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Colossians Two
Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit,
according to the tradition of men,
according to the basic principles of the world,
and not according to Christ.
For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily;
and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power.
In Him you were also circumcised with the circumcision made without hands,
by putting off the body of the sins of the flesh,
by the circumcision of Christ,
buried with Him in baptism,
in which you also were raised with Him
through faith in the working of God,
who raised Him from the dead.
And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh,
He has made alive together with Him,
having forgiven you all trespasses,
having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us,
which was contrary to us.
And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.
Having disarmed principalities and powers,
He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it.
So let no one judge you in food or in drink,
or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths,
which are a shadow of things to come,
but the substance is of Christ.
Let no one cheat you of your reward,
taking delight in false humility and worship of angels,
intruding into those things which he has not seen,
vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, 19and not holding fast to the Head,
from whom all the body, nourished and knit together
by joints and ligaments, grows with the increase that is from God.
Therefore, if you died with Christ from the basic principles of the world,
why, as though living in the world,
do you subject yourselves to regulations--
"Do not touch, do not taste, do not handle,"
which all concern things which perish with the using--
according to the commandments and doctrines of men?
These things indeed have an appearance of wisdom in self-imposed religion,
false humility, and neglect of the body,
but are of no value against the indulgence of the flesh.
Let No Man Judge You....
Was the Sabbath Nailed to the Cross?
Colossians Safe Guard Against Rome's Deceptions
Roman's 14 and Judge Not Texts.
Many questions are raised concerning the issues in Colossians chapter two, especially concerning the Sabbath.
The more I read this chapter the more it reveals itself as having been written to be a blessing to end-time Sabbath keepers rather than a negative. You may think this strange, for of all the passages in the Bible, this one is used most often to attack the Sabbath.
Yet God asks us to "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it HOLY". This command shows the ultimate love relationship with our Savior, for no one can keep anything HOLY on their own. It is only as we enter into fellowship with Christ, that we can keep the Sabbath HOLY, in the spirit of the law, not just in the letter of the law. From the scriptures we find the Sabbath refers to a literal day each week and that it will play a prominent part in the last day scenes when the dragon goes forth to wage war against God's commandment keeping people (Rev. 12:17).
The word "sabbaths" in Colossians 2:16 refers to Sabbath.
The Greek word used for "Sabbath" in Colossians is "sabbata".
Sabbata, is used in Matt. 12:1,5,10,11,12 and Matt. 28:1 (and many more) all of which refer to the Sabbath Day.
To understand a passage it must be read in context. So we need to consider the fact that the text, "let no man judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of a holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath" is put in the framework of these two other texts:
1. "Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, AFTER THE TRADITIONS OF MEN, after the principles of
the world, and not after Christ." Col 2:8
Now notice something unusual: Paul is speaking in future tense --
The commotion over certain people urging certain man made rules in these Colossian texts, were not about whether or not to keep God's
commandments; the concern was with MAN MADE rules.
This commotion was a shadow of what IS to come. It was a foretaste of something yet future in Paul's day.
Already the mystery of iniquity was at work. On the one hand the Jewish leaders had encased the Sabbath in a ritualistic box of strict rules which deprived it of spiritual meaning. Though Christ had broken the Sabbath FREE of these man-made rules and presented it as a day of spiritual and physical restoration and fellowship, not all understood this. Next we see the early evidences of gnostic thought with it's ascetic ideology. The "severity to the body" "rigor of devotion" "self abasement" do not point to Jewish rules, but to the ascetism.
These ascetic ideas would blossom more fully in the Christian church. Leaders would also arise and tell people to fast upon the Sabbath, celebrate upon the sun's day, they would tell the people
to observe a whole liturgy of holy days and festivals and to keep the wrong Sabbath day. AND WOULD EXCOMMUNICATE and
consign to hell any who disobeyed her.
Just read the Pope's messages -- and know this will be again. The primacy of the Pope, not just over it's own church, but over the whole ecumenical unity, -- of their "truth" -- their right to authority;
Let no man judge you.
