as a legacy of our Judeo-Christian heritage. The Bible makes clear that homosexuality violates natural relations as ordained by our Creator (e.g., Romans 1:22-28). Thus we could not honor the Scriptures while also supporting homosexual conduct. Since God’s grace reaches out to everyone, homosexuals are welcome to find fellowship and healing in attending Adventist worship services. But anyone who becomes a member of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, or is an employee of the denomination, must be willing to limit sexual behavior within sacred matrimony between a man and a woman.

What’s the best thing we can do for our pastors during Pastoral Appreciation Month in October? Pray? Yes—and then help fulfill those prayers by supporting their leadership.

Let me tell you about two churches in one district where I was pastor. Neither had experienced growth for years. Church #1 embraced change, while church #2 resisted. Church #1 rallied to a shared vision under my leadership, while elders at the other one opposed change or simply held their peace.

What happened? Church #1 began by making Sabbath services friendlier, less formalized. We did nothing radical—just made the service flow worshipfully like a river, singing simple but heartfelt praise songs. The effect was profound. Attendance grew. An assistant secretary of the U.S. Navy, moving to our city after retiring from the Pentagon, went church shopping and chose our congregation. He had known Adventist truth for years, but now his heart was fulfilled in Sabbath worship and fellowship. His presence gave an immediate and dramatic boost to our stature in the community.

Local pastors invited me to pray with them Thursday mornings. They decided to include Seventh-day Adventists in the annual March for Jesus—even moving the event from Sabbath morning to afternoon to accommodate our participation. When an interdenominational praise band formed, I joined. We played for a Christian festival at the local high school, which then invited me to help student leaders and administrators plan the spiritual elements of graduation weekend. We also played for the annual community Easter celebration, where I gave the sermon.

The city ministerial association elected me to become president. Twice I was called upon to mediate squabbles in non-Adventist churches. The pastor of the largest church, previously an enemy of Adventism, offered to sponsor me as a police chaplain. Through him I met the mayor, who invited me to her home for prayer, sought my spiritual counsel on a civic matter, and presented me with a community service award.

Although some pastors might not take the approach I did, all of this happened without compromising our Seventh-day Adventist message or mission. Two pastors became convinced of the Sabbath. One of them, whom I had lunch every week, accompanied me to Toronto so he could attend my seminar presentation at the World Ministerial Convention that preceded the 2000 General Conference Session.

All this Spirit-filled transformation happened for church #1, which doubled in size. Church #2 witnessed that excitement with deep concern. They renewed their commitment to “historic Adventism,” faithful even unto death. For example: someone objected to members greeting each other in their sanctuary, so church leaders spent thousands of potentially evangelistic dollars building a foyer—then announced that from henceforth the sanctuary must become silent. It did, rather like a graveyard. Soon after, the elder who led the battle for church reverence got into a physical altercation involving the police. (Really.) Community relations took another hit when another self-appointed terrorist of the Testimonies complained about the church’s food bank distributing canned soup with chicken. Lay leaders shut down the operation, quickly solving the problem (for the church—too bad for the neighbors, and never mind Christ’s inconvenient commandment to feed the hungry).

All of this generated a different type of community publicity than church #1 enjoyed. While that congregation flourished, church #2 declined.

Why? Both had the same pastor with the same vision. The main difference was local church leaders being willing to work with their pastor for change.

Yes, opposition did arise in church #1, but elders there confronted it. When somebody complained about our praise singing (“Celebration music!”) or our participation in the city’s March for Jesus (“Collaborating with Babylon!”), or about my putting a simple wooden cross on the platform (“Catholicism!”), other leaders spoke up for me. They also defended me speaking at the community Easter celebration (“Don’t worry—he’s not glorifying the Easter bunny.”). These courageous elders protected me like football linemen guarding their beloved quarterback. Whereas at church #2 I got sacked frequently, leaders in church #1 provided protection to run a powerful offense against the devil. We moved the ball together, scoring early and often for God’s kingdom.

Bottom line: If you want to do something nice during Pastoral Appreciation Month, then appreciate your pastors enough to support them when attacked. Even if you can’t agree with them in everything, you can pray for them—and then work together in positive new ways.

The following is an editorial in the October issue of Outlook magazine.

What’s the best thing we can do for our pastors during Pastoral Appreciation Month in October? Pray? Yes—and then help fulfill those prayers by supporting their leadership.

Let me tell you about two churches in one district where I was pastor. Neither had experienced growth for years. Church #1 embraced change, while church #2 resisted. Church #1 rallied to a shared vision under my leadership, while elders at the other one opposed change or simply held their peace.

