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Beginners Care Package

Holy Sabbath Series

Holy Sabbath #5

Fred R. Coulter

This is Holy Sabbath number 5, and we’re going to thoroughly cover all the aspects of the Sabbath in the Bible, and men’s arguments concerning why they keep Sunday, and so forth. And I think that we’ll find that the Sabbath is the only day, as we’ve seen, that God has ever sanctified and set aside as a weekly day of worship and rest for Him.

Now let’s go back to Jeremiah 7, and let’s see that the Israelites were also violating God’s laws and commandments by Sunday worship. Now what do I mean by that? Whenever you read about Baal, Baal is the sun god. And Ashtoreth is the female counterpart, which we have today in the Catholic Church as the Virgin Mary. In Babylon it was Semiramis. And of course, all the other names of it, if you get the book, The Two Babylons and read that all the names of these gods and deities came out of Babylon; and when the language was changed at the tower of Babel, the names were changed. But it’s still the same old worship.

Let’s see something very important here in Jeremiah 7, which is this: that the Israelites, just like those people today who claim to be the people of God, who claim to worship God on Sunday, who claim to say that they have license to do this because God has made it possible for them to do so, are using the very same excuses that they used, and Jeremiah confronted them with it. Plus, also, it’s important to understand, that they didn’t do this out in the peripheries. They didn’t do this secretly in their homes. They did it publicly, at the very temple of God where God said He would put His name. There they worshipped Baal. There they committed all sorts of sacrilegious and idolatrous acts.

Now let’s read it beginning here in Jeremiah 7:1. “The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD, saying, Stand in the gate of the LORD’s house, and proclaim…” So he had to go there and stand. And Jeremiah was not liked, because he told the truth. He gave them the Word of God. And they didn’t like to hear it because it upset their idolatrous and sinful ways of which they had pleasure in. Just like today. “…And proclaim there this word, and say, Hear the word of the LORD, all ye of Judah, that enter in at these gates to worship the LORD. Thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, Amend your ways and your doings,…” (Jer. 7:1-3). So God first of all always calls for repentance. And God calls for repentance of Sunday-keepers today, that they change, that they amend their ways; that they quit using the name of God on the first day of the week and saying that that is the Lord’s Day, or the Christian Sabbath. Because as we have proven it is not so. It is not true. There is no such thing as a “Christian Sabbath” being the first day of the week. That is the day of the sun. That is the day of the sun god.

And He says, “…and I will cause you to dwell in this place. Trust not in lying words,…” And isn’t that what people are trusting in today, lying arguments? How many times did we see that they know – the religious leaders know and they understand that the Sabbath is the seventh day of the week and not the first day of the week. The Catholics know it, the Protestants know it. Everyone knows it, but yet they want to trust in their lying words, because, you see, the human heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. And they want to have pleasure in their sin. And they want to do it right in the temple of God. They want to come right before God, and stick their thumb right up before God. “…Saying, The temple of the LORD, The temple of the LORD, The temple of the LORD are these” (vs. 3-4). Meaning that, “If we do it for God, everything is fine.” Listen – God never sanctions sin. Understand that. And sin is the transgression of the law. God will never be honored by lies. God will never be honored by sin.

Now verse 5, “For if ye throughly amend your ways and your doings;…” That is, you quit your Sunday-keeping, your Easter-keeping, your Christmas-keeping, and you cast it away from you, and repent and amend your ways, “…if ye throughly execute judgment between a man and his neighbor; If ye oppress not the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, and shed not innocent blood in this place, neither walk after other gods to your hurt:…” (vs. 5-6). See, because God gave the Sabbath as His commandment in love so that the people of God would always have that direct connection between God and themselves. So when you do something that’s contrary to the laws and commandments of God, which is the will of God, it’s only to your hurt. Because it’s sin; and the wages of sin is death, Romans 6:23.

Verse 7, “…Then I will cause you to dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers, for ever and ever.” And that is going to be true of the United States of America, and of Canada, and Australia, and New Zealand. That if the people of God would change and repent they could dwell in the land; but since they probably won’t, then God is going to raise up the stranger within. And the silent invasion that has been taking place will overwhelm us and overtake us, and then we will be invaded by foreign troops and carried off into captivity, just exactly like the Israelites were. Because, as we will see, they were carried off into captivity because of Sabbath-breaking. We’ve already seen that. But we’ll see it reaffirmed here.