Also, so important in this understanding of the situation is the truth that our sins -- that which is against us, is blotted out by the blood of
Christ which was shed on Calvary.
NEVER by an earthly priest who "absolves" the sinner.
Let no ecclesiastical body judge your eternal destiny. Let no person push a man made Sabbath on you and judge you as evil for not
keeping that man made sabbath. Obey God and His commandments, commit yourself to His mercy and judgment-- He alone is Lord
and Savior!
The issue is not whether or not we obey God's commandments.
WAS THE SABBATH NAILED TO THE CROSS?
This text is the most popular one people use to tell us that the Sabbath was nailed to the cross.
But wait-- let's go back over those verses again:
By the commandment law sin is defined. (Romans 7:7)
However, a real reading of the text doesn't say that God's moral law that defines sin was nailed to the cross! It says the "written record" against us. The whole book of Colossians doesn't even refer to the
law. So we must ask ourselves, did God bring forgiveness to mankind by destroying that which points out sin, or by taking upon Himself
our sins and paying the penalty in our behalf? The Bible makes this clear enough.
Colossians brings that same message. Paul is talking about forgiveness of sins (2:13) Of dying to those sins (2:12) Of putting off the body
of the sins through Christ (2:11) of being established in the faith (2:7).
COLOSSIANS IS A SAFE GUARD AGAINST FALSE SABBATHS!
Far from destroying the Sabbitarian understanding this message is a safe guard against the agenda of those who set up false standards in
opposition to God's law. This chapter is contrasting "philosophies" "traditions" and "commandments of men" with the things of Christ. Its dealing with our source of authority and where we turn to for our "wisdom and "knowledge".
It is sad to realize that what the scriptures in the book of Hebrews (4:9) says REMAINS (the 7th day Sabbath) they have abolished, and that which scripture says in Hebrews (8) is abolished (the priest/sacrifice system) they have established.
For centuries a religious power has told the world has re-established an earthly priest system and they have told the people that they have the power to forgive sins, and determine who is
worthy of heaven. For centuries they pretend to re-sacrifice Christ in daily mass, claiming they have the power to create the Creator and produce him
as a bloodless victim to offer to God on a daily basis. They have played god on earth, pretending they have the power to absolve people from their sins
or bar them from heaven. Then they sent out the inquisition and the papal armies to subdue all "heretics" who understood the truth, that
sins can only be forgiven by Christ and that the ONLY ONCE AND FOR ALL sacrifice was completed at the cross. And that the
ONLY priest who can apply that blood is Christ our high priest in the heavenly sanctuary, which He entered with His own blood. HE
ALONE CAN BLOT OUT OUR SINS.
Then people have told us this verse says the 4th commandment was nailed to the cross and Sabbath keeping is abolished? Yet they ignore the full
intent of the message and turn around and do exactly what the chapter warns against.
Don't let anyone judge you — just as in Paul's day, people were judging others spirituality by enforcing the commandments of men, so a
religious/political ecclesiastical body wants to judge the world by enforcing holy days, penances, sacraments, which either have no bases
in scripture, or are a distortion of scripture. But worst of all is that they set aside the commandment of God so they can observe their
tradition. They set aside the plain commandment to keep holy the day God blessed and sanctified, and replace it with the day of the sun.
Then they would call upon their members to urge for political legislation.
But, someone says, Verse (16) clearly says the Sabbath is ended, does it not? "Let no one judge you concerning..sabbath days."
"Let no one judge you"...according to HUMAN TRADITION according to the elemental spirits of the universe AND NOT
ACCORDING TO CHRIST (2:8) He, Christ, disarmed the principalities and powers and ...triumphed over them. 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. Let no one disqualify you
insisting on self-abasement (acts of penance) and worship of spirit beings, (praying to saints and venerating Mary) taking their stand on
their own senses... Why submit to regulations that have an appearance of wisdom in promoting rigor of devotion and self-abasement
...but which all perish according to human precepts and doctrines for they are based on human commands and teachings."
