Why seventh day adventist worship on saturday

The Ten Commandments are a demonstration of our love for God the first four and our love for others the last six. The fourth commandment is about expressing our love to God by setting aside the day He assigned as holy.

Every seventh day of the week, God commands His people to put aside their regular work and rest from their labor Exodus Resting from work allows the body to regenerate and recuperate after 6 six days of work. You are not to do any work; wherever you live. Seventh-day Adventists worship together on Saturdays and observe the seventh-day Sabbath because it is a demonstration of love to God. Observing the seventh-day Sabbath is not about works but about resting in Jesus and His grace.

It is the only commandment that calls for people to rest from works. When we keep Sabbath as God commanded, we recognize that we could never do enough to be worthy. At the end of the week, no matter how much work you may have done, Sabbath rest allows us to focus on Jesus Christ and His merits.

The seventh-day Sabbath is also symbolic of resting in Jesus. The Lord calls for anyone who is weary and burdened to come to Him for rest Matthew Both mental and spiritual vigour are in great degree dependent upon physical strength and activity; whatever promotes physical health, promotes the development of a strong mind and a well-balanced character.

One way Adventists keep healthy is by eating a healthy diet, following the food rules laid down in Leviticus A vegetarian diet is recommended but not insisted upon. One little known fact is that Adventists were responsible for the popularisation of breakfast cereal; the Adventist layman John Harvey Kellogg invented cornflakes as a replacement for eggs and bacon.

Health has a missionary as well as an individual purpose. Adventists believe that "it is the Lord's design that the restoring influence of health reform shall be a part of the last great effort to proclaim the gospel message. Dress is to be simple, modest, and neat, befitting those whose true beauty does not consist of outward adornment but in the imperishable ornament of a gentle and quiet spirit.

But they don't adopt an antique style of dress; preferring to wear tasteful conservative and sensible styles that are common at any particular period. They are not "the first to adopt the new styles of dress or the last to lay the old aside. Clothes are chosen for their durability, and "profuse ornamentation" and "gaudy display" are unacceptable.

Radio and television: Educational programmes, news and current affairs and classical music programmes are valuable. Adventists avoid programmes that are neither "wholesome nor uplifting". Theatre and cinema: Adventists are advised not to go to the theatre, cinema or, presumably to watch videos or DVDs , which, with other entertainments, are seen as partly responsible for the poor moral state of the world.

Great care should be exercised in the choice of music. Any melody partaking of the nature of jazz, rock, or related hybrid forms, or any language expressing foolish or trivial sentiments, will be shunned by persons of true culture.

The Church Manual sets out a code of practice for social events, which are usually held in family homes, rather than commercial places of entertainment:. Social gatherings for old and young should be made occasions, not for light and trifling amusement, but for happy fellowship and improvement of the powers of mind and soul. Good music, elevating conversation, good recitations, suitable still or motion pictures, games carefully selected for their educational value, and, above all, the making and using of plans for outreach missionary effort can provide programs for social gatherings that will bless and strengthen the lives of all.

Sex outside marriage is forbidden, and parents are expected to chaperone meetings between young people. Young people, for their part, are expected to take responsibility for avoiding sexual encounters. Adultery, homosexual and lesbian practices, sexual abuse within marriage, incest and sexual abuse of children are banned. Pornography should be avoided. The monogamous union in marriage of a man and a woman is affirmed as the divinely ordained foundation of the family and social life and the only morally appropriate locus of genital or related intimate sexual expression.

Adultery, sexual perversion and "abandonment by a non-believing spouse" are valid grounds for divorce, although the Church will first try to mediate and reconcile the couple.

If reconciliation isn't possible, the couple can divorce and the spouse who remained faithful has the right to remarry. The spouse who broke the marriage vow may not remarry while their ex-partner lives.

Seventh-day Adventists obeyed the 6th Commandment thou shalt not kill , and would not take a combatant role in warfare, although Adventists outside the USA for example in Nazi Germany were sometimes forced to compromise their principles and bear arms. This is the only area where Adventists are likely to clash with secular government as they regard it as a "sacred responsibility" to be good citizens. Adventist worship is very like other Protestant worship - apart from the fact that the main day for worship is a Saturday not a Sunday.

These normally take place four times a year. Only unfermented grape juice and unleavened bread are used for communion, and any Christian may take communion, not just Church members. Adventist communion services also include "the ordinance of foot-washing" before the communion. This ritual conveys a message of forgiveness, acceptance, assurance, and solidarity, primarily from Christ to the believer, but also between the believers themselves. Most importantly it symbolises an overall purification - "a cleansing of the heart".

