As we saw earlier, the Sabbath points to more than just the days of creation. The second time we hear the Ten Commandments, Moses is reviewing Israel’s 40 years in the wilderness. This time, the sentence introducing the reason for keeping the Sabbath holy is not about creation but rather about liberation from slavery and bondage in Egypt (Deuteronomy 5:12-15).

And though, today, we are not slaves in Egypt, we can all face another kind of slavery, one that, in some ways, can be just as oppressive.

What other forms of slavery do we face today? Read Genesis 4:7, Hebrews 12:1, and 2 Peter 2:19.

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Sabbath is a celebration of freedom from all the things that keep us in bondage. On Sabbath, we are reminded that there is freedom from sin, not in our own power but in the power of God, which is offered to us by faith. We also are reminded that this is a freedom we did not earn. The firstborn Israelite children were saved by the blood of the lamb smeared on the doorposts the evening before their exodus from Egypt (Exodus 12). We, too, have been saved by the blood of the Lamb, and are now to walk in the freedom that is ours in Christ Jesus.

Read Romans 6:1-7. What is Paul saying here that can be linked to what we have been given in the Sabbath?

In the very wording of Deuteronomy 5:15 — “And remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out from there by a mighty hand and by an outstretched arm” (NKJV) — the people are reminded, again, that it was the work and power of God in their behalf that saved them. How much more so should we, as Christians, realize that it’s only the work and power of Christ in our behalf that has saved us from sin?

This command tells us to rest in the salvation that God has earned for us by His mighty arm. We are set free from our own attempts at righteousness as we remember that God is Creator and that we can trust Him to re-create us, too, and to free us, even right now, from the bondage of sin if we are willing to let Him work in us.

<–Sunday Tuesday–>

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Of all the Ten Commandments, only the fourth begins with the verb “Remember.” It’s not, “Remember, you shall not steal,” or “Remember, you shall not covet.” There is only “Remember the Sabbath day. …”

The idea of “remembering” presupposes history, presupposes that something happened in the past that we need to, well, remember. When we remember, we make connections with the past, and “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” marks a straight line back to the Creation week itself.

Read  Genesis 1.26-27 and Genesis 9:6. What do these verses teach us about how special we as human beings are, and how radically different we are from the rest of God’s earthly creation? And, too, why is it so important that we understand this distinction?

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When we remember creation, we remember that we are created in God’s image, something that is not said about anything else depicted in the Creation account. It’s obvious that, as human beings, we are radically different from any other creature on the planet, regardless of how much DNA we share in common with some other animals. And, contrary to popular mythology, we are not mere advanced apes or more highly evolved versions of some primeval primate. As humans, made in the image of God, we are unique among all that God created on this world.

How does the Creation story remind us of our relationship to creation? Genesis 2:15, Genesis 2:19.

Realizing that God also created our world reminds us of our responsibility to creation. We are to “have dominion” over creation. Having dominion does not mean exploiting it. We are to rule as God’s regents. We are to interact with the natural world as God would.

Yes, sin has marred and messed up everything, but this earth is still God’s creation, and nothing gives us the right to exploit it, especially to the detriment of other human beings, which is so often the case.

<–Sabbath Monday–>

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Sabbath Afternoon

Read for This Week’s Study:  Genesis 1.26-27; Genesis 9:6; 2 Peter 2:19; Romans 6:1-7; Exodus 19:6; John 5:7-16.

Memory Text: “Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation. You shall do no work on it; it is the Sabbath of the LORD in all your dwellings” (Leviticus 23:3).

We hear all sorts of arguments against keeping the seventh-day Sabbath, don’t we? We hear everything from Jesus changed the Sabbath to Sunday, or that Jesus abolished the Sabbath, or that Paul did, or that the apostles replaced the seventh-day Sabbath with Sunday in honor of the resurrection, and so forth. In recent years, some of the arguments have become more sophisticated, claiming, for instance, that Jesus is our Sabbath rest, and therefore, we don’t need to a keep the day or any day holy. And, of course, there will always be the argument, strange as it is, that by resting on the seventh-day we are somehow seeking to work our way to heaven.

On the other hand, some Christians have become more interested in the idea of rest, of a day of rest, and though they argue that the day is Sunday or that it doesn’t matter, they have picked up on the biblical notion of rest and why it is important.

Of course, as Seventh-day Adventists we understand the perpetuity of God’s moral law and that obedience to the fourth commandment, as it reads, is no more working our way to heaven than would be obedience to the fifth, sixth, first, or any other commandment.

This week we will look more at the rest God has given us in the Sabbath commandment and why it’s important.

Study this week’s lesson to prepare for Sabbath, September 4.

Sunday–>

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Support for the mission activities of the Seventh-day Adventist church has always been part of the Sabbath School program. This video is Mission Spotlight for this week.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrzNjdxFyk4

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Power of a Smile

By Dale Wolcott

The Chinle Seventh-day Adventist Church isn’t exactly located in the best neighborhood on the Navajo Reservation in the U.S. state of Arizona.

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As the pastor, I live in a trailer beside the church building. Several well-respected neighbors, including a Navajo Nation police officer, live in nearby trailers. But one house is looked down on as the local “drug house.” Its unkempt yard and constant stream of random foot and vehicle traffic lend credibility to its reputation as a supplier of illegal liquor and more.

The church board has discussed how to best relate to those neighbors. We have prayed for them and even visited, praying with them and sharing literature and invitations to church events. The family’s children have occasionally attended children’s programs. But we have not seen any breakthroughs.

Then along came the Covid-19 pandemic. The church was closed, and our public meetings moved onto the telephone. Although the church has access to the Internet, many families here don’t have Internet at home.

One day, Catherine walked across the church yard with a big smile. She wanted to apologize for missing our call-in midweek prayer meeting because she had joined her husband and their two daughters, Katelyn, 11, and Kallie, 9, in organizing their own evening worship by a creek.

“Oh, and we took the neighbor kids with us,” Catherine said.

“Which ones?” I wondered aloud.

“The ones right next door here,” she replied, gesturing toward the infamous “drug house.”

Surprised, I asked Catherine how she had managed to invite the children.

Catherine smiled proudly. “Their big sister noticed how happy our girls seem to be every day when they walk by their house on the way to the church to do their schoolwork,” she said.

The girls usually live at Holbrook Seventh-day Adventist Indian School, located about 90 minutes away by car, but were sent home because of Covid-19. Since the family did not have any Internet, the girls were studying at church.

“The big sister wanted to know why Katelyn and Kallie smile instead of looking mostly sad like her own little sisters. She also wanted to know why Katelyn and Kallie are always singing. So we invited them to evening worship,” Catherine said.

“How did it go?” I asked.

“When we finished, they asked if we could do it again the next day,” she said. “My children have been touched by the Lord, and they can see it.”

Part of this quarter’s Thirteenth Sabbath Offering will help Holbrook Indian School. Thank you for planning a generous offering.

Produced by the General Conference Office of Adventist Mission.
Find more mission stories at adventistmission[dot]org

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