What happened? Church #1 began by making Sabbath services friendlier, less formalized. We did nothing radical—just made the service flow worshipfully like a river, singing simple but heartfelt praise songs. The effect was profound. Attendance grew. An assistant secretary of the U.S. Navy, moving to our city after retiring from the Pentagon, went church shopping and chose our congregation. He had known Adventist truth for years, but now his heart was fulfilled in Sabbath worship and fellowship such as he not not experienced before. His presence gave an immediate and dramatic boost to our stature in the community.

Local pastors invited me to pray with them Thursday mornings. They decided to include Seventh-day Adventists in the annual March for Jesus—even moving the event from Sabbath morning to afternoon to accommodate our participation. When an interdenominational praise band formed, I joined. We played for a Christian festival at the local high school, which then invited me to help student leaders and administrators plan the spiritual elements of graduation weekend. We also played for the annual community Easter celebration, where I gave the sermon.

The city ministerial association elected me to become president. Twice I was called upon to mediate squabbles in non-Adventist churches. The pastor of the largest church, previously an enemy of Adventism, offered to sponsor me as a police chaplain. Through him I met the mayor, who invited me to her home for prayer, sought my spiritual counsel on a civic matter, and presented me with a community service award.

Although some pastors might not take the approach I did, all of this happened without compromising our Seventh-day Adventist message or mission. Two pastors became convinced of the Sabbath. One of them, whom I had lunch every week, accompanied me to Toronto so he could attend my seminar presentation at the World Ministerial Convention that preceded the 2000 General Conference Session.

All this Spirit-filled transformation happened for church #1, which doubled in size. Church #2 witnessed that excitement with deep concern. They renewed their commitment to “historic Adventism,” faithful even unto death. For example: someone objected to members greeting each other in their sanctuary, so church leaders spent thousands of potentially evangelistic dollars building a foyer—then announced that from henceforth the sanctuary must become silent. It did, rather like a graveyard. Soon after, the elder who led the battle for church reverence got into a physical altercation involving the police. (Really.) Community relations took another hit when another self-appointed terrorist of the Testimonies complained about the church’s food bank distributing canned soup with chicken. Lay leaders shut down the operation, quickly solving the problem (for the church—too bad for the neighbors, and never mind Christ’s inconvenient commandment to feed the hungry).

All of this generated a different type of community publicity than church #1 enjoyed. While that congregation flourished, church #2 declined.

Why? Both had the same pastor with the same vision. The main difference was local church leaders being willing to work with their pastor for change.

Yes, opposition did arise in church #1, but elders there confronted it. When somebody complained about our praise singing (“Celebration music!”) or our participation in the city’s March for Jesus (“Collaborating with Babylon!”), or about my putting a simple wooden cross on the platform (“Catholicism!”), other leaders spoke up for me. They also defended me speaking at the community Easter celebration (“Don’t worry—he’s not glorifying the Easter bunny.”). These courageous elders protected me like football linemen guarding their beloved quarterback. Whereas at church #2 I got sacked frequently, leaders in church #1 provided protection to run a powerful offense against the devil. We moved the ball together, scoring early and often for God’s kingdom.

Bottom line: If you want to do something nice during Pastoral Appreciation Month, then appreciate your pastors enough to support them when attacked. Even if you can’t agree with them in everything, you can pray for them—and then work together in positive new ways.

A dramatic archeological discovery has just been announced of great significance to the life and times of Jesus: the remains of a synagogue in the ancient town of Migdal, by the Sea of Galilee, from which Mary Magdalene is thought to have derived her name. Jesus would have passed by this site and no doubt visited it en route to Jerusalem from Capernaum, “His own city” (Matt. 9:1).

To learn more about it and see a photo from the site, visit:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/09/11/jerusalem.synagogue/index.html

As one born and raised not far from “ground zero” of the WTC site, I’d like to share a little reflection I wrote about the tragedy. The Adventist Review magazine selected it for publication after 9/11:

“It’s the Ashes”

So this is what it all comes down to …

Ashes. #

Gigahertz computers and wireless uplinks,

mahogany boardrooms and executive washrooms,

plush carpets and power lunch clubs …

Everything amounts to ashes. #

Corporate strategies and market share,

stock prices and interest rates,

quarterly profits or losses …

The bottom line is ashes. #

Office policies and politics,

promotions and retirement plans,

Brooks Brothers suits and the bodies inside …

All ends up in ashes. #

It’s not the economy, after all. It’s the ashes.

