steve wrote:I have altered this post because I first posted it before reading the above post (they must have been posted almost simultaneously).
You did not provide any scripture documenting Christian meetings on the sabbath. The meeting by the river in Philippi was a Jewish congregation (Lydia was a Gentile God-fearer, who attended the Jewish meeting). It is clear that the meeting was not a Christian one, because no one in Philippi had yet heard the gospel. The other examples were also of Jewish outreach conducted by Paul at the synagogue. These were not Christian meetings, which is why Paul was kicked out of them after a couple of weeks.
Steve, Paul was in Philippi for a year and a half. When these Jewish converts accepted Christ as the Messiah they didn't all of a sudden stop going to synagogue.
So please answer my first question, if you can. If you cannot, then please do not claim that the scriptures support your assertion that the early Christians held their meetings on the sabbath day.
Do you have any scripture that show the early Christians didn't keep the sabbath day?
Your answer to my second question was that, yes, you are recommending that we attend the Jewish synagogue on sabbath. You said, "What's wrong with a Jewish synagogue?" Well, for one thing, it is an anti-Christian meeting.
So? If Paul or Peter took that attitude they wouldn't have converted anyone!
But do you actually attend a Jewish synagogue on the sabbath?
No, I attend a SDA church on the sabbath.
If so, when do you go to church? If not, why would you recommend the practice to others? When would you have them go to church?
I go to church on the sabbath. And I actually have been a Jewish synagogue before.
You did not demionstrate that Jesus was a sabbath-keeper. You did demonstrate (what no one ever disputed) that Jesus, like Paul after Him) did go and preach in the synagogue on the sabbath (the only day that He would find an audience there). But preaching in a synagogue is never commanded in the Law, so this does not document that Jesus kept the sabbath in terms of its Old Testament requirements. Can you give a scripture that would make your point on this?
It was Jesus' "custom" as in something He did regularly in attending synagogue on sabbath. Being part of a "holy convocation" is not an all day exercise now anymore than it was then.
Act 13:27 For they that dwell at Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they knew him not, nor yet
the voices of the prophets which are read every sabbath day, they have fulfilled [them] in condemning [him].
Act 15:21
For Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every sabbath day.
Just as it is customary to read scripture in our modern day monolithic churches today Steve it was customary to read the Law and the prophets on the sabbath day as well.
A "holy convocation" was required on the seventh day sabbath Steve.
Lev 23:3 Six days shall work be done: but the seventh day [is] the sabbath of rest, an holy convocation; ye shall do no work [therein]: it [is] the sabbath of the LORD in all your dwellings.
The word convocation literally means assembly or "called out."
from 'qara'' (7121);
something called out, i.e. a public meeting (the act, the persons, or the place); also a rehearsal:--assembly, calling, convocation, reading.
Isn't it interesting that church in Greek is Ekklesia which literally means "called out ones."
As for your question of whether I have any scriptures to show that the early Christians did NOT meet on the sabbath, that would hardly be my province to provide, since I have never denied that Christian meetings could sometimes have fallen on a sabbath day.
So then you agree that Christians met on the sabbath. Outstanding!
But then, I am not the one recommending that Christians meet on any particular day—you are.
I haven't said anything as to when Christians should meet. I'm simply pointing out that Sunday ain't the Sabbath and however many times Hebrews 3 and 4 are misinterpreted they don't say we can meet whenever we want to.
It is up to you to show that what you require agrees with primitive Christian practice.
Steve, I don't require any sabbath observance. God does.
On the other hand, there is strong evidence that Gentile Christians saw no need to observe sabbath in Paul's observation that some of the Roman Christians "regard every day alike" (Rom.14:5). This could not be said of sabbath observers.
Steve, Romans 14 says nothing about the sabbath. It deals with eating foods offered to idols. See 1 Corinthians 10.
I wrote:
"We know that Paul went to the synagogue to preach on the sabbath, but that was not a meeting of Christians, but of Jews."
To which, for some reason, you replied:
"What were they after they accepted the reality of the Messiah? One with Christ. No more Jew, no more Greek."
What has your answer to do with my observation.
Um, that once they accepted Christ as the Messiah the were no longer Jews or gentiles but one with Christ.
I pointed out that the only sabbath meetings that Paul is said to have attended was the synagogue (a non-Christian meeting).
Steve, let me see if I can provide an illustration for you. Let's assume for a second that Paul has entered into an all-Jewish synagogue and speaks the Gospel of Christ by expanding and teaching from the only documents he would have had - the Torah and the Tanakh.
Now, let's say after one session he manages to convert two Jews out of oh, I don't know, ten. Would Paul have told those two he converted, "Don't come back anymore?" Would he have said, "Now that you are converted there is no more sabbath?"
Yet the Bereans spent many a day and night searching the scriptures to see if what Paul was preaching was true.
Then you tell us that, after people accepted Christ, they were neither Jew nor Gentile. This is true, but what has it to do with the fact that Paul attended meetings of unbelieving Jews?
See the above illustration.
Not everyone was convinced by what Paul was preaching right away Steve. Some accepted it readily, with almost no question, some needed additional convincing (weeks, months, years) and some wanted him dead for preaching the Gospel.
Would you please try to understand the questions and give responses that are somewhat relevant?
Steve, I've answered each and every question you've managed to ask with all the skill and muster a poor dummy such as myself can hope to obtain.
Paul didn't just walk into a non-converted Jewish synagogue Steve, magically open his mouth and convert everyone in the room on the spot. It took alot of deft maneuvering though the Torah and Tanakh, through a painstaking profess at times, to demonstrate that Jesus Christ was the promised Messiah. Yet he was able to convert both Jew and gentile at the same time.
I know you don't want to answer the question because you don't think you have too, but just exactly what did Paul do in converting the gentiles that were unfamiliar with the Torah and Tanakh?