The Seventh-day Adventist Church, like all Christian churches, puts the Bible at the centre of its faith. Adventists regard the Bible as literally true, its writers as inspired by God. They regard the Bible as an infallible guide to life. Adventists believe that "the Seventh-day Adventist Church has been richly blessed by the Lord through the gift of prophecy manifested in the ministry and writings of Ellen G White," which they see as "a continuing and authoritative source of truth which provide for the church comfort, guidance, instruction, and correction.

The Church teaches that these writings were instrumental in taking the Church from a small group to a worldwide movement. These writings are not regarded as scripture or authoritative, but as a wise guide to interpreting scripture, and living a Christian life. The writings of Ellen White are not a substitute for Scripture.

They cannot be placed on the same level. The Holy Scriptures stand alone, the unique standard by which her and all other writings must be judged and to which they must be subject. Seventh-day Adventists Believe The fact that God has revealed His will to men through His Word, has not rendered needless the continued presence and guiding of the Holy Spirit. On the contrary, the Spirit was promised by our Saviour to open the Word to His servants, to illuminate and apply its teachings.

Baptism is by immersion. Before a person is baptised they are questioned about their faith and attitudes. This is usually done in front of church members, although it can be done in front of a church board if necessary. Each level is chosen by democratic representation. A church elects its own officials by majority voting and also elects its own delegate to a conference. Officials within unions and the General Conference are elected for each session.

Ministers are not elected. Search term:. Read more. This page is best viewed in an up-to-date web browser with style sheets CSS enabled.

While you will be able to view the content of this page in your current browser, you will not be able to get the full visual experience. Please consider upgrading your browser software or enabling style sheets CSS if you are able to do so. This page has been archived and is no longer updated. Find out more about page archiving. Earlier in the epistle Paul instructs: "I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship" Rom.

To deliberately appropriate as food that which God condemns as harmful see Lev. In his first epistle to the Corinthians, Paul seriously warns against defiling the body temple. If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy that person. For God's temple is holy, and you are that temple" 1 Cor.

But in Romans 14, God accepted the diet of the non-vegetarians. The issue was not a matter of health. Since God accepted both parties, the dietary issue among the Roman Christians was a matter of indifference adiaphora ; it was not a question of right and wrong. Paul says later in the chapter, "I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself; but it is unclean for anyone who thinks it unclean.

If your brother or sister is being injured by what you eat, you are no longer walking in love" Rom. This parallels the remark in his epistle to Timothy: "For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected, provided it is received with thanksgiving" 1 Tim. Obviously not! What Paul is saying is that everything that God created as acceptable for food may be partaken of. But Paul is not condoning the eating of that which would be harmful to health whether it is specifically mentioned in Scripture or not.

Since our bodies are the temples of the Holy Spirit, imbibing that which is hurtful to health is a moral issue. The issue in Rome was not a question of health; it was a question of preference in matters that did not involve right and wrong in God's sight. But one party did not recognize that the specific dietary question was a non-issue. Vegetarians today who refrain from eating flesh for health reasons have a different motivation than did the vegetarians in the Roman church. The question was not a moral issue as it would have been if one of the Ten Commandments was being questioned.

The Sabbath and worship are not even mentioned in the passage. The observance of the days in question, whatever days they were, was not a matter of right and wrong.

The Lord accepted both parties, those who observed the days and those who did not. In the light of Matthew , the Lord could not have accepted anyone who did not honor His Sabbath day, as Jesus had honored it during his life on earth Luke and as Paul himself honored it Acts 13, 15, 17, Those who were abstaining from eating particular foods "in honor of the Lord" seem to have been those who were observing particular days in honor of the Lord verse 6.

Dederen's suggestion is that there was a party in the Roman church that chose to refrain from certain foods on certain days which they regarded as religious fast days.

He writes: "Paul's statement in Romans , 'One believes he may eat anything, while the weak man eats only vegetables' R.

He mentions the two cases together, and later in the chapter he declares that a man should not be judged by his eating verses , which may imply that Paul is referring to fast days.

It appears quite probable from the context that Paul here is correlating the eating with the observance of days. Most likely--although it is impossible to ascertain this--the apostle is dealing with fast days in a context of either partial or total abstinence. They sanctified certain days that were not observed by the general stream of Jews. The Essenes scrupulously abstained from meat and wine--at least at times.

They added certain feast days to the regular Jewish calendar. The discussion over the point existed in Jewry prior to the advent of Christianity. Could it be that the controversy was carried over into the Christian church and finds itself reflected in Romans 14?

