Keeping the Sabbath of the New Covenant
I was listening to a preacher on the radio talking about the Sabbath. He explained that the weekly Sabbath pointed us to the rest we have in Christ, so we no longer need the weekly Sabbath because we now have Jesus. He sounded sincere, and I really appreciated Him pointing people to Jesus and resting their faith in Him, since the grace of Jesus is the only way to be saved.

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As a matter of fact the Sabbath is a sign that we are resting our faith in Jesus’ grace and not our works. God explicitly set aside that day as a sign of His covenant with His people – a sign that He sanctifies His people, in contrast to sanctification by works.1 That’s why I find it ironic when people accuse me of trying to get to heaven by my own works by keeping the Sabbath. The radio preacher was correct that the Sabbath pointed us to the rest we have in Christ. However, he apparently did not realize that the Sabbath is a sign of God’s New Covenant in which He promises to write His law within our hearts:
But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. Jeremiah 31:33
Do you see that the New Covenant is the Lord’s promise to sanctify us? A promise to write His law in our hearts, so we would serve Him from the heart? And that’s exactly the meaning of sanctification of which the Sabbath is a sign. Sanctification means to make holy, and God wants to make us holy by writing His law in our hearts.
Some other things he did not appear to consider:
Thus the heavens and the earth, and all the host of them, were finished.
And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made. Genesis 2:1-3 NKJV
While the feast days and ceremonial Sabbaths such as the Passover, were not instituted until sin came into the world, we have the weekly Sabbath made holy (sanctified) before there was sin and the need of a Savior. Paul says in Colossians 2:16-17 that the ceremonial feast Sabbaths were done away with at the cross. 2Some people say we should still keep the feast days. They don’t seem to realize that we are literally living in what the feast days symbolized! We no longer need a ceremonial Passover because Jesus dying on the cross was the real Passover to which all the other Passovers pointed. We no longer keep the ceremonial Day of Atonement because, beginning in 1844 we are living in the real Day of Atonement. So those feast days that point us to the cross are done away with, but the Bible nowhere indicates that the weekly Sabbath was a “shadow of things to come.” The weekly Sabbath was there before our need of the cross, and the Bible tells us that it will still be there after the cross.
While Paul tells us the ceremonial Sabbaths were done away at the cross, He continued observing the weekly Sabbath.
And he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, and persuaded both Jews and Greeks. Acts 18:4 NKJV
The weekly Sabbath was not a Jewish custom. He met with the Greeks also.
Then Paul, as his custom was, went in to them, and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the Scriptures, Acts 17:2 NKJV
I have heard people argue that the only reason Paul was at the synagogue on Sabbath was because that’s the only day he could meet the Jews there to talk about Jesus. However we just saw in Acts 18:4 that in the New Testament, Greeks were worshiping on Sabbath as well, and Paul was persuading them all about Jesus as they continued keeping the seventh-day Sabbath. In Acts 17:2 we see Sabbath keeping was still Paul’s own custom even after accepting Jesus. In the New Testament, those who accepted Jesus continued keeping the seventh-day Sabbath.
The Sabbath was not just made for the Jews. The gentiles were keeping the Sabbath as well. Jesus Himself said that the Sabbath was made for mankind, which included Jews and Gentiles alike.
The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. Mark 2:27 NKJV
Nowhere does Jesus or anyone else in the Bible say the weekly Sabbath was made for Jews. Jesus says it was made for mankind. Not only was the Sabbath made for everyone, it will be kept by everyone even in the new earth.
And it shall come to pass That from one New Moon to another, And from one Sabbath to another, All flesh shall come to worship before Me,” says the Lord. Isaiah 66:23 NKJV
The weekly Sabbath was instituted before sin and remains after the cross. The Sabbath was given to all “flesh” and “mankind.” “Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience.”-Hebrews 4:11.
Will you enter into the Sabbath rest that remains since the creation of the world? Will you keep God’s holy day as an outward sign of your inward faith in Christ as both your Creator and Redeemer? Let us remember that only sanctified people can really keep a sanctified day. So let us enter into that rest by letting Jesus be Lord in our lives.
- See Exodus 31:13, Ezekiel 20:12, 20 ↩
- For more details see “THE SABBATH IN COLOSSIANS 2″ by Andy Nash. He references Ron DuPreez’s book, Judging the Sabbath: Discovering What Can’t Be Found in Colossians 2:16, which you can buy at Amazon.com. The book is particularly valuable in solving the question of whether or not faithful Sabbath keepers should also keep the feasts today. And here’s an article by Ron Dupreez: “No “rest” for the “Sabbath” of Colossians 2:16: A structural-syntactical- semantic study.” ↩

thank you. God bless the work of your hands
This is not long...but let's also remember that Jesus RESTED on the Sabbath and rose on the first day of the week! So he even observed the Sabbath in death. His last act on this earth.