Verse 8, “Behold, ye trust in lying words, that cannot profit.” And concerning the Sabbath day versus Sunday, the lying words that cannot profit are these: that everything that was on the seventh day has now been transferred to the first day. And those are lying words. That, “In the New Covenant, now we have the first day of the week. And that is the Sabbath.” Those are lying words. “Oh well. Christmas and Easter, oh, they’re so wonderful and fine, and it’s for the children anyway.” That’s pleasing human beings, and those are lying words.

“Will ye steal [and they steal God’s name], [will you] murder [because you continuously sacrifice Christ, or crucify Him over and over again by living in sin], and [will you] commit adultery [physically and spiritually],…” Will you commit adultery with the great whore of Revelation 17 that is going to amalgamate and bring all the religions of the world together under the hegemony of the Pope? “…And swear falsely, and burn incense unto Baal, and walk after other gods whom ye know not;…” They don’t even know and understand that. “…And come and stand before Me in this house, which is called by My name, and say, We are delivered to do all these abominations?” (vs. 9-10). And that’s exactly the phraseology that people have today concerning Sunday and Sunday-keeping: “We have been delivered from the law so that we can do these things.” And they’re an abomination before God because it’s sun worship.

“Is this house, which is called by My name, [has it] become a den of robbers in your eyes? Behold, even I have seen it, saith the LORD.” He says, “But go ye now unto My place which was in Shiloh, where I set My name at the first, and see what I did to it for the wickedness of My people Israel.” And the wickedness was going after other gods. And other gods always involved Sunday-worship. “And now, because ye have done all these works, saith the LORD, and I spake unto you, rising up early and speaking, but ye heard not; and I called you, but ye answered not; Therefore will I do unto this house, which is called by My name, wherein ye trust, and unto the place which I gave to you and your fathers, as I have done to Shiloh. And I will cast you out of My sight, as I have [and I will] cast out all your brethren, even the whole seed [house] of Ephraim. Therefore…” (vs. 11-16).

Now there comes a time when God says He’s had enough. Enough is enough, is enough, is enough. And that’s what is going to happen with Sunday worship today. Because the Protestants failed to bring the Reformation all the way to the Sabbath, they are going back to Rome. They are going back to the abomination of Rome, which is Babylon the Great. Only this time it’s going to bring all the religions into it. And when that happens and God, as we saw last time, gives them over to believing a lie through great delusion, then will be brought to pass verse 16 right here in Jeremiah 7: “Therefore [God told Jeremiah] pray not thou for this people, neither lift up cry nor prayer for them, neither make intercession to Me: for I will not hear thee.” Now that day is going to come for us in this last time.

Notice verse 17. It defines what they’re doing. “Seest thou not what they do in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?” Right there where God’s name is. “The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven,…” So if you’re going back to Rome, you’re going right back to the queen of heaven worship under the guise supposedly of the Virgin Mary. That is idolatry. That is sin. That is against the Word of God. Because you refuse to keep the Word of God, because you refuse to keep the Sabbath, because you refuse to keep the holy days of God, because you refuse to do what is right in God’s sight. Oh, you want to take His name. You want to say, “Well, we will keep nine of the commandments.” But God didn’t say nine is enough. “Well, we will keep eight of the commandments. Oh well - we’ll just make our own standard.” No. “…To the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto other gods, that they may provoke Me to anger. Do they provoke Me to anger? saith the LORD: do they not provoke themselves to the confusion of their own faces?” (vs. 17-19). And isn’t that true? Who knows, in the realm of religion today, what is right, what is wrong, what is truth, what is error? Because we all now we have to get along and go along, and do not speak evil of anything or anyone. And then all of the abominable false doctrines can come pouring in.

“Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, Mine anger and My fury shall be poured out upon this place, upon man, and upon beast, and upon the trees of the field, and upon the fruit of the ground; and it shall burn and shall not be quenched.” (vs. 20). Question: did that happen? Answer: yes. It happened twice - the Babylonian captivity and the captivity with the fall of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. And then the extension of that carried on to the Bar-Kockba revolution which ended in 135 A.D. Were they scattered to the four winds? Were they rejected of God? Were they cursed? Yes. Why would anyone want to persist in their own way and their own lives, and to bring a curse upon themselves? To be in such a condition that God will not hear your prayers? To be in such a condition that you love the abominations which God hates? To be in such a condition that you don’t care, and just say, “Well, God is going to bring it. Let him bring it.”