In this case, the practice of the weak may be compared with the early Christian custom indicated in the Didache of fasting twice every week. Is it not significant, and relevant as well, that we have in this document too a matter of diet and days connected in a controversial issue? The Didache or Teaching that Dederen cites is a late first- or early second-century document.

The relevant statement reads: "Your fasts must not be identical with those of the hypocrites. They fast on Mondays and Thursdays; but you should fast on Wednesdays and Fridays. We know that in Jesus' day there was a controversy over fasting.

See Matt. In fact, in Jesus' parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector, the Pharisee prayed, "I fast twice a week" Luke It seems that it would not be unusual for the fasting controversy of Jesus' day to carry over into the early Christian church with lively discussion as to which days would be the most appropriate for fasting. Some have suggested that the days referred to in Romans , 6 were the ceremonial feast days of the Jewish religious year.

See Lev. Although this is a possibility, the suggestion seems to be ruled out by the fact that these days were feast days, not fast days. Paul's discussion of the controversy over days Rom. Hence it seems that Dederen's suggestion of the presence in the Roman church of an ascetic group like the Essenes who were insisting on abstinence from certain foods on certain days is the most likely explanation.

At all events, the passage gives no warrant for the conclusion that Paul rejected the seventh-day Sabbath. A second passage that is often cited as evidence that Paul rejected the seventh-day Sabbath is Colossians In the New American Standard Bible, the passage is translated as follows:. And when you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Him.

Therefore let no one act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day-- Verses 13 and 14 are speaking of God's forgiveness of the believer's sins made possible by Christ's death on the cross.

Some would have us believe that the law was nailed to the cross. But this is not what the text is saying. It was our indebtedness in view of our having broken the law that was nailed to the cross. Verse 14 may be translated, "Blotting out the handwriting in decrees which was against us which was contrary to us, and he took it out of the way, nailing it to the cross.

God had decreed that "the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord" Rom. Jesus took the death which was ours so that we can have the life which is His. Compare Romans It was our guilt born by Jesus Christ that was nailed to the cross.

As we have noted above, the law remains as the standard expression of God's righteousness. Not only did Jesus suffer for our sins on the cross, he disarmed Satan and his cohorts and publicly displayed to the world and the universe the evil demons that they are.

Verse 16 adds the corollary: No one can now judge the believer in regard to ritualistic eating and drinking or in respect to the sacrificial observances involved in the practice of the ceremonial law. The phrase "a festival [feast] or a new moon or a sabbath" Col. The Old Testament background is in Numbers 28 and 29 and Leviticus 23, in which the burnt offerings daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly are listed.

There were five yearly feasts, involving seven ceremonial sabbaths. The seven ceremonial sabbaths were:. Seven Old Testament passages use some form of the phrase "feasts, new moons, sabbaths" 1 Chron. Consistently these passages refer to the burnt offerings to be offered weekly, monthly, and yearly.

Usually the feasts specify only the three pilgrimage feasts Unleavened Bread, Weeks or Pentecost, and Tabernacles. The sabbaths must, therefore, include the ceremonial sabbaths--otherwise Solomon, for example, would have failed to offer burnt offerings on the days of Trumpets and Atonement.

If the "sabbaths" mentioned in the passage did not include ceremonial sabbaths, Solomon would have failed to offer the stipulated burnt offerings on the feast of Trumpets and the Day of Atonement, because the feasts as listed exclude these two ceremonial sabbaths.

The word sabbath whether singular or plural in the phrase "feast, new moon, sabbath" specifies the burnt offerings for weekly and annual ceremonial sabbaths. Colossians , 17 is simply teaching that the sacrifices offered weekly sabbath , monthly, or yearly were a "shadow" pointing forward to Christ see Heb. Now no one has a right to judge those who reject these ceremonial observances which pointed forward to the sacrifice and heavenly ministry of Jesus Christ.

The phrase "feast, new moon, sabbath" is simply a stylized way of referring to the temporary ceremonial observances that typified the work of our Savior. Although the special animal sacrifices commanded for the weekly Sabbath Num 28; Lev. The "food and drink" Col. Or they may refer to ritualistic eating and drinking or abstaining from eating and drinking of the kind referred to in Romans Or they may refer to eating or not eating food that had been offered to idols 1 Cor.

The force of the passage Col. Paul was not abolishing the weekly Sabbath which, according to the book of Acts, he consistently observed. The history of the early Christian Church establishes that worship services on Sunday, associated with a progressive rejection of the seventh-day Sabbath, began in Rome during the second century A.

While most Christians around the Mediterranean world were still observing the Sabbath, there grew up in Rome a veneration of Sunday.