It is worth noting that in Acts, references to Greeks are often referring to Hellenistic Jews. These were the Greek speaking Jews of the diaspora. They were not gentile Greeks. The Hellenistic Jews were the ones that gave us the Septuagent. One needs to understand some of the differences and tensions between the judaistic and Hellenistic Jews because it explains quite a lot about the development of early Christianity. It is thought by some that Paul was from a Hellenistic background but later became a Pharisee.
Okay pastor it was only ceremonial feast ended,but how can i help someone who wants to know the exactly meaning of Paul in collosians 2:16-17.
How can i start to educate that man who put this verse as his pilot study and the end of the sabbath?
Christopher you may share this post with them, including the links on Colossians.
In Col 2:14 "by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross."
I understand it as many Christians do that it is the record of our sins that required payment that were nailed to the cross. One who is forgiven of sin need not be concerned how others judge them. Thus: "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." The emphasis should be on what Christ did on the cross for us not our works of how we eat or drink or how we observe.
"These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ."
Interesting it does not say was a shadow but rather are. If the Sabbath is spoken of here as done away with then why does it not speak of it in the past tense?
I do not buy the argument that only the ceremonial Feasts are spoken of here in Col 2:16. The progression in this passage is Feasts (yearly) news moons (monthly) and Sabbaths (weekly). If Feast equals Sabbaths why the needless repetition?
Moreover the majority of the Church down through history has retained two of the Feasts due to their importance to Christianity, that is the Paschal Feast (called Easter by those of you who speak English, Pascha for most everyone else) and Pentecost. Yes, these two feasts are mostly observed in a Christian context and rightfully so yet they both still their have roots that go back to the OT. Thus if Pascha and Pentecost can be retained in a Christian context then why not the weekly Sabbath also? Clearly Paul continued to observe in the context of Christ and the Christian life. If Paul did then should we not also? 1 Corinthians 4:16
I am not going to explain those 2 verses (Col 2:16-17) which are constantly used to abrogate the Sabbath commandment, however, I am going to post two bible verses that are hardly ever used by pastors or bible teachers (including SDA) when they bring up the polemic.
Doing this might change or enlarge one's perspective about the topic.
Hebrews 10:1 For the law having a SHADOW of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those SACRIFICES which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect.
Ezekiel 45:17 And it shall be the prince's part to give burnt offerings, and MEAT offerings, and DRINK offerings, in the feasts, and in the new moons, and in the sabbaths, in all solemnities of the house of Israel: he shall prepare the sin offering, and the meat offering, and the burnt offering, and the peace offerings, to make reconciliation for the house of Israel.
Robert E: I am confused to what you refer. The two feasts are kept partially, yes. The Passover as the Lord's supper, Easter being a celebration of the resurrection we expect in the near future. Would you suggest we have something more for Sabbath?
Perhaps this: Rev 5:9,10 with 2Corinthians 5:21 KJV
For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.
I cannot keep Sabbath, it keeps me. I cannot save myself, my Savior had to do it for me. I receive that as did Abraham, Romans 4,11ff. So by his Righteousness I am made Holy. By His rest I rest in his work of saving me. No duty here, it (Sabbath) was made for me. I can fabricate rules of obedience and personal "fences" to keep me 'holy' but none of that does so. Only his work in me is of any value.
Exodus 31:13. It's about His work in us, which we must take time to appreciate.
Michael you do not seem confused at all to me. You seem to understand it well.
I would only add to what you said: Hebrews 4:1-10
4 Therefore, since the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it. 2 For we also have had the good news proclaimed to us, just as they did; but the message they heard was of no value to them, because they did not share the faith of those who obeyed.[a] 3 Now we who have believed enter that rest, just as God has said,
“So I declared on oath in my anger,
‘They shall never enter my rest.’”[b]
And yet his works have been finished since the creation of the world. 4 For somewhere he has spoken about the seventh day in these words: “On the seventh day God rested from all his works.”[c] 5 And again in the passage above he says, “They shall never enter my rest.”
6 Therefore since it still remains for some to enter that rest, and since those who formerly had the good news proclaimed to them did not go in because of their disobedience, 7 God again set a certain day, calling it “Today.” This he did when a long time later he spoke through David, as in the passage already quoted:
“Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.”[d]
8 For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken later about another day. 9 There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; 10 for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from their works,[e] just as God did from his.