Sunday is based on human commands and teachings and tradition! Not the 7th day Sabbath. God Himself created, blessed and sanctified
the 7th day. Gen.2:1-3
No, Colossians doesn't do away with God's Sabbath day.
May we be strong and not succumb to the judgment of man, for we serve Christ, Who said, "I am Lord of the Sabbath day, the Sabbath
was created for man."(Mark 2:27,28)
May we say with Peter and the other apostles:
"Who are you to judge? To His own master he stands or falls." And WHO is our master?
For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ... each of us shall give account of himself to God.
We must give an account to God, not to man.
Yet an earthly power that is now claiming primacy over all other religions and which is seeking to unite all churches under itself in what
is called ecumenicalism, declares thus:
"The priest has the power of the keys, or the power of delivering sinners from hell, of making them worthy of paradise and of
changing them from the slaves of Satan into the children of God. And God himself is obliged to abide by the judgment of his priests,
and either not to pardon or to pardon, according as they refuse or give absolution,...The sentence of the priest precedes, and God
subscribes to it, write St. Peter Damian. St John Chrysosom concludes" The Sovereign Master of the universe only follows the servant
by confirming in heaven all that the latter decides upon earth." (Dignity and Duties of the Priest by St. Alphonsus De Liguari p. 27-28,
Imprimatur 1927)
It is important to understand that the Catholic position on Sunday is that it is an obligatory moral responsibility which it enforces by
means of Canon Law, and urges civil governments to pass civil Sunday legislation to help enable people to fulfill this obligation.
Interestingly the Pope's appeal for Sunday concludes with an appeal to the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, for Mary is "always
present in the Church's Sunday ...From Sunday to Sunday the pilgrim people follow in the footsteps of Mary. #86
The Marian movement is not just a fringe element in the Catholic Church. In his Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Ecclesia in America
for the Conversion, Communion and Solidarity in America" section 11, the Pope states "Mary is the sure path to our meeting with
Christ. Devotion to the Mother of the Lord, when genuine, is always an impetus to a life guided by the spirit and values of the
Gospel. How can we fail to emphasize the role which belongs to the Virgin Mary in relation to the pilgrim Church in America
journeying towards its encounter with the Lord?"
Yes, the final question will be who do we worship. If you have read the previous article of the
Page 389 in the book Thunder of Justice: we read what "mary" plans to do to lead people to the worship of the false christ:
"The commandment forbidding false idols has so many shapes and forms in our daily lives. . .This is where we see many of the root
causes of our problems: it is in the commandment of "KEEPING THE SABBATH HOLY". In the Old Testament, not honoring this day
was punishable by death. . . There is widespread abuse all throughout the Christian culture concerning the Sabbath. . .we have lost
God"
However it is clear in the passage that the Sabbath they are talking about is SUNDAY!
Yes, the pretension of upholding God's ten commandments is there, but the obvious breaking by the Roman church of both the
commandments referred to in the above passage are glaring!
Turning again to the Pope's recent writings we find his "Dies Domini on Keeping the Lord's day Holy". In it he makes this completely
erroneous statement in section 14 "In the first place, Sunday is the day of rest because it is the day "blessed" by God and "made holy"
by him set apart from the other days to be among all of them. "The Lord's Day." In section 29
"Sunday appears as the supreme day of
faith, it is the day when, by the power of the Holy Spirit.......
Given it's many meanings and aspects, and its link to the very foundations of the faith, the celebration of the Christ Sunday remains,
on the threshold of the third millennium, an indispensable element of our Christian identity."
Interesting isn't it that the Roman Catholic church should call SUNDAY the indispensable element of Christian IDENTITY. Yet the
Bible calls the 7th Day Sabbath a sign between God and His people throughout the generations; that we may know that God is the
LORD that does sanctify us. (Ex. 31:31, Ezekiel 20:12)
God is our judge— to Him be true.