Gradually this practice spread from Rome to other places. By the early medieval period, Sunday observance of one sort or another was quite common in the eastern empire as well as in the west.

There were three closely related reasons for this development beginning in Rome and spreading from there to other Christian centers:. Among the Jews the Sabbath was never a day of fasting, sadness and gloom. For them it was a festival occasion. In Leviticus 23 and Numbers 28, the Sabbath is included among the Jewish feast days. The apocryphal book of Judith says: "And she [Judith] fasted all the days of her widowhood, save the eves of the sabbaths, and the sabbaths, and the eves of the new moons, and the new moons, and the feasts and joyful days of the house of Israel.

In the second-century Roman Christian church, the practices of Easter weekend were gradually transferred to every weekend of the year.

Friday and Sabbath were fast days, while Sunday was a day of feasting and rejoicing in view of the resurrection of Christ. The result was that the Sabbath became a day of fasting and gloom by contrast with Sunday which was a day of joy and pleasantness.

Early in the third century, Tertullian wrote of the Roman Christians: "Anyhow, you sometimes continue your Station [fast] even over the Sabbath, -- a day never to be kept as a fast except at the passover season, according to a reason elsewhere given. The evidence suggests that toward the end of the second century the Roman Church had begun to transfer the fasting practices of Easter weekend to every weekend of the year, by which Friday and the Sabbath were fast days, and Sunday a feast day.

The gradual effect of this was to depreciate the Sabbath and exalt Sunday. By the time of the Spanish Synod of Elvira c. In the early fourth century, while various places in the West were treating the Sabbath as a fast day, this was not the custom in the East. By the fifth century, the weekly Sabbath fast was a fixed custom in Rome. The reason is clearly brought out in the following statement of Pope Innocent I :.

For if we celebrate the Diem Dominicum to show reverence for the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ not only on the day of Easter, but indeed also from one weekly cycle to another one, if we assemble together for the commemoration of that very day, and fast on the sixth holiday, we must not omit the Sabbath, which comes between the sadness and the joy of that period.

Just as the Sabbath of Easter weekend was a fast day, so, it was reasoned, must be every Sabbath day of the year. The result was the denigration of the Sabbath to the level of a day of sorrow and mourning, by contrast with Sunday which was a day of Christian joy and rejoicing.

The practical effect on Christians was to lead them to turn away from the Sabbath and to exalt Sunday as the special feast day memorializing Christ's resurrection. Samuele Bacchiocchi writes: "That the Church of Rome was the champion of the Sabbath fast and anxious to impose it on other Christian communities is well attested by the historical references from Bishop Callistus A.

The fast was designed not only to express sorrow for Christ's death but also, as Pope Sylvester emphatically states, to show 'contempt for the Jews' execratione Judaeorum and for their Sabbath 'feasting' destructiones ciborum. Military, political, fiscal, and literary repressive measures were taken against them on account of their resurgent nationalism, which exploded in violent uprisings in many places.

Militarily, the statistics of bloodshed provided by contemporary historians, even allowing for possible exaggerations, are most impressive. Tacitus c. Dio Cassius c. Bacchiocchi points out that "under Vespasian A. Bacchiocchi writes: "Literarily, a new wave of anti-Semitic literature surged at that time, undoubtedly reflecting the Roman mood against the Jews.

Writers such as Seneca died A. Particularly were the Jewish customs of Sabbathkeeping and circumcision contemptuously derided as examples of degrading superstition. Christians were motivated to separate themselves from the Jews in the minds of the populace and rulers. They wrote against Jewish legalism and began to attack the Sabbath. Writing from Rome about the middle of the second century, Justin Martyr condemned Sabbath observance and provided the earliest account of Christian Sunday worship services:.

Then we all rise together and pray, and, as we before said, when our prayer is ended, bread and wine and water are brought, and the president in like manner offers prayers and thanksgivings, according to his ability, and the people assent, saying Amen. But Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly, because it is the first day on which God, having wrought a change in the darkness and matter, made the world; and Jesus Christ our Saviour on the same day rose from the dead.

For He was crucified on the day before that of Saturn Saturday ; and on the day after that of Saturn, which is the day of the Sun, having appeared to His apostles and disciples, He taught them these things, which we have submitted to you also for your consideration.

Thus Sunday observance began in Rome in the middle of the second century A. Opposition to the religion of the Jews was a factor in the depreciation of their Sabbath and the gradual substitution of Sunday.

Sun worship was one of the oldest practices in the Roman religion. From the early part of the second century A.

The emperor was regarded and worshiped as a Sun-god.