Now here, let’s go to Isaiah 28. We’ll come back here to Jeremiah 7 again. Because you see, this is what you’re actually doing when you reject the Word of God, which is the truth of God. When you reject the true Jesus Christ for the false Jesus, the false Messiah, when you reject the Sabbath for Sunday and you reject the holy days for Christmas and Easter, and the other abominations. And I just read recently that many of the Protestant churches are being brought back to Rome even a little further, by this spring celebrating forty days of Lent.

Now I want you to read Isaiah 28. Let’s begin in verse 14. “Wherefore hear the word of the LORD, ye scornful men, that rule this people which is in Jerusalem. Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement;…” And if you continue in Sunday and the pagan holidays that’s exactly what you are into. There’s no eternal life in Sunday. There is no eternal life in the pagan holidays. Eternal life comes through Jesus Christ, because He died for you and rose again to bring you eternal life. And Jesus said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” But no, if you cling to the lies, if you cling to the false doctrines, if you cling to these things which are not right then you have made a covenant unto death and are in agreement with hell. And “…when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come unto us:…” Because you see, in doing that you say, “Well, it won’t happen to us. Maybe it happened to them back there in the olden days, but it won’t happen to us.” It will happen to any people anywhere who reject God. “…For we have made lies our refuge and under falsehood have we hid ourselves.” Now notice. The only way out is through Christ. And here is a prophecy of it. Verse 16, “Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste” (Isa. 28:14-16). So that’s the way out - through Christ.

Now let’s come back here to Jeremiah 7, and let’s see something else. All the way through the book of Jeremiah God talks about, “Obey My voice; did not obey My voice; did not listen to Me.” Now remember when we started out this series, we went how many times to Genesis 26:5, that Isaac was to receive the blessing because his father Abraham, “Obeyed My voice, kept My charge, My commandments, My statutes, and My laws.” Now let’s read it here. Jeremiah 7:21, “Thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, Put your burnt offerings unto your sacrifices, and eat flesh.” Now, who were they sacrificing to? Baal. Where were they sacrificing to Baal? Right at the temple of God. Were these noxious to God? Yes.

So he says, “For I spake not unto your fathers, nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices:…” That is, these sacrifices to the other gods. Surely He spoke to them about His own sacrifices, yes. But these wrong, abominable sacrifices to other gods right in the temple of God is just one of the greatest effronteries that people could ever do to God; and yet God kept pleading with them to repent. God kept pleading with them to turn from their ways. God kept pleading with them to come back to Him, like He does here in verse 23: “But this thing commanded I them, saying, Obey My voice,…” Now that means every word that God has spoken that you read in the Bible which says, “Thus saith the Lord…”; “…Moses, speak to the children of Israel and say, ‘Thus saith the Lord: Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.’” Those are the words of God, aren’t they? Did not God speak, as we saw, from the top of Mount Sinai to give the commandments to God, which contained - the commandments to the people of God, rather - which contained the Sabbath day, the seventh day Sabbath? Yes.

“…Obey My voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be My people: and walk ye in all the ways that I have command you, that it may be well unto you. But they hearkened not, nor inclined their ear, but walked in the counsels and in the imagination of their evil heart, and went backward and not forward. Since the day that your fathers came forth out of the land of Egypt unto this day…” (vs. 23-25). Did they not, right after Moses went up to the mount after hearing the Ten Commandments and God giving the Ten Commandments, did they not say, “Where is this man Moses? We don’t know where he is.” They came to Aaron and said, “Aaron, make us gods.” So Aaron foolishly took all of their gold and made a molten calf, which is the symbol of Baal. And the molten calf had horns, like this, with the round sun disk right in the horns. And the people worshiped that and made merry, saying, “It’s a feast unto the Lord!” So they did it from the very day they came out of Egypt.

Do we do the same thing today? Yes we do. Does not the Catholic priest hold up the wafer, the round wafer, so-called “the host,” which is a round disk made unto the sun? Is there not over the throne of the Pope there in St. Peter’s Basilica a great sunburst? Yes there are. And are there not four serpentine pillars going up from the base, clear, way up to the very top of the so-called sanctuary? Serpentine, picturing that Satan is the god that’s holding up that? Yes. And do they not do the same thing? Does not the Pope burn incense, and walk around with the incense, and the smoke coming up? Yes. And the Protestants, following their command of keeping Sunday, and Christmas, and Easter, are going right back to Rome, doing the same thing, the same thing that the children of Israel did here.