2. "Why are you subject to rules after the COMMANDMENTS OF MEN and DOCTRINES OF MEN? Col 2:22
Consider too, what Jesus said in Matt. 15:3,6,9
Using the 5th commandment as an example he says:
"In vain they worship me, teaching for doctrines THE COMMANDMENTS OF MEN....Why do you transgress the
COMMANDMENT OF GOD by your tradition...making of none effect the commandment of God by your tradition....In vain you
worship me.....
their demand for holy days, festivals, and Sunday;
their religious (not health) laws on fasting and lent etc.
The papal Church, for centuries, claimed and intimidated people, saying it has the keys of heaven and hell, and that their priests have
the authority to assign or deliver people to heaven or hell. AND GOD HIMSELF must abide by their decisions--
You will find that written in their "Duties of the Priest" books.
God's people are repeatedly portrayed as "obeying God's commandments" in the New Testament.
The issue is over whether they obey God's commandments or the commandments of men!
"Christ brings us to life with Him, forgiving our sins...
"Nailing the written record which is against us to the cross....
How can anyone come to the conclusion that Christ nailed his moral law to the cross? The Sabbath is part of the decalogue which
God spoke from Sinai with His own voice, and etched on those stones with His own finger. If this text means the law containing God's Holy Sabbath was nailed to the cross and done away with,
it means the whole decalogue is abolished. That includes ALL TEN commandments, not just one. For if Christ's death took place to nail that law to the cross, then no one has the right to resurrect ANY of it's precepts and impose them upon mankind again.
Yet no one who has honestly studied scripture can come to that conclusion.
We are sinners. The wages of sin is death.(Romans 6:23)
So Christ took upon Himself the wages of OUR SINS and was nailed upon the cross, so that we could live! So that all who confess their
sins, will receive forgiveness and cleansing (See also 1 John 1:9)
But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness. (Romans 6:22)
What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, (transgressing God's commandment law) that grace may abound? God forbid. How
shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein? (Romans 6:1-2)
Do we then make void the commandment law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law. (Romans 3:31)
So would Paul, in Colossians 2 support the popular interpretation that the "written document, the "cheirographon" that was nailed to the
Cross is God's commandments, in general and the Sabbath, in particular?
That's what people try to tell us, that God set aside and nailed to the Cross the Old Covenant law (ten commandments), and the Sabbath.
Now it is true that ceremonial rituals, which typified the sins of the repentant sinner being placed upon a lamb, which was then slain, taking the death penalty in the sinners place, met their reality at the cross.
Now that Christ THE LAMB OF GOD took upon HIMSELF our sins, the sacrificial system and ceremonies are abolished. To use them is to deny Christ's all sufficient sacrifice, for HE BORE OUR SINS upon Himself.
"Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose
stripes ye were healed. " (1 Peter 2:24)
It is the commandments of men that will perish! (Col. 2:22)
No, this says nothing of the Sabbath being ended. It is speaking of people judging according to MANMADE rules.
Read surronding verses that are usually not quoted by the anti-Sabbitarians which are needed to show the full context! This is what the whole context shows
it actually says,
Sunday is the day, which in past history, has been enforced by the Christian church with penalties both physical and intimidations of
spiritual penalties.
Colossians is a clear warning that people will try to implement counterfeit Sabbaths.
Also Warns Against Allowing Human Beings To Judge on Eternal Matters According to Human Laws
So does it not behoove us to follow the commandments of God, NOT the traditions of men? Even if all rights to buy and sell are
removed from us, if we obey God rather than men?
"Real and the Counterfeit"
you will see that the whole counterfeit leads to the worship of the false christ, who will be none other than Satan himself!
Here is the patience of the saints, here are they that keep the commandments of God and have the faith of Jesus. Rev. 14:12
More on Colossians 2 and it's powerful message in favor of Sabbath Keepers
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