Save us, O God, from our ashes. ###

Now more than 6,500 visitors from six continents have made more than 27,000 page views on the new website www.sdaforme.com, dedicated to defending Adventist truth against those who seem determined to destroy it. Many letters of appreciation have been received as well, from people getting the information they need to feel biblically confident about being Adventists, or from those who are getting information they need to help others in the valley of confusion about the truth as it is in Jesus.

Have you been to www.sdaforme.com yet? Take a tour over there and see what you think. Click on the issues column and see what might interest you.

Is the seventh-day Sabbath explicitly taught in the New Testament? (Martin Weber responds to a recent comment at the new website: www.sdaforme.com.)

In seeking to present the Sabbath to Sunday-keeping friends, Adventists typically overlook Hebrews 4, where we find the keeping the seventh day connected to our Gospel rest in Jesus.

To see the context, let’s go back a few verses to chapter 3, which recounts the fatal unbelief of those who failed to enter Canaan. Then comes a warning for Jewish Christians to avoid likewise falling short of gospel rest.  In this context of resting in God’s salvation, the seventh day Sabbath is introduced: God’s “works were finished from the foundation of the world” and He “rested on the seventh day from all His works” (4:3,4).  Then comes the sad history of Jewish failure to enter this Sabbath rest, which God had earned for them.  Even after Joshua finally led them into Canaan they were not yet into Sabbath rest.  Being external sabbatarians, the Jews did avoid business on the holy day.  But they were not true Sabbath keepers  they never entered the spirit of Sabbath rest.

This passage, read carefully, clearly carries the seventh-day Sabbath into the Christian church.  Verse 8 mentions “another day” David introduced.  Another day besides what?  The Sabbath, of course; the passage is still discussing the seventh day rest.  Did David’s day replace the Sabbath day?  On the contrary.  He made true Sabbath keeping possible by calling a time apart to repent and believe in God’s salvation.  Did the Jews ever become true Sabbath keepers?  Unfortunately not:  “There remains therefore a Sabbath rest for the people of God” (4:9).  And what Sabbath rest is this that remains for New Testament Christians?  “For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His” (4:10).  When did God rest from His works?  Verse 4 says: “God did rest the seventh day from all His works.”

So there we have it. This seventh-day Sabbath, says the apostle, remains for us so we can celebrate gospel rest.

Keep in mind that Hebrews 4 has no hint that God would abolish His sacred day of rest.  The opposite is stated.  So why do even Adventists themselves often ignore this powerful New Testament proof of the Sabbath?  Because some of us doubt that the seventh day Sabbath is under discussion throughout the passage.  After all, how could the apostle be telling Hebrews that their nation never kept the Sabbath?  But this is exactly his point  the Jews, who strictly observed the day, ignored its meaning.  The apostle proves their need to begin true Sabbath keeping by reminding them of Canaan.  In David’s day, three centuries after Joshua brought them in, they still had not entered the rest it represented.  Therefore they were mere sabbatarians, not Sabbath keepers. The call for spiritual rest on Sabbath, just like God Himself did rest—on the seventh day! This is the rest that remains for us.

Here is a point-by-point summary of the case for keeping the seventh-day Sabbath in Hebrews 4:

1)   The theme in Hebrews 4 is entering Gospel rest, carried over from chapter 3.

2)   The warning is about avoid refusing to enter Gospel rest, like the Israelites in their disobedient unbelief under Moses.

3)   We see here two symbols of entering that gospel rest: Canaan, and the Sabbath—specifically the seventh-day Sabbath. (And Coleen, please note that this weekly Sabbath rest is founded in God’s finishing of creation—a truth which you and Dale Ratzlaff deny by trying to push the Sabbath off until the time of Moses, so you can reject it as a Jewish ritual. Yet here’s a direct and undeniable quote from the Creation account in Gen 2:2-3 that is connected with a discussion about the Sabbath.)

4)   The lesson of Hebrews 4 is that the Israelites never entered spiritual rest—even though they were outwardly complying with both symbols of rest: entering Canaan and keeping the seventh-day Sabbath. They were living physically in the land of rest but not embracing spiritual rest. And they were outwardly keeping the Sabbath while missing its meaning of spiritual rest.

5)   The proof that Joshua had failed to lead Israel into spiritual rest, even after he led them into the land of rest, is that several hundred years later David had to set aside “another day.”

6)   “Another day” besides what day? The seventh-day Sabbath day of rest, mentioned two verses earlier—the only day we see in this passage so far. So obviously the seventh-day Sabbath is under discussion.

7)   What was David’s “another day” for? Was it to replace the seventh-day Sabbath? Obviously not, since a thousand years later the seventh-day Sabbath was still being kept in Christ’s day.