Now let’s read on. “…I have even sent unto you all My servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending them: yet they hearkened not unto Me, nor inclined their ear, but harden their neck:…” And that’s what we’re seeing happening today in this society. “…They did worse than their fathers. Therefore thou shalt speak all these words unto them; but they will not hearken to thee: thou shalt also call unto them; but they will not answer thee.” So it’s the same thing here today. If you hear these words of God read from the Bible and you don’t answer God’s call to repentance, and you don’t listen to the truth of God’s Word, then you are going to pay the penalty because you have made a covenant with death. “But thou shall say unto them, This is a nation that obeyeth not the voice of the LORD their God, nor receiveth correction: truth is perished, and is cut off from their mouth” (vs. 25-28). And God did cast them away.

Let’s come over here to Jeremiah 10 for just a minute. Let’s pick it right up here in verse 1. “Hear ye the word which the LORD speaketh unto you, O house of Israel: Thus saith the LORD, Learn not the way of the heathen,…” (Jer. 10:1-2). And Sunday is the way of the heathen. Now hold your place here and come back to Deuteronomy 12. God warned them over, and over, and over, and over again, but they wouldn’t listen. They refused, just like He said. But here, Deuteronomy 12, we will see what God told them, pleaded with them, asked them to do, saying, “I love you; keep My commandments. And if you love Me, keep My commandments.” Same thing as the New Testament doctrine that Jesus brought. And remember, the apostle Paul wrote to Timothy and said that, “From a child you have known the Holy Scriptures [that is, the Old Testament] which are able to make you wise unto salvation through Jesus Christ” (2 Timothy 3:15, paraphrased).

Question: do you think that you can receive salvation if you reject the words of Christ? Now remember, Christ was the Lord God of the Old Testament Who created the Sabbath, as we saw. If you refuse Christ, refuse His word, refuse His truth, refuse to listen, do you think that you’re going to receive eternal life? Do you think that you can take the Word of God and add to it, and take away from it, and put in this little heathen practice which is cute and nice? And this little one, which is so enjoyable? And to bring in so many people just to “church” them, just to have numbers in a building? Let’s read what He says here, Deuteronomy 12:28. “Observe and hear all these words which I command thee [that is, hearken to the voice of the Lord your God] that it may go well with thee [because God wants it to go well with you], and with thy children after thee for ever, when thou doest that which is good and right in the sight of the LORD thy God.”

Now what is good and right? As we saw last time, all the commandments of God are truth; all the statutes of God are truth; all the law of God is truth; and every precept that God has concerning all things are altogether right. And if we understand that, then it would go well with us. Now notice verse 29. Now He gives a warning after that. “When the LORD thy God shall cut off the nations from before thee, whither thou goest to possess them, and thou succeedest them, and dwellest in their land; take heed to thyself that thou be not snared [that means, be entrapped] by following them, after that they be destroyed from before thee; and that thou inquire not after their gods, saying, How did these nations serve their gods? even so will I do likewise. Thou shalt not do so unto the LORD thy God: for every abomination to the LORD, which He hateth, have they done unto their gods; for even their sons and their daughters they have burnt in the fire to their gods” (vs. 29-31).

Yes - they actually had the sacrifice of children, where they were burnt in offering to Moloch and to Baal. And the priests ate the flesh of the children. That’s where you get the name “cannibals,” meaning “priests of Baal.” Can you imagine that? Can you understand that? Can you see what kind of abomination this is to God? And yet the children of Israel did that very thing when He said, “Don’t do that!” “Thou shalt not do so unto the LORD thy God: for every abomination to the LORD, which He hateth, have they done unto their gods; for even their sons and their daughters they have burnt in the fire to their gods. What thing soever I command you, observe to do it:…” Now notice – “…thou shalt not add thereto nor diminish from it” (vs. 31). And that includes the Sabbath. That’s the dividing line between Sabbath and Sunday. Because if you add Sunday then you have violated the commandment of God, and you have gone after the heathen. Now let’s come back to Jeremiah 10. And part and parcel with the whole thing is Easter, and Christmas, and all of the pagan holidays that come along with it.

Now back here to Jeremiah 10:2. “…Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them. For the customs of the people are vain [vanity, nothing]: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe. They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not.” And that’s what people have just done, haven’t they, with Christmas? Yes. “They are upright as the palm tree…” And of course, down in Egypt that’s what they used. They used a palm tree. In the northern climates use a pine tree, or, a fir tree. “…But [they] speak not: they must needs be borne [they need to be carried around - that’s what he said] because they cannot go [themselves]…” And people used to worship those as gods. So people today say, “Well, we don’t do it for that reason.” Well then, why do you do it when God says not to? “…For they cannot do evil, neither also is it in them to do good.” Now that doesn’t give justification for doing it. It’s just saying that these things are no gods, to do good or evil. So why would you leave the true God and go after the tree? “Forasmuch as there is none like unto thee O LORD; Thou art great, and Thy name is great in might” (Jer. 10:5-6).

