A question about what Scripture actually says There is a question that keeps coming up whenever Christians discuss the Sabbath. It usually goes something like this: “The Sabbath was part of the Old Covenant. We are under the New Covenant now.” Fair enough. But that statement raises another question. Where does the New Testament actually say that the seventh-day Sabbath was abolished? Or transferred to Sunday? Or replaced by another day? That is a different question from wheth

There is a Hebrew word in Scripture that we have become so familiar with that we may have stopped asking what it actually means. The word is Shabbat. We usually hear “Sabbath” and immediately think of rest. We think of relaxation, sleep, taking a break, or recovering from exhaustion. But the Hebrew verb behind the word, shābat, carries the more precise idea of ceasing, stopping, or desisting from an activity. That does not eliminate the idea of rest. Rather, it helps us under

From Abraham to Adam, and from Adam to Christ Part 1 ended with Paul moving from Abraham to Adam—and from Adam to Christ. But before we follow Paul into that comparison, there are two things we need to notice about faith itself. God Remains Faithful Paul's argument raises another question. If Israel has been entrusted with the oracles of God, what happens when some of God's covenant people do not believe? Does their unbelief mean God's promises have failed? Paul's answer is e

Paul says we are justified by faith apart from works of the law. So why does he immediately say, “We establish the law”? There is a moment in Paul's letter to the Romans when the argument seems to collide with itself. First, Paul says: “We conclude that a person is justified by faith apart from the works of the law.”— Romans 3:28 Then, almost immediately, he asks: “Do we then make void the law through faith? Certainly not! On the contrary, we establish the law.”— Romans 3:31

Election, Covenant, Apostasy, and the Warning of Israel Next, we go back to the beginning. We've spent the first four articles following the development of a doctrine. We watched the early Christian understanding of perseverance develop through the centuries. We followed Augustine. We followed the Reformation. We followed Calvin. We watched perseverance become increasingly connected with election. We followed Dort, Westminster, Owen, the nineteenth century, the Plymouth Breth

Security, Perseverance, Apostasy, and the Warning Passages We have spent the first three articles following a historical trail. We started with the earliest Christians. We followed the development of Christian teaching through Augustine and the medieval church. We watched the Reformation reshape the discussion. We followed Calvin, Dort, Westminster, Owen, the nineteenth century, the Plymouth Brethren, dispensationalism, and eventually the modern doctrine commonly called “once

How “The Saints Will Persevere” Became “Once Saved, Always Saved” In the first article, we asked what the earliest Christians believed about falling away. In the second, we followed the theological development from Augustine to Calvin and watched an important change take place. The question gradually moved from: Can a believer fall away? to: Who is a true believer? And eventually: If someone is truly elect, regenerated, and united to Christ, can that person finally fall away?

From Augustine to Calvin—and the Changing Meaning of Salvation Security In the first article, we asked a deceptively simple question: Did the earliest Christians believe that a person who genuinely entered the Christian faith could later turn away? The evidence did not give us the simple answer many modern Christians might expect. The earliest Christian writers repeatedly spoke about perseverance, falling away, repentance, restoration, and the danger of apostasy. They certain

What Did the Earliest Christians Actually Believe? There is a phrase millions of Christians have heard: “Once saved, always saved.” For some, it is one of Christianity's greatest assurances. For others, it raises a difficult question: What happens when someone who genuinely believed in Christ later walks away? Was that person never saved? Was the earlier faith never real? Can a Christian abandon Christ? And perhaps the most important question of all: Did the earliest Christia

Hebrews 10, Unbelief, and the Danger of Rejecting the Gospel There is a passage in Hebrews that has frightened Christians for centuries: “For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins.”Hebrews 10:26 What does that mean? Does it mean that after becoming a Christian, committing a serious sin means there is no more forgiveness? Does it mean that one deliberate act of disobedience places us beyond the reach

Three Tenses. Three Dimensions. One Savior. When Christians talk about salvation, we often speak as though salvation belongs to only one tense. “I am saved.” Or perhaps: “I will be saved.” But the Bible speaks about salvation in more than one way. There is something God has already done. There is something Christ is doing now. And there is something Christ will complete in the future. These are not three different salvations. They are three dimensions of the one salvation acc

What does it mean when Revelation says: “The hour of His judgment has come.”— Revelation 14:7 For many Christians, those words immediately sound frightening. They imagine God sitting in judgment, examining our lives, looking for reasons to condemn us. But is that really what Revelation is telling us? Look carefully at the order of the message. The first angel does not begin with judgment. He begins with the Gospel. “Then I saw another angel flying in the midst of heaven, havi

“How can the Christian Gospel be morally just if God punishes an innocent person for the guilt of someone else?" How the incarnation, corporate solidarity, and the law reveal what God actually accomplished in Christ There is a way of explaining the cross that most Christians have heard many times: We sinned. God required punishment. Jesus took our punishment. He paid our debt. Therefore God can forgive us. There is truth in the language of substitution. Christ died for us. Ch

The Sabbath, sanctification, righteousness by faith, and the question of worship We've followed the Sabbath question a long way. From Creation to Christ. From Jesus to the apostles. From Paul to Hebrews. And along the way, we've discovered that the Sabbath is much bigger than a question about which day appears on a calendar. It touches Creation. It touches rest. It touches sanctification. It touches righteousness by faith. And ultimately, it touches worship and authority. Now

The Sabbath was never merely about a day. We began this series with what seemed like a simple question: Why the seventh day? At first, it looked like a debate about Saturday and Sunday. But the further we followed Scripture, the more we discovered that something much deeper was happening. The Sabbath takes us back to Creation. Creation takes us to God's authority. God's authority takes us to sanctification. Sanctification takes us to the Gospel. The Gospel takes us to Christ'

What was Paul actually discussing? There is a verse in Romans that is often presented as if it settles the Sabbath question: “One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind.”— Romans 14:5 The argument usually goes something like this: Paul says one day is optional. The Sabbath is a day. Therefore the Sabbath is optional. It sounds simple. But before we make Romans 14 carry that conclu

Jesus did not merely fulfill Israel’s prophecy. He fulfilled Israel’s story. We've spent this series following the Sabbath question back to Creation. We've seen that God created the seventh day, blessed it, and sanctified it. We've seen that the Sabbath points toward God's finished work and that Hebrews connects God's Sabbath rest with the Gospel and faith in Christ. But there is another piece of the biblical story that we need to understand before we can see the whole pictur

What does it mean to enter God's rest? We've spent the first part of this series asking a question that initially sounded very simple: Why the seventh day? But the further we've gone, the more we've discovered that the Sabbath question is actually connected to something much bigger. Creation. Authority. The law. Justification. Sanctification. Christ's finished work. Faith. And now Hebrews 4 has brought us to the heart of it: “There remains therefore a Sabbath rest for the peo

If the Sabbath was finished, why does Hebrews say that a Sabbath rest remains? We've followed this question from Creation to Christ, from the apostles to Paul, and now we arrive at one of the most fascinating passages in the New Testament. Hebrews 4:9 says: “There remains therefore a rest for the people of God.” And some translations make the Sabbath connection even more obvious: “There remains therefore a Sabbath rest for the people of God.” The Greek word is sabbatismos—Sab

What was Paul actually talking about? This is a critical post because Colossians 2:16–17 is probably one of the strongest passages people use to argue that the Sabbath was abolished. So we're not going to dodge it. We're going to slow down and let Paul's entire argument speak. And we already did the research on this, so we don't need to start from scratch. The central text: “So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, which