8)   David’s “another day” was a special day he set aside for national repentance—as noted in Psalm 95, which Hebrews 4 is quoting. Psalm 95 is a call to repent and worship the Creator God—which is purpose of the seventh-day Sabbath. So seventh-day Sabbath rest is throughout this passage right up to the beginning of verse 9.

9)   After David’s time, did the Jews ever enter the spiritual rest of their own seventh-day Sabbath? No, says verse 9: “There remains therefore a Sabbath rest for the people of God.” What is this “sabbatismos,” mentioned only here in the NT? Note that there is no article in front of it, so nobody can say this is   just “a sabbath,” turning it into anything restful that they might wish it to be. And Life Assurance Ministries (led by ex-Adventist pastor Dale Ratzlaff) is mistaken by calling it a “sabbath-like rest.” The word means simply “Sabbath rest.” And we don’t have to guess what Sabbath rest is being referred to, for two reasons: what immediately precedes Sabbatismos and what follows it.

10) Verse 9 begins with an inferential participle, translated “so then” or “therefore.” This picks up the seventh-day Sabbath from verse 8 and carries it into verse 9. “Therefore” it’s the seventh-day Sabbath that “Sabbatismos” is referring to.

11)  Lest anyone miss that connection, notice the next verse (10): “For whoever has entered God’s rest has also rested from His works as God did from His.” When did God “rest from His works”? We don’t have to guess or speculate. Verse 4 already told us, using the exact language here: “And God rested on the seventh day from all His works.”  So there we have it: Rather than doing away with the seventh-day Sabbath by introducing some wishful thinking substitute day, Hebrews 4 specifically and emphatically reinforces the seventh day Sabbath. It’s simple message: “Don’t make the same mistake the ancient Israelites did. They entered the land of rest physically but not spiritually, and they were Sabbath-keepers physically but not spiritually—Sabbatarians who had never entered Gospel rest.  And isn’t this exactly the picture of the Jews of that day? They had hundreds of outward laws for Sabbath observance, but they rejected the Lord of the Sabbath and hurried home before sundown to light Sabbath candles.  But wait a moment—what about the SDA Commentary? It says that Hebrews 4 is probably not talking about the weekly Sabbath, because the Israelites already were keeping the day holy. But actually, they weren’t. Our Commentary somehow overlooks this, which is the very point of the passage, as we’ve been discussing. It was the same situation as in Isaiah’s day, when in chapter 58 God rebukes His people for missing the meaning of the Sabbath despite all their fasting and outward forms of worship.

12) So there remains therefore a Sabbatismos for the people of God—and if we enter that rest we will do as God did, resting not just physically but spiritually on the seventh day from all our works. And as a bonus, we have in Hebrews 4 undeniable proof that the seventh-day Sabbath began not with  Moses but with God’s finished works at the foundation of this world.

To summarize: When we recognize the reality that Hebrews 4 is a challenge to enter the inner spiritual meaning of what already was being kept only outwardly and physically, then seventh-day worship is reinforced rather than abolished.

It’s really true–through the New Covenant of grace, we have a close and affectionate relationship with God as our “Abba, Father.” This word “Abba” is best translated “Daddy,” or “Papa.”

Sometimes people seem to think this is just a superficial devotional thought rather than deep theological truth. If you have ever wondered about that, please read the following from several distinguished theological sources:

“’Abbā’ in Aramaic was originally a nursery word, part of the speech of children, with the meaning “Daddy.” In NT times it was no longer limited to the speech of small children, but was used also by grown children and was even used as a form of address for old men.”

-       Balz, H. R., & Schneider, G. (1990-c1993). Exegetical dictionary of the New Testament. Translation of: Exegetisches Worterbuch zum Neuen Testament. (1:1). Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans.

“In the mouth of Jesus αββά occurs literally only in the oldest form of the prayer in Gethsemane (Mark 14:36), as an expression of a childlike trust in God and of the obligation to obedience.”

-       Balz, H. R., & Schneider, G. (1990-c1993). Exegetical dictionary of the New Testament. Translation of: Exegetisches Worterbuch zum Neuen Testament. (1:1). Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans.

“He [Jesus] applies to God a term which must have sounded familiar and disrespectful to His contemporaries because used in the everyday life of the family. In other words, He uses the simple “speech of the child to its father.” … “This Father-child relationship to God far surpasses any possibilities of intimacy assumed in Judaism, introducing indeed something which is wholly new.”

-       Theological dictionary of the New Testament. 1964-c1976. Vols. 5-9 edited by Gerhard Friedrich. Vol. 10 compiled by Ronald Pitkin. (G. Kittel, G. W. Bromiley & G. Friedrich, Ed.) (electronic ed.) (1:6). Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans.