04 - THE PRESENT TRUTH

God has given mankind timeless truths and truths for the times. Timeless truths are applicable to all people at all times. Some of these are salvation only by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, repentance, pardon, obedience, love to God with all one’s heart, and love for one’s neighbour as for oneself.

In addition to these timeless truths are truths to meet certain situations at specific times. Examples are Noah’s message about the impending worldwide flood, Jonah’s message to the people of Nineveh, the message of John the Baptist as the forerunner of Christ, the preaching of the apostles during the first century, the message of Martin Luther and the other Reformers, and the preaching of William Miller and his associates in the 1830`s .

The concept of there being not only Christ’s timeless truths but also His truths for a particular time is of supreme importance to every soul because, together, these truths comprise the one way of Christ for our day. In view of numerous divergent teachings bidding for acceptance as the alleged right way, what is more essential than to know for a certainty God’s one true way and then follow it to the end?

The apostle Peter directed the Christians to “be established in the present truth” (2 Peter 1:12). What was the present truth in the days of the apostles? The New Testament clearly shows that it was adherence to the truths of Jesus for that day, plus God`s timeless truths from previous generations as they applied to Peter`s time.

Note one example of how timeless truth and truth for the time met, as described in Acts 18:24 tells of Apollos, “mighty in the scriptures,” who knew and preached the teachings of the Old Testament. Then he learned of the gospel unfolded by John the Baptist (verse 25). But Aquila and Priscilla taught him further truth for the time: they “expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly” (verse 26).

This is an example to teach us that Jesus`way, as the only right way for our day, is adherence to the truths that Christ has appointed particularly for us, plus the timeless truths of previous generations. Notice how this way into truth is set forth in the experience of Saul of Tarsus, who became the greatest apostle of Jesus Christ.

This learned and devout Jew had been adhering to all the timeless truths from previous generations, as he understood them. However, he was ignorant of the truth of Jesus for his time. In fact, he unwittingly hated that truth. He fought against it, and sought to have those who followed it put to death.

Then he had a personal encounter with Jesus on the Damascus road. His reaction was, “Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?” (Acts 9:6).

Jesus told him to go into Damascus, where he would be shown his duty. The Lord directed one of His followers, Ananias, to communicate to Paul the truth of Christ. Saul gladly accepted that truth for his time. Now he could be used of God to win thousands of Jews and Gentiles to the true way.

Note one more Bible example that illustrates the fact of timeless truth and truth for the time. Jesus declared that as it was in the days of Noah prior to the Flood, so it would be in the end-time when His second coming would be near (Matt. 24:37). It is obvious that the one true way of the Lord in the days of Noah was adherence to the timeless truths from the days of Adam, with the addition of the special truth for that time – preparation for the Flood.

A study of Genesis 7:6 compared with chapter 6:3,7 indicates that Noah was 480 years old when he received the special truth about the impending Flood. He already had the timeless truths handed down from Adam.

The timeless truths, plus the truth about the coming of the Flood, was Christ’s present truth during that 120-year period from the time Noah was 480 years old until the Flood came when he was 600 years old. The two truths merged, even as the Missouri River combines with the Mississippi and flows on to the Gulf of Mexico. The merging was like the letter Y, in which two diagonal lines merge into a short perpendicular line.

So Christ’s present truth for us is the timeless truths of the gospel from former times merged into His truths for our day. Some of these will be set forth from Bible prophecy in the following two chapters.

We do well to consider some of the timeless truths Noah had, because they are applicable to every person today:
1- Redemption through Jesus Christ (foreshadowed in sacrifices).
2- Love and loyalty to God, shown by obedience to Him. (the result of disobedience was well known through the experience of Adam and Eve.)
3- Worship of the only true God as the Creator of all. It is seen in the light of the New Testament that this Creator-God was the Lord Jesus Christ, who is also the only Saviour (John 1:1-3,14,10; Eph. 3:9; Col. 1:14-16; Heb. 1:1-2).
4- The acceptance by faith that the Lord made the world in six twenty-four-hour days. This creation was later described by Moses, in Genesis 1. many, on the basis of geology, believe that these six days were actually long periods of time. But the Word of God declares that each consisted of only an evening and a morning, being a twenty-four-hour period from one evening to the next (Genesis 1: 5,8, 13, 19, 23, 31).

God’s command for man to keep the seventh day as the Sabbath is specifically based upon His creation of the earth in six twenty-four-hour days. Having made the world in the first six days of the first week, God rested upon the seventh day and then sanctified it, or set it apart, as His Sabbath for man. (Gen. 2:1-3; Ex. 20:8-11.) This made the seventh-day Sabbath timeless truth for all the future, which is evident in that the Sabbath will be honored eternally in the new earth (Isa. 66:22, 23).

It should be remembered that from the days of Adam certain timeless truths, such as the Sabbath, have become testing truths for certain epochs, a part of the present truth for that period. Thus the keeping of the Sabbath was a testing truth when Israel came out of Egypt (Ex. 16:4, 22-30). Also, the manner of Sabbathkeeping was a testing truth in the days of Christ’s ministry (Matt. 12:1-13; John 5:1-17). So it is that the timeless truth of the true Lord’s day, the seventh day, is a testing truth for our time, as presented in God’s threefold message for the last days (see Rev. 14:7, 9-12). This message will be unfolded in the next two chapters.

In Exodus 31:16, 17, the Lord declares that the seventh-day Sabbath is a sign between Him and His people, the children of Israel, forever because He made the world in six days and rested upon the last day of the week, the seventh day. The nation of Israel was intended to be a nucleus for, and a type of, all God’s children. Paul makes it plain that it is God’s spiritual children who are the true Israel (Rom. 2: 28, 29; 9:6; Gal. 3:7-9). And Christ made it absolutely plain that because Israel “after the flesh” failed in its plain that because Israel “after the flesh” failed in its calling, the kingdom would be taken from it and given to a people who would manifest the character given to a people who would manifest the character of Jesus (Matt. 21:43). This people was the church that Jesus set up. God’s blessings and requirements for Israel are now for His church. Christ’s seventh-day Sabbath is continuing evidence that He made the world in six twenty-four-hour days.

Those who keep it as God has directed cannot be led astray by the false theory of evolution with its millions-of-years concept regarding man and the world.

Men have substituted the keeping of Sunday, the first day of the week, for the keeping of the seventh day, Saturday. We see the baneful results of this error in the millions of professed Christians who are committed to the false theory of evolution.

Thank God, there are many Christians among those who keep Sunday who still believe that the six days of Creation were twenty-four-hour days. It is good that they stand with Jesus in this. We pray they will go all the way with Him by keeping His seventh-day Sabbath as His appointed sign of the creation to show their faith by their works and keep the seventh day as His appointed Creation sign.

The seventh-day Sabbath is not only a sign of the Lord Jesus as the Creator (Ex. 31:16, 17), it is also a sign of the Lord Jesus as the only Saviour. The Lord declares that He gave His Sabbath to His people “to be a sign between me and them, that they might know that I am the Lord that sanctify them” (Eze. 20:12). Thus God’s Word presents the Sabbath as a double sign of Christ as our Creator and as our Re-creator, or Saviour. What a privilege, then, to keep the Sabbath as a link of love that binds our hearts to Jesus! As surely as you love Jesus, you will love the Sabbath as His sign that He is your blessed Creator-Saviour.

Many Christians who conscientiously keep Sunday preach Christ as the Creator and only Saviour. However, if they really follow through on their belief in Him, what can they do but keep the seventh day as His appointed sign that He is the Creator-Saviour, and as He has commanded in the Ten Commandments?

Some object, “The keeping of the seventh day is a sign of attempting salvation by works.” But god declares it is a sign of continuing sanctification (Eze 20:12); it is a sign of truly knowing Christ as our Creator and Saviour. Only a truly converted person can keep the Sabbath as God has commanded.

True Sabbathkeeping is an outward sign of the inner experience of righteousness by faith in Jesus Christ. When a born-again believer has Christ living in his life, the keeping of the seventh day of the Decalogue cannot be legalism any more than being honest, truthful, pure, kind, honouring one’s father and mother, being reverent, and worshiping the only true God, as called for in the other nine commandments, are legalism.

Some have declared that, since the word Sabbath is not mentioned in Genesis, the day was not instituted until the Israelites left Egypt. This contradicts God, because in His law He calls the seventh day, which He rested upon and sanctified at the close of Creation, “the Sabbath day” (Ex. 20:11).

God needs no Sabbath for rest. Therefore, when He sanctified, or set apart, the seventh day after He had rested upon it (Gen. 2:1-3), it must have been for man to observe (Mark 2:27).

Many honestly believe they are obeying Christ by celebrating Sunday in honor of His resurrection. But there is no text in the Bible directing anyone to celebrate the first day of the week for that or any other purpose. The celebration of Sunday as a weekly holy day rests upon the authority of the Catholic Church and not upon the Holy Scriptures. The observance of Sunday stands as a sign of submission to the authority of the Catholic power.

In the June, 1978, issue of Decision, the official organ of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, there appeared this question: “Are Christians required to refrain from work one day out of seven, as specified in the Fourth Commandment (Exodus 20: 8-11)?”

This was the answer by Gleason L. Archer, Jr., professor of Old Testament and Semitic language at Trinity Evagelical Divinity School, Deerfield, Illinois:
“In his teaching ministry Jesus laid special emphasis upon the spiritual meaning and implication of the Ten Commandments – including the Fourth Commandment, about which he had more to say than any of the rest (by actual count of the verses in which he spoke of Sabbath-keeping). After his crucifixion and resurrection the disciples made a point of gathering each Sunday – the day on which Christ rose – in order to celebrate his Easter victory.

“Nowhere is it stated in the New Testament, nor is it even suggested, that the day of rest had lost its sacred character of refraining from gainful labour and activities appropriate for the other days of the week.”

This is true except for the observation “The disciples made a point of gathering each Sunday… to celebrate his Easter victory.” No Bible references are cited to support this, because there are no statements in the New Testament that declare this to be so. Christ appeared to the disciples on the Sunday night of the day He arose to convince them that He had risen from the dead (Mark 16:9-14).

No one need miss the certainty of the truth regarding the seventh day. While on earth, the Lord Jesus Christ did not rest on earth, the Lord Jesus Christ did not rest on any other day of the week. He never mentioned any change; therefore, no day aside from the seventh can ever be God’s as Creator, ever blessed, hallowed, or sanctified for man, it is the only day Christ commanded man to keep. It is the only day that will be honored as God’s holy day for man throughout eternity in the new earth (Isa. 66:22, 23). The seventh-day Sabbath spans the entire history of man, from Creation through all generations, and on into the eternal inheritance of all the saved. Surely these Bible facts establish the seventh day of the week as the only right day to observe.

In view of these plain scriptural considerations, all arguments in favour of the keeping of Sunday are futile. As Jesus said, “In vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men” (Matt. 15:9).

Under the covenant of grace, the Lord Jesus has appointed four memorials: baptism by immersion in commemoration of His death, burial, and resurrection (Rom. 6:3-5; Col. 2:12); the keeping of the seventh day to commemorate His creation and recreation, or redemption (Rom. 6:3-5; Col. 2:12); the keeping of the seventh day to commemorate His creation and re-creation, or redemption (Ex. 31:16, 17; 20:8-11; Eze. 20:12); the Lord’s supper to commemorate His body broken for us and His blood shed for our sins (1 Cor. 11:24-26); the ordinance of foot-washing preceding the Lord’s Supper as a sign of humiliation and love for one another (John 13:12-15).

The message John the Baptist proclaimed to prepare the way for the Messiah to be manifested to Israel at His first advent, and to prepare a people to receive Him, is an illustration of a special truth for a particular time. John’s message and mission were foretold by the prophet Isaiah: “The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God” (Isa. 40:3). When John was asked by the religious authorities who he was, and why he was preaching a message so different from theirs, he pointed them to that prophecy: “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Esaias” (John 1:23).

Is there a prophecy in the Scriptures intended to prepare the way for Christ’s Second Advent and make ready a people to meet Him, as John prophesied to prepare for Christ’s first advent? Most assuredly. It is recorded in Revelation 14:6-12, as mentioned in the previous chapter. This threefold message is the way of the Lord for all people today, as John’s message was God’s way for Israel.