Now let’s come to Jeremiah 11. Let’s begin right here in verse 1. “The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD, saying, Hear ye the words of this covenant, and speak unto the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem; and say thou unto them, Thus saith the LORD God of Israel, Cursed be the man that obeyeth not the words of his [this] covenant,…” (Jer 11:1-3). Now let’s project that forward to the New Covenant. What is the curse for not obeying the words of the New Covenant? Eternal death in the lake of fire. And whenever you claim that God sanctifies Sunday, you have broken the words of the covenant. Because as we saw in Hebrews 8 and Hebrews 10, that the covenant that God makes with us is this: that He will blot out our sins and iniquities and remember them no more; and write into our minds and inscribe upon the tablets of our heart, His commandments and His laws. So here is a prophecy of it here.

“…Which I commanded your fathers in the day that I brought them forth out of the land of Egypt,…” And you can say, which Jesus Christ instituted on the night of the Passover, Nisan 14, when He broke the bread and said, “Take, eat; this is My body…” When He passed the cup of wine and said, “Take, drink; This is My blood in the New Covenant.” So you break that covenant, you are in deep trouble. “…[And] from the iron furnace saying, Obey My voice, and do them, according to all which I command you: so shall ye be My people, and I will be your God:…” (Jeremiah 11:1-4). Now, He continued to say that. Let’s come down here in verse 7. “For I earnestly protested unto your fathers in the day that I brought them up out of the land of Egypt, even unto this day, rising early and protesting, saying, Obey My voice.”

Will you obey the voice of Jesus Christ when He said, and He still is today, that the Son of man is Lord also of the Sabbath day? Not Sunday - the Sabbath day. Will you obey His voice, or will you cling to your false, lying, deceitful doctrines which say, “Oh well, the Sabbath - that was a Jewish Sabbath, and God has delivered us from all these ‘Jewish’ things.” Well, you see, that’s how they denigrate the laws of God. The laws that Judaism has added to the laws of God, and made it a great burden, those are just as much sin as Sunday is sin. And we need to understand that. Jesus said, “Do not think that I have come to destroy the law or the prophets. I have come not to destroy, but to fulfill” (Matthew 5:17, paraphrased). That is, bring it to the full; and then fulfill all the prophecies concerning His first coming. So we have the same thing here, verse 8. “Yet they obeyed not, nor inclined their ear, but walked every one in the imagination of their evil heart: Therefore I will bring upon them all the words of this covenant, which I commanded them to do; but they did them not.”

Now notice verse 9. “And the LORD said unto me, A conspiracy is found among the men of Judah, and among the inhabitants of Jerusalem. They are turned back to the iniquities of their forefathers, which refused to hear My words; and they went after other gods to serve them: the house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken My covenant which I made with their fathers.” (vs. 9-10). And He says, “I’m going to bring evil upon you.”

Let’s come over here to Jeremiah 16. You see, this applies today. These words and these prophecies are also for today, for modern Israel today - the people of America, and Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Those are the people of Israel. And if you believe that, as the Jews have said in their lies, that all of the Israelites were Jews, that is a lie. The children of Israel, the ten tribes of the northern tribes, were carried off into captivity because of their sins. And then after that the Jews said, “Well, they have been absorbed into the heathen. Therefore, we are the house of Israel.” Not so. They are one tribe of Israel.

Now let’s pick it up here, Jeremiah 16:10. “And it shall come to pass, when thou shalt shew this people all these words, and they shall say unto thee, Wherefore hath the LORD pronounced all this great evil against us?…” “Oh, well, God can’t be that way. God is a God of love.” Like we have today – “‘God so loved the world He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes on Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.’ Oh, God wouldn’t do that,” and you get a warm, fuzzy feeling in your heart. That’s not the love of God. God will pronounce it upon you, because unless your love is based upon keeping the commandments of God and serving Him His way, and obeying His voice, then God is going to bring it. “…Or what is our iniquity?…” Your iniquity is Sunday-keeping, Christmas, Easter, New Year’s, all of those things. That is the iniquity. Lying, cheating, murder, adultery, abortion, and every one of these things are the iniquity that God is going to bring.

“…Or what is our sin that we have committed against the LORD our God? Then shalt thou say unto them, Because your forefathers have forsaken Me, saith the LORD, and have walked after other gods, and have served them, and have worshipped them, and have forsaken Me, and have not kept My law; and ye have done worse than your fathers; for, behold, ye walk every one after the imagination of his evil heart, that they may not hearken unto Me:…” (Jer. 16:10-12). And isn’t that true today? People don’t want the truth. People don’t understand the truth, you see. And Sabbath-keeping, Sabbath-breaking, Sunday-keeping, and all of these things are all tied together. Because look at what happens to the society when they reject the Sabbath of God and His holy days, and turn their back on God - they gradually get rid of every single one of the commandments. And that’s where we are today. And we put in the White House a president that is a paranoid liar, that doesn’t know the truth from error, and would rather tell a lie than the truth. And the people love it that way. And he is popular, and wonderful.

Well, when it gets that way there is a day of reckoning coming, and it’s not too far down the road. And so you need to ask yourself a question: what am I going to do? Or are you going to say, “Well, there goes this preacher again. He’s got to come and attack everybody under the sun.” No. I’m only reading you the Words of God. And God says if you will return and repent He will forgive you and put it all under the blood of Jesus Christ. But you cannot continue in the way that you have been going. And you cannot come up from the abomination of Sunday-keeping, and all the pagan holidays, as if you are coming up from eating all of the abominable things of the earth and wipe your mouth and say, “We are delivered to do it.” Never happen. God won’t listen to you.

Let’s come over here to Jeremiah 17:19. Right here in the middle of it God said, “Alright, if you will honor the Sabbath I won’t send you into captivity. If you will just turn, if you will just listen, if you will just respond…” God says. Verse 19, “Thus said the LORD God unto me, Go and stand in the gate of the children of the people, whereby the kings of Judah come in, and by the which they go out, and in all the gates of Jerusalem.” So he had to go to every one of the gates and stand there and give this message; then move on to another gate and stand there and give that message; move on to another gate and stand there and give that message. “And say unto them, Hear the word of the LORD, ye kings of Judah, and all Judah,…” So it begins right at the very top doesn’t it? “…And all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, that enter in by these gates: Thus saith the LORD; Take heed to yourselves and bear no burden on the sabbath day, nor bring it in by the gates of Jerusalem; neither carry forth a burden out of your houses on the sabbath day, neither do ye any work, but hallow ye the sabbath day, as I commanded your fathers” (Jer. 17:19-22).

So He gave them another chance, didn’t He? How many times must people be told? I mean, isn’t it something, that, just consider the millions, and millions, and billions of people around the world that come to their churches and cathedrals on Sunday and say, “We are delivered to do these things,” and participate in abominable ceremonies, which are just, what you might say, sanitized form of Baal worship. And they won’t listen. And they won’t hear. Oh, they will worship the Virgin Mary. Oh, they’ll bow down to the Pope. Oh, they will say, “We are delivered to do Sunday. Oh, God hates those Jews. So therefore, the Sabbath, we can’t do that.” Look, the Jews did not keep the Sabbath. Some people say that God gave the Sabbath day to curse the Jews. Wrong, wrong, wrong. God gave the Sabbath day to be a blessing, and intended it to be.

Let’s continue on here, verse 23. “But they obeyed not, neither inclined their ear, but made their neck stiff, that they might not hear, nor receive instruction.” Does what I’m saying to you make your hair on the back of your neck bristle? Does it make you want to not hear another word that I’m saying? Then you put yourself right in the company with those who rejected God and His Sabbath. And they were Jews, and they were keeping Sunday. Do you understand what I’m saying? God never gave the Sabbath as a curse. God gave it as a blessing. God gave it in truth. Can we come to yield to God with a tender heart, yielded mind, willing acceptance, and loving of God? To keep His commandments, to keep His Sabbath, to keep His holy days? To keep all the things that Jesus said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments”? Do you profess to love Jesus Christ? If you don’t keep His commandments, including the Sabbath and holy days, you don’t love Him. You may have a false love. You may have a deceitful love. You may have an experience that Satan the devil would want you to have. Because it’s a counterfeit Christ, counterfeit Jesus, counterfeit way. It’s not in the Bible. We’ll see that by the time we’re done with this series. What will you do? Will you listen to God? Will you change? Will you turn? Will you repent? It’s